Card Highlights #16: Venari Wavesmith

"Protect those who protect you." - Evangelos Venizelos
When you love someone, you protect them from the pain. You don't become the cause of it. Venari Wavesmith is the soul of the word. She is the protector of Water elementals. Her very presence provides safety of those around her allowing her comrades to survive. Survival is the essence of the game. The longer you survive, the higher chance of winning you have.

Lore

Banished from Below 3 of 5 - A massive race of rat-like people called venari have lived in the Strite for thousands of years. They are skilled technicians and mechanics who can make advanced devices and tools the likes of which Splinterlanders have never seen. The venari control powerful forms of magic that they have synthesized from the minerals and mana flows of the Strite. Through their complex field of science called smithing, they have been able to create and recreate many types of natural and magical phenomena from any magical element.

Rental Cost

Venari Wavesmith's rental is, same as it's buy cost, at the lowest as well. Renting one is really efficient especially if you would be renting or owned Alric Stormbringer. The new water cards are exceptional if used in congruent with Venari and other mages as they not only have great abilities but great stats as well.

Buy/Sell Cost

Venari Wavesmith's buy cost is at the lowest right now at $0.19 at the time of this writing. I remember the time when you can pull one for $10 and a lot of people still buy it. However, it's still an advantage for the many to have lower price as this allows people to get higher level of this card.

Card Stats

Venari Wavesmith's stats is deceptively low. I said deceptively because Venari Wavesmith is actually used along with Alric Stormbringer bringing his damage to 2. He may have 3 health but Venari Wavesmith's Protect also gives him 2 armor along that so the stats are actually decent but deceptively low.

Card Effect

Protect || All friendly Monsters gain +2 Armor. || The reason why water mages were good is because of Venari Wavesmith. The Protect allows the higher survival of other monsters while the other mages crush the opponent to pieces. Protect is good in the right hand and is always good as long as there's no Rule Sets or abilities that hinders it.
Protect is what makes Venari Wavesmith overpowered. Almost all water mages has a universal weakness, health. The low health makes water mages prone to dying right after their main tank dies. Protect allows your mages to survive a few more turns against snipes and sneaks. Venari Wavesmith's Protect is a make it or breake it ability if you're using water mages.

Dispel || When this monster hit an enemy, it clears all positive status effects on that enemy. || Dispel is a good bonus as it removes any buffs the opponent might have. This is true especially in higher league where most of the monster's abilities are unlocked. Take note that it only removes the positive buffs, like protect, inspire and things like that. It does not remove innate abilities like Shield, Thorns or Void.
Dispel is a good addition but not the best. It removes positive effects on opponent's monster that it hits. Since Venari Wavesmith has no effects like sneak, opportunity or snipe, this is a good ability to make their main tanks in check. It removes strong effects like inspire which increases their damage. As far as I know, dispell does not remove innate abilities like Shield or Void. This still makes it tricky to fight such opponents. However, any abilities that provides any kind of benefit is good.

When to use

|| Monsters get +2 added to their armor stat.
Armored Up is like having a secondary Venari Wavesmith. Since magic damage passes through armor, if you're using all mages, this rule set does not hinder you at all. All you get are benefits as long as your opponents also use mages.

|| All monsters get the Blast Ability which does additional damage to Monsters adjacent to the target Monster. Additional damage is equivalent to main damage/2 rounded up.
Explosive Weaponry is another complementary Rule Set for mages. Since Blast ability takes form on the monster's type of attack, if you attack with magic damage, the blast damage will be magic damage as well and of course, the blast damage passes through armor as well.

|| All Ranged and Magic attack Monsters have the Snipe ability.
Target Practice is one of the best mage rule set. It adds the snipe ability to your attacks which targets non-melee mosters first. Which is, most of the time, supports, other mages, and/or archers. In other words, this eliminates most damage dealers and pesky supports immediately as the game progresses allowing your tanks to survive better.

When not to use

|| Monsters lose their own abilities. Summoner effects such as those that give abilities to monsters still take effect.
Back to Basics is a pesky rule set not only for you but also for the opponent. This may not be worst for Venari Wavesmith since you still have your magic damage and that also means your opponents would be void of Sneak, Snipe and Opportunity but any form of demerit to your strategy is a disadvantage.

|| Monsters do not have any armor and do not get armor from Abilities or Summoner Buffs.
Unprotected is bad for obvious reason. It blocks Venari Wavesmith's main purpose. It's like Back to Basics but only for Venari. I need not to say more of how bad a targetted debuff is for any monsters.

|| All monsters start the game poisoned and will take 2 damage each turn unless cleansed. Big HP and cleanse are going to be your best bet here. However there may be some cases where you ignore and go for a big offensive attack and wipe out your opponent before the poison becomes a factor.
Noxious Fumes is one of the worst as it passes through armor. Most mages have low health and this two damage per turn that passes through armor eliminates most of your mages in 1 to 2 turns. And not using mages in water element greatly demerits your winning potential as water mages not only have the lowest mana cost but great hidden ability in the form of being able to use magic damage as their type of attack.

Battle

Click here to view the replay

This is the positioning I used for this battle:

I used Venari Wavesmith as a support in the middle with tanks and sneak blockers on each other side. One good trait of Venari Wavesmith is any card becomes a sneak blocker due to his protect ability. The longer you allow him to survive, the longer you reap benefits from his Protect.

Round 1

Due to my opponent's high damage, Cruel Sethropod actually dies in one turn. Venari Wavesmith may block Unicorn Mustang's damage but all magic damage passes through armor so Venari Wavesmith's protect does not help.

Round 2

By end of Round 2, Frost Lion dies making Djinn Oshannus to take the front. Unicorn Mustang is down to half health and I'm in danger since Unicorn Mustang has Void ability which halves all magic damage.

Round 3

The good thing is even with Unicorn Mustang's Void, the damage is still enough to take him down. Unfortunately, Djinn Oshannus is not down to 3 health and might die but next round. Mycelic Morphoid now takes the front for next round with the death of Unicorn Mustang.

Round 4

By end of Round 4, a miracle comeback happened and grinded my opponent's monsters to the ground. Most of his monsters are low health and my mages ravaged the lands with their blood. Djinn Oshannus dies but with him, Mycelic Morphoid, Creeping Ooze and Khmer Princess also takes the fall.

Round 5

By end of Round 5, Goblin Psychic dies. Regal Peryton did a fantastic job of bringing Venari Wavesmith down to 1 health.

Round 5

Game ended with my victory on Round 6 with the death of Venari Wavesmith and Regal Peryton.

Disclaimer

• Battle photos are taken from Splinterlands in-game website. To view the full game, click on this link.

• I do not own any of the animated pictures. Visit Giphy to get more information.
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