Does anyone else swap their starting relic as Defect?

[Artemis]

I feel like it's the only character that could get away with it. it's just 1 lightning channeled and boss relics can be pretty stupidly good.

[Zu]

If I see 4 elites in a row, I might. On Silent too.

[knightcoreframe]

You might be able to on Ironclad, if you play a heavy barrier style. I think it just makes you do different deck styles for each character, but they're all equally viable. Defect and Silent might just be the easier ones to do it with.

[Benkyo]

Depends how random you want your start to be. Pandora's box can make a run trivial, an unlucky calling bell can pretty much end it. I'm most likely to try it with Silent.

[Ruibarian]

I don't think I could ever swap it. It's almost always 20+ damage, would you ever give up White Beast Statue if it gave you a free fire potion every time?

[Sealer]

Never. Dual cast Saves a lot of hitpoints early, later on it's one orb closer to cycling orbs. It makes a lot of elites much easier and at the very worst it's 3 damage per turn.

[Drecon]

I do it on Silent a lot, Defect sometimes. I think it can be a lot of fun, although the results will vary a lot. If you want to win consistently it's not your best option though.

[Soulkey]

I don't swap relics on any char anymore.
Was screwed over with Snecko Eye so many times I just don't risk it.
That relic is "ok" once there are high cost cards in the deck, but at the early game it tends to ruin the entire run.

[My Little Omi]

My priority is "choose rare card" -> "rare relic" -> "rare card for a small price like 7hp or loose gold" -> "250 gold for a small price" - "random rare card for free" -> "swap relic"

[Ghostlight]

I would only swap it if all the other options were really bad. Having that initial Orb is actually the source of a huge amount of the damage you will do, especially on Floor 1. Once you get Dual Cast upgraed to costs 0 (and even before that tbh) a turn 1 Dual Cast of your initial Orb for 16 is incredibly strong for Act 1. Without it, you will end up healing at a lot more bonfires than usual which is crucial for the Defect; who needs to upgrade cards much more than the other 2 classes do.

Even then, almost every time that I have traded the Relic for something else, I have regretted it, even when the replacement was decent.

[burningmime]

Almost always, because I rarely go orb-based strats unless it's handed to me on a silver platter. It's roughly equivalent to a randomized Mercury Hourglass with some other potential upsides depening on what cards you get (and making Dualcast not a dead card, but I usually have that out of my deck by the end of Act 1 anyways). It *is* quite helpful for Act 1, but 4 energy is more helpful for Act 1.

Boss relics that IMO are almost always better (8):
Cursed Key
Ectoplasm
Runic Dome
Sozu
Velvet Choker
White Beast Statue
Snecko Eye
Black Star

Relics that are usually better but can screw you (5):
Astrolabe
Orrey
Pandora's Box
Philosopher's Stone
Inserter

Relics that are worse (5):
Runic Pyramid
Eternal Feather
Lizard Tail
Tiny House
Calling Bell

Seems like a pretty good deal.

Originally posted by Soulkey:

Was screwed over with Snecko Eye so many times I just don't risk it.

Snecko Eye is pretty great on Defect. It's roughly a wash with your starting deck (but obviously much higher variance) as compared to having no relic at all. Drawing 2 extra cards per turn with random costs means you'll on average be able to cast about 3 of them.

But as soon as you start taking other cards, it gits gud. Defect has a wonderful crop of 2+ cost cards (Meteor Storm, Sunder, Glacier, Streamline, most of the powers, etc), and your best block card (Reinforced Body) is unaffected. My Snecko+Defect win rate is through the roof. It does lock you out of some strats, though.

[Paranoia]

On Ironclad I never do that.
On Silent I always do that unless there´s a reasonable trade-off for getting a Rare Relic.

On Defect I do that when there is no other reasonable Relic gain choise. So about a third of the time.