Magalli's "SHARE YOUR BATTLE Weekly Challenge!CRYPT BEETLE!"

Another season is finally finishing on Splinterlands, and it is time to start a new "Weekly Battle Challenge"!
This week the subject is the Crypt Beetle.

Before talking about the card, I want to say that I analyzed it as a Bronze player.

So let's start analyzing the card:

1 ) Mana cost: 3 Considering the stats, the Mana Cost could appear a bit high, but considering also the Ability, it is a fair Mana Cost.

2 ) Melee Attack: 1 The lowest possible Melee attack, but the Crypt Beetle's role is not to deal damage, so it is ok.

3 ) Speed: 1 As the Melee Attack stat, the lowest possible.

4 ) Expansion: Chaos Legion I highlighted that because in the near future the Expansion of a card will be essential to know if it is playable in the Modern format or in the Wild format (MF: playable only in the last two Expansions that came out on Splinterlands, WF: every Expansion is playable).

5 ) Armor: 1 Nice stat, the Crypt Beetle can absorb the first Physical damage "for free".

6 ) Health: 2 Fair health amount, nothing exceptional.

7 ) Element: Death Its element is "Death" which can be used only with Death Summoners and Dragon Summoners.

8 ) Ability: Shield That's why the Crypt Beetle can be considered a useful card, even if it has 3 as Mana Cost.

This ability makes the Crypt Beetle an interesting low-cost Physical tank.

Please Note: I specified Physical damages because the Magic Attacks ignore Armor and Shield ability.

The Crypt Beetle can be more useful with some "Rules of Combat" than others, I chose the best, in my opinion, for this card:

I selected "Rules of Combat" where Physical damage will probably be involved and where the Crypt Beetle's ability can be useful.

The introduction to the Crypt Beetle is finished, let's see how I used it in my battle:

Rules of Combat: Positive If Monsters will be with no armor, there are high chances that my Opponent will choose Monsters with Physical damage, it is true that I'm wasting my Crypt Beetle's armor but its ability will make it a nice bait.

Mana Cap: Positive I can use the Crypt Beetle without sacrificing important cards.

Active Elements: Neutral Even if my opponent would choose a Magic Deck my Summoner's debuffs would counter it.

Considering the Active Elements and my Opponent's previous Deck choices, I bet that it would have used a Fire Deck, with a lot of Physical attack Monsters involved.

The Fire Deck is really performing with these specific "Rules of Combat" but it has a weakness: Speed.

The most common used Fire Monsters that target the first position Opponent's Monster both have 1 in Speed:

That's why I decided to take advantage of my Level 2 Thaddius Brodd Summoner:

To use as the Tank my GF Pelacor Conjurer, that with its 4 in Speed and the Flying ability it would have a 55% chance to evade enemy's Physical damage (considering Opponent's Monster's speed as 1).

A common GF (Gold Foil) card's stats at Level 1 match a Level 3 non-GF card.

After the Pelacor Conjurer I placed my GF Crypt Bettle as a second tank in case I was unlucky with missed percentages.

Then I placed my Level 3 Silent Sha-Vi, that considering its enhanced Attack stat, it should clean all the Opponent's second line Monsters.

If you already have a Level 2 Thaddius Brodd Summoner, I strongly recommend leveling up the Silent Sha-Vi to Level 3 (14 cards that cost ~ 0,15$ each).

To help the Silent Sha-Vi I placed the Undead Badger behind it which has the same Ability of the previous card, and can refine the "cleaning" job.

Considering its low life, versus a Fire Deck it will probably work as a simple bait.

And in the end, I placed the Cursed Windeku, placing a Monster in the last position without abilities that allow it to attack from the second line could appear like an error, but considering the Sneak ability, that a lot of Fire Monsters have, the Cursed Windeku can really hit and protect my Opponent's second line attacking Monsters.

The strategy is settled, the Cursed Windeku will be my posterior Tank, with its Thorns ability to weaken my Opponent's Monsters, in the first position the Pelacor Conjurer should avoid the Opponent's Monster's Physical attacks while the Silent Sha-Vi cleans the Second Lines previously weakened.

Luckily my Battle Preview was right, and my Opponent choose a Fire deck to take advantage of the "Rules of Combat".

After just two rounds, the Cursed Windeku, the Silent Sha-Vi and the Undead Badger decimated the enemy's Second Lines.
Meanwhile, the Pelacor Conjurer avoided all the Attacks it received.

I won at round 5, all my Monsters survived and the strategy worked perfectly. The Crypt Beetle didn't do anything.

I won, and it's always a nice idea to use GF cards because they give +10% each in DEC reward bonus:

Final Consideration: The Crypt Beetle is a useful card to "complete" a deck, it should be used only if there are enough Mana to use it with all the most powerful cards, and the "Rules of Combat" are positive.

Considering the Level ups the Crypt Beetle doesn't really shine reaching new levels, but it remains a solid bait to complete the Deck when it is needed.

The Battle: https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_b544e5e1ad157eca09a4bc7f96b1d42b&ref=magalli

Best regards,
Mr.Magalli

P.S. my referral link: https://splinterlands.com?ref=magalli

Ability Images from: https://splinterlands.fandom.com/wiki/Splinterlands_Wiki

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