A young rookie and a seasoned adventurer enter the Spire, seeking to conquer its challenges together. After vanquishing their first enemy, they contemplate which card to add to their deck. The rookie, a young Silent, ponders between Deadly Poison and Bouncing Flask.
“Take the 2-cost card!” the veteran pipes up.
“Wait, why?” asks the rookie. “For the same energy, I could play Deadly Poison twice and get 10 poison!
“Ah, but you’re not going to draw Deadly Poison twice,” retorts the older adventurer, “and by the time you do, you instead also play the Bouncing Flask a second time for even more poison! You only get to see each card once until you redraw the deck, so you want each card to be as impactful as possible. Oh, and you should upgrade it too!”
“Upgrade it?” asks the rookie. “But then it’s even worse compared to Deadly Poison+! Isn’t 12 poison for 2 energy just worse than 7 poison for 1? That’s like 14 poison for 2 energy!”
“Like I said,” replies the vet, “you’re not going to draw that Deadly Poison twice. Maybe you could add another one to your deck next floor, but then you’re comparing two cards against one. Two cards takes more time to draw, and you only get to upgrade one of them! A more fair comparison would be Bouncing Flask+ versus one Deadly Poison+ and one unupgraded card.”
The vet continues, “Bouncing Flask+ is 12 poison for 2 energy and only 1 card drawn. Deadly Poison and Deadly Poison+ is also 12 poison for 2 energy, but 2 cards drawn. When you look at it like that, the Bouncing Flask is just better.”
“Okay,” says the rookie, “now I see what you’re talking about.”
“But there’s more to it than that as well,” continues the experienced Spire slayer. “You can also enchant your cards with additional bonuses sometimes at Events. And a more powerful card benefits more from an enchantment like that! Sometimes you can duplicate a card as well, either by permanently adding a second copy or by simply playing it twice at once in a combat. In either case, you get more benefit with a bigger, stronger card!”
“What about 0-cost cards? Are they bad then?”
“0-cost cards can be great!” replies the oldtimer. “As long as you’ve got something to spend your energy on. If you’re ending your turn with leftover energy, that means those free cards are going to waste. Once you’ve got a payoff for the energy you already have, that’s when 0-cost cards are great!”
“So…. I should take the 2-cost card?”
“Now you’ve got it!” smiles the vet.
