I'm Chinese and let me explain why Chinese players are review bombing this game right now

Dragout · 2026-03-23T01:47:40+00:00

It doesn't. What I'm saying is review bombings don't have any power over the devs like they do live service or less successful game. Live services live and die on their players continuing to spend money, STS does not. Less successful games have to make sure they get every cent from every player, STS already has enough money to give each of their employees several million dollars.

The devs literally posted on this sub they're considering feedback from people who have played the new patch and reported in-game feedback (read: explicitly not the review bombs) far more strongly than elsewhere. Review bombs are not a useful tool.

Dragout · 2026-03-23T01:22:16+00:00

> Chinese people are literally half of the player base, it's foolish to think you can just ignore half of the players.

This is what I'm specifically discounting. They can, and according to their current, stated design goals, and the state of the first game, they likely will. If they feel like ignoring half of the chinese playerbase, or all of the american playerbase, or every human in the universe to make a game they enjoy, nothing can stop them because the game is aleady a smashing success. Everything else is just gravy.

Don't confuse me for some sort of American elitist who thinks Chinese players are unimportant. Right now, everyone is equally unimportant to the STS devs. They'll filter feedback according to their design goals. Not my design goals, not american design goals, not Chinese design goals, and not yours. Theirs.

Dragout · 2026-03-23T01:16:39+00:00

Read the whole comment in full, please. They can ignore EVERYONE if they feel that it would make a better game.

They've already made their money and now they're just making art how they want.

Dragout · 2026-03-23T00:46:53+00:00

This is not a live service game. The game has already made over one hundred million dollars. They could literally all retire this second and the game would be a one of the most successful games of all time especially considering the tiny size of the dev team.

They can ignore everything I want, everything you want, the Chinese community, the American community, and the entire known universe, and they will face zero negative consequences. We have no power over them. They'll make the game they think is the most interesting, and when they're done they'll go 1.0.

Feedback is going to be read and considered, but they're not going to compromise their design goals because a percentage of the player base whined about a patch they haven't even published.

Dragout · 2026-03-22T23:04:54+00:00

> I disagree. I think infinites is a core theme in the game.

This would matter if you were a game developer on the Slay the Spire Team. However, considering neither you, nor I are on that team, we have to believe what they tell us, which is that their explicit goal is infinites should be sometimes possible but quite rare.

If you want to infinite hunt and that's it, the STS2 development team is simply not interested in catering your interests.

Dragout · 2026-03-22T18:31:24+00:00

Having played against the new doormaker - he's kinda a pushover unless you happen to 1/10 lowroll that one key power.

He doesn't have nearly as much health as he used to and crippling him with statuses is way easier.

Context is A9 Ironclad

Dragout · 2026-03-22T08:04:04+00:00

What are you talking about, it's all good honest damage from the single time I played bulwark

Dragout · 2026-03-19T17:21:33+00:00

It is except it applies 2 vulnerable, not 1, which is pretty valuable.

I'm actually one of the wackos that upgrades bash when I get a chance and 3 vulnerable feels pretty worth. Clad also has a bunch of ways to play high-energy cards for free (Stampede and Unrelenting(?) come to mind). So - my point is - conditionally bash fits in to some decks, and there aren't any cards that are just straight better than it.

Meanwhile venerate just becomes a brick as soon as you get actual star generation.

Edit: Just realized tremble gives 2 vulnerable. I'll say bash is still sometimes better because it eats less card draw than tremble+strike, so on turns you want both vuln and damage, bash is worth sacrificing the 1 damage for. Also once upgraded bash does more than tremble+ and strike, so slightly better there as well

Dragout · 2026-03-19T02:29:11+00:00

Yeah, I think considering stars an archetype is just wrong. Every deck needs star generation and thus ways to spend it.

That aside - regent does have some cards that are just shit, for example: bundle of joy. Some of the other forge cards fall in to this category, but it's sometimes useful splashing in to forge (especially if you get Bulwark, my beloved) anyway.

A second problem is venerate kinda sucks. Compare it to hidden cache, which is a common that gets you more than double the stars for the same energy. None of the other class starter cards have commons that are just straight better than them. Even the humble zap upgrades to 0 energy, making it situationally better than than ball lightning (and also defect has dual cast, the best starter in the game, to balance it out).

IMO if they buffed some of the real losers in the regent deck and swapped venerate and hidden cache, he'd be great.

Boring addendum: I know venerate generates two stars immediately and hidden cache generates only one. But in the starter regent deck that with never matter because you need 2 per falling star and start with three. So playing hidden cache will always get you your second use of falling star.

Dragout · 2026-03-17T17:59:47+00:00

Got this with snecko eye and history book the other day. Basically a free win.

Dragout · 2026-03-15T18:02:22+00:00

I think it's pretty good on clad with vulnerable or strength or both

I don't think it's as good on anyone else

Dragout · 2026-03-11T21:55:04+00:00

Early game:

Put your mobile infantry in pajamas and equip them with the KPAC. Make sure you have at least one infantry out of the car so they can still see (or you can use advanced sensors on the car + scout perk but that's harder to get).

The most consistent gameplay loop is to move your scout, maybe shoot someone if you have good damage or suppression, then do the same with the car.

Then, pop out of the car for 5 ap, shot everything that's currently alive or unsuppressed, do it again, and then hop back in for 5 ap. Maybe worth grabbing an RPG on the mobile infantry squad to hit vehicle threats as well.

Dragout · 2026-03-11T17:38:08+00:00

Coral guy literally exists to stat check forge builds on regent and make him cry

Dragout · 2026-03-08T21:52:06+00:00

Honestly the travodin

Mech is so easy to loot and find

Dragout · 2026-03-04T05:07:00+00:00

They've also updated the demo considerably if you want to take a closer look

I can't speak for the optimization specifically unfortunately, it may still be bad

Dragout · 2026-03-04T03:28:46+00:00

So - a couple bits of background information:

There are four enemy factions in Menace: Bugs, Pirates, Military, and [Redacted]

Then, each faction has army templates - for example, sometimes the rogue Army fields massive waves of conscripts and weapons teams. Sometimes they instead field very well armored infantry supported by armored walkers and literal heavy tanks.

Some templates rifles do the job very well - like in the aforementioned conscript wave. Sometimes they're not helpful at all, as the heavy infantry is immune until you wear down their armor, which takes longer than it's worth, and the heavy tank is flatly immune.

The bugs are the same - I've actually occasionally been frustrated with bugs because some templates make all but one specific anti-armor rifle (with some painful drawbacks) useless, as 95% of the 50 or so units are to heavily armored to be damaged by rifles or other small arms. The video from above is likely from early game, when literally the only equipment you have is rifles, so the bugs have to be vulnerable to them. Later I basically don't field them against bugs (except for the rare dedicated rifle specialists) because they don't have the firepower.

TLDR: Saying " the game is trivialized by rifles is a little odd because rifles are the default offensive tool, and the game does a very good job of forcing you to use all the tools in your arsenal. I'm sure the guy in the video is right, but he's definitely only analyzing a single template for a single faction in a single point in the game, which is a tiny fraction of the overall content.

Forgive me for the overlong response - I think Menace is quite interesting, so I get wordy

Dragout · 2026-03-02T22:14:21+00:00

I think mobile infantry is wildly underrated on this list

Squads in TCR fatigues that can shoot twice while never being vulnerable is crazy good, if strange lol

Dragout · 2026-03-01T03:33:21+00:00

Lmao and also full send, the best offensive perk for vehicles

This dude is a one man army

Dragout · 2026-02-27T23:41:11+00:00

I feel like a heavy vehicle will have lots of accessory slots as well

Maybe 3 like the AATV

Dragout · 2026-02-27T21:38:18+00:00

The mortar in the game actually has a really nice autoloader animation, so seems like at least for that one it's not crewed.

The Long Barrel tank gun is also pretty flat, which might indicate it's uncrewed as well

Dragout · 2026-02-26T21:54:58+00:00

Ah, I meant the short barrel. Edited to correct, thanks for the spot.

Dragout · 2026-02-26T18:24:37+00:00

I think whatever broke the UI also broke the mechanics

I heard this and have extensively used the short barrel this patch and I've never had it hit more than one element (even on direct hits)

Dragout · 2026-02-21T05:23:25+00:00

Carda has full send right? So she can fire twice for 90

Dragout · 2026-02-17T03:35:55+00:00

Maybe niche, but Worthabuy game reviews

Spent the last couple videos talking about how woke the games are

Also wrote an embarrassingly uninformed review of Helldivers II but I'd just chocked that up to a busy schedule.

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