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Hello again community !

As always, it´s me , Trenloco.

First of all, a warm, hearthfelt thank you to all of you !!
My posts couldn´t be better received and I´m so happy that you find them helpful and get in contact with me.

So this time , I´ll try to adress a growing concern of new players, as I usually get some form of this question:

        What cards should I buy to grow my collection?

For me, the answer to that is prioritize Summoners. And more so, don´t sleep on Kretch Tallevor.

THE END

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Well actually, that would be too short a post, wouldn´t it? And that´s not really my style.

                                                        I´m more a wall of text type of guy

So I figured out I should just show you what I mean.

Today I bring a deck idea centered around brute forcing, that is, winning battles mainly through superior card levels.

I´ll show you a cheap, unassuming deck featuring Kretch Tallevor. With this deck, I quickly went from 1153 to 1332 rating spending no more than 40 DEC.

Keep in mind I just went to the market and rented out all I needed, you can do much better than me if you are patient and snipe a couple good deals.

Though I decided to use the Life splinter today (to pair with Dragon) , my objective is to expand on this the following weeks and showcase other splinter options.

But wait, you will say, Kretch Tallevor is crap, 3 mana and he doesn´t even have an ability !!

Let me try to convince you:

• He´s dirt cheap. Hovering around $5 a piece.

• He´s an Epic. That means lower BCX per level (you only need 4 Kretch for level 2).

• He´s a Dragon Summoner. That means he can both use Dragon cards (meh) plus any other Splinter (this is key).

• At levels 2 and 5 (max for bronze and gold, respectively), Epic summoners can field rare cards one level higher than usual (compared to other rarities).

TLDR:

Levelling just Kretch is cheap and allows you to play higher levelled cards in any splinter (just by renting them)

Think about it, long term Kretch has you covered. Otherwise you´d have to get one high level summoner for each single splinter. We don´t have that kind of money here.

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Team Setup

Today we´ll be playing a Life Sneak Melee deck. Nothing too fancy, it´s a reliable deck but not meta by any means.

As you´ll see in the replay section, the deck is quite flexible, a much needed trait given the ample variety of battle conditions.

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The MVP

The keystone of the deck is Silvershield Knight, his Inspire ability boosts the whole team´s melee attack by 1. This is absurdly powerful.
The Knight makes the deck really click. I like to place him in Third Position. But sometimes, when mana cap is very low and I have no other choice than to put him in First Position. Try your best not to leave him out!
                                                                 

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First Position

We have plenty of options for our frontline tanks. Choose depending on mana cap:

• Crystal Jaguar: Low mana cost, solid stats. Only card you can use in little leagues.

• Clay Golem: Very good against magic teams. Keeps Aldric in check.

• Djinn Chwala: Excellent choice when mana cap is high. Solid against melee teams thanks to Thorns.

• Silvershield Paladin: 1 mana more than Jaguar but Shield ability. Usually my go-to frontliner, very cost-effective.

• Shieldbearer: Good choice when mana is high and you need to protect your backliners from Snipe/Sneak/Opportunity.

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Second Position

Sometimes , Silvershield Knight goes here, as always, depends on mana cap. But if mana is plenty, the Knight should go in Third Position.

Here we have a variety of options depending on matchup:

• Manticore: Solid monster. Reach allows it to deal its 2 damage (before Inspire buff) freely from this position. Also an excellent backup tank due to the Flying ability. If you can´t find it for cheap, Twilight Basilisk is a budget replacement.

• Warrior of Peace: Its ability lowers enemy´s whole team melee damage by 1. Overperforms against melee-focused teams (usually Fire, Death or Life splinters).

• Crystal Werewolf: Its ability lowers enemy´s whole team magic damage by 1. Underrated card, silver bullet against water decks.

• Divine Healer: When mana is low , it´s hard to field much damage. In these kind of matches, Healer can just make your frontline unkillable and run away with the game.

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Sneak Damagers

I´ll give you a list of options, with a short commentary for each card, to fill out the remaining spots. As always, choices will depend on mana cap and matchup.

Having said that, keep in mind that your strongest card will almost always be Silvershield Assassin.

• Silvershield Assasin: As mentioned above, your most powerful card (and most expensive too, by far). He has both Sneak and Double Strike, so not only does he dive for the opposing backline, he attacks twice for a total of 4 damage (6 when you count the inspire buff). Expensive to rent, expensive to field, worth every single penny. Must include.

• Cave Slug: Underrated card. Opportunity makes it target the enemy with the lowest health. 3 damage (4 after inspire) ensures that enemy won´t be there when the Slug attacks again. Only downisde is 1 speed, which can be slighlty be offset by running Creeping Ooze.

• Feral Spirit / Elven Cutthroat: I put them together as they are practically the same card. Spirit just has one more speed point (neutral cards are weaker as a rule). Good fillers when you have mana to spare, cheap sources of quick damage.

• Sand Worm: When mana is high enough, I love to put this guy at the back. That way, it both protects the backline against enemy Sneak/Opportunity and deals loads of damage. Keep in mind you should always try to pair it with Ooze, as its low speed makes missing attacks an issue.

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Creeping Ooze and Furious Chicken

I´ll mention these two in every deck I post from now on, for real. If you have the DEC to spare (more so for Chicken, Ooze is laughably cheap), by all means rent them.

Every team (as long as there is an empty slot) will benefit from Chicken. Either at the very front , or at the very back, it´s guaranteed to tank at least one hit, this can decide close games.

And Ooze is just an amazing card, more so in this deck. Your backline will always attack first, getting rid of priority targets without even giving them the chance to act. Plus, the extra dodge chance (remember, 10% dodge chance for every point of speed over the attacker) can steal games.

                                                 

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Of course, what I presented above is just the outline for a deck.

You should play it out yourself, test choices, make it your own

And remember, the principle of brute forcing can be applied to any splinter.

The takeaway today is to get your Kretch up to par and rent cheap, higher level cards from any splinter (not just Life) to get your rating up.

Collection building made easy. What more could you ask for?

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Rental Costs Breakdown

To illustrate even more how cheap it is to rent out this deck, and how cost-effective brute forcing can be, I made the following spreadsheet:

First, I note that for our level 2 Kretch Tallevor, max monster card levels are 3 (common) , 3 (rare), 2 (epic) and 1 (legendary).

Then, you can see rental prices for each card mentioned, at each playable level (at the time of writing, 29/09/21, 2 days before End of Season).

In green you can see my personal card choices to rent for this deck

Keep it in mind I do a cost-efficiency analysis, obviously cards are more powerful at higher levels, but I sometimes think that such increase in power doesn´t offset the increase in rental cost.

In blue I noted choices that I feel you could go for. This depends on how much DEC are you willing to spend on renting.

Finally, in grey I noted which card levels I feel are not worth it to rent.

For example, I personally don´t feel like paying 9.5 DEC for a level 3 Divine Healer just for a single point of melee attack. I´d rather play it at level 1 for free and be ok with it not attacking.

On the other side, although level 3 Silvershield Assassin is very expensive, the extra melee attack point more than makes up for it. The level 3 power spike is too big to pass up on this card.

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To prove this deck can compete in the current harsh meta, I bring you some juicy replays straight from Silver League.

First, best case scenario battles, with both Dragon and Life splinters allowed:

• 50 Mana - Divine Shield - Odd Mana costs
• 14 Mana - Poison - Blast
• 36 Mana - Close Range - Blast
• 17 Mana - Opportunity - No Heal

And now, odd battles, odd conditions, banned splinters, pick up ideas to break the mold here:

• 20 Mana - No Summoner Abilities - Divine Shield - No Dragon Splinter
• 38 Mana - No Heal - Weak Magic - No Dragon Splinter
• 46 Mana - Armor Up - Odd Mana Costs - No Life Splinter
• 26 Mana - No Heal - No Dragon Splinter
• 50 Mana - No Magic - No Dragon Splinter

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As always, if you made it this far, all I can say is thank you !!

I appreciate any comment, any advice you might have is very welcome.

You can always go check out my previous posts on the series:

1. Trenloco´s Beginner Primer #1: Fundamentals + Fire Splinter
2. Trenloco´s Beginner Series #2: Silver on the cheap with Life Snipe
3. Trenloco´s Beginner Series #3: Making waves in Silver with Spellbook Water (+$2 MVP)

Any questions you might have, I´ll check this post often so just ask away. Good luck on the battlefield !

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In case you have friends that have not yet joined the game, I delegate cards to my referrals, together with deck help to get them on the right foot:

https://splinterlands.com?ref=trenloco

NOTE: Even if you bought Spellbook already , I can still sign you up as a referral. Just fill out the following form with Add Referral as subject: Splinterlands Support.

After that, just drop a comment in any post of mine and I´ll delegate a couple cards straight away!

You can also find me (as wells as many other great players and hive bloggers) at the following awesome servers on discord:

• Crypto Gaming Guild Discord
• Hive Pizza Discord

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I play lots of other games on Hive too, and I help referrals there also, just DM me and ask away !! Keep in mind that being referred doesn´t cost you anything in these games.

• DCrops: HIVE´s Farming Simulator - Passive gameplay + Holding rewards
• Rising Star: Mafia Wars style gameplay - Become an NFT Rockstar

I urge you to check out my post on DCrops for a quick rundown on the game, mostly from an investing standpoint, but hurry up, ALPHA packs are flying off the shelves !!

DCrops Rundown: HIVE´s most promising investing opportunity. Now is the time !

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