Doebun's Grand Guide

## General Tips

There are a few things to keep in mind, regardless what character you're playing.

### Card Advantage

Consistency is key, and in a game with so many draw cards, it's possible to draw through your entire deck every turn. That should be the goal - or at least, draw into enough combo pieces to do exactly what you want to get done. Any +0 (draw 1) card advantage cards with any benefits or damage are passable. Anything that results in more than +0 consistently (i.e. not exile, sustainable re: resource management) is usually a good idea to include regardless how many you have in your deck.

That being said, some enemies penalise you for excessive card use, so +0 should be used with caution and care.

Also, this is not to say that having a very large deck is always a good thing, but the amount of extra draw power allows for consistency in otherwise bloated decks. For some situations, like a Lady Knight Whirlwind Axe combo, smaller decks allow for more consistent and powerful outcomes.

### Resource Management

The existence of action and mana means extended plays require planning and forethought about the combos you are trying to pull off, as well as understanding what is in your deck and what has been played. Thankfully, there is a deck tab which lets you check exactly what is left. For action, I recommend keeping the number of action cards to at most, the total action you can gain in a turn (free action cards aside). For mana, I recommend around the same but there are more factors than with action i.e. cost reduction cards, mana doubling, etc. but there should still be a reasonable number of mana cards in a deck with spells.

### Gameplay

* Use each special ability as soon as they're off cooldown, as those often contribute greatly to deckbuilding

* Don't skip any monsters - every one can be beaten with the right strategy, and those will make future fights easier as you'll have more resources/gold/levels. (PS: Ghost Doll, Pirate Captain and Bear Mage are harder than most mobs. If you really must skip something, then skip these three.)
* Aim to finish each fight as soon as possible - the less damage you take, the easier the next fight is (and why card advantage/drawing your entire deck in 1 turn is very important)
* Unless you desperately need a card/action/etc., an extra equipment slot is almost always the best choice as good equipment cards can drastically expand the scope or effectiveness of what you can do
* Use the more specific search cards before the general draw cards
* Try and allow Soul Strike to trigger as many times as possible, but only leave 1 copy in your deck
* Do not go into each run with a plan; allow the cards given to you inform your decision, and don't forget to experiment!
* You'll need a good balance of grindy, small damage, and massive damage to deal with different enemies

### Generally good cards

* Draw cards
* Equipment that gives extra draws/free cards
* Healing cards
* Duplication/copy cards
* Soul Strike (because extra permanent max health is good for every class, and reduces the sting of pandora's box/other trade blessings)
* Combo/massive damage/cost-effective cards (within reason)

## Lady Knight

The Lady Knight class revolves around attack cards, and support for those attack cards through equipment and action cards. There are many attack draw cards available, which makes large decks with equipment damage support a viable strategy. However, as there are many varied attack cards, combo pieces and major damage dealers must be prioritised when deckbuilding. Cards should either protect you, deal major damage, or draw more cards. Anything that becomes mediocre by end game (i.e. basic attack cards, poison equipment) should be removed if possible to make room for better cards.

## Ranger

Ranger revolves around action, and action-based incremental damage, so the more action recovery you have, the better. There are also some other fun card combinations, including discard cards and effect-on-discard cards, card negation/hand reduction cards, and others. If the card doesn't mess with your opponent, draw deeper into your deck, or give you resources to draw deeper into your deck, you probably don't need it...except those cards that deal extra damage based on the number of cards in your hand, or the number of action cards you've used that turn.

## Nun

Nun uses prayer cards, which are unfortunately often too slow, and starts as something you work around. But, through judicious use of prayer-counter-increasing cards, consistent damage is possible. Also, as expected of any holy class, the Nun has great recovery abilities, which means long-term grind games are entirely possible, if a bit difficult to maintain consistently. The prayer cards to prioritise are life-restoring and card-drawing, as well as the use-1-attack-card-5-times-in-5-turns one (because that can become massive damage, massive draw power, or anything else really). Damage should come from all the other cards accumulated through runs. This is truly one of the most frustrating and difficult classes to play.

However, there's another fun approach: the copy-cat nun. It begins similar with an ordinary nun - to out-survive the enemy - until you got some "key" cards. These are cards which allow nun copying/taking the cards of the enemy, which are quite often overpowered. Certain boss provides permanent health increase cards - which can make your nun a giant that can't be wear down even by witch's explosive magic. Having said that, it requires some understanding about how each of boss gimmick are - so you know which card to take/copy in each fight. Yet it's still fun to beat the monsters by their own tricks.

## Little Witch

The elemental spellcaster, Little Witch relies spells and mana to deal the majority of her damage. This results in spell-slinging and a heavy reliance on searching and mana. However, as Little Witch can build into fire, ice, or lightning-based damage, it is recommended to either specialise, or choose the strong cards that don't rely on any conditionals to bring out their max damage. Otherwise, the deck is too unfocused and can't do much. So cutting cards is very important for Little Witch.

## Magician

Magician plays a lot of tricks, with her abilities to copy and search cards, as well as consistently returning cards to the hand and mana-changing effects. As such, mana management is a priority when it comes to choosing cards, and it's fine to use high-mana cards as long as you have either enough mana recovery or mana cost reduction cards. Thanks mainly to her starting Poker Dart, that keeps returning to her hand, Magician is good at consistent, long-term damage, but can also burst if there's enough high-damage cards and draw cards. Magician also has access to a lot of good counter cards - which are integral to a strong defense, and compliments the long-term grin that Magician is capable of.

## Apothecary

The apothecary utilises potions, and also many exile cards. She can become incredibly self-sustaining, or a one-shot cannon, depending on which avenue is taken. Somewhere in-between is recommended, as a lot of those exile cards can be very good in the long-term (i.e. duplicate/copy cards) but also will not instantly burn out on your second turn. Two cards are also almost always necessary to a good potion run: Cocktail (use every type of potion in deck, always in starting hand) and Catalyzer (every potion increases enemy's side-effects). Cocktail is an easy early-game consistent kill, and also provides an effective baseline upon which catalyzer and your potions can build a deadly turn on. Furthermore, beyond the Slowness, Chill, and Burn effects, Poison is also affected by the Catalyzer countdown, and is included when calculating Multiple Infection (For each type of enemy's side effects, deal damage equal to half the total side effects), so poison-inducing cards are also useful. That being said, when prioritising potion purchases, fire, ice, and sticky potions are best as they add more counters to the opponent's side-effects than shadow. However, fire is overall the best, as sticky potions' effects cap out after 30ish, and enemies will not do enough damage that 100 reduction will ever be overcome. More damage is always welcome. Every card should either draw more, replenish mana, add more counters to the opponent, exile, or deal massive damage. Also, action cards should be added cautiously, as Cocktail is very important to the potion strategy, and there aren't many action-replenishing cards available to Apothecary.

## Extreme Theory-Crafting

Disclaimer: this section does not have any practical deck suggestions, but through exploring the extremes of what can be achieved, a better understanding of the cards and their interactions can be reached.

### Lady Knight - Endless Armor

Piercing Attack deals extra damage based on the amount of armor you're wearing. Bolster gives you more armor based on how much damage you're dealing. If you build up a good start, you can easily break through 200 damage in one shot, and almost endless armor. This also works well with the Lady Knight's activated ability to gain armor based on health lost, and also whirlwind axe, as that is in general one of the best cards available for Lady Knight regardless what you're building. This is one of the few theoretical decks that can win with fewer than 10 cards.

### Ranger - Denial

There are many draw/action cards available to ranger. One of them is Sprint, which draws 3 and also gives 3 action. Spam a bunch of these, Mute (draw 1, negate enemy's next action), and add in a few Sidekick (1 damage, enemy draws 1 less card next turn), and you've locked down your opponent without having to use any counter cards. Plus some equipment that deal damage on action card use, Precision Strike (more damage for more cards in your hand) and Back Stab (extra damage for each action card used this turn), and you've got a monster.

### Little Witch - Looped to Death

Mana storm deals 10 lightning damage, and can spend 30 mana to guarantee an extra turn. There are many mana giving search/draw cards, as well as Master of Magic, which can add an extra 30 mana. The loop should be obvious. This is an infinite loop if done right, and also one of the only ways I can think of to guarantee a win with fewer than 10 cards.

### Apothecary - Infinite Potion Spam

This relies on a few factors - the previously mentioned Cocktail + Catalyzer combo, Lightning Link, which is a 1-cost way to search 2 more spells (i.e. more Lightning Links, and every potion), and any mana card that decreases mana cost/gives you mana per spell this turn (Mana Spring, Cleansing, Magic Curtain, or most likely, Energy Metal). Once you throw out that mana card, as long as you have as many Lightning Links as you have potions, it is very unlikely for you to end the turn without an empty deck, and much more likely that the enemy is dead before your turn is done. Throw in one Multiple Infection, and something that poisons the enemy early on, and you might just crack the 999 side effects achievement.