The problem with Runic Dome is that knowing the enemy's intentions is one of my favorite mechanics of StS, which sets it apart from other games like this, and Runic Dome actively destroys that fun.
There was an interview with the Megacrit devs where they talked about how much the intention mechanic added to their game when they tried it out, how much their playtesters loved it and how much better the game is now with that mechanic. And even with that knowledge they still went and added Runic Dome to the game. :?
The problem with Runic Dome is that knowing the enemy's intentions is one of my favorite mechanics of StS, which sets it apart from other games like this, and Runic Dome actively destroys that fun.
Agreed on that. I've made Dome work for me, and dunked on A20 with it - sometimes the challenge is nice. But i thorughly agree with Intentions just being SO GOOD.
Meanwhile, i keep quitting my current Watcher game. Why? To give my poor zombie brain a break.
Nilroy's Codex. Dead Branch. Gambling Chip. And i took the upgrade all cards, no healing event (Knowing this would cost me the run, but LEARNING). It is SO HIDEOUSLY COMPLICATED TO PLAY THIS DECK.
SO SO COMPLICATED.
It's also REALLY strong, but ridiculously hard to play.
One thing it's taught me though? Holy shit i have been SLEEPING on Foreign Influence. The bit i missed? It uses the same rare card generation mechanic that Pandora's box, Nilroys, Astrolabe etc use. That is: It just looks at the entire pool of cards and generates a selection of attacks from those, with no weighting towards or away from Rares. The results are very, very sweet. (And actually kinda awesome, because card-sleection on attacks is super strong, and they stop clogging your deck after the fight)
I always forget that foreign influence doesn't do the thing where it makes the card cost 0 until end of turn, like Discovery.
I draft it a lot because, afaik, there is only one card for watcher that gives vulnerable? Also I don't like the watchers aoe cards, so I hope to get one of those two things, normally.
I always forget that foreign influence doesn't do the thing where it makes the card cost 0 until end of turn, like Discovery.
I draft it a lot because, afaik, there is only one card for watcher that gives vulnerable? Also I don't like the watchers aoe cards, so I hope to get one of those two things, normally.
There's two watcher cards that give vulnerable but Wave of Hand is so crappy I'd never draft that. Crush Joints is pretty nice though, I try to get one usually. And I like Foreign Influence too, getting something like a Dagger Spray for an AE fight is soo nice (and that's far from the best card you can get).
Anyone know of any good write ups or videos on deck building strategies and path selection? On PC I got up to A8 or A9. On Xbox I just hit A4 on all. I feel like my ability to play an individual match is rock solid, but my card choices may not always be the best for building my decks.
For path selection, generally try to pick the path that has the most elite + campfire spots with focusing as follows:
1) Act 1 - Focus on normal mobs
2) Act 2 - Mix of normal mobs and ? encounters
3) Act 3 - Mostly going for ? encounters with a few normal mobs if I'm missing a key normal/uncommon card.
This is obviously just in general. Like, if I get a mummified hand and the artifact that upgrades powers while playing as the Defect, I will go for more normal fights because I want to get more powers.
For deck building, I know you can go thematic decks like strength stacking or block stacking ironclad, shiv/poison/draw silent, lit/frost/darkness/power/0-cost defect, etc. How do you evaluate a card though, rather than against a theme, but for it's value in the moment and for later?
You should always be doing the thing that makes you the strongest while not killing you.
That may seems obvious, but puzzling out what that is, makes up about 50% of the game.
In act I (and all of them), you should be looking to get the cards/potions to beat as many elites as you reasonably can without missing too many campfires or shops. Balancing the value of each of those spots is contextual and won't always be one or the other. Sometimes it's better to get a random relic (and a good shot at a rare card, and some gold) than it is to upgrade a card in your deck, sometimes it isn't.
Sometimes your deck is set up to stomp 2 out of the 3 possible elites but the third will get you. And then you have to decide if you need that relic+ enough to take the 33% chance and getting your face bashed in.
In general, I will say its better to take an elite later in an act, because elites don't get stronger, but you should be. And also hallway fights get harder the later in an act.
? vs hallway fights are also contextual. I would say, if you deck needs a card really bad, like at the start of act I before you have some decent attacks, hallway fights might be better than ?s.
Also you can do really deep dives and find out which events appear on which act, and keep track of the ones you've already had and factor that into your pathing.
Ideally I would skip stores in Act 1 so there’s a nice pile of money for that early act 2 store, but practically if a deck isn’t feeling strong for an upcoming elite you will want to get a potion or something to make an early fight possible.
Anyone know of any good write ups or videos on deck building strategies and path selection? On PC I got up to A8 or A9. On Xbox I just hit A4 on all. I feel like my ability to play an individual match is rock solid, but my card choices may not always be the best for building my decks.
For path selection, generally try to pick the path that has the most elite + campfire spots with focusing as follows:
1) Act 1 - Focus on normal mobs
2) Act 2 - Mix of normal mobs and ? encounters
3) Act 3 - Mostly going for ? encounters with a few normal mobs if I'm missing a key normal/uncommon card.
This is obviously just in general. Like, if I get a mummified hand and the artifact that upgrades powers while playing as the Defect, I will go for more normal fights because I want to get more powers.
For deck building, I know you can go thematic decks like strength stacking or block stacking ironclad, shiv/poison/draw silent, lit/frost/darkness/power/0-cost defect, etc. How do you evaluate a card though, rather than against a theme, but for it's value in the moment and for later?
WHY HULLO, DID SOMEONE SAY MY NAME.
Okaaaay!
So!
Act 1: Kill Elites. No, more Elites. NO EVEN MORE THAN THAT. Act 1 is about one thing and one thing only: Burning up your hp to get as strong as possible. Frankly, expect to die a lot doing this. That's okay! You're going to be learning a whole new stratergy and punching out elites or getting your lights punched out is the best way. The thing about elites is they are bar nothing the BEST value/floor you can get. an Elite represents: Garunteed gold. A garunteed relic AND a card choice that has +10% chance of being a rare. You also have the chacne to get a potion.
In general, how i'd rank floors, without anything else going on is: Elites -> Campfires/Shops -> Events --> Normal Fights. Stuff that can modify this ranking includes things like Black Star, Preserved Insect, Shovel, Giryia, Question Card, Prayer Wheel... you get the gist - There's a lot that can change how you're valuing floors. Also, obviously, you cannot value floors if you're dead.
Act 2: Elites if you can take them, otherwise act 2 invets are incredibly, incredibly strong. Act is mostly about refining what your deck is doing, or scrabbling to find answers if you've got no idea what your deck is doing. Act 2 elites are a giant jump in harshness from act 1, and demand a heavy investment in AoE effects to really be safe - and even with that you still have to deal with book of stabbing somehow.
Act 3: Final refinements for your deck, prepping for act 4. At this point you're either off to the races, or you're still scrabbling up answers.
As to drafting: I'm ignoring themes or archtypes in general (Well, within reason. If i'm not doing anything with strength, why would i take Heavy Blade or Sword Boomerang? etc). What i'm trying to answer is the following questions:
How do i scale? How do i frontload my damage? How do i scale my defenceses? How do i frontload my defences? How's my ability to draw and put into play what i need?These are all the things i'm trying to answer.
Like early act 1 - How am i killing elites? They're all damage races, really. So that's a priority to solve. After that, the question becomes: How am i beating the boss? Hexaghost demands i scale. Slime demands i have either burst, or significant aoe. Ideally both. Guardian demands i be able to alternate my defences and offenses on demand
Most of the time, having information on what to expect from the enemy is more valuable (by a lot) than 1 extra energy
It’s not like Runic Dome is the only way to add energy to your deck; hell, I’ve had Heart defeats, as in plural, with only 3 energy, so it’s not like having an energy relic is mandatory for victory
It just sucks because every time it comes up in the boss relics it’s just a waste of a slot because I’ll never ever take it
I'm probably going for too many elites in Act 2. I'm basically treating Act 2 as a repeat of Act 1. If it works, I usually find Act 3 a cake-walk. But I've been dying a lot recently in Act 2.
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Mojo_JojoWe are only now beginning to understand the full power and ramifications of sexual intercourseRegistered Userregular
This is interesting
My ordering has been Chests > Elites > Shops if I've got over 400 cash > Bonfires > ? > Normals
Regardless of the act
Homogeneous distribution of your varieties of amuse-gueule
Beat it with the ironclad guy. 12 attempts with various characters, 1 victory.
Combining the cards that kept your block, doubled your block and then did damage equalling your block was the combo I used to beat the third act boss (I think it was two donuts). The exhaust card that adds 30 odd to your block also came in handy, as did the attack card that puts something from your discard on top of your draw pile.
Picked up some nice relics on the way, like the one that does 50 odd damage after 7 turns. Very handy in boss fights.
I'm probably going for too many elites in Act 2. I'm basically treating Act 2 as a repeat of Act 1. If it works, I usually find Act 3 a cake-walk. But I've been dying a lot recently in Act 2.
So, Act 2 elites are hell. The importnat thign to remember with act 2 is that act 2 Hard hallway fights (Any hallway fight past the first 2) are also hell. Act 2 suuuuuucks. If you're fighting things.
But you're going to have to fight things, so how do you get through act 2?
The first thing is that act 2 demands AoE. Crippling Cloud is not a very good card in act 1 - it's hardly a bad card there, but it's not amazing. Crippling Cloud will stomp on every act 2 fight save Gremlin Leader, and even then it messes that fight up. Immolate, Corpse Explosion, Electrodymanics, these are all cards you take end of act 1 because they ANNHILATE act 2 for you. Silent will often take a single Dagger Spray, or aIronclad will lean into Whirlwind - not because they're great cards (They're okay, solid attacks), but again because they're AoE and you just need AoE.
The second thing you need is a way to deal with book of stabbing. This traditionally means a way to cripple it's strength (Disarm, Piercing Wail), or a way to make it's attacks hurt it more than they hurt you (Liquid Bronze, Caltrops, Static Discharge). Or just a way to kill it before it ramps out of control - generally you wanted it dead before it can hit you with it's 7x5 attack.
The other thing that helps is understanding the AI of each of the three Elite fights.
Tri Slavers: Red Slaver is always the priority to kill. One, he can Vuln you, causing a massive spike in damage. Two, he can ensare you, stopping your attacks - both are bad. You want to kill him turn 1, turn 2 at most really - beyond that, it can be too late. After that, it's your choice - Traditionally i take out the Blue Slaver (Weak is also crippling), followed by the Slaver Boss, but sometimes taking out the slaver boss so you dont drown in Wounds is the right approach.
Gremlin Leader: Gremlin leader has three actions: Summon, Buff, Attack. Gremlin leader can never do an action twice in a row (If he buffs, he can only summon or attack next turn). Gremlin Leader can also only summon if he's got less 2 gremlins on the field. Therefore, you want a way to kill the gremlins as fast as possible, to ideally lock him in a loop of summoning and buffing. Second to this: Gremlin leader likes to buff more the more gremlins there are. He likes to summon the less gremlins there are. Hence - you can ideally lock him in a loop. But be careful: It's by no means garunteed. If you take too long to kill him, he is going to roll to attack you, and he may be insanely buffed when he does.
Book of Stabbing: Book of Stabbing has the simplest AI. It starts off with either a Multiattack for 7x2, or a straight attack for 24. and from that point, it just starts ramping up - two multi attacks, straight attack, two multi attacks. Every time it attacks, it's multiattack goes up by one attack. Theoretically you could stall the fight until the Book is doing 99x7, in which case a: Well done, B: Stop playing the game and get some fresh air!
All of this said, it's worth noting that Act 2 is stuffed to the gills with good events - Bites are AMAZING if you can get them upgraded, havent removed any strikes, or have only rmeoved one or two and have the blood vial to trade in. (And upgraded bites are so, so strong it's not funny). Apparitions are gamebreakingly good. The weakest of the three tomes is necronomicon, and it's still crazy strong in the right deck - Enchridion and Nilry's are flat out busted relics. Colosseum is such a huge burst of power it's almost never worth bailing (Side note, you can only find the Colosseum in events after the treasure chest). The libary gives you an amazing amount of card selection to find that silver bullet you needed - or just a good heal. even the Bandits and Sacrifical Shrine events have big upsides, as do the Flaming Skull and Bet event.
Beat it with the ironclad guy. 12 attempts with various characters, 1 victory.
Combining the cards that kept your block, doubled your block and then did damage equalling your block was the combo I used to beat the third act boss (I think it was two donuts). The exhaust card that adds 30 odd to your block also came in handy, as did the attack card that puts something from your discard on top of your draw pile.
Picked up some nice relics on the way, like the one that does 50 odd damage after 7 turns. Very handy in boss fights.
I'm probably going for too many elites in Act 2. I'm basically treating Act 2 as a repeat of Act 1. If it works, I usually find Act 3 a cake-walk. But I've been dying a lot recently in Act 2.
So, Act 2 elites are hell. The importnat thign to remember with act 2 is that act 2 Hard hallway fights (Any hallway fight past the first 2) are also hell. Act 2 suuuuuucks. If you're fighting things.
But you're going to have to fight things, so how do you get through act 2?
The first thing is that act 2 demands AoE. Crippling Cloud is not a very good card in act 1 - it's hardly a bad card there, but it's not amazing. Crippling Cloud will stomp on every act 2 fight save Gremlin Leader, and even then it messes that fight up. Immolate, Corpse Explosion, Electrodymanics, these are all cards you take end of act 1 because they ANNHILATE act 2 for you. Silent will often take a single Dagger Spray, or aIronclad will lean into Whirlwind - not because they're great cards (They're okay, solid attacks), but again because they're AoE and you just need AoE.
The second thing you need is a way to deal with book of stabbing. This traditionally means a way to cripple it's strength (Disarm, Piercing Wail), or a way to make it's attacks hurt it more than they hurt you (Liquid Bronze, Caltrops, Static Discharge). Or just a way to kill it before it ramps out of control - generally you wanted it dead before it can hit you with it's 7x5 attack.
The other thing that helps is understanding the AI of each of the three Elite fights.
Tri Slavers: Red Slaver is always the priority to kill. One, he can Vuln you, causing a massive spike in damage. Two, he can ensare you, stopping your attacks - both are bad. You want to kill him turn 1, turn 2 at most really - beyond that, it can be too late. After that, it's your choice - Traditionally i take out the Blue Slaver (Weak is also crippling), followed by the Slaver Boss, but sometimes taking out the slaver boss so you dont drown in Wounds is the right approach.
Gremlin Leader: Gremlin leader has three actions: Summon, Buff, Attack. Gremlin leader can never do an action twice in a row (If he buffs, he can only summon or attack next turn). Gremlin Leader can also only summon if he's got less 2 gremlins on the field. Therefore, you want a way to kill the gremlins as fast as possible, to ideally lock him in a loop of summoning and buffing. Second to this: Gremlin leader likes to buff more the more gremlins there are. He likes to summon the less gremlins there are. Hence - you can ideally lock him in a loop. But be careful: It's by no means garunteed. If you take too long to kill him, he is going to roll to attack you, and he may be insanely buffed when he does.
Book of Stabbing: Book of Stabbing has the simplest AI. It starts off with either a Multiattack for 7x2, or a straight attack for 24. and from that point, it just starts ramping up - two multi attacks, straight attack, two multi attacks. Every time it attacks, it's multiattack goes up by one attack. Theoretically you could stall the fight until the Book is doing 99x7, in which case a: Well done, B: Stop playing the game and get some fresh air!
All of this said, it's worth noting that Act 2 is stuffed to the gills with good events - Bites are AMAZING if you can get them upgraded, havent removed any strikes, or have only rmeoved one or two and have the blood vial to trade in. (And upgraded bites are so, so strong it's not funny). Apparitions are gamebreakingly good. The weakest of the three tomes is necronomicon, and it's still crazy strong in the right deck - Enchridion and Nilry's are flat out busted relics. Colosseum is such a huge burst of power it's almost never worth bailing (Side note, you can only find the Colosseum in events after the treasure chest). The libary gives you an amazing amount of card selection to find that silver bullet you needed - or just a good heal. even the Bandits and Sacrifical Shrine events have big upsides, as do the Flaming Skull and Bet event.
Does the probability of seeing any aoe cards at all before act 2 always work out such that you can reliably get them most -or all- games?
If moving in to act 2 without aoe, what then? Just avoid elites and focus on ?/shops/fires?
I'm probably going for too many elites in Act 2. I'm basically treating Act 2 as a repeat of Act 1. If it works, I usually find Act 3 a cake-walk. But I've been dying a lot recently in Act 2.
So, Act 2 elites are hell. The importnat thign to remember with act 2 is that act 2 Hard hallway fights (Any hallway fight past the first 2) are also hell. Act 2 suuuuuucks. If you're fighting things.
But you're going to have to fight things, so how do you get through act 2?
The first thing is that act 2 demands AoE. Crippling Cloud is not a very good card in act 1 - it's hardly a bad card there, but it's not amazing. Crippling Cloud will stomp on every act 2 fight save Gremlin Leader, and even then it messes that fight up. Immolate, Corpse Explosion, Electrodymanics, these are all cards you take end of act 1 because they ANNHILATE act 2 for you. Silent will often take a single Dagger Spray, or aIronclad will lean into Whirlwind - not because they're great cards (They're okay, solid attacks), but again because they're AoE and you just need AoE.
The second thing you need is a way to deal with book of stabbing. This traditionally means a way to cripple it's strength (Disarm, Piercing Wail), or a way to make it's attacks hurt it more than they hurt you (Liquid Bronze, Caltrops, Static Discharge). Or just a way to kill it before it ramps out of control - generally you wanted it dead before it can hit you with it's 7x5 attack.
The other thing that helps is understanding the AI of each of the three Elite fights.
Tri Slavers: Red Slaver is always the priority to kill. One, he can Vuln you, causing a massive spike in damage. Two, he can ensare you, stopping your attacks - both are bad. You want to kill him turn 1, turn 2 at most really - beyond that, it can be too late. After that, it's your choice - Traditionally i take out the Blue Slaver (Weak is also crippling), followed by the Slaver Boss, but sometimes taking out the slaver boss so you dont drown in Wounds is the right approach.
Gremlin Leader: Gremlin leader has three actions: Summon, Buff, Attack. Gremlin leader can never do an action twice in a row (If he buffs, he can only summon or attack next turn). Gremlin Leader can also only summon if he's got less 2 gremlins on the field. Therefore, you want a way to kill the gremlins as fast as possible, to ideally lock him in a loop of summoning and buffing. Second to this: Gremlin leader likes to buff more the more gremlins there are. He likes to summon the less gremlins there are. Hence - you can ideally lock him in a loop. But be careful: It's by no means garunteed. If you take too long to kill him, he is going to roll to attack you, and he may be insanely buffed when he does.
Book of Stabbing: Book of Stabbing has the simplest AI. It starts off with either a Multiattack for 7x2, or a straight attack for 24. and from that point, it just starts ramping up - two multi attacks, straight attack, two multi attacks. Every time it attacks, it's multiattack goes up by one attack. Theoretically you could stall the fight until the Book is doing 99x7, in which case a: Well done, B: Stop playing the game and get some fresh air!
All of this said, it's worth noting that Act 2 is stuffed to the gills with good events - Bites are AMAZING if you can get them upgraded, havent removed any strikes, or have only rmeoved one or two and have the blood vial to trade in. (And upgraded bites are so, so strong it's not funny). Apparitions are gamebreakingly good. The weakest of the three tomes is necronomicon, and it's still crazy strong in the right deck - Enchridion and Nilry's are flat out busted relics. Colosseum is such a huge burst of power it's almost never worth bailing (Side note, you can only find the Colosseum in events after the treasure chest). The libary gives you an amazing amount of card selection to find that silver bullet you needed - or just a good heal. even the Bandits and Sacrifical Shrine events have big upsides, as do the Flaming Skull and Bet event.
Does the probability of seeing any aoe cards at all before act 2 always work out such that you can reliably get them most -or all- games?
If moving in to act 2 without aoe, what then? Just avoid elites and focus on ?/shops/fires?
There are a bunch of commons that are aoe, yeah. Thunderclap/kinda sword boomerang for ironclad, dagger spray for silent, eye beam or whatever it's called for defect, and the free 8 damage card for the watcher - desecration?
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Mojo_JojoWe are only now beginning to understand the full power and ramifications of sexual intercourseRegistered Userregular
Boom. Cleared with Ironclad. +5 searing blow and a pen nib is no joke
Just silent left to go
Homogeneous distribution of your varieties of amuse-gueule
I'm probably going for too many elites in Act 2. I'm basically treating Act 2 as a repeat of Act 1. If it works, I usually find Act 3 a cake-walk. But I've been dying a lot recently in Act 2.
So, Act 2 elites are hell. The importnat thign to remember with act 2 is that act 2 Hard hallway fights (Any hallway fight past the first 2) are also hell. Act 2 suuuuuucks. If you're fighting things.
But you're going to have to fight things, so how do you get through act 2?
The first thing is that act 2 demands AoE. Crippling Cloud is not a very good card in act 1 - it's hardly a bad card there, but it's not amazing. Crippling Cloud will stomp on every act 2 fight save Gremlin Leader, and even then it messes that fight up. Immolate, Corpse Explosion, Electrodymanics, these are all cards you take end of act 1 because they ANNHILATE act 2 for you. Silent will often take a single Dagger Spray, or aIronclad will lean into Whirlwind - not because they're great cards (They're okay, solid attacks), but again because they're AoE and you just need AoE.
The second thing you need is a way to deal with book of stabbing. This traditionally means a way to cripple it's strength (Disarm, Piercing Wail), or a way to make it's attacks hurt it more than they hurt you (Liquid Bronze, Caltrops, Static Discharge). Or just a way to kill it before it ramps out of control - generally you wanted it dead before it can hit you with it's 7x5 attack.
The other thing that helps is understanding the AI of each of the three Elite fights.
Tri Slavers: Red Slaver is always the priority to kill. One, he can Vuln you, causing a massive spike in damage. Two, he can ensare you, stopping your attacks - both are bad. You want to kill him turn 1, turn 2 at most really - beyond that, it can be too late. After that, it's your choice - Traditionally i take out the Blue Slaver (Weak is also crippling), followed by the Slaver Boss, but sometimes taking out the slaver boss so you dont drown in Wounds is the right approach.
Gremlin Leader: Gremlin leader has three actions: Summon, Buff, Attack. Gremlin leader can never do an action twice in a row (If he buffs, he can only summon or attack next turn). Gremlin Leader can also only summon if he's got less 2 gremlins on the field. Therefore, you want a way to kill the gremlins as fast as possible, to ideally lock him in a loop of summoning and buffing. Second to this: Gremlin leader likes to buff more the more gremlins there are. He likes to summon the less gremlins there are. Hence - you can ideally lock him in a loop. But be careful: It's by no means garunteed. If you take too long to kill him, he is going to roll to attack you, and he may be insanely buffed when he does.
Book of Stabbing: Book of Stabbing has the simplest AI. It starts off with either a Multiattack for 7x2, or a straight attack for 24. and from that point, it just starts ramping up - two multi attacks, straight attack, two multi attacks. Every time it attacks, it's multiattack goes up by one attack. Theoretically you could stall the fight until the Book is doing 99x7, in which case a: Well done, B: Stop playing the game and get some fresh air!
All of this said, it's worth noting that Act 2 is stuffed to the gills with good events - Bites are AMAZING if you can get them upgraded, havent removed any strikes, or have only rmeoved one or two and have the blood vial to trade in. (And upgraded bites are so, so strong it's not funny). Apparitions are gamebreakingly good. The weakest of the three tomes is necronomicon, and it's still crazy strong in the right deck - Enchridion and Nilry's are flat out busted relics. Colosseum is such a huge burst of power it's almost never worth bailing (Side note, you can only find the Colosseum in events after the treasure chest). The libary gives you an amazing amount of card selection to find that silver bullet you needed - or just a good heal. even the Bandits and Sacrifical Shrine events have big upsides, as do the Flaming Skull and Bet event.
Does the probability of seeing any aoe cards at all before act 2 always work out such that you can reliably get them most -or all- games?
If moving in to act 2 without aoe, what then? Just avoid elites and focus on ?/shops/fires?
The chance that you see no aoe is very low.
To the point I want to say is impossible. (Now seeing some good aoe...)
Alsoo aoe is only the easiest way to solve these fights - I've beaten them with combo builds that just delete the leader or one of the slavers turn one. Or just have a really big stick to hit them with. Like this is where stuff like a potion can help - you might have no aoe, but an explosive pot or fire pot can do a ton in these fights. Or even just a flex or strength potion can do crazy work. Plus stuff like Stone calendar, Mercury hourglass etc all change the math. (Heck, I had akabeko + chemical x whirlwind the other day. Turn 1 kill on the slavers)
Honestly, its a bit of art figuring out when you can take elites and when you can't. My best advice? Take all the elites you can. Expect to loose. Try and figure out why you lost. Reload the fights and try again - was there a line you missed? Or was your deck just too weak? Why was it weak? Did you not draw your answers in time? Did you not have an answer? Was your damage too low? Did you take too much damage in a previous fight?
Loosing often is the best way to learn in this game. There's no shame in it!
All that said, I def prioritize act 2 events after elites. They just offer you so much power
That's a really good write-up and exactly the kind of help I've been looking for. It's nice to know my interpretation of the Gremlin elite fight has been correct; killing minions makes him attack rarely. The slavers always give me the most trouble, because they're doing 30ish points of damage a turn.
Also, didn't Corpse Explosion used to transfer the poison from the mob that died to all of the other mobs? Or am I misremembering?
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AuralynxDarkness is a perspectiveWatching the ego workRegistered Userregular
That's a really good write-up and exactly the kind of help I've been looking for. It's nice to know my interpretation of the Gremlin elite fight has been correct; killing minions makes him attack rarely. The slavers always give me the most trouble, because they're doing 30ish points of damage a turn.
Also, didn't Corpse Explosion used to transfer the poison from the mob that died to all of the other mobs? Or am I misremembering?
You're thinking of The Specimen, a relic that combos real well with CE.
Also, didn't Corpse Explosion used to transfer the poison from the mob that died to all of the other mobs? Or am I misremembering?
Ages ago it used to do 2x (3x) of target's poison to the target and then reset target's poison to 0, IIRC. Or maybe it did AE damage equal to the target's poison, something like that. That was a long ago though.
ETA:
Corpse Explosion (Silent - Attack)
Cost: 2 Energy
Enemy loses all Poison. Deal damage equal to twice (Upgraded: 3 times) the amount [of poison] lost to ALL enemies.
I just can't get my head around the Ironclad. This class just seems so much worse than the other two, and it seems like they really depend on getting the exact right cards/relic or they get outpaced super quickly.
I just can't get my head around the Ironclad. This class just seems so much worse than the other two, and it seems like they really depend on getting the exact right cards/relic or they get outpaced super quickly.
100% agree! Somehow some people do best with Ironclad, and I don't get them :P
I just can't get my head around the Ironclad. This class just seems so much worse than the other two, and it seems like they really depend on getting the exact right cards/relic or they get outpaced super quickly.
I would actually rate the Ironclad as the easiest/strongest. To the point that when i'm chaining runs i find Ironclad a bit boring somtimes
So i've posted this before, but it's worth reiterating:
Ironclad is amazing at just doing huge amounts of damage easily. Ironclad also has some very, very strong defensive options (Other classes would KILL for Flame Barrier, for one, or Shrug It Off. True Grit too. Hells, Armaments!). What ironclad sucks at is doing both of these in one turn. Which is a huge tripping point for most people. Early ascension levels, Ironclad's ridiculous firepower can carry you through pretty easily. But that's not enough on later Ascension levels. Like no other class rivals Ironclad's ability to just dump frontloaded damage and end things - and at the moment, only Watcher rivals Ironclad for AMAZING early game rares (or amazing rares in general)
Second to this, Ironclad has a lot of issues with energy - lots of it's best cards cost 2 energy, or 3 energy. A lot of it's options to get more energy are
Third to this: A lot of ironclad's good early game cards fall off hard late game. A lot of it's good late game cards are terrible early - an iconic example would be Corruption. Wins you the game mid-act 2 onwards, kinda useless before that.
So how do you solve all of this?
Well, let's break it down - what do we need to solve for Ironclad?
-> We need a way to fix our energy issue.
-> Early game vs Late game dichtomy
-> Balance offense vs defence
So Point 1 is probably hte biggest one, because it really twists everything else.
So how do we solve that? Well, straight off: Most of Ironclad's get energy cards are kinda awful. Also, you cannot rely on them being in hand when you need them. So we can shelve those, but maybe keep an eye out if we have Runic Pyramid.
Okay, so if those are out, how are we solving energy issues? Ironclad has two big options here - Boss Relic and Corruption.
Boss relic is the easiest and most reliable option. Any of the energy relics are great on Clad, though they all impose restrictions. Mark of Pain is notably bad however, though the new Firebreathing makes it okayish. Still, that's one i'd avoid (Sacificing your card draw for energy is only a good bet when you can do something about that - bottled evolve, for instance). Velvet Choker also locks you out of Deadbranch/Corruption shennagins. But that's okay, i've won plenty of Clad runs with choker - just be aware of the consquences.
The spicy option is Snecko Eye. Clad has so many expensive cards that Snecko is amazing in general, and clad is NEVER unhappy to get an extra 2 card draw per turn.
The third option is Corruption. Exhuasting your cards sounds scaaaaary, but it's really only a threat in very long fights. And even then, it provides so much power. Corruption also goes amazingly with Snecko - it overwrites Snecko's cost randomziation. And exhausting your card pool is a very powerful thing, to let you draw your strong options more often
Figuring out all of this lets you start to deal with balancing your offenses vs your defences. Corruption is a big option here - knocking all of your defensive cards to zero helps. Another big option is Reaper. Ironcla'ds strenght scaling is insane, and comes in multiple flavours (Flat, based on stacking Inflame, Steady based on Demon Form/Spot Weakness, or Expotnential based on Limit Break+ abuse with headbutt or Exhume shennagins). Being able to convert all this offensive oompf into healing is great. Obviously, if you can score Bite+, Ironclad loooves those.
Taking corruption also unlocks the Feel No Pain/Juggernaught Combo. by itself, Feel No Pain is a card you take early because it stomps all over the Sentries fight (and the Chosen fight), but it dosent do much else. Late game, FNP is an incredible defensive engine... if you can exhaust reliably. Juggernaught meanwhile is an okay card, but combining it with Feel No Pain and Corruption causes some crazy things to happen. Specifcally, exhausting a defend or any card that gives you block gives you DOUBLE juggernaught procs - One for the cards defense, and a second proc from Feel No Pain's proc. This combo is referred to exodia for a good reason. (For those not familar with Yu-Gi-Oh, assembling all five pieces of Exodia wins you the game instantly. FNP/Corruption/Juggernaught has a similar effect. Adding Dark Embrace and Barricade to it just makes the effect nuttier)
Entrench is worth mentioing here, but it's very slow. The ideal way to use entrench is usually with a runic pyramid deck - You need to be able to hold it till you can create a chunk of block in one turn, double it, and then fetch back Entrench to do it again. And obviously, you want Callipers or Barriacde to keep all that block - I'd prefer Calipers here, but Barriacde is still a valid option. Obviously, if you're doing this,Body Slam becomes a real option.
Okay, so we've talked about Energy, we've talked about balancing defense and offences. So what about Early game vs Late game?
Well, this is a toughie. Frankly, this is a problem that all classes face, but we're talking about ironclad.
Well, you cant get to the late game without surving the earl game, so what can we do there?
Ironclad loves relics. He has a lot of great class specific ones, and stuff like Oricalcum, Tungsten Road, Torii, Thread and Needle, are all great, helping with his defensive issues. So right off the ad, taking rare relic at Neow is a great choice.
Ironclad's rares are almost universally amazing, and several - Bludgeon, Feed, Immolate, Fiend Fire can be game winning if you get them from Neow at the start of the run. Offering, Reaper, Impervious, Demon Form are also all good, and even stuff like Beserk is now pickable early. So that's another solid option. Similarly, taking gold for max hp, or hp is a good choice on Ironclad with an early shop. I dont recommend taking a curse, unless you feel like playing the odds - It diminishes the value of getting gold severely. Curse for Max HP or Rare card is worth it though. (Ironclad gets a whopping +14 max hp from Neow, which is as good as getting the Mango rare relic). Loosing Gold for Rare card is usually worth it, as is Max Hp.
Upgrading a card is a good option for Clad as well - Bash is a VERY strong upgrade (3 vuln is a lot more usuable than 2 vuln, esp with Clad's energy issues).
Right now i'd avoid the hell out of the colourless cards - they've just changed how that works on the beta, and frankly, i have no idea how to judge those changes yet. Still, Colourless cards are very niche, so...
Anyway. Beyond that, early on you want to look to be picking up stuff like Anger, Uppercut, or if you get lucky, immolate & feed. FNP to take out tri sentries is valid, Whirlwind is okaaay (But really needs an upgrade). Rampage is a very solid early-to-mid game card (It falls off in act 3, but it can win the champ for you solo). Headbutt is almost always useful. Spot Weakness, Inflame, Demon Form... start establishing what you could be doing early are all good options.
Hopefully this helps as a starting point - if you want me to expand on anything, let me know!
@Heffling - You're very welcome. I love talking about this game and streaming tutorials for it as you can probably tell!
Edit: Holy fuck the new Wheel Kick is AMAZING. Probably getting nerfed. it's a straight upgrade to Predator, in a class that's better at making energy and can just flat out DOUBLE ITS DAMAGE. Thing's a workhorse!
Small add to the above, Mark of Pain is also pickable if you get Med Kit (esp with Feel No Pain) and/or Evolve+ (bottled) to counter its downsides.
edit: yeah, zombie's right (see below). I'm forgetting what happens when you draw the wounds on a first pass without Evolve or Firebreathing already in play first to let the wounds do something.
Small add to the above, Mark of Pain is also pickable if you get Med Kit (esp with Feel No Pain) and/or Evolve+ to counter its downsides.
I actually hard disagree there. This would be the case if mark of pain put it's wounds in to your discard pile, but it does not. It puts them into your draw pile. This is INFINITELY worse. For comparison sake, this is worse than Curse of the Bell currently. Like we remove Strikes (and if your deck is strong enough Defends) because they're just BAD draws. Do nothing cards that you cant even cast are so, so much worse to draw, specifically first time through your deck. You just do NOT want to be drawing cards that do nothing.
Bottled Evolve is about the only time i feel comfortable taking Mark of Pain - that and if there's no other energy options, and i desperately need a fourth energy. Firebreathing+ makes it okay because at least then you draw cards that do 10 damage to everything, whcih is pretty crazy - You still have to get Firebreathing in play, and it's not a situation i'm happy about.
Something else worth mentioning: Common relic is a great choice for clad. There's a lot of good common relics, and notably a bunch of them help out on energy - Happy Flower and Art of War are strong, Sundial can do infinites with Pommel Strike+.
Hmm, I think Mark of Pain is totally fine with an unbottled Evolve or Evolve+ (which turns it into card draw)
You might get one cycle where the wounds clog your hand, but one bad draw won't kill you that early in a fight (at least not below Ascension 20 IME), especially if your deck has lots of other draw sources (pommel, shrug, battle trance, etc)
The extra energy is just so incredibly valuable for Ironclad
Hmm, I think Mark of Pain is totally fine with an unbottled Evolve or Evolve+ (which turns it into card draw)
You might get one cycle where the wounds clog your hand, but one bad draw won't kill you that early in a fight (at least not below Ascension 20 IME), especially if your deck has lots of other draw sources (pommel, shrug, battle trance, etc)
The extra energy is just so incredibly valuable for Ironclad
As always, my perspective comes from A20/Heartkills where a single bad draw can end your run. (esp for energy hungry Reaper decks or similar). So always take my advice with that perspective in mind!
ZP, could you do a write-up for Floor 3 strat? I followed your floor 2 advice last night and got my defect up to A4.
I agree that Ironclad is strong, but I feel like he's the most boring.
+1
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ArcticLancerBest served chilled.Registered Userregular
As another badd-o, I also like Mark of Pain. I've never felt like it was that hard to mitigate and works fine with lots of Ironclad cards I would normally take, but I also A) don't usually shoot for heart kills most runs at this point and probably play Ironclad differently than most other people, by the regularity of posts by others about how they play Ironclad. :P
I feel like I usually have enough card draw and exhaust while I often have not enough energy, so ... it works for me. But I also like bad cards like Second Wind so don't rely on me for Ironclad advice. ^_^
ZP, could you do a write-up for Floor 3 strat? I followed your floor 2 advice last night and got my defect up to A4.
I agree that Ironclad is strong, but I feel like he's the most boring.
@Heffling So, honestly, 2k hours in? I dont have an act 3 strat.
Yeah, it sounds crazy to me too.
But the thing about act 3 is it's just incredibly volatile. it can be anything between a curbstomp to a sudden an unexpected lss to a hallway fight, often with the same deck. Just depends on what you roll. That, and because i'm going for heart kills at a20, my act 3 routing is often dictated by "I need at least a couple of campfires so i can get my red key and get a rest if i need it, i need to give up my treasure for a blue key, i need to kill the super elite..." - which of course all changes if i've done any of that before act 3.
Generally though, i'm mainly trying to hunt elites in act 3. Act 3 hallway fights are evil in general - the easiest is probably either the 4x or 3x shape variants. The rest are varying degrees of awful &/or fuck you over depending on your deck. Nemisis is the "Easisest" act 3 elite, but has a tendecy to kill you out of nowhere if he decides to chain 45 damage haymakers into your face. Easiest because he's the most similar to the heart I'm already building for. Giant head is a healthy "Do i actually scale fast enough" check, and Reptomancer involves undiginifed screaming, hoping i have an explosive pot, and more undigifnied screaming. (Reptomancer used to be a hall way fight, consider that - she stole the spot of Double Spheres). Okay, more seriously Reptomancer is a bigger nastier Gremlin Leader who only summons souped up suicide Gremlin Wizards and who's ai cant be manipulated as easily - She can summon if she's got 3 or less daggers, but she's just as likely to decide to beat your face in herself (A skill she does with aplomb). So AoE tactics etc tend to wrok well on her- Electrodymanics into play t1/turn 2 tends to hose the fight fight isntance, and Crippling Cloud can do messy things. (Specimen can do hilariously messy things as each dagger going poof will eventually end up with all the poison on her)
Act 3 events are anywhere from really good (Mind Bloom, Tesseract, ;Falling if it lets you remove a useless card, Double Orb Walker if you can kill, Idol event when you crush it or just need the heal badly, Tomb of Lord Red Mask can be great too) to really bad (Tesseract when it costs you ten and you get nothing, Double Orb Walker, Falling most of the time, Bloody freaking Warp to the boss, Madness event)
Really the thing with act 3 is you're in one of three states: You have a clear plan on how to win, and you're refining that. You have a nearly clear plan, and you're trying to find a few last pieces, or You have no plan, your decks a mess and it's time to start belting out highway to hell while you ride eternal, hoping that by the time you skid to a stop you've found a solution to the whole "Win the game" thing. The phase space for decks and relics by the time you hit act 3 is just insanely, insanely huge mindbogglingly huge.
Most of them have some level of descriptive-ish title, usually that sums up whatever the major thing the deck's doing. Or in the case of "Go home X, you're drunk" titles, i've given up figuring out what the deck was doing. Presumably alchol was invovled, which is strange given i'm a teetotaller undead mockery of life. I'm usually hitting act 3 by 20-30 minutes into those, so try jumping into some of them and see what you can glean from what i'm doing. I'll try and tag you next time i stream and make a point to talk about my routing then.
(Also, yes, totally judge @ArcticLancer for their ironclad choices. Though Second wind is perfectly fine, it's just not an always take - it has it's niche and it does it's niche well)
Lately I feel like I've been doing way worse at the game than normal, so it's good to have these writeups and whatnot to give me an idea of what I'm not doing/what I should be doing.
Also I've straight up skipped some relics because they were all booby prizes like "not seeing enemy intents" or the one that makes your enemies stronger for a measly extra energy.
Lately I feel like I've been doing way worse at the game than normal, so it's good to have these writeups and whatnot to give me an idea of what I'm not doing/what I should be doing.
Also I've straight up skipped some relics because they were all booby prizes like "not seeing enemy intents" or the one that makes your enemies stronger for a measly extra energy.
The +1 enemy strength for an extra energy is a great deal
Losing intents makes it super hard (and less fun)
Losing out on card options can be fine if you've already sorted yourself out
These are my strong opinions
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There was an interview with the Megacrit devs where they talked about how much the intention mechanic added to their game when they tried it out, how much their playtesters loved it and how much better the game is now with that mechanic. And even with that knowledge they still went and added Runic Dome to the game. :?
Dying is fine.
Y'all should die more often.
I'll take useless posts for $500, Alex.
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Agreed on that. I've made Dome work for me, and dunked on A20 with it - sometimes the challenge is nice. But i thorughly agree with Intentions just being SO GOOD.
Meanwhile, i keep quitting my current Watcher game. Why? To give my poor zombie brain a break.
Nilroy's Codex. Dead Branch. Gambling Chip. And i took the upgrade all cards, no healing event (Knowing this would cost me the run, but LEARNING). It is SO HIDEOUSLY COMPLICATED TO PLAY THIS DECK.
SO SO COMPLICATED.
It's also REALLY strong, but ridiculously hard to play.
One thing it's taught me though? Holy shit i have been SLEEPING on Foreign Influence. The bit i missed? It uses the same rare card generation mechanic that Pandora's box, Nilroys, Astrolabe etc use. That is: It just looks at the entire pool of cards and generates a selection of attacks from those, with no weighting towards or away from Rares. The results are very, very sweet. (And actually kinda awesome, because card-sleection on attacks is super strong, and they stop clogging your deck after the fight)
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I draft it a lot because, afaik, there is only one card for watcher that gives vulnerable? Also I don't like the watchers aoe cards, so I hope to get one of those two things, normally.
There's two watcher cards that give vulnerable but Wave of Hand is so crappy I'd never draft that. Crush Joints is pretty nice though, I try to get one usually. And I like Foreign Influence too, getting something like a Dagger Spray for an AE fight is soo nice (and that's far from the best card you can get).
For path selection, generally try to pick the path that has the most elite + campfire spots with focusing as follows:
1) Act 1 - Focus on normal mobs
2) Act 2 - Mix of normal mobs and ? encounters
3) Act 3 - Mostly going for ? encounters with a few normal mobs if I'm missing a key normal/uncommon card.
This is obviously just in general. Like, if I get a mummified hand and the artifact that upgrades powers while playing as the Defect, I will go for more normal fights because I want to get more powers.
For deck building, I know you can go thematic decks like strength stacking or block stacking ironclad, shiv/poison/draw silent, lit/frost/darkness/power/0-cost defect, etc. How do you evaluate a card though, rather than against a theme, but for it's value in the moment and for later?
That may seems obvious, but puzzling out what that is, makes up about 50% of the game.
In act I (and all of them), you should be looking to get the cards/potions to beat as many elites as you reasonably can without missing too many campfires or shops. Balancing the value of each of those spots is contextual and won't always be one or the other. Sometimes it's better to get a random relic (and a good shot at a rare card, and some gold) than it is to upgrade a card in your deck, sometimes it isn't.
Sometimes your deck is set up to stomp 2 out of the 3 possible elites but the third will get you. And then you have to decide if you need that relic+ enough to take the 33% chance and getting your face bashed in.
In general, I will say its better to take an elite later in an act, because elites don't get stronger, but you should be. And also hallway fights get harder the later in an act.
? vs hallway fights are also contextual. I would say, if you deck needs a card really bad, like at the start of act I before you have some decent attacks, hallway fights might be better than ?s.
Also you can do really deep dives and find out which events appear on which act, and keep track of the ones you've already had and factor that into your pathing.
WHY HULLO, DID SOMEONE SAY MY NAME.
Okaaaay!
So!
Act 1: Kill Elites. No, more Elites. NO EVEN MORE THAN THAT. Act 1 is about one thing and one thing only: Burning up your hp to get as strong as possible. Frankly, expect to die a lot doing this. That's okay! You're going to be learning a whole new stratergy and punching out elites or getting your lights punched out is the best way. The thing about elites is they are bar nothing the BEST value/floor you can get. an Elite represents: Garunteed gold. A garunteed relic AND a card choice that has +10% chance of being a rare. You also have the chacne to get a potion.
In general, how i'd rank floors, without anything else going on is: Elites -> Campfires/Shops -> Events --> Normal Fights. Stuff that can modify this ranking includes things like Black Star, Preserved Insect, Shovel, Giryia, Question Card, Prayer Wheel... you get the gist - There's a lot that can change how you're valuing floors. Also, obviously, you cannot value floors if you're dead.
Act 2: Elites if you can take them, otherwise act 2 invets are incredibly, incredibly strong. Act is mostly about refining what your deck is doing, or scrabbling to find answers if you've got no idea what your deck is doing. Act 2 elites are a giant jump in harshness from act 1, and demand a heavy investment in AoE effects to really be safe - and even with that you still have to deal with book of stabbing somehow.
Act 3: Final refinements for your deck, prepping for act 4. At this point you're either off to the races, or you're still scrabbling up answers.
As to drafting: I'm ignoring themes or archtypes in general (Well, within reason. If i'm not doing anything with strength, why would i take Heavy Blade or Sword Boomerang? etc). What i'm trying to answer is the following questions:
How do i scale? How do i frontload my damage? How do i scale my defenceses? How do i frontload my defences? How's my ability to draw and put into play what i need?These are all the things i'm trying to answer.
Like early act 1 - How am i killing elites? They're all damage races, really. So that's a priority to solve. After that, the question becomes: How am i beating the boss? Hexaghost demands i scale. Slime demands i have either burst, or significant aoe. Ideally both. Guardian demands i be able to alternate my defences and offenses on demand
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It’s not like Runic Dome is the only way to add energy to your deck; hell, I’ve had Heart defeats, as in plural, with only 3 energy, so it’s not like having an energy relic is mandatory for victory
It just sucks because every time it comes up in the boss relics it’s just a waste of a slot because I’ll never ever take it
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My ordering has been Chests > Elites > Shops if I've got over 400 cash > Bonfires > ? > Normals
Regardless of the act
Chests are always the same, unless you go for events which have a small chance at being a chest.
It is impossible to not hit exactly one chest per act.
Edit: Technically you could 'jump into the portal' in act 3 before the chest and skip straight to the boss...
Combining the cards that kept your block, doubled your block and then did damage equalling your block was the combo I used to beat the third act boss (I think it was two donuts). The exhaust card that adds 30 odd to your block also came in handy, as did the attack card that puts something from your discard on top of your draw pile.
Picked up some nice relics on the way, like the one that does 50 odd damage after 7 turns. Very handy in boss fights.
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So, Act 2 elites are hell. The importnat thign to remember with act 2 is that act 2 Hard hallway fights (Any hallway fight past the first 2) are also hell. Act 2 suuuuuucks. If you're fighting things.
But you're going to have to fight things, so how do you get through act 2?
The first thing is that act 2 demands AoE. Crippling Cloud is not a very good card in act 1 - it's hardly a bad card there, but it's not amazing. Crippling Cloud will stomp on every act 2 fight save Gremlin Leader, and even then it messes that fight up. Immolate, Corpse Explosion, Electrodymanics, these are all cards you take end of act 1 because they ANNHILATE act 2 for you. Silent will often take a single Dagger Spray, or aIronclad will lean into Whirlwind - not because they're great cards (They're okay, solid attacks), but again because they're AoE and you just need AoE.
The second thing you need is a way to deal with book of stabbing. This traditionally means a way to cripple it's strength (Disarm, Piercing Wail), or a way to make it's attacks hurt it more than they hurt you (Liquid Bronze, Caltrops, Static Discharge). Or just a way to kill it before it ramps out of control - generally you wanted it dead before it can hit you with it's 7x5 attack.
The other thing that helps is understanding the AI of each of the three Elite fights.
Tri Slavers: Red Slaver is always the priority to kill. One, he can Vuln you, causing a massive spike in damage. Two, he can ensare you, stopping your attacks - both are bad. You want to kill him turn 1, turn 2 at most really - beyond that, it can be too late. After that, it's your choice - Traditionally i take out the Blue Slaver (Weak is also crippling), followed by the Slaver Boss, but sometimes taking out the slaver boss so you dont drown in Wounds is the right approach.
Gremlin Leader: Gremlin leader has three actions: Summon, Buff, Attack. Gremlin leader can never do an action twice in a row (If he buffs, he can only summon or attack next turn). Gremlin Leader can also only summon if he's got less 2 gremlins on the field. Therefore, you want a way to kill the gremlins as fast as possible, to ideally lock him in a loop of summoning and buffing. Second to this: Gremlin leader likes to buff more the more gremlins there are. He likes to summon the less gremlins there are. Hence - you can ideally lock him in a loop. But be careful: It's by no means garunteed. If you take too long to kill him, he is going to roll to attack you, and he may be insanely buffed when he does.
Book of Stabbing: Book of Stabbing has the simplest AI. It starts off with either a Multiattack for 7x2, or a straight attack for 24. and from that point, it just starts ramping up - two multi attacks, straight attack, two multi attacks. Every time it attacks, it's multiattack goes up by one attack. Theoretically you could stall the fight until the Book is doing 99x7, in which case a: Well done, B: Stop playing the game and get some fresh air!
All of this said, it's worth noting that Act 2 is stuffed to the gills with good events - Bites are AMAZING if you can get them upgraded, havent removed any strikes, or have only rmeoved one or two and have the blood vial to trade in. (And upgraded bites are so, so strong it's not funny). Apparitions are gamebreakingly good. The weakest of the three tomes is necronomicon, and it's still crazy strong in the right deck - Enchridion and Nilry's are flat out busted relics. Colosseum is such a huge burst of power it's almost never worth bailing (Side note, you can only find the Colosseum in events after the treasure chest). The libary gives you an amazing amount of card selection to find that silver bullet you needed - or just a good heal. even the Bandits and Sacrifical Shrine events have big upsides, as do the Flaming Skull and Bet event.
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*points at Stone Calendar "look at the time!"
Does the probability of seeing any aoe cards at all before act 2 always work out such that you can reliably get them most -or all- games?
If moving in to act 2 without aoe, what then? Just avoid elites and focus on ?/shops/fires?
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There are a bunch of commons that are aoe, yeah. Thunderclap/kinda sword boomerang for ironclad, dagger spray for silent, eye beam or whatever it's called for defect, and the free 8 damage card for the watcher - desecration?
Just silent left to go
The chance that you see no aoe is very low.
To the point I want to say is impossible. (Now seeing some good aoe...)
Alsoo aoe is only the easiest way to solve these fights - I've beaten them with combo builds that just delete the leader or one of the slavers turn one. Or just have a really big stick to hit them with. Like this is where stuff like a potion can help - you might have no aoe, but an explosive pot or fire pot can do a ton in these fights. Or even just a flex or strength potion can do crazy work. Plus stuff like Stone calendar, Mercury hourglass etc all change the math. (Heck, I had akabeko + chemical x whirlwind the other day. Turn 1 kill on the slavers)
Honestly, its a bit of art figuring out when you can take elites and when you can't. My best advice? Take all the elites you can. Expect to loose. Try and figure out why you lost. Reload the fights and try again - was there a line you missed? Or was your deck just too weak? Why was it weak? Did you not draw your answers in time? Did you not have an answer? Was your damage too low? Did you take too much damage in a previous fight?
Loosing often is the best way to learn in this game. There's no shame in it!
All that said, I def prioritize act 2 events after elites. They just offer you so much power
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Also, didn't Corpse Explosion used to transfer the poison from the mob that died to all of the other mobs? Or am I misremembering?
You're thinking of The Specimen, a relic that combos real well with CE.
Ages ago it used to do 2x (3x) of target's poison to the target and then reset target's poison to 0, IIRC. Or maybe it did AE damage equal to the target's poison, something like that. That was a long ago though.
ETA:
Corpse Explosion (Silent - Attack)
Cost: 2 Energy
Enemy loses all Poison. Deal damage equal to twice (Upgraded: 3 times) the amount [of poison] lost to ALL enemies.
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100% agree! Somehow some people do best with Ironclad, and I don't get them :P
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I would actually rate the Ironclad as the easiest/strongest. To the point that when i'm chaining runs i find Ironclad a bit boring somtimes
So i've posted this before, but it's worth reiterating:
Ironclad is amazing at just doing huge amounts of damage easily. Ironclad also has some very, very strong defensive options (Other classes would KILL for Flame Barrier, for one, or Shrug It Off. True Grit too. Hells, Armaments!). What ironclad sucks at is doing both of these in one turn. Which is a huge tripping point for most people. Early ascension levels, Ironclad's ridiculous firepower can carry you through pretty easily. But that's not enough on later Ascension levels. Like no other class rivals Ironclad's ability to just dump frontloaded damage and end things - and at the moment, only Watcher rivals Ironclad for AMAZING early game rares (or amazing rares in general)
Second to this, Ironclad has a lot of issues with energy - lots of it's best cards cost 2 energy, or 3 energy. A lot of it's options to get more energy are
Third to this: A lot of ironclad's good early game cards fall off hard late game. A lot of it's good late game cards are terrible early - an iconic example would be Corruption. Wins you the game mid-act 2 onwards, kinda useless before that.
So how do you solve all of this?
Well, let's break it down - what do we need to solve for Ironclad?
-> We need a way to fix our energy issue.
-> Early game vs Late game dichtomy
-> Balance offense vs defence
So Point 1 is probably hte biggest one, because it really twists everything else.
So how do we solve that? Well, straight off: Most of Ironclad's get energy cards are kinda awful. Also, you cannot rely on them being in hand when you need them. So we can shelve those, but maybe keep an eye out if we have Runic Pyramid.
Okay, so if those are out, how are we solving energy issues? Ironclad has two big options here - Boss Relic and Corruption.
Boss relic is the easiest and most reliable option. Any of the energy relics are great on Clad, though they all impose restrictions. Mark of Pain is notably bad however, though the new Firebreathing makes it okayish. Still, that's one i'd avoid (Sacificing your card draw for energy is only a good bet when you can do something about that - bottled evolve, for instance). Velvet Choker also locks you out of Deadbranch/Corruption shennagins. But that's okay, i've won plenty of Clad runs with choker - just be aware of the consquences.
The spicy option is Snecko Eye. Clad has so many expensive cards that Snecko is amazing in general, and clad is NEVER unhappy to get an extra 2 card draw per turn.
The third option is Corruption. Exhuasting your cards sounds scaaaaary, but it's really only a threat in very long fights. And even then, it provides so much power. Corruption also goes amazingly with Snecko - it overwrites Snecko's cost randomziation. And exhausting your card pool is a very powerful thing, to let you draw your strong options more often
Figuring out all of this lets you start to deal with balancing your offenses vs your defences. Corruption is a big option here - knocking all of your defensive cards to zero helps. Another big option is Reaper. Ironcla'ds strenght scaling is insane, and comes in multiple flavours (Flat, based on stacking Inflame, Steady based on Demon Form/Spot Weakness, or Expotnential based on Limit Break+ abuse with headbutt or Exhume shennagins). Being able to convert all this offensive oompf into healing is great. Obviously, if you can score Bite+, Ironclad loooves those.
Taking corruption also unlocks the Feel No Pain/Juggernaught Combo. by itself, Feel No Pain is a card you take early because it stomps all over the Sentries fight (and the Chosen fight), but it dosent do much else. Late game, FNP is an incredible defensive engine... if you can exhaust reliably. Juggernaught meanwhile is an okay card, but combining it with Feel No Pain and Corruption causes some crazy things to happen. Specifcally, exhausting a defend or any card that gives you block gives you DOUBLE juggernaught procs - One for the cards defense, and a second proc from Feel No Pain's proc. This combo is referred to exodia for a good reason. (For those not familar with Yu-Gi-Oh, assembling all five pieces of Exodia wins you the game instantly. FNP/Corruption/Juggernaught has a similar effect. Adding Dark Embrace and Barricade to it just makes the effect nuttier)
Entrench is worth mentioing here, but it's very slow. The ideal way to use entrench is usually with a runic pyramid deck - You need to be able to hold it till you can create a chunk of block in one turn, double it, and then fetch back Entrench to do it again. And obviously, you want Callipers or Barriacde to keep all that block - I'd prefer Calipers here, but Barriacde is still a valid option. Obviously, if you're doing this,Body Slam becomes a real option.
Okay, so we've talked about Energy, we've talked about balancing defense and offences. So what about Early game vs Late game?
Well, this is a toughie. Frankly, this is a problem that all classes face, but we're talking about ironclad.
Well, you cant get to the late game without surving the earl game, so what can we do there?
Ironclad loves relics. He has a lot of great class specific ones, and stuff like Oricalcum, Tungsten Road, Torii, Thread and Needle, are all great, helping with his defensive issues. So right off the ad, taking rare relic at Neow is a great choice.
Ironclad's rares are almost universally amazing, and several - Bludgeon, Feed, Immolate, Fiend Fire can be game winning if you get them from Neow at the start of the run. Offering, Reaper, Impervious, Demon Form are also all good, and even stuff like Beserk is now pickable early. So that's another solid option. Similarly, taking gold for max hp, or hp is a good choice on Ironclad with an early shop. I dont recommend taking a curse, unless you feel like playing the odds - It diminishes the value of getting gold severely. Curse for Max HP or Rare card is worth it though. (Ironclad gets a whopping +14 max hp from Neow, which is as good as getting the Mango rare relic). Loosing Gold for Rare card is usually worth it, as is Max Hp.
Upgrading a card is a good option for Clad as well - Bash is a VERY strong upgrade (3 vuln is a lot more usuable than 2 vuln, esp with Clad's energy issues).
Right now i'd avoid the hell out of the colourless cards - they've just changed how that works on the beta, and frankly, i have no idea how to judge those changes yet. Still, Colourless cards are very niche, so...
Anyway. Beyond that, early on you want to look to be picking up stuff like Anger, Uppercut, or if you get lucky, immolate & feed. FNP to take out tri sentries is valid, Whirlwind is okaaay (But really needs an upgrade). Rampage is a very solid early-to-mid game card (It falls off in act 3, but it can win the champ for you solo). Headbutt is almost always useful. Spot Weakness, Inflame, Demon Form... start establishing what you could be doing early are all good options.
Hopefully this helps as a starting point - if you want me to expand on anything, let me know!
@Heffling - You're very welcome. I love talking about this game and streaming tutorials for it as you can probably tell!
Edit: Holy fuck the new Wheel Kick is AMAZING. Probably getting nerfed. it's a straight upgrade to Predator, in a class that's better at making energy and can just flat out DOUBLE ITS DAMAGE. Thing's a workhorse!
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edit: yeah, zombie's right (see below). I'm forgetting what happens when you draw the wounds on a first pass without Evolve or Firebreathing already in play first to let the wounds do something.
I actually hard disagree there. This would be the case if mark of pain put it's wounds in to your discard pile, but it does not. It puts them into your draw pile. This is INFINITELY worse. For comparison sake, this is worse than Curse of the Bell currently. Like we remove Strikes (and if your deck is strong enough Defends) because they're just BAD draws. Do nothing cards that you cant even cast are so, so much worse to draw, specifically first time through your deck. You just do NOT want to be drawing cards that do nothing.
Bottled Evolve is about the only time i feel comfortable taking Mark of Pain - that and if there's no other energy options, and i desperately need a fourth energy. Firebreathing+ makes it okay because at least then you draw cards that do 10 damage to everything, whcih is pretty crazy - You still have to get Firebreathing in play, and it's not a situation i'm happy about.
Something else worth mentioning: Common relic is a great choice for clad. There's a lot of good common relics, and notably a bunch of them help out on energy - Happy Flower and Art of War are strong, Sundial can do infinites with Pommel Strike+.
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You might get one cycle where the wounds clog your hand, but one bad draw won't kill you that early in a fight (at least not below Ascension 20 IME), especially if your deck has lots of other draw sources (pommel, shrug, battle trance, etc)
The extra energy is just so incredibly valuable for Ironclad
As always, my perspective comes from A20/Heartkills where a single bad draw can end your run. (esp for energy hungry Reaper decks or similar). So always take my advice with that perspective in mind!
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I agree that Ironclad is strong, but I feel like he's the most boring.
I feel like I usually have enough card draw and exhaust while I often have not enough energy, so ... it works for me. But I also like bad cards like Second Wind so don't rely on me for Ironclad advice. ^_^
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
@Heffling So, honestly, 2k hours in? I dont have an act 3 strat.
Yeah, it sounds crazy to me too.
But the thing about act 3 is it's just incredibly volatile. it can be anything between a curbstomp to a sudden an unexpected lss to a hallway fight, often with the same deck. Just depends on what you roll. That, and because i'm going for heart kills at a20, my act 3 routing is often dictated by "I need at least a couple of campfires so i can get my red key and get a rest if i need it, i need to give up my treasure for a blue key, i need to kill the super elite..." - which of course all changes if i've done any of that before act 3.
Generally though, i'm mainly trying to hunt elites in act 3. Act 3 hallway fights are evil in general - the easiest is probably either the 4x or 3x shape variants. The rest are varying degrees of awful &/or fuck you over depending on your deck. Nemisis is the "Easisest" act 3 elite, but has a tendecy to kill you out of nowhere if he decides to chain 45 damage haymakers into your face. Easiest because he's the most similar to the heart I'm already building for. Giant head is a healthy "Do i actually scale fast enough" check, and Reptomancer involves undiginifed screaming, hoping i have an explosive pot, and more undigifnied screaming. (Reptomancer used to be a hall way fight, consider that - she stole the spot of Double Spheres). Okay, more seriously Reptomancer is a bigger nastier Gremlin Leader who only summons souped up suicide Gremlin Wizards and who's ai cant be manipulated as easily - She can summon if she's got 3 or less daggers, but she's just as likely to decide to beat your face in herself (A skill she does with aplomb). So AoE tactics etc tend to wrok well on her- Electrodymanics into play t1/turn 2 tends to hose the fight fight isntance, and Crippling Cloud can do messy things. (Specimen can do hilariously messy things as each dagger going poof will eventually end up with all the poison on her)
Act 3 events are anywhere from really good (Mind Bloom, Tesseract, ;Falling if it lets you remove a useless card, Double Orb Walker if you can kill, Idol event when you crush it or just need the heal badly, Tomb of Lord Red Mask can be great too) to really bad (Tesseract when it costs you ten and you get nothing, Double Orb Walker, Falling most of the time, Bloody freaking Warp to the boss, Madness event)
Really the thing with act 3 is you're in one of three states: You have a clear plan on how to win, and you're refining that. You have a nearly clear plan, and you're trying to find a few last pieces, or You have no plan, your decks a mess and it's time to start belting out highway to hell while you ride eternal, hoping that by the time you skid to a stop you've found a solution to the whole "Win the game" thing. The phase space for decks and relics by the time you hit act 3 is just insanely, insanely huge mindbogglingly huge.
Something i can suggest to toot my own horn: I have a crap ton of vods of a20 heart kills here: https://www.twitch.tv/thezombiepenguin/videos?filter=highlights&sort=time
Most of them have some level of descriptive-ish title, usually that sums up whatever the major thing the deck's doing. Or in the case of "Go home X, you're drunk" titles, i've given up figuring out what the deck was doing. Presumably alchol was invovled, which is strange given i'm a teetotaller undead mockery of life. I'm usually hitting act 3 by 20-30 minutes into those, so try jumping into some of them and see what you can glean from what i'm doing. I'll try and tag you next time i stream and make a point to talk about my routing then.
(Also, yes, totally judge @ArcticLancer for their ironclad choices. Though Second wind is perfectly fine, it's just not an always take - it has it's niche and it does it's niche well)
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Also I've straight up skipped some relics because they were all booby prizes like "not seeing enemy intents" or the one that makes your enemies stronger for a measly extra energy.
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The +1 enemy strength for an extra energy is a great deal
Losing intents makes it super hard (and less fun)
Losing out on card options can be fine if you've already sorted yourself out
These are my strong opinions