Slay the Spire Trophy Guide • PSNProfiles.com (2024)

This section will discuss various aspects of the game for those who are playing this game for the first time. If you’ve played a couple of runs, you may already know this, so be sure to skip to the Tricks section at the end.

Below is a numbered list of the different parts of the screen layout with an explanation for each. This will help you understand the controls and how the game runs.

Each is a description according to the number shown on the image above:

This is your save file name and it is also where you will see the keys needed to unlock the secret ending.
This is the healththat you have during the run. Once it reaches zero, it is game over(you are unable to revive using the “Encounter Reset” strategy method once your health reaches zero).
This is the goldthat you have obtained during the run. You can use it on one of the Marketsin your run, an event, or it can be stolen by certain enemies.
These are the potion slots. You begin with three when doing a normal run without any ascension modifiers and the number of slots can be increased by obtaining a Potion Belt[Upon pickup, gain 2 potion slots]relic.
This icon denotes the floorsthat you have climbed in your current run.
This is theascension marker. It tells you in what current ascension your run is set to.
This is the mapicon. You can access it anytime by pressing to see what encounters will appear next.
This is your deckicon. You can press at any time to see your current cards. You are able to organize them by the time in which you acquired each, rarity, type, cost, and alphabetically.
This is the settingsmenu which allows you to save your current run and exit (used for resetting the current encounter as detailed later on), abandon the run, and tweak different gameplay aspects. It can be accessed at any time by pressing .
You will see a small icon such as this one above every enemy and it will denote their intentonce you finish your turn (unless you have the Runic Dome[Gain 1 energy at the start of your turn. You can no longer see the enemy intents]relic). If you are not sure what the icon means, you can press and move the analog stick all the way to that area, prompting a small text window that will explain what will happen.
This area, similar to the one in your character as seen in #17, will be where thebuffs and debuffs will be seen during combat. If you are not sure what a buff/debuff icon means, you can press and move your analog stick to the icon to have a small window text explain what it is.
This is your exhaustpile. These are cards that have been removed from your deck, hand, and discard pile for the rest of the combat. It can be accessed at any moment during combat by pressing .
This is your discardpile. Once your deck is empty, your complete discard pile will return to your deck. In this game, you do not die if you run out of cards in your deck. You can access this list of cards at any time by pressing .
This area is your hand.The minimum number of cards (without any negative effects active) consists of five while the maximum amount is 10 (any additional cards drawn after this amount are immediately discarded).
This is your draw pile. It will show how many cards remain but they will not be shown in order (unless you have theFrozen Eye relic [When viewing your draw pile, your cards are now in order]). You can view it by pressing at any time.
This will be where you can see the energyyou have. Each card costs a set amount of energy that will be taken from this pool. Each character has a different design but they all have the same purpose.
In this area, you will see the buffs and debuffs that will be applied to your character during the combat.
You will find the relics you have gathered in your run here. You can press over them and you will see a small description of what they do. Whenever a relic is active, you will see it blink. Additionally, relics that have a turn or card-sensitive ability will display a small counterbelow their icon, letting you know how close or far they are from activating.

A normal run consists of you completing the three Acts present in the game and beating the final boss in Act 3. An Act can be described as a chapter in a book. Each Act is divided into 17 floors. These floors will vary when it comes to what you will find (except for the 17th floor in each of the Acts which will always be the boss of the act).

The encounters you will find are the following:

Enemy (also known as Hallway encounters): these will consist of a solo or group of enemies that will attack you. The farther you are in the act, the tougher the fight will become. Your reward from completing this encounter consists of a small amount of gold and a choice of 3 cards (the rarity of the cards vary).
Elite: the mini bosses of the Acts. They are much tougher than your average enemy and will act as a skill check to determine if you are strong enough to battle the boss. Your reward from beating this encounter consists of a random relic, a medium amount of gold, and a choice of 3 cards (with a higher chance at rarer cards).
Unknown: denoted by the question mark on the map, this is a mix of different interactions that may happen. Some may be positive (giving you the opportunity to buy a random relic at a lower price) or negative (obtain a curse card) events. There is also the possibility that you will encounter an enemy on this fight unless you have the Juzu Bracelet[Regular enemy combats are no longer encountered in ? rooms]relic.
Market: this is a safe encounter in which you will be able to spend your hard-earned gold. As a note, gold carries over even if you did not spend any of it at the Market. In this encounter, you are able to:
- Buy new cards.
- Buy a relic and/or a potion from a selection of 3 each.
- Remove a card from your deck
Rest: you will be able to regenerate health or upgrade a card (an upgraded card has a green outline in its name and a plus "+" sign next to it) of your choosing in this area. Arriving at one of these floors can be crucial in extending your run.
Treasure: these are rooms in which you will simply open a chest. They act as short breaks in your run if you are trying to reach a rest area when you are at low health. The bigger the chest, the rarer the relic you will find.
Boss: the last encounter in every Act, you will fight one of the 3 bosses that are designated to each of the Acts. Each of them has their own mechanics and they will test your deck in a different manner. For the boss-specific trophies, there will be descriptions of what they do and ways to tackle them.

There are 3 Acts (Act 1 is called the Exordium, Act 2 is called the City, and Act 3 is the Beyond) with 17 floors each with a 4th Act present in the secret ending. In order to “complete” a run, you just have to defeat the Act 3 boss. The secret ending for each character is only achieved by going into Act 4 and beating the secret boss at the end.

In this game, you will find several cards in your journey that have different categories, they are the following:

Attack: these are the cards that you will use to deal damage to your opponent. Once you select the card, it will point an arrow towards your target. You confirm the attack by pressing to your selected target.
- PD: if your enemy has the “Vulnerable” debuff, you will be able to see the true damage you will deal to it ONLY when you point your Attack cards to it.
Skill: these cards vary in their uses. They can provide you with block, buffs, debuffs to you or your opponents. If you have played other card games, you could describe these cards as “Spell Cards”.
Power: these are buffs, debuffs, and effects that can be played and remain active until the end of the combat. They are often very powerful and must-takes for some of the builds that will be discussed in the character-specific trophies. Once a Power is played, it "disappears" from the combat since it will not be present in either the discard or exhaust pile. You can only play each Power once per turn.
Status: these are cards that are added into your deck during combat. They are not useful and can be detrimental to your deck build. This is due to their ability to cause damage to your character, disrupt your drawing ability by giving you unplayable cards, and being an overall nuisance. However, they can be powerful in certain builds such as in an IroncladFire Breathing[Power: Whenever you draw a Status or Curse card, deal 6 damage to ALL enemies] build.
Curses: similar to the Status cards, they affect your deck by increasing its size and making it harder to draw the cards you want. They also come with harsher punishments compared to Status cards. They can be added into your deck by enemies, events, and certain modifiers. They can only be removed in the Market, certain events and the Omamori[Negate the next 2 curses you obtain]relic. If not, they will remain with you for the rest of your run.

Note: If you are unsure to which category each card belongs, you will see the card’s category in a small text box at the bottom of the card’s art.

Card Rarities:

Basic: these are the cards you start with each match. They have a grey border just like the common cards. It is recommended that once you begin doing serious runs in your game, you begin removing one or more “Strike” each time, this allows your deck to be smaller and makes it easier for you to draw the cards that you need.
Common: these are the cards that you will mostly find after each enemy encounter as they are, to not sound redundant, the most common cards available in the game. You can distinguish them by a greyborder. Initially, you may think that between a common and an uncommon card, you should always go for the rarer card. But that is not always correct, you need to make sure the card works for your build.
Uncommon: these cards are identified by a blueborder. They offer a great variety with some cards being extremely powerful and creating great combos with others. You have a greater chance at finding these cards during an Elite fight.
Rare: these cards are identified by a goldenborder. You are guaranteed a selection of 3 of these cards as a reward for defeating the bosses on Acts 1 and 2. Note that you always pick a card first before the boss relic.

Note: The rarities mentioned above also apply for Potions.

Special type of cards: Colorless

These cards are special. They are the only cards that you will always see in common between characters. You will only be able to buy them from Markets(unless you have the Prismatic Shard[Combat reward screens now contain colorless cards and cards from other colors] relic but even then, you are not guaranteed to find them). They offer unique abilities that in some cases can be rather powerful. These cards also have the same types of rarities as the rest of the cards. If you have the money and there is nothing else at the store that you want, you should buy the one that fits your current deck build.

Most of the relics in Slay the Spire follow the rarity of the cards and potions except for three unique groups:

Event relics: these are relics that you obtained from certain events during your runs. Most of the powerful non-boss relic are among these. If you have the option, you definitely should take them since they may provide you with a little bit more power.
Boss Relics: these are relics that will only be available after you defeat a boss in Act 1 or 2 (the boss in Act 3 does not give any relics when you are doing the secret ending). There is a way of obtaining a boss relic as early as the beginning of the run by trading your starting relic to Neow (the blue whale that greets you whenever you begin each run). This is a High Risk- High Reward maneuver since you may get a very bad boss relic that will make you abandon your current run.
- In order to unlock this option from Neow, you must have at least reached the Boss in Act 1 during your previous run.
Market Relics: these will be only available to buy from the Market. They are a mixed bag of relics with some being very powerful and others not being worth the cost. Most of the time when you enter a Market, you should prioritize buying a relic before picking a card.

How will Cards, Potions, and Relics be mentioned in this guide?

In order to make it easier for you to distinguish the rarity of the cards, potions, and relics, they have been color-coded to match the colors in this section of the game. For the cards ranging from Common to Rare, it is possible to match the color with the rarity in-game. The only colors that are different are the ones for the Event, Boss, and Marketrelics.

Additionally, a description has been added to every card, potion, and relic mentioned in this guide. This will allow you to get used to what each card does to the point where you can just remember them by name.

Save-Scumming

Given the way that this game saves your progress, you are able to create save states in the middle of your run! However, it is not recommended to do this when you are starting since you still need to get a feel of the game and resorting back to the beginning of the Act may not be an educational experience. However, if you are doing a run to reach the Secret ending and you feel that you have a good deck, then it would be wise to save at the beginning of Act 3 in case everything goes wrong.

How to Save-Scum an Act (or whichever floor you are on):

Select the "Save and Exit" option within the Settings menu during your run.
Exit the game and plug a USBinto your console.
Go to your“Saved Data Management” option in your console’s setting and select “Copy to USB”.
Now, you want to copy your save data of Slay the Spire into the USB.
Once that is done, you are now able to return to your game and continue. If at any moment you die and want to try another path. Close the game, plug in your USB and download the saved data copied on the USB to the console.

Encounter resets

Using the same principle as mentioned above, you will be able to reset the encounter you are on by saving the game through the settings screen and selecting “Continue” on the main game screen. This method can only reset the current encounter you are on and you do not need an USB.

Doing this trick will be especially useful in the following situations:

Trying a different strategy when fighting a boss.
Selecting another option in an event (for this, you cannot press “Continue” once the outcome has become apparent. If you do, you are unable to retry the event).
Selecting a different relic during the boss reward screen (this works best when one of the relics in the boss screen is either Astrolabe[Upon pickup, choose and transform 3 cards, then upgrade them] or Pandora’s Box[Transform all Strikes and Defends]. If the random cards that you obtained do not fit your current deck strategy, you are able reset the relic reward screen and select another one).

Note:When you are going for the Ascension 20 run, each boss fight in Act 3 counts as a separate encounter. Therefore, if you are about to die in the second boss fight and you want to reset the encounter back to the first boss, you will not be able to (the author learned this the hard way).