Doormaker's beta rework has been released to the main branch of Slay the Spire 2 last week, but the attempt to solve this Act 3 boss' identity crisis has received a ton of backlash since. I’ve broken down what makes this encounter special and discussed its reception.
How does the New Doormaker Work in Slay the Spire 2?
Doormaker now opens with an idle turn of invincibility to give you a head start, then repeatedly rotates through three phases:
Hunger
All Attacks and Skills played this turn are Exhausted. You can often use this in your favor to whittle your deck down, but it sometimes forces you to sacrifice key cards to stay alive.
Scrutiny
This phase prevents additional card draw. While being prone to dicey draw orders is familiar throughout Slay the Spire 2, draw cards that would otherwise alleviate that danger now uniquely make it worse. The free turn at the beginning helps mitigate this issue, provided you have some Power cards to set up.
Grasp
You lose an additional Energy after each card played. The Doormaker also gains permanent Strength here. If a card play uses all your remaining Energy before the penalty applies, the downside is circumvented. This a common breakpoint to reach with a pair of 1-cost cards on a typical 3-Energy turn. 0-cost cards like Adrenaline and Claw also remain free if you play them after spending all your Energy.
It’s been a cause of significant frustration for many players in the community, especially those who have not encountered it in the beta branch before it was dropped on everyone. But why the concerns? Here are what seem like the main reasons.
Why Players are Criticizing the Doormaker Rework
A Bad First Impression
Some of the objections may be the result of how the new Doormaker was introduced. Learning a specific encounter through trial and error can be demoralizing after a three-act investment in a run. I believe that the feeling of discovery is better suited to learning the general principles of the game rather than a key fight.
I’m looking forward to the upcoming Bestiary feature, which should inform players about enemies through an official in-game resource. While actual practice will be needed to master this encounter, I hope that newer players who go in blind will have the option to alleviate some of that surprise and feel less robbed.
Restricting Play Freedom
To many StS2 enthusiasts, the Doormaker's oppressive mechanics feel like the game is fighting back, offering new obstacles to adapt to in an Act where builds often stagnate. However, the game’s growing casual audience enjoys pursuing builds that satisfyingly adhere to themes or play with extreme streamlining or scaling – and Doormaker's new mechanics limit the sense of agency and expression to that audience.
I don't feel the encounters can be balanced to alleviate that conflict without compromising on complexity that bolsters the game's longevity for the competitive community. I hope to see this solved through an Ascension modifier, similar to the 'advanced moveset' challenges in the original game.
Say goodbye to your draw tools.
Randomness
The impact of bad draw orders from Scrutiny’s draw-down debuff feels unrewarding to many, though I see that as a necessity to keep offering strategic challenge and moments of excitement to seasoned players.
After enough playtime, closing out guaranteed wins becomes less fulfilling, and if the final boss can be predictably beaten after your deck reaches a certain power level, those who enjoy maximizing their win rate will lose motivation to take risks that gain resources like farming Elites.
Tough Constraints on Infinite Builds
Each of the Doormaker’s three phases attempts to restrain infinites in different ways. The approach is still viable – and sometimes even helped by the Hunger phase – and achieving infinites in this fight is especially satisfying to me now because it feels like you’re not supposed to do so.
Scrutiny is the main opportunity to actually execute an infinite, either with exceptional Energy generation, or exclusively using 0-cost cards. However, Doormaker's modest health pool is often easier to chew through with traditional scaling solutions.
Should the Doormaker Be Changed?
A popular discussion thread on Reddit earlier in the week showed both sides of the coin. The thread itself is called "The Doormaker Rework is way more engaging than the previous iterations and it's way more fun," but some of the top comments call the fight "very RNG," "a tad overtuned," and "some of his phases are boring as heck to play against."
For what it's worth, Jorbs called the beta branch version of the Doormaker "the best enemy ever made for a deckbuilder" in a recent video:
The developers addressed player concerns in the V.0.104.0 patch writeup but decided against making any changes to Doormaker just yet: “We are currently monitoring the Doormaker and looking at a combination [of] in-game feedback, social media posts, and metrics. We want to give players time to adjust a bit, otherwise we'll be balancing around kneejerk reactions. Currently, from looking at millions of runs, Doormaker's overall difficulty/winrate is in a good place (slightly weaker than the other Act 3 bosses both in kill rate and damage dealt). However, we do want to ensure that its mechanics aren't too abrasive against certain playstyles.”
This means the character stays as-is for now, even in the beta branch.
Absey32 is a writer and streamer passionate about roguelites, arena shooters, consumer tech, and discovering music.