UNTAMED Preview Discussion #2 - Its Goblin o'clock

Alright! That was earlier than expected! I guess @yabapmatt wants me to stay up longer, its 11pm atm for me ._.

Lets get talking.

The first card we got to see today is the Coral Wraith, a magic sneaker (I think the 3rd in the game?) for the water splinter. Besides sneak he comes with the new rust ability. Now you might think why the blue splinter need this, and that on a magic unit? But that makes sense actually. Many times when you think you can just counter armor with magic, you run into magic reflect, water also didnt have any real ways (pierce) to work through armor before, so now it has! And the unit has sneak, so that it doesnt kill itself on frontline magic reflecters.
The card that is most similar to this is:

The goblin sorcerer, for one mana less you get the same dmg in the life splinter, but one less HP. Keep in mind that you can easily post the wraiths magic dmg by 1 in this splinter.
The second card it might be compared to is the mischievous mermaid.

If you want raw magic power she is still better, but she wasnt played that much, so a cheaper version for 4 mana could take her place.

Next up we have the Crystal Jaguar, which as the offical post already says is an excellent low manacap tank. While I think that Silvershield Paladin is very likely still better in most cases, this card still has a place. Up until now the life splintr did not have a real tank in the little league ruleset. You might also consider to use this card over Paladin in the new 12 mana games.

Of the the lower mana tanks for little league is the Crystal Werewolf, but without armor, shield or any defenses he is an easy kill for most setups. So Crystal Jaguar is the better tank.

The other option up until now was to use the reach unit as a frontline tank.

While the silvershield warrior did an okay job playing tank in little league, you now can use the Jaguar and the warrior in the reach spot, where he was meant to be played.

Third card and my least favorite of this bunch. My first thoughts about this card was "melee mayham + unlimited mana" - thats exactly where this card shines. I can see this card getting a good amount of play anyway. Its a physical tank, with armor and thorns, thats always good. His counter are magic units, so you need to be careful when to play him. He also never gets above 1 speed, so hes the ideal tank for reverse speed.

If you want a magic tanky unit instead you should stay with Lord A, or the Pit Ogre.

The Living Lava feels almost like a big brother to the Serpentine Soldier.

Ah yeah! This card looks cool, sounds cool, and is good? Its a second reach unit for the earth splinter, this card should shine in silver and gold, where the Minitauer Warrior dies too easily to magic blast damage. This is also the second in spire unit in earth, which might open this splinter to use more melee units. If you use Brownie, Daria and the Sergeant, you get +3 melee dmg. I can see this card getting played alot.

The Minotauer should keep his value, since hes a cheaper version for different setups and has pierce which is more valueable now that we got more protect units.

Brownie is already seen in quite a few games, but I can see a lot of setups with Flesh Golem, Orc Sergeant, Brownie, Harpy - with daria running around in gold league.

Oh boi. WHAT IS THAT. Four abilities on an epic card? Okay then. But you are paying in terms of HP.
This card comes with the new ability called "snare" which always hits flying units, and makes them lose the benefits of flying for the rest of the battle.
Having stun on a fast unit like this makes it very good, if you position this card correctly you should be able to get at least two attacks of, I can see this card beeing used in higher mana games as a fast stunner. Im not sure yet how valueable the snare ability will be. Headwinds is also amazing, since the other source in death is from Fallen Spectre who is almost never used.

Soulstorms stats remind me the most of the Vampire statline.... lets hope it wont share its fate.

In lower mana games you would still use the Haunted Spieder.

Let there be neutrals they said. And so we got two neutrals today. The first one beeing Tower Griffin. This is a neutral source of protect, so I expect it to be used just for that.
When I look at this card, it fits one ruleset perfectly, and thats earthquake. It has flying to not get hit by it, and has protect, the best ability for that ruleset after flying.
It terms of stats 6 HP for 4 mana is good, you could use the card in the second spot as snipe/blast bait. But it only gets its second attack on the max lvl. So I expect it to be only played for protect for the most part.

Spirit of the Forest and Crustacean King are two of the best cards to use in earthquake rulesets currently.

P.S. Whats up with ranged units giving protect?

Okay we nearly made it! The 7th and last card is actually my favorite of this bunch. And my overall favorite UNTAMED artwork so far!

Let me just start of with giving a bold prediction: I think this card will be one of the more expensive untamed cards and used by a lot of people.

Do you remember Peacekeeper? Yea, hes used in almost every single life game. And for good reason hes really good! Goblin Chariot is nearly the same and a neutral! So Goblin has the same HP, one less speed, and the same dmg as the Keeper, and yes he costs one more mana. But for that he has the pierce ability, which is really good with all the new protect and armor units coming! Even without pierce this would still be a good unit that would be used in many decks wanting a back line tanky ranged unit.

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