Slay the Spire 2
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Slay the Spire 2 1.0 release: Sep 2027Not announced: our best guess from Mega Crit's 1 to 2 year Early Access plan.
Best guessMega Crit's Early Access FAQ on Steam says it will stay in Early Access "Until the game feels great! Last time we thought it would be about a year and it took about 1.5 years. So perhaps in the same 1 - 2 year range." We count 18 months from the Mar 5, 2026 Early Access launch, as the first game took, to the first Thursday of Sep 2027 (Mega Crit ships on Thursdays) at 10 AM Pacific, the hour of the Early Access launch. Steam

10Months6Days

Defect

The Defect is the fifth and last character to unlock in Slay the Spire 2 (end a run as the Necrobinder, win or lose), an automaton that fights with Orbs and Focus. It starts with 75 HP, 99 Gold, 3 Energy, 3 Orb slots, 4 Strikes, 4 Defends, Zap, Dualcast and the relic Cracked Core, which Channels 1 Lightning at the start of each combat.

The Defect is one of the five playable characters in Slay the Spire 2 and the last one to unlock: you get it by playing one run as the Necrobinder, win or lose, per TheGamer's unlock guide. It is an automaton returning from Slay the Spire (2019) that fights with Orbs, floating charges that act on their own every turn and can be spent for a bigger effect, and with Focus, which makes every Orb stronger. The game's data gives it 75 HP, 99 Gold, 3 Energy and 3 Orb slots, a 10-card starting deck of 4 Strikes, 4 Defends, Zap and Dualcast, and the relic Cracked Core, which Channels 1 Lightning at the start of each combat (PCGamesN). Slay the Spire 2 is in Early Access, so the numbers on this page are those of the live main branch, v0.107.1 ("Major Update #2", Jun 19, 2026), with later beta changes labeled.

A golden robot with a blue cloak stands in a dark jungle ruin with three glowing orbs beside it and 75 of 75 HP, facing a large blue lizard-like creature with a toothy mouth. A hand of cards is fanned at the bottom, the middle one raised: Rip and Tear, an attack costing 1. The energy counter shows 2 of 3 and a button reads End Turn 3.
The Defect, with three Orbs floating around it, faces a blue reptilian beast at 30 of 72 HP; the card Rip and Tear reads "Deal 7 damage to a random enemy twice." Mega Crit

Quick facts

Character The Defect, an automaton that "Deploys Orb technology when it must fight" (game data)
Unlock Play one run as the Necrobinder, win or lose (TheGamer); the Timeline Epoch is "Booting Up" (Mega Crit's v0.106.0 notes)
Max HP 75
Gold 99
Energy 3 per turn
Orb slots 3 to start
Starting deck 4 Strike, 4 Defend, Zap, Dualcast (10 cards)
Starter relic Cracked Core: "At the start of each combat, Channel 1 Lightning." (PCGamesN)
Ancient relic Infused Core: Channel 3 Lightning at the start of each combat, and Lightning deals 1 additional damage (game data)
Ancient cards Quadcast and Biased Cognition (game data)
Card pool 88 cards: 4 Basic, 20 Common, 36 Uncommon, 26 Rare, 2 Ancient; see Defect Cards
Archetypes Orbs, Status and Claw (PCGamesN)
Tier lists A tier with PCGamesN (Apr 28, 2026) and Pocket Tactics (Oct 5, 2026)

Who the Defect is

The Defect is a machine that keeps rebuilding itself. Its line on the character select screen reads "An automaton eternally modifying itself to survive. Deploys Orb technology when it must fight." (game data). When something saves it from death, it says "I must live on for my friends!", and the Ancients greet it as a construct: Neow asks it what it has become (game data). Lore and Story tells the Spire's story.

It returns from Slay the Spire, the first game, with a new body. Mobalytics' guide says it "returns to Slay the Spire 2 with a complete glow-up", rebuilt with "a bulkier, more advanced chassis". Mega Crit sold the redesign as a plush in March 2026 and wrote, in its March 2026 Neowsletter, "Yep, that means BEEFECT IS REAL (and squishable.)"

How to unlock the Defect

You unlock the Defect by finishing one run as the Necrobinder, whether you win or lose. The characters open in a chain: the Ironclad is available from the start, a run with the Ironclad unlocks the Silent, a run with the Silent the Regent, a run with the Regent the Necrobinder, and a run with the Necrobinder the Defect, per TheGamer and PCGamesN. In the game each unlock is an Epoch on the Timeline, and the Defect's is "Booting Up", whose art Mega Crit's v0.106.0 notes list. Unlocks and the Timeline covers every Epoch.

The run must be a normal one. Since v0.100.0 (Mar 20, 2026), Epochs, and with them character unlocks, cannot be earned in Daily or Custom runs (Daily Climb and Custom Mode).

Starting deck and relic

The Defect starts with 10 cards, two of them its own. All numbers are the main branch's, from the game data that Spire Codex reads (v0.107.1); upgrades are in parentheses.

Card Cost Type Effect Upgraded
Strike (4) 1 Attack Deal 6 damage. Deal 9 damage.
Defend (4) 1 Skill Gain 5 Block. Gain 8 Block.
Zap 1 Skill Channel 1 Lightning. Costs 0.
Dualcast 1 Skill Evoke your rightmost Orb twice. Costs 0.

Source: Spire Codex (game data, v0.107.1), read Oct 26, 2026.

Cracked Core gives the Defect an Orb before its first card. Its text is "At the start of each combat, Channel 1 Lightning." (PCGamesN), so every fight opens with a Lightning Orb that deals 3 damage to a random enemy at the end of each turn until it is Evoked.

Orbs and Focus

Orbs are the Defect's own resource: you Channel them with cards, they act at the end or start of each turn, and you Evoke them for a bigger one-time effect. The game's rule for Channel is "Channeling an Orb puts it into your first empty slot. If you have no empty slots, your first Orb is automatically Evoked to make room." and for Evoke "Consume your rightmost Orb and use its Evoke effect." (game data). The Defect starts with 3 slots; Capacitor, Modded, the Potion of Capacity and the Shop relic Runic Capacitor add more.

Five kinds of Orb exist, and Glass is new to Slay the Spire 2 (Mobalytics: "Deals damage to ALL enemies. Decreases damage every turn.", Mobalytics). Their base values in the game data:

Orb Passive Evoke
Lightning End of turn: deal 3 damage to a random enemy. Deal 8 damage to a random enemy.
Frost End of turn: gain 2 Block. Gain 5 Block.
Dark End of turn: raise this Orb's damage by 6. Deal its damage (6 to start) to the enemy with the lowest HP.
Plasma Start of turn: gain 1 Energy. Gain 2 Energy.
Glass End of turn: deal 4 damage to ALL enemies, then lose 1 value. Deal 8 damage to ALL enemies.

Source: Spire Codex: orbs (game data, v0.107.1), read Oct 26, 2026; the same values are in PCGamesN's Defect guide (Apr 7, 2026).

Focus raises what every Orb but Plasma does. PCGamesN says Focus "increases orb effects, acting like Strength and Dexterity" (PCGamesN), and TheGamer that each point adds 1 to the damage Orbs and to Frost's Block (TheGamer). Plasma's text says it "is unaffected by Focus" (game data). Permanent Focus comes from Defragment, Biased Cognition (which loses 1 Focus a turn), the Common relic Data Disk and the Focus Potion; Hotfix, Focused Strike and Synchronize give it for one turn.

Because a full row Evokes the first Orb to make room, the order of Orbs matters. TheGamer's beginner guide advises stacking Orbs early rather than constantly Evoking them, especially Dark, whose damage keeps growing while it sits (TheGamer).

Status cards and Claw

The Defect also has two archetypes that ignore Orbs. The Status archetype adds Status cards to your own deck on purpose and pays you for them: Boost Away adds Dazed, Gunk Up Slimed, TURBO Void, Overclock Burn and Fight Through Wounds, while Smokestack, Iteration, Compact, Flak Cannon, Rocket Punch and Trash to Treasure reward each Status (game data). PCGamesN calls it "a newer archetype" (PCGamesN).

Claw is a 0-cost Attack that grows. It deals 3 damage and raises the damage of ALL Claw cards by 2 for the rest of the combat (4 and 3 upgraded), per the game data, so Claw decks fill up with cheap cards and draw (Scrape, Skim, FTL, Hologram, All for One). PCGamesN says Status and Claw "lose effectiveness at higher Ascension levels" (PCGamesN), and Pocket Tactics that 0-cost and Claw builds work but have a lower ceiling than all-in Orb builds (Pocket Tactics).

Ancient relic and Ancient cards

The Ancient Orobas can turn Cracked Core into Infused Core. His relic Touch of Orobas reads "Upon pickup, replace your starter Relic with an Ancient version." and the Defect's Ancient version is Infused Core: "At the start of each combat, Channel 3 Lightning. Lightning deals 1 additional damage" (game data). The extra Lightning damage arrived in v0.105.0 and reached the main branch in v0.107.1. Neow and the Ancients covers Orobas and the others.

The Defect has two Ancient-rarity cards, Quadcast and Biased Cognition (game data). Quadcast (1 Energy, 0 upgraded) Evokes your rightmost Orb 4 times; Biased Cognition (1 Energy, Power) gives 4 Focus (5 upgraded) and takes 1 Focus away at the start of each turn. Another Orobas relic, Archaic Tooth, transforms "a starter card into an Ancient version" (Mega Crit's v0.103.0 notes).

Defect relics

Seven relics appear only for the Defect in v0.107.1, per the game data: Data Disk (Common, 1 Focus at the start of each combat), Gold-Plated Cables (Uncommon, your rightmost Orb triggers its passive an additional time), Symbiotic Virus (Uncommon, Channel 1 Dark at the start of each combat), Emotion Chip (Rare, all Orb passives trigger if you lost HP the turn before), Metronome (Rare, 30 damage to ALL enemies the first time you Channel 7 Orbs in a combat), Power Cell (Rare, 2 zero-cost cards from your Draw Pile at the start of each combat) and Runic Capacitor (Shop, 3 more Orb slots). Kotaku notes that Gold-Plated Cables comes from the Epoch for killing 15 bosses with the Defect (Kotaku). The full list is on Relics.

Epochs and card unlocks

The Defect's Timeline holds six Epochs of its own, per Destructoid: Tricked (beat Act 1), Hello Hello! (Act 2), Resolving Bugs (Act 3), Laser Beams (kill 15 bosses), Confrontation (kill 15 Elites) and Ooh Shiny! (beat Ascension 1). The game data says Tricked unlocks Loop, Null and Consuming Shadow, Confrontation unlocks Barrage, Flak Cannon and Smokestack, Ooh Shiny! unlocks TURBO, Scavenge and Helix Drill, and Resolving Bugs opens Ascension for the Defect and adds three potions (Spire Codex: epochs).

Archetypes guides name

Guides agree on Orbs and Focus as the Defect's main plan. PCGamesN's Orb build starts with Ball Lightning, Cold Snap, Lightning Rod and Focused Strike, adds Glacier, Chill, Hailstorm and Hotfix, and ends with Capacitor, Defragment, Synchronize and Voltaic; it calls Frost decks the safest and Defragment the best Focus card (PCGamesN, Apr 7, 2026). Game Rant's Status build makes Status cards on purpose for Smokestack, Iteration, Flak Cannon and Trash to Treasure, and its third build, "Weapons", is 0-cost Attacks: Claw, FTL, Scrape, Feral and All for One (Game Rant, Mar 10, 2026). Defect Guide goes through each build in depth and Defect Cards lists every card.

How strong and how hard

Both published character tier lists put the Defect in A tier, behind only the Silent: PCGamesN (Apr 28, 2026), which calls it "barely changed since launch", and Pocket Tactics (Oct 5, 2026). Characters compares the full lists. Guides also call it one of the hardest to learn: Game Rant calls it "the most complex character", with Claw decks easy and Orb juggling hard (Game Rant, Mar 10, 2026), and TheGamer suggests learning the Regent first because Stars are simpler than Orbs (TheGamer, Mar 9, 2026). Players pick it about as often as the others: Mega Crit's chart in the May 2026 Neowsletter gave it 19% of all runs.

Changes by patch

The Defect has changed the least of the five. At Major Update #1 Mega Crit wrote that it "has seen the least amount of changes of any of the characters" (v0.103.2, Apr 17, 2026). The changes now on the main branch:

  • v0.100.0 (Mar 20, 2026): Hotfix gained Exhaust (its upgrade removes it); Rocket Punch's cost cut lasts until it is played.
  • v0.101.0 (Mar 27, 2026): Voltaic's cost rose from 2 to 3.
  • v0.105.0 (May 8, 2026): Infused Core's Lightning bonus; Hyperbeam 26(34) to 28(36); Shatter Evokes all Orbs twice; Tesla Coil's upgrade deals 4 instead of 6 but triggers Lightning twice; Uproar 5(7) to 6(8).
  • v0.106.0 (May 22, 2026): Fusion costs 1 with Exhaust (was 2, 1 upgraded); Synthesis 12(18) to 14(20); Shatter 11(15) to 7(11).

The public beta has gone further, and none of it is on the main branch yet. Its biggest Defect changes: three new co-op cards and a Shatter that Exhausts (v0.108.0, Jul 3, 2026); Biased Cognition up to 5(6) Focus and Synchronize no longer Exhausting (v0.110.0, Jul 31, 2026); and Hyperbeam reworked to "Deal 24(30) damage to ALL enemies. Lose 3 Focus this turn.", Thunder up to 8(11) and Synchronize down to 1(2) Focus (v0.111.0, Aug 14, 2026). Defect Cards has every card's beta numbers, and Patches and Updates every patch.

The Defect in co-op

In co-op the Defect has two cards that only appear in multiplayer, Energy Surge (ALL players gain 2 Energy) and Ignition (another player Channels Plasma), per the game data. PCGamesN calls it flexible in co-op, able to deal damage or support (PCGamesN). More on Co-op Multiplayer and Multiplayer Cards.

What is different from the first game

The Defect keeps its role from Slay the Spire, the Orb character, and gains a new Orb, a new archetype and a new body. Glass is a new Orb type (Mobalytics), Status is "a newer archetype" (PCGamesN), and the chassis is rebuilt (Mobalytics). The run around it changed too: Ancients such as Orobas replace the first game's boss relics, and Ascension has 10 levels instead of 20. Differences from Slay the Spire lists the rest.

Frequently asked questions

How do you unlock the Defect in Slay the Spire 2? In Slay the Spire 2 you unlock the Defect by playing one run as the Necrobinder, win or lose; it is the last of the five characters in the unlock chain, per TheGamer. Daily and Custom runs do not count since v0.100.0.

What is the Defect's starting deck in Slay the Spire 2? The Defect starts Slay the Spire 2 with 10 cards: 4 Strikes, 4 Defends, Zap (Channel 1 Lightning) and Dualcast (Evoke your rightmost Orb twice), plus the relic Cracked Core, per the game data.

How much HP does the Defect have in Slay the Spire 2? The Defect starts Slay the Spire 2 with 75 Max HP, 99 Gold, 3 Energy and 3 Orb slots.

What does Focus do in Slay the Spire 2? In Slay the Spire 2, Focus raises the passive and Evoke values of the Defect's Lightning, Frost, Dark and Glass Orbs, about 1 per point per TheGamer; Plasma is "unaffected by Focus" (game data).

What is the Glass Orb in Slay the Spire 2? Glass is the Defect's new Orb in Slay the Spire 2: at the end of each turn it deals 4 damage to ALL enemies and loses 1 value, and Evoking it deals 8 damage to ALL enemies, per the game data.

Is the Defect good in Slay the Spire 2? Both published tier lists put the Defect in A tier in Slay the Spire 2, behind only the Silent: PCGamesN (Apr 28, 2026) and Pocket Tactics (Oct 5, 2026). Game Rant calls it "the most complex character" (Game Rant).

What is the Defect's Ancient relic in Slay the Spire 2? In Slay the Spire 2, Orobas' Touch of Orobas turns Cracked Core into Infused Core, which Channels 3 Lightning at the start of each combat and makes Lightning deal 1 additional damage, per the game data.

Sources

Moments

Slay the Spire 2 Beginner’s Guide | Important Tips You Need to Know

IGN

  1. The Defect is one of the five playable characters in Slay the Spire 2 and the last one to unlock: you get it by…

How to WIN with the Defect | Slay the Spire 2 Guide

Caleb Gannon Gaming

  1. Cracked Core gives the Defect an Orb before its first card. Its text is "At the start of each combat, Channel 1…
  2. Orbs are the Defect's own resource: you Channel them with cards, they act at the end or start of each turn, and you…
  3. Five kinds of Orb exist, and Glass is new to Slay the Spire 2 (Mobalytics: "Deals damage to ALL enemies. Decreases…
  4. Focus raises what every Orb but Plasma does. PCGamesN says Focus "increases orb effects, acting like Strength and…
  5. The Defect also has two archetypes that ignore Orbs. The Status archetype adds Status cards to your own deck on…
  6. Both published character tier lists put the Defect in A tier, behind only the Silent: PCGamesN (Apr 28, 2026), which…

Hyperbeam is FINALLY good?! | Spire 2 Patch Rundown v0.111.0

JapaneseExport

  1. The public beta has gone further, and none of it is on the main branch yet. Its biggest Defect changes: three new…

Photos

A golden robot with a blue cloak stands in a dark jungle ruin with three glowing orbs beside it and 75 of 75 HP, facing a large blue lizard-like creature with a toothy mouth. A hand of cards is fanned at the bottom, the middle one raised: Rip and Tear, an attack costing 1. The energy counter shows 2 of 3 and a button reads End Turn 3.

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See also

Last updated Oct 26, 2026 by the Vi.ki team. Page text CC BY-SA 4.0.

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