DJINN APPRENTICE : THE UNTAINTED

From the deep side of the volcanoes, lump of magma mystically evaporate, transforming into human like spirit. Djinn Inferni stand high overwatching the all the process in motion. Finally Djinn Inferni send a wave of heat energy, sending the spirit fly up into the air. The spirits are now laying in the mouth of the volcanoes, taking their full human form. A shining light dazzle their sight. And then a bellowing voice come "My creation...... born from the intense heat of magma; your soul are untainted, yet long path ahead of you. But I shall guide you to find your true power, and I shall call you as Djinn Apprentice!"

Djinn Apprentice is one of my most favorite magic card from the Fire Splinter collection. Djinn Apprentice, Tenyii Striker, and Radiated Brute make a combination I nicknamed "3 Champions of Fire". And it named for several reason, their versatility on the back row, sufficient health, and at least 2 damage at Level 1. They made my primary choice in mid mana battle. Djinn Apprentice is a raw card, no particular abilities, which is compensated by its better overall status (2 magic damage, 2 speed, and 4 health). Fire Splinter have few selection in term of magic card compared to other Splinter. And Djinn is one of the solid selection for magic support.

The chart above maps the Damage per Mana and Health per Mana between Fire Splinter magic card (*Notes: Only health and damage which tend to scale parallel with mana; while speed varies around high or low mana. Armor and abilities are not included, since its rather complex to be compared). As can be seen below, at Level 1, Djinn Apprentice have foremost efficiency ratio. The damage was only surpassed by Djinn Inferni and Ifrit Rising (by considering Recharge ability). Even after reach Max Level, Djinn Apprentice growth even more, surpassing Djinn Inferni in damage ratio. This show how Djinn are suitable selection for its magic damage.

1. Raw (no specific abilities) mid-mana card with high magic damage. Djinn is a counterpart of Magi of Chaos (see my previous post). While both are similar, Djinn have better damage, while Magi have better health.	1. Decent health with no additional armor, make Djinn an easy target for card with Snipe and Opportunity.
2. At Level 6, Djinn will attain Deathblow. Deathblow, high magic damage, and low to mid mana battle; it's a best combination to crush your opponent.	2. Speed is an essential status. Yet Djinn's speed somewhat undermined by other quicker card, which just aggravate it survivability.

Market Price Analysis

Market price for Djinn Apprentice have been rather constant in the past 30 days, thought in the gold foil have a downtrend price. Compared to Magi of Chaos, Djinn have rather affordable price, as per today the regular sold around $ 0.09 and the gold foil sold around $ 1.24. But even though gold card price have hit its lowest point this week, the regular/gold ratio are still rather low at around 1:13 to 1:14. Since at Rare category, it takes regular card around 5 to 6 times more card than gold card for the same level; this means to reach the same level card, it will cost you double by using gold card! Therefore with this uncertain price, it seemed regular card are more a safe choice.

Progression Analysis

Djinn Apprentice is a raw magic card. Major progression come from its magic damage. At level 4 and max level, Djinn will gain damage increase. Other than health maxed up at 5, which makes Djinn a really fragile card at higher level. Speed also grow rather slowly which won't be enough to dodging incoming attack. At level level 6, Djinn will earn Deathblow ability which will be useful in low-medium mana battle, where chances that fewer card will be deployed.

Rulesets To Be Watched

Ruleset	Strategy
	Armored Up would makes melee and ranged card put extra effort to penetrate. Magic would be the best attack to directly hit the health.
	Nothing better than magic attack combined with Explosive Weaponry. The blast damage would chip health of back row card before they move to first row.
	As magic card always have lower damage compared to melee and ranged, thus Weak Magic will make magic card less favorable.
	Low health will surely will make Djinn as primary target from all card with Opportunity ability.
	With low health and no significant progression, Earthquake and Noxious Fumes will consume Djinn within 2 round.

Here's one of my battle experience where I deployed my "3 Champions of Fire". Click Here for the battle link. The battle have 28 mana cap, with Rise Of The Commons modification. This battle doesn't ended as expected, but from this battle we will see the lesson learned about Djinn's weakness already mentioned before.

For my formation, I used:

1st Row : Molten Ash Golem
2nd Row : Radiated Brute
3rd Row : Djinn Apprentice
4th Row : Tenyii Striker
5th Row : Lava Spider
6th Row : -

My opponent formation:

1st Row : Serpent of Eld
2nd Row : Albatross
3rd Row : Deeplurker
4th Row : Merdali Guardian
5th Row : Scavo Hireling
6th Row : Feasting Seaweed

The sight of the battle show that my formation has more firepower, 5 card all with damage capabilities. In Addition with Tarsa abilities, both Tenyii and Brute boosted to 3 melee damage. Meanwhile opponent only have 3 striking card and 2 support card. But Merdali and Scavo is a support combination that sometimes come out as surprise. Before we enter Round 1, I have to admit that I failed to anticipate that opponent used Keyla Frendul as summoner. The armor boost just stall my melee and ranged attack.

Round 1 start, and my card launched full scale attack, but the dispersed attack only managed to destroy Albatross and Seaweed armor. And as we already warned before, caution should be taken on Opportunity ability. Djinn without any protection was eliminated by Seaweed and Deeplurker. Without that, my formation was left without any magic card anymore.

At Round 2, tide start to turning into my side, as Tenyii slain Seaweed and Lava slain Albatross. Luckily all the incoming attack was directed at Golem, which managed to survive with its large health.

Round 3 doesn't show much progress. Again the armor boost play part in delaying the attack as Tenyii and Lava attack only destroy Merdali and Scavo armor. While Golem with its final health eliminated by Serpent's attack.

Speed start to shine as winning factor. With Deeplurker take the initiative and destroy Lava, my formation was left with only Tenyii and Brute. And Brute was already in a losing fight, as the injured Serpent was mended by Merdali's heal. Tenyii still able to strike and destroy Scavo, which is better than destroy Merdali and let Scavo alive.

By the start of Round 5, the outlook doesn't seemed good. Again speed become winning factor. With Serpent and Deeplurker took first strike, their combined damage enough to destroy Brute. Tenyii make the counter-attack with no avail as Serpent have better evasion.

Finally at Round 6, left with only 1 card, my fate was sealed already. Tenyii have no chance to survive the massive attack from Serpent and Deeplurker.

The above battle is a lesson learned of how fragile Djinn Apprentice is. As Djinn doesn't have any armor, and Fire Splinter lack card with Protect ability; thus positioning is an important thing. Djinn are better positioned in back row, at least 3rd row or more, with semi-tank card in front and back of it to protect against Snipe and Sneak ability. The most difficult one would come from attack with Opportunity ability. The only readily option is to put cannon fodder card with lower health than Djinn in front of it. In low and mid mana battle (around less than 20 mana), Djinn can took the 4th or 5th row, and then card costing 1 to 2 mana cost could fill the gap toward the front row.