Slay the Spire - Catch all

EriktheRed wrote:

Snecko Eye is the best relic in the game, fite me.

I daren't, cos I just know that I'll pull an entire hand of cards which all cost 3 to play, and you'll doubtless have a giant attack lined up for that turn.

Unless you're running a zero cost deck (defect or shiv I guess), it's a most take for me. The card advantage alone makes it great, the random cost can be worked around and often works in your favour. Although I won't lie and say that it hasn't screwed me over on a few occusions.

onewild wrote:

Unless you're running a zero cost deck (defect or shiv I guess), it's a most take for me. The card advantage alone makes it great, the random cost can be worked around and often works in your favour. Although I won't lie and say that it hasn't screwed me over on a few occusions.

I feel like it's screwed me over far more often than the well-crafted deck it broke did.

The only time I've really regretting picking up Snecko Eye is when I already had Orange Pellets. I kept accidentally removing the confusion status, so half my deck would end up stuck with random energy costs.

I think it's fascinating that Snecko Eye gets this much discussion over and over again. And not just here.

In a game full of randomness I guess it's the ultimate random item.

Further to that, I think it plays into the adaptability that StS expects from it's players. You can go into a game with the aim of pursuing a particular strategy but you are at the mercy of not only the cards, but also the climb, the potions you are presented with, relics, random events, etc. This means that to be consistently successful you need to be willing to change your strategy on the fly. Snecko Eye pushes that need down to the tactical level while providing some additional assistance in the process.

I personally love it because it has saved me from my own bad decisions a number of times, and I like that it forces me to work with my entire toolset on the fly

I figure this might be a good spot to put this.

I watched some of “Iris and the Giant” on Twitch, last night - it feels like a game that Slay the Spire-ists might also enjoy.

Found a video done by Nookrium, on YT:

I'm trying to get the achievement for beating the game in under 20 minutes and I think I'm picking up some bad habits. I've just been play Ironclad on non-ascension and clicking on AOE attack cards and strength ASAP and ignoring everything else.

First time I tried, I won with Whirlwind + Strength in 24 minutes. Then I lost - a lot of times. Then I just won with two immolates and ways to apply vulnerable. That run took me 23 minutes- so I'm getting better. Hopefully I get a good run, under 20, soon.

Tscott wrote:

I'm trying to get the achievement for beating the game in under 20 minutes and I think I'm picking up some bad habits. I've just been play Ironclad on non-ascension and clicking on AOE attack cards and strength ASAP and ignoring everything else.

First time I tried, I won with Whirlwind + Strength in 24 minutes. Then I lost - a lot of times. Then I just won with two immolates and ways to apply vulnerable. That run took me 23 minutes- so I'm getting better. Hopefully I get a good run, under 20, soon.

It took me a while to get this. Prioritise avoiding fights as they take time, I did it by smithing out any defence cards and going for a big strength ironclad build think I had demon form and I ended up taking the bite cards from the vampire which gave some healing mitigation.

I need to get the plasma and focus defect trophies for the platinum but I can’t seem to get the required rng!

There is some setting that lets you speed up card play animations. Make sure you have that turned on. It will make a difference. I've managed to do a couple sub-20 minute runs, but only on the Dailys.

I wonder if achievement chasing would improve my play? At least it would force me to try some new things.

I've started ascension climbing and have gained a new appreciation for the Silent in the process. That class is better than I was giving it credit for.

I think i'm the worst player of this game... am I the only one that has never beaten it? I think I've beaten a daily, but never the actual campaign. I am such an anti min-maxer and maybe that's costing me. I just take what I think looks interesting and I believe synergizes with whatever I have.

If it makes you happy do what you will, but it does seem like you'll hit a wall fairly quick in ascension levels if you take cards, relics, etc, willy nilly. But it sounds like you're trying to get synergies and that's about all I do and have good success. Some folks may take things a bit more seriously but I always know there will be another run.

I've come pretty close to my 20 minute achievement- I got two wins in that were under 21 minutes this weekend. I just need to get just a little bit luckier.

I did just accidentally get the Ooh! Donut! achievement though while trying this. I had a small deck with 3 copies of Feed, two Inflames, a Spot Weakness and two Limit Breaks+. I was building strength like crazy and it was fairly easy to draw into a Feed on a turn to kill Donu. I didn't get whirlwind until very late in this run so that was slowing me down- no way was I getting a win in under 20, but I did finish with over 160 max HP- so that was fun.

Finally got it tonight, in 18:08! Ended the run with 11 cards in my deck: Whirlwind+ (of course), Inflame+, Double Tap+, Flex+, Seeing Red+, Headbutt, Battle Trance+, Bash+ and Defend+ (x3). I beat Donu and Deca fairly easily.

On my way to the Act 3 boss, I got the Writhing Mass fight twice. That's the enemy that changes attacks every time you damage it, and will sometimes give you a curse (Parasite) in your deck. Both times it gave me the curse after I played whirlwind- but I had Omamori (Negate the next 2 Curses you obtain) so they weren't added to my deck. Talk about being lucky!

Tscott wrote:

Finally got it tonight, in 18:08! Ended the run with 11 cards in my deck: Whirlwind+ (of course), Inflame+, Double Tap+, Flex+, Seeing Red+, Headbutt, Battle Trance+, Bash+ and Defend+ (x3). I beat Donu and Deca fairly easily.

On my way to the Act 3 boss, I got the Writhing Mass fight twice. That's the enemy that changes attacks every time you damage it, and will sometimes give you a curse (Parasite) in your deck. Both times it gave me the curse after I played whirlwind- but I had Omamori (Negate the next 2 Curses you obtain) so they weren't added to my deck. Talk about being lucky!

Congratulations! Well played.i am occasionally banging my head off of the complete the game with 1 relic. To my shame I must admit twice I have built decks that would probably do it and then auto pilot collected a relic late in the game..... Yes I am an idiot.

I did that a few times when trying for that achievement. My strategy for that one was to reroll the starting relic for, hopefully, a decent energy boss relic that I could build my deck around.

Ugh. Had an ironclad run last night where I had the relic 1st attack 2 or more energy gets played twice. Had 2 Bludgeon+ (42 dmg) cards and a Carnage+ (28). Also the relic that applies vulnerable to enemies at battle start.

I killed an elite book of stabbing with 1 Bludgeon+ card on turn 1.

I one shot enemy after enemy in act 3.

Took 5 turns to kill both donuts.

I killed the Spire shield elite before the heart in one turn. I killed the spear only losing 20 health. And I gained 14 max hp after the fight.

Sitting at 117 hp and ready to kick ass... With a backup heal 25% potion... I couldn't even get the heart below half health.

f*ck this game.

I still haven't beat the heart & I've my 3 characters sitting at level 16 ascension. I am thinking I'm the only one who is that deep into the ascension levels, with near 400 hours played, that hasn't tasted victory over that beating lump!

The heart fight is a challenging fight that can change the game if you're planning on going into act 4. It seems pretty easy to build decks that can make it to the heart, but not beat it, especially on higher difficulties. It requires a lot out of your deck: being able to block on turn two, while drawing a lot of status cards; somehow getting some block at the start of each turn so the beat of death doesn't wear you down; finding ways to weaken/or remove strength on turns when it multi-attacks; etc.

I know I link to Jorbs on youtube a lot, but he apparently recently had a world record win streak while playing accension 20, playing each character in order. He uploaded the first win today. CLICK HERE TO WATCH

In the video, he rewatches the run and gives his thoughts on what's happening as well as some great perspective on how he plays, and things to look out for like making sure turn-based relics are set on the correct number for next fight. It's a long video, but I found the insights to be fascinating as someone who's currently playing at accession 19-20. He'll be doing the same thing for the next run, the Ironclad, and I'm really looking forward to it.

Tscott wrote:

things to look out for like making sure turn-based relics are set on the correct number for next fight.

I noticed that today, I had an extra energy every 3rd turn relic, and some fights I would have it on turn 1. Realized it was carrying over between fights. Then when I got to one end of act boss I realized I could have just turtled on the previous enemy and started with 1 more energy.

The heart is a very different ask to every other fight in the game. I find unless I make slightly different decisions on the run that focus on the heart fight I will lose to it. I second Jorbs videos as I think I have mentioned here before. When he tries to explain his thought process it’s very instructive.

Look for the word "overexplain" to find the most instructive Jorbs videos.

I beat the heart on my third try with an Ironclad Body Slam/Barricade/Entrench deck. Did like 450-damage to him with my final body blow. I won't claim to have a lot of heart experience since I've only fought him 3 times but after failing miserably in my first two tries my only thought was "I need a deck that can generate and sustain a lot of block". I would imagine a Defect deck that can generate a full compliment of high focus and frost heavy orbs would also be a good option. The damage just comes too fast and the health pool is so large you need a build that doesn't take too long to ramp up and can then consistently sustain a huge block pool. Anything else just seems like a recipe for disaster.

OK, advice time please. I'm at Ascension level 6 with the Defect, and it feels like I can never get enough defense out.

What do I need to do differently? Forego Claw? Maximise Frost orbs?

I feel like I'm skipping taking cards because there's no good defense-y options.

EDIT - and of course, the VERY NEXT RUN, I get defense up the wazoo, cruise through killing Elites without taking a single point of damage, and kill the awakened one without raising a sweat.

I got Watcher to accession 20 finally this morning (didn't beat the Heart though).

Now I'm trying to get the Silent up accession 20 too. It's currently on accession 19. I'm finding it really tough. The Watcher can have some pretty "easy" (relatively speaking) runs with the right cards even at higher difficulty, but with the Silent I'm usually dying the first elite fight, the act one boss or early in act 2. So frustrating to find yourself with a "good" deck that makes it through act 1 only to watch your health get chipped away in the first 3 fights of act 2.

Got the Defect to Heart, and got him down to about 150 health, but couldn't finish. Replayed it 3 times and that was the best I could do. Had 2 copies of buffer. But the way the heart alternates between x12 attacks and one big one, pretty much made those useless. One saved me from his first huge attack but the 2nd one nearly killed me and the 3rd did.

I had Echo Form, Rainbow, a bunch of solid block cards. Just not enough to outlast him.

I only took 18 damage on the two elites pre-heart.

Really thought I had it that time.

Tscott wrote:

So frustrating to find yourself with a "good" deck that makes it through act 1 only to watch your health get chipped away in the first 3 fights of act 2.

I might be remembering wrong, but I'm pretty sure that Jorbs fellow says the first 3 fights of act 2 are the most dangerous part of the game. I think it has to do with that being the first time you're really tested on your AOE damage.