Splinterlands Community Engagement Challenge: Combo Chronicles - The Fire Gladius Buddies!

It's been a while since I did a Community Engagement Challenge and when I saw that this week's theme was Combo Chronicles, I thought why not give it a shot?

And this time round, I am going to introduce the Fire Gladius buddies, which is none other than Gorth and Chimney Wallstop.

Gorth and Chimney Wallstop makes a good pairing because both of them are Gladius cards and they do come with Bloodlust.

• Gorth is a strong Melee attacker upfront as the tank. At Level 2 (currently my card level), it packs 13 HP and with 5 Melee damage, it is almost surely able to get at least one Bloodlust.
• Chimney Wallstop pairs well with Gorth because it has Reach, and can attack from the second position. While Gorth buys time at the front, Chimney Wallstop is also able to make use of the opportunity to clock some Bloodlust and by the time Gorth goes down, it becomes a monster and the opponent would not be able to handle.

Here's a look at the card designs and stats!

Before we go further, here's the lore for Gorth and Chimney Wallstop and you should take a read too!

Gorth is the largest Gladiator who holds the professional title in the Moxian arena. He is a Cyclops hailing from the southern Burning Lands. Unlike most Cyclops who live there, Gorth has educated himself in the common tongue and even taught himself to read simple texts. Until he recently proved this to settle a bet between Relenor Cleaver and Kotriphus Bane, the Gloridax masters would not accept that a Cyclops could learn such skills. His ability to read has allowed him to learn ancient secrets of hand-to-hand combat, including those from Lyveria, Khymeria, even ΛZMΛRÉ. While most Burning Lands Cyclops are still crudely grunting and throwing rocks at distant prey, Gorth charges his enemies head on, swinging the massive hammer that he paid dearly to have crafted especially for him by the famed Dragonborne Smith of southern Praetoria.

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They say that smoking is bad for your health, but so is facing off against Chimney Wallstop in single Gladiator arena combat. When he is not fighting, he is rarely seen without a smoking pipe in his hand and a smile on his face. Before embarking on his Moxian journey to become a professional Gladiator, Wallstop lived alone in one of the slums of Azad, the largest city in the Burning Lands. He scraped a living as a trapper, collecting, crafting and selling wares from the creatures he obtained in the open Ashlands, especially the radiated land near Mitreyya's Hand. This treacherous rocky land has been Chimney's home since he was a boy, when he migrated to the Burning Lands from Anumun by stowing away on a goblin ship. This alone was an incredible accomplishment because goblins are especially vigilant (and severe in punishment) for stowaways. Wallstop has never looked back from his decision to leave his green and lush homeland for the desolate waste of the Burning Lands. He is far more comfortable fighting to survive. As he says: “The world is always trying to kill you. Why let it be sneaky about the effort?”

The burly, bearded man has been nicknamed Chimney so long that he may not even remember his given name. His surname of Wallstop may also be a nickname born of his incredible sturdiness and size, but it is difficult to say for sure. To Chimney, these matters are of no concern. His favorite thing is to sit around a fire all night laughing among friends, smoking his pipeweed like a chimney. The fire inside him is his thirst for adventure, and in recent years it has been smoldering rather than raging. He needs new stories and new adventures, which is why he has decided to travel to Praetoria and join the Gladiators' camp. His weapon is a large hammer handcrafted by his mentor, a famous but retired kobold blacksmith by the name of Hugo Steppor. The hammer is light and easy for Chimney to swing. On one end is a blunt head for smashing, and on the other is a golden spearhead for goring.

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So using the brawl battle to illustrate, here's how I lined up my cards!

• Gorth and Chimney Wallstop at the front. A slight difference this time is because of the Super Sneak ruleset. This means all the Melee attacks would go to the last card (excluding Camouflage).
• Because we have a huge mana quota to fill this time, Lava Launcher takes the 3rd place. Tanky stats and a decent damage output.
• Firecaller took the "last card" in this Super Sneak battle to extra the maximum benefit from the Martyr boost to adjacent cards like Forgotten One and Countess Sinash (who stays camouflaged).

Round 1: And off we went! My opponent cleverly utilised cards with Shield and that meant I had to dig deep to inflict my damage output. With the hits flying over, we managed to get the Martyr boost.

Round 2: Gorth finally went down, and Chimney Wallstop took over the tank position. Countess Sinash's Opportunity hits were very critical and both teams were neck to neck with 4 cards each.

Round 3: My damage output was superior at the late stages as Countess Sinash's Opportunity hits continued to impress while the frontline held very steady.

Round 4: And we won by a larger margin than expected!

You can view the battle here.

So to sum up:

The Fire Gladius buddies, Gorth and Chimney Wallstop, are definitely one of the stronger Melee pairings. The damage output from these two cards at low levels can easily be 10 in total, and the only downside is that they require a huge amount of mana to fill, which means they might not be so suitable to low mana battles.

That's all I have! Let me know if you have any thoughts too!

As always, thanks for reading and have a pleasant day ahead!

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