Quick Links
How To Build Decks For The Ironclad
Strength Build
Barricade Build
Corruption Build
Status Build
Slay the Spire combines deckbuilding with roguelike mechanics to produce one of the most addicting strategy games of the last few years. With such fine margins between success and failure, it makes sense that you'll look to optimize your builds as much as possible.
Related
18 Slay The Spire Mods That Make The Game Even Better
Slay the Spire is a fantastic and highly replayable card-based game, one that comes with a robust mod scene. What are the title's best mods?
The Ironclad is the first class you'll use in Slay the Spire and is simple to come to grips with, but has a lot of depth to it. The starting relic with this class is Burning Blood, which heals 6HP at the end of each encounter; he also has the highest starting HP of the four with 80HP. Here are four of the best builds for Ironclad, including which relics to use and different playstyles you can use to beat this incredibly tough game.
Updated July 9, 2022 by Matthew Pentleton: We've given this guide an update to add more information and refresh it so that it has everything you need to know for all your Ironclad deckbuilding needs.
How To Build Decks For The Ironclad
The key to a good build is to not go in with any expectations. This is true of all Slay the Spire's characters, and while it's very helpful to know what the main builds are, it's a bad idea to choose one beforehand, due to the nature of RNG.
You'll always want to skip any cards that don't really fit your deck, as adding them would basically just mean drawing dead cards in fights. However, if you've decided before your run that you want to do a strength build, and are skipping any cards that don't really fit that, you might be passing up strong status cards, and there's no guarantee of ever seeing the strength cards you need, and you'll be left with no deck at all.
The way to go is to just take the first good cards and relics you see, and then pick cards that synergize with those as you progress. What is key, though, is removing the likes of Strikes - you wouldn't pick any would-be dead cards at a card reward, so you don't want to keep the dead cards that are Strikes in your deck either.
Strength Build
v1.jpg "Slay The Spire: Best Builds And Relics To Use With Ironclad (3)")
Recommended Cards | Spot Weakness, Limit Break, Inflame, Demon Form, Whirlwind, Heavy Blade, Rupture |
|---|
Strength adds additional damage to your attacks, equal to the value of strength you have.
This is a useful buff regardless, but works particularly well with multi-hit attacks like Whirlwind (which hits all enemies multiple times) as the strength bonus is added to each hit of the attack. It also works well with Heavy Blade, which gains three (five upgraded) times the usual bonus from strength.
Using those as your attacking cards, focus on scaling strength using:
- Spot Weakness, which gives three (four upgraded) strength if the enemy intends to attack.
- Inflame, which gives you two (three upgraded) strength.
- Demon Form, which gives you two (three upgraded) strength per turn.
- Limit Break, which doubles your strength. Ordinarily, Limit Break exhausts, but if you upgraded it, it doesn't, making it by far the best way to scale strength.
You can also utilise Rupture, which gives one (two upgraded) strength every time you take damage from a card. Bloodletting, Offering, and Hemokinesis can all proc this, as can Brutality and Combust for reliable strength every turn.
Good relics in a strength build are the Vajra, which starts you off with one strength each fight, the Red Skull, which gives you three strength if you're below 50 percent HP, and Mutagenic Strength, which gives you three strength only on the first turn of a fight.
Also worth mentioning is the Akabeko, which adds eight damage to the first attack you play in a fight. Like strength, this works with multi-hit attacks, letting you get some early damage off with a Whirlwind.
There are plenty of defensive options with the Ironclad, as these are actually what most of his builds centre around. With this in mind, combine this build with one of the defensive builds described below to sort both the offensive and defensive aspects of your build.
Barricade Build
Recommended Cards | Barricade, Entrench, Impervious, Power Through, Body Slam |
|---|
As the name suggests, this build is centred around Barricade, a power that prevents block from being removed at the end of your turn.
This allows you to build up massive amounts of block, utilising high-block cards like Impervious and Power Through, as well as Entrench, which doubles your block. It's completely possible to scale block well into the hundreds with just these cards, meaning you never have to worry about taking damage.
If you don't feel like using strength for your offence, this deck has one very easy solution - Body Slam, which is a one-cost card (that upgrades to be free) and deals damage equal to your block. This means you can focus on getting set up defensively, build up hundreds of block, and then just play Body Slam for hundreds of damage to end the fight on the spot.
Also worth a mention is Juggernaut, a power that deals five damage to a random enemy every time you gain block, but this is much rarer and less effective than Body Slam, so it's a nice bonus rather than an offensive core.
Related
Slay The Spire: Best Builds And Relics To Use With Watcher
The Watcher works best with a specific deck in Slay the Spire, so here are the best builds and relics for this character.
Corruption Build
Recommended Cards | Corruption, Fiend Fire, Second Wind, Dark Embrace, Feel No Pain, any Skill card |
|---|
Corruption is a power that reduces the energy cost of all skills in your deck to zero, with the caveat that they exhaust when played. This deck is just as often called an exhaust deck, as it revolves around making things happen when cards are exhausted.
Dark Embrace draws a card whenever a card is exhausted, giving you the potential to replace your zero-cost skill with another, or bring in a powerful attack, while Feel No Pain gives block for every exhausted card. Since the majority of skills provide block, running Corruption is already a defence-oriented deck, so Feel No Pain makes it even stronger.
Fiend Fire exhausts every card in your hand and deals seven (ten upgraded) damage for every card exhausted. It won't be free with Corruption, but it'll take advantage of the same synergies.
Second Wind does the same thing but grants block, meaning its five (seven upgraded) block could potentially be a better deal than playing what block cards you do have. These cards can actually work as exhaust decks on their own, though Corruption is such a strong card that few Ironclad decks don't benefit from it.
Another card that works particularly well with Fiend Fire and Second Wind is Battle Trance, as it draws extra cards, giving you more to exhaust for damage or block. This is a premier pick in any Ironclad deck, though, as it's one of the few reliable ways he can get draw.
As for relics, Charon's Ashes deals three damage to a random enemy every time a card is exhausted, but by far the best relic for an exhaust deck is Dead Branch, which adds a random card into your hand every time a card is exhausted, letting you replenish your hand as you get rid of cards - and if Dead Branch gives you a skill, Corruption will make it free, too.
As for offence, strength is still a reliable option, though some other notable offensive strategies with Ironclad are:
- Searing Blow, which you can upgrade an unlimited number of times, making it deal huge damage.
- Rampage, which increases in damage for the duration of a fight every time it's played.
- Perfected Strike, which deals additional damage for every card in your deck with "Strike" in its name - stack up on cards like that and Perfected Strike becomes seriously strong.
Status Build
Recommended Cards | Fire Breathing, Evolve, Power Through, Wild Strike, Reckless Charge, Immolate |
|---|
This deck is a damage-dealer that focuses on adding status cards to your deck to hurt enemies, using Fire Breathing, which deals six (ten upgraded) damage to ALL enemies for every status or curse card you draw.
Making this work as a full deck can be tricky, but it's never a bad idea to pick up a Fire Breathing as the extra damage can be really nice in status-heavy fights like the Chosen or Sentries.
The idea is to add lots of status cards to your deck, to proc your Fire Breathings (ideally you have multiple active) as much as possible.
Power Through - which gives block in return for giving you two wounds - and Wild Strike and Reckless Charge - which deal damage for a similar tradeoff - are great for this.
So is Immolate, which deals massive damage to all enemies, but shuffles a burn into your draw pile.
Another card that's great in this deck is Evolve, which draws an additional card whenever you draw a status card. This can either be another status for more damage, or an actual card you can play, as while statuses are effective damage dealers in this deck, you still need to be able to block when necessary.
On that note, one of the biggest risks with this deck is bloating your deck too much, and being left with hand after hand of dead cards.
Because of this, the best relic you can get for a status build is the Medical Kit, which lets you play status cards to exhaust them, preventing the spam from getting out of hand.
Another great relic is the boss relic Mark of Pain, which gives you extra energy per turn but shuffles two wounds into your deck - ordinarily a drawback, but not with Fire Breathing!
Next
Pro Tips For Slay The Spire You Should Know
Slay The Spire is a fun rogue-like game that utilizes cards. Like most rogue-like games it is hard, so make sure to note these helpful tips.
