A Sap-erior Ranged Option - Using Life Sapper in Battle!

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This week's Share Your Battle challenge features Life Sapper! I wasn't particularly thrilled to see that the splinter for this week was Death - I'm not a big fan of the Death splinter and only use it occasionally in battle. With that said, Life Sapper is a pretty cool monster, with a fun ability that can gain you additional value as the battle progresses.

Life Sapper is a magic attacking monster for the Death splinter. It is a nice and cheap card to bring into battle, costing just 3 mana. Its base stats aren't anything to write home about - you get a single point of magic attack, paired with 2 mana and 2 speed. The thing that makes Life Sapper particularly interesting is its Life Leach ability - each time it deals damage, its maximum health increases for the rest of the battle. this is great because Life Sapper starts off a little on the squishy side, but can get stronger as the battle progresses. This makes Life Sapper a fun card to play with, as it rewards being able to position Life Sapper in a spot where it can survive for a while and gain some additional health - something that I tried my best to do in today's battle!

If you wanted to jump right to the action, the Battle Link is right here. Want to hear some more about the lineup? Read on further!

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Here is the ruleset for this week's battle. Death tends to be strong in low mana cap battles, and 14 mana certainly qualifies as a low mana cap! Life Sapper is a budget monster that should hopefully fit in well with some of the other cost efficient monsters from the Death splinter.

As I mentioned, Death is my least played splinter. This meant that my summoner options were limited, as I don't normally have a lot of Death summoners at my disposal. Luckily, the one that I did have was a good one! Thaddius Brood is a solid summoner, and works well in low mana battles. His -1 health debuff should apply to almost every monster, and will make the enemy team that much easier to kill. I am not expecting the -1 magic debuff to do a whole lot in this particular battle, but it is a nice bonus in case my opponent decides to bring some magic attackers into play.

I started my team with as much beef as I could afford to bring. Cursed Windeku is a super solid tank - with 9 health plus Thorns, not to mention a respectable 2 melee damage, it has a great chance of being able to kill whichever monster my opponent decides to place at the front of their lineup. Carrion Shade is not the greatest secondary tank, but this was a low mana battle and I could use all of the buffer I could get for my back line monsters. Also, this one is a gold foil - good for some nice bonus RP/SP whenever you use it in ranked battles!

Next up came our guest star of the week - Life Sapper! As I have mentioned repeatedly, this is a low mana cap battle. Life Sapper's low mana cost of just 3 allows us to spend more mana on our front line tank, which should theoretically allow Life Sapper additional time to attack and gain more health with its Life Leach ability. My game plan was for my tanks to stall and take out my opponent's front line while Life Sapper sits at the back and gains added value over time.

I am entirely out of mana at this point. Luckily, I have a 0 mana cost card in my collection! Corpse Fiend is free to bring into battle, and I put it at the very back of my lineup in order to protect Life Sapper from any Sneak damage.

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With the lineup set, it's off into battle! When I see the selected teams I am hopeful - my opponent has also gone with a Death splinter lineup, including some potentially problematic sneak damage. However, I feel pretty good about my chances - I have my Corpse Fiend at the back to protect my Life Sapper, and if I can knock out my opponent's two monsters in the front then their Xenith Archer won't be able to attack anymore.

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In the first round of battle things go as expected - the two Cursed Windekus at the front trade blows and are taking damage evenly. My Corpse Fiend goes down, but that extra turn allows Life Sapper enough time to get off an attack and gain a crucial point of health that will allow it to survive a Sneak attack.

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It actually only took one more round until the battle was decided - that Thorns damage made things go quickly! Thanks to Thorns and some magic attacking from Life Sapper, my team is able to knock out my opponent's front two monsters. It came down to a duel in the end, and luckily my monster could attack while my opponent's could not. Victory!

And again, if you wanted to see the whole battle for yourself, you can see it right here.

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Life Sapper played a huge role in this battle. My strategy worked out perfectly and it was able to survive through the tricky early phase of the battle while dishing out enough magic damage to turn the tide of the fight. At the end, it was able to attack from the front line in order to seal the win.

While I am not a fan of the Death splinter, I do enjoy using Life Sapper. It is the kind of card that rewards skillful placement and sound strategy, and is certainly a card that I will continue to use in my Death lineups moving forward!

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Thank you so much for reading all the way to the end. Interested in seeing some more of my writing in the future? Be sure to give me a follow! In the meantime, if you'd like to see some of my recent posts:

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All images used in this article are open source and obtained from Pixabay or Unsplash. Thumbnails borrowed with permission from the Splinterlands team or made in Canva.

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2 comments
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Thanks for sharing! - @yonilkar

It works, Chaos Legion summoners need more mana and this rule had few mana so it works.

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