10 Tips and Tricks for Ascension 10 in Slay the Spire 2

Slay The Spire 2 has been out for a good while now, and all those who crave a real challenge are busy tackling the 10 tricky Ascension levels the Spire has to offer.

If you thought completing the Spire the normal way was hard, well, try it with extra tough enemies, extra curses, fewer Potions and even a brutal double Act 3 boss… and more!

Ascension 10 is certainly not for the faint of heart, requiring players to fine-tune their skills and know every nook and cranny within the spire. Oh, and don’t forget you’ll need a good dash of luck too, if you want to make it through in one piece!

If you’re struggling to beat this mighty challenge, then take a look at this list before you start your next run! If I can do it, you can too!

10 Offense Isn’t Always Best

Batten Down the Hatches!

Oddly enough, one of the biggest stumbling blocks when attempting the higher Ascension levels, particularly 9 and 10, is Act 1. Normal enemies hit hard, and elites hit even harder.

In Slay the Spire 1, it was a pretty common tactic to go full offense in the first act and steamroll through every enemy. Now it’s pretty much the opposite. You want to pick up some strong defensive options and perhaps a single high-cost damage dealer.

Keeping yourself alive through the first act is the most important thing. You can worry about consistency later on. Just focus on the next fight; that’s all.

9 Don’t Waste Your Potions!

I Need Only Your Strongest Potions

Previously, I was under the impression that Potions were just for bosses and dangerous elites. However, the more I play Ascension 10, the less I believe this to be the case.

Generally, you only have 2 potion slots in A10, and certain hallway fights can be just as difficult, if not more, than elites. Don’t be afraid to use a potion, even if you just block 10 or so damage, or even end the fight 1 turn earlier.

There are so many occasions that I end up holding on to a potion, only to get another at the end of a fight and have to throw one away. If you have any doubts, just use your potion and adjust your pathing accordingly. Those potions won’t be very useful when you’re dead now, will they?

8 Greed Will Get You Killed

Health is Wealth!

This was often a big problem for me. My first instinct when I reach a rest site is to upgrade my most played cards. That helps in the long term, right?

Well, yes and no. After a good amount of play time, I almost always find myself resting instead of smithing, unless I have a really strong deck. The main goal, as I mentioned, is to stay alive at all costs. You can always get event upgrades or relic upgrades later on, but keeping your health up is your number 1 priority.

It’s basically suicide to go into a final act boss with less than half your max HP. Maybe the rest isn’t necessary, but it’s always better to err on the side of caution.

7 Keep Your Deck Slim

Kill Your Darlings

Do you often find yourself waiting for one of your ace cards that just happens to be sitting on the bottom of your deck?

The majority of the time, this is because people end up taking practically every single card reward after each fight. Or perhaps they are taking shop and event rewards instead of thinning their deck. Consistency is key here.

Having a small deck, along with a healthy amount of draw and energy cards, means you very rarely get dead turns. Dead turns, where you only get status cards, strikes or defends, can often end a seemingly winnable run. Keep it tight, and don’t bloat your deck.

6 Spend Time Pathing

Master Cartographer

This seems like a pretty obvious point at first. But after every single Ancient, I take a good minute or so to scout out each path ahead.

Use the legend on the side of the screen to find Rest Sites, Merchants, and Elites. You want a good few rest sites to keep your health up, and at least 1 merchant in each Act. Even if you don’t path through elites, normal enemy encounters can chip away at your health. If you don’t have any rest sites, you’re pretty much done for.

If you don’t have much cash, look for merchants near the end of the Act. Your path needs to have a healthy balance of everything.

5 Events Aren’t Always That Eventful

A Boat's a Boat, But a Mystery Box Could be Anything! It Could Even be a Boat!

And speaking of pathing, this can often be the death of many a run. It’s tempting to path through as many events as possible because they’re easy and fun. Some events are so powerful that they can practically win a run on their own.

However, most of the time, you’re not going to get card rewards from these encounters. In the first 2 acts, you need a good selection of cards, even if they’re just common and uncommon. You can’t beat act with your starter deck, unfortunately.

In the worst-case scenario, you get a bunch of events that deal damage and give you curse cards, which are going to clog up your deck. In a similar vein, be careful with events that let you pick an option multiple times, like the hot spring event. Being too greedy here is an easy way to lose before you even reach the boss.

4 Be Careful with Elites

Gremlin Nob Would be Proud

This is the final pathing point, I promise. Elites are notoriously tricky. It can be tempting, especially if you get a relic like Black Star, to pick as many elite fights as possible for the powerful relic rewards.

However, in Ascension 10, these elites hit like a truck. If you do want to path through them, focus on elites that are surrounded by rest sites or those near the end of the act. Picking an elite when you’ve just started an Act is extremely dangerous. You need more time for your deck to grow and flourish.

For me, I usually feel that 1 elite per act is very doable, unless my deck is going crazy. Then 2 elites is a viable choice.

3 Don’t Force a Build

Claw is the Law

I’m sure you’ve heard this one before, but in A10 it’s even more important. You can get away with playing fun builds in the first couple of Ascendancies. You might love playing Poison-Silent or Claw-Defect, I get it.

However, when things start getting serious, you can’t force a deck. Instead, you need to pick the card that’s going to get you through the next fight. Maybe you need defensive options, maybe you have no draw power. Sometimes it’s even worth foregoing a rare card if it means your deck is going to be stronger in the long run.

Synergies are great and all, but sometimes the card that makes the deck come together is never going to appear for you. It’s very rarely worth the risk.

2 Get Used to Losing & Review Your Losses

Don't Cry Because It's Over, Smile Because it Happened

Ascension 10 is hard. That much is obvious. In fact, it’s so hard that you will lose the majority of your games, especially when you’re still learning how to play high Ascensions. Sometimes you just get unlucky; sometimes the events suck, and the cards just don’t come.

This is normal. Getting used to losing and restarting with a fresh mindset is really important. Every single time you play, you’re bound to make mistakes and misplays. However, learning from your mistakes is the most important thing.

After a loss, maybe go into your run history and take a look at your deck. Do you have a good card balance? Were you too greedy with smithing and events? I know how tempting it can be to save-scum, but at the end of the day, this doesn’t help in the long term and will end up making you reliant on something that isn’t strictly a part of the game.

1 Ensure your Deck Has Something For Every Situation

Only the Worthy!

Consistency is key. If anything, this has to be the most important thing in Slay the Spire 2. And when you’re forced to fight 2 Act 3 bosses at the end of every run, only the decks that are consistent will make it through that extreme gauntlet.

So what is consistency? Well, that all revolves around deck balance. Entering into that final gauntlet, you need to have a good balance of damage, block, energy generation and card draw. If you can’t draw, you’ll be stumped by the Queen. If you can’t block well, Test Subject will finish you off.

And more importantly, you need something that will scale in power the longer the fight goes on. All these bosses increase their strength every few turns, meaning they scale indefinitely, so if you don’t have something to match them, you will quickly be whittled down over time.

And it’s not good enough to sacrifice your HP to play powerful attack cards, because you need to make your health pool last over 2 fights. So defensive options are crucial here.

Exhaust-Ironclad works wonders in thinning the deck and getting rid of status cards. The same can be said for Sly-Silent. Maybe you can max out your Defect’s orb slots and fill them with frost or generate a ton of Stars with the Regent.

There’s only so much you can do, and honestly, a lot of it is going to be luck, getting the right cards, and Ancient choices, etc. Keep bashing your head against it, and eventually it’ll begin to click.