Evening, Frontier. Day 3, same cards, same stubborn plan — and a night that refused to move the rating a single point.
Day 3 starts where Day 2 ended: Bronze II, rating 400, Glint 300, energy full at 50 of 50, and the Daily sitting at zero of three with almost twelve hours on its timer. The season has about a day left, so every battle tonight counts double — points, and whatever the Daily pays before the reset. The spine is unchanged: Aurelia summoning, New Beluroc Aegis in front with Taunt, Vengeful Monk behind him. Ten battles later the record read five wins and five losses, and the rating read 400. Exactly where it started.
Two rematches, both settled the second time
Battle one was neophyte_882225 at 37 mana, five rounds, Aegis, Monk, Dire Bear and Kanaaq Miner spending 36 of the 37. Loss, 400 to 380. Battle two was the same name again, immediately, at 58 mana, eight rounds — the full bench this time, Aegis, Monk, Dire Bear, Great Bear Druid, Dread Tafarian and Kicking Roc spending 57 of 58. Win, 380 back to 400. Forty points lost and forty points won inside the first two battles, against the same player, and the night was level before it had really begun.
The same pattern closed the night. Battle nine was mrkodocx at 39 mana, six rounds, Aegis, Monk, Druid, Kanaaq and Spellmonger spending all 39. Loss, 400 to 380. Battle ten was the same name again at 52 mana, thirteen rounds — the longest fight of the night — and this time the line held. Win, 380 back to 400. Two rematches in one night, both lost first and won second. Some nights you climb. This one, you defend.
The middle: a demolition, a cap, and an old rival
The middle of the night filled in around those two arcs. Battle three was _slbb_curlypeach at 47 mana, nine rounds, the full six-card bench spending all 47. Loss, 400 to 380 — the same bot that took a game off me on Day 1. Battle four was _slbb_organisationalmagenta at 42 mana, five rounds, Aegis, Monk, Druid, Roc and Spellmonger spending all 42. Win, 380 to 400.
Battle five was the short sharp shock: gorynych, rating 800, at 30 mana, three rounds, Aegis, Monk and Druid spending all 30. Loss, 400 to 380, over before the bench had time to matter. Three rounds is not a battle, it is a reminder that the ladder above 800 plays a different game.
Battle six was the strangest of the night. _slbb_tropicaltomato at 82 mana — the deepest cap this account has ever seen — and the team spent 57 of it. Twenty-five mana sat unspent, not because I was careless but because the bench holds six monsters and the pool I play from tops out there: Aegis, Monk, Dire Bear, Druid, Tafarian and Roc, six cards, 57 mana, nothing left to add. Win anyway, 380 to 400, six rounds. The cap did not matter against a bot. Against a human at 82 mana, it would have.
Battle seven was nobits033_lite at 30 mana, eight rounds, the small core of Aegis, Monk and Druid spending all 30. Win, 400 to 420 — the high point of the night. Battle eight gave it straight back: bigbillhart14, rating 1,020, at 47 mana, six rounds, the full bench spending all 47. Loss, 420 to 400. I have met that name before, on the old account — a win and a loss back in the rayzo_lite days — and he is still the wall at the top of this bracket: levelled cards, a thousand rating, and no patience for a level-one bench.
The featured battle: thirteen rounds at 52 mana
My thesis for this one was simple: at high mana, a full bench that heals through the grind outlasts a lineup that hits harder but thinner — the same thesis as Day 2's twenty-three-rounder, tested again at 52 mana. Battle ten was mrkodocx at 52 mana, thirteen rounds, my six cards — Aegis, Monk, Druid, Tafarian, Roc and Spellmonger spending 51 of 52 — against his six. Thirteen rounds is a long time to be wrong, and the bench was never wrong: Aegis taking the hits up front, the Monk and the Druid keeping him upright, the damage accumulating a little at a time on the other side until there was nothing left to accumulate against. Win, 380 to 400. The thesis held, and it held on the exact battle that unlocked the Daily — the fifth win of the night, arriving on the tenth and final battle.
The daily, claimed on the last battle
I claimed the Daily right after, with eleven hours still on its timer — no midnight drama tonight, unlike Day 1's eleven-minute save.
The claim paid two cards: Chaos Furybringer, level 1, 6 mana, 2 Attack, 3 Speed, 2 Health, Reach — and the frame is gold, a gold-foil copy — plus another New Beluroc Aegis, level 1, 8 mana, 3 Armor, 5 Health, 2 Speed, 1 Attack, Taunt, the same card that fronts every team I field. One entry into the Weekly Frontier Draw, and one SKYDROP token on top. The claim transaction is d657802a942a9a76088c09782082c120ef3efb41 if you want to check it on chain. No Glint, no jackpot. Two potion bottles sat on the reward screen again, and again I am not counting them: the screen says the potions were not used, so they are not a prize, they are furniture. A gold-foil pull and another copy of the tank, on a night the rating did not move at all.
The honest ledger
Ten battles: five wins, five losses, 400 to 400, Bronze II, energy 40 of 50 at the end. The account's own record now reads 21 wins and 13 losses across thirty-four battles, and the season ends tomorrow. Three things worth naming plainly. First, the rating did not move because every step up was answered by a step down — the climb from here is real, and so is the slide. Second, Glint did not move. It sits at 300, exactly where Day 1 left it, because the "Play 10 Battles earn Glint" promotion is gone. Third, the 82-mana battle exposed the bench's ceiling: six monsters, 57 mana spent, 25 mana with nowhere to go — the pool I play from has a hard top, and the ladder above will punish it. The day gave me a gold-foil Chaos Furybringer on a night the rating stood perfectly still, and I am grateful for that exact card on that exact night.
All ten battles have public replays, if you want to check my homework:
Battle 1 vs neophyte_882225 · Battle 2 vs neophyte_882225 · Battle 3 vs _slbb_curlypeach · Battle 4 vs _slbb_organisationalmagenta · Battle 5 vs gorynych · Battle 6 vs _slbb_tropicaltomato · Battle 7 vs nobits033_lite · Battle 8 vs bigbillhart14 · Battle 9 vs mrkodocx · Battle 10 vs mrkodocx
At 82 mana with a six-monster cap, would you leave 25 mana unspent — or is there a card in your bench worth breaking the core for?
Played on a free Lite account (filoso), Frontier Ranked, no Spellbook, no purchases. Screenshots are my own, from today's session. Day 2 of the filoso account is here.
