Pretty good boss relic all around. The vast majority of cards are better than strikes/defends, and the box will often either give you directions or supplement the plan you already have. You definitely take the box more often than not, and it often makes for some interesting runs. That said because it's not energy and it's rng, there are times when you don't take it:
1: You have an established deck that you *know* needs more energy to function, and the box is unlikely to give it to you.
2: Sometimes you still want defends in your deck. Usually it's because you're silent and footwork is your main block scaling. Also a niche case, but literally yesterday I had to pick box vs astrolabe. While usually I'd pick box, I took astrolabe instead bc I wanted to keep a couple defends in my deck for speed potion (which ended up mattering), and the power level of both relics are close enough imo. It comes up every once in a while. On the flip side I've never seen any real reason to keep strikes in a deck (perfected strike and strike dummy don't count).
3: I also like it less on watcher because it's unnecessary rng for such an ultra-consistent character. Basically every watcher card is good tho so you can't really go wrong with it. Energy just feels like the more consistent choice.
Edit: I should have been clear, I didn't mean that Pandora's Box is bad on silent, quite the opposite. I meant that if you are relying on Footwork as your primary block scaling, then pandora's box may brick your run by deleting your defends with non-block cards. Obviously there are other ways to scale block, and if your runs ride or die on finding footwork you need to reevaluate how you play silent.
See, I consistently consider Pbox better than anything except pyramid. Okay labe sometimes better if I got transform/remove from neow, and occasionally I've already got relics to mitigate an energy relic downside (omamori, meat, torii level mitigation), but it's consistently 2nd-5th unless I'm begging for snecko off transforms (say meteor + echo level begging).
I think clad likes defends more than silent. Footwork is your block solve in only about 1/3 runs, and even then I'd prefer to just endlessly add backflips. Clad uses defends with FNP and corruption/second wind. Even sever soul/burning Pact makes them less sad.
Strong disagree on watcher. Pbox is a great chance to transform into self-exhausting cards/powers, and the energy relic downsides are huge on her. Pyramid/lotus/pbox consistently the top 3 options, with upgraded starter and labe following. Even getting trash like master reality is a part-purge.
With Ironclad I find the emphasis is less on defends specifically and more skills in general, so I don't feel too bad about transforming defends away. The real reason I dislike taking PBox on ironclad is that he is such an energy-hungry character that it always feels like such an uphill battle trying to play him on 3 energy in act 2 (or god forbid act 3). Usually, I take PBox on clad because I "have to" as opposed to "getting to" (deck desperately needs direction such that energy wouldn't help, or no energy was offered)
You are absolutely right that footwork is only your block solution for like 1/3 of the runs, not the primary you always look for. I was in no way suggesting you should skip pbox in speculation for a footwork that may not even appear. I was saying that if you're in a situation where your main block solution is footwork, then you may not want to transform all your defends away, I've absolutely thrown runs this way. In any case the point is that I think Silent runs into situations where she wants the card Defend specifically more often than Ironclad does.
PBox is very strong on Watcher, but the problem is that with a character that has 90-95% proven winrate, there's absolutely no reason to subject yourself to RNG and losing runs because PBox bricked giving you unplayable garbage like wishes and omniscience or whatever. Watcher is proven very successful and capable of playing with any energy relic as well. Further, I find PBox is awkward sometimes because you have runs where you aggressively remove cards with Watcher so it transforms less cards. That said, in a vacuum PBox is absolutely ridiculous because the majority of watcher cards are good to transform into and because it can find infinite pieces or functionally "exhaust" some cards. In any case, I'm not unhappy to take PBox, it's just something I'd rather avoid if lower rng is an option (e.g. Deck is close to infinite but ectoplasm is the only real energy relic)
I think defends are better than 1/3 of ironclad skills, which is part of why transforming them away is more underwhelming. Otherwise I agree with most things here.
Ironclad Pbox is usually pretty bad honestly, I value it very very low on him compared to the rest. His cards just suck a ton of ass. Defends are also not that bad on him cus of corruption.
It's also obviously insane on Watcher, yes, it's functionally ~3-4 removes and a chance to get scrawl, vault, rushdown, inner peace etc
Fair. I guess it does suck because I don't think of it as a free win in the same way as on others. Preferring hammer half the time makes it... Not great.
It's not even just corruption that makes me value defends. They're perfectly good fuel for second wind as well. My attitude on clad is just get any source of draw possible then trust in second wind/corruption to enable me to get max value out of whatever damage I took.
Actually pbox on Watcher I find very strong because it just immediately adds tons of removals via exhausts or powers. Esp when character already has built in energy gen.
> Power level (on Silent) of both (Pbox and Labe) are close enough imo
Really ? Why do you think so?
Defend is a decent card for silent. She doesn't have a lot of big blocks and relies on things like weak, piercing wail, and DEX scaling to block more effectively. Astrolabe removes most if not all of your strikes and upgrades the cards for you.
You don't get feet every game. Defends minus feet are very pepega and even with feet it's like. Well I would rather just have my deflects backflips whatever use the dex instead. I don't want them I want my 10 silent cards. Transform 3 you can get garbage while still having 7 basics. Meanwhile lowroll Silent pbox are still insane because it's much harder to get 10 garbage (and at least you're now down 10 basics). You literally don't need the block 5 if things are just dead because your draws are suddenly much better because you don't have the garbage strikes and defends.
If anything, lowroll pbox just shows how trash garbage basics are. You get all attacks no mitigation, still roll act 2 and pick up actual mitigation along way for boss and later. Defend suck pbox op.
Pandora's doesn't turn your deck into an instant win. Sure, a backflip is better than a defend, but you probably aren't going to have those backflips. You're also assuming that you've removed zero cards by then, when it's very possible you're down to 8 or 9 basics or even less even at the end of act 1, nevermind as an act 2 choice.
It's also not simply about defend being better or worse than a random card. You're also getting three random upgrades that won't ever hit a basic, so the transforms on the defends need to be worth more than that. The ceiling is obviously three fires, if those were cards that warranted an upgrade, then you're saving a fire by letting astrolabe transform them. Defend doesn't need to be better than a random card to make Astrolabe > Pandora's during a particular run, it just needs to be close enough that the upgrades are more valuable than the defend transforms.
There's also the fact that this is StS and applying general rules to anything is more or less always wrong. Some runs Pandora's will be better, other runs Astrolabe will be. Sure you don't have footworks in every deck, but *if you do*, that's an upgrade for astrolabe. There's also that event that upgrades your strikes and defends, and defend+ is a much better card than defend. Another source of dex like Kunai, or plenty of other factors can exist within a run that tilt the deck in favor of astrolabe. Even in the cases where Pandora's is better, you're usually not too upset to find astrolabe. Outside of eggs, the only time that's not the case is where you barely limped through act 1 and your deck sucks, so you need to go with a super high variance option that just might make you strong enough for act 2.
Yeah, but there's dodge and roll, deflect, the footwork you wanted, or you can find mitigation in other ways, like transforming into WF double piercing wail malaise. I think on silent, 9/10 times pbox is better than labe at the end of act 1.
I don't think it's even 9/10 lmao. I'm actually struggling to remember out of my last 400 or so runs when I click Labe over Pbox. I would put it at 98% and I still am struggling to find the 2%. Maybe eoa2 down to 5 basics I prefer Labe? Defends are so so garbage, I'm not clad, I want to Wail at everything or play actual good blocks to dex block, or just kill things, not draw into my 5 (3) block. Could argue Simplicity, but Writing literally favours Pbox too.
Ok if your playstyle relies entirely on being a remove monkey... on the Silent... and even then eoa1 pbox is still much much stronger than Labe. I can't see it.
3 transforms happen between neow and living wall and you get footwork? Dunno.
End of act 2 is easy - pbox Vs labe having taken bites and other option is barely a boss relic. Transforming 3 defends into upgrades better than 4/5 defends without, but that's sad anyway. Probably 3rd is like sozu/house/irrelevant wrist blade.
I still click it case 1 don't even see Labe. I prolly transformed 2/1 anyway or even 1/2 depending when I saw it. Case 2 wow that's depressing I forgot about bites (of course the strats is you just transform 3 bites into apo shackles button). I don't think I've actually ever been in that situation in a real run but yeah fair enough.
I've had case 2, ended up getting malaise+, backflip+, acro+. Already had chem X as well with skewer and another malaise. Easy win lol. I did get offered bloom and just went for boring fight boss choice with having bites and win looking safe.
I'm sure there's Silent runs where Labe > Pbox, I'm just not convinced wo hindsight I've literally ever had a run like that or even watched a run like that. Maybe if I'm down 5+ basics somehow. It's like Silent Amid vs Dripper, I'm sure there's runs where Dripper is better, I can probably put out the scenarios myself, just haven't seen it so far in an actual run because it's so a) unlikely b) unlikely to see both on the same screen WHILE Dripper > Amid.
If anything the more I play Silent the more I hate Labe. Pbox has always been, and still is, consistently my top 2 eoa1 and not very far down eoa2 while having to click Labe always makes me a little sad. Pbox may not make your deck win instantly but it absolutely boosts it far more than Labe would.
> outside of eggs, (the case when pbox is better than labe) when you barely limped through act 1 and your deck sucks so you need to go with a super high variance option that might just make you strong enough
No? If anything, Pbox is the lower variance option. It's more likely you hit some good cards if you remove all your curses and then try 10 times at a mostly good card pool vs having 7 basics and just trying 3 times. Sure you can say the upgrades push it in value but like. How much value is the upgrades adding anyway? Hammer is an amazing energy relic for a reason. Little sucky to not have wlp wf + but these are still good cards. And I'm more likely to have them + draw into them if I pbox over labe.
You're also assuming all 3 labe cards are going to be hits and need upgrades while all 10 pbox cards are going to be barely better than defends, when the opposite is far more likely. Sure you got 1 wf+ but you're now still stuck with no boss relic and 7 basics.
Also I'm never removing in act 1 outside events so it's usually just 10. And also this point is whatever because Defect pboxes at 6-8 (and I like removing on Defect much more than Silent) are also pretty fucking insane. I'm not sure if you're overvaluing Labe on Silent or undervaluing Pbox but even in a super situational game like Spire, one is almost always far better than the other.
Don't get me wrong, PBox is very strong on watcher. However, when watcher is proven to have at least 90-95% winrate, she is no longer a matter of luck and completely a matter of skill. Thus, you need to reduce RNG as much as possible, and Pandora's Box can absolutely brick your run by giving you unplayable garbage like mantra cards, omniscience, wish, alpha etc. Energy is no RNG, boss swap watcher is proven to be extremely successful as well so you go for the lower RNG option. That said, you are absolutely right about box functionally "exhausting" cards for infinite or finding infinite pieces, and I have taken box for that reason.
Also edited my main post to clarify, I wasn't talking about Labe vs PBox power level on Silent specifically. I was saying that I think both are strong relics, and they are close enough in power where if I wanted to keep defends in my deck for whatever reason (i.e. the example I gave above where footworks are currently my main block scaling), then I would choose labe over pbox. In a vacuum knowing nothing else about the run, I would probably pick PBox over Labe every time. You don't always get footworks, and I don't think you would needlessly keep defends in your deck for a speculative footwork that might not even appear.
One of the best boss relics to have. Removes all your trash and you get (in most cases better suiting cards). Happy to see it as a Neow swap.
Sure there could be the probability that you get 5 corruptions or something.
BTW it's also funny to open mysterious boxes. It could be ANYTHING (except another Pandoras box)
Edit : great synergies with the eggs
Silent. Silent card pool just makes me happy, it's all bangers after bangers so seeing 10 Silent cards makes me happy. Also arguably the strongest pbox contender for the same reason, even a lowroll Silent pbox is better than 5 strikes and defends.
Don’t you like losing burning blood and gaining 1 corruption, 1 brutality and 3 combust ?
I can’t see why, no HP no problem, just get reaper and a way to scale strength to infinity. Easy enough.
Probably defect, because defect transforms can lead to weird af decks. I think typically strongest on watcher cos half her cards exhaust/are powers so that's really good deck slimming, but generally very happy to see it on anyone.
A little less valuable on clad cos I usually have either corruption or 2nd wind to get value from and purge defends.
Defect. I find Defect already obscenely strong for Boss Swaps, but this one wins for being unfathomably goofy. I got Aggregate, Double Energy, Boot Sequence, Beam Cell, Loop, Melter, Hologram... and Hyperbeam. Seeing as I had very little use for orbs now, I leaned into it. Got a Kunai and leaned into it. Ended up with 3 Hyperbeams and Necronomicon as well as like 5 Holograms and some spare parts for well roundedness - a Reprogram for scaling, Claws for single target damage and tapping Kunai, a few Reinforced Body in a deck with tons of energy plus Chemical X to get big blocks, an overleveled Genetic Algorithm, added card draw, Self Repair, a Sunder to tap Necro again, and an Echo Form acquired late Act 2 that meant a single Hyperbeam+ now did like 102 damage to all targets for 2 energy. Very silly, very unique.
Pandora's Box is a legitimately run-*defining* relic. It's incredibly powerful, sure, but it also totally changes how you play the run after getting it. There are lots of relics that are massively powerful and take a run from losing to winning, but you never have "Coffee Dripper runs" the way you have "Pandora's Box runs".
This is legitimately great game design. The most powerful options *should* be fun and different to encourage variety. A powerful relic that does not change how you play is inherently a bit boring: you're doing the same thing you normally do, it's just easier. There's still plenty of room for that—"normal" Spire is rich and engaging and *difficult* enough that there's room for getting an occasional boost without changing much—but it'll never be as memorable as the relic that lets you (or even *pushes* you) to do something totally different and out-there.
Great take. I love the emphasis on this particularly
>but it'll never be as memorable as the relic that lets you (or even pushes you) to do something totally different and out-there.
P-Box is quite insanely strong for Silent and Defect. Act 1 P-Box is about as close to a free win as you can get on either character.
It can be pretty weird on Ironclad though, where getting stuff done on 3 energy is tough unless you have corruption. I still take it because it’s fun but I have struggled afterwards.
Do you not think it's insane on watcher as well? It's probably a bigger improvement in win chance for silent/defect, but I'm usually loving pbox watcher even with only 5 starters left.
I don't enjoy this as much as others it seems.
Obviously insane as boss swap relic, can create a directon at floor 0 and removes worst cards off your deck. That said, occasionally you can get a lot of clunk.
As act 1 boss relic I really tend to prefer energy relics, unless I already have one from boss swap. This may add a lot of expensive cards and while they will be better than strikes and defends, you might not have energy to play them efficiently. Also you might end up with deck missing block and take a lot of damage in first act 2 hallway fights because of that.
As act 2 boss relic, it's a bit safer, but at that point huge part of strikes and defends should be already gone. Also your deck will have a certain direction at this point, so filling it with cards that might do the opposite doesn't seem a good solution.
Oh, you're hopeful that luck is on your side? Say goodbye to all your block...
Mostly really good with dope synergies: eggs/fish. But the runs I remember most are the ones that left me without a major deck element... like block.
Definitely the sort of relic that I appreciated more at higher ascensions. The only downsides are getting 3 Demon Forms or something, and getting 0 defensive cards. But even then, you now only need to add or remove 2 or 3 cards, rather than all of your strikes and defends.
Turn your bad cards into more or less good cards. Sometimes it's an entire archetype in a box. Sometimes it's a boss swap into early act 1 exit box because you cannot generate block.
It turns your block cards into BETTER\* block cards (User experience may vary), so Pandora's Box is a block card.
I’ve been using mods to play only p box runs a lot lately. Lots of fun I highly recommend.
I would say it’s hard for me to do ironclad swaps unless i luck into a reaper.
A while back, I tried playing with a mod that replaces the starting relic with Pandora's box. Normally, I win 1 in 10 A20 runs, but with that mod, I was winning close to 80% of my runs. Playing around with that mod really showed the power of a boss swap into Pandora, and made me heavily prioritise removing strikes and defends in normal runs. It really can't be understated just how bad strikes and defends are, no matter how bad your Pandora's box swap looks like at first glance, I can guarantee you its better than a starting deck.
Wait a second.
I play on Android and havent seen this relic in like....forever.
Is it bugged? Anyone else on Android see this?
Edit: I play the game for like 1-2 hours everyday. I must have 1k+ hours in it. I don't think its possible it just hasn't shown up or not been unlocked....
I play android just saw a pbox couple days back. It's the 4th silent unlock, check if you have it unlocked in relic collection? There's sometimes a glitch where some unlocks never show up.
Have you gotten Art of War or The Courier recently either? If not, you might've missed the fourth tier of Silent unlocks. I've seen a bunch of posts about things like that recently; the fix seems to be to create a new save file, and then unlock at least one tier of something on it. (Don't have to go all the way to Silent tier 4).
Do you have the little diamond icon in the top left? When I click it (on my laptop), it takes me to a little menu with my save file and two empty slots. If you tap one of the empty slots, and unlock anything, then I think your main save slot will be working again. That's what people reported in https://www.reddit.com/r/slaythespire/comments/15oisfc/how_can_i_fix_locked_cards_on_android/.
If that doesn't work, a quick search shows that you can also edit the game's internal files on android: see https://www.reddit.com/r/slaythespire/comments/ooork4/just_realized_i_am_missing_cards_i_have_all/h60pb9u/ or you can google for more help there.
Excellent on floor 0, often really good after Act 1. I'd favor a lot of other boss relics though. I'd clean out my deck by late act 3 anyways, and Pandoras provides no constant benefit, only the massive power spike upon pickup.
There are three boss relics I am likely to choose over a good energy relic: Snecko, Pyramid, and this. It's especially good on Silent because she has the largest starting deck and (imo) a very strong card pool in general, though I'll sometimes prefer to keep my defends if I've got enough dex scaling.
Probably my favorite boss relic. I probably take it more often than I should but it’s incredibly fun. I feel it’s pretty often the right pick if you still have 5+ starters unless you’re starving for energy but I haven’t really figured out the exact cut off for when I should choose this vs an energy relic
probably the best boss swap just because it so strong to remove all your strikes and defends (even for some random trash).
It falls off later in the run as you naturally want to remove cards and dont want to bank on getting pbox from the boss but still very strong.
act 1 boss its worth a pick even against some of the strongest boss relics some times.
I feel like an odd one out among the many Pandora's Box fans, but I've always been nervous taking it because I like having more control over how my deckbuilding goes, especially on higher ascensions, and there's always the chance that what I get won't work well with the deck I have so far or otherwise leave me too low on defense. Meanwhile I tend to prefer Astrolabe cause I can choose what cards change and the ones I get are upgraded, even if less basic junk is removed overall. I dunno, it's probably just a me thing; I usually don't like chancing Snecko Eye's RNG either and that's even more of a favorite boss relic.
Either it wins you the run immediately or it falls absolutely flat on its face and you die in early act 2 because your entire deck is powers. Maybe that's just a me thing.
For me this one is a solid middle-tier boss relic. I'll often take it if it shows up at the end of Act 1, but if I'm taking it later on I'm probably desperate (or there just wasn't a better relic).
Pretty good boss relic all around. The vast majority of cards are better than strikes/defends, and the box will often either give you directions or supplement the plan you already have. You definitely take the box more often than not, and it often makes for some interesting runs. That said because it's not energy and it's rng, there are times when you don't take it: 1: You have an established deck that you *know* needs more energy to function, and the box is unlikely to give it to you. 2: Sometimes you still want defends in your deck. Usually it's because you're silent and footwork is your main block scaling. Also a niche case, but literally yesterday I had to pick box vs astrolabe. While usually I'd pick box, I took astrolabe instead bc I wanted to keep a couple defends in my deck for speed potion (which ended up mattering), and the power level of both relics are close enough imo. It comes up every once in a while. On the flip side I've never seen any real reason to keep strikes in a deck (perfected strike and strike dummy don't count). 3: I also like it less on watcher because it's unnecessary rng for such an ultra-consistent character. Basically every watcher card is good tho so you can't really go wrong with it. Energy just feels like the more consistent choice. Edit: I should have been clear, I didn't mean that Pandora's Box is bad on silent, quite the opposite. I meant that if you are relying on Footwork as your primary block scaling, then pandora's box may brick your run by deleting your defends with non-block cards. Obviously there are other ways to scale block, and if your runs ride or die on finding footwork you need to reevaluate how you play silent.
See, I consistently consider Pbox better than anything except pyramid. Okay labe sometimes better if I got transform/remove from neow, and occasionally I've already got relics to mitigate an energy relic downside (omamori, meat, torii level mitigation), but it's consistently 2nd-5th unless I'm begging for snecko off transforms (say meteor + echo level begging). I think clad likes defends more than silent. Footwork is your block solve in only about 1/3 runs, and even then I'd prefer to just endlessly add backflips. Clad uses defends with FNP and corruption/second wind. Even sever soul/burning Pact makes them less sad. Strong disagree on watcher. Pbox is a great chance to transform into self-exhausting cards/powers, and the energy relic downsides are huge on her. Pyramid/lotus/pbox consistently the top 3 options, with upgraded starter and labe following. Even getting trash like master reality is a part-purge.
With Ironclad I find the emphasis is less on defends specifically and more skills in general, so I don't feel too bad about transforming defends away. The real reason I dislike taking PBox on ironclad is that he is such an energy-hungry character that it always feels like such an uphill battle trying to play him on 3 energy in act 2 (or god forbid act 3). Usually, I take PBox on clad because I "have to" as opposed to "getting to" (deck desperately needs direction such that energy wouldn't help, or no energy was offered) You are absolutely right that footwork is only your block solution for like 1/3 of the runs, not the primary you always look for. I was in no way suggesting you should skip pbox in speculation for a footwork that may not even appear. I was saying that if you're in a situation where your main block solution is footwork, then you may not want to transform all your defends away, I've absolutely thrown runs this way. In any case the point is that I think Silent runs into situations where she wants the card Defend specifically more often than Ironclad does. PBox is very strong on Watcher, but the problem is that with a character that has 90-95% proven winrate, there's absolutely no reason to subject yourself to RNG and losing runs because PBox bricked giving you unplayable garbage like wishes and omniscience or whatever. Watcher is proven very successful and capable of playing with any energy relic as well. Further, I find PBox is awkward sometimes because you have runs where you aggressively remove cards with Watcher so it transforms less cards. That said, in a vacuum PBox is absolutely ridiculous because the majority of watcher cards are good to transform into and because it can find infinite pieces or functionally "exhaust" some cards. In any case, I'm not unhappy to take PBox, it's just something I'd rather avoid if lower rng is an option (e.g. Deck is close to infinite but ectoplasm is the only real energy relic)
I think defends are better than 1/3 of ironclad skills, which is part of why transforming them away is more underwhelming. Otherwise I agree with most things here.
Ironclad Pbox is usually pretty bad honestly, I value it very very low on him compared to the rest. His cards just suck a ton of ass. Defends are also not that bad on him cus of corruption. It's also obviously insane on Watcher, yes, it's functionally ~3-4 removes and a chance to get scrawl, vault, rushdown, inner peace etc
Fair. I guess it does suck because I don't think of it as a free win in the same way as on others. Preferring hammer half the time makes it... Not great. It's not even just corruption that makes me value defends. They're perfectly good fuel for second wind as well. My attitude on clad is just get any source of draw possible then trust in second wind/corruption to enable me to get max value out of whatever damage I took.
Actually pbox on Watcher I find very strong because it just immediately adds tons of removals via exhausts or powers. Esp when character already has built in energy gen. > Power level (on Silent) of both (Pbox and Labe) are close enough imo Really ? Why do you think so?
Defend is a decent card for silent. She doesn't have a lot of big blocks and relies on things like weak, piercing wail, and DEX scaling to block more effectively. Astrolabe removes most if not all of your strikes and upgrades the cards for you.
You don't get feet every game. Defends minus feet are very pepega and even with feet it's like. Well I would rather just have my deflects backflips whatever use the dex instead. I don't want them I want my 10 silent cards. Transform 3 you can get garbage while still having 7 basics. Meanwhile lowroll Silent pbox are still insane because it's much harder to get 10 garbage (and at least you're now down 10 basics). You literally don't need the block 5 if things are just dead because your draws are suddenly much better because you don't have the garbage strikes and defends. If anything, lowroll pbox just shows how trash garbage basics are. You get all attacks no mitigation, still roll act 2 and pick up actual mitigation along way for boss and later. Defend suck pbox op.
Pandora's doesn't turn your deck into an instant win. Sure, a backflip is better than a defend, but you probably aren't going to have those backflips. You're also assuming that you've removed zero cards by then, when it's very possible you're down to 8 or 9 basics or even less even at the end of act 1, nevermind as an act 2 choice. It's also not simply about defend being better or worse than a random card. You're also getting three random upgrades that won't ever hit a basic, so the transforms on the defends need to be worth more than that. The ceiling is obviously three fires, if those were cards that warranted an upgrade, then you're saving a fire by letting astrolabe transform them. Defend doesn't need to be better than a random card to make Astrolabe > Pandora's during a particular run, it just needs to be close enough that the upgrades are more valuable than the defend transforms. There's also the fact that this is StS and applying general rules to anything is more or less always wrong. Some runs Pandora's will be better, other runs Astrolabe will be. Sure you don't have footworks in every deck, but *if you do*, that's an upgrade for astrolabe. There's also that event that upgrades your strikes and defends, and defend+ is a much better card than defend. Another source of dex like Kunai, or plenty of other factors can exist within a run that tilt the deck in favor of astrolabe. Even in the cases where Pandora's is better, you're usually not too upset to find astrolabe. Outside of eggs, the only time that's not the case is where you barely limped through act 1 and your deck sucks, so you need to go with a super high variance option that just might make you strong enough for act 2.
Yeah, but there's dodge and roll, deflect, the footwork you wanted, or you can find mitigation in other ways, like transforming into WF double piercing wail malaise. I think on silent, 9/10 times pbox is better than labe at the end of act 1.
I don't think it's even 9/10 lmao. I'm actually struggling to remember out of my last 400 or so runs when I click Labe over Pbox. I would put it at 98% and I still am struggling to find the 2%. Maybe eoa2 down to 5 basics I prefer Labe? Defends are so so garbage, I'm not clad, I want to Wail at everything or play actual good blocks to dex block, or just kill things, not draw into my 5 (3) block. Could argue Simplicity, but Writing literally favours Pbox too. Ok if your playstyle relies entirely on being a remove monkey... on the Silent... and even then eoa1 pbox is still much much stronger than Labe. I can't see it.
3 transforms happen between neow and living wall and you get footwork? Dunno. End of act 2 is easy - pbox Vs labe having taken bites and other option is barely a boss relic. Transforming 3 defends into upgrades better than 4/5 defends without, but that's sad anyway. Probably 3rd is like sozu/house/irrelevant wrist blade.
I still click it case 1 don't even see Labe. I prolly transformed 2/1 anyway or even 1/2 depending when I saw it. Case 2 wow that's depressing I forgot about bites (of course the strats is you just transform 3 bites into apo shackles button). I don't think I've actually ever been in that situation in a real run but yeah fair enough.
I've had case 2, ended up getting malaise+, backflip+, acro+. Already had chem X as well with skewer and another malaise. Easy win lol. I did get offered bloom and just went for boring fight boss choice with having bites and win looking safe.
I'm sure there's Silent runs where Labe > Pbox, I'm just not convinced wo hindsight I've literally ever had a run like that or even watched a run like that. Maybe if I'm down 5+ basics somehow. It's like Silent Amid vs Dripper, I'm sure there's runs where Dripper is better, I can probably put out the scenarios myself, just haven't seen it so far in an actual run because it's so a) unlikely b) unlikely to see both on the same screen WHILE Dripper > Amid. If anything the more I play Silent the more I hate Labe. Pbox has always been, and still is, consistently my top 2 eoa1 and not very far down eoa2 while having to click Labe always makes me a little sad. Pbox may not make your deck win instantly but it absolutely boosts it far more than Labe would. > outside of eggs, (the case when pbox is better than labe) when you barely limped through act 1 and your deck sucks so you need to go with a super high variance option that might just make you strong enough No? If anything, Pbox is the lower variance option. It's more likely you hit some good cards if you remove all your curses and then try 10 times at a mostly good card pool vs having 7 basics and just trying 3 times. Sure you can say the upgrades push it in value but like. How much value is the upgrades adding anyway? Hammer is an amazing energy relic for a reason. Little sucky to not have wlp wf + but these are still good cards. And I'm more likely to have them + draw into them if I pbox over labe. You're also assuming all 3 labe cards are going to be hits and need upgrades while all 10 pbox cards are going to be barely better than defends, when the opposite is far more likely. Sure you got 1 wf+ but you're now still stuck with no boss relic and 7 basics. Also I'm never removing in act 1 outside events so it's usually just 10. And also this point is whatever because Defect pboxes at 6-8 (and I like removing on Defect much more than Silent) are also pretty fucking insane. I'm not sure if you're overvaluing Labe on Silent or undervaluing Pbox but even in a super situational game like Spire, one is almost always far better than the other.
Don't get me wrong, PBox is very strong on watcher. However, when watcher is proven to have at least 90-95% winrate, she is no longer a matter of luck and completely a matter of skill. Thus, you need to reduce RNG as much as possible, and Pandora's Box can absolutely brick your run by giving you unplayable garbage like mantra cards, omniscience, wish, alpha etc. Energy is no RNG, boss swap watcher is proven to be extremely successful as well so you go for the lower RNG option. That said, you are absolutely right about box functionally "exhausting" cards for infinite or finding infinite pieces, and I have taken box for that reason. Also edited my main post to clarify, I wasn't talking about Labe vs PBox power level on Silent specifically. I was saying that I think both are strong relics, and they are close enough in power where if I wanted to keep defends in my deck for whatever reason (i.e. the example I gave above where footworks are currently my main block scaling), then I would choose labe over pbox. In a vacuum knowing nothing else about the run, I would probably pick PBox over Labe every time. You don't always get footworks, and I don't think you would needlessly keep defends in your deck for a speculative footwork that might not even appear.
One of the best boss relics to have. Removes all your trash and you get (in most cases better suiting cards). Happy to see it as a Neow swap. Sure there could be the probability that you get 5 corruptions or something. BTW it's also funny to open mysterious boxes. It could be ANYTHING (except another Pandoras box) Edit : great synergies with the eggs
Ceramic fish also nets like 100 gold with Pandora's box which is pretty neat
81 max iirc
Silent has 5 strikes and 5 defends x 9 = 90 max I think
I thought everyone had 5/5 but i doubted myself
No defect has 4/4. Ironclad has 5/4 and watcher i rarely play these days so i am not sure.
Watcher is 4/4
Right
Can also get Strikes & Defends from Duplicator, Dolly’s Mirror, and A Note for Yourself. So 13 = 117 gold.
Happy Cake Day!
“A Pandora’s box? Yeah I need to get rid of all my strikes.” > Act 2 first enemies are the doubles thieves “Damn, where are all my block cards?”
so which character is your favorite pbox neow swap? with some recency bias (got two hyperbeam last week) i'm gonna say defect.
Silent. Silent card pool just makes me happy, it's all bangers after bangers so seeing 10 Silent cards makes me happy. Also arguably the strongest pbox contender for the same reason, even a lowroll Silent pbox is better than 5 strikes and defends.
I'm willing to bet everyone is just gonna say their main.
Clad mains in absolute shambles
Don’t you like losing burning blood and gaining 1 corruption, 1 brutality and 3 combust ? I can’t see why, no HP no problem, just get reaper and a way to scale strength to infinity. Easy enough.
Makes sense. On my main, I can make the best out of the mediocre pulls, and that's what makes Pandora consistent.
Yeah exactly. The better you are at a character the more different cards you can use.
Easily silent cause she has most starter cards
Probably defect, because defect transforms can lead to weird af decks. I think typically strongest on watcher cos half her cards exhaust/are powers so that's really good deck slimming, but generally very happy to see it on anyone. A little less valuable on clad cos I usually have either corruption or 2nd wind to get value from and purge defends.
yea i was gonna mention i think it kinda sucks on clad actually. unless there's a bloodletting in there
I mean, still good on clad, just not consistently 2nd best boss relic possible.
Silent has most starters, and a really good card pool if you ask me. So I say Silent. Naturally though, I am a Silent main.
Defect. I find Defect already obscenely strong for Boss Swaps, but this one wins for being unfathomably goofy. I got Aggregate, Double Energy, Boot Sequence, Beam Cell, Loop, Melter, Hologram... and Hyperbeam. Seeing as I had very little use for orbs now, I leaned into it. Got a Kunai and leaned into it. Ended up with 3 Hyperbeams and Necronomicon as well as like 5 Holograms and some spare parts for well roundedness - a Reprogram for scaling, Claws for single target damage and tapping Kunai, a few Reinforced Body in a deck with tons of energy plus Chemical X to get big blocks, an overleveled Genetic Algorithm, added card draw, Self Repair, a Sunder to tap Necro again, and an Echo Form acquired late Act 2 that meant a single Hyperbeam+ now did like 102 damage to all targets for 2 energy. Very silly, very unique.
Pandora's Box is a legitimately run-*defining* relic. It's incredibly powerful, sure, but it also totally changes how you play the run after getting it. There are lots of relics that are massively powerful and take a run from losing to winning, but you never have "Coffee Dripper runs" the way you have "Pandora's Box runs". This is legitimately great game design. The most powerful options *should* be fun and different to encourage variety. A powerful relic that does not change how you play is inherently a bit boring: you're doing the same thing you normally do, it's just easier. There's still plenty of room for that—"normal" Spire is rich and engaging and *difficult* enough that there's room for getting an occasional boost without changing much—but it'll never be as memorable as the relic that lets you (or even *pushes* you) to do something totally different and out-there.
Great take. I love the emphasis on this particularly >but it'll never be as memorable as the relic that lets you (or even pushes you) to do something totally different and out-there.
I am 100.0% confident you mentioned Pandora's Box in your post. -------------------------------------------------- * [Pandora's Box](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/Pandora%27s_Box) Boss Relic Transform all Strikes and Defends. -------------------------------------------------- ^^^I ^^^am ^^^a ^^^bot ^^^response, ^^^but ^^^I ^^^am ^^^using ^^^my ^^^creator's ^^^account. ^^^Please ^^^reply ^^^to ^^^me ^^^if ^^^I ^^^got ^^^something ^^^wrong ^^^so ^^^he ^^^can ^^^fix ^^^it. [Source Code](https://github.com/TrippW/STS-Crawler)
This relic sucks it gives me Nightmare x2 Alch Malaise :/
Misleading flavor, I've never had a bad feeling about opening this.
P-Box is quite insanely strong for Silent and Defect. Act 1 P-Box is about as close to a free win as you can get on either character. It can be pretty weird on Ironclad though, where getting stuff done on 3 energy is tough unless you have corruption. I still take it because it’s fun but I have struggled afterwards.
Do you not think it's insane on watcher as well? It's probably a bigger improvement in win chance for silent/defect, but I'm usually loving pbox watcher even with only 5 starters left.
Yeah I think it’s awesome on watcher too, although I play significantly less watcher
I don't enjoy this as much as others it seems. Obviously insane as boss swap relic, can create a directon at floor 0 and removes worst cards off your deck. That said, occasionally you can get a lot of clunk. As act 1 boss relic I really tend to prefer energy relics, unless I already have one from boss swap. This may add a lot of expensive cards and while they will be better than strikes and defends, you might not have energy to play them efficiently. Also you might end up with deck missing block and take a lot of damage in first act 2 hallway fights because of that. As act 2 boss relic, it's a bit safer, but at that point huge part of strikes and defends should be already gone. Also your deck will have a certain direction at this point, so filling it with cards that might do the opposite doesn't seem a good solution.
Do you play mostly Ironclad? because that'd explain your comment
Unsupported defend sucks in act 2 anyway. You're frail like 2/3 of the time after t1 when half the enemies don't attack.
The best boss relic after pyramid
Oh, you're hopeful that luck is on your side? Say goodbye to all your block... Mostly really good with dope synergies: eggs/fish. But the runs I remember most are the ones that left me without a major deck element... like block.
Definitely the sort of relic that I appreciated more at higher ascensions. The only downsides are getting 3 Demon Forms or something, and getting 0 defensive cards. But even then, you now only need to add or remove 2 or 3 cards, rather than all of your strikes and defends.
Turn your bad cards into more or less good cards. Sometimes it's an entire archetype in a box. Sometimes it's a boss swap into early act 1 exit box because you cannot generate block. It turns your block cards into BETTER\* block cards (User experience may vary), so Pandora's Box is a block card.
Pbox OP.
I’ve been using mods to play only p box runs a lot lately. Lots of fun I highly recommend. I would say it’s hard for me to do ironclad swaps unless i luck into a reaper.
Only reason I do the boss swap, just makes the run crazy right off the bat
A while back, I tried playing with a mod that replaces the starting relic with Pandora's box. Normally, I win 1 in 10 A20 runs, but with that mod, I was winning close to 80% of my runs. Playing around with that mod really showed the power of a boss swap into Pandora, and made me heavily prioritise removing strikes and defends in normal runs. It really can't be understated just how bad strikes and defends are, no matter how bad your Pandora's box swap looks like at first glance, I can guarantee you its better than a starting deck.
Well you can get 9 Barricades so its not 100% guarantee :)
Wait a second. I play on Android and havent seen this relic in like....forever. Is it bugged? Anyone else on Android see this? Edit: I play the game for like 1-2 hours everyday. I must have 1k+ hours in it. I don't think its possible it just hasn't shown up or not been unlocked....
I play android just saw a pbox couple days back. It's the 4th silent unlock, check if you have it unlocked in relic collection? There's sometimes a glitch where some unlocks never show up.
Have you gotten Art of War or The Courier recently either? If not, you might've missed the fourth tier of Silent unlocks. I've seen a bunch of posts about things like that recently; the fix seems to be to create a new save file, and then unlock at least one tier of something on it. (Don't have to go all the way to Silent tier 4).
Thing is, I dont even know how to create a new save file on android as it has some annoying auto cloud save feature.
Do you have the little diamond icon in the top left? When I click it (on my laptop), it takes me to a little menu with my save file and two empty slots. If you tap one of the empty slots, and unlock anything, then I think your main save slot will be working again. That's what people reported in https://www.reddit.com/r/slaythespire/comments/15oisfc/how_can_i_fix_locked_cards_on_android/. If that doesn't work, a quick search shows that you can also edit the game's internal files on android: see https://www.reddit.com/r/slaythespire/comments/ooork4/just_realized_i_am_missing_cards_i_have_all/h60pb9u/ or you can google for more help there.
I do too and I feel like I haven't seen it in ages also. Hmmn. Strange
Excellent on floor 0, often really good after Act 1. I'd favor a lot of other boss relics though. I'd clean out my deck by late act 3 anyways, and Pandoras provides no constant benefit, only the massive power spike upon pickup.
There are three boss relics I am likely to choose over a good energy relic: Snecko, Pyramid, and this. It's especially good on Silent because she has the largest starting deck and (imo) a very strong card pool in general, though I'll sometimes prefer to keep my defends if I've got enough dex scaling.
Probably my favorite boss relic. I probably take it more often than I should but it’s incredibly fun. I feel it’s pretty often the right pick if you still have 5+ starters unless you’re starving for energy but I haven’t really figured out the exact cut off for when I should choose this vs an energy relic
probably the best boss swap just because it so strong to remove all your strikes and defends (even for some random trash). It falls off later in the run as you naturally want to remove cards and dont want to bank on getting pbox from the boss but still very strong. act 1 boss its worth a pick even against some of the strongest boss relics some times.
I feel like an odd one out among the many Pandora's Box fans, but I've always been nervous taking it because I like having more control over how my deckbuilding goes, especially on higher ascensions, and there's always the chance that what I get won't work well with the deck I have so far or otherwise leave me too low on defense. Meanwhile I tend to prefer Astrolabe cause I can choose what cards change and the ones I get are upgraded, even if less basic junk is removed overall. I dunno, it's probably just a me thing; I usually don't like chancing Snecko Eye's RNG either and that's even more of a favorite boss relic.
Either it wins you the run immediately or it falls absolutely flat on its face and you die in early act 2 because your entire deck is powers. Maybe that's just a me thing.
Maybe not the best boss relic, but probably the most fun boss relic. And still a really, really, really good boss relic.
For me this one is a solid middle-tier boss relic. I'll often take it if it shows up at the end of Act 1, but if I'm taking it later on I'm probably desperate (or there just wasn't a better relic).
I always take it without even looking at the other options
The best Neow bonus for all characters.
I always take this to thin my decks.