Hello Splinterlands summoners and welcome to my blog! Less than a week and Escalation presale starts. I've already prepared my SPS and DEC on Hive engine to at least avail copies of the Doldrus promo card.

Doldrus is a four mana, dual splinter card that boasts of five abilities. Though it has no attack, it's support abilities more than make up for its lack of attacking power. We only need to buy ten packs in the presale to earn one copy.

Portia Nyr, the legendary card, needs one hundred packs to earn one copy.

She's a strong magic user also with five abilities. She's a neutral splinter so she can be used by all splinters.

Along with the promo cards, there are five low mana cards that were shown in the escalation page. Let's break them down one by one.

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Emberscale Invoker

Emberscale Invoker is a seven mana Drakoshan common card. It deals three magic damage and has four speed. It has four armor and six health on defense. It's a good unit to use as a tank in Wands Out ruleset due to its Phase ability that pairs well with its speed stat. If used with Kavor Skarn, then his speed will increase by one therefore increasing the chances of dodging magic attacks. He also has the Ambush ability, delivering an attack before the start of the round that could already eliminate an enemy in the middle because of its Snipe ability.

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Drifting Manatee

Drifiting Manatee is a three mana Water card. It has no attack but can be trainable if used with a unit with Weapons Training ability. It has good defensive stats of five armor and seven health though it's speed is lacking. It has Dodge ability that doesn't work well with its speed stat only one. It has Cleanse Rearguard ability that makes it useful in rulesets like Noxious Fumes. It has Amplify that makes it a good combo to units with Thorns, Return Fire and Magic Reflect abilities and finally, it has Stun ability that will work if you pair it with a unit with Weapons Training. The Manatee is a unit that will easily find a spot in our battles because it only needs three mana.

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Earthwork Sentinel

Earthwork Sentinel is another three mana unit with no attack. It has good defense and speed making it a good unit to guard the rear against sneak attackers. It has abilities to debuff the enemy and support allies. Slow decreases enemy speed by one while Reveal removes Camouflage from units each round. On the support side, it has Shield Ward that grants Shield to units in front of it while Triage is a useful ability to heal units in the backline. I often combo units with Triage ability with Taunt units.

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Vextali

Vextali is an epic Death card that is also low mana. She deals two range damage, has three speed, three armor and six health. I don't find much use in her abilities though. I think she can be placed in the rear and counter range units with Sneak ability like Aranduriel and Bren Palesworn with her Return Fire ability.

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Gorvash the Pallid

The return of zero mana cards. I don't think we have one in the Conclave Arcana set. Gorvash the Pallid is a Life splinter card that deals two range damage, has four health and great speed of five. It has the new ability, Bloodline Pact that's similar to a bloodlust ability that will apply to all orcs. On the other hand, the ability has a drawback since orcs will also suffer damage and loss of attack if Gorvash gets defeated.

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Final Thoughts

These are just a few of the new cards that will come. They are sure to bring fresh strategies and shake the meta. I already prepared some SPS and DEC to take part in the presale to try my luck in opening packs but I will probably upgrade my cards through the market.

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Come Play Splinterlands!

Start your Splinterlands adventure today with my referral. You can play the game for free in the Frontier Mode or take your game to the next level by purchasing a spellbook. Buying a spellbook allows you to earn SPS tokens and use the market to sell in game assets. Also, we will both get 500 Credits which can be used top purchase cards once you buy a spellbook.