Almost always saves you more HP than it costs by letting you get more cards in play. If you're already winning the fight, consider not playing this.

Probably Ironclad's best card and an almost automatic pick. Immediate draw and energy outweigh the HP cost in nearly every deck.

Good in almost any deck. If your block cards are sparse, you'll appreciate doubling whatever you draw. If you have lots of block, you can use this on your most impactful ones for maximum effect.

An exceptionally strong block multiplier that can outperform comparable boss-relic effects by doubling the best block turn every combat.

Simply ludicrous damage for 1 energy. Get it back with Headbutt to play it more often!

Still efficient, but less exceptional after Dominate moved to rare. Tremble often supplies enough Vulnerable while being common and easier to obtain.

The cheap vulnerable payoff is consistently strong for Ironclad, despite occasional decks that cannot exploit it well.

One of Clad's best damage mitigation cards. Reduced damage values round down, making this block for more than 50% at times. Make sure you have multiple ways to apply vulnerable to get most of this card.

Still extremely powerful after its small nerf. Vulnerable is easy to maintain, making its damage reduction a reliable foundation for block-heavy decks.

Decent block if you can't activate the effect, and ludicrous block if you can! Worth grabbing early on even if you can't yet meet the condition consistently because of how strong this card can be.

Only modest block without setup, but excellent once exhaust can be aligned consistently. The enhanced block can support Barricade and Unmovable decks.

One of the best ways to get Strength on Ironclad. Always provides a small amount but goes crazy with cards like Tremble and Molten Fist. Beware of enemies with Artifact!

More balanced but still worthy of A at rare. In the right boss fight it supplies enormous Strength and Vulnerable for only one energy.

Powers that draw more cards are extremely strong because they can get you additional cards across many turns for only a single initial card play. This card is one of the strongest card draw powers because you can activate the effect many times per turn. This combos with a wide variety of cards, including some Curse and Status cards.

A core power for virtually every engine-focused Ironclad deck. Exhaust is common enough that additional copies and upgrades remain attractive.

A massive source of draw that can be used to enable energy-generating cards in your build. You only need 2 or 3 sources of Vulnerable to make this excellent. A must-upgrade.

Good once draw, energy, and Vulnerable support are assembled, but expensive and replaceable by cards such as Pommel Strike in more ordinary decks.

One of the best ways to get more energy to play cards. The cost in health is generally offset by the added value of the additional cards you can throw down. One way to win a run is to add enough draw to your deck to cycle this card repeatedly and use the energy gain to kill bosses before you run out of health.

Still a top-tier engine card after moving to uncommon. It converts Ironclad's plentiful draw into the energy needed for fast combo turns.

Dealing a lot of damage is the obvious benefit of this card, but exhausting your whole hand is also beneficial. Play any cards you don't want to Exhaust first, THEN play the Fiend Fire to delete everything else. This can let you thin your deck down to one strong combo.

A consistent way to turn card draw into immediate damage while thinning the deck. Enchantments and other multipliers make its ceiling exceptional.

Outstanding for activating exhaust effects like Feel No Pain or Dark Embrace. Creating random cards can make new powers for you or otherwise bail you out by making an immediately useful card.

Powerful and unusually flexible, but easy to misuse. It can rescue an unfinished engine, yet refined decks often prefer more consistent output cards.

The damage added to this card includes your Strength, Relics, and Enchantments. The damage of this card can scale very rapidly while also thinning the deck so that you can re-draw it later.

A versatile but situational long-fight damage plan. It can also exhaust obsolete attacks more reliably than an unupgraded True Grit.

Pommel Strike's cooler brother. Doesn't need an upgrade and can work wonders with an attack-heavy deck. Combine with Anger or Hellraiser.

A weak attack-draw card that he still finds no reason to pick; Pommel Strike performs the useful part much more efficiently.

Treat this like a multiplier to all of your Attack damage, so it works equally well with large single attacks or multiple small hits. Gets even better with multiple copies.

An uncommon with rare-level output. One upgraded copy makes Vulnerable dramatically stronger, while stacking copies produces extreme damage.

Ironclad loves card draw and this is one of the better ways to get it. Really wants an upgrade to become draw 2.

The premier common attack: efficient damage plus draw, useful at every stage, and a major reason weaker draw attacks look unnecessary.

The gold standard for block cards. Play it to block a whole turn on its own, but it works even better with Barricade.

A dependable rare that can blank a dangerous turn by itself. Barricade and Unmovable make its large block number even more valuable.

Tons of free block for doing what Clad already does best: playing lots of attacks.

A high-priority early pick that can become a full block engine. It bridges draw-heavy decks until Bloodletting or other energy support appears.

Effectively 1 draw per turn that always gets an attack. Very useful if you have bonus energy generation or if you can limit the cards that this will retrieve.

Usually too slow for Ironclad's fast combo decks, but the innate upgrade can solve specific late-game problems and its recurring attack retrieval has niche value.

Very solid block per turn combined with self-damage to activate other cards. Nice with Rupture, Tear Asunder or the relic Self-Forming Clay.

Spectacular passive block despite its nerf. The upgrade remains excellent and the HP loss also enables Ironclad's self-damage synergies.

Basically makes all your blocks free so you can spend energy on attacks. You should have a plan to win the fight by the time you run out of block cards.

An amazing engine enabler, especially when a deck has many Burning Pacts, Taunts, Trembles, and Shrugs but lacks Bloodletting.

Corruption rapidly exhausts the deck into powerful loops and usually accelerates Ironclad directly toward a win.

Free Skills accelerate Ironclad into powerful exhaust turns, while some decks remain too dependent on preserving their Skills.

The damage from this power adds up very fast, especially in a deck that blocks many times for small amounts. Activates once per card exhausted by Second Wind. Also great with any relic that gives block like Cloak Clasp or Gorget.

Has almost no convincing solo use case. Even the obvious Second Wind plus Pain setup has better payoffs available.

A powerful sustain effect that you can use to fuel self-damage cards or just to heal damage back from combats. You might need to skip playing this the first time and draw back into it later.

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Area damage is generally desired at the start of a fight, when the condition of this card may not yet be met. This is a card that performs well if re-drawn repeatedly, similar to Blood For Blood.

A strong payoff for exhaust-heavy decks, providing efficient damage while helping remove attacks that are no longer useful.

Huge energy generation for a single setup turn allows you to tackle endgame fights much more easily. This is a must-upgrade.

Provides enough scaling for a two-energy power and can support self-damage decks, but it is not universally efficient.