How I would improve The Defect: Get rid of Creative AI and Hello World.

[jopejope]

So I've gotten reasonably accustomed to playing The Defect, to the point where I'm comfortable at Ascension 15. I think the Orbs are fun but the Powers of the Defect need work. Mainly the no-fun powers are Hello World and Creative AI. I'm not saying these cards are bad power-level wise. Creative AI is obviously strong (though not nearly as consistently good as Echo Form). They're no-fun. Creative AI is strong but random. Instead of playing the deck you built with the relics and powers you've drafted, you just get a ton of random powers. Hello World is similar, in that if fills your deck with random cards making what you've drafted less relevant.

I think The Defect would be more fun if the following powers were just removed from the game: Creative AI, Hello World, Heatsinks, and Storm. Why remove Heatsinks and Storm? Well, these reward you for playing powers, and they appear to be focused around Creative AI. I typically will not draft these unless I have Creative AI, and even then they're low picks. Storm can at least be upgraded to be Innate but otherwise there's no guarantee you'll draw these before drawing your other powers, so without Creative AI they aren't very good. It seems like their primary reason for existing is so that Creative AI can give them to you randomly, but even in this case I'm usually disappointed because I generally need something that will help me immediately for this fight instead of maybe drawing a card next turn at the expense of an energy now. So, I would drop these cards.

Amplify I would keep. Even though The Defect has fewer powers than Ironclad, I enjoy the synergy of each class getting to double a different thing. I would change Amlify to exhaust though, as it's really annoying to keep drawing it after you've played all your powers, and I would change it so it upgraded to cost 0 instead of working on two powers. OR better yet, it could upgrade to double the next power played this COMBAT instead of this turn.

[Paranoia]

...I actually quite agree with this post. I never liked the design of either of these Cards.

[Ryukana]

While learning each deck's cards, and how I want to build a deck, I always grab cards that give me more cards. So my first Ironclad deck was a hoarder, exhaust deck. Silent seemed like a simple theme to just pick-up and go, so there wasn't much need to load up on random cards. While Glitch is practically built for stacking Power cards, imo.

I agree about Amplify though, especially with Echo in the deck.

[draigonic]

If you don't like those cards, don't take them? I'd understand if you thought they were unbalanced (Either too weak or too powerful), but your only problem with them is that you don't think they're fun, in which case, fine, I guess? But why ruin it for people like me that actually like Hello World and Creative AI? You want to deprecate 4 cards and an entire archetype just because you don't like running it, but that seems rather selfish to me. I don't like running dark orbs, but you don't hear me asking for their removal.

[Zu]

Originally posted by draigonic:

Your only problem with them is that you don't think they're fun, in which case, fine, I guess? But why ruin it for people like me that actually like Hello World and Creative AI?

From a more objective standpoint, these cards are quite the departure from how the rest of the game is handled. Normally you have limited resources and make decisions based on them.

Then they decided to add more dead branches and nilries to the game. By that I mean: You pick the card, you play it, and moments later the decision-making is at a minimum, especially creative a.i. as a one-card win condition. It's like demon form except the rest of the deck doesn't need to support it. It just gives you all this offensive and defensive value for free.

And then there's the aspect that it can give you magnetism which can give you bandage up, so you're in this weird spot where you know that you could and should grind it out for a full heal, but it takes awfully long.

That was me rephrasing the following section and its conclusion that "It's boring."

Originally posted by jopejope:

Creative AI is strong but random. Instead of playing the deck you built with the relics and powers you've drafted, you just get a ton of random powers. Hello World is similar, in that if fills your deck with random cards making what you've drafted less relevant.

[jopejope]

It's important to note that "are the cards unbalanced" and "are the cards fun" are questions that are fundamentally linked. This is especially true in a single-player campaign like Slay The Spire.

A card that is strong and fun is fundamentally less "unbalanced" than a card that is strong and not-fun. "Unbalanced" often means, "contributes power to my deck in a negative-to-fun way". Consider the following card: "Cost 0: deal 999 damage to ALL enemies." Is it overpowered? Yes. Are there ways to get this effect in the game as it currently exists? Yes. Why is this card overpowered? Because it's no fun. It would just end all the battles as soon as you draw it. It's more fun to try and get essentially this effect through gradual deck-crafting rather than it handed to you in one card.

You could argue, "well if you don't like it just don't take that card." Well, I'm trying to win. Of course I take the cost 0 card that does 999 damage to all enemies. Yes, I could choose to value fun over winning and just ignore that card. But why is it there? I want to win the game and that desire is what drives forward the progress. It is like Reiner Knatzia says, "When playing a game, the goal is to win, but it is the goal that is important, not the winning"

It's easy to not take Heatsinks and Storm. They are weak and don't help me win. Dud cards. It's annoying to see duds because it limits my choices, but it isn't so bad. It's worse to see Creative AI, because it's a strong card and if I want to win the run I should take it. Hello World is less strong but it is good enough that often you want it over the other options. Now I have to choose between winning the run and having fun and playing the game I want to play.

Also, there is this mechanic Transform, which means that due to certain events you might end up with these cards in your deck even if you don't pick them.

Also, if I dislike these cards probably other people dislike them as well. I'm not being selfish for saying they should be removed. I'm having negative experiences with these cards and would like other people to not have those negative experiences.

Also, if these cards are removed it makes room for other, potentially more interesting cards to be added in their place. Or simply for the other fun Defect cards to come up more often.

[Paranoia]

Personally, I would rather that the two titular Cards were Skills instead: 0 Energy, give 2(3) Cards of the appropriate kind. Exhaust.

Do they step on the turf of some other Cards? Sure. But they´d also be a definitely finite deals.
Besides, random 3 Powers added to the Deck is certainly an interesting prospect. In a way an indefinite amount certainly ain´t.

[jopejope]

Originally posted by jopejope:

Hello World is less strong but it is good enough that often you want it over the other options.

And I'm saying this as if Hello World *isn't* bonkers insane. Truthfully, I don't pick it because I don't like it. It's probably really strong. It's like Creative AI but for 1 energy and a slightly different selection of cards.

Machine Learning is like the more-fun safer version of Hello World. They do similar things but with Machine Learning your deck actually matters. Unfortunately Machine Learning is rare and Hello World is uncommon.

Essentially all you need is a few defense cards, a few strike removals, and Hello World or Creative AI to win. Well, a little luck too, so your Creative AI doesn't just give you Sadistic Nature turn after turn for a whole battle against The Collector (true story...).

These cards are like, "hey, do you love Dead Branch? well, we've got a *whole character* for you!"

[Complex]

Maybe a power that duplicates any power drawn?

[Paranoia]

Originally posted by mightjustaswell:

Maybe a power that duplicates any power drawn?

Now this seems like a good idea too.

[draigonic]

Originally posted by jopejope:

It's important to note that "are the cards unbalanced" and "are the cards fun" are questions that are fundamentally linked. This is especially true in a single-player campaign like Slay The Spire.

A card that is strong and fun is fundamentally less "unbalanced" than a card that is strong and not-fun. "Unbalanced" often means, "contributes power to my deck in a negative-to-fun way". Consider the following card: "Cost 0: deal 999 damage to ALL enemies." Is it overpowered? Yes. Are there ways to get this effect in the game as it currently exists? Yes. Why is this card overpowered? Because it's no fun. It would just end all the battles as soon as you draw it. It's more fun to try and get essentially this effect through gradual deck-crafting rather than it handed to you in one card.

You could argue, "well if you don't like it just don't take that card." Well, I'm trying to win. Of course I take the cost 0 card that does 999 damage to all enemies. Yes, I could choose to value fun over winning and just ignore that card. But why is it there? I want to win the game and that desire is what drives forward the progress. It is like Reiner Knatzia says, "When playing a game, the goal is to win, but it is the goal that is important, not the winning"

It's easy to not take Heatsinks and Storm. They are weak and don't help me win. Dud cards. It's annoying to see duds because it limits my choices, but it isn't so bad. It's worse to see Creative AI, because it's a strong card and if I want to win the run I should take it. Hello World is less strong but it is good enough that often you want it over the other options. Now I have to choose between winning the run and having fun and playing the game I want to play.

Also, there is this mechanic Transform, which means that due to certain events you might end up with these cards in your deck even if you don't pick them.

Also, if I dislike these cards probably other people dislike them as well. I'm not being selfish for saying they should be removed. I'm having negative experiences with these cards and would like other people to not have those negative experiences.

Also, if these cards are removed it makes room for other, potentially more interesting cards to be added in their place. Or simply for the other fun Defect cards to come up more often.

A lot to unpack here. Unbalanced means "Is this significantly better or worse than everything else" it has nothing to do with how fun something is. If a fighting game character is the most fun thing anyone has ever created, but it's completely beyond everything else in it's game, it's still unbalanced. A boring character that fights on roughly the same level as everything else is still balanced, even if you don't want to use it.

How is a hypothetical instant win card (Which, no it's not overpowered because it isn't fun, it's overpowered because it does literally 200 times the amount of damage any of competitors do, which has the side effect of making it not fun) even relevant here? Are you saying Creative AI and Hello World are this? Because last I checked, it takes time for them to even do *anything* let alone win the match for you. If your deck is just the one 'Win button' you win, no support necessary, but Creative AI does need support so you don't die while waiting for something to happen, and Hello World basically just amounts to an increase in options every turn until your deck is turned to an unrecognizable mush, which is far from an instant victory on it's own. Echo Form is far more of an instant win than these cards.

Heatsinks is a mediocre (if not bad) card on it's own, yes, and if you were asking for only it to be deprecated, (Though I'd say Entrench is in the same boat, nearly useless on it's own, amazing with Barricade/calipers) I might be inclined to agree, but Storm is good enough when upgraded since you likely have Capacitors and Defragments, and who knows what else to get a few lightning orbs out for 1 energy as you set up. Creative AI is a strong card, but it's far from Offering levels of instant pick. If your deck is sufficiently aggressive and/or tight, it does more harm than good, and things like All For One and Meteor Swarm don't care much for it.

Yeah transform is a thing, but you know what else is a thing? Card removal. I once transformed a strike into an eviscerate while running a shiv deck, so you know what I did? I removed it. Transformation is *meant* to be a gamble, and if you get something you don't care for, well it's not like you were going to keep that strike you transformed anyway.

If you dislike it, so do other people, yes almost definitely, but if I like it, I'm clearly alone in my thinking? I'm having positive experiences with these cards and want other people to have those positive experiences as well.

If any card is removed, it makes room for other cards. that's not a point.

I will concede that Hello World should be deprecated if you show me a run where you use only it, and pure defensive cards and win (And you couldn't have achieved the same result by replacing it with Darkness). Creative AI might work, but as you said, even that's absurdly luck based if you don't actually take Storm or something to facilitate a win condition.

[draigonic]

Originally posted by Paranoia:

Originally posted by mightjustaswell:

Maybe a power that duplicates any power drawn?

Now this seems like a good idea too.

NO that's a terrible idea, that card would turn Defrag into a better Allocate, Echo Form+ into even more of a monstrosity, and Buffer into a skill and that's just the nonsense off the top of my head

[Paranoia]

Originally posted by draigonic:

Originally posted by Paranoia:

Now this seems like a good idea too.

NO that's a terrible idea, that card would turn Defrag into a better Allocate, Echo Form+ into even more of a monstrosity, and Buffer into a skill and that's just the nonsense off the top of my head

As opposed to as it is now, where it can create an endless strem of those anyway?
1: The effect would be capped at how many Powers one has in one´s Deck.
2: You still need to actually play the Powers duplicated. Duplicating Echo Form unUpgraded is useless unless one has the Energy to use it on the turn.

Tldr: How would one shot duplication be stronger than the current implementation with the endless stream of those same Powers? In short term, maybe, but on the long term it clearly loses out.

EDIT: Wait, no, I got it. One could endlessly duplicate if one does not play the Powers.
...Bugger.

[Slin]

Agreed

[Firellius]

I agree with the point of Storm and Heatsinks being entirely dependent cards, but I don't agree with Creative AI and Hello World being bad for gameplay. I enjoy both of them a -lot-, though you may have a point about them corrupting any kind of deck.

I'd say a better solution to that would be to add 'these cards get exhaust' to Hello World, and 'these cards get ethereal' to Creative AI, than to remove them outright.

[gmclucabel]

I disagree, for both hello world and creative ai.
I find their concept fun, there are other cards that synergies with them such as stack and aggregate so it is possible to "build" for them, to a degree. Or a juicy mind blast.

Defect is the only character with a common power. if I go for heatsink/storm then I try to pick many capacitors, I had one run with a bottle heatsink and 7 capacitors plus some random other powers along the way, it was prime-level amount of cicle.

And anyone waiting a billion turns for creative ai to draw magnetism to draw bandages is no different from anyone bunkering up a billion turns on ironclad for a big fat reaper.

I don't think those cards warrants being deprecated, at most I'd argue about creative ai not pulling magnetism... or magnetism not pulling bandage, *IF* we have to change something, but I don't think it's necessary