I want to like this game...

[Invader Skoodge]

But I just can't. The ramping is too ridiculous. I cannot fathom how people are saying it's too easy. No build I make works, and the bosses deal just ludicrous amounts of damage.

Kong prime just dealt 300+ damage to my entire party because he spawns with 1k rage. Guess you can't ramp against him, you just have to come out doing a thousand damage out of the gate or else you're just ruined.

Devs, please. Keep the difficulty for the people who like it, but make the game playable for the rest of us.

[Krasus]

if you have trouble try a team with Koa, his blasting force is realy strong.
together with Boop they have a lot of combos.
try things to get more hits and resilent deffense, there you get 5 defense for each hit.

my first clear team was koa boop and Shoork

skills i used:

Koa: blasting force, lucky hits, shaterstorm and resilent defense

boop: numbing zap ( if you have to take a hit you can half it, chain detonation, defragmentation blast ( against debuffs like poison) and i think last was precision

Shoork: defend (important to max it),bowling bubble , life block and defending wave

my second clear was with gramps instead of shork, but that needed a few tries.

i hope that did help a little and the skills are only a suggestion, you need to change them sometimes ( the fire dragon did hard counter that stratgie for exampel)

[Begood]

A lot of people including myself find this game easy. Since this is a deck builder, it's natural to compare it to the difficulties of other well-made games in this genre. Compared to Slay the Spire, Wildfrost, Inscryption, Tainted Grail, and Spell Rogue to name a few on top of my head, this game doesn't pose much challenge. All those games I listed have mob and boss designs that'll constantly test your skill, and give you less resources to work with.

There are reasons that make this game easy for card players compared to other games.
1. You always have access to shop between every battle.
2. You get to store extra abilities in your inventory to swap into if you feel necessary. I actually love this feature, but that doesn't change the fact that it makes thing easier.
3. In-game currency gain rate is very high so that almost always you can make your deck however you want.
4. Not that most good players will use them but we start out with free potions. Healing in any shape or form makes things trivial. Fighting over tempo is one of the aspects that spikes difficulty,. If you can heal back a character without using any mana, it completely nullifies what the enemy did in their turn.
5. Up to two out of three members of your team, there is no consequence of them dying since they revive after battle. It's almost as if we have two free lives at all times.
6. There is no card draw RNG involved. This part is fine since it's a game design. Just mentioning for comparison.
7. Upgrades for leveling characters both passive and active are juiced. Especially the passives the characters carry have value of at LEAST 1 mana spell cast and they are active for free at all times. Meanwhile the mobs and bosses do not scale.
8. Some relics in this game are flat out OP. I believe one of them gives stun debuff to all enemies when the battle begins. And you can have more than one of this relic essentially making enemies lose multiple turns. To give more examples we have stuff like +1 gold every time a character lands a hit, and +3 shield every time a character gains a shield. If you're a deck builder enjoyer, you'd know these kind of buffs just win you the game blindfolded.
9. Shield stacking capabilities are insane. I've never played a game where not getting hit was this easy.

No other card games that are worth playing have even half of these hand-holding features listed. Way less than half or even none. I mean I guess they could make it even easier. I'm fine with that. But I think they should focus a little more on making hard mode option.

[Agreus]

Originally posted by Begood:

A lot of people including myself find this game easy. Since this is a deck builder, it's natural to compare it to the difficulties of other well-made games in this genre. Compared to Slay the Spire, Wildfrost, Inscryption, Tainted Grail, and Spell Rogue to name a few on top of my head, this game doesn't pose much challenge. All those games I listed have mob and boss designs that'll constantly test your skill, and give you less resources to work with.

There are reasons that make this game easy for card players compared to other games.
1. You always have access to shop between every battle.
2. You get to store extra abilities in your inventory to swap into if you feel necessary. I actually love this feature, but that doesn't change the fact that it makes thing easier.
3. In-game currency gain rate is very high so that almost always you can make your deck however you want.
4. Not that most good players will use them but we start out with free potions. Healing in any shape or form makes things trivial. Fighting over tempo is one of the aspects that spikes difficulty,. If you can heal back a character without using any mana, it completely nullifies what the enemy did in their turn.
5. Up to two out of three members of your team, there is no consequence of them dying since they revive after battle. It's almost as if we have two free lives at all times.
6. There is no card draw RNG involved. This part is fine since it's a game design. Just mentioning for comparison.
7. Upgrades for leveling characters both passive and active are juiced. Especially the passives the characters carry have value of at LEAST 1 mana spell cast and they are active for free at all times. Meanwhile the mobs and bosses do not scale.
8. Some relics in this game are flat out OP. I believe one of them gives stun debuff to all enemies when the battle begins. And you can have more than one of this relic essentially making enemies lose multiple turns. To give more examples we have stuff like +1 gold every time a character lands a hit, and +3 shield every time a character gains a shield. If you're a deck builder enjoyer, you'd know these kind of buffs just win you the game blindfolded.
9. Shield stacking capabilities are insane. I've never played a game where not getting hit was this easy.

No other card games that are worth playing have even half of these hand-holding features listed. Way less than half or even none. I mean I guess they could make it even easier. I'm fine with that. But I think they should focus a little more on making hard mode option.

Exacly this.
What surprises me is that the game is this easy and still very fun I think they have found a gem that needs just some polishing.
Normally games that are this easy don´t get me to play this long I hope they manage to turn it into a nice challange for everyone with different difficultys.

[Vespertellino]

Yeah the thing is that you have ALMOST COMPLETE CONTROL over your build, apar from you chasing some skills early
Which makes it fun, but also really easy once you understand what you're doing

[Invader Skoodge]

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree because no matter what build I try, I just get wiped by the boss. The boss design is straight ass, and ruins the game.

[rodrigo.az]

Hey guys! Thanks for discussing the difficulty and challenge of the game here, to address the core topic, we're definitely looking to modify the difficulty before entering a run and give options to the hardcore players as well as those that need less of a challenge. It's a difficult balance to strike, and we're looking at all feedback on both sides! Thanks everyone

[Lionheartwolf]

Originally posted by Begood:

A lot of people including myself find this game easy. Since this is a deck builder, it's natural to compare it to the difficulties of other well-made games in this genre. Compared to Slay the Spire, Wildfrost, Inscryption, Tainted Grail, and Spell Rogue to name a few on top of my head, this game doesn't pose much challenge. All those games I listed have mob and boss designs that'll constantly test your skill, and give you less resources to work with.

There are reasons that make this game easy for card players compared to other games.
1. You always have access to shop between every battle.
2. You get to store extra abilities in your inventory to swap into if you feel necessary. I actually love this feature, but that doesn't change the fact that it makes thing easier.
3. In-game currency gain rate is very high so that almost always you can make your deck however you want.
4. Not that most good players will use them but we start out with free potions. Healing in any shape or form makes things trivial. Fighting over tempo is one of the aspects that spikes difficulty,. If you can heal back a character without using any mana, it completely nullifies what the enemy did in their turn.
5. Up to two out of three members of your team, there is no consequence of them dying since they revive after battle. It's almost as if we have two free lives at all times.
6. There is no card draw RNG involved. This part is fine since it's a game design. Just mentioning for comparison.
7. Upgrades for leveling characters both passive and active are juiced. Especially the passives the characters carry have value of at LEAST 1 mana spell cast and they are active for free at all times. Meanwhile the mobs and bosses do not scale.
8. Some relics in this game are flat out OP. I believe one of them gives stun debuff to all enemies when the battle begins. And you can have more than one of this relic essentially making enemies lose multiple turns. To give more examples we have stuff like +1 gold every time a character lands a hit, and +3 shield every time a character gains a shield. If you're a deck builder enjoyer, you'd know these kind of buffs just win you the game blindfolded.
9. Shield stacking capabilities are insane. I've never played a game where not getting hit was this easy.

No other card games that are worth playing have even half of these hand-holding features listed. Way less than half or even none. I mean I guess they could make it even easier. I'm fine with that. But I think they should focus a little more on making hard mode option.

I also agree with this. I think you hit the nail on the head with what makes this game easy, but I don't necessarily think that it makes this game bad. In fact, it's a great way for people new to the genre to be introduced.

Not everybody is a 30+ year old video game vet looking for the masochistic experience of banging your head into a wall. The visuals, and themes of this game are a dead giveaway. It's easy for the same reason Pokémon is too easy. And just like Pokémon there are a lot of people who complain about the difficulty because they don't understand that they are not the target audience. (Not saying you are, but there are enough negative reviews out there that emphasize my point.)

Ultimately, I don't think it is meant to please StS veterans. I think it is meant to usher in a new generation of StS fans. It's not for everybody and that is okay. If people think that it is too easy, or too childish for them, it is probably because it is. (And to make a point to the devs, I dont think you should be discouraged by that. Its easy to see the main complaints, and cater to that voice, but survey bias prevents you from getting a complete data set. If you make a kids game, don't assume the adults who respond in the forums and Discord are the complete picture. There is a reason why Gamefreak doesnt change dispite the online conversation. They understand their target audience isnt online talking about it because they are children.)

As for the OP, if you are finding this game too hard, it's because you haven't found a build that works. Personally, one of my criticisms of the game is how poorly the game explains itself. A lot you will learn will just be from making mistakes. That is just a normal part of the intrinsic learning experience that is so critical for the genre, but this game I feel leads you astray. The campaign kinda teaches you a way to play that really doesn't work well in the Master Raid. It placed a lot of emphasis on individual roles like support/defender/attacker but I found that the best builds are just all out attacks, and using your teammates as mules for passive slots to max your DPS. My first successful run in the Raid was a critical build and while I had one shield ability, just in case, I never used it because every enemy died by the second turn (sans the final boss.)

Once you find that OP build and listen to the advice from Begood here you will see that this game cannot get much easier. The difficulty from these games usually comes from the RNG that prevents you from always using the same exact build, and adapting with whatever bad hand you are dealt. This game embraces the idea of being able to pick the cards you want for all the reasons mentioned above. If you are struggling it's because you don't know what cards to pick yet.

[Krasus]

another advice would be that you should not mix to much the different themes.

Human has a heavy fokus on crit

water on refresh (using a skill again and again)

fire on rage

earth on poison
they have a card that gives shield if you poison an enemy and another to poison an enemy if you get a shield maxed at 20 times. if you have both you give enemys 200+ poison each round and get 50+ shield
this math includes several other poison boosts

in the beginning just go for the human set and make a crit deck.

[Invader Skoodge]

Okay, so you're saying "you're just picking bad skills". Sure, but the bad skills shouldn't be "bad", they should be part of alternative viable builds. The idea that you make a set build and win or deviate and lose is a balancing issue that maybe isn't directly related to "difficulty" but is still a problem.

[Nanosaurus]

I'd say that there isn't really "bad skills" per say, it's most likely a bad combinations problem maybe, and even with that levelled up heroes should carry you pretty far.

I'll agree that Vulcanova is quite challenging, but Kong is pretty easily defeated with any kind of damage dealing heroes if you play with his fight mechanics, you have roughly 3 or 4 turn to kill his bobs (which gives rage to the thing that killed them which include you) to gain enough dps to lower his rage, if you can kill both bobs in the same turn with the same character (which a lot of character can) you should have more than enough dps to lower his rage, just try not to hit Kong himself until you need to lower the rage as to not get poisoned too much. Also mutli-hit attack are quite effective since the rage damage bonus apply to every hit meaning you should get his rage down in 1 or 2 turn

Also only levelling up heroes and having their skills maxed is usually more than enough to deal with most of the early part of a run.

[Lionheartwolf]

Originally posted by Nanosaurus:

I'd say that there isn't really "bad skills" per say, it's most likely a bad combinations problem maybe, and even with that levelled up heroes should carry you pretty far.

I'll agree that Vulcanova is quite challenging, but Kong is pretty easily defeated with any kind of damage dealing heroes if you play with his fight mechanics, you have roughly 3 or 4 turn to kill his bobs (which gives rage to the thing that killed them which include you) to gain enough dps to lower his rage, if you can kill both bobs in the same turn with the same character (which a lot of character can) you should have more than enough dps to lower his rage, just try not to hit Kong himself until you need to lower the rage as to not get poisoned too much. Also mutli-hit attack are quite effective since the rage damage bonus apply to every hit meaning you should get his rage down in 1 or 2 turn

Also only levelling up heroes and having their skills maxed is usually more than enough to deal with most of the early part of a run.

I agree with this advice, and maybe I wasn't clear enough in my post. I wouldn't say there are bad skills either. Some are probably better than others, but that isn't really the issue. It's more that builds should really be hyper focused. If you are spreading yourself too thin by trying to focus on debuffs, defense and offense you are probably hurting yourself. I don't think I have found any builds that work well like that. You have limited slots and to get the max benefit from them you are going to want more than 4 (which is the max 1 character can have.) Even stacking passives for really good combos works better than giving a teammate their own attack.

Like I was saying with the right builds you don't even really need defense or debuffs, but I've also seen some interesting things done with all defense builds so it's not just about offense either. I think most of my successes come from picking one concept (like Krasus states) and really trying to max it out. One good skill with enough relics and passives will be enough to carry you. You'll know you found it when it becomes impossible to lose.

Also, don't forget to upgrade your heroes. That one good skill I was talking about was Koi's default attack fully upgraded with a boatload of crit passives. It attacks like 50 times on its own and if you have 50 fold crane it's even better.

It doesn't take a lot of experimenting. You'll find it just keep looking, and it will eventually find you.

[Nanosaurus]

Indeed, also i think Kong as a boss fight is heavily reliant on it's bob rage gimmick, unless you have an really strong build with most team you will need to kill those bobs if you want enough damage to lower Kong damage

[Hunter Wolf]

I donno bout you but I suck at this and barely managed to defeat Maliss but I can defeat Leviathan she is REALLY HARD in campaign and I think there should be maybe some easy mode filters or something

[cluefake]

I dont know how do you play but this is clearly one of the easiest deckbuilding or turn based game. I guess you didnt play any of those games.

There's no unviable cards you just need to make your skill have synergy. If you dont know what i am saying then just pick koa and level him up he will clear the game for you. Just spam 3 star blasting force dude. And pick bo with him, pick lasting wounds together, game is auto cleared

Dont say like game has the problem. You are saying like game must be cleared even if I pick skill almost randomly. No there is no game like that.

[GetGoudaBro]

this game is way too easy