LogFAQs > #960095799

Spire Sword and Shield

One thing that's really important to recognize with act 4 is how fundamentally different the sword and shield are from the heart. They're basically two different skillsets: the heart is all about scaling up to deal with the big attacks that are to come, while the sword and shield are about burst damage. On turn 2, you're looking at 10x4 damage (at least on A20, not sure what the numbers are on lower ascensions). Turn 3 is often 57 damage from the shield. They lower your attack/focus and they have artifact charges, both things the heart doesn't do.

You can think of these guys as a heat check for the heart. Okay, you made it past the act 3 boss, but are you REALLY ready for the heart? But also, because they're such different skillsets, these guys can sometimes be harder than the heart. Defect, for example, loves getting capacitor and loop and frost orbs galore and just outsurviving you. That ain't gonna work on the sword and shield unless you're really fast with it - biased cognition, glacier, echo form, etc. You might have a Watcher deck that's based around Talk to the Hand and lots of 0 damage attacks, like Weave or whatever. That'll work wonders on the heart, but not here!

Another important thing with these guys is how much a bad turn 1 can wreck you. If you don't have a way to cycle through your deck to find the right cards to play, these guys will mess you up quick. These jerks putting two burns into your deck on turn 2 only exacerbates the problem. Turn 1 Foresight with Watcher is a must! It isn't the 2 damage that's the problem, it's only getting 3 cards to play. Better hope you get a Skim or a Battle Trance, because otherwise that 5 energy build you've got going won't really do you much good.

One of the harder things for me to recognize is when to use my potions on the sword and shield instead of the heart. The heart is the main event but sometimes the sword and shield are worse!

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xyzzy