<div class="pull-right">
</div>
<div class="text-justify">After debuting for the first time 12 weeks ago and after learning last week that sometimes the battlemages throughout Praetoria can temporarily forget the fact they can summon Monsters with odd mana cost, the Battle Mage Secrets Weekly Challenge is back and this time all Monsters on the board have added explosives to their weapons, projectiles and spells. Yeah, I know you've already read the title but even if you haven't, you have positively figured out that the Challenge this week is to display a battle involving the Explositve Weaponry ruleset. </div>
Let us see what this ruleset does before we get into the nitty-gritty of the line-up and the battle itself.
<div class="text-justify">The Explosive Weaponry ruleset is pretty straight-forward - All monsters get the Blast Ability (does additional damage to Monsters adjacent to the target Monster). Additional damage is equivalent to main damage/2 rounded up. </div>
<div class="text-justify"> Now that we've got a good idea of what the Explosive Weaponry ruleset practically does, let's see now how it can be effectively utilized.</div>
There are two options to approach this ruleset as far as I'm concerned:
<div class="text-justify">- Option 1 - 1st row - to utilize the protection provided by Monsters with the Reflection Shield (this Monster is immune to all indirect, or reflected damage. That means that it will not take damage from Blast, Thorns, Return Fire, or Magic Reflect) ability. Monster with Reflection Shield are most often placed in the 2nd spot of the line-up or in the 5th spot (all slots are filled) so that their ability can mitigate all Blast damage coming in from enemies attacking the main tank or Sneak Monsters coming from behind. </div>
<div class="text-justify">- Option 2 - 2nd row - is to strategically place Martyr (when this Monster dies, adjacent Monsters get +1 to all stats) and Triage (heals the friendly back-line Monster that has taken the most damage) Monsters in your line-up. You would want Martyr monsters in the 2nd and 5th spots, and the Triage ones in the middle, unless they are really beefy healers. The point is to have your Martyrs die to Blast damage and buff your remaining Monster/Monsters, while the Triage Monsters could potentially keep up with and even outheal the Blast damage if there are enough of them on the field. </div>
Now that we have a decent understanding of the featured Ruleset and its potential advantages and disadvantages, let us have a look at the battle I have chosen to showcase.
<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>[BATTLE](https://splinterlands.com/?p=battle&id=sm_qpNoGpnpz06dL8fT57qe)<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>
- The line-up of the Battle and the Ruleset:
<div class="text-justify">The rulesets for this battle are Explosive Weaponry and Keep Your Distance (Monsters with Melee attack may not be used in battles). The mana budget is 59 which is above average by a pretty good margin so it will be easier for me to assemble a decent line-up. The available Splinters are: all but Water. I have decided to go with the Earth Splinter.
<div class="pull-right">
</div>
<div class="text-justify">The 1st place in the line-up goes to a RW addition - Runemancer Florre. I like using her a lot in high mana battles since I find her to be a Monster with a very good damage output thanks to her dual attack - Ranged/Magic, and she can also take a few hits if she has to thanks to her 13 Health. However, since I start with her with the tanking spot this time around, I will have to rely only on her Magic Attack. </div>
<div class="pull-left">
</div>
<div class="text-justify">The 2nd spot goes to the Uloth Dhampir. It is actually a Monster I use really often in my Earth line-ups and I like it a lot. It has the Stun (when a Monster with Stun hits a target, it has a chance to stun the target causing it to skip its next turn) and at max level it also has Triage (heals the friendly back-line Monster that has taken the most damage) abilities. The Stun is nice but it is RNG-reliant so I don't normally choose it for that, Triage on the other hand is a very powerful ability in general. I've included it in this line-up in the 2nd position because it has a quite a lot of health.</div>
<div class="pull-right">
</div>
<div class="text-justify">3rd in the line-up is Queen Mycelia. She is probably one of the best support Monsters in the game (if not the best) with her Protect (All friendly Monsters gain +2 Armor), Amplify (Increases Magic Reflect, Return Fire, and Thorns damage to all enemy monsters by 1), and Triage (Heals the friendly back-line Monster that has taken the most damage) abilities. As well as Rust (Reduces the Armor of all enemy Monsters) for all those lucky people who have a maxed version of her. You can never go wrong with including her in your line-up unless the rulesets render her abilities useless. </div>
<div class="pull-left">
</div>
<div class="text-justify"> Following immediately after Queen Mycelia is the Spirit Hoarder. I've got it in this spot to be protected from splash damage as long as possible while triaging its allies who are taking the blast hits instead of it. It has the Triage ability right from the start, which allows it to heal the back-line of its team. It also has the Dispel ability which allows it to dispel any buffs on the enemy targets hit by its attacks. Lastly it also has Blind (All enemy Melee & Ranged attacks have an increased chance of missing their target).</div>
<div class="pull-right">
</div>
<div class="text-justify">Following immediately after is one of the new soulbound cards which have recently been introduced into the game - the Fungus Flinger. It is just at level 7 but that's enough because I am more more interested in its main ability - Martyr (When this Monster dies, adjacent Monsters get +1 to all stats). At this level in addition to Marty it also has Blind so that's a nice added bonus. It has only 4 health so that's generally not too hard to happen, especially in a battle such as this where it is guaranteed to get hit by Blast Damage due to its placement. </div>
<div class="pull-left">
</div>
<div class="text-justify"> Last but definitely not least is the Mycelic Slipspawn. Generally it is my go-to Taunt Monster for the Earth Splinter but since one of the rulesets is Scatter Shot, it will not be able to attract the shots fired by the enemy archers and magic users, however, it still does work on melee Monsters with Opportunity and Sneak abilities. I have it in this line-up because it has a very large health pool and I expect it to survive at least a couple of rounds. It's a really good tank with its Forcefield (this Monster takes only 1 damage from attacks with power 5+) and Slow (reduces the Speed of all enemy Monsters) abilities.</div>
It is time for a quick round by round analysis:
- The Summoner I am going with for the battle is Immortalis. He is my favorite Earth Summoner, and is probably one of the Summoners I use most often in battles together with Quix and Kelya. He is also a nice fit for this particular battle as he nerfs the health of the enemy Monsters by 1 HP, and also provides the Shatter ability to all Monsters on his team. Shatter effectively removes the whole shield amount of enemy Monsters that get hit, so that will make them absolutely vulnerable to Blast Damage coming from non-Magic users. My enemy has chosen to go with Immortalis as well as and they have obviously also chosen the Earth Splinters, so it is a sort of a mirror, however, they have decided to go with a few Untamed cards. I'm always anxious when I see these since I don't have any of them in my deck.
- After 1 round the enemy main tank has fallen and the Almo Cambio has taken its place. It's only level 1 though so that might not be much of an issue. On the other hand my Fungus Flinger has also perished but that was intended as it has buffed my Slipspawn and Spirit Hoarder.
- Round 3 - I have taken down the enemy Almo Cambio and I am working on the Monster following it. My Slipspawn is at full health courtesy of the 3 Triage Monsters I have in my backline. My Spirit Hoarder will die to Blast damage this turn though.
- Round 4 - All that is left for me is to mop the floor with the remainder of the enemy Monsters. They resisted a bit but it was not enough at all.
- My victory seemed really, really easy, but let's see what [Splintertools.io](https://splintertools.io/) has to say about that. I actually had a **100%** chance to win so definitely no surprises here.
Well this was definitely a fast but fun battle, and an entertaining way to showcase the Explosive Weaponry ruleset. See you next week with another exciting post related to the brand new Battle Mage Secrets Weekly Challenge!
Over and Out,
[Referral](https://splinterlands.com?ref=ghostlybg)
hiveblocks