Beginner Guide: Your First Covenant Wins

The core loop in one minute

Your train has three defendable floors plus the Pyre room on top. Each battle, enemies board at the bottom and climb one floor per turn; whatever survives your defenses attacks the Pyre. If the Pyre's health hits zero, the run ends. Between battles you draft cards, buy upgrades and pick artifacts — by the final boss, you want a machine, not a pile of cards.

Ember is the real resource

You play cards with Ember, refreshed each turn. Early on, expensive bombs look tempting, but a hand you can't afford is a dead hand. Keep most of your deck at 0–2 Ember and treat every 3+ Ember card as a commitment. The cheap end of the card database is where consistency lives, and X-cost cards scale as the fight drags on.

Fight on one floor (mostly)

Spreading units across all three floors is the classic new-player trap. Pick a primary combat floor — usually the bottom or middle — and stack your buffs, rooms and champion there. Units with Multistrike, Armor or Rage compound fast when they fight together. The floors above are for overflow and emergencies.

Draft for an engine, not a highlight reel

• Skip is a pick. Every card you add dilutes the deck. If it doesn't feed your plan, pass.
• Purge relentlessly. Merchants can remove starter cards — a thinner deck draws its best cards more often.
• Follow keywords, not rarity. A common that triggers your keyword engine beats a rare that doesn't. Every keyword page lists all its payoffs.
• Upgrade what you actually play. Two upgraded workhorses beat five sidegrades.

Clans to learn first

Per the community tier list, the friendliest strong starts are:

• Underlegion — swarm the floor with Fun Guys; board presence forgives mistakes.
• Melting Remnant — Burnout units come back; you learn value cycling without punishment.
• Banished — straightforward Valor stacking with a champion (Fel) the meta rates S tier.

Your ally clan matters too: its banner units and spells fill the gaps your primary clan leaves. When in doubt, pair a unit-heavy primary with a spell-heavy ally.

Champion paths decide your plan

Each champion offers three upgrade paths of three tiers — that choice is your build-around. Check any champion's card page (say, Fel or Bolete the Guillotine) to read all three paths with exact numbers before you commit at the first Temple.

When you're ready: Covenant

Winning unlocks Covenant ranks — stacking difficulty modifiers up to Covenant 10. Read the Covenant guide for every rank's exact effect, and start logging your climbs in the run tracker to see which pairings actually win for you.