Slay the Spire 2 Card Tier List

Lose 6 HP, gain 2 Energy, and draw 3 cards for zero mana. The HP cost stings early but nothing else in the class turns one card into this much tempo.

Exhausts your whole hand, then refills it card-for-card with random ones. Pair it with Dark Embrace or Feel No Pain and a single copy rewrites your turn.

Two free Strength every turn for three Energy up front. By turn four you're hitting harder than any other Ironclad power gets you.

Draw a card every time something Exhausts. Slot it in with Second Wind, Feed, or Fiend Fire and your hand never runs dry.

Thirty Block for two Energy. The panic button every control Ironclad wants in a pinch.

Skills cost zero and Exhaust themselves. Ancient rarity, and it shows: it turns Second Wind, Feel No Pain, and True Grit into an engine that runs itself.

Block stops disappearing at the start of your turn. Useless alone, but with Body Slam or Juggernaut in the deck it's the centerpiece of a wall you never take damage through.

Exhausts your hand and deals 7 damage per card burned. Late in a fight with Dark Embrace already running, this closes runs.

Vulnerable enemies take 25% more damage, and Ironclad has no shortage of ways to apply it. Free scaling on a class that already wants to hit hard.

One extra Energy every turn for two mana. Unexciting on paper, but it anchors every Power-heavy build in the class.

Lose 1 HP, Exhaust a card, gain Strength, for free. Cheap scaling as long as you've got fodder to burn.

10 damage that raises your Max HP by 3 on a kill. Farm it against small enemies early and your HP total by Act 3 looks nothing like anyone else's.

Every point of Block you gain fires 6 damage at a random enemy. Stack it with Barricade or Impervious and defending starts doing real damage.

Gain Strength every time you lose HP on your turn. Bloodletting, Offering, and Hemokinesis all feed it, so a self-damage Ironclad turns pain into permanent power.

The first Block you gain each turn is doubled. Simple math that makes every defensive card in the deck better.

3 Block whenever a card Exhausts. It pairs with almost everything on this board; take it in any Exhaust build without thinking twice.

Exhausts every non-Attack card in hand for 5 Block each. Dump a clogged hand of Skills into a wall in one turn.

Pulls a random Attack from your Discard Pile and upgrades it, every turn. It snowballs an Attack-heavy deck into hitting harder each cycle.

Take double damage from enemies, allies take half. Solo, that clause about allies does nothing: this is a pure downside unless you're carrying a team in the 4-player co-op mode.

7 damage and 2 Strength this turn only; the buff vanishes at end of turn. It reads like a scaling card and isn't one.

Permanently adds 5 damage to itself each time you play it this combat, but you have to draw it again to cash in. Great in a long fight, dead weight if you only see it once.

Zero cost for 1 Energy and 2 cards. There's no build this doesn't belong in.

An X-cost Skill that strips X Strength and applies X Weak in one card. Scales with whatever Energy you can spare and doubles as your answer to a Strength-stacking Elite.

Pick a card, and three copies land in your hand next turn. Point it at Adrenaline or your best Shiv payoff and the following turn is absurd.

Draw a card and discard a card at the start of every turn. Quiet, permanent hand filtering that never stops paying off.

1 Dexterity and 4 Thorns for 3 Energy. Thorns punishes every attacker that hits you, and Dexterity makes your Block cards better at the same time.

Weak enemies take double damage from Attacks. Silent applies Weak constantly, so this quietly doubles the whole Attack suite.

4 damage to a random enemy on every card you play. In a deck full of cheap Shivs and Skills, this adds up to more damage than most Attacks do.

Shivs hit every enemy and you get 4 of them on the spot. Turns a single-target Shiv deck into an AOE deck.

Discard your hand, get a Shiv for every card binned. The best Shiv generator in the class once your hand's already spent.

Every card you draw this turn applies 2 Poison to every enemy. Stack it with a big draw turn and you've Poisoned the whole board without playing a Poison card.

1 damage plus 1 for every card drawn this combat. By Act 3 with a draw engine running, this one card is doing 20-plus.

You can't draw more this turn, but everything in hand is free. Empty your whole hand for the price of one card.

Discard your hand now, deal double damage with Attacks next turn. A two-turn combo that turns your worst hand into your best one.

Draw until you have 6 cards. Flat, reliable, and it never has a bad turn to play it.

Every Skill you play gains Sly, which triggers its effect again once discarded. Turns a control hand into a hand that pays out twice.

Free card draw, and 3 Block if it's a Skill. Silent's deck skews Skill-heavy enough that the bonus usually hits.

Every unblocked Attack hit applies 1 Poison, no setup needed. Silent throws enough small hits that this turns into a pile of stacks fast.

Strips Artifact and Block off the enemy, then applies 2 Vulnerable, for free. The answer to any fight where Artifact is otherwise walling you out.

1 Block every time you play a card, for the rest of the fight. A one-cost Power that turns a big hand into a wall without needing anything else in the deck.

Gain Block whenever another player attacks an enemy. Solo, there's no other player to trigger it: this card does nothing outside co-op.

Spend 3 Energy to gain 1, a net loss on its own. It only works once you've got enough cost reduction, like Up My Sleeve or Pinpoint, to knock it down toward free.

The enemy takes double damage from other players this turn. Another co-op-only clause: solo, you're paying 2 Energy for a card that does nothing.

Plays every Shiv sitting in your Exhaust Pile against the enemy. Needs a real Shiv-exhaust engine behind it or it whiffs for nothing.

60 damage to every enemy, but only if your Draw Pile is completely empty. A genuine finisher in a deck built to draw itself out, a dead card everywhere else.

4 damage to all enemies twice for 1 Energy sounds fine until you compare it to Flick-Flack doing similar work for less setup. Filler.

One extra card, every single turn, for 1 Energy. The simplest power in the Defect's kit and still one of the best.

Shuffles hand, discard, and draw pile back together and draws you 4. A full reset for 0 Energy that undoes a bad turn instantly.

The first card you play each turn happens twice. Double your best Attack, Block, or Orb setup, every turn, for the rest of the fight.

4 Energy for 0 cost. Nothing else in the class prints this much tempo in one card.

10 damage, then every 0-cost card in your Discard Pile jumps back into your hand. Needs a deck full of Claw- or Zap-style 0-cost cards to be worth building around, but it's absurd once you have them.

2 Energy to everyone at the table, yourself included. Solo, that's still a straight +1 Energy for the cost.

Prevents the next instance of HP loss. One card, one dodged hit, and against a scary boss attack that's a full turn bought back.

Free damage equal to every point of Energy you've already spent this turn. Play it last for a real finisher out of cards you were casting anyway.

The next Power you play triggers twice. Point it at Echo Form or Biased Cognition and you've doubled your best engine piece.

A random Power lands in your hand every turn, for 3 Energy up front. Snowballs hard once Echo Form or Machine Learning is already running.

3 cards for 1 Energy, no conditions. As efficient as draw gets in this class.

4 Focus immediately, then it bleeds 1 Focus a turn. Front-loaded value for an Orb deck that wants a big Focus number early and doesn't mind it decaying.

28 damage to every enemy for 2 Energy, minus 3 Focus. The best AOE burst Defect has, at the cost of an engine you were probably about to spend anyway.

Channels Lightning equal to everything you've already Channeled this fight. Weak turn one, absurd turn five.

19 damage and 3 Frost Channeled for 3 Energy. The rare Defect Attack that's just efficient without needing a combo.

Evokes your rightmost Orb four times for 1 Energy. Ancient rarity for a reason: park a big Dark or Plasma Orb on the right and this alone can end a fight.

Channels a random Orb whenever you create a Status. Needs a Status-generation engine already in the deck to matter at all.

Makes another player Channel Plasma. Solo, there's no other player: this card is a blank.

3 damage, and every Claw you own gets +2 damage for the rest of combat. Needs multiple copies in the deck to matter; one Claw by itself is nothing.

1 Block for 1 Energy, but its own Block permanently goes up by 3 every time you play it. A snowball that takes several turns to become good.

A free Orb Slot and a card draw, but its own cost goes up by 1 every time you play it. Great once, worse every time after.

8 damage per Status card Exhausted, but you need Status cards in hand for it to do anything at all. A build-around piece, not a pickup.

Whenever you play a card, gain a Star. Ancient rarity and it earns it: this alone turns every card in your hand into Star income.

Draw 6 cards for 2 Energy. Nothing else in the game refills a hand this cheaply.

9 damage to every enemy and every enemy loses 9 Strength, for 1 Energy. Cheap, and it does two jobs a normal AOE card only does one of.

Draw 3, then play a Skill in hand three times, for free. Point it at Big Bang or Prophesize and the payoff is enormous.

Forge 30 in one card, more than any other Regent card manages in a single play. The fastest way to get the Sovereign Blade to a scary number.

Gives the Sovereign Blade Replay 1, so it hits twice. The single best payoff for a Forge deck that's already invested in the Blade.

Draw a card, gain Energy, gain a Star, and Forge 5, for zero cost. It's the one card that helps both Regent archetypes at once, which is why everyone takes it.

Ends your turn immediately, but the first 2 cards you play every following turn are free. An Energy engine that taxes the turn you cast it on, not the ones after.

Draw a card and Exhaust a card from hand at the start of every turn. Reliable cycling, as long as you're not Exhausting something you needed.

Every Attack you land strips 1 Strength off the enemy. Any Attack-heavy Regent turns this into a constant Strength shred.

Transforms any number of cards in hand into Minion Sacrifice. Flexible, and it scales with however many cards you're willing to give up.

Puts 2 cards from your Draw Pile into your hand next turn. Cheap selection that sets up your following turn instead of this one.

20 damage, then copies a Colorless card from your hand. Full damage and a free card, no downside at all.

Forge 7, and the Sovereign Blade starts hitting every enemy instead of one. Turns a single-target Forge build into an AOE one.

Sovereign Blade also gains 10 Block. Turns your win condition into your defense at the same time.

8 Plating for 1 Energy. Plating doesn't decay like Block does, so this is stapled-on defense for the rest of the fight.

2 Stars every turn for 2 Energy up front. Any Star-focused deck runs this as its core income.

Draw 3, put one back on top. Card selection and card advantage in the same card.

Every 4 Energy you spend refunds 1. Rewards a deck that's already spending big, and Forge decks usually are.

Whenever you Forge, all allies Forge too. Solo, you have no allies: this only matters in co-op.

Gives another player a random Colorless card. Solo, there's no one else to give it to.

1 Strength every time you create a card. Needs Bundle of Joy or another card-creation source running to do anything at all.

3 Block whenever you create a card. Same requirement as Arsenal: dead without a card-creation engine, strong stapled to one.

10 Block, and it replays itself if it's still on top of your Draw Pile at the end of the turn. Hard to keep on top of the deck without dedicated support, but once it's looping there it prints Block forever.

3 random Colorless cards into your hand for 1 Energy. The easiest way to feed Arsenal or Pillar of Creation if you're building around card creation.

30 damage, and if it kills the enemy you get 5 Stars. The Stars only matter on a kill you didn't need help getting; the payoff never lands when you actually want it.

3 Energy and 2 cards at zero cost, but you take 3 Doom yourself at the start of every following turn. Doom kills you once it matches your current HP, so this is a ticking clock as much as a burst of value. Take it in a deck that can close the fight fast.

1 Energy and an extra card draw, every turn, for 3 Energy up front. A permanent engine that pays for itself in two turns.

Lets you remove a card from your deck at the end of combat. Ancient rarity spent on deck quality instead of a flashy effect, and it's worth every point.

3 Souls into your Draw Pile for every player at the table, yourself included. Solo, that's 3 free Souls for 1 Energy feeding Devour Life, Haunt, and Necro Mastery.

A random card lands in your hand at the start of every turn, Ethereal. It vanishes if you don't play it, but it's still a free card most turns, and it's the engine every Ethereal build runs on.

Adds Replay to a card in hand for 1 extra Energy. Point it at your best Attack or biggest Doom card and you're casting it twice.

Summon 20 in one card. Nothing else gets Osty's HP this high this fast.

Puts 3 cards from your Discard Pile back into your hand for 1 Energy. The best recursion in the class.

7 damage at no cost, and it copies every debuff on the enemy to every other enemy. Turns a single Doom or Vulnerable stack into a board-wide effect.

11 damage, X times. Scales with whatever Energy you have free, which makes it a reliable finisher at any point in the fight.

Draw an extra card every time an Ethereal card hits your hand. The payoff piece for a Call of the Void shell.

4 Block every time you play an Ethereal card. Turns the Ethereal engine into a defensive one as well as an offensive one.

Summon 6 for everyone at the table, yourself included. Solo, that's 6 free HP on Osty for 2 Energy.

3 cards for 1 Energy. As clean as draw gets.

33 damage to every enemy, costing 2 Energy less for every Ethereal card played this fight. Expensive at 9 Energy base, but an Ethereal-heavy deck knocks that down to nothing fast.

4 Energy now, but every card costs 1 more this turn. Play 3 or fewer cards and you come out ahead; play 4 and you've broken even.

7 Block off a 0-cost card, and it adds a copy of itself to your Discard Pile. Keeps paying out Block every time it comes back around.

Summon 5, and every time Osty loses HP, all enemies lose that much HP too. Turns tanking hits on Osty into free damage.

29 Doom to every enemy, executing anything with Doom at or above its current HP. Closes the fight once Doom is already stacked on the board, dead weight if it's your first Doom source.

10 damage, and Vulnerable and Weak both hit twice as hard on this enemy for 2 turns. One Uncommon card that makes your whole debuff kit better against a single target.

A permanent 2 Strength and 1 Energy every turn, for 1 Energy up front. Quietly one of the best Powers in the class for how little it costs.

Kills Osty for Block equal to double his Max HP. A solid panic button if Osty's already stacked a fortune of HP, but it burns your entire Osty investment to cash in.

3 Doom to the enemy for every card you play this turn, for free. Scales with hand size, so it wants a deck built around playing a lot of cheap cards in one turn.

Exhausts your hand, and grants Intangible only if exactly 9 cards got Exhausted that way. Hitting exactly nine on purpose is rare, so most decks never see this trigger.

Upgrades every card in your deck at once. Ancient rarity, and it's the single biggest power spike any class can pick up.

3 cards for 0 Energy. No downside, no condition, in every deck.

Tutors any Skill straight out of your Draw Pile into your hand for free. Turns a dead draw into your best Skill on demand.

Same deal as Secret Technique, but for Attacks. Between the two, you can fish for whatever your deck actually needs.

Damage equal to every card you've played this fight. Weak turn one, but by a long boss fight this is doing more than most Rares in the game.

9 Plating for 3 Energy. Plating doesn't wear off like Block does, so this is nine permanent points of defense stapled onto any deck.

25 damage and 3 random 0-cost cards land in your hand. Damage now, free value after.

15 damage plus 5 for every unique debuff already on the enemy. Stack Vulnerable, Weak, and Poison first and the damage adds up fast.

Every Attack you play adds a random Attack to your hand. In an Attack-heavy deck this snowballs your hand size all fight.

20 damage, and 20 Gold if it kills. Solid flat damage with a shopping trip attached.

Transforms a card in your hand into something else at the start of every turn. Slowly upgrades the quality of whatever you're holding over a long fight.

Draws until your hand is full for 1 Energy. As much card advantage as you can hold in your hand at once.

A free random potion. There's whiff potential, but potions are strong enough in this game that even an average one is worth 1 Energy.

12 Block to everyone at the table, yourself included. Solo, that's a flat 12 Block for 2 Energy, no conditions.

2 cards to everyone at the table, yourself included. Same math as Rally: a clean draw spell even with nobody else in the run.

Damage equal to your entire Draw Pile. Weak early, a genuine finisher once your deck's stacked with generated cards.

30 Block in one card, but you can't gain Block from cards for the next 2 turns. The best emergency button in the game as long as you can survive on Plating or Intangible for those two turns.

13 Block and you keep your whole hand for next turn. Defense and tempo in the same card.

33 damage and a full Stun, Ancient rarity, Event-reward only. Nothing else in the Colorless pool removes an enemy's turn outright.

Gives other players half your Block whenever you gain some. Solo, there's nobody else at the table: this card does nothing.

Gives another player 2 Energy. Same problem as Beacon of Hope: solo, there's no one to give it to.

Copies the Block another player is currently holding. Without another player, there's nothing to copy.

10 damage, and the enemy takes double damage from other players this turn. The base card is mediocre on its own; the bonus only cashes in with a co-op partner.