Slay the Spire 2 Silent character guide - strategy, builds, and tier list

How do you play The Silent in Slay the Spire 2? Originally from the Foglands, a region haunted by tormented souls, The Silent hunted down the cursed entity plaguing the land and now wears its skull as a trophy. After ascending the Spire and defeating The Heart, she brought a piece of it to her sisters, but her trophy ended up poisoning her. The Silent heads back to the Spire upon its reopening, searching for a cure.

The Silent brings her assassination talents back to the card game, and like the rest of the returning Slay the Spire 2 characters, she comes packing a refreshed arsenal of tools to murder her targets. If you plan on unlocking all the Ascension levels, the new Sly mechanic makes it easy to cheat out high-cost cards, giving you an easy run to quickly ascend the Spire.

There are three Silent builds to pick from: Sly, Poison, and Shivs. Sly allows you to play cards for free if you can discard them from your hand, Poison slowly drains health from your enemies over multiple turns, and Shivs let you chip away at your enemy using zero-cost attacks. The Silent is definitely the strongest among the cast, equipped with so many powerful cards to construct a game-winning deck with.

As we've pointed out with all of our character guides, the perfect deck makes use of every card reward offered, so it's important to know how every archetype works. Sly plays well with both of these deck archetypes, but Poison and Shiv are more difficult to tie together. That's not to say it can't be done, though the synergies aren't as obvious.

The Silent's starting relic is Ring of the Snake, drawing two additional cards at the start of combat. Card draw is a big part of The Silent's identity, featuring a range of options to quickly cycle through your deck. Her biggest weakness is her relatively poor selection of block cards, so you need to take advantage of cards that provide Dexterity.

The Silent Sly build

Sly is the most powerful keyword in STS 2, and the other new additions aren't even close. The Silent's best cards focus on card draw and card removal, so this naturally synergizes with everything she already wants to do. The starting deck only has Survivor as your Sly activator, but that's enough to see you through most of Act 1.

Here are some Sly cards you should aim to acquire right away:

• Ricochet
• Flick-Flack
• Untouchable

All three of these Sly cards are worth their Mana cost, particularly in Act 1, and they continue to get better as you add more discard options to your deck. The Silent struggles against multiple enemies, so it's important to add cards that'll help you dish out damage to different targets.

Pick up these cards to improve the consistency of your Sly deck:

• Acrobatics
• Dagger Throw
• Prepared

Acrobatics is a fantastic card to rifle through your deck, and the Sly synergy should give you an easy discard target. We didn't pick Dagger Throw very often in the first game, but the inclusion of Sly means we've got plenty of reasons to add it to our deck. Finally, Prepared is just a great card for ensuring you have playable cards in your hand, in addition to the perks Sly offers for discarding things.

Pick up these Sly cards to take your deck to another level:

• Abrasive
• Hand Trick
• Reflex
• Tactician

Once you've got your deck loaded with discard tools, it's time to start searching for uncommons and rares. Reflex and Tactician are obvious targets for removal due to their high cost, giving you a chance to cycle through your deck multiple times if you happen to hit both of them. Hand Trick is incredible as it opens up the possibilities to create a hybrid archetype with both Poison and Shiv - if you land Sly on a card like Burst or Adrenaline, you're basically free to play anything you like.

The Silent Poison build

Poison has always been a great archetype to build towards, letting you whittle away at the enemy's health bar while you sit back and wait for the inevitable.

A common newbie mistake is to fill your deck up with Poison cards in Act 1, but this can be deadly as you won't have the survivability tools to keep yourself alive. Focus on building a solid foundation first using cards like Dash, Backflip, and Footwork before committing to a Poison deck.

Here are some Poison cards you should aim to acquire right away:

• Poisoned Stab
• Bouncing Flask
• Noxious Fumes

Poisoned Stab and Bouncing Flask shine brightest in Act 1, though you may want to remove them towards the end of Act 2 when they start to lose their effectiveness. As for Noxious Fumes, this card is worth using in virtually every fight, and it's even better once you can get it upgraded.

Add these Poison cards once you're able to apply the effect consistently:

• Envenom
• Corrosive Wave
• Bubble Bubble
• Haze

Depending on how your deck is shaping up, you can go down two routes with Poison: attacks or skills. Envenom offers an easy way to apply Poison and makes for a natural partner alongside a Shiv deck, whereas Corrosive Wave pairs nicely in Sly decks to help you reach cards like Bubble Bubble and Haze.

Pick up these Poison cards to take your deck to another level:

• Accelerant
• Mirage

Accelerant is the best power card you can trigger in a Poison deck, doubling up the effect every time you trigger it. As for Mirage, it will get you out of serious trouble by giving you block equal to the Poison applied across all enemies, but be careful as it does feature the keyword Exhaust.

The Silent Shiv build

Shiv decks aren't quite as effective as they used to be as some of the main cards were toned down. Fortunately, STS 2 doesn't feature anywhere near the number of elites and bosses that used to terrorize Shiv decks.

Here are some of the best Shiv cards in the early game:

• Blade Dance
• Cloak and Dagger
• Finisher
• Hidden Daggers

Blade Dance might not be as strong as its predecessor in the first game, but it's still worth picking up. After all, 12 damage for one Mana is always a good thing, and it exhausts which can be helpful in the later acts. As for Cloak and Dagger, The Silent struggles to build block quickly, so this is a great way to earn Shivs and defend against attacks.

If you can find it early on, Hidden Daggers is an excellent Sly activator while also providing you with additional attacks. Finisher is the combo piece you need to end most fights - it starts out strong just paired with a single Blade Dance, but it gets absolutely absurd towards the end of Act 3 when you're able to consistently cheat out cards.

Pick up these Shiv cards to take your deck to another level:

• Accuracy
• Fan of Knives
• Knife Trap

You should only look to include Accuracy when you're able to draw into your Shiv cards in most turns. When this power card is active, your Shivs effectively turn into mini-missiles, capable of blasting away any enemies in your way.

Fan of Knives isn't essential, but it does help in fights against multiple enemies and at worst it serves as another version of Blade Dance. Knife Trap is an alternate finisher card, targeting an enemy with every Shiv you have in your exhaust pile, and it works surprisingly well even when you don't have tens of Shivs in your deck.

The Silent card tier list

The Silent has access to so many amazing cards that don't necessarily fit any of the archetypes, but they're so game-changing that you need to include them when you encounter them. Practically anything in the S-tier of cards can be included in most decks, so don't feel bad if you have to prioritize some of them over the deck you're building towards.

Here's our Silent card tier list, ranking cards from best to worst:

That's everything you need to know about playing The Silent in Slay the Spire 2. If you want to learn how to play some of the more difficult characters, be sure to read our character guides on Regent, Necrobinder, and Ironclad to understand how they work.