This isn't a deck building game

[Aphex]

This game is pure luck based. If it was a deck building game you would at some point get the cards you need, this game however gives you some initial cards and at that point you are commited to whatever you found. Thing is, you almost NEVER get the nesscesary cards to make the deck viable, especially since there are only a handfull of builds that are viable in the first place.

The problem is scaling. If you want to defeat the game as Ironclad for example you either go strength, block or .... that's it. If you go perfect strike or anything else you need block as well. By the time you reach the endboss damage is so insane that you need massive ammounts of block but the only viable way is entrench + anything really. You don't have dex bonuses or anything to improve these basic trash block cards.

[1.2M | Missingno.]

To paraphrase the Rolling Stones: you can't always get the cards you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find, you get the cards you need.

One of the most common beginner mistakes is to tunnel-vision on trying to force a specific 'build', passing up anything that doesn't fit into that build, and then blaming the game because you built a deck that won't work if you don't find a certain card/relic you really wanted. That's on you for passing on the cards you actually needed.

Always work with what you have in the here and now and never speculate on things you don't know if you'll get. You need to build a flexible deck that can adapt to anything you find, and have different plans for enemies that would hard-counter a one-trick deck.

There are players with very high winrates on the hardest difficulty, and on the lowest difficulty it is pretty simple to win literally 100% of the time once you know what you're doing.

[Yojo0o]

Well, no, that's not the case at all. This game is full of viable strategies and ways to succeed, and there's a clear gap between skilled and unskilled players.

[Nibbie]

Oh boy, this again. I see you are new to the game. You don't understand all the mechanics and cards and how to strategize around them, you don't know all the enemies and what moves they do, you don't know what all the bosses and elites are and how to prepare for them, you don't know the relic and event pools and when to go for them. This is obviously fine, but blaming RNG for your losses isn't.

Skill is an incredibly large determiner of whether you win a run. While each run is technically down to RNG, and there are theoretically runs that even the best player couldn't beat, skill tips the scales so far in your favor that even just a "good" player like me (I have beaten A20 on all characters once) has well over a 90% win rate at the base difficulty, including currently being on a 26 win streak with A0 Defect.

To address some of your specific points, while there are relatively few archtypes for each class, there are several combinations and synergies that can make each archtype work. Ironclad's "Strength" archtype can be enabled by Demon Form, Spot Weakness, Limit Break, Inflame, Flex, Girya, or Rupture, and it can be paid off by Sword Boomerang, Twin Strike, Heavy Blade, Reaper, Whirlwind, Fiend Fire, Pummel, and Dropkick. Any individual piece I listed may be unlikely to be found in a run, but you will probably get *something*, and different combinations of these things can play out in different ways. It is also important to remember that going for an archtype from the start is risky, because you may not get the cards you want; the trick is recognizing what archtype and synergies the cards you are given can create, and how to combine them into a deck that works, both early on and then scaling into the late game.

In addition to the Strength and Block archtypes, Ironclad has the Exhaust (Havoc, True Grit, Burning Pact, Dark Embrace, Feel No Pain, Second Wind, Sentinel, Corruption, Exhume, Fiend Fire), Self Damage (Offering, Brutality, Rupture, Hemokinesis, Combust, Bloodletting), and Status (Wild Strike, Evolve, Power Through, Fire Breathing, Reckless Charge) archtypes, along with several generically good cards that could reasonably go in any deck, especially early on (Impervious, Feed, Double Tap, Beserk, Uppercut, Shockwave, Flame Barrier, Disarm, Battle Trance, Shrug It Off, Pommel Strike). There are also more specific decks, such as the 'Infinite Dropkick' deck that uses card removal and exhaust to get its deck small enough to cycle two dropkicks forever, or the 'Constant Rampage/Searing Blow' deck that uses cards like Headbutt and Double Tap to play one specific attack over and over. All of these archtypes can win the game, especially on base difficulty. Of course, these archtypes don't exist in a vacuum either, they can be crossed in different ways; you could use a block deck to buy time for a demon form to scale, or use exhaust cards to manage the statuses you add to your deck. Figuring out how win with what you are given is the key to any roguelike, and is certainly important in this one.

[LHGreen]

Lol, yay, another "luck-based game" thread! Let's see how long we can stretch this one out!

[HAWAIIANpikachu]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2781807088

Git Gud

[HAWAIIANpikachu]

I would contribute but uh.

All of what Nib (Steam Censor) said.

I'm not stating that again that about it.

I'll just give this old guide which you can follow the core ideas: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1613845715

[mldb88]

Oh hey, the entire reason I wrote a guide!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2673443183

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by mldb88:

Oh hey, the entire reason I wrote a guide!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2673443183

Lol, excuse me, are you saying you DON'T want this thread to turn into an argumentative flame war with an absurd, record-breaking number of posts?

[mldb88]

Originally posted by LHGreen:

Originally posted by mldb88:

Oh hey, the entire reason I wrote a guide!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2673443183

Lol, excuse me, are you saying you DON'T want this thread to turn into an argumentative flame war with an absurd, record-breaking number of posts?

Oh, no flame away, I just wrote it so I don't have to write an entire thesis paper every time one of these posts come up to save me some time.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by mldb88:

Originally posted by LHGreen:

Lol, excuse me, are you saying you DON'T want this thread to turn into an argumentative flame war with an absurd, record-breaking number of posts?

Oh, no flame away, I just wrote it so I don't have to write an entire thesis paper every time one of these posts come up to save me some time.

Lol, in that case, will you be partaking in the bonfire, in the unlikely event one starts?

[mldb88]

Originally posted by LHGreen:

Originally posted by mldb88:

Oh, no flame away, I just wrote it so I don't have to write an entire thesis paper every time one of these posts come up to save me some time.

Lol, in that case, will you be partaking in the bonfire, in the unlikely event one starts?

This is what I live for...

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by mldb88:

This is what I live for...

Lol, starting to look like it may not happen, though. Maybe OP checked the other two 200+ post threads and took the advice and lessons in those to heart? One sort of hopes so....

[Ackranome]

Originally posted by Yojo0o:

Well, no, that's not the case at all. This game is full of viable strategies and ways to succeed, and there's a clear gap between skilled and unskilled players.

Knowing every single type of build to win is pretty insane even on one character - but even then - the first set of cards you get tell you basically what you can or can't do as getting a particular set of powers or initial cards can make or break a run.

Most call this RNG - but the game just is absolutely unforgiving.

[1.2M | Missingno.]

Originally posted by Ackranome:

the first set of cards you get tell you basically what you can or can't do as getting a particular set of powers or initial cards can make or break a run.

This isn't true at all. Really, your first priority in Act 1 should just be to pick up a few damage commons so that you can kill some elites. Again, leave your options open, don't box yourself in trying to force anything so early. You have all the time in the world to figure out what your endgame will be when you actually get to the endgame.

[HAWAIIANpikachu]

The first act is really more about focusing on getting better offense to fight about 2 elites for their relics (1 less/more depending on your health/deck) and defense/support. Act 2 is really when your build should start to get going. By that point you should have a decent amount of money for the store (assuming you didn't go ectoplasm/get random boss relic ectoplasm)