Slay The Spire

As you get to higher ascension different cards become more valuable. I went through with the Ironclad. Its hard to write a guide since each run is different but here is some general things I noticed.

On mid ascensions I relied on either a lot of defense (Shrug It Offs, Ghostly Armor) and then sort of waited for the run to decide to go all in on defense (Barricade, Entrench) or go more offense with strength scaling (Spot Weakness, Inflame, Demon Form). Obviously the boss relics make a huge difference as well. Snecko Eye is great if you have several 2 or more cards. Then I usually favored any Energy boss relics. Runic Pyramid can be a run winner too.

Other general advice is to remove or transform Strikes. In mid ascension I would try to take on more elites but towards the very end found that difficult. Run winning combos can be Dead Branch + Corruption, Barricade + Entrench, Demon Form + defense to get it rolling (you don't need many offensive cards). There are several other really cool ways to win but I found these at high ascension the best.

My last two runs took me some time. For A19 I got a Dead Branch off the bat (Dead Branch seems really rare I only saw maybe 5 out of 200 runs). Then I got Corruption early in Act 2 and those are a great combo. For A20 I somehow got like 3 Dropkicks in Act I and a Runic Pyramid. I tried to go infinite (keep drawing cards forever with Dropkick) and it worked. I had like Offering, True Grit, Arnaments, Shockwave, and Bash (must have for Dropkick) and a couple Defenses by the time I hit Act 3. Luckily I did not have to face the Time Eater.

Finally watch Jorbs or other YouTube runs they can help you learn a lot.

I just completed this the other day after 220+ hours of attempts. There are obviously people that did it faster so I am by no means an expert and this guide is meant to encourage those of you who are middling at the game (like me) to keep trying. I completed this on Silent, so all of my examples stem from that deck.

The single most important tip: Watch Jorbs. Here is a link to his YouTube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpjr4aOTbpvat8Y77e8dd_Q This is undeniably the single most helpful thing I did to complete ascension 19 and 20. He is playing at the next level of thinking so every little tip that I could glean from him helped up my game. I won both 19 and 20 immediately after watching his wins and after loss streaks numbering in the dozens. I don’t think that’s by accident.

Here are my take home tips, all credit goes to the numerous hours of watching Jorbs:

1. Play to the floors immediately in front of you. As tempting as it may be, you don’t need a Nightmare or even Wraith Form at level 2. These are always going to be inferior to a damage card in the first act and may mean your death if you draw one instead of a high damage card against Gremlin Nob or Lagavulin. Of course they are good cards later, but that’s moot if you die in act one because you don’t have enough damage. In act 1 you want front loaded damage, act two look for sustain/aoe (and aim to continue to be able to fight elites) and act 3 aim to round out your deck with whatever it is missing (card draw, block, weak, scaling damage, etc.).

2. Play to the run. Each run has a theme or some sort of a predetermined path to winning, most runs have multiple variations of cards that can get you the win but you will notice a pattern early on. Don’t fight this, learn to love it! My A20 win started with an early Tingsha followed by 2(!) Calculated Gamble+. If I had not just watched Jorbs, and been open to what the run was trying to feed to me, I would have easily passed on an early Gamble+ (because I need more damage, right?!?) but by the time I got the second, my deck was dishing out enough damage to end most hallway fights in one deck rotation. Play to the run! Create synergies and win. Other more obvious ones include shuriken/Kunai and shivs, snecko skull and poison, etc.

3. Don’t let some fantasy of your perfect deck cloud the winning path right in front of you. What do I mean? Don’t necessarily take the “best” card choice if it doesn’t synergize with the other cards/relics you already have. This is a trap I would fall into too often; I don’t need a bunch of Footworks (great card, essential for most runs) if I’ve already established a Nightmare/Wraith Form combo. Maybe another Noxious Fumes isn’t better than a cloak and dagger when I have Shuriken and not enough block or blade dance when I have kunai and not enough damage, etc.

Again, this is by no means the end all of guides, and I’m certainly no expert at this game. Furthermore, every run will be unique and there is no absolute “right way” or “perfect deck.” In fact, once you stop “fighting” the game, you will start winning more; the path of least resistance here is key. All that said, through sheer determination and a lot of help and study from Jorbs, I was able to succeed, which means I know you can too!

I focused on having fun and on learning about the game, so I only started climbing ascension levels towards the goal of reaching 20 after I knew all 4 characters and decided to go with the Watcher (the mantra lady, 4th and last character to be unlocked).

So, so far I've played the game for 171 hours, again, because I enjoyed it (not that much at first, of course, because it first feels too hard, unbalanced, until you get the hang of it).

I'd also like to point out that I don't watch Youtube channels nor have I looked up any guides, so I'm proud to have come up with my own method, which also helped me unlock at least 2 other tough achievements in this game using what I'm gonna describe right now.

You only need 3 cards (and two of them you already start with since the very beginning of the game) plus a relic called Violet Lotus, which gives you an additional energy point whenever you exit Calm.

The cards you are gonna need are:

- Eruption ("Deal 9 damage. Enter Wrath")
- Vigilance ("Enter Calm. Gain 8 Block")
- Rushdown ("Whenever you enter Wrath, draw 2 cards")

From the above, Rushdown is the one you are going to have to acquire along the way.

Using the three of them in the right order will make you enter an infinite loop of attacks until any enemy is dead. It works not only on bosses but it might help you defeat any foe such as the Transient or any other high HP enemy as well. The downside per se is that the damage done with each attack is small, so it will take many hits to end the fight, but it works great and that's what matters in the end. Here's the step by step:

1- First, play Rushdown to apply its effects on this turn/fight. 2- Then play Vigilance to enter Calm and 3- finally use Eruption to enter Wrath and attack. That's it. Rinse and repeat steps 2 and 3 to keep attacking.

Having those cards upgraded is a plus (or even a necessity in case you only have 3 total energy to spend, since Vigilance costs 2 and upgraded Eruption costs 1). When you exit Calm you earn 3 more energy, which is essencial for the loop since you will keep spending those earned energy points on Vigilance and Eruption, respectively, over and over.

You are also gonna need to have a hand of about 7 cards in total, because when the Rushdown effect happens you need it to bring back those 2 other cards that you are using to keep the loop and attack, that is, Vigilance and Eruption. If you have more than 7 cards total you risk breaking the loop in case one of those 2 doesn't return to your hand when redrawing.

In order to achieve only 7 cards or less in your hand, simply take advantage from the beginning of the game to get rid of the other ones you don't need. There are plenty of opportunities between some of the ? (question mark) events and also the removal services found in shops. For me it seems almost like the game notices that I'm playing this way (minimalist deck) from start and throw a lot of such opportunities.

About the Violet Lotus relic:

Although much on this game is random, there are certain patterns you can learn by experience or you could, for instance, read the wiki dedicated to this game. I've noticed thru experience that the Violet Lotus can appear at least from these 3 different events:
- At the beginning of the climb, (IF you have reached a boss on your previous attempt and) if you decide to swap your original relic (Pure Water) for it;
- Before the first boss (although I believe it could also appear after him, since the relic's order as a reward or acquirable item tend to change every time). I'm adding this just for reference, for it has happen to me multiple times and it could help a player trying the achievement for defeating a boss on turn 1.
- As a reward for defeating the 1st boss on chapter 1. This was what happened to me when I beated ascension level 20, although it might be worth to remember that it is NOT always shown as one of the 3 possible rewards, it doesn't happen often or at least every time.

Extra info from original solution (other achievement):

I first discovered this method while working my way towards the final boss (before the Heart), on act 3, and I used this same technique that had worked on the Transient for these other 2 achievements. Because I was learning as I went (used no guides), I had a few cards over the 7 total in my hand but I also had a Blasphemy card ("Retain. Enter Divinity. Die next turn. Exhaust.") and a potion which allowed me to enter either Calm or Wrath as backups. Those extras helped me get the loop started. So I first entered Divinity, then used the Rushdown card, then a potion to enter Wrath. By doing that, I was finally able to have Eruption and Vigilance in my hand to start the proper loop as explained. I was unlucky to get the toughest boss (in my opinion) as the enemy, the Awaked One, but as soon as I killed him the first time that other achievement unlocked.

EDIT: Qwanimal suggests, in case you can't find the Violet Lotus relic, players can use the Inner Peace ("If you are in Calm, draw 3 cards, otherwise Enter Calm") card instead of Vigilance since it allows players to enter Calm costing only 1 energy.

Got this after 150 hours with 'the Defect'.

Screenshots + seed number here: https://imgur.com/a/O1P6Lif

The key success factor on this run was that I got 'Echo Form' off the start, which later combined very well with 3 'Glacier' cards, focus cards & 'Inserter' orb (I almost didn't pick the Inserter, as I had 2 other good options as shown in one of the screenshots).

The 2nd final boss was the real concern because during my last near-miss run on A20, I had 0 chance against the 2nd boss.

But this time I was able to easily ramp-up high focus & orb slots with the 2nd boss before getting any damage.
Was also the highest focus (21) I ever achieved.

TL;DR: I tried & tried to beat A20, I only managed to do it once I built a deck around 'Echo Form', which allows high amount of Glacier, focus cards to build up tough defense. Even with that defense I almost died 2 floors close to the final boss.

Bonus tip: be careful when using 'Static Discharge'. In some battles you rather not use it and keep those defense orbs, instead of lightning. Slow & steady is better than fast & dead