Rate the strengths of the clans

[allmike]

Overall Most Value (Strongest to least):

1. Stygian Guard
2. Melting Remnant
3. Hellhorned
4. Awoken
5. Umbra

So to explain my rankings:

Umbra is 5th, but it's worth mentioning they are very self synergistic, so they can still be strong if you're choosing more Umbra cards and going for their gimmicks. But if you're playing with all other clans trying to get wins with each, there's way less synergies available between umbra/any than the other clans. Hellhorned easily fits in with all, and Melting Remnant is second in those terms.

What's your rating? Make sure to specify how you define strength, like if you only care about progression as your best team, rate some other teams by comparison.

[Ditto]

So far I've unlocked all but Melting Remnant and have only had success with Stygian and Hellhorned.

Don't know what I'm doing wrong but I never seem to be able to get enough damage with the other clans (or if I do get high damage I can't defend them).

Stygian seems to be the easiest for me to perform well with as I always get good spells and manage to upgrade them without much fuss.

My Umbra runs always seem to end quick unless I get units which produce morsels. Without them my creatures just get smashed.

To rate my experience with the clans so far:

1. Stygian Guard
2. Hellhorned
3. Awoken
4. Umbra
?. Melting Remnant

[.//slayer]

I agree with Ditto (heh), Stygian is probably the easiest to win with because of how reliable, powerful, and easy the Spell Weakness build is.

[Neon Black Interactive]

1. Stygian
2. Awoken
3. Hellhorned
4. Umbra
5. Melting Remnant

Stygian has a built in guarantee that you'll have a dps strong enough to clear bosses and it only takes 1 capacity. Additionally they have access to units on every end of the spectrum from super tanky units with built in sustain all the way to hyper dps focused units like nameless siren. They have access to sweep units which is a huge deal because a quick sweeper clears backliners before they get to attack. Finally they have the best utility suite in the game with multiples ways to access sap, access to silence, access to sap, and cards that provide draw power. They can perform literally any function you need them to and do it very well.

Awoken has similar things going for it that stygian does in the form of a wide spectrum of powerful units. They have the most draw power in the game. They also have access to sweepers which are great for the reasons I mentioned when talking about stygian. Their biggest weak point is issues getting early game damage but there are plenty of ways to supplement that. Similar to stygian they also have a very easy time with bosses but for a different reason. Regen is one of the strongest buffs against bosses in the game.

Hellhorned are dead average. The recent buff to the champ definitely helps them a ton though so we'll have to see if I change my mind and put them above awoken in the near future though, definitely worse than stygian though. They provide no real utility and most of their units are damage focused. They have one good tank in the form of steelworker but they're definitely more favored towards damage centric units. Their biggest selling point is definitely hidden passage which keeps them from being below umbra. Without hidden passage they would definitely be worse than umbra.

Umbra is just too hard to strike a balance with reliably. They have access to all the pieces of a winning run but you need to jump through hoops to use them. Penumbra himself is solid, especially with his architect path. They have access to reliable aoe in the form of shadoweater but that requires morsels so you can brick your draw with it unlike sweepers. Due to the gorge mechanic their major tanks are too capacity reliant to have much backline set up behind them. Their biggest damage source in the form of alloyed construct suffers from consistency issues. Overall just a bit too inconsistent and cumbersome.

Melting remnant has no utility to speak of and unbelievable consistency problems. They have no real synergy with anyone and in the case of stygian even have anti synergy cause dregs don't trigger incant. The only champ path worth a damn is burn bright. Burn bright is pretty strong if it works. The problem is as I said the consistency. You need reform or additional burnout but if you don't draw the burnout before he's dead it doesn't matter. If you draw the moldeds too early it also doesn't matter. Their biggest killing point is all this crap that reforms and applies burnout does nothing else. So you're running do nothing cards just for the sake of making your remnant units not suck. But if you don't draw those cards when you need them you're boned.

[Dlanor]

Originally posted by Urilbedamned:

Melting remnant has no utility to speak of

What exactly do you even mean by this? By "Utility", you mean cards that are not damage but also not survival, right? Melting Remnant has amazing amounts of that. They have BOTH of the only debuff/buff removal cards, they have the only cards to cheat extra gold (including Intent on Death, which actually lets you get double or even more gold from Collectors, as they give gold on Extinguish), and they have Stealth, which is the ultimate stall tactic as you can put holdover and reduced cost on "Engulfed in Smoke" and just build up insane stacks of it. Other classes can have utility too, like Umbra has capacity and ember gimmicks, but Melting Remnant offers huge snowballing just because it lets you cripple entire fights through debuffing and also lets you pile up gold to get way more out of fights than any other can possibly can, since no other clans "gain" anything mid-battle, gold is the only thing that stays when the fight ends outside of clanless cards like Pyre health gain or Purge cards.

[Neon Black Interactive]

Originally posted by Thegooblop:

Originally posted by Urilbedamned:

Melting remnant has no utility to speak of

What exactly do you even mean by this? By "Utility", you mean cards that are not damage but also not survival, right? Melting Remnant has amazing amounts of that. They have BOTH of the only debuff/buff removal cards, they have the only cards to cheat extra gold (including Intent on Death, which actually lets you get double or even more gold from Collectors, as they give gold on Extinguish), and they have Stealth, which is the ultimate stall tactic as you can put holdover and reduced cost on "Engulfed in Smoke" and just build up insane stacks of it. Other classes can have utility too, like Umbra has capacity and ember gimmicks, but Melting Remnant offers huge snowballing just because it lets you cripple entire fights through debuffing and also lets you pile up gold to get way more out of fights than any other can possibly can, since no other clans "gain" anything mid-battle, gold is the only thing that stays when the fight ends outside of clanless cards like Purge or the spider-bots.

Their card that removes all allied debuffs and all enemy buffs is their only real utility card. Wickless recruitment is more of a combo piece and won't prevent enemies from doing any weird bs.

I wrote some crap here about stealth but I deleted it because I didn't want to talk about semantics, doing so is largely pointless. If you wanna say that if I don't consider stealth utility I can't consider sap utility either then sure you got me. In short though Most sap cards are used specifically to hard counter specific threats, stealth is used as a primary tanking strat. Sap can be used as a tanking strat but it's not the primary function on most cards with it. Stealth can be used as a utility spell however that's not its primary use case.

Wickless tycoon and paraffin thug have mediocre stats on their own so you're all in on their ability. The issue with this is they're work than other units with similar costs during the fight. This makes your deck perform worse. As a result you can't take trials as often or as safely. This effectively renders their gold gain abilities pointless. The gold doesn't make one lick of difference if you're dead cause your mediocre units had stats too poor to keep you alive.

[Weekend Player]

1. Stygian: They have access to the most tools in the game, exclusively including some of the strongest to beat high cov (frostbite, sap, spell weakness). Their champion, while weak on his own, can deal massive damage. Some situational and weak cards though.

2. Awoken: Strong units, almost all of their spells and relics are great and have the best consistently good mechanic (spikes). They can also focusing on a few big units through their buffs/heals so you don't worry about space. Lots of card draw.

3. Hellbourne: A lot of strong builds including the easiest build to beat high cov (ascension). They lack consistency though since you need specific cards to make each build work.

4. Melting Remanent: Burnout champion can carry you early on, you can farm a lot of Gold as well, and some unique things you can do here and there (massive legion of wax, 100+ dmg piercing dagger...etc). But they lack good units and their main mechanic, burnout/reform, becomes too slow later at high covenants. Not to mention, reform is useless at boss phase usually due to space issues. The mechanic needs to be looked into.

5. Umbra: While you can argue they have better things than melting remanent, they are pigeon holed into morsel builds. All their units are trash on their own. Just very slow all over and unsynergetic with other clans. And they need A LOT of space, no card draw and have expensive cards so they lack in everything.

[AnGe Zarwine]

My favorite :
1. Melting Remanent

[Fridge]

1. Umbra
2. Melting Remnant
3. Stygian
4. Hellhorned
5. Awoken

[Lotion]

I do agree with 1 stygian, 2 awoken, 3 hellborn, 4 melting remnant, 5 umbra. I just love the melting and umbra though lol. Here was the easiest cov 25 run i have ever had.
monstertrain://runresult/601298d4-2afc-45c5-9588-ab2aeb90b588

Basically just summoned to bottom lane and when final boss attacked the devourer of death face blasted him twice for KO .. barely anything made it off first floor and the holding spell "a fatal melting" just melted them if they limped off first floor

[Jaeus]

As objectively as I can:

1. Remnant
Burnout Flicker has many Common cards to pop off with, and carries a lot while you find the firepower you need behind him. Consistency and low rarity requirements are why I give them top slot.

2. Stygian
All versions of Tethys have value and are an excellent support for many flexible ways to build up. Their spells can be potent for anyone else to ally with as well.

3. Awoken
Explosive Sentient makes their starter card a 15/30/60 damage spell, which brings them up a ton at higher difficulties where you get more copies of their starter card. Consistency and low (no) rarity requirement go a long way here.

*I can even see fair cases for these 3 being ordered differently. I think they're all in a solid spot.*

4. Hellhorned
Bad Units, no Tanks with sustain at all, overcosted spells, there are so many things going against Hellhorned. Hellhorned Prince's buffs have gone a long way to getting them a guy who can delete 1-2 frontliners easily and even carry the boss fight, but they rely on someone else for the frontline because their own are all terrible.

5. Umbra
If I could add 5 more empty slots and put Umbra at 10th, I would. Penumbra is the worst Champion by a mile. It's 3 Capacity for no good reason. Architect at least offsets that. Gorge is a worse basic Harvest unit from Remnant, for example, or Harvest Flicker. And Monstrous is terrible to a mind-boggling degree.
Unlike everyone else, they are also very Capacity hungry, which means you're -1 Ember and/or -1 Draw per turn later in the run. Shadesplitter could at least cost 0. A LOT of their cards could use to cost less given what the Capacity demands do to your choices after Daedalus and Fel.
But as it stands, Rubble Morsel exists, and Shadesplitter is the worst card in the entire game that isn't a Blight or a Scourge. And Blights are better with a number of events, so really... I'd probably be better off with 5 Calcified Ember in my deck and trying to high roll a Blight event than with Shadesplitter.

[Khor]

Originally posted by Jaeus:

As objectively as I can:

1. Remnant
Burnout Flicker has many Common cards to pop off with, and carries a lot while you find the firepower you need behind him. Consistency and low rarity requirements are why I give them top slot.

2. Stygian
All versions of Tethys have value and are an excellent support for many flexible ways to build up. Their spells can be potent for anyone else to ally with as well.

3. Awoken
Explosive Sentient makes their starter card a 15/30/60 damage spell, which brings them up a ton at higher difficulties where you get more copies of their starter card. Consistency and low (no) rarity requirement go a long way here.

*I can even see fair cases for these 3 being ordered differently. I think they're all in a solid spot.*

4. Hellhorned
Bad Units, no Tanks with sustain at all, overcosted spells, there are so many things going against Hellhorned. Hellhorned Prince's buffs have gone a long way to getting them a guy who can delete 1-2 frontliners easily and even carry the boss fight, but they rely on someone else for the frontline because their own are all terrible.

5. Umbra
If I could add 5 more empty slots and put Umbra at 10th, I would. Penumbra is the worst Champion by a mile. It's 3 Capacity for no good reason. Architect at least offsets that. Gorge is a worse basic Harvest unit from Remnant, for example, or Harvest Flicker. And Monstrous is terrible to a mind-boggling degree.
Unlike everyone else, they are also very Capacity hungry, which means you're -1 Ember and/or -1 Draw per turn later in the run. Shadesplitter could at least cost 0. A LOT of their cards could use to cost less given what the Capacity demands do to your choices after Daedalus and Fel.

I wouldn`t be this catastrophic on Umbra, but pretty much this

Tier A: Awoken, Melting Remnant, Stygian

Tier B: Hellhorned

Tier C: Umbra

[F.O.A.M]

i played melting once and i dont ever want to again, it was ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ awful. its garbage. weak units that dies after 2 rounds? cant even fcking buff them without wasting 4 cards making them stay alive for 3 rounds instead of 2. sushi warriors, the wooden patroll and ALOT OF ENDLESS IMPS are really good though. umbra and candleshithead is garbage relying on their clan meme to much to even come close to compare

[Kamel]

My tier list:

A: Awoken, Stygian
B: Melting Remnant
C: Hell Horned
D: Umbra

[IamSalvation [LATX]]

A: Stygian
B: Melting, Awoken
C: Hell Horned, Umbra

I think with buffs to the Champ Umbra isn´t THAT bad anymore - still could use some buffs to the starting card as it is the worst one by far.
Hell Horned just has no good Tanks, nearly no good Spells, no Draw and Damage Units are not amazing compared to other Clans.

Stygian is lone A Tier because they can carry any run and have everything - Best Tank, Sweepers with Utility, Boss Killer Champ with AoE ability, Sap, Daze, Spell Weakness for oneshotting Bosses and Tanks...

[SkyCake]

Typed up a long reply. But, then accidentally turned off my desktop to swap to my laptop and didn't post the reply before I did. Oops! I'll type up a shorter reply.

1. Stygian
2. Melting
3. Awokened
4. Hellhorned
5. Umbra

1. Stygian Guard. They're always good and it's pretty difficult to do them wrong. Spells are strong. Incant is strong. Their synergies are easy to access and have powerful effects. The only downsides to them aren't even that bad. Frostbite can be a little weak if you don't build for it and you often don't get a choice. But! Frostbite is also usually mixed with Sweep and makes for a great way to soften targets up. With the right build, it decimates the enemy. Their discard/draw synergy can be a little difficult to get going. But, spells will always be able to carry any slack if it doesn't work out. Champion is very strong even though it's a glass cannon. All upgrade paths are not only great on their own. But, they work great together.

2. Melting Renmant. They have extremely strong mechanics and synergies. Burnout is probably the strongest mechanic in the game. They're also the richest clan with their Harvest and gold on Slay units. This gives you much more influence on your runs. Their Tomb units are very strong and get even stronger with certain artifacts. With a little thought and planning, you can easily be pushing out an army of incredibly strong units with little worry about anything. Their Champion is kind of "meh" since I do think that only one of the upgrades is really worth it. As a graveyard player in TCGs, this clan clicked with me the most.

3. Awokened. They received a massive and much needed buff on launch. Almost everything they have is just good and works with them in some way. What keeps them at 3rd is unlike the first two, I do feel like you can steer'd in the wrong direction by early game artifacts. You get an artifact that increases Thorns application but then never get the one that increases its damage, you're going to be weaker for it if you committed to the idea of Thorns. But! It's still going to be useful. That keeps it above the last two. Cards like Spore really help as it works with all builds. All three of their Champion's upgrade routes are also very good. I was surprised just how strong the Revenge upgrades were.

4. Hellhorned. They're basic but good at they do. Get big monsters and make them bigger. Rage! Armor! Rawr! The issues I have with them are their Imps and interactions with ally clans. The Imps are either very strong or very weak with little middle ground. They have to have certain artifacts and cards to work. If you don't get those, then you're often weaker for it. The middle ground is that some of the Imps are worth summoning on their own if you get increased capacity so that they're at least not totally useless. I also think they're influenced more heavily by their ally clan than other clans are. There is a big difference when you're allied with Awokened rather than Umbra. I think this is because what they do is so basic that any outside influence (such as giving them Quick with Awokens tome) can drastically change up your play. Their Champion is also only "okay" in my opinion. You can get Multistrike 5 and still be doing no damage unless you get the right artifacts or cards. Not bad, just doesn't really stand out. This is the "Warrior" class in an RPG basically.

5. Umbra. They're easily the most polarizing clan. Either you have a very OP run with them or your run just crumbles into nothing. Most of this is because of Morsels. Morsels are so important to Umbra that you can't ignore them. Yet, they're so very easily countered by the enemy. Sweep or Harvest enemies will ruin your day if you're not careful. Even Incant enemies if you cast the summons on the wrong floor. But! If you get a monster with Gorge effects for either Damage Shield or Lifesteal, you can make a pretty OP monster by just setting up a Morselmaker and/or Morselmaster behind it. By the time the boss reaches them, they'll be super monsters! If you can get the setup. It's so easy to disrupt this setup though. Love the theme.

That's how I feel about the with 30 hours and maxed clan ranks. This is just my opinion and I feel like the ranking are fairly close. Even if I think Stygian is the best and Umbra the worst, I don't think it's by a huge margin. I think my opinion can be very easily swayed as I get better at the game.