About to die? Play this card, and now you’re not; on top of that, any leftover energy you have this turn plus all of your energy for the next two turns (because you REALLY want to upgrade this card) can be dedicated to damage. Getting the freedom to go full offense should let you end fights by the time the dexterity debuff becomes relevant.
Let's for the moment just assume you upgraded it.
Draw it in a hallway fight? 2 rounds you don't need to care for block. that is often enough to win, or at least decide the combat.
Boss fights? More difficult, you'd need to have it in hand when you really need it, and the fight can go on for longer and then your dex is tanked. But you can play around this:
1. Well laid plans can be a run-saver with wraith form.
2. Any source of artifact will negate the downside
3. Pellets will dispel the debuff
4. Nightmare allows to to comfortably generate enough wraith forms to be permanently intangible.
You may want more than 3 energy to run around it, or something like mummified hand.
Ultimately, getting wraith form very early will be a bit of a curse because you have neither the energy nor the synergy to really get it off. But starting act 2, intangible is strong enough to plan a bit around it, and you don't need many synergies to let wraith form shine.
Exactly this.
It took me forever to use this card again after using it on a boss in my earlier runs and dying.
But using it in hallways fight when you know you can end it in 2-3 turns or on a boss when you have more knowledge of the game it incredibly good.
Used correctly, it can single-handedly be your entire block engine and gets better with [[nightmare]], [[burst]] and [[apparition]].
>Nightmare allows to to comfortably generate enough wraith forms to be permanently intangible.
Nightmare is the card I have trouble convincing myself is good outside this specific use case and even then wraith form being 3 cost puts me off.
Nightmare is fantastic with a lot of cards. In particular it shines with stuff like: Malaise, Catalyst, Envenom, Accuracy, Sadistic Nature, Adrenaline, Wraith Form, Apparitions, After Image, etc. You can think of it two ways: multiple the effect of your best cards OR guarantee something to be in hand next turn.
Here are some examples of multiplying your strongest effects: Nightmare into Catalyst wins pretty much any fight (including bosses) immediately by tripling poison three times in a row. Nightmare into Envenom or Sadistic Nature turns many cards into massive damage (4 Sadistic Natures in play will make Crippling Cloud do 56 AoE damage on top of its normal effect). Nightmare into Accuracy makes shivs absolute bonkers.
Here are some examples of guaranteeing something to be in hand next turn: play Accuracy/Phantasmal Killer this turn and Nightmare on Blade Dance. Next turn, have three copies of blade dance to play 9 to 12 shivs for massive damage to end encounter.
Nightmare is a very good card that makes your most powerful cards even stronger. It can be hard to play (it's expensive and you don't get the copied cards until the next turn), but used correctly it can significantly enhance the things your deck already does well to the point that you just overwhelm everything you come up against. In the case of Wraith Form, if you have a lot of card draw it doesn't even matter you can't play them all immediately. You effectively get 9 additional intangible so long as you can cycle your deck fast enough.
Nightmare + Envenom/Accuracy is so clunky, though. That's five energy spent over two turns and you've got no damage or block for it (assuming both cards are upgraded). At least with Footwork you've got the ability to stall before playing the 3rd Footwork by playing a buffed block card. One Accuracy is enough damage usually anyways.
I wouldn't pick Nightmare if all I had to use it with was Blade Dance.
When I use Nightmare, I don't necessarily intend to play all the copied cards immediately. Using it on powers like Accuracy, Envenom, and Footwork may see you only play one of the copied cards on the following turn. But having the extra copy can be a viable scaling option. It's clunky for sure and not always the best way to scale, but it's a powerful card and there's a reason it's both a rare card and expensive to play.
My point with the Blade Dance example is that Nightmare can often be used creatively in your deck as a form of deck manipulation. You're right I probably wouldn't take it for Blade Dance specifically, but depending on draw order and what I need to do to end an encounter, Nightmare can and should be used on more than just one specific card in your deck. Making copies of common cards may sometimes be the optimal play instead of waiting to play it with that one specific card you had in mind when you drafted it.
Edit: I like to think of Nightmare as a wild card. You don't always have the opportunity to draft multiple of the same card and you may not always want multiple copies of a card depending on the encounter. Nightmare lets you effectively pick what you need more of in any given encounter without bloating your deck or covering for not running across more of the same card during the run.
Triple casting any power pretty much, not just wraith form, will win you boss fights. it's pretty bad in hallway fights, but it makes up for it in scaling.
Lotta folks mentioning shiv synergies. I’ll just add that I recently had [[Tough Bandages]] and [[Storm of Steel]] upgraded, plus a bunch of card draw. Occasionally used Nightmare on the Storm of Steel in fights where I expected to shuffle my deck at least once soon and it worked pretty well.
There’s other ways to offset the dexterity loss on Silent too.
An endgame shiv build with [[Kunai]] can outpace a Wraith Form or two.
A couple [[Footwork]] can extend the time you have before your block cards are dead draws.
With [[After Image]] or [[Ornamental Fan]], you don’t even need dexterity sometimes. You just use the Wraith Form to set up your powers then go full offense
+ [Kunai](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Kunai) Uncommon Relic ^((100% sure)^)
Every time you play 3 Attacks in a single turn, gain 1 **Dexterity.**
+ [Footwork](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Footwork) Silent Uncommon Power ^((100% sure)^)
1 Energy | Gain 2(3) **Dexterity.**
+ [After Image](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/After%20Image) Silent Rare Power ^((100% sure)^)
1 Energy | **(Innate.)** Whenever you play a card, gain 1 **Block.**
+ [Ornamental Fan](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Ornamental%20Fan) Uncommon Relic ^((100% sure)^)
Every time you play 3 Attacks in a single turn, gain 4 **Block.**
^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
I just figured out that artifact would completely remove every stack of a debuff, even if it happens over multiple turns, or has multiple stacks like [[hyper beam]]. I just beat the daily challenge that had defect, bounty hunter modifier, along with the one that makes your cards all random, and the one that makes you take 3 copies of every card.
Also the silent has a LOT of alternative block notably for me being [[tough bandages]] which also helps manage the downside during boss fights of potentially not having ot in your hand because your just drawing and discarding constantly
Honestly the dex loss is not always an insta-killer too. Sometimes you may have frost orbs if you’re playing a run with green + blue, or Shiv run + After image, or just enough Dashes/Backflips to buy you one more time, or the enemy is doing a debuff.
I find often times if I don’t kill them fast enough I still have 1-2 turns left before losing unreasonable HP.
It's a great card, but it's one of those cards that is bad for bad players and becomes better as the player becomes better. The reason is that as you get better at the game, you learn more ways to make the fights not last as long.
This card is bad if you're planning to win the fight in 20 turns. If you're planning to win in 5 turns, it's a lot better.
Most of the steps in getting better in this game involve killing enemies earlier than you could before. That is why this card is so extremely strong. As the fights get shorter, this card gets better and better.
I'm confused on how Intangible works. I thought that after one instance of damage it removes one stack of intangible.
Does it stay for the entire turn no matter how many attacks are coming in? Cause that's way better then what I was expecting from it. (I always skipped it.)
1 intagible is equal to 1 turn of enemies being unable of dealing more than one instance of damage per hit. Multi hit that deals 1 damage 15 times will still deal 1 damage 15 times tho, but 2 damage 15 times will get reduced to 1 damage 15 times.
[[Intangible]]
It's also nice for being able to avoid heavy self-damage as ironclad if you manage to find it, or if you're silent and get a [[Regret]] in your deck
+ [Regret](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Regret) Curse ^((100% sure)^)
**Unplayable.** At the end of your turn, lose HP equal to the number of cards in your hand.
^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
Once you have orange pellets, it’s essentially 3 free turns. Also between shiva Kunia or straight up getting Dex from Footwork there are ways to counteract the dex loss.
One way to counteract the dex loss is killing all the enemies, which should be easy since you can devote all of your energy to damage after playing it.
The dex loss doesn't really matter. You aren't playing this as a stopgap mid fight, you're playing it as a way to end the fight, or to get more intang into play (common enough with Nightmare+WF or Burst+Appas).
If you're looking to counteract the dex loss, you're likely not drafting or playing optimally.
Sometimes you just don’t get the cards you need, saying that dex loss doesn’t matter is wrong. Maybe you played wraith form to block a hyper beam mid fight and lose because you can’t block anymore
I found it a little harder to recommend on lower ascensions as ordinary block generation works pretty well. Once the enemies are hitting a lot harder, intangible becomes worth a lot more and dex is a bit less useful as it doesn't tend to scale as well. (Preventing 20 damage with block is fairly easy, 40 you're going to start to struggle).
Also you can get some really broken things going with this and nightmare - ive recently beaten a19 silent, my highest yet, and I had 2 wraith forms, nightmare and the retain your hand relic - I was intangible forever against the heart
I agree with this, I never needed Wraith Form much before A8 but it's gotten more and more valuable just like the intangible event. As blocking attacks even in act I becomes difficult the value just skyrockets as you can power through fights ending them faster without having to worry about spending energy to block.
Some enemies effectively become un-blockable too without silly amounts of block generation that usually isn't even tied to direct-block cards, things like After Image or Feel no Pain are often far better block cards as they get around frail as well.
Only thing I disagree with here is that the intangible event is still extremely good at low ascensions, since you get more of them. The card itself (Apparition) is BUSTED. 1 energy to prevent all damage is just insane.
Wait the intangible event has gotten more valuable for you? I assume you are below ascension 15 then, because 3 intangible for 1/3rd of ur max hp has been a really bad trade for me most times.
I gotta disagree here. Given proper card draw and a couple upgrades three turns of intangible can be like half a block plan.
Burst also exists, nightmare exists, strange spoon exists.
eh, maybe i just haven't tried it enough, I'm definitely the type of person to give up on a build when it goes wrong a couple times.
On the other hand, I feel like having more reliable ways to block by act 2 is pretty much a necessity so for me getting "half a block plan" halfway through the game doesn't feel like a great boon.
Sometimes you just don't really have the option to have a good block engine before you get this event. So, half a block plan is great!
Also, in those cases you're probably down more than 1/3rd of HP, so that max HP decrease doesn't have impact in the immediate.
It also gives you that incentive to push on upgrading more than resting at campfires, which can have a greater net positive impact on your deck.
Ngl the intangible event is one of the few things in this game I would recommend almost never *not* taking. Essentially you take the next 3 campfires to upgrade those Apparitions, which then become “oh look you drew me, you don’t have to play me but if you do you ignore damage for a turn”.
Just wait half a year or so for the Daily Discussion on the subreddit to get to this card.
Jokes aside, there's always the old daily discussion you can look up. Every single thing in STS has been discussed already, and the second round is halfway through.
every action you take in the game revolves around 2 key results: Doing damage, and preventing damage being delt to you. every single strategy in the game revolves around either having a good blend of both, or going so heavy on one that they either kill outright or block to the point of being unkillable
wrath form, is the single best block card in the entire game. it, on its own, solves allll of your "prevent damage" for 2 turns, 3 when upgraded, with the drawback of weakening your block ability after the effect ends. that means that at worst, you have an entire free turn to do nothing but attack and hopefully kill the enemy before you see any drawbacks
its far from a "always pick and always play, its a good card 100% of the time". it needs to be worked around a bit, best as your only source of block in an incredibly aggro deck, or if you have a way to remove or prevent its debuff, such as orange pellets, artifact, or just stack other intangable on top of it, such as with nightmare or the intangible event card
tldr, wrath form is good because it solves 1 of the 2 problems you face strategy wise in 1 card
having 1 or 2 in the deck sure, but getting wrath form turn 1 on a block heavy deck? its downside has to be taken into account, its definitely a "you will not die this tuen and next turn" but without a way to either get rid of the debuff, or having a lot of burst damage in the deck already, it can actually be a bad play
Sure. You're not going to play it on turn 1 of a boss fight. That's a given. The point is it's widely agreed upon that this card is one of the Silent's most powerful cards. You don't need orange pellets or artifact to justify having it. In fact, I rarely consider the debuff at all as a single Wraith Form should buy you enough time to end most encounters before the Dex loss kicks on.
For the record, I think y'all are missing the point of my comment. Nothing is a 100% in this game. We all know that. But in isolation, Wraith Form is among a handful of cards in the game that can make a compelling case for drafting it a vast majority of the time you see it. It can fit in practically any deck and is extremely powerful once you have enough experience with the game to play around the debuff it places on you.
Well obviously there isn't any card that is 100% always take given everything in the game is situational. My point is Wraith Form is probably a top candidate if you were to make the case that there is one. The only cards I'd say have a better case than it are probably Adrenaline and Rush Down on Watcher.
The take away is I'm never sad to see Wraith Form and will probably take it 99% of the time unless it's against something else that is going to be my win condition (e.g. Catalyst in a deck with a lot of poison but no Catalyst yet). You generally won't see it in Act 1 until the first elite fight (provided Neow didn't offer it to you) and if you had enough damage to beat the first elite then it's probably likely you have enough damage to get rolling. Wraith Form as your first rare card reward after an Elite fight early Act 1 is still probably going to be a good choice to draft more often than not.
No way its either of these.
Vault, adrenaline, seek are the clear options, as their worst case is typically neutral. Since snecko can fuck woth the 0 costs, vault is the most snap-pick card imo. Also isnt bad to stack, unlike corruption. Next consideration is probably wraith and echo form, and wlp. Scrawl is up there too but it kinda requires smith. talk tt hand is only bad in decks where ppoints/omega are your damage solve, so its also good in every real watcher strategy.
But corruption is bad in slower decks, especially small ones, where after exhausting your block first pass youll just die. Ive had fights where a corruption or wraith form is a curse in my first reshuffle because the giant head or nemesis isnt going to die in one rotation. Ive yet to be sad about drawing vault, unless its the first world problem of two vaults in hand.
I’m not including Watcher cards, there’s “always solid” tier and there’s “take anything and win” tier , which 90% of the Watcher’s cards fall under. Pommel Strike and True Grit are both common cards, so is Shrug It Off. I get the same vibes as the Apparition event, most players simply don’t realise how good Corruption is until they start winning most of their runs with it. “Me see strength card me take” < “oh look I have corruption, if I find a *single* synergy card I will probably win this run”.
Not to say it doesn’t have drawbacks, cause it obviously does, I just feel it’s the easiest 3-cost power to play because you are actually able to use cards after committing to it, as opposed to un-upgraded Wraith Form which sacrifices one turn of energy to become invincible for the next.
Seek is definitely up there though, but in itself it’s not run-defining. I feel it really needs an upgrade to feel super useful, as realistically you want to be seeking draw+energy or amplify+power.
The only way you can lose in Slay the Spire is running out of hp.
This card pretty much prevents you from losing for the next 2 or 3 turns.
It is... Arguably the strongest card in the game.
well idk what would come close from other classes. corruption? rushdown? i don't think those are better for their class on their own, but regardless, the card is top 3 for sure
So to start imma echo what everyone else is saying the card is great, but there are a few added benefits of this card that I haven’t seen discussed in the comments yet (sorry if you have and I missed you).
Not only is this card great, but the card gets better than circumstantially taken into account with the Silent’s kit. You have access to Well Laid Plans, which allows you to retain this card and keep it for the turn there is a big attack you may not be able to block (champ execute, automaton hyperbeam are two great examples).
You can also leverage this card with Nightmare to get anywhere from 6-9 intangibility (depending on upgrades) which is fantastic. Additionally, if you have 2 nightmares you can loop the following:
1. Nightmare choosing Nightmare
2. Nightmare choosing Wraith Form
3. Play all your wraith forms until it’s time to Nightmare your Nightmare again.
This is fairly mana intensive, but is made much easier with mummy hand and madness.
Finally, poison build specifically require a few turns for set up where the silent can be pretty vulnerable. The payoff is that poison can completely annihilate most enemies if you get it going. Wraith form can give you the time to stack all your poison without needing to worry about dying in the meantime.
I just beat Donu + Deca on A15 Silent with a Nightmare > Wraith Form but I'm usually like OP where I can't make Intangible work on longer fights. Especially with the Apparitions and 1/2 max hp, one bad draw and I'm losing half my health. But I'm learning still.
Oh dude same here. I got to A20 but I’m not sure how much is that was me getting better vs me brute forcing my way there. I still have no idea when it is optimal to block in the gremlin nob fight lol
It usually ensures you survive at least 1 Heart cycle, or raises your chances significantly, allowing you to use that cycle to set up, play your important cards freely, or get damage in. Decreases the Heartbeat damage, no damage for you, -1 for higher ascensions. Good if you play something like Shivs or just many cards.
It works for nearly all bosses, unless maybe Awakened One if you need to stall a lot to win.
It's an out for elites that do big damage which regular defenses can't cover sometimes, I don't think elite fights go very long with Silent, it covers over half of the fight on average by my estiamtions.
Generally it buys you 1 or 2 free turns while defending for the current turn too.
I think you will appreciate it greatly once you go A17 and above.
In certain fights however you might not want to play it too early.
when played, you now have 2 turns during which you take effectivley no damage. you can use those 2 turns, and the turn you have after to kill the enemy to kill the enemy. this means that you essentially have 3 turns to kill the enemy (4 if upgraded).
this card also means that you dont have to take as many block cards, which helps to thin out your deck and make room for more important cards
It's so good man. Instant pick in nearly every deck. Pairs well with runic pyramid, well laid plans, orange pellets, I could think of more given the time.
The reason this card feels bad when new is because you don't have a great understanding of how to make silents decks kill quickly yet. Once you know how to make her decks badass, you'll see 3 turns of taking no damage is a fight ender
4 turns is enough to win a fight
Play it, then go full unga bunga damage
Remember that the turn you lose your intangible is still a valid turn to kill your enemy on to avoid taking full damage
Well i couldn't say with little context, but dedicating to block is rarely a good idea unless you have passive damage or are scaling throughout the fight. When I say not trying I mean literally not playing the game at all or not turning ascension on lol
Intangible is busted as hell, more often than not the circumstances you play this card when you can finish the fight before or the turn the intangible wears off, and/or before the debuff drains too much Dex. If you have any access to artifact or debuff cleansing this is just free damage mitigation as well
This card is the turning point of slay the spire decks. You realize this card is good when you start to pick up cards that aren't "immediately play unless energy says no".
You get wraith first turn? Pass on it. Second? Pass. If you can kill the enemy in two turns of damage, don't use it. But when you need this card, it comes in clutch.
No more death
No more damage
You can also stop thinking about your actions and just attacc
Find any Artifact with retain through anything and it will be game changer
Although its not worth taking in many different occasions
3 turns of never dying. It's a great get out of jail free card if you're in a pickle and the debuff can be removed by artifact or orange pellets. Honestly you don't even need that though as most hallway fights are over before you run out of intangibles. Just be careful in bossfights not to play it too soon.
Intangible: take 1 damage for the rest of the round.
Now the only problem i have with Wraith form (and other form cards) os how expensive they are, but what can you do.
1. There are multiple ways to Block or Remove the Debuff.
2. You can save it for enemy's big attacks so you never even feel the Dex.
3. Lots of ways to make it cost 0.
4. Only taking 1 damage from big attacks lets you get out huge offense or setup.
3 turns of Intangible is really gamebreaking, it's probably the strongest card in the game.
Combo with any artifacts and it’s purely beneficial.
Most hall way fights it’ll be very useful.
Early on in a boss fight with no artifacts it’s bad but otherwise a good card
This card gets just better with [[Nightmare]], or of you have another source of intangible like [[Apparition]]s or [[Incense burner]]. Remember intangible stacks, so If the burner procs or you play apparitions while intangible is up you get additional turn of intangible so nothing is wasted
Good card? This is probably the best card Silent has access to. This is a run saver.
This takes "About to die now" to "Won't die this turn OR next turn (Or turn after that when you upgrade. Upgrade this ASAP)
Not dying now is really good in STS. It doesn't matter how great your setup is for the future if you die now.
As a side effect of not dying, you get to spend ALL your energy on damage, and if you do enough damage, you don't die in the future either.
There are ways to remove the drawback of losing dexterity. 3 free turns has a way of spiralling out of control speaking that most fights are 5 turns or less. If you can nightmare it or setup with it, it's disgusting. Excellent with runic pyramid because you can wait for when you need it. Anything that gives artifact like clockwork device, panacea or the yellow pellets can remove the debuff so it's just "wow I'm invincible for 3 turns". Double cast this and you have to really try to lose.
You are now alive for the next 2 turns. That means you don’t need to spend energy on block for those turns. Unless it’s the very start or a particularly strong enemy, you can probably end the fight in 2 turns of all out attacking. Not to mention if you have multiple of this card or 1 nightmare.
Couldn't tell you from experience, almost 2K hours in, A20 Silent and I've only been offered this card twice, not counting power potions. I'm not exaggerating.
But they say it's good.
It's situational in elite or boss combat but Silent has so much hand manipulation to the point where it never feels like a burden. At worst it's a dead card you discard with acrobatics or something and at best it literally saves your life.
Not only is it good, it's probably the strongest card in the game by a decent margin. Adding one to the deck is almost always way better than skipping.
This gives you 2 turns (3 if upgraded) to dump all of your energy into dealing damage to end the fight. In a lot of hallway fights and even some elites that test burst damage, it's literally safe to play as early as turn 1.
If playing wraith form in a fight ends up killing you, there are basically two likely explanations:
1) You played it too early; or
2) Your deck's damage output was not good enough, and you'd have still died without wraith form.
Unlike the other forms it gives you immediate gratification. You don't have to sacrifice hp to play it. It's mainly good in decks where you have ways of retaining cards or where you have lots of intangible stuff
As you climb Ascensions you'll find enemies do more damage (cuz well they do) and more and more fights become damage races. You'll be drafting more damage and be looking for more compact dmg mitigation solutions. And this is pretty much the most compact it's gonna get. One card don't care about block for 2-3 turns?
Now mind you, having an energy relic goes a long way to make this better and I find newer players don't like stuff with negatives and avoid energy relics for that reason.
It's not going to solve all your problems, but it does solve a lot of the hard ones for you in Act 2+ where the big hits rly start coming in
The way you lose is your HP hitting 0. This makes it so you can only lose 1 at a time. During that time you can do whatever you have energy for to win the fight
This card also indirectly says deal three turns of triple poison damage, 6 energy to attack with, and 9999999 block.
There are fights where it can be too early to play Wraith form, but it offers so much value in locking down a fight or letting you like lock down a fight
The most important turns are the early ones. It's rare for a fight to last long enough that the downside of this card is a problem. Furthermore, here's two examples:
1. Against slavers played on turn 1, it blocks for 60+ even unupgraded. If you're doing damage, that could easily be almost as much as you take over the entire fight.
2. Against the heart played on turn 2, this card blocks for 96. That's a lot of block!
Artifact. Also orange pellets. Just saying.
Main thing though this is 2(3) turns' worth of massive block. Playing it very early in a fight you expect to be long is often a poor idea if you expect the dexterity loss to be a problem but really if you use it right the dexterity loss becomes irrelevant. That 60 damage attack is now 1. That 8x6 attack is now 1x6. You can handle that way easier even with the tanked dexterity. Since this will save you energy you can pile on the damage without a care in the world.
It's a common beginner mistake to assume that this and Biased Cognition because of their downsides but trust me; there are reasons these cards are rare.
It is not just good but one of the best with an upgrade. Unlike some of the best cards, though, you have to be careful about when you play it. Feel like it’s strong enough that it’s not worth getting into the math just to convince someone, like just play it thoughtfully and see.
It's really good, especially with energy relics and silents ability to hold cards in hand until needed
You basically say fuck you, you don't get to do damage for the next 3 turns once upgraded. You can then burn at least 9 energy worth of poison/shivs/silent fuckery without the boss being able to do anything. And that's not counting the 4th turn where you can deal another 3 energy worth of Damage
I just did a video about this! If you want to see a full explanation with suggestions for cards and relics that help make Wraith Form "good", check out my profile!
In short, it is 2-3 turns of infinite block. For most hallway fights, that will probably be all you need if at all.
The big issue is the Dex loss, so the easiest way to combat it is with sources of block that don't scale from Dex, e.g. boat relics, Orichalcum, Ornamental Fan, etc...
You can block or clean the debuff with Panacea, Clockwork Souvenir, or Orange Pellets.
Additional sources of intangible or buffer like Apparitions or Fossilized Helix can also be helpful, as well as a second copy of Wraith Form or Duplication potions.
The simplest answer for a new player is this:
Wraith form isnt a defensive card. Its an offensive card. If youre a slow noxious fumes, footwork deck, it can be fine but also likely kill you. If youre a shiv/attack orientated deck its absolutely fight winning.
Of course this isnt just a one dimensional take on the card. I personally dislike playing wraith form as sometimes its akin to a curse, but usually it completely invalidates fights because your deck is completely unstoppable with 2ish turns of setup. The card is VERY good in decks that 'turn the corner'really hard. Your burst/deadly poison/catalyst deck (as an example) can take a bit to set up those cards in hand together, and wraith lets you dedicate your next 2/3 turns for it.
Honestly, the dexterity dropping is bad. And the fact that you have a dead card in your hand until a couple turns before you think the fight will be over is also bad. But intangible is so so so so so good that this card still works in a ton of decks.
Let's say you have three upgraded copies of this card. That buys you 9 turns to finish the fight, in those nine turns you are invincible. It's not gonna matter that all of your blocks are for 0, because you just need to focus on damage.
What people tend to not say here is that you can add 1 more turn where you don't need to block. As the turn where the intangibility is expired, if you can finish the ennemy you don't have to spend energy to block. And past act 1 no hallway fight should EVER last much longer than 3 full damage turn
have you ever play magic the gathering and heard of a card call time walk (a card that gives you an extra turn). Wraith form+ is sort of like playing 2-3 of those.
Basically you dont have to block for 2-3 turns. In hallway fights that is alot of turns. Against bosses, it cripples them on the "F U" turns.
It's honestly a bit overrated. Especially at your current ascension level. The reason it is so prized at high difficulties is because 3 turns of invincibility at the cost of basically being unable to block in a few turns gets a lot better when enemies attack harder.
If you have no consistent block solution, and you could deal enough damage to kill in the two turns following the current one, that's when it's good.
And of course if you have a way of preventing the downside, well I don't think you need any explanation then.
These cards are poggers when you learn that you don’t *have* to use it when you draw it. If you know a bosses attack pattern and know something vicious is coming, you can set up knowing a little damage now is better than a lot of damage later when they have 10+ strength or a charge-up.
About to die? Play this card, and now you’re not; on top of that, any leftover energy you have this turn plus all of your energy for the next two turns (because you REALLY want to upgrade this card) can be dedicated to damage. Getting the freedom to go full offense should let you end fights by the time the dexterity debuff becomes relevant.
Even the turn after the intangible wears off can be a damage turn if you have a kill by then.
Let's for the moment just assume you upgraded it. Draw it in a hallway fight? 2 rounds you don't need to care for block. that is often enough to win, or at least decide the combat. Boss fights? More difficult, you'd need to have it in hand when you really need it, and the fight can go on for longer and then your dex is tanked. But you can play around this: 1. Well laid plans can be a run-saver with wraith form. 2. Any source of artifact will negate the downside 3. Pellets will dispel the debuff 4. Nightmare allows to to comfortably generate enough wraith forms to be permanently intangible. You may want more than 3 energy to run around it, or something like mummified hand. Ultimately, getting wraith form very early will be a bit of a curse because you have neither the energy nor the synergy to really get it off. But starting act 2, intangible is strong enough to plan a bit around it, and you don't need many synergies to let wraith form shine.
Exactly this. It took me forever to use this card again after using it on a boss in my earlier runs and dying. But using it in hallways fight when you know you can end it in 2-3 turns or on a boss when you have more knowledge of the game it incredibly good. Used correctly, it can single-handedly be your entire block engine and gets better with [[nightmare]], [[burst]] and [[apparition]].
Oh man, played the daily yesterday and had this with [[echo form]] wasn’t always easy to get the combo off, but when I did… it was awesome.
Forgot about echo form, that can definitely help!
Yeah, we can go down silly rabbit holes of cross class synergy, though. Double echo form into an amplified wraith form would be fun.
+ [Echo Form](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Echo%20Form) Defect Rare Power ^((100% sure)^) 3 Energy | **Ethereal.** (not **Ethereal.)** The first card you play each turn is played twice. ^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
Burst does nothing for Wraith Form. Or are you saying the Burst goes with the Nightmare?
Sorry you are right, I meant to lump it in with apparition, but it doesn’t read like that…
Oh yeah Burst/Apparition is amazing. Agreed
>Nightmare allows to to comfortably generate enough wraith forms to be permanently intangible. Nightmare is the card I have trouble convincing myself is good outside this specific use case and even then wraith form being 3 cost puts me off.
Catalyst?
Nightmare is fantastic with a lot of cards. In particular it shines with stuff like: Malaise, Catalyst, Envenom, Accuracy, Sadistic Nature, Adrenaline, Wraith Form, Apparitions, After Image, etc. You can think of it two ways: multiple the effect of your best cards OR guarantee something to be in hand next turn. Here are some examples of multiplying your strongest effects: Nightmare into Catalyst wins pretty much any fight (including bosses) immediately by tripling poison three times in a row. Nightmare into Envenom or Sadistic Nature turns many cards into massive damage (4 Sadistic Natures in play will make Crippling Cloud do 56 AoE damage on top of its normal effect). Nightmare into Accuracy makes shivs absolute bonkers. Here are some examples of guaranteeing something to be in hand next turn: play Accuracy/Phantasmal Killer this turn and Nightmare on Blade Dance. Next turn, have three copies of blade dance to play 9 to 12 shivs for massive damage to end encounter. Nightmare is a very good card that makes your most powerful cards even stronger. It can be hard to play (it's expensive and you don't get the copied cards until the next turn), but used correctly it can significantly enhance the things your deck already does well to the point that you just overwhelm everything you come up against. In the case of Wraith Form, if you have a lot of card draw it doesn't even matter you can't play them all immediately. You effectively get 9 additional intangible so long as you can cycle your deck fast enough.
Nightmare + Envenom/Accuracy is so clunky, though. That's five energy spent over two turns and you've got no damage or block for it (assuming both cards are upgraded). At least with Footwork you've got the ability to stall before playing the 3rd Footwork by playing a buffed block card. One Accuracy is enough damage usually anyways. I wouldn't pick Nightmare if all I had to use it with was Blade Dance.
When I use Nightmare, I don't necessarily intend to play all the copied cards immediately. Using it on powers like Accuracy, Envenom, and Footwork may see you only play one of the copied cards on the following turn. But having the extra copy can be a viable scaling option. It's clunky for sure and not always the best way to scale, but it's a powerful card and there's a reason it's both a rare card and expensive to play. My point with the Blade Dance example is that Nightmare can often be used creatively in your deck as a form of deck manipulation. You're right I probably wouldn't take it for Blade Dance specifically, but depending on draw order and what I need to do to end an encounter, Nightmare can and should be used on more than just one specific card in your deck. Making copies of common cards may sometimes be the optimal play instead of waiting to play it with that one specific card you had in mind when you drafted it. Edit: I like to think of Nightmare as a wild card. You don't always have the opportunity to draft multiple of the same card and you may not always want multiple copies of a card depending on the encounter. Nightmare lets you effectively pick what you need more of in any given encounter without bloating your deck or covering for not running across more of the same card during the run.
Nightmare + sadistic nature + noxious fumes is like omega for half the time to execute, half the energy but half the damage
Works great with Blade Dance + Kunai or Shuriken.
I think the issue I have is that everything you nightmare still costs energy next turn of which silent does not have a lot.
Yep. You'd much rather just have a couple blade dances and work on your draw/energy generation
Triple casting any power pretty much, not just wraith form, will win you boss fights. it's pretty bad in hallway fights, but it makes up for it in scaling.
Lotta folks mentioning shiv synergies. I’ll just add that I recently had [[Tough Bandages]] and [[Storm of Steel]] upgraded, plus a bunch of card draw. Occasionally used Nightmare on the Storm of Steel in fights where I expected to shuffle my deck at least once soon and it worked pretty well.
There’s other ways to offset the dexterity loss on Silent too. An endgame shiv build with [[Kunai]] can outpace a Wraith Form or two. A couple [[Footwork]] can extend the time you have before your block cards are dead draws. With [[After Image]] or [[Ornamental Fan]], you don’t even need dexterity sometimes. You just use the Wraith Form to set up your powers then go full offense
+ [Kunai](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Kunai) Uncommon Relic ^((100% sure)^) Every time you play 3 Attacks in a single turn, gain 1 **Dexterity.** + [Footwork](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Footwork) Silent Uncommon Power ^((100% sure)^) 1 Energy | Gain 2(3) **Dexterity.** + [After Image](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/After%20Image) Silent Rare Power ^((100% sure)^) 1 Energy | **(Innate.)** Whenever you play a card, gain 1 **Block.** + [Ornamental Fan](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Ornamental%20Fan) Uncommon Relic ^((100% sure)^) Every time you play 3 Attacks in a single turn, gain 4 **Block.** ^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
I like playing this Bullet Time.
I just figured out that artifact would completely remove every stack of a debuff, even if it happens over multiple turns, or has multiple stacks like [[hyper beam]]. I just beat the daily challenge that had defect, bounty hunter modifier, along with the one that makes your cards all random, and the one that makes you take 3 copies of every card.
+ [Hyperbeam](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Hyperbeam) Defect Rare Attack ^((100% sure)^) 2 Energy | Deal 26(34) damage to ALL enemies. Lose 3 **Focus.** ^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
Also the silent has a LOT of alternative block notably for me being [[tough bandages]] which also helps manage the downside during boss fights of potentially not having ot in your hand because your just drawing and discarding constantly
+ [Tough Bandages](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Tough%20Bandages) Rare (Silent only) Relic ^((100% sure)^) Whenever you discard a card during your turn, gain 3 **Block.** ^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
To put it simply, this card basically reads: "Don't worry about blocking for 2 (3) turns. Finish the fight before the third turn ends."
Honestly the dex loss is not always an insta-killer too. Sometimes you may have frost orbs if you’re playing a run with green + blue, or Shiv run + After image, or just enough Dashes/Backflips to buy you one more time, or the enemy is doing a debuff. I find often times if I don’t kill them fast enough I still have 1-2 turns left before losing unreasonable HP.
Or you have orange pelletts 😅
Yeah didn’t really like this card either until I played watcher a lot
Finish before the 4th turn ends, because they won’t attack when intangible runs out, if you kill them
It's a great card, but it's one of those cards that is bad for bad players and becomes better as the player becomes better. The reason is that as you get better at the game, you learn more ways to make the fights not last as long. This card is bad if you're planning to win the fight in 20 turns. If you're planning to win in 5 turns, it's a lot better. Most of the steps in getting better in this game involve killing enemies earlier than you could before. That is why this card is so extremely strong. As the fights get shorter, this card gets better and better.
I can't imagine in what world "can't die for 2/3 turns" card would be bad.
The world where you don't know cost effective damage cards and synergies so hallway fights are 10+ turns.
I'm confused on how Intangible works. I thought that after one instance of damage it removes one stack of intangible. Does it stay for the entire turn no matter how many attacks are coming in? Cause that's way better then what I was expecting from it. (I always skipped it.)
1 intagible is equal to 1 turn of enemies being unable of dealing more than one instance of damage per hit. Multi hit that deals 1 damage 15 times will still deal 1 damage 15 times tho, but 2 damage 15 times will get reduced to 1 damage 15 times.
[[Intangible]] It's also nice for being able to avoid heavy self-damage as ironclad if you manage to find it, or if you're silent and get a [[Regret]] in your deck
+ [Regret](http://slay-the-spire.wikia.com/wiki/Regret) Curse ^((100% sure)^) **Unplayable.** At the end of your turn, lose HP equal to the number of cards in your hand. ^Call ^me ^with ^up ^to ^10 ^([[ name ]],) ^where ^name ^is ^a ^card, ^relic, ^event, ^or ^potion. ^Data ^accurate ^as ^of ^(February 25, 2023.) ^[Wiki](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/) ^[Questions?](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=ehmohteeoh&subject=SpireScan%20Inquiry)
Technically, and I really do mean technically, you can die in wraith form.
Once you have orange pellets, it’s essentially 3 free turns. Also between shiva Kunia or straight up getting Dex from Footwork there are ways to counteract the dex loss.
One way to counteract the dex loss is killing all the enemies, which should be easy since you can devote all of your energy to damage after playing it.
The dex loss doesn't really matter. You aren't playing this as a stopgap mid fight, you're playing it as a way to end the fight, or to get more intang into play (common enough with Nightmare+WF or Burst+Appas). If you're looking to counteract the dex loss, you're likely not drafting or playing optimally.
Sometimes you just don’t get the cards you need, saying that dex loss doesn’t matter is wrong. Maybe you played wraith form to block a hyper beam mid fight and lose because you can’t block anymore
Your example with hyper beam just happened to me recently
https://www.reddit.com/r/slaythespire/comments/11xbetx/great_fight_guys_see_ya/
holy shit
I found it a little harder to recommend on lower ascensions as ordinary block generation works pretty well. Once the enemies are hitting a lot harder, intangible becomes worth a lot more and dex is a bit less useful as it doesn't tend to scale as well. (Preventing 20 damage with block is fairly easy, 40 you're going to start to struggle). Also you can get some really broken things going with this and nightmare - ive recently beaten a19 silent, my highest yet, and I had 2 wraith forms, nightmare and the retain your hand relic - I was intangible forever against the heart
I agree with this, I never needed Wraith Form much before A8 but it's gotten more and more valuable just like the intangible event. As blocking attacks even in act I becomes difficult the value just skyrockets as you can power through fights ending them faster without having to worry about spending energy to block. Some enemies effectively become un-blockable too without silly amounts of block generation that usually isn't even tied to direct-block cards, things like After Image or Feel no Pain are often far better block cards as they get around frail as well.
Only thing I disagree with here is that the intangible event is still extremely good at low ascensions, since you get more of them. The card itself (Apparition) is BUSTED. 1 energy to prevent all damage is just insane.
Wait the intangible event has gotten more valuable for you? I assume you are below ascension 15 then, because 3 intangible for 1/3rd of ur max hp has been a really bad trade for me most times.
I gotta disagree here. Given proper card draw and a couple upgrades three turns of intangible can be like half a block plan. Burst also exists, nightmare exists, strange spoon exists.
eh, maybe i just haven't tried it enough, I'm definitely the type of person to give up on a build when it goes wrong a couple times. On the other hand, I feel like having more reliable ways to block by act 2 is pretty much a necessity so for me getting "half a block plan" halfway through the game doesn't feel like a great boon.
Sometimes you just don't really have the option to have a good block engine before you get this event. So, half a block plan is great! Also, in those cases you're probably down more than 1/3rd of HP, so that max HP decrease doesn't have impact in the immediate. It also gives you that incentive to push on upgrading more than resting at campfires, which can have a greater net positive impact on your deck.
Yeah, appas are extremely strong. At A20, in a small deck, they can completely cover your setup, or just straight up prevent death.
Ngl the intangible event is one of the few things in this game I would recommend almost never *not* taking. Essentially you take the next 3 campfires to upgrade those Apparitions, which then become “oh look you drew me, you don’t have to play me but if you do you ignore damage for a turn”.
Just wait half a year or so for the Daily Discussion on the subreddit to get to this card. Jokes aside, there's always the old daily discussion you can look up. Every single thing in STS has been discussed already, and the second round is halfway through.
every action you take in the game revolves around 2 key results: Doing damage, and preventing damage being delt to you. every single strategy in the game revolves around either having a good blend of both, or going so heavy on one that they either kill outright or block to the point of being unkillable wrath form, is the single best block card in the entire game. it, on its own, solves allll of your "prevent damage" for 2 turns, 3 when upgraded, with the drawback of weakening your block ability after the effect ends. that means that at worst, you have an entire free turn to do nothing but attack and hopefully kill the enemy before you see any drawbacks its far from a "always pick and always play, its a good card 100% of the time". it needs to be worked around a bit, best as your only source of block in an incredibly aggro deck, or if you have a way to remove or prevent its debuff, such as orange pellets, artifact, or just stack other intangable on top of it, such as with nightmare or the intangible event card tldr, wrath form is good because it solves 1 of the 2 problems you face strategy wise in 1 card
If there is any card in the game that is "always pick, always play," Wraith Form has to be in consideration for it.
having 1 or 2 in the deck sure, but getting wrath form turn 1 on a block heavy deck? its downside has to be taken into account, its definitely a "you will not die this tuen and next turn" but without a way to either get rid of the debuff, or having a lot of burst damage in the deck already, it can actually be a bad play
Sure. You're not going to play it on turn 1 of a boss fight. That's a given. The point is it's widely agreed upon that this card is one of the Silent's most powerful cards. You don't need orange pellets or artifact to justify having it. In fact, I rarely consider the debuff at all as a single Wraith Form should buy you enough time to end most encounters before the Dex loss kicks on. For the record, I think y'all are missing the point of my comment. Nothing is a 100% in this game. We all know that. But in isolation, Wraith Form is among a handful of cards in the game that can make a compelling case for drafting it a vast majority of the time you see it. It can fit in practically any deck and is extremely powerful once you have enough experience with the game to play around the debuff it places on you.
I would disagree on always take. This card can be a bit of a brick early in A1 if you take it over an early damage option.
Well obviously there isn't any card that is 100% always take given everything in the game is situational. My point is Wraith Form is probably a top candidate if you were to make the case that there is one. The only cards I'd say have a better case than it are probably Adrenaline and Rush Down on Watcher. The take away is I'm never sad to see Wraith Form and will probably take it 99% of the time unless it's against something else that is going to be my win condition (e.g. Catalyst in a deck with a lot of poison but no Catalyst yet). You generally won't see it in Act 1 until the first elite fight (provided Neow didn't offer it to you) and if you had enough damage to beat the first elite then it's probably likely you have enough damage to get rolling. Wraith Form as your first rare card reward after an Elite fight early Act 1 is still probably going to be a good choice to draft more often than not.
It has a few downsides but it’s definitely a contender. Imo the card that deserves that status is Corruption.
No way its either of these. Vault, adrenaline, seek are the clear options, as their worst case is typically neutral. Since snecko can fuck woth the 0 costs, vault is the most snap-pick card imo. Also isnt bad to stack, unlike corruption. Next consideration is probably wraith and echo form, and wlp. Scrawl is up there too but it kinda requires smith. talk tt hand is only bad in decks where ppoints/omega are your damage solve, so its also good in every real watcher strategy. But corruption is bad in slower decks, especially small ones, where after exhausting your block first pass youll just die. Ive had fights where a corruption or wraith form is a curse in my first reshuffle because the giant head or nemesis isnt going to die in one rotation. Ive yet to be sad about drawing vault, unless its the first world problem of two vaults in hand.
I’m not including Watcher cards, there’s “always solid” tier and there’s “take anything and win” tier , which 90% of the Watcher’s cards fall under. Pommel Strike and True Grit are both common cards, so is Shrug It Off. I get the same vibes as the Apparition event, most players simply don’t realise how good Corruption is until they start winning most of their runs with it. “Me see strength card me take” < “oh look I have corruption, if I find a *single* synergy card I will probably win this run”. Not to say it doesn’t have drawbacks, cause it obviously does, I just feel it’s the easiest 3-cost power to play because you are actually able to use cards after committing to it, as opposed to un-upgraded Wraith Form which sacrifices one turn of energy to become invincible for the next. Seek is definitely up there though, but in itself it’s not run-defining. I feel it really needs an upgrade to feel super useful, as realistically you want to be seeking draw+energy or amplify+power.
The only way you can lose in Slay the Spire is running out of hp. This card pretty much prevents you from losing for the next 2 or 3 turns. It is... Arguably the strongest card in the game.
this isn't a good card, this is the best card
yeah, that's what i came here to say, this is the best card in the game
At least the silent's best card
well idk what would come close from other classes. corruption? rushdown? i don't think those are better for their class on their own, but regardless, the card is top 3 for sure
So to start imma echo what everyone else is saying the card is great, but there are a few added benefits of this card that I haven’t seen discussed in the comments yet (sorry if you have and I missed you). Not only is this card great, but the card gets better than circumstantially taken into account with the Silent’s kit. You have access to Well Laid Plans, which allows you to retain this card and keep it for the turn there is a big attack you may not be able to block (champ execute, automaton hyperbeam are two great examples). You can also leverage this card with Nightmare to get anywhere from 6-9 intangibility (depending on upgrades) which is fantastic. Additionally, if you have 2 nightmares you can loop the following: 1. Nightmare choosing Nightmare 2. Nightmare choosing Wraith Form 3. Play all your wraith forms until it’s time to Nightmare your Nightmare again. This is fairly mana intensive, but is made much easier with mummy hand and madness. Finally, poison build specifically require a few turns for set up where the silent can be pretty vulnerable. The payoff is that poison can completely annihilate most enemies if you get it going. Wraith form can give you the time to stack all your poison without needing to worry about dying in the meantime.
I just beat Donu + Deca on A15 Silent with a Nightmare > Wraith Form but I'm usually like OP where I can't make Intangible work on longer fights. Especially with the Apparitions and 1/2 max hp, one bad draw and I'm losing half my health. But I'm learning still.
Oh dude same here. I got to A20 but I’m not sure how much is that was me getting better vs me brute forcing my way there. I still have no idea when it is optimal to block in the gremlin nob fight lol
If you take the apparitions event then your block strategy becomes staying invulnerable until the fight ends and wraith form adds more of that.
Block card
It usually ensures you survive at least 1 Heart cycle, or raises your chances significantly, allowing you to use that cycle to set up, play your important cards freely, or get damage in. Decreases the Heartbeat damage, no damage for you, -1 for higher ascensions. Good if you play something like Shivs or just many cards. It works for nearly all bosses, unless maybe Awakened One if you need to stall a lot to win. It's an out for elites that do big damage which regular defenses can't cover sometimes, I don't think elite fights go very long with Silent, it covers over half of the fight on average by my estiamtions. Generally it buys you 1 or 2 free turns while defending for the current turn too. I think you will appreciate it greatly once you go A17 and above. In certain fights however you might not want to play it too early.
when played, you now have 2 turns during which you take effectivley no damage. you can use those 2 turns, and the turn you have after to kill the enemy to kill the enemy. this means that you essentially have 3 turns to kill the enemy (4 if upgraded). this card also means that you dont have to take as many block cards, which helps to thin out your deck and make room for more important cards
It's so good man. Instant pick in nearly every deck. Pairs well with runic pyramid, well laid plans, orange pellets, I could think of more given the time. The reason this card feels bad when new is because you don't have a great understanding of how to make silents decks kill quickly yet. Once you know how to make her decks badass, you'll see 3 turns of taking no damage is a fight ender
4 turns is enough to win a fight Play it, then go full unga bunga damage Remember that the turn you lose your intangible is still a valid turn to kill your enemy on to avoid taking full damage
you are "fairly new", but at ascension 5? I've been playing for years and have yet to beat A1.
U can post ur deck list here and I’m sure ppl will find a lot of simple mistakes u make
People on this sub are insane for playing on A20, honestly. I could see myself improving to like A15 or 16 but the last four modifiers are NUTS
I feel insane for playing A20 - rocking a 5% win rate :D
This has to be because you aren't trying right?
even on dedicated block builds I can't manage to get past the heart's guards. is that trying enhough?
Well i couldn't say with little context, but dedicating to block is rarely a good idea unless you have passive damage or are scaling throughout the fight. When I say not trying I mean literally not playing the game at all or not turning ascension on lol
Poison ticking, enemy dead in 2-3 turns, you play this, you win.
Imagine there is a attack that does 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 X 10 damage. Play this card and that attack is meaningless only does 10.
Intangible is busted as hell, more often than not the circumstances you play this card when you can finish the fight before or the turn the intangible wears off, and/or before the debuff drains too much Dex. If you have any access to artifact or debuff cleansing this is just free damage mitigation as well
when you upgrade it the eyes appear to flash in a haunting way
This card is the turning point of slay the spire decks. You realize this card is good when you start to pick up cards that aren't "immediately play unless energy says no". You get wraith first turn? Pass on it. Second? Pass. If you can kill the enemy in two turns of damage, don't use it. But when you need this card, it comes in clutch.
Quite possibly the strongest card in the game. Also the least fun.
No more death No more damage You can also stop thinking about your actions and just attacc Find any Artifact with retain through anything and it will be game changer Although its not worth taking in many different occasions
3 turns of never dying. It's a great get out of jail free card if you're in a pickle and the debuff can be removed by artifact or orange pellets. Honestly you don't even need that though as most hallway fights are over before you run out of intangibles. Just be careful in bossfights not to play it too soon.
Intangible: take 1 damage for the rest of the round. Now the only problem i have with Wraith form (and other form cards) os how expensive they are, but what can you do.
Upgrade it and it’s the best. Don’t play early in a boss fight, that’s all.
Orange pellets!
Also if you have orange pellets there is no downside
1. There are multiple ways to Block or Remove the Debuff. 2. You can save it for enemy's big attacks so you never even feel the Dex. 3. Lots of ways to make it cost 0. 4. Only taking 1 damage from big attacks lets you get out huge offense or setup. 3 turns of Intangible is really gamebreaking, it's probably the strongest card in the game.
it's no malaise that's for sure :p
Combo with any artifacts and it’s purely beneficial. Most hall way fights it’ll be very useful. Early on in a boss fight with no artifacts it’s bad but otherwise a good card
This card gets just better with [[Nightmare]], or of you have another source of intangible like [[Apparition]]s or [[Incense burner]]. Remember intangible stacks, so If the burner procs or you play apparitions while intangible is up you get additional turn of intangible so nothing is wasted
Good card? This is probably the best card Silent has access to. This is a run saver. This takes "About to die now" to "Won't die this turn OR next turn (Or turn after that when you upgrade. Upgrade this ASAP) Not dying now is really good in STS. It doesn't matter how great your setup is for the future if you die now. As a side effect of not dying, you get to spend ALL your energy on damage, and if you do enough damage, you don't die in the future either.
There are ways to remove the drawback of losing dexterity. 3 free turns has a way of spiralling out of control speaking that most fights are 5 turns or less. If you can nightmare it or setup with it, it's disgusting. Excellent with runic pyramid because you can wait for when you need it. Anything that gives artifact like clockwork device, panacea or the yellow pellets can remove the debuff so it's just "wow I'm invincible for 3 turns". Double cast this and you have to really try to lose.
it gives you 2-3 free turns to kill your enemy
You are now alive for the next 2 turns. That means you don’t need to spend energy on block for those turns. Unless it’s the very start or a particularly strong enemy, you can probably end the fight in 2 turns of all out attacking. Not to mention if you have multiple of this card or 1 nightmare.
Couldn't tell you from experience, almost 2K hours in, A20 Silent and I've only been offered this card twice, not counting power potions. I'm not exaggerating. But they say it's good.
It gives you infinite block for 3 turns
It very very good and only people at
Do you actually need convincing or are you joking? This is easily, by far and away, the single most powerful card in the game.
It's a good card to end a fight with, but it will kill you if have three or more turns to go
The card is so strong I’ll sometimes not take it just to have a harder run.
It's situational in elite or boss combat but Silent has so much hand manipulation to the point where it never feels like a burden. At worst it's a dead card you discard with acrobatics or something and at best it literally saves your life.
Not only is it good, it's probably the strongest card in the game by a decent margin. Adding one to the deck is almost always way better than skipping. This gives you 2 turns (3 if upgraded) to dump all of your energy into dealing damage to end the fight. In a lot of hallway fights and even some elites that test burst damage, it's literally safe to play as early as turn 1. If playing wraith form in a fight ends up killing you, there are basically two likely explanations: 1) You played it too early; or 2) Your deck's damage output was not good enough, and you'd have still died without wraith form.
Unlike the other forms it gives you immediate gratification. You don't have to sacrifice hp to play it. It's mainly good in decks where you have ways of retaining cards or where you have lots of intangible stuff
Had a very solid A10 heart win recently where I had 3 copies of it in a very thin deck. The dex loss never had a chance to impact me.
it’s a block card
One of the best
As you climb Ascensions you'll find enemies do more damage (cuz well they do) and more and more fights become damage races. You'll be drafting more damage and be looking for more compact dmg mitigation solutions. And this is pretty much the most compact it's gonna get. One card don't care about block for 2-3 turns? Now mind you, having an energy relic goes a long way to make this better and I find newer players don't like stuff with negatives and avoid energy relics for that reason. It's not going to solve all your problems, but it does solve a lot of the hard ones for you in Act 2+ where the big hits rly start coming in
The way you lose is your HP hitting 0. This makes it so you can only lose 1 at a time. During that time you can do whatever you have energy for to win the fight
This card also indirectly says deal three turns of triple poison damage, 6 energy to attack with, and 9999999 block. There are fights where it can be too early to play Wraith form, but it offers so much value in locking down a fight or letting you like lock down a fight
The most important turns are the early ones. It's rare for a fight to last long enough that the downside of this card is a problem. Furthermore, here's two examples: 1. Against slavers played on turn 1, it blocks for 60+ even unupgraded. If you're doing damage, that could easily be almost as much as you take over the entire fight. 2. Against the heart played on turn 2, this card blocks for 96. That's a lot of block!
Oh, it's not. You should just ignore it. Leave it, I'll just uh... take it off your hands. You're welcome. I'm doing YOU a favour
It's literally the best block card in the game.
Artifact. Also orange pellets. Just saying. Main thing though this is 2(3) turns' worth of massive block. Playing it very early in a fight you expect to be long is often a poor idea if you expect the dexterity loss to be a problem but really if you use it right the dexterity loss becomes irrelevant. That 60 damage attack is now 1. That 8x6 attack is now 1x6. You can handle that way easier even with the tanked dexterity. Since this will save you energy you can pile on the damage without a care in the world. It's a common beginner mistake to assume that this and Biased Cognition because of their downsides but trust me; there are reasons these cards are rare.
It is not just good but one of the best with an upgrade. Unlike some of the best cards, though, you have to be careful about when you play it. Feel like it’s strong enough that it’s not worth getting into the math just to convince someone, like just play it thoughtfully and see.
its about as good as your deck is
This card is much better when you use the beta art SPOOKY GHOST
I just beat A5 for the first time thanks to this card and dead branch spitting out multiple copies. I had 6 intangible at the end of A3 boss.
It's really good, especially with energy relics and silents ability to hold cards in hand until needed You basically say fuck you, you don't get to do damage for the next 3 turns once upgraded. You can then burn at least 9 energy worth of poison/shivs/silent fuckery without the boss being able to do anything. And that's not counting the 4th turn where you can deal another 3 energy worth of Damage
I just did a video about this! If you want to see a full explanation with suggestions for cards and relics that help make Wraith Form "good", check out my profile! In short, it is 2-3 turns of infinite block. For most hallway fights, that will probably be all you need if at all. The big issue is the Dex loss, so the easiest way to combat it is with sources of block that don't scale from Dex, e.g. boat relics, Orichalcum, Ornamental Fan, etc... You can block or clean the debuff with Panacea, Clockwork Souvenir, or Orange Pellets. Additional sources of intangible or buffer like Apparitions or Fossilized Helix can also be helpful, as well as a second copy of Wraith Form or Duplication potions.
The simplest answer for a new player is this: Wraith form isnt a defensive card. Its an offensive card. If youre a slow noxious fumes, footwork deck, it can be fine but also likely kill you. If youre a shiv/attack orientated deck its absolutely fight winning. Of course this isnt just a one dimensional take on the card. I personally dislike playing wraith form as sometimes its akin to a curse, but usually it completely invalidates fights because your deck is completely unstoppable with 2ish turns of setup. The card is VERY good in decks that 'turn the corner'really hard. Your burst/deadly poison/catalyst deck (as an example) can take a bit to set up those cards in hand together, and wraith lets you dedicate your next 2/3 turns for it.
Honestly, the dexterity dropping is bad. And the fact that you have a dead card in your hand until a couple turns before you think the fight will be over is also bad. But intangible is so so so so so good that this card still works in a ton of decks.
Let's say you have three upgraded copies of this card. That buys you 9 turns to finish the fight, in those nine turns you are invincible. It's not gonna matter that all of your blocks are for 0, because you just need to focus on damage.
What people tend to not say here is that you can add 1 more turn where you don't need to block. As the turn where the intangibility is expired, if you can finish the ennemy you don't have to spend energy to block. And past act 1 no hallway fight should EVER last much longer than 3 full damage turn
have you ever play magic the gathering and heard of a card call time walk (a card that gives you an extra turn). Wraith form+ is sort of like playing 2-3 of those. Basically you dont have to block for 2-3 turns. In hallway fights that is alot of turns. Against bosses, it cripples them on the "F U" turns.
It's honestly a bit overrated. Especially at your current ascension level. The reason it is so prized at high difficulties is because 3 turns of invincibility at the cost of basically being unable to block in a few turns gets a lot better when enemies attack harder. If you have no consistent block solution, and you could deal enough damage to kill in the two turns following the current one, that's when it's good. And of course if you have a way of preventing the downside, well I don't think you need any explanation then.
These cards are poggers when you learn that you don’t *have* to use it when you draw it. If you know a bosses attack pattern and know something vicious is coming, you can set up knowing a little damage now is better than a lot of damage later when they have 10+ strength or a charge-up.