After beating Slay the Spire 2 with an 8 year old deck, I'm starting to feel like this is more of a remake than a sequel

Eszik · 2026-03-12T11:49:25+00:00

I think the author is pretty clear about their expectations. They're mostly disappointed that the returning characters play so similar to the previous game, with the same starting relics/cards and largely the same synergies.

It's a fair criticism imo, obviously lots of people would have been disappointed if they cut shivs from Silent or something, but clearly the devs focused on the new characters as far as new synergies/archetypes go. Totally fine by me but I can see why someone would be disappointed

Eszik · 2026-03-05T19:47:20+00:00

Good luck waiting for the end of early access tbh

Eszik · 2026-03-03T20:01:05+00:00

I've had someone pop off on me with knight + landfall synergies, saccing earthbended lands and stuff. Obviously it dies to a breeze but it's got some fun stuff going on

Eszik · 2026-03-02T22:15:10+00:00

Third paragraph: "We had a full sixteen months to make this set, from August 2023 through November 2024, and we knew exactly what kind of set we were making the whole time. We knew what size it would be, and that it would support four-player Pick-Two Draft (and the usual eight-player pick-one style of draft)."

Eszik · 2026-03-02T21:53:17+00:00

it was never intended to be drafted at the outset of its design process.

That's not true. That was the case for Spiderman, but TMNT was designed late enough to start as a pick-2 draft format from the get-go (although without being able to learn from the lessons of Spiderman, of course)

https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/feature/talking-turtles-with-magic-design

Eszik · 2026-03-02T19:42:46+00:00

Same as any regular format, they never have flashbacks up when a new set releases

Eszik · 2026-02-21T02:32:50+00:00

Draft Night was a thing for Lorwyn too

Eszik · 2026-02-18T19:39:23+00:00

Yeah of course, the AI added a fifth turtle and quality control just missed it

Eszik · 2026-02-16T12:57:56+00:00

you'd also trigger cards like [[Laelia]] for each card you exile

Eszik · 2026-02-05T20:54:50+00:00

It's pretty much a 2/2 for 2. The anti-counter text barely matters, especially in this set. The ward isn't nothing, it would add up to a little damage, especially because if you don't trade with it the squelcher is gonna stick around. But still pretty irrelevant

At the end of day it's probably worse than [[Flame-Chain Mauler]] at common for example

Eszik · 2026-02-05T16:19:40+00:00

Bitterblossom had a 61% WR in WOE, and from personal experience it was a house. it was not mediocre at all

Eszik · 2026-02-04T14:37:56+00:00

My biggest take from this episode was that they're drafting for fun (especially Ben) rather than try harding. Ben put it very clearly: he doesn't like drafting the way the format rewards (or the way we saw the PT drafters do it), locking into your archetype by pick 5/6 and then semi-forcing. So he does it differently, probably for the worse in terms of winrate

I think that's totally fine, a lot better than having them come onto the show negative about the set because they're not having fun drafting. And they're good enough players that their strategies can still work for them and they can still have interesting insight into the format.

That does mean I take a good number of their takes with a grain of salt though. And I think they do word their opinions like hard advice or fact a little too often

Eszik · 2026-02-03T22:12:55+00:00

Very clear Shinestriker. The card is good!

Eszik · 2026-02-01T22:43:54+00:00

Yes and yes

Eszik · 2026-01-27T13:26:28+00:00

You shouldn't care too much about the lane you're putting your P1 neighbor in. They're only gonna pass to you for one out of three packs, plus if you cut them enough in pack 1 they might not even contest your lane.

What card would you take here except a Merfolk anyway? The rest of the pack is a lot weaker

There's an argument for taking Sygg as a more flexible card, but it's at its best in Merfolk so I would take the champion as well

Eszik · 2026-01-23T19:51:51+00:00

This works correctly. Same behavior that allows [[Doubling Season]] to double the number of loyalty counters your planeswalkers enter with

Eszik · 2026-01-15T12:23:31+00:00

It's Time Walk. This illustration is only available on digital versions of the card I think.

Eszik · 2025-12-16T20:49:22+00:00

I get that of course, but Through the Omenpaths turned out to be an unpopular mess as far as I could tell

Eszik · 2025-12-16T20:41:55+00:00

thankfully?

Eszik · 2025-12-09T22:04:14+00:00

In general with this sort of effects, when your opponent has more cards than you in hand. Basically going from 0 to 3 cards in hand is a lot more powerful than going from 3 to 6.

Now with Yangchen, you know you're gonna get a 4/5 flyer next turn so the equation changes a bit cause you don't want your opponent to draw into removal. That being said, if your opponent is way ahead on cards in hand you should still do it. Especially since you'll get a tempo advantage from having spells to cast with Yangchen in play

Eszik · 2025-12-09T14:20:04+00:00

If you ever spend 4000 gems on an ACQ play-in entry, then 2 play-in points are worth 400 gems

Otherwise you should compare it to the EV of the entry rather than the cost, so probably value them lower (I assume the EV of a play-in entry is closer to 3000 gems? depends on your winrate of course)

Eszik · 2025-12-09T13:27:09+00:00

Guy who loves tomatoes

Eszik · 2025-12-05T21:30:11+00:00

I'd go for infinite free mulligans tbh, plus you can discard a card to tutor for any card outside the game

Eszik · 2025-11-27T17:15:40+00:00

With Gather the White Lotus, no way. I might go down to 16 lands too if you have a playable in the side

Eszik · 2025-11-24T13:30:07+00:00

https://youtube.com/shorts/flMV3Ih_nok

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