[New Steam Guide] CLASSES of Slice & Dice

[eharper256]

I've just released a steam guide giving a breakdown, analysis and tier-list of all the numerous classes we can find in Slice & Dice. Check it out!!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3234507089&preview=true

If you think I'm missing something vital in one of the analysis sections, I appreciate your input. I've got a fair bit of play-time but I'm sure there are super-experts in the woodwork. I nearly always happily make amendments to things in my guides if you tell me and explain it.

[KingOfCharge]

Things I disagree with on this list, top to bottom
Clumsy is a bit worse because if she dies once she’s basically just going to die every time without really doing anything
Trapper’s not focused on one side, the vuln sides are really good too, especially with certain spells. Overall great hero
Spellblade’s better than C, really good item combo potential and still good itemless
Ludus is kinda worse, 6 hp is not enough and her damage is somewhat high but not to the extent that it justifies having less health than t2
Words cannot show how bad lazy is. Having to keep shields on your main damage dealer to avoid rolling blanks is beyond awful. I get that D tier is low but anything above the very bottom is far too high
Hoarder is actually really good, 2 damage is plenty for a t1 and guilt is nowhere near as bad as it seems because you can just use it to lower an enemy then have blue or orange get the kill
Scrapper is really good, many grays can give him enough shield to just disintegrate things. Knight, guardian, warden, etc.
Berserker is acceptable as a first t2, because he can just nuke things immediately early on and allow you to build around doing that for the rest of the run
Barbarian same comment as berserker, he compensates for the pain very well
Wallop’s rated correctly, just he doesn’t become obsolete later, he actually grows in power until you upgrade him because enemy sides get stronger
Knight’s steel shields are basically just shields but 3 shields are still good and the exert damage sides are also 3 shields because of parry which means you get 4 sides that are all 3 shields and 3 shield is pretty good from a t2 gray. Also if you already have ninja the steel becomes really good for her copycat (though it’s usually knight making me pick ninja and not the other way around
Herbalist’s healing is kinda weak but vine alone makes her one of the best t2 reds and I basically just don’t upgrade her until I know she won’t be needed to counter basalt’s slate spam
Doctor’s probably better than that. T3 red is probably what I’m least qualified to comment on though, besides greens
Prodigy looks like hot garbage but early on 3 mana is enough to make the character decent despite have 2 sides that are both single use
Meddler is top tier. The bones aren’t a big problem when at the end of t1 there’s almost nothing else left to attack you with meddler’s beyond insane mana gen
Student’s mana is pretty bad, not A tier. There is only one blue I think is worse:
Initiate doesn’t even get shields to compensate for not making mana and unless you have multiple allies consistently rolling blanks (scoundrel + lazy type) and decent mana from red gather often bricks
Sparky’s basically running on 1 side in the basic comp.
Fiend’s really high mana gen makes him much better than worst blue. In fact I’d go as far as putting him next to caldera and glacia for his ability to delete threats with 5 different sides
Chronos’s mana gen is the exact opposite of superb unless you’re stalling fights way, way too much. In a 3-turn fight where you roll a mana side every time he makes the least mana of every blue. His support options give him a niche but not S tier
I don’t play with greens enough to comment on them, with one exception
Twin used to be a gray with slightly different sides but a similar overall gimmick, and was F tier except with one of many, many really good item combos, some of which won the game on the spot. Overall way too variable to give an F tier rating across the board

[CrabNicholson]

Originally posted by KingOfCharge:

Things I disagree with on this list, top to bottom
Clumsy is a bit worse because if she dies once she’s basically just going to die every time without really doing anything
Trapper’s not focused on one side, the vuln sides are really good too, especially with certain spells. Overall great hero
Spellblade’s better than C, really good item combo potential and still good itemless
Ludus is kinda worse, 6 hp is not enough and her damage is somewhat high but not to the extent that it justifies having less health than t2
Words cannot show how bad lazy is. Having to keep shields on your main damage dealer to avoid rolling blanks is beyond awful. I get that D tier is low but anything above the very bottom is far too high
Hoarder is actually really good, 2 damage is plenty for a t1 and guilt is nowhere near as bad as it seems because you can just use it to lower an enemy then have blue or orange get the kill
Scrapper is really good, many grays can give him enough shield to just disintegrate things. Knight, guardian, warden, etc.
Berserker is acceptable as a first t2, because he can just nuke things immediately early on and allow you to build around doing that for the rest of the run
Barbarian same comment as berserker, he compensates for the pain very well
Wallop’s rated correctly, just he doesn’t become obsolete later, he actually grows in power until you upgrade him because enemy sides get stronger
Knight’s steel shields are basically just shields but 3 shields are still good and the exert damage sides are also 3 shields because of parry which means you get 4 sides that are all 3 shields and 3 shield is pretty good from a t2 gray. Also if you already have ninja the steel becomes really good for her copycat (though it’s usually knight making me pick ninja and not the other way around
Herbalist’s healing is kinda weak but vine alone makes her one of the best t2 reds and I basically just don’t upgrade her until I know she won’t be needed to counter basalt’s slate spam
Doctor’s probably better than that. T3 red is probably what I’m least qualified to comment on though, besides greens
Prodigy looks like hot garbage but early on 3 mana is enough to make the character decent despite have 2 sides that are both single use
Meddler is top tier. The bones aren’t a big problem when at the end of t1 there’s almost nothing else left to attack you with meddler’s beyond insane mana gen
Student’s mana is pretty bad, not A tier. There is only one blue I think is worse:
Initiate doesn’t even get shields to compensate for not making mana and unless you have multiple allies consistently rolling blanks (scoundrel + lazy type) and decent mana from red gather often bricks
Sparky’s basically running on 1 side in the basic comp.
Fiend’s really high mana gen makes him much better than worst blue. In fact I’d go as far as putting him next to caldera and glacia for his ability to delete threats with 5 different sides
Chronos’s mana gen is the exact opposite of superb unless you’re stalling fights way, way too much. In a 3-turn fight where you roll a mana side every time he makes the least mana of every blue. His support options give him a niche but not S tier
I don’t play with greens enough to comment on them, with one exception
Twin used to be a gray with slightly different sides but a similar overall gimmick, and was F tier except with one of many, many really good item combos, some of which won the game on the spot. Overall way too variable to give an F tier rating across the board

Yeah, I generally agree with these points but Meddler is absolutely atrocious. I get the idea of Meddler, you summon a bunch of bones but have a bunch of Mana, and as you kill the bones they cascade damage and wipe eachother out. This only works out up until about Hard mode. However, if you play on one of the hardest difficulties, like Brutal or Hell, then you're going to basically have no choice but to have a curse list that looks something like this:

All heroes take 4 damage per turn
or
Double all monster HP + add shields every turn
or
All monsters have like +4 pips to all sides
or
Start damaged and summon a troll or cyclops every 3rd turn
or
Summon a troll or cyclops at the start of every combat

or something bogus like that, and you'll probably also have a bunch of low-impact minor curses as well. You're basically going to have to be extremely tight with how you play. Either you have a party that can rush everything down in the first 2 turns, or a party that can consistently heal and shield past all incoming damage and attrition down enemies with a bonkers huge health pool.

With Meddler, spawning in a couple of skeletons is a death sentence. Those skellies could be buffed up by curses to the point where they're dealing enough damage to one-shot any tier 1 or 2 character, or could have 8 HP + shields + ethereal + whatever else, or at the very least, could distract you from stunning a cyclops that is about to stomp half your party to death, or just stall you out so long that you die from sandstorm or have to face a turn 3 summon when half your party is dead.

It basically bricks a good number of runs to start with Meddler.

[KingOfCharge]

Monsters have +4 to all sides basically helps meddler because he is better than any other t1 besides maybe cultist at clearing the original enemies before they act,
Also, no t1 can consistently handle add freaking cyclops. And if there is one that can, it’s meddler by making 3 mana and stunning it t1 killing it t2.
The other curses you mentioned are actually bad for meddler but none of them are particularly playable without a blessing involved anyway (and if there’s a blessing involved why not just put monster hp -3 and turn meddler into a god of mana that disintegrates the top enemy)
And hell mode basically requires cheese anyway so it’s a terrible metric for ranking t1.
If there is a single t1 hero that no one can agree on, it’s probably meddler. On the discord I’ve seen one of the best players say meddler’s the best t1 blue and another say he’s the worst.

[eharper256]

• Clumsy- After death she'll have 2 HP, right? So you'd just not always re-roll on that first turn and try to prioritise her healing. Do see your point, will reduce to B.
  
• Trapper- Re-written description.
  
• Spellblade- She's never horrifically bad but I've always been a bit let down by her. Imbue is great but niche. I've re-written her description though and raised her to B.
  
  
• Ludus- Sure, we'll pop B- on her.
  
• Lazy- Sure, I'll F him. He got a D since 3 damage occasionally is okay, but you're right.
  
• Hoarder- Guilt has killed me too often. Admittedly he seems to often compound a bad starting party where he's stuck as main DPS for me quite often. 2 damage is dead average for T1 IMHO (Ruffian and Brigand can get 3/4).
  
• Scrapper- Yep, sure, but he badly needs that support. I popped an (in brackets) rating.
  
• Berserker- You can, but I wouldn't risk it.
  
• Wallop- I say he obsoletes since with 5 HP it becomes hard to stun things. Pilgrim and Spheres stuns are great due to the higher threshold though.
  
• Knight- True, does have Ninja synergy. Quite specific but it's a nice one. Exert can be burned on Parry, but seems a bit odd.
  
• Herbalist- Already mentioned. Vine is indeed solid and efficient.
  
• Doctor- Regen is very solid. But his poison is dubious. Surgeon, Shaman, Prophet and Fate can all rescue quite well but Doc can't without using Booze, which he can't afford the mana cost of. Good if you have a Blue mana generator, but we're looking at things in isolation.
  
• Prodigy- Already mentioned. He burns bright as the Pro.
  
• Student- Sure mana sucks, but shields on a blue and entire extra turns alone makes him an A for me.
  
• Initiate- Already mentioned that relies hard on Cantrip mana.
  
• Meddler- If the Bones weren't on Cantrip, or if there was even just 1 face, I'd defo rate him higher (I do say C if you're okay with the risks). But after I saw three bones in three rolls once (very possible- and now your a T1 party having to clear 12 more HP with 3 mana!) I can't in good conscience rate Meddler higher.
  
• Sparky- Mentioned already that he wants mana generation. I also mentioned fishing for 1 side is fine in the criteria section, since there's roughly a 40% chance of it.
  
• Fiend- I think it's clear by now I'm usually risk averse and you're all for hard plays, so we'll chalk this one down to a difference in opinion. :D
  
  @CrabNicholson Glad you agree Meddler is too risky to not get rid of ASAP. :D

[KingOfCharge]

2 damage from hoarder isn’t wow, but getting it with all 6 sides is. And while stuff like the death side are bad, stuff like single use and pain are pretty fine. Definitely not lazy tier
Wallop’s stuns are a bit harder as enemies get more health, but in midgame it’s usually possible to damage non-bosses down to 5 and then stun them. And then the stun’s reward is way higher with stronger enemies
The 3 exert means he doesn’t move next turn, while using parry means he does. Exert’s usually only something I use for not parry when the enemy dies and I get defense like that
For student, just fight bramble once with him on your team then come back
Nobody can agree on meddler lol. Like, actually nobody. Every time he’s brought up in the discord a long discussion follows as people argue about whether he’s the best or worst hero in the game
Did you do anything with chronos?

[eharper256]

Chronos: Growth on his mana makes it great from my perspective. Yeah, he's nowhere near Weaver/Ace/Warlock, but its good enough. I can change the description again if it's really getting to you. All together, I find his package to be superb though.

Knight was amended (and the above post), I was being dumb thinking Parry still Exerted.

[KingOfCharge]

On t1 and t2, chronos still makes less mana than some t2 and it takes a very long time to reach “superb”
You can say his mana grows in pros but that he his mana starts poor in cons. But simply saying it’s great is just… no.

[eharper256]

I changed his description.

[KingOfCharge]

His turn 1 mana gen is still rather terrible though

[CrabNicholson]

I suppose meddler does have his uses. but he's one of those guys that needs to be planned around when choosing your curses and is disproportionately affected by higher difficulties since buffs to monsters affect his boned ability.

Tier 1 Hoarder is really good. Being able to consistently pull 2 damage on every face beats a lot of other tier 1s who only have 1 or 2 sides that consistently deal 2 damage or who have a lot of X's or non-attack abilities like shield/heal/evade. It's easy to work around guilt, just don't use him for the killing blow but use him to soften up tougher enemies like wolf or boar. Like 90% of the time, it's the guilt side I'm actually rolling for. The only really bad side is the death side, but just treat it like an X.

With Knight: In addition to parry ignoring exert, parry also ignores other negative effects like heavy, pain or single-use, and all your characters can use it. The Reflection's Thrike does the same. Attack an enemy for 3 pips to give Reflection 3 pips on his single-use side, then use thrike, and it keeps the side from exhausting.

On a general note: Most combats are over (or at least all threatening enemies have been wiped out) by turn 2. Even boss fights usually only last at most 3 or 4 turns. Unless you're going for a slow attrition type of build, growth is probably one of the least desirable positive abilities, since you're usually not going to roll the same side more than once or twice each combat, and it doesn't help you on turn 1, which is the most important turn. For the same reason, decay and single-use are usually not all that bad, since they are usually most powerful on turn 1, which is when you need power to clear the board and make the incoming damage more manageable.

[KingOfCharge]

I second the part about growth being weak here, it’s also why pain heroes are good: you kill the threats faster then when the enemies are more manageable you babysit the near-dead pain hero

[KingOfCharge]

In order for a chronos growth to make the same mana as weaver’s basic, you need to use it 3 times, 2+3+4=3x3. And you don’t usually use the same side 3 times per fight

[eharper256]

As mentioned, Chronos description was changed. Tbh, none of the tier III blues are bad, except Ghast being the outlier, but even he has 2x Double Weaken so can't be considered an absolute failure.

[KingOfCharge]

Chronos description was changed, but still doesn’t reflect the fact that in shorter battles, his mana gen is outright bad. It takes a long time for it to reach levels where I’d consider it good and by then most fights are over

[eharper256]

Golly gosh my man, get off your phone at work, your replies are way too quick lol.

Again, we'll have to agree to disagree on this one then, Chronos has always been superb for me. The re-rolls and extra turns alone grant him his S-.