Best Build And Relics For The Ironclad In Slay The Spire 2

Slay the Spire 2 is here, which means it’s time to grab your potions, fill your hand with cards, and fight a plethora of fearsome monsters. Similar to the previous entries, there are multiple characters you can choose from, each of which has their own specified deck archetypes, cards, and playstyles you’ll need to master.

One of these is The Ironclad, which is probably the most straightforward of all the heroes to play. Focusing on either raw damage, hitting himself to increase his damage, or becoming an immovable object, The Ironclad has a bunch of ways you can build him. But if you’re struggling, here is my suggestion for one of the best builds for this character and what Relics you should use.

The Best Ironclad Build

Look, before we get into the nitty-gritty details of this character, I should make it clear that The Ironclad has quite a few very viable builds throughout most Ascension levels. Both his block and self-damage archetypes are exceptionally strong, and you should definitely not feel like all hope is lost if you constantly get cards that support this playstyle.

Additionally, The Ironclad has a lot of infinite combo potential since he has a ton of Exhaust support and card draw options that loop damage, draw, and energy creation spells. These are all great alternative options when playing Ironclad.

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The Archetype

For this build, we’re going to focus on the Strength mechanic, which increases all damage you do depending on the number of Strength stacks you have on Ironclad. This can, unsurprisingly, spiral out of control very quickly as it allows you to hit enemies for a comical amount of damage in a single turn.

A lot of this is due to the Ironclad not only having quite a few ways to apply Strength to himself, but the use of multi-hit attacks that can benefit from your improved damage. Plus, unless the card states it or an enemy debuffs you, Strength doesn’t go away, which means you only get more powerful as a battle drags on. This makes the Strength archetype ideal for boss battles or tougher Elites that have tanky Block modes.

The Best Cards

When it comes to picking cards for the Strength build, we’re going to break it down into three separate categories. The first is core, which are the main spells that help facilitate your game plan and drive your deck. The second are payoff spells, which are your main ways to kill enemies and quickly close out battles. Finally, there are support spells which either shore up our defenses, draw us cards, or provide additional effects we will benefit from.

Here is a breakdown of the core cards you’ll want to look out for:

When it comes to actually gaining Strength, we have a few ways to beef up our damage numbers. Inflame is the most basic form of this that nets us a minimum of 2 Strength for 1 energy, while Brand gives us an extra Strength at the cost of a card and a single health point. The latter wonderfully combos with Rupture, which will increase our Strength whenever we lose health on our turn regardless of how it happened.

Setup Strike is a nice early damage spell that gives us a brief burst of temporary Strength, and Fight Me can quickly get out of hand since it hits twice, which scales wonderfully with Strength. Demon Form is a big, flashy Strength spell that, while costing 3 energy, can absolutely take over an entire game since it persistently amps up our damage.

Finally, we have Dominate, which can be really strong if you’ve snagged a few Vulnerable spells along the way. However, if you haven’t picked any up, then this card is worth passing on since you’ll need other enablers to make it consistently work for you.

With our core cards covered, it’s time to look at the big damage spells we will be using to make use of our improved Strength.

As for our damage spells, the big kill spells for this archetype are Whirlwind and Fiend Fire. Since Strength will buff each individual hit, Whirlwind can do a ton of damage and is amazing for dealing with multiple enemies. Inversely, Fiend Flame can deal ludicrous amounts of single-target damage if you are willing to Exhaust your entire hand while you have some Strength buffs.

Some early damage cards that scale well include Twin Strikes and Sword Boomerang, both of which hit multiple times and will only hit harder the more Strength you obtain. Thrash is a little more situational since you need to give up another Attack spell for it, but this can quickly push you to the finish line when needed. Finally, we have Conflagration, which increases its damage based on how many Attack cards you have (which should be a lot), allowing you to deal with groups of foes.

Now that we’ve covered the core and payoff spells, let’s look at some general support spells to shore up our deck’s weaknesses:

For support spells, these are all cards you should consider for this deck when you’re progressing through the Acts. The three cards here you want to prioritize are Taunt, Shrug It Off, and Bloodletting. The first two provide us with some good Block, allowing us to weather attacks in case we cannot kill our foes as quickly as we want. While Bloodletting (and Offering) gives us some extra energy, so we can play more Attack or Strength spells in one turn.

Battle Trance draws three cards for free, and Crimson Mantle is a nice, continuous source of gaining Blocking for a relatively low cost. One-Two Punch allows us to deal even more burst damage in one turn. However, this is a card only worth having a single copy of, since you don’t want to flood your hand with it. Lastly, there’s Aggression, which can keep putting Attack spells into our hand to ensure a relentless onslaught on our enemies.

The Best Relics

While all the Relics are great to have, these are the ones you should keep an eye out for while on a run:

As for Relics, some big ones you want to hunt for increase your Strength at the start of combat or under specific conditions. Vajra, Ruined Helmet, and Sling of Courage are all ideal options since they will give you Strength for free, which only makes our payoff spells even deadlier. Molten Egg is great since we’re grabbing a lot of Attack spells, and Bag of Marbles is a nice way to give us some early burst damage thanks to the Vulnerable debuff.

You’ll also want to look for Relics that help improve our defenses. Beating Remnant is amazing since it limits those big attacks some Elites and bosses can do. Alternatively, you should nab any Relics that give you Block or Plating to further increase your survivability during fights. We’re mostly going on the attack in this build, so always try to find ways to passively defend yourself.

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