Dicey Dungeons is the best card-based roguelike out there.

I love card-based roguelikes, and I love Dicey Dungeons even more than Slay the Spire, heck, even more than Dream Quest. I've enjoyed my first 33 hours of play (including earlier versions) and will enjoy plenty more. Why?

Depth and replayability.

Also, unlike some of Terry Cavanagh's other games, Dicey Dungeons's difficulty is pleasantly curvy! Casual players can enjoy the game, starting with the simpler classes. Hardcore players will be challenged by the more complex classes.

Each class plays so differently that it's almost like playing a different game. The enemies are the same, but each different class has:

• different equipment drops (some overlap, but many class-specific items)
• a unique game-changing special
• a unique guild that changes playstyle
• a unique limit break

After you complete a run with one class, you get to learn a whole new twist on the mechanics to master the next class. There's even a secret class that is delightfully awesome.

There's also enough variety within each class to keep you coming back for more.

• If I play Warrior, do I go for the standard shield build, culminating in Shield Bash? Or do I focus on DPS? (I guess DPT since it's a turn-based game) Or, if I get the drops, go for a control build?
• If I play Thief, do I go for Dagger+, poison, or countdowns?
• If I play Witch, do I go for Fire, Ice, or Shock?
• and so on!

These builds play differently enough that they're almost like subclasses, and it's fun to try to complete a run with each one.

There are also certain enemies and bosses that are particularly hard to beat with certain classes, if you like a challenge.

Dicey's status effects are especially cool. In addition to the usual Freeze, Burn, Poison,  there are some innovative ones: (if you want to be surprised in-game, skip the following list)

• Curse (50% chance of your equipment not working and just eating your dice)
• Shock (disable a piece of equipment, can be re-enabled by spending 1 dice)
• Lock (make 1 dice unusable this turn)
• Blind (you can't see the number on your dice)

These also add variety to the battles and strategy, and keep gameplay fresh and interesting.

Now I'm going to compare Dicey Dungeons to other card-based roguelikes I've played.

Dicey Dungeons vs. Slay the Spire

Length of run
The thing I prefer most about Dicey over StS is the tightness of each run. StS runs are LONG. Like, over 2 hours long. My Dicey runs usually take me 20-40m.

The thing I dislike most about many roguelikes is the frustration of permadeath. Permadeath feels like a punishment instead of challenge when I don't feel like I made any progress during the run, either by learning something new or via in-game progression. One way Dicey mitigates this is by having runs be relatively quick. I really like that. It encourages me to experiment, to try new builds, new equipment, new strategies, because if I die, I just try again. I've only lost 20 minutes of progress, not 2 hours.

Meaningful choices
And it's not just length, it's tightness. I love how in Dicey, it feels like (almost) every fight matters. There's no filler. In Slay the Spire (and to a lesser extent Dream Quest), there are a lot of filler fights, where the decisions you make don't have any big impact on the overall outcome, as long as you don't fuck up and take a lot of damage. This lowers replayability. If I have to grind through a bunch of scrubs to get to the interesting bits, I'm going to get bored more quickly. Dicey's tightness keeps my interest.

In StS, there are a bunch of strategic deckbuilding decisions, but (depending on your deck) not always a lot of tactical "Which card do I play now?" decisions. The design difference of Dicey having dice makes a HUGE difference. It adds a level of choice, so that it's no longer a yes-or-no"Do I play this card or not?" but "Which dice do I put in this card?" which creates more meaningful choices.

Boss and enemy variety
StS's bosses feel different from each other. Dicey's bosses feel WAY different from each other. I love this. It keeps the game fresh and interesting and less generic-feeling. It makes each run interestingly different instead of more of the same. It's the same with enemies. Dicey's enemies have more variety - each one has a specific feel, and require different approaches. StS has some of that but not as much, and in Dicey, you never fight the same enemy twice during the same run.

WINNER: Dicey Dungeons. StS is fun, but I enjoy replaying Dicey more.

Dicey Dungeons vs. Dream Quest

Backup strats
In Dream Quest, I love how every strategy has a counter. But I don't love how RNG-dependent it is. I'm not forced to add a non-physical damage card to my deck; I can just avoid Wisp or hope it doesn't appear. I'm not forced to balance my card types; I can just avoid Sphinx or hope she doesn't appear. After I lost against Kraken, my takeaway wasn't, "Aha, I need to tweak my Action strat so it won't die to Kraken", my takeaway was, "Let me try the exact same strategy and hope Kraken doesn't come up".

If, in Dicey Dungeons, I go for a poison build and I encounter an enemy that's poison-resistant, or I go for a control build and I encounter an enemy with gobs of equipment and gobs of dice, I'm not completely hosed like I would be in Dream Quest. I just swap out my poison/control equipment for my second-string equipment and do my best.

That's AWESOME. This is one area in which I think Dicey Dungeons is better than Dream Quest - it encourages backup strats.

Filler Enemies

In DQ, about 2/3 of the enemies feel like filler enemies. There's nothing special about them. They're not weak to anything, they're not strong against anything, they don't have any particularly interesting cards... you just Play All, repeat, and move on. In Dicey Dungeons, 80-90% of encounters feel interesting and fun.

WINNER: Dicey Dungeons. Dream Quest is awesome, but Dicey feels tighter. Fewer enemies, but more interesting enemies with less filler.

Dicey Dungeons vs. Card Quest

WINNER: Dicey Dungeons, by KO in round 1. I found Card Quest to be repetitive and tedious.

OVERALL WINNER: Dicey Dungeons! It's the best card-based roguelike out there, and one of my favorite roguelikes overall.