Splinterlands Engagement Challenge: Paths to Power

Every week there is a Splinterlands challenge that can be found in this week's post. I also encourage Splinterlands players to partake in the challenge because they get to learn about the game. In this week's challenge, I talk about why levels for summoners/archons and monsters are important to improving your Splinterlands power.
Path to Power
The challenge topic is to talk about how to get stronger in the Splinterlands ecosystem. There are many different parts, such as cards that synergize well, how to take advantage of rulesets, and many other topics. However, I still think that one of the simplest things that players need to understand is how Archons/Summoners work with monsters. It teaches players to understand which cards have what abilities, and what level they can be used up to. Without that, you might not be able to synergize cards well or play them according to the ruleset. Some of the most efficient metas on card combinations also require card level requirements so this is an important topic.
Archons/Summoners

Archons are important because they are the first thing that you pick in a fight. Every single summoner has a splinter type, ability, and level. The splinter type determines which cards can be used, the abilities can be used to increase your team or debuff your opponent, and the level determines the maximum level for the cards in the lineup.
For example, Aurelia is an example of an Earth Archon. This means that Earth monsters can be used in your fight, and its ability is +1 health to all monsters in your lineup. At level 1, you can only use level 1 cards for common, rare, epic, and legendary. However, leveling this card to level 4 allows you to use up to level 5 common cards, level 4 rare cards, level 3 epic cards, and level 2 legendary cards.
Monsters

Above is a card called Codex Sage. It is a life splinter that costs 4 mana. This splinter starts with the untrainable ability. Leveling up this card gives it higher stats and the void armor ability at level 3. Another thing to note is that a monster will gain either stats or abilities with each level, so that can give you a slight advantage in fights. With a level 1 Archon, you would not be able to get the void armor ability even if you had a level 3 version of this card.

For example, in my battle selection screen, I have a level 2 rare water archon. This allows my common cards to be played up to level 3 and my rare cards to be played up to level 2. Any of the cards with the yellow ! mark are cards that I do not have a high enough Archon so they are lowered down in level.
Conclusion and thoughts
Overall, I think that understanding how Archons and monsters work is beneficial. Increasing their level means you have stronger monsters in terms of stats or abilities, and this can be very useful in your fights. If you are struggling due to low-level cards, it does not hurt to level them up, so long as you make sure that you have an Archon that can use them. It also opens up the option of different card synergies and more options in your own fights. Although I did not mention it specifically in this post, higher-level cards also move faster in the turn order.
What do you think about summoners/archons and monsters? I think that understanding this is the first step to getting powerful in Splinterlands. Do you think something else is more important?
Feel free to leave a comment if you read my post. If you have any questions, feel free to ask and I will do my best to answer.
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Have an awesome week and good luck with your battles!
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Well explained.Leveling up and combining cards effectively is definitely the path to stronger battles and more fun in Splinterlands.
Isn’t Splinterlands pretty much dead?
Splinterlands is not dead, but the token price isn't doing the greatest. They are still doing updates, and the latest ones have been focused on land.
Thanks for sharing! - @mango-juice
