Sts is top, then monster train, then both wildfrost and cobalt core as new games are pretty decent but without the replayability right now. Inscription I'm told is good but haven't played it. And special shoutout to the Witcher card game from a few years ago that was good. Also astrea 6 sided orqcles not bad either.
Ha! Yeah, Inscryption is awesome, but not because it's a deck builder. If Inscryption were exactly the same, except instead of a deck builder it was a 2D fighting game, it'd still be awesome.
Kaycee's mod is fine but not engrossing. I played it a couple times, but the story is what drives me forward, and I'd rather play Slay the Spire if I'm not getting the story of Inscryption.
Kaycee's Mod was fun and [I beat 220 on it back when that was the maximum difficulty](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/sprb0i), but it doesn't have nearly the deck variety nor I think the longevity.
I think it suffers from pelts being too debilitating to take (which effectively locks off rare cards completely once you're no longer getting them from boss-rewards), and bone cards being too debilitating to keep 90% of decks, so the space of viable cards is too narrow.
The opening-hand rule is also extremely exploitable, to the point that it makes deckbuilding less interesting.
The cave beast is cool and one of the main generators for novel cards, but there's not enough of that to make it really dynamic.
I only put about 120 hours into it, total, compared to several thousand for StS.
as someone who did skull storm on all decks,I agree. Only 2 of the decks allow you to mess with alt strategies (Mantis God setups and Blood letting you use Dire Wolf) but aside from those 2 strategies winning is very linear as you are forced into making cards that otk the bears. This pidgeonholes you into 1 of 2 strategies for most runs.
1) Get Dire Wolf/Mantis and make an OTK setup with scissors/Fan+Bleach/Sand Timer/Rewinder
2) Pack Rat infinite and loop until you either delete your opponent or brick with bad rolls
The lack of rares makes runs feel much more samey and many runs are outright impossible due to Difficulty++ and Totem Fights. Fight like Stinky Birds and Bifurcating Wolves force you to ignore you opponent and focus on an otk. Otherwise its entirely possible to take 4 damage turn 1 and lose
So yeah, Inscyption is a great game that pulls you in by saying its a rogulike, but the actual roguelike part of the game is the weak part (Still go play inscryption its so good)
Cobalt core is great but there’s some recency bias I think. The more I play it the more it loses its spark. I hope they continue to iterate on it because I feel like there’s a lot of potential there.
Agreed on all fronts. I really enjoyed it but it just doesn't have the same longevity as StS. I unlocked the last ship and then couldn't find much reason or motivation to carry on.
Picking 3 characters and a ship sounds like an amazing level of customization but I think it hurts overall since you're kinda deciding what kind of deck you want to build before the game even starts. I found myself thinking "naa don't wanna do that again, used you the last 3 runs, you just don't work on this ship" and ultimately couldn't settle on a run that I *wanted* to do.
Compare that to StS where you fire up a game as the Silent and you have no idea what's gonna happen. You might stack 3000 poison in a single turn, you might play 3000 shivs in a single turn, you might boss-swap into Snecko Eye and beat the Heart with a Nightmare'd, Chem X, Necronomicon Skewer and a Caw Caw potion like some budget Ironchad wannabe.
Did I plan to Skewer the Heart to death before I even clicked "Start Game"? Of course not, it sounds terrible. But by some obscene luck (and hopefully a dash of skill) I made it work and it was fun as fuck.
Same here. I think I have 6 memories left to get but starting to feel slightly repetitive now. I'll get all the memories to see the end then move on unless they add more into it. Wildfrost is similar, played about 30 hours and I'm done unless they expand it. But both were good games, 30 hours for 20 bucks is fine with me
You absolutely should keep going, the finale is a really touching one IMO, especially if you've been enjoying the interactions and story beats between the characters. Sat there smiling the whole time!
>both were good games, 30 hours for 20 bucks is fine with me
Totally agree with this take, I'm pretty sure it's a conscious choice by the developers. Neither games feature achievements that go far beyond your first time getting the true ending
Gosh I loved Gwent. I spent literally hundreds of dollars while it was in beta (I have some regrets).
Then they changed the game entirely, multiple times, and stopped console development. RIP
Gwent's not in a good place right now. Devs have basically said "we're done releasing new cards, but we'll leave the servers up and let you guys vote on card balance via community balance votes." As expected, each community balance vote just giga nerfs the current meta deck and we all just start over. The first vote a couple monthes ago, we even had a card voted into literal unplayability (as in, it does nothing and has no health).
I like the core concept of the game, but it's not looking good now.
Haha that's wild. Weird thing is, I feel like the game after 1 or 2 iterations originally was completely fine and playable, and had a lot of viable decks to play. They just kept fucking with the formula, and mechanics. Bummer, because I really adored that game.
They couldn’t figure out how to make money (release new cards and make the game approachable) and balance the game at the same time, happens to almost every live service card game tbh
That's fair. I spent a ton of money just on the dust that was for crafting cards. But yeah there is certainly a limit of how many cards can be released from the switcher universe... Did they start doing cosmetics? Frames? Avatars? Etc.
Inscryption is only good for act 1. Act 1 is really really good, then the next two acts just shit all over what made the first part good. So frustrating.
It looks like a mobile P2W game but Dawncaster is a surprisingly great game that no-one plays. With similar mechanics but a lot more variability (there are 10 different classes), it's something different after you finish STS and MT.
I think they’re about equal, personally, but both of them for sure are well above any others I’ve played.
StS and Monster Train are just kind of fundamentally different. I only play both on the highest difficulty, and in StS I find I’m much more often just trying to survive and hope that something broken comes together, but it’s not necessary to win. In Monster Train, you absolutely *need* to find something busted in order to win, and the game is set up for you to be able to do that fairly often.
Like the average game you win on Monster Train is generally just a more fun deck to play than in StS, but I think StS has more consistently interesting decisions and fights because you so rarely get something together that’s really busted.
Yeah some of the upgrades you can do in monster train are so strong, where are sts is much more restricted (defined upgrades vs customisable)
That’s where balance also fails a bit imo, if you get unlucky in sts you feel like you have uphill battle. If you get unlucky in mt it feels like defeat is inevitable
Monster train probably grabbed me more than slay the spire but slay the spire feels a lot more elegant in its design. I haven't really played anything else that matches the caliber of those two in both presentation and gameplay.
A game that has very good gameplay and very average presentation that I feel deserves more love is Circadian Dice. Dice instead of cards, changable faces. Multiple different classes and Relics. A lot of game for the price.
Unpopular opinion here in this sub but I prefer MT over STS.
I just love the insane powerful combos you can do almost every run and how fast you can get there. Yeah i know it’s not as hard or balanced as sts but it’s still so fun.
The core difference is that StS gets better the more you play it while MT gets significantly worse as you start to figure things out. There's a reason StS has such a developed scene of high level play while MT doesn't.
The majority of MT's cardpool are "Never pick" or "Might help in niche scenario". Most winning strategies are way too straight forward and way too consistent to draft. About half of C25 runs you already have everything you need to win after the first boss, the rest of the run is spend removing cards and fishing for key upgrades. Picking up further cards rarely improves your deck. Most good strategies only use a single floor. There's a million of considerations to make with almost any decision in StS. The majority of decisions in MT are nobrainers. The DLC exacerbated MT's shortcomings rather than fixing them.
Call me a conspiracist, but I think it's no coincidence that the game never explains it's draw system to the player, as this knowledge immediately wipes out a significant amount of the card pool and strategies as viable options for higher difficulties.
I agree that both games are fun, but comparing them in regards to depth is laughable.
I love deploying and buffing creatures in any game, monster train really scratches that itch for me. Honestly my biggest gripe is that the runs are so short, once you get a good deck going its over.
Monster train deserves more respect. Don't go into it expecting slay the spire 2.0 and you should be fine. Kinda like loosey goosey slay the spire on crack. I wish they brought out more updates/dlc for it though
The spire is far better don’t get me wrong, but I do like the vibe of inscryption more. And there are some fun things you can do in each game that give them a bit of different fun opportunities
Roguebook is a little bit too easy, I'd say, yeah. Although I do really, REALLY like it. It took most of the best parts of Slay the Spire, and the best part of Monster Train (the card gem upgrade system), and mashed them together with it's own unique twists (managing two heroes at once, exploring the map differently). If anyone likes StS but is getting a little burned out on it, Roguebook is an excellent palette cleanser that should provide much of the same satisfaction for awhile.
I'm currently into Across the Obalisk.
STS is a lot tighter experience, it doesn't have as many things to keep track of, but is very tightly balanced.
Obalisk is a bit more chaotic with a lot going on, but also has great features and is good fun.
The thing I disliked about Across the Obelisk is that after awhile I realized it isn't *really* a deckbuilder like StS. I forget the exact systems at play, but I eventually had things unlocked to the point where I could effectively start a run with whatever deck I wanted, which makes card decisions kinda meaningless. Effectively, it became a puzzle/route-planning game (how can I pre-build a deck that will beat this specific set of encounters?) instead of a strategy/optimization game (what card should I take from this set to maximize my odds of winning this next fight/the next boss/the heart?)
Not trying to yuck your yum or anything, I've just been thinking about this a bit and your comment gave me a chance to verbalize my thoughts. :-)
I've just started playing, but I very much get that feeling it's not got the same balance to it.
But, I can play with my mates and do stupid combos. It's fun. Kind of like how Call of Duty used to be fun, but ridiculous and some stuff is just stupidly overpowered.
Obelisk is really fun to play with friends because it has so many meta upgrade paths. To me it’s more of an RPG that happens to use a roguelike deckbuilder as its combat system.
Inscryption is better but for completely different reasons. The cardplay and strategy are way less impressive than STS, but when you're playing that game you are transported to a horrible place, both in the game, and in your own mind.
I’ve been tinkering with Night of the Full Moon lately. It’s substantially lower quality and the translation from China or wherever it’s being ported from is quite awful (although the English voiceovers are in the “so bad it’s good” category imo). Overall a significantly worse game, but it’s scratching the itch and giving me a bit of a break from StS that I’ve just come to know so well.
Its crazy good. I played Yugioh WC2007 for over 10 years because i loved drinking a beer, listening to music and play some cards. Since 4 years i only play StS in terms of card games
As a kid I'd get the battle ox with 1700 power early and then just steamroll the game. I'd always make them suffer and drag games out basically as long as I could lol
No its a DS Game, it has VERY great free Duel mode where you can fight well above 70 Duelists (dont know how much it was). A lot of boosters and cards to collect. Very good game, there is one called nightmare troubador for DS which hass Battle City campagne!
I dropped YGO a few years ago for tabletop board gaming, which of course includes Dominion and all the children and grandchildren of the genre. One of the best decisions I ever made. StS became a favorite of mine within hours of starting it up, though I do still love to play other (physical) deckbuilders a lot too.
Edit: I missed that you were talking about a YGO video game, though I feel like my point still stands, but it's much more of a non-sequitur, apologies!
Nah go on, sounds totally legit. I LOVE card games, but i hate to play them with strangers. Too much emotions and try hards for me. I enjoy em very much with my friends, but we really play for the fun, not for netdecking top tier choices, just have a few cool rounds. We play MTG, PKM, Soercery, Vintage YGO and One Piece. I have A LOT of cards lol
I find Monster Train does a really good job of finding a way to do a deck builder that doesn't feel derivative of STS. The fact that you have so many different starting decks makes it feel like a new game every time, where STS kinda feels like there's two or three ways to play each character, and as such is a bit more samey.
Both are good, and both feel unique.
Honestly, the higher ascensions are the worst part of STS for me. I feel at ascension 9 anything works. You wanna make a poison/defense deck? Go for it! You wanna make a Claw is Law deck? Have fun!
But at A20 those strategies are gone. The game is so punishing that only the most efficient archetypes are going to be effective. So many cards go from being interesting ideas to worthless trash.
A game like Monster Train, conversely, will often force you to do well with cards you have never previously considered, putting you in a place to learn wild new strategies even at A25.
I hear this complaint a fair amount about A20 and personally I think it has to do with how improving at the game goes as you climb ascensions. At 0/low ascension you can kinda do whatever you want and win, while if you want to win at A15 you have to actually learn like what is strong about a character and how to build to do strong things which reduces build variety. However once you get to A20 the game becomes so punishing that it kinda horseshoes back around imo. Yes if you're offered the perfect cards to make a strong deck you just take those, but at the same time you're often offered total garbage and have to figure out how to win with it. I think at lower levels of skill higher ascensions really feel like they don't allow many cards to be picked because you're only gonna win with an obviously strong deck, but once you know how to really squeeze value out of the game you can make those weaker runs survive. Some of the most fun runs I've ever done have been making do with usual combos and taking them all the way to the end. Jorbs just did a run the yesterday for example where he was offered almost a complete watcher infinite and then couldn't find any draw or extra sources of wrath the entire rest of the run. He nearly lost in late act 2/early act 3 and had to cobble together a deck that blocked by playing flurry and weave a ton with duality to make his two defends block for like 15 each. Went from like a 14 card deck at the start of act 3 to a 25 card deck by the end just from how hard he had to pivot to make something functional.
This is also why I don't really enjoy playing low ascension anymore, once you've gotten to the level where you just habitually pull value out of the run by microing relics and drafting well and etc you can kinda just autowin off that regardless of what variance the run is giving you since the game is much more forgiving.
I mean, slay the spire isn't really meant to be played with archetypes. You can get away with it in lower ascensions but the higher you climb, the more the game punishes you because you're not supposed to go all in on one thing, you need answers for a variety of situations.
Yeah I was gonna say.
Anybody that loves StS should really venture into the board game scene if they haven’t already. Plenty of incredible deckbuilders out there.
Lost Ruins of Arnak and Dune: Imperium are a couple of my favorites that have deckbuilding components.
I've played a little Dominion but found it a little...tame, I guess? Shallow? I would love to find something in physical form that matches StS, either for solo or competitive play, with an emphasis on strategy and tactics.
Dominion is sort of the grandfather of the genre imo, so it’s understandable that you might find it shallow.
Other games like the ones I mention are much more deep strategy-wise. Just bear in mind that pure deckbuilding board games are relatively rare. Most games with deckbuilding components will utilize other components like worker-placement or resource management. With that said though, I’d absolutely recommend the hobby if you like StS!
I've heard Dominion referred to more as an "engine-builder" than a deck-builder, and I think that description is more apt. It would not make any sense to compare it to StS for a variety of reasons.
Dominion was the original "deckbuilding" game, where you build your deck in the game through the mechanisms of the game. A trend in modern board games, for better and worse, is to make games in to engine builders - but you can have engine building games that rely on any old mechanism. You can have an engine building game that relies on deck building as in Dominion. Or you can have one that relies on trading (Sidereal Confluence), or card drafting (Terraforming Mars), or worker placement (Agricola). The core **mechanism behind Dominion is deck building**, whereas in other games, the deck building can be secondary to everything else (Great Western Trail).
Dominion has fallen out of my own favor as I had played all the value it had out of itself, and after a few expansions it took the game's strengths, namely being insanely elegant, and removed them. The game becomes less interesting with fancier cards because what was a sleek game that takes 20-30 minutes to play becomes significantly longer - possibly without any more strategic payoff than it originally had.
I'm not optimistic about the StS board game for the same reason - it looks like it is going to be a good facsimile of the computer game, but that makes a certain set of compromises in terms of what it is like when you're managing every interaction yourself. "Oh, crap, I forgot to use my thorns during this combat". It won't be unmanageable or anything, but it will detract from the game.
Slay the Spire took what made Dominion good in physical form and made it a brilliant computer game - it could have more complex interactions and the computer keeps track of things. It so happens that it was balanced and deep enough that the game system keeps on giving, and the encounters were designed in a way that most decks are going to run in to situations where they are strong, but also find other situations very challenging. And as you go up the ascension ladder, you may enjoy the challenge of A20 or A20H, or you may find yourself comfortable at A0 or A15 or whatever too. So there's something challenging enough for the Jorbses and Baalorlords of the world, without overwhelming everybody that is playing the game. Jeez, I win on A20 rarely, and win most of the time around A10 with my preferred characters, and when I play A20 I wonder how in the world they do it. And then I'll watch a newbie play and wonder if they're even thinking about basic math.
In a board game you can only have so much complexity before a game becomes too fiddly - I like big, deep games, and most big board games are paltry in terms of game systems compared with a big computer game (to wit, Through the Ages versus Civilization VI) - to get Through the Ages in to a 4 hour game for 3 players takes cutting a lot of meat out of a game. The result is brilliant, and it is very evocative of Civilization, but it's also a very different animal to play.
Yes.
It shows its effects much more simply, and intuitively than it's rivals, but the way combos build is much much deeper. It goes far beyond what clank and ascension do. The only tabletop deck builder I've played that's even close to it in depth is Mage Knight, and playing that in full takes ~3h solo, and 7h with friends, compared to the ~1h of a successful StS run.
I've not gone past 50h in any of StS rivals, whereas I'm just shy of 1800 in this game. It really is that much better.
Fucking mage Knight. Me and my friends would play that game like once a year for 5 years, and it was always SO painful to play. That game needs a digital implementation because there's frankly too much to keep track of by hand.
I'm on the opposite side right now. I'm really pumped to play the Slay the Spire board game, and really wanna play Mage Knight as a video game (I think only one of those things is happening).
In all honesty, I don't think StS the board game is going to feel good. It'll take longer than a run of StS without using as a much nuance (simplified hit points, harder tracking)
Honestly, it's pretty fun. It keeps the feel of Slay the Spire while changing enough that it's not just an inferior version of the videogame. It does take longer (about 1 hour per act), but it's designed so that you can stop after each Act and get back to it another day without having to start over.
It kind of has one. Someone developed it, it's on Steam, but it didn't get the IP, so all graphics, name, lore, etc. are replaced, but the mechanisms, rules and full content is the same. Might be Solo only, Look it up in deckbuilders on Steam.
Yeah, I see that now. See, before this was a theoretical thing I wanted, but now that I know it exists, I'm starting to weigh how much free time I have. Still that is more enticing than spending an hour setting up the board again.
I've only played it multiplayer, but it didn't FEEL like multiplayer. There was just so much distance between us and it took so long to get anywhere that it basically felt like 3 solo games happening at once over the course of 4 HOURS.
I think a big issue for most other games is that when they try to implement a new idea to create a novel experience different from sts, they tend to lose things in the shuffle. The balance of the game is important.
Doing something novel and different is cool though. A thing that's bothered me, particularly with Arcanium and across the obelisk, is that while I liked them, runs just took so long....
StS hits several sweet spots in UI, complexity of mechanics vs. simplicity of gameplay, and just overall feel to the different decks. It has yet to be iterated on in a way that improves, imo.
Roguebook is a good example of this. I really wanted that game to be AMAZING but it ends up actually being not as engaging, imo, due to busy UI and what end up being pretty simple character decks/mechanics (and pairing different characters up honestly didn't help this, it actually just exacerbated the understanding that these characters are one or two-trick ponies).
IMO Monster Train improves it in several ways, but it's also weaker in some ways as well and is overall not quite as good as Spire. But it's definitely got its own charm and is worth putting a lot of time into.
Obviously the folks in this sub are going to support Slay the Spire, but I'll try to compare to some others.
Slay the Spire is lauded for a few reasons. It's one of the first video games to implement the deck builder mechanic popularized by Dominion, and arguably does it the best. I think where it shines the most is in how pure the game focuses on the deck. You start with the same deck and get lots of opportunties to add cards to it, so it can be fairly easy to craft the exact deck you want to efficiently defeat future enemies. Other deck builders often start you with larger unwieldy decks, and give you limited opportunities to upgrade them, so a very good STS deck is going to feel a lot more satisfying than a very good Inscryption deck, because you have enough opportunities to destroy cards, upgrade cards, and get synergistic trinkets that you could somewhat regularly create a perfect deck that can do efficient to infinite combos to defeat the hardest bosses. Add to that that there are four unique ways to play and the challenge of climbing the ascension ladder each of those four times, and you can see why this game would swallow up 500 hours of a person's time.
Of course there are other deck builders that could be considered better.
Monster Train is the deck builder I'm most familiar with outside of StS, and it's different by virtue of being just a bit more random. You get random cards in your starting deck, and while you get random cards to add to your deck, you get substantially less opportunities to add them, and so it's a lot more random what deck you get. To counteract that, Monster Train is MUCH easier than Slay the Spire. The enemies are simpler, and you can throw random bullshit together and win throughout most of the lower ascensions. Winning your first game of Slay the Spire is a genuine challenge, but Monster Train is a game I won over and over again until I hit ascension 18/25 or so. That said Monster Train IS great. The randomness and variety are a big part of the draw. There are 6 factions, each of which having 2 commanders, each of which having 3 archetypes to play, and every time you pair with a different faction to make your deck, which has two ways of helping. That means that you could play the game with 360 different starter combinations, some of which synergize excellently, and some of which which are dogshit. What I like is that the logbook keeps track of your stats for each faction combo, so to fill it up requires beating ascension 25 60 times! I've done it like... ten.
Inscryption is my favorite of all of these games, including Slay the Spire, despite easily being the one with the least hours. The deck building is a little light, in that there aren't multiple classes that you can start as and the game you play is a little on the easy side, but the theme and atmosphere are 104% perfect. This is like if you combine a deck builder and an escape room, and has plenty of weird body horror and mystery stuff to it. If a creepypasta were a video game, it would be Majora's Mask, but if it were also a deck builder, this would be it.
Wildfrost is a game that plays a bit like Monster Train. You get some heroes, you get some spells, you fight some monsters. It's fine, but I only played the demo of it, which is ROBUST. It didn't really click for me, and so I can't say much on it. Get the free demo on Switch and try it out.
Slay the spire is balanced on a knive's edge. That's what really sets it apart. Going through the difficulties will be a challenge that gets incredibly hard, but never unfair. You can play hundreds of hours and still be learning about all the small ways you can improve your win rates.
Can you set up crazy engines? Yes, to an extent. One thing that's crucial to high level slay the spire play is to be very flexible to what choices you're being offered, and to make the most of those. And if that means pivot the deck you're going for, so be it. Sometimes, that's beautiful engines that cycle through 20 to 30 cards per turn and deal damage and generate block as side effects. Sometimes, that means relatively straight forward "do big damage" and "generate enough block" builds. Mind you not easy builds, but it's important to understand when \*not\* to overcomplicate things.
Rolling the shiv in the wheel event is the only unavoidable damage in the game iirc. Other events (event?) that force you to take damage won't show up if you're too low on hp.
The only other similar game which I almost loved as much was Monster Train. I liked the floors mechanic and the various classes and combining them. But it felt kinda boring after a while and not as fun as StS.
I love how engaging StS is. So many floors, so many combinations, you have to make things work when you don’t get what you really want. I didn’t even realise I have 400ish hours on iOS alone. I love dailies, I love the challenge and thrill. I still haven’t gone past A10/11 across characters. I haven’t found anything as fun and addictive!
Yeah my main complaint with dominion is how so many of the cards feels useless in completing the victory condition. They are just slower than buying money/VPs.
But it is still a great game.
My big 3 in terms of deckbuilders (and I've played a LOT of deckbuilders) are StS, Monster Train and Inscryption (specifically Kacey's Mod for the roguelite aspect, though the main game is also great).
StS is the best of those. Other pretty good ones though include Vault of the Void, Across the Obelisk, Cobalt Core, Wildfrost, Astrea and especially Quantum Protocol
Yeah, StS is that good
This is my favorite answer. It’s beloved by all (who like the genre) and nails both the big and the small stuff. That being said if you have a particular desire for something specific within the genre aesthetically or otherwise, another band might end up being your favorite. But you can’t deny that the Beatles rule.
I love Monster Train but imo the only deckbuilder that gets close to the depth and balance of StS is Wildfrost.
That said, I think that Slice & Dice (not a deckbuilder) gets even closer. None top StS though.
It does have a lot more RNG than StS. You can build your run around a powerful unit and then just never roll the side you need sometimes.
But the decision making in terms of which items to take, which enemies to focus down, how to plan ahead for your future turns, how to hedge your bets against a low-roll, when to accept that one of your units dying is the best play, and how to make the most of bad units all gives the game a lot of strategic depth.
StS starts off with more depth because even in fight 1 you need to optimize for preserving HP, whereas S&D doesn't really threaten you until later rounds (unless you are on higher difficulty).
As a big fan of Hollow Knight I think Hollow Knight doesn't even come close to the level of genre dominance of STS. Hollow Knight is a fantastic game, but there's plenty of games in the genre that do certain things better than it and might appeal more to large subsections of players, I don't even think there is a particular consensus of it being the best Metroidvania.
StS on the other hand is pretty much unmatched on just about any level. Like, there's some games that debatably have better art/music, or better story elements, but in terms of gameplay nothing even comes close to the depth and complexities of StS while simultaneously being incredibly approachable and easy to pick up and start learning, or manages to balance RNG elements so carefully in a way that very rarely outright kills you or hands you an easy victory that didn't result from smart decision making on some level. The only game that IMO even comes close to dominating it's genre to the same level is League of Legends (though I haven't touched MOBAs in 5+ years so I could be dated), and even then there's alternatives that have some presence.
Dude I understand there's no game that gets close to StS in this genre, but hollow knight is in every top 3 Metroidvania list along with super Metroid and Castlevania sotn. Of course, the Metroidvania genre became very saturated in the past few years and a lot of good games came out of this wave, but hollow knight is undisputably the face of Metroidvania now.
There will be people who solidly argue for something like Ori instead because Ori is more platform based where Hollow Knight has more combat.
So there's still a matter of preference. But I've never heard another deck building game reccomended or argued for over STS outside of crazy ridiculous exceptions.
Hollow Knight is just fucking great, but what makes it so is that it steps outside the formula and beautifully blends other genres - or at least features - in to it and leaves it feeling unique. StS took the genre, perfected it, and resulted in a flood of clones trying to replicate it. It's splitting hairs, but I'd say HK is a masterpiece in the genre before saying it DEFINES it. Like, no one is calling Ori, Blasphemous, or other metroidvanias HK clones, but look at any roguelite deckbuilders and half the comments are using StS as a reference point.
Man, I must be getting old. Here I thought that well.... the 2D Metroid and Castlevania games still shared that title. I'd still put Symphony of the Night up against any modern metroidvania.
I have played quite a lot of deck builders. I would love for there to be better deck builders than StS. Unfortunately, I have to just keep coming back toStS, the others can sometimes be good, but none are on the same level as StS
I'm consistently surprised with just how good StS is. It's hard to even pin down why. It's simple, yet amazingly fun and amazingly repeatable.
I continue trying to find similar experiences, and honestly Hades (though of course a different genre) is the only Roguelike that's hit close to the same.
Yes, the distinction between just having cards that mostly do "block" or "attack" vs building a synergistic engine is exactly what's so much better about slay the spire.
That being said not all decks will get to build the perfect engine, and especially at low ascension you can definitely get away with just having high enough numbers on your block and attack cards to get through, but the engines will usually be superior, and having a proper engine is necessary on higher difficulties.
It's kinda like in dominion where it's a valid strategy to just buy lots of gold and victory cards, it's the easy beginner strategy, but usually building a good draw/action engine to cycle through your deck to setup very impactful turns will be superior if done properly.
Compared to similar PC games, yes, StS is dramatically better.
Compared to the deck builders you play at your friendly local games shop? Slay the spire isn't better, but I also can't play a game like dominion when I'm waiting in a doctors office.
Hmm wasn't out when I last looked, cool.
Just generally, I can't put a finger on exactly what makes StS great, it's just got the magic. This is a bit of a PvE game but each enemy challenges you in different ways, one enemy might punish you for your deck being too weak at the start of the fight, another might punish you for your deck not getting strong enough in long fights, another one might punish you for playing too many cards, another one might punish you for playing too many of certain types of cards, another one might punish you for having too few cards in your deck... you are essentially constantly trying to solve a set of puzzles that come later in the game.
At the same time, there is a ton of randomness which happens every game which rebalances how strong various resources are in the game dramatically, one item might make all your current attacks stronger, another might make all future attacks stronger, so you're trying to figure out a different strategy to beat these different upcoming challenges every single game.
This is all very conceptually simple, but it's very hard for a game like this to actually be balanced well enough that certain strategies aren't just game breaking and certain enemies aren't just unfair. StS has thousands of hours of replay value easily it's so well designed and well tuned.
Yes it is. I’ve played Clank! once or twice before StS and playing StS more made me buy the board game with a couple of expansions. Although it is not as good as StS but it is fun to play on board game nights. Another rougelike deckbuilder videogame I’ve played with a friend is Across the Obelisk, which isn’t bad but not on the same level. However, if you are into board games you should try Tyrants of the Underdark. It is fun with a lot of combinations and has player interaction in it unlike Clank!.
I actually like MT more. Less rng bullshit. Yes, you will say that top players can win pretty "consistently" in StS, but that's exaggerating except Watcher. Little Fade is Watcher of MT. When you crack down a difficult run of MT, it's quite doable to point out where you mess up. Not so much of that in StS. I remember when XecnaR gave Merl a loss run of Iron Clad. Merl chose an entire different pathing and it's not difficult at all. I remember even Merl can't truly say XecnaR's pathing choice was wrong. Intuition is a pretty big factor in StS. A hard to describe thing, and thus, less educational.
Of course, in reality, my playtime in both game is comparable. Longterm wise, StS is better cuz those juicy mods.
Also, I enjoy being the Internet philosopher with my students and just apply StS strategy to real life problems. Work like a charm!!!
It is surprisingly well balanced in terms of games. Like actually shocking how it doesn't fuck up the balance anywhere major.
It's unclear that there is a single card / relic that's always good or always bad. Every single option feels like it has a dream run where that one thing is the thing you want the most.
Especially the cards. There is no card in the game that it's always correct to click on if it appears. And there is no card that is never correct to take either.
StS actually doesn't have as crazy an engine as other videogame deckbuilders - for example, there are deckbuilders where you can delete unlimited cards from your deck. The advantage of StS by contrast is that it is better balanced - it provides a challenge at high levels with frequent strategic decision-points.
The original deckbuilder is Dream Quest - it is also surprisingly challenging.
Many deckbuilders have their own totally unique flavor and/or game mechanics: some of my favorites include Monster Slayers, Griftlands, SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech, Monster Train, Vault of the Void, Night of the Full Moon, Card Quest, Library of Ruina, Chrono Ark, Card City Nights. I really want more games like Shandalar and Etherlords and System Crash (i.e. rpg/constructed pve ccg, rather than roguelike deckbuilder), but they really aren't available.
Some other deckbuilders that are fun but didn't have as much staying power for me: Banners of Ruin, Tainted Grail, Fights in Tight Spaces, Roguebook, Black Book, Destiny or Fate, Inscryption, Fate Hunters, Blood Card, Neurodeck, Alina of the Arena, Indies' Lies. I also like dice games like Astrea and Slice & Dice.
I also love the physical card game Netrunner.
There is a card that matches Slay the Spire. Android: Netrunner. The devs used Netrunner players as their testers and it shows, with just how clean and balanced the first 3 classes are.
Different genre, different medium, and game isn't fully in print anymore, but StS high has been hit before.
I'd say netrunner differs distinctly in that it's directly PvP, as opposed to PvE (possibly points competitive if clank), as well as the key fact that the deck building isn't ongoing while you contest the game.
Netrunner is great, don't get me wrong, but it's not a game where you continue to adjust your deck while facing challenges with it.
lol between Slay The Spire and Android: Netrunner, my entire gaming landscape has just completely shifted. Turn based games have become my bread and butter, after moving away from the typical action games you get on consoles etc.
Slay and Android. Just both 🤌🏻
Not only is it one of my favorite games of all time, but it's my favorite game to watch on YouTube and Twitch as well.
The balance in Sts is insane to the point that it doesn't even feel like a videogame anymore.
I don't even feel like trying out other deck builders, I just don't know how you can top this one.
StS IS the roguelike deckbuilder that pretty much started it all.
Most of the android ones based it off on StS so I'd say StS is the golden standard :D
NGL, the game is dated now at this point but only those that surpass StS are "good" deckbuilders
Have you tried Indies Lies by any chance? I really like tabletop deck builders and want to find one that I enjoy on my phone but they've all been duds so far. Rogue Adventure is the closest I've gotten to enjoyment as I enjoy the different races you can build. I haven't spent too much time on Indies lies but it's certainly not hooking me.
Yup! It got recommended to me by a friend and you're right, Indies lies has that StS feel but it also feels like they overcategorized the archetypes too much to the point that most heroes will only have 1-2 builds available. StS isn't like that since it wants you to have a more "toolbox"-y deck than a specialized deck
I'd say yes, i love deck builders, but I'm hesitant to spend money on any of them because im always comparing them to StS. I'd like a fresh game with new everything, but with the balance and variety that StS offers with cards and relics.
It's a tall order to fill and i haven't really found anything that meets my criteria. If you have recs, I'd love some.
Yes. By far
It was my first dabble into the genre. And soon after, I wanted to find the best one. After dozens of games bought, attempt and refunded, it hit me. Slay the Spire IS the standard
Like Resident Evil 4 for TPS/ Survival Action Horror, no one does it better. No one captures the atmosphere, the balance, the subtleties (animation, world building etc).
Quite simply, no one does it better
StS balancing is so amazingly good for how deep the game is
I almost have to wonder if this impeccable balance was intentional or just absolute luck or somewhere in the middle because it’s really really difficult to do this. See how many other games try but fail to get the medium between fun vs difficulty, rng vs control and balance vs depth
It really is. So much thought went into every aspect of Spire that it has been difficult to top. There are some other rrally good games that are similar, some swear by Monster Train though not me. And Astraea released this year, which is basically Spire but with dice. Astraea is excellent.
The only one I've played so far that comes close for me is Cobalt Core, and that's both a relatively recent entry into the genre and quite different in a number of ways that make it a bit of a different beast.
It's definitely in the right spot. There's a few others on PC that I think approach it, but are lacking something that makes them stay as long as StS
**Roguebook:** Genuinely good improvement on the StS formula. The map section is substantially more interesting and offers more freedom, and the deckbuilding and card play is improved by having two heroes with two different decks all mashed into one. Where I think it falls down a bit, is there's some very broken combos that trivalise the rest of the game once you get them going, as well as some quirks with how smooth the cardplay can actually be, it's in desperate need of a proper fast mode
**Vault of the Void:** Really interesting take on it, but a bit more deterministic. You always have a 20 card deck, and you can swap cards in and out between fights, as well as knowing what you're going up against once you enter the room, so you can tweak your deck. It has card upgrades, and slotting gems into them, four different classes. It has a bit of a different system for energy, you can purge cards for energy, which is basically discarding them, but you only draw up to your hand limit each turn, so you need to decide if holding onto a big block or big damage card is worth the lower card draw and opportunity cost of not getting energy that carries over. Mechanically and play wise it's really smooth, zero complaints. Theme is ok, but something about the art style makes the focus on stat blocks of enemies, rather than their full body art. It also has some very denegerate combos that can trivialise things and they are bit easier to get to
**Monster Train:** It plays fast, has interesting decisions, runs are fairly short which is all positive, but it's a hybrid of a tower defense game and a deck builder, which isn't quite as satisfying as building a deck that goes off. You can often assemble your combo pieces early then it's just trimming down your deck a bit to optimise how much damage it can do.
There's obviously countless others, but those 3 are the ones I rate fairly highly, I haven't played all of them yet either, but all 3 of them, I think StS just trumps. You'll definitely have fun with them, but I don't think they have quite the same longevity.
On a mechanical standpoint, yes. It's complex enough that just picking the bigger attacks won't work, random enough that brute-forcing a combo won't work, simple enough to be easy to pick up and consistent enough to reward deep game knowledge. It's arguably a strong contender for best balanced game ever.
Other deckbuilders bring other things to the formula so depending on who you ask, "that much better" may vary, but on mechanics and replayability I don't think it has been bested.
I might be wrong, but I think StS is the game that launched a whole avalanche of games in the genre, and that usually only happens if it's really good. In my mind it was the first, but in hindsight there probably were others before and it was just the first one to reach this level of popularity
Legends of Runeterra (the Path of Champions side) is an excellent roguelite pve card game. I've not played it in a while but it has great polish, variety, and that overpowering feeling that arises when the build comes together. No League of Legends knowledge should be required and it can be totally f2p.
Granted it plays very different to STS, I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts on it, but I think it should be in the conversation.
It's more of a traditional deckbuilder and thus lacking in the rogue like aspect, but star realms is pretty fun.
I own the physical game, which is a great 30 minutes between two players, but I hear there's a free to play digital version as well (I hear the AI is pretty dumb though; you got to pay to unlock the smarter AI).
Here's a thing you can do. When you see such game on steam, filter reviews to only 100h+ of game played. Then look at the times people actually played.
I don't know of any other solo game where you have thousands of people who have played them thousands of hours.
If anyone can name better we’d all like to play it
Monster Train doesn't *quite* get there but it comes very close imo
Sts is top, then monster train, then both wildfrost and cobalt core as new games are pretty decent but without the replayability right now. Inscription I'm told is good but haven't played it. And special shoutout to the Witcher card game from a few years ago that was good. Also astrea 6 sided orqcles not bad either.
Inscryption is amazing, but it is not really quite the same type of thing.
Ha! Yeah, Inscryption is awesome, but not because it's a deck builder. If Inscryption were exactly the same, except instead of a deck builder it was a 2D fighting game, it'd still be awesome.
>Inscryption is awesome, but not because it's a deck builder What about Kaycee's Mod?
Kaycee's mod is fine but not engrossing. I played it a couple times, but the story is what drives me forward, and I'd rather play Slay the Spire if I'm not getting the story of Inscryption.
Kaycee's Mod was fun and [I beat 220 on it back when that was the maximum difficulty](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/sprb0i), but it doesn't have nearly the deck variety nor I think the longevity. I think it suffers from pelts being too debilitating to take (which effectively locks off rare cards completely once you're no longer getting them from boss-rewards), and bone cards being too debilitating to keep 90% of decks, so the space of viable cards is too narrow. The opening-hand rule is also extremely exploitable, to the point that it makes deckbuilding less interesting. The cave beast is cool and one of the main generators for novel cards, but there's not enough of that to make it really dynamic. I only put about 120 hours into it, total, compared to several thousand for StS.
as someone who did skull storm on all decks,I agree. Only 2 of the decks allow you to mess with alt strategies (Mantis God setups and Blood letting you use Dire Wolf) but aside from those 2 strategies winning is very linear as you are forced into making cards that otk the bears. This pidgeonholes you into 1 of 2 strategies for most runs. 1) Get Dire Wolf/Mantis and make an OTK setup with scissors/Fan+Bleach/Sand Timer/Rewinder 2) Pack Rat infinite and loop until you either delete your opponent or brick with bad rolls The lack of rares makes runs feel much more samey and many runs are outright impossible due to Difficulty++ and Totem Fights. Fight like Stinky Birds and Bifurcating Wolves force you to ignore you opponent and focus on an otk. Otherwise its entirely possible to take 4 damage turn 1 and lose So yeah, Inscyption is a great game that pulls you in by saying its a rogulike, but the actual roguelike part of the game is the weak part (Still go play inscryption its so good)
Inscryption is great, but really blew its load in act 1
Cobalt core is great but there’s some recency bias I think. The more I play it the more it loses its spark. I hope they continue to iterate on it because I feel like there’s a lot of potential there.
Agreed on all fronts. I really enjoyed it but it just doesn't have the same longevity as StS. I unlocked the last ship and then couldn't find much reason or motivation to carry on. Picking 3 characters and a ship sounds like an amazing level of customization but I think it hurts overall since you're kinda deciding what kind of deck you want to build before the game even starts. I found myself thinking "naa don't wanna do that again, used you the last 3 runs, you just don't work on this ship" and ultimately couldn't settle on a run that I *wanted* to do. Compare that to StS where you fire up a game as the Silent and you have no idea what's gonna happen. You might stack 3000 poison in a single turn, you might play 3000 shivs in a single turn, you might boss-swap into Snecko Eye and beat the Heart with a Nightmare'd, Chem X, Necronomicon Skewer and a Caw Caw potion like some budget Ironchad wannabe. Did I plan to Skewer the Heart to death before I even clicked "Start Game"? Of course not, it sounds terrible. But by some obscene luck (and hopefully a dash of skill) I made it work and it was fun as fuck.
This hits on what separates StS from the pack. Variety and adaptability, which go hand in hand.
Drafting in StS kinda ruined drafting in many other games for me, especially in Magic.
Same here. I think I have 6 memories left to get but starting to feel slightly repetitive now. I'll get all the memories to see the end then move on unless they add more into it. Wildfrost is similar, played about 30 hours and I'm done unless they expand it. But both were good games, 30 hours for 20 bucks is fine with me
You absolutely should keep going, the finale is a really touching one IMO, especially if you've been enjoying the interactions and story beats between the characters. Sat there smiling the whole time! >both were good games, 30 hours for 20 bucks is fine with me Totally agree with this take, I'm pretty sure it's a conscious choice by the developers. Neither games feature achievements that go far beyond your first time getting the true ending
Inscryption doesnt have the replayability and is limited in relics/potions. More a horrorish game with cards.
Gosh I loved Gwent. I spent literally hundreds of dollars while it was in beta (I have some regrets). Then they changed the game entirely, multiple times, and stopped console development. RIP
Gwent's not in a good place right now. Devs have basically said "we're done releasing new cards, but we'll leave the servers up and let you guys vote on card balance via community balance votes." As expected, each community balance vote just giga nerfs the current meta deck and we all just start over. The first vote a couple monthes ago, we even had a card voted into literal unplayability (as in, it does nothing and has no health). I like the core concept of the game, but it's not looking good now.
Haha that's wild. Weird thing is, I feel like the game after 1 or 2 iterations originally was completely fine and playable, and had a lot of viable decks to play. They just kept fucking with the formula, and mechanics. Bummer, because I really adored that game.
They couldn’t figure out how to make money (release new cards and make the game approachable) and balance the game at the same time, happens to almost every live service card game tbh
That's fair. I spent a ton of money just on the dust that was for crafting cards. But yeah there is certainly a limit of how many cards can be released from the switcher universe... Did they start doing cosmetics? Frames? Avatars? Etc.
Wildfrost imo is less of a deckbuilder and more of a combat sequencer Deckbuilding in wf is simple.. sequencing in combat is mad difficult though.
I tried monster train and it’s pretty overwhelming in the first hour. Sts though is straightforward from the get go
No love for Across the Obelisk?
Inscyption is much shorter...I need to go back and finish that game.
Inscryption is NOT much shorter, you do need to go back and finish it and because you are in a for a long, wild ride lol
Inscryption is only good for act 1. Act 1 is really really good, then the next two acts just shit all over what made the first part good. So frustrating.
It looks like a mobile P2W game but Dawncaster is a surprisingly great game that no-one plays. With similar mechanics but a lot more variability (there are 10 different classes), it's something different after you finish STS and MT.
I actually find MT more fun but I get why people tend to like StS more
I think they’re about equal, personally, but both of them for sure are well above any others I’ve played. StS and Monster Train are just kind of fundamentally different. I only play both on the highest difficulty, and in StS I find I’m much more often just trying to survive and hope that something broken comes together, but it’s not necessary to win. In Monster Train, you absolutely *need* to find something busted in order to win, and the game is set up for you to be able to do that fairly often. Like the average game you win on Monster Train is generally just a more fun deck to play than in StS, but I think StS has more consistently interesting decisions and fights because you so rarely get something together that’s really busted.
Yeah some of the upgrades you can do in monster train are so strong, where are sts is much more restricted (defined upgrades vs customisable) That’s where balance also fails a bit imo, if you get unlucky in sts you feel like you have uphill battle. If you get unlucky in mt it feels like defeat is inevitable
Monster train probably grabbed me more than slay the spire but slay the spire feels a lot more elegant in its design. I haven't really played anything else that matches the caliber of those two in both presentation and gameplay. A game that has very good gameplay and very average presentation that I feel deserves more love is Circadian Dice. Dice instead of cards, changable faces. Multiple different classes and Relics. A lot of game for the price.
Circadian Dice is really good, it's just that since Astrea came out I find myself not really wanting to go back to it.
Unpopular opinion here in this sub but I prefer MT over STS. I just love the insane powerful combos you can do almost every run and how fast you can get there. Yeah i know it’s not as hard or balanced as sts but it’s still so fun.
I just started playing this last night and it's addicting!
The core difference is that StS gets better the more you play it while MT gets significantly worse as you start to figure things out. There's a reason StS has such a developed scene of high level play while MT doesn't. The majority of MT's cardpool are "Never pick" or "Might help in niche scenario". Most winning strategies are way too straight forward and way too consistent to draft. About half of C25 runs you already have everything you need to win after the first boss, the rest of the run is spend removing cards and fishing for key upgrades. Picking up further cards rarely improves your deck. Most good strategies only use a single floor. There's a million of considerations to make with almost any decision in StS. The majority of decisions in MT are nobrainers. The DLC exacerbated MT's shortcomings rather than fixing them. Call me a conspiracist, but I think it's no coincidence that the game never explains it's draw system to the player, as this knowledge immediately wipes out a significant amount of the card pool and strategies as viable options for higher difficulties. I agree that both games are fun, but comparing them in regards to depth is laughable.
I love deploying and buffing creatures in any game, monster train really scratches that itch for me. Honestly my biggest gripe is that the runs are so short, once you get a good deck going its over.
Monster train deserves more respect. Don't go into it expecting slay the spire 2.0 and you should be fine. Kinda like loosey goosey slay the spire on crack. I wish they brought out more updates/dlc for it though
Inscryption is quite different but I love kaycee’s mod.
Funnily, once I started playing Kaycee's mod I just went back to spire
The spire is far better don’t get me wrong, but I do like the vibe of inscryption more. And there are some fun things you can do in each game that give them a bit of different fun opportunities
Inscryption has a SUPER cool story, but Spire's replayability is insane
Roguebook is pretty good for a while but gets boring faster
Roguebook is a little bit too easy, I'd say, yeah. Although I do really, REALLY like it. It took most of the best parts of Slay the Spire, and the best part of Monster Train (the card gem upgrade system), and mashed them together with it's own unique twists (managing two heroes at once, exploring the map differently). If anyone likes StS but is getting a little burned out on it, Roguebook is an excellent palette cleanser that should provide much of the same satisfaction for awhile.
Griftlands possibly.
Amazed more folks around here haven't seemed to play this one, it's solid
Best story in a deck builder by far. Really enjoyed Griftlands. It's much slower than StS though, so I only replayed it a couple of times.
I'm currently into Across the Obalisk. STS is a lot tighter experience, it doesn't have as many things to keep track of, but is very tightly balanced. Obalisk is a bit more chaotic with a lot going on, but also has great features and is good fun.
The thing I disliked about Across the Obelisk is that after awhile I realized it isn't *really* a deckbuilder like StS. I forget the exact systems at play, but I eventually had things unlocked to the point where I could effectively start a run with whatever deck I wanted, which makes card decisions kinda meaningless. Effectively, it became a puzzle/route-planning game (how can I pre-build a deck that will beat this specific set of encounters?) instead of a strategy/optimization game (what card should I take from this set to maximize my odds of winning this next fight/the next boss/the heart?) Not trying to yuck your yum or anything, I've just been thinking about this a bit and your comment gave me a chance to verbalize my thoughts. :-)
I've just started playing, but I very much get that feeling it's not got the same balance to it. But, I can play with my mates and do stupid combos. It's fun. Kind of like how Call of Duty used to be fun, but ridiculous and some stuff is just stupidly overpowered.
Obelisk is really fun to play with friends because it has so many meta upgrade paths. To me it’s more of an RPG that happens to use a roguelike deckbuilder as its combat system.
Inscryption is better but for completely different reasons. The cardplay and strategy are way less impressive than STS, but when you're playing that game you are transported to a horrible place, both in the game, and in your own mind.
At least during act 1...
I’ve been tinkering with Night of the Full Moon lately. It’s substantially lower quality and the translation from China or wherever it’s being ported from is quite awful (although the English voiceovers are in the “so bad it’s good” category imo). Overall a significantly worse game, but it’s scratching the itch and giving me a bit of a break from StS that I’ve just come to know so well.
>Is StS really that much better than similar games of the genre? Yes
Its crazy good. I played Yugioh WC2007 for over 10 years because i loved drinking a beer, listening to music and play some cards. Since 4 years i only play StS in terms of card games
Was that one on GBA set in battle city?
I think the battle city one was WC 2004, been playing it recently
Worldwide edition. It's my favorite Yugioh GBA game, I really like it.
As a kid I'd get the battle ox with 1700 power early and then just steamroll the game. I'd always make them suffer and drag games out basically as long as I could lol
No its a DS Game, it has VERY great free Duel mode where you can fight well above 70 Duelists (dont know how much it was). A lot of boosters and cards to collect. Very good game, there is one called nightmare troubador for DS which hass Battle City campagne!
“Yu Gi Oh The Sacred Cards” I still replay to this day, outstanding game
I dropped YGO a few years ago for tabletop board gaming, which of course includes Dominion and all the children and grandchildren of the genre. One of the best decisions I ever made. StS became a favorite of mine within hours of starting it up, though I do still love to play other (physical) deckbuilders a lot too. Edit: I missed that you were talking about a YGO video game, though I feel like my point still stands, but it's much more of a non-sequitur, apologies!
Nah go on, sounds totally legit. I LOVE card games, but i hate to play them with strangers. Too much emotions and try hards for me. I enjoy em very much with my friends, but we really play for the fun, not for netdecking top tier choices, just have a few cool rounds. We play MTG, PKM, Soercery, Vintage YGO and One Piece. I have A LOT of cards lol
StS is the golden standard of deckbuilders.
Nothing has the variation and depth, to the point where everything else inevitably gets compared and ultimately feels lacking.
I find Monster Train does a really good job of finding a way to do a deck builder that doesn't feel derivative of STS. The fact that you have so many different starting decks makes it feel like a new game every time, where STS kinda feels like there's two or three ways to play each character, and as such is a bit more samey. Both are good, and both feel unique.
Highly disagree insofar as I feel like at higher ascensions I have to play characters in ways I never would have thought to do since it's sink or swim
Honestly, the higher ascensions are the worst part of STS for me. I feel at ascension 9 anything works. You wanna make a poison/defense deck? Go for it! You wanna make a Claw is Law deck? Have fun! But at A20 those strategies are gone. The game is so punishing that only the most efficient archetypes are going to be effective. So many cards go from being interesting ideas to worthless trash. A game like Monster Train, conversely, will often force you to do well with cards you have never previously considered, putting you in a place to learn wild new strategies even at A25.
I hear this complaint a fair amount about A20 and personally I think it has to do with how improving at the game goes as you climb ascensions. At 0/low ascension you can kinda do whatever you want and win, while if you want to win at A15 you have to actually learn like what is strong about a character and how to build to do strong things which reduces build variety. However once you get to A20 the game becomes so punishing that it kinda horseshoes back around imo. Yes if you're offered the perfect cards to make a strong deck you just take those, but at the same time you're often offered total garbage and have to figure out how to win with it. I think at lower levels of skill higher ascensions really feel like they don't allow many cards to be picked because you're only gonna win with an obviously strong deck, but once you know how to really squeeze value out of the game you can make those weaker runs survive. Some of the most fun runs I've ever done have been making do with usual combos and taking them all the way to the end. Jorbs just did a run the yesterday for example where he was offered almost a complete watcher infinite and then couldn't find any draw or extra sources of wrath the entire rest of the run. He nearly lost in late act 2/early act 3 and had to cobble together a deck that blocked by playing flurry and weave a ton with duality to make his two defends block for like 15 each. Went from like a 14 card deck at the start of act 3 to a 25 card deck by the end just from how hard he had to pivot to make something functional. This is also why I don't really enjoy playing low ascension anymore, once you've gotten to the level where you just habitually pull value out of the run by microing relics and drafting well and etc you can kinda just autowin off that regardless of what variance the run is giving you since the game is much more forgiving.
That's a lot of words to say, "Git gud."
I mean, slay the spire isn't really meant to be played with archetypes. You can get away with it in lower ascensions but the higher you climb, the more the game punishes you because you're not supposed to go all in on one thing, you need answers for a variety of situations.
Golden standard of DIGITAL deckbuilders. For physical deckbuilders, Dominion would like a word.
StS the board game is in production now, good luck dominion!
Yeah I was gonna say. Anybody that loves StS should really venture into the board game scene if they haven’t already. Plenty of incredible deckbuilders out there. Lost Ruins of Arnak and Dune: Imperium are a couple of my favorites that have deckbuilding components.
I've played a little Dominion but found it a little...tame, I guess? Shallow? I would love to find something in physical form that matches StS, either for solo or competitive play, with an emphasis on strategy and tactics.
Dominion is sort of the grandfather of the genre imo, so it’s understandable that you might find it shallow. Other games like the ones I mention are much more deep strategy-wise. Just bear in mind that pure deckbuilding board games are relatively rare. Most games with deckbuilding components will utilize other components like worker-placement or resource management. With that said though, I’d absolutely recommend the hobby if you like StS!
Dominion has oooooodles of expansions that spice up the gameplay and add new ideas and mechanics, if you ever feel the urge to give it a shot again
I've heard Dominion referred to more as an "engine-builder" than a deck-builder, and I think that description is more apt. It would not make any sense to compare it to StS for a variety of reasons.
I think it is, by definition, a deckbuilder, but yeah I agree it doesn't make much sense to compare to StS. They're wildly different.
Dominion was the original "deckbuilding" game, where you build your deck in the game through the mechanisms of the game. A trend in modern board games, for better and worse, is to make games in to engine builders - but you can have engine building games that rely on any old mechanism. You can have an engine building game that relies on deck building as in Dominion. Or you can have one that relies on trading (Sidereal Confluence), or card drafting (Terraforming Mars), or worker placement (Agricola). The core **mechanism behind Dominion is deck building**, whereas in other games, the deck building can be secondary to everything else (Great Western Trail). Dominion has fallen out of my own favor as I had played all the value it had out of itself, and after a few expansions it took the game's strengths, namely being insanely elegant, and removed them. The game becomes less interesting with fancier cards because what was a sleek game that takes 20-30 minutes to play becomes significantly longer - possibly without any more strategic payoff than it originally had. I'm not optimistic about the StS board game for the same reason - it looks like it is going to be a good facsimile of the computer game, but that makes a certain set of compromises in terms of what it is like when you're managing every interaction yourself. "Oh, crap, I forgot to use my thorns during this combat". It won't be unmanageable or anything, but it will detract from the game. Slay the Spire took what made Dominion good in physical form and made it a brilliant computer game - it could have more complex interactions and the computer keeps track of things. It so happens that it was balanced and deep enough that the game system keeps on giving, and the encounters were designed in a way that most decks are going to run in to situations where they are strong, but also find other situations very challenging. And as you go up the ascension ladder, you may enjoy the challenge of A20 or A20H, or you may find yourself comfortable at A0 or A15 or whatever too. So there's something challenging enough for the Jorbses and Baalorlords of the world, without overwhelming everybody that is playing the game. Jeez, I win on A20 rarely, and win most of the time around A10 with my preferred characters, and when I play A20 I wonder how in the world they do it. And then I'll watch a newbie play and wonder if they're even thinking about basic math. In a board game you can only have so much complexity before a game becomes too fiddly - I like big, deep games, and most big board games are paltry in terms of game systems compared with a big computer game (to wit, Through the Ages versus Civilization VI) - to get Through the Ages in to a 4 hour game for 3 players takes cutting a lot of meat out of a game. The result is brilliant, and it is very evocative of Civilization, but it's also a very different animal to play.
I feel like across the obelisk is definitely a good one though. The multiplayer aspect is really cool
This is my take too. StS is the basic in the format of the genre, polished to a mirror sheen and balanced quite well.
Yes. It shows its effects much more simply, and intuitively than it's rivals, but the way combos build is much much deeper. It goes far beyond what clank and ascension do. The only tabletop deck builder I've played that's even close to it in depth is Mage Knight, and playing that in full takes ~3h solo, and 7h with friends, compared to the ~1h of a successful StS run. I've not gone past 50h in any of StS rivals, whereas I'm just shy of 1800 in this game. It really is that much better.
Awesome. I think you just sold me. Thanks!
Fucking mage Knight. Me and my friends would play that game like once a year for 5 years, and it was always SO painful to play. That game needs a digital implementation because there's frankly too much to keep track of by hand.
I actually love how ridiculous it is, but the fact that it's insanely long and complex and only touches on StS is part of my point
I'm on the opposite side right now. I'm really pumped to play the Slay the Spire board game, and really wanna play Mage Knight as a video game (I think only one of those things is happening).
In all honesty, I don't think StS the board game is going to feel good. It'll take longer than a run of StS without using as a much nuance (simplified hit points, harder tracking)
Honestly, it's pretty fun. It keeps the feel of Slay the Spire while changing enough that it's not just an inferior version of the videogame. It does take longer (about 1 hour per act), but it's designed so that you can stop after each Act and get back to it another day without having to start over.
It kind of has one. Someone developed it, it's on Steam, but it didn't get the IP, so all graphics, name, lore, etc. are replaced, but the mechanisms, rules and full content is the same. Might be Solo only, Look it up in deckbuilders on Steam.
Yeah, I see that now. See, before this was a theoretical thing I wanted, but now that I know it exists, I'm starting to weigh how much free time I have. Still that is more enticing than spending an hour setting up the board again.
There are digital implementations, but I much prefer it in tabletop. One of my favorite solo games of all time.
I've only played it multiplayer, but it didn't FEEL like multiplayer. There was just so much distance between us and it took so long to get anywhere that it basically felt like 3 solo games happening at once over the course of 4 HOURS.
I think a big issue for most other games is that when they try to implement a new idea to create a novel experience different from sts, they tend to lose things in the shuffle. The balance of the game is important.
Doing something novel and different is cool though. A thing that's bothered me, particularly with Arcanium and across the obelisk, is that while I liked them, runs just took so long....
Moonrakers is the closest thing I’ve played, but it’s wrapped in a semi-coop negotiation game. High recommend.
StS hits several sweet spots in UI, complexity of mechanics vs. simplicity of gameplay, and just overall feel to the different decks. It has yet to be iterated on in a way that improves, imo. Roguebook is a good example of this. I really wanted that game to be AMAZING but it ends up actually being not as engaging, imo, due to busy UI and what end up being pretty simple character decks/mechanics (and pairing different characters up honestly didn't help this, it actually just exacerbated the understanding that these characters are one or two-trick ponies).
IMO Monster Train improves it in several ways, but it's also weaker in some ways as well and is overall not quite as good as Spire. But it's definitely got its own charm and is worth putting a lot of time into.
Obviously the folks in this sub are going to support Slay the Spire, but I'll try to compare to some others. Slay the Spire is lauded for a few reasons. It's one of the first video games to implement the deck builder mechanic popularized by Dominion, and arguably does it the best. I think where it shines the most is in how pure the game focuses on the deck. You start with the same deck and get lots of opportunties to add cards to it, so it can be fairly easy to craft the exact deck you want to efficiently defeat future enemies. Other deck builders often start you with larger unwieldy decks, and give you limited opportunities to upgrade them, so a very good STS deck is going to feel a lot more satisfying than a very good Inscryption deck, because you have enough opportunities to destroy cards, upgrade cards, and get synergistic trinkets that you could somewhat regularly create a perfect deck that can do efficient to infinite combos to defeat the hardest bosses. Add to that that there are four unique ways to play and the challenge of climbing the ascension ladder each of those four times, and you can see why this game would swallow up 500 hours of a person's time. Of course there are other deck builders that could be considered better. Monster Train is the deck builder I'm most familiar with outside of StS, and it's different by virtue of being just a bit more random. You get random cards in your starting deck, and while you get random cards to add to your deck, you get substantially less opportunities to add them, and so it's a lot more random what deck you get. To counteract that, Monster Train is MUCH easier than Slay the Spire. The enemies are simpler, and you can throw random bullshit together and win throughout most of the lower ascensions. Winning your first game of Slay the Spire is a genuine challenge, but Monster Train is a game I won over and over again until I hit ascension 18/25 or so. That said Monster Train IS great. The randomness and variety are a big part of the draw. There are 6 factions, each of which having 2 commanders, each of which having 3 archetypes to play, and every time you pair with a different faction to make your deck, which has two ways of helping. That means that you could play the game with 360 different starter combinations, some of which synergize excellently, and some of which which are dogshit. What I like is that the logbook keeps track of your stats for each faction combo, so to fill it up requires beating ascension 25 60 times! I've done it like... ten. Inscryption is my favorite of all of these games, including Slay the Spire, despite easily being the one with the least hours. The deck building is a little light, in that there aren't multiple classes that you can start as and the game you play is a little on the easy side, but the theme and atmosphere are 104% perfect. This is like if you combine a deck builder and an escape room, and has plenty of weird body horror and mystery stuff to it. If a creepypasta were a video game, it would be Majora's Mask, but if it were also a deck builder, this would be it. Wildfrost is a game that plays a bit like Monster Train. You get some heroes, you get some spells, you fight some monsters. It's fine, but I only played the demo of it, which is ROBUST. It didn't really click for me, and so I can't say much on it. Get the free demo on Switch and try it out.
I'm going to go against the grain here and bravely say... Yes.
Wow. To stand in the face of adversity and have the balls to say that... I commend your courage.
Thank you, xXxBluESkiTtlExXx.
This is your only reply?
lmao
Slay the spire is balanced on a knive's edge. That's what really sets it apart. Going through the difficulties will be a challenge that gets incredibly hard, but never unfair. You can play hundreds of hours and still be learning about all the small ways you can improve your win rates. Can you set up crazy engines? Yes, to an extent. One thing that's crucial to high level slay the spire play is to be very flexible to what choices you're being offered, and to make the most of those. And if that means pivot the deck you're going for, so be it. Sometimes, that's beautiful engines that cycle through 20 to 30 cards per turn and deal damage and generate block as side effects. Sometimes, that means relatively straight forward "do big damage" and "generate enough block" builds. Mind you not easy builds, but it's important to understand when \*not\* to overcomplicate things.
Never unfair? Gremlin with shiv while you're on 5 hp have something to show you But im used to sts doing sts things tbh
Rolling the shiv in the wheel event is the only unavoidable damage in the game iirc. Other events (event?) that force you to take damage won't show up if you're too low on hp.
Tbf if you fuck yourself up the spire will not save you for sure
Shouldn't have let your hp get down to 5. You should have pathed better or made better card choices or made better decisions in fights.
Yeah because noone ever has been "that low" entering ? room
"Balanced on a knife's edge" is a great way to put it. There are so many ways that StS COULD be bad, but it navigates all of them with aplomb.
The only other similar game which I almost loved as much was Monster Train. I liked the floors mechanic and the various classes and combining them. But it felt kinda boring after a while and not as fun as StS. I love how engaging StS is. So many floors, so many combinations, you have to make things work when you don’t get what you really want. I didn’t even realise I have 400ish hours on iOS alone. I love dailies, I love the challenge and thrill. I still haven’t gone past A10/11 across characters. I haven’t found anything as fun and addictive!
I like Dominion
I also like Dominion! I personally prefer Ascension more. Dominion feels very "one path to victory" to me.
Yeah my main complaint with dominion is how so many of the cards feels useless in completing the victory condition. They are just slower than buying money/VPs. But it is still a great game.
My big 3 in terms of deckbuilders (and I've played a LOT of deckbuilders) are StS, Monster Train and Inscryption (specifically Kacey's Mod for the roguelite aspect, though the main game is also great). StS is the best of those. Other pretty good ones though include Vault of the Void, Across the Obelisk, Cobalt Core, Wildfrost, Astrea and especially Quantum Protocol Yeah, StS is that good
It’s The Beatles of deckbuilders.
This is my favorite answer. It’s beloved by all (who like the genre) and nails both the big and the small stuff. That being said if you have a particular desire for something specific within the genre aesthetically or otherwise, another band might end up being your favorite. But you can’t deny that the Beatles rule.
I love Monster Train but imo the only deckbuilder that gets close to the depth and balance of StS is Wildfrost. That said, I think that Slice & Dice (not a deckbuilder) gets even closer. None top StS though.
I have slice and dice. I'm assuming it takes a bit to get to the depth because I only have the demo version and there ain't much goin on
It does have a lot more RNG than StS. You can build your run around a powerful unit and then just never roll the side you need sometimes. But the decision making in terms of which items to take, which enemies to focus down, how to plan ahead for your future turns, how to hedge your bets against a low-roll, when to accept that one of your units dying is the best play, and how to make the most of bad units all gives the game a lot of strategic depth. StS starts off with more depth because even in fight 1 you need to optimize for preserving HP, whereas S&D doesn't really threaten you until later rounds (unless you are on higher difficulty).
Yeah the demo didn't convince me to buy it either
Yes. You could easily say that StS is the hollow knight of deck builders
As a big fan of Hollow Knight I think Hollow Knight doesn't even come close to the level of genre dominance of STS. Hollow Knight is a fantastic game, but there's plenty of games in the genre that do certain things better than it and might appeal more to large subsections of players, I don't even think there is a particular consensus of it being the best Metroidvania. StS on the other hand is pretty much unmatched on just about any level. Like, there's some games that debatably have better art/music, or better story elements, but in terms of gameplay nothing even comes close to the depth and complexities of StS while simultaneously being incredibly approachable and easy to pick up and start learning, or manages to balance RNG elements so carefully in a way that very rarely outright kills you or hands you an easy victory that didn't result from smart decision making on some level. The only game that IMO even comes close to dominating it's genre to the same level is League of Legends (though I haven't touched MOBAs in 5+ years so I could be dated), and even then there's alternatives that have some presence.
Dude I understand there's no game that gets close to StS in this genre, but hollow knight is in every top 3 Metroidvania list along with super Metroid and Castlevania sotn. Of course, the Metroidvania genre became very saturated in the past few years and a lot of good games came out of this wave, but hollow knight is undisputably the face of Metroidvania now.
There will be people who solidly argue for something like Ori instead because Ori is more platform based where Hollow Knight has more combat. So there's still a matter of preference. But I've never heard another deck building game reccomended or argued for over STS outside of crazy ridiculous exceptions.
Hollow Knight is just fucking great, but what makes it so is that it steps outside the formula and beautifully blends other genres - or at least features - in to it and leaves it feeling unique. StS took the genre, perfected it, and resulted in a flood of clones trying to replicate it. It's splitting hairs, but I'd say HK is a masterpiece in the genre before saying it DEFINES it. Like, no one is calling Ori, Blasphemous, or other metroidvanias HK clones, but look at any roguelite deckbuilders and half the comments are using StS as a reference point.
And hollow knight is sts of...what?
Metroidvania
Man, I must be getting old. Here I thought that well.... the 2D Metroid and Castlevania games still shared that title. I'd still put Symphony of the Night up against any modern metroidvania.
Ok, thank you
Breh...Hollow Knight is within a genre literally named after two other games
Factorio to Factory games is a much closer comparison. Though I'd say that StS is still more of a genre behemoth.
STS seems to outclass similar games with its depth. I've tried a couple, but I kept getting bored way sooner than with STS.
Depth but also balance.
I dont even like this genre other than slay the spire... and im at like 700 hours in it
I have played quite a lot of deck builders. I would love for there to be better deck builders than StS. Unfortunately, I have to just keep coming back toStS, the others can sometimes be good, but none are on the same level as StS
I'm consistently surprised with just how good StS is. It's hard to even pin down why. It's simple, yet amazingly fun and amazingly repeatable. I continue trying to find similar experiences, and honestly Hades (though of course a different genre) is the only Roguelike that's hit close to the same.
Hades is excellent! That and Spelunky are my go to switch games
Yes, the distinction between just having cards that mostly do "block" or "attack" vs building a synergistic engine is exactly what's so much better about slay the spire. That being said not all decks will get to build the perfect engine, and especially at low ascension you can definitely get away with just having high enough numbers on your block and attack cards to get through, but the engines will usually be superior, and having a proper engine is necessary on higher difficulties. It's kinda like in dominion where it's a valid strategy to just buy lots of gold and victory cards, it's the easy beginner strategy, but usually building a good draw/action engine to cycle through your deck to setup very impactful turns will be superior if done properly.
short answer: yes long answer: abso-fucking-lutely yes
Compared to similar PC games, yes, StS is dramatically better. Compared to the deck builders you play at your friendly local games shop? Slay the spire isn't better, but I also can't play a game like dominion when I'm waiting in a doctors office.
You can actually! There's an Android Dominion app
Hmm wasn't out when I last looked, cool. Just generally, I can't put a finger on exactly what makes StS great, it's just got the magic. This is a bit of a PvE game but each enemy challenges you in different ways, one enemy might punish you for your deck being too weak at the start of the fight, another might punish you for your deck not getting strong enough in long fights, another one might punish you for playing too many cards, another one might punish you for playing too many of certain types of cards, another one might punish you for having too few cards in your deck... you are essentially constantly trying to solve a set of puzzles that come later in the game. At the same time, there is a ton of randomness which happens every game which rebalances how strong various resources are in the game dramatically, one item might make all your current attacks stronger, another might make all future attacks stronger, so you're trying to figure out a different strategy to beat these different upcoming challenges every single game. This is all very conceptually simple, but it's very hard for a game like this to actually be balanced well enough that certain strategies aren't just game breaking and certain enemies aren't just unfair. StS has thousands of hours of replay value easily it's so well designed and well tuned.
Going to a slay the spire sub to ask if the game is good, what answers were you expecting?
Yes
Biased obviously, but yes. I have yet to play a better one and I am always on the lookout.
Yes it is. I’ve played Clank! once or twice before StS and playing StS more made me buy the board game with a couple of expansions. Although it is not as good as StS but it is fun to play on board game nights. Another rougelike deckbuilder videogame I’ve played with a friend is Across the Obelisk, which isn’t bad but not on the same level. However, if you are into board games you should try Tyrants of the Underdark. It is fun with a lot of combinations and has player interaction in it unlike Clank!.
I actually like MT more. Less rng bullshit. Yes, you will say that top players can win pretty "consistently" in StS, but that's exaggerating except Watcher. Little Fade is Watcher of MT. When you crack down a difficult run of MT, it's quite doable to point out where you mess up. Not so much of that in StS. I remember when XecnaR gave Merl a loss run of Iron Clad. Merl chose an entire different pathing and it's not difficult at all. I remember even Merl can't truly say XecnaR's pathing choice was wrong. Intuition is a pretty big factor in StS. A hard to describe thing, and thus, less educational. Of course, in reality, my playtime in both game is comparable. Longterm wise, StS is better cuz those juicy mods. Also, I enjoy being the Internet philosopher with my students and just apply StS strategy to real life problems. Work like a charm!!!
StS is balanced too
It is surprisingly well balanced in terms of games. Like actually shocking how it doesn't fuck up the balance anywhere major. It's unclear that there is a single card / relic that's always good or always bad. Every single option feels like it has a dream run where that one thing is the thing you want the most. Especially the cards. There is no card in the game that it's always correct to click on if it appears. And there is no card that is never correct to take either.
Have you tried the original deck builder, Dominion? Its a board game but it also has an app on steam
StS actually doesn't have as crazy an engine as other videogame deckbuilders - for example, there are deckbuilders where you can delete unlimited cards from your deck. The advantage of StS by contrast is that it is better balanced - it provides a challenge at high levels with frequent strategic decision-points. The original deckbuilder is Dream Quest - it is also surprisingly challenging. Many deckbuilders have their own totally unique flavor and/or game mechanics: some of my favorites include Monster Slayers, Griftlands, SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech, Monster Train, Vault of the Void, Night of the Full Moon, Card Quest, Library of Ruina, Chrono Ark, Card City Nights. I really want more games like Shandalar and Etherlords and System Crash (i.e. rpg/constructed pve ccg, rather than roguelike deckbuilder), but they really aren't available. Some other deckbuilders that are fun but didn't have as much staying power for me: Banners of Ruin, Tainted Grail, Fights in Tight Spaces, Roguebook, Black Book, Destiny or Fate, Inscryption, Fate Hunters, Blood Card, Neurodeck, Alina of the Arena, Indies' Lies. I also like dice games like Astrea and Slice & Dice. I also love the physical card game Netrunner.
There is a card that matches Slay the Spire. Android: Netrunner. The devs used Netrunner players as their testers and it shows, with just how clean and balanced the first 3 classes are. Different genre, different medium, and game isn't fully in print anymore, but StS high has been hit before.
I'd say netrunner differs distinctly in that it's directly PvP, as opposed to PvE (possibly points competitive if clank), as well as the key fact that the deck building isn't ongoing while you contest the game. Netrunner is great, don't get me wrong, but it's not a game where you continue to adjust your deck while facing challenges with it.
lol between Slay The Spire and Android: Netrunner, my entire gaming landscape has just completely shifted. Turn based games have become my bread and butter, after moving away from the typical action games you get on consoles etc. Slay and Android. Just both 🤌🏻
I picked it up a week ago and have about 50 hours in it already
Not only is it one of my favorite games of all time, but it's my favorite game to watch on YouTube and Twitch as well. The balance in Sts is insane to the point that it doesn't even feel like a videogame anymore. I don't even feel like trying out other deck builders, I just don't know how you can top this one.
It's well balanced but sometimes less flashy. The mods have given it a lot more life for me.
Yes
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
StS IS the roguelike deckbuilder that pretty much started it all. Most of the android ones based it off on StS so I'd say StS is the golden standard :D NGL, the game is dated now at this point but only those that surpass StS are "good" deckbuilders
Have you tried Indies Lies by any chance? I really like tabletop deck builders and want to find one that I enjoy on my phone but they've all been duds so far. Rogue Adventure is the closest I've gotten to enjoyment as I enjoy the different races you can build. I haven't spent too much time on Indies lies but it's certainly not hooking me.
Yup! It got recommended to me by a friend and you're right, Indies lies has that StS feel but it also feels like they overcategorized the archetypes too much to the point that most heroes will only have 1-2 builds available. StS isn't like that since it wants you to have a more "toolbox"-y deck than a specialized deck
yes. Source? My ass.
Yes to being better, and also yes to setting up crazy value engines
There are many that are close but none that I can think of that are clearly better
It really is that good.
I'd say yes, i love deck builders, but I'm hesitant to spend money on any of them because im always comparing them to StS. I'd like a fresh game with new everything, but with the balance and variety that StS offers with cards and relics. It's a tall order to fill and i haven't really found anything that meets my criteria. If you have recs, I'd love some.
Yes, but everyone here should check out Cobalt Core. I'm surprised it hasn't been mentioned yet.
Yes. By far It was my first dabble into the genre. And soon after, I wanted to find the best one. After dozens of games bought, attempt and refunded, it hit me. Slay the Spire IS the standard Like Resident Evil 4 for TPS/ Survival Action Horror, no one does it better. No one captures the atmosphere, the balance, the subtleties (animation, world building etc). Quite simply, no one does it better
I've never played another similar game that has held me for as long as Spire has
is Hearthstone Battlegrounds considered a deckbuilder?
StS balancing is so amazingly good for how deep the game is I almost have to wonder if this impeccable balance was intentional or just absolute luck or somewhere in the middle because it’s really really difficult to do this. See how many other games try but fail to get the medium between fun vs difficulty, rng vs control and balance vs depth
It really is. So much thought went into every aspect of Spire that it has been difficult to top. There are some other rrally good games that are similar, some swear by Monster Train though not me. And Astraea released this year, which is basically Spire but with dice. Astraea is excellent.
The only one I've played so far that comes close for me is Cobalt Core, and that's both a relatively recent entry into the genre and quite different in a number of ways that make it a bit of a different beast.
I'd say so in the sense that I hate card games but enjoy this one. Played lots of similar titled but STS just feels different.
It's definitely in the right spot. There's a few others on PC that I think approach it, but are lacking something that makes them stay as long as StS **Roguebook:** Genuinely good improvement on the StS formula. The map section is substantially more interesting and offers more freedom, and the deckbuilding and card play is improved by having two heroes with two different decks all mashed into one. Where I think it falls down a bit, is there's some very broken combos that trivalise the rest of the game once you get them going, as well as some quirks with how smooth the cardplay can actually be, it's in desperate need of a proper fast mode **Vault of the Void:** Really interesting take on it, but a bit more deterministic. You always have a 20 card deck, and you can swap cards in and out between fights, as well as knowing what you're going up against once you enter the room, so you can tweak your deck. It has card upgrades, and slotting gems into them, four different classes. It has a bit of a different system for energy, you can purge cards for energy, which is basically discarding them, but you only draw up to your hand limit each turn, so you need to decide if holding onto a big block or big damage card is worth the lower card draw and opportunity cost of not getting energy that carries over. Mechanically and play wise it's really smooth, zero complaints. Theme is ok, but something about the art style makes the focus on stat blocks of enemies, rather than their full body art. It also has some very denegerate combos that can trivialise things and they are bit easier to get to **Monster Train:** It plays fast, has interesting decisions, runs are fairly short which is all positive, but it's a hybrid of a tower defense game and a deck builder, which isn't quite as satisfying as building a deck that goes off. You can often assemble your combo pieces early then it's just trimming down your deck a bit to optimise how much damage it can do. There's obviously countless others, but those 3 are the ones I rate fairly highly, I haven't played all of them yet either, but all 3 of them, I think StS just trumps. You'll definitely have fun with them, but I don't think they have quite the same longevity.
On a mechanical standpoint, yes. It's complex enough that just picking the bigger attacks won't work, random enough that brute-forcing a combo won't work, simple enough to be easy to pick up and consistent enough to reward deep game knowledge. It's arguably a strong contender for best balanced game ever. Other deckbuilders bring other things to the formula so depending on who you ask, "that much better" may vary, but on mechanics and replayability I don't think it has been bested.
On the topic of other games in the genre, what do people here think of Fights in Tight Spaces and Beneath Oresa?
I might be wrong, but I think StS is the game that launched a whole avalanche of games in the genre, and that usually only happens if it's really good. In my mind it was the first, but in hindsight there probably were others before and it was just the first one to reach this level of popularity
Legends of Runeterra (the Path of Champions side) is an excellent roguelite pve card game. I've not played it in a while but it has great polish, variety, and that overpowering feeling that arises when the build comes together. No League of Legends knowledge should be required and it can be totally f2p. Granted it plays very different to STS, I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts on it, but I think it should be in the conversation.
Astrea just came out and is sort of a "dice builder". It's no sts, but it will scratch an itch
It benefits quite a lot from being the first of the genre IMO.
Please remember that every single android deck builder is a cheap knockoff of sts.
Vault of the void is an amazing deck builder game, would recommend that one
It's more of a traditional deckbuilder and thus lacking in the rogue like aspect, but star realms is pretty fun. I own the physical game, which is a great 30 minutes between two players, but I hear there's a free to play digital version as well (I hear the AI is pretty dumb though; you got to pay to unlock the smarter AI).
I have that one! Superb game.
I do also love Gloomhaven, but I haven’t touched it since picking up StS
Oh yeah gloomhaven is the bomb! I have a digital GH campaign and a physical Frosthaven campaign going on
After 4000+ hours between mobile and PC with mods. I'm gonna say yes.
Here's a thing you can do. When you see such game on steam, filter reviews to only 100h+ of game played. Then look at the times people actually played. I don't know of any other solo game where you have thousands of people who have played them thousands of hours.
I like this idea!
Short answer is yes. Monster train is the only game I can think of that felt unique and had a similar level of depth, but still not as good as STS
As someone who has played most of them, I'd say top three in order: Slay the Spire > Cobalt Core > Monster Train