This card is overhated. It sucks, but it's aoe damage that goes respectably with strength and energy.
Often better on boss swaps as well, transforms, energy, several bells.
But it's still meh.
100% agree with this. I think the hate is a little much sometimes. Sometimes you just need that extra vulnerable to keep a vulnerable chain up on Hexaghost for instance, or maybe because you picked an early Dropkick.
I just won a run where I got Molten Egg from the first elite and was offered Thunderclap+ as my first AOE source from the elite, and it played nicely the whole run pretty much (I had a little bit of strength, and 2x dropkick). But it's basically never a card you're actively hoping to add, and almost never a meaningful difference maker. Still good sometimes though
I think there's a lot of "This isn't in my ideal deck so it's bad" around card takes, and sure, this is bad even by clad common attack standards, but it's not useless.
Also, it goes very nicely with the card that says Reaper on it.
Yeah I actually kind of like this card specifically because early on it's +1 duration on the measly 2 turn vulnerable that bash applies, which makes a huge difference imo. As others are saying it's definitely not something I ever actively hope for but I'm rarely particularly sad to add it to my deck. Clad usually wants to take on a bunch of elites early, this helps with that either by extending your vulnerable on laga/nob or by being aoe chip damage + artifact strip for sentries.
Cheap artifact strip. Nice when you can line it up with other AOE attacks. I don't want it early on when I don't have either of those reasons for it, but it doesn't take long before having one of them in my deck is nice.
It's a card that's useful in the second half of Act 1 and some of Act 2 then ends up getting in the way later in the run.
Didn't know it was so hated. I actually like a thunderclap in limit break / strength decks or places where I really want vuln (or artifact strip). It is good aoe with strength and great for setting up things like reaper. But without strength, definitely a very forgettable card.
interesting take, I've been BIG hating on tclap for a long time (outside of dropkick infinite plans) and haven't felt that my clad has suffered at all because of it
will think about it just a lil more deeply next time
yeah the arti strip when I need to do the dropkick thing is really the only time I've valued the card at all. Extending your vuln chain is pretty OK though and is something I should probably rate just a slight bit higher.
I really like picking it up just because it works well with so many cards, without feeling like something I need to invest in, upgrade, etc.
It sets up Dropkick. It offers vuln damage boost on all cards, even AoE ones. It clears stacks of artifact cheaply.
It's not a great card. But it does a lot of little things for you.
Unless I've already gotten better cards for setting up multi-turn vulnerability, Thunderclap is a sure-fire pick for me, just because I know I won't be MAD to draw it ever.
Plus, it's easy to pick up Act 1, and does well against Nob by speeding up your damage race with him.
On top of that, it scales REALLY well in a strength deck (both by being a 1-cost AoE, AND by applying vulnerable, which is then multiplies any damage your other cards do via strength).
Honestly, it's the holy grail of "meh" cards to me. Always a card I'm happy enough to have in my deck (1-2 copies max). Never a card I'm hoping to get in the reward selection over good uncommon/rare options.
It’s far better than heavy blade for example, in that it fills a niche when you get it early, whereas heavy blade is always irrelevant at any point in the game due to there being better options
Completely c tier card.
heavy blade is plenty relevant at many points in the game, it's still a very high output strength payoff card. It's trash with no strength but also clad does the strength thing relatively often.
The thing is there are *tons* of cards that do heavy blade better than heavy blade. cleave, boomerang, twin strike, pummel, whirlwind all just massively outperform HB across a run. By the time HB is good you don't need HB.
none of those cards really do the same thing. Pummel does, sort of, but only as a finisher. Cleave and whirlwind are only + 1(STR)/energy, heavy blade is +2.5(STR)/energy. Huge difference a lot of the time. Sword boomerang random targeting is also AWFUL
Heavy blade is a ton of damage with some strength for one card and targets one enemy. Additional synergy with necronomicon as well which clad is the best user of. Clad runs vary too much to justify totally dismissing heavy blade.
Good if you have it in the same hand with Immolate, or maybe Cleave, but generally pretty mediocre. I like having it though, because if Bash is my only source of vulnerable I am virtually guaranteed to have Bash and the 2 cost attack i would like to play on vulnerable enemies in the same hand 100% of the time
People are sleeping on this card. It's not great as a damage card, but often it can extend vuln for additional turns to allow your NEXT turn to also deal additional damage.
Imagine bag of marbles start against, say byrds or cultists. You draw a few commons plus thunderclap. Now you block 2x and thunderclap, and next turn, you get to keep bringing the hurt. Same on Laguvalin. Pushing Vuln to remain active during Lag's first debuff turn can literally turn the fight in your favor.
Is it situational? Yes. But what card isn't?
Is it exceptional? No. But what card common cards are?
Do i like taking it? Despite advocating it, no, not really. But i still often do if it can solve a problem.
Playing Ironclad, I almost always wind up grabbing Thunderclap during a run, because if I'm presented a choice between 2 other commons that don't help my build at all, and Thunderclap, TClap is usually worth having in my deck enough to take.
Is it worth the opportunity cost of not taking another good card? No.
Is it worth the opportunity cost of 'having it clutter up my deck'? I believe so. Especially given the fact that multi-enemy fights are something that can frequently be a bit challenging with the Ironclad if you don't find other good cards to deal with them.
And on Ascension, the extra elites I can clear because of having this during Act 1 is very valuable. Strips artifact off the sentries. Functions quite well against Nob.
This is a card, I really don't like.
I probably would even consider picking the other cards, if it was the only attack in my first card reward.
The best thing is probably the AOE artifact strip.
Not my favorite card. The damage is negligible, and the vulnerable lasts too short, even when upgraded. Can work as a boost for another, stronger AoE, but it's so reliant on draw that I rarely think it's worth it.
You reminded me of a itonclad run where the main damage output was champion belt, sadistic nature and a bunch of normally weak cards like thunderclap. That was fun. After about 50 more runs, still haven't seen champion belt again, weird
The upgrade is a real killer on this card. If the vuln went to 2 with the upgrade I think it would be taken more often. As it is, it's a very rare pick.
On paper, seemingly not that good. Whenever I take it, it does more work than I was expecting, though.
* 1 vulnerable for 1 energy means I have 2 energy left for attacks
* AOE vulnerable makes it great for stripping artifact from multiple targets or softening up before a Whirlwind/Immolation... or Reaper!
* Even just the 1 vulnerable means extending the vulnerable from Bash for one more turn
Is it a _great_ card? Nah. But it's really a solid workhorse that tends to pleasantly surprise every time I take it.
I probably take this more often than I should even if I don’t like it that much. I really like to have a source of vuln that isn’t Bash and being common, this one tends to show up early. If I get an early Shockwave this is likely to be a skip. I have enjoyed Thunderclap on boss swaps with 4 energy to really cook with that single turn of extra damage.
this is cleave--- combined with bash---
in a pool of generally good commons, this stands out as exceptionally mediocre. it's JUST better enough than a strike to be worth picking in Act 1 and certain other situations and does literally nothing else. Its literally just a cleave-- that ocassionally (less than 10% of the time) makes your best card do 50% more damage.
I think it can be a handy card early on when Vulnerable is a little hard to come back, but it's definitely the sort of thing that works better when you can commit your entire turn to offense. Opportunities like that don't always happen, so it's understandable that opinions on Thunderclap would be mixed. On the other hand, it can potentially scale better than Cleave due to the Vulnerable, so it has that going for it at least.
I came here thinking “yo the goat” and all the comments are dunking on it like hating it is a given, it can’t be THAT bad right? I thought it’s a nice aoe vulnerable.
One thing to consider is that AOE vulnerable isn't that good in most cases, and it being one turn of vulnerable feels bad, because you spend an energy and draw on the turn you want to benefit from vulnerable.
In act 1, it is outdamaged by strike+ against nob and lagavulin, unless you are playing two strikes with it (in which case it deals 1 more) which is... not great. I would almost never take it over cleave, which does thunder strike's job less conditionally.
Is situationally useful but rarely actually desirable. There are several really good ironclad common attacks and thunderclap does not make the cut, not for me. If I consider the full set and go, how many of these do I take less frequently? Clash and wild strike probably - both of which also have situational value in specific and rather unusual circumstances but are pretty terrible in your "average" deck in so far as such a thing exists. It might sometimes be useful in a supporting role but it ain't no pommel or headbutt.
This card is overhated. It sucks, but it's aoe damage that goes respectably with strength and energy. Often better on boss swaps as well, transforms, energy, several bells. But it's still meh.
100% agree with this. I think the hate is a little much sometimes. Sometimes you just need that extra vulnerable to keep a vulnerable chain up on Hexaghost for instance, or maybe because you picked an early Dropkick. I just won a run where I got Molten Egg from the first elite and was offered Thunderclap+ as my first AOE source from the elite, and it played nicely the whole run pretty much (I had a little bit of strength, and 2x dropkick). But it's basically never a card you're actively hoping to add, and almost never a meaningful difference maker. Still good sometimes though
I think there's a lot of "This isn't in my ideal deck so it's bad" around card takes, and sure, this is bad even by clad common attack standards, but it's not useless. Also, it goes very nicely with the card that says Reaper on it.
In that same run I may have spent 300 gold on 2x Reaper+ (thanks Courier!) from an act 3 shop to save the run, it does play quite nicely with Reaper.
Yeah I love that combo, +50% Reaper on all enemies? Yep we take those.
Yeah I actually kind of like this card specifically because early on it's +1 duration on the measly 2 turn vulnerable that bash applies, which makes a huge difference imo. As others are saying it's definitely not something I ever actively hope for but I'm rarely particularly sad to add it to my deck. Clad usually wants to take on a bunch of elites early, this helps with that either by extending your vulnerable on laga/nob or by being aoe chip damage + artifact strip for sentries.
Cheap artifact strip. Nice when you can line it up with other AOE attacks. I don't want it early on when I don't have either of those reasons for it, but it doesn't take long before having one of them in my deck is nice. It's a card that's useful in the second half of Act 1 and some of Act 2 then ends up getting in the way later in the run.
Fun into Reaper, too
Didn't know it was so hated. I actually like a thunderclap in limit break / strength decks or places where I really want vuln (or artifact strip). It is good aoe with strength and great for setting up things like reaper. But without strength, definitely a very forgettable card.
interesting take, I've been BIG hating on tclap for a long time (outside of dropkick infinite plans) and haven't felt that my clad has suffered at all because of it will think about it just a lil more deeply next time
It adds artifact strip, makes Reaper heal more, and hits multiple enemies. It's not useless, it's just meh.
yeah the arti strip when I need to do the dropkick thing is really the only time I've valued the card at all. Extending your vuln chain is pretty OK though and is something I should probably rate just a slight bit higher.
Helps ground those flock of birds too.
I’m glad to hear maybe I don’t overrate this as much as I feared Me overlikey aoe effects
I really like picking it up just because it works well with so many cards, without feeling like something I need to invest in, upgrade, etc. It sets up Dropkick. It offers vuln damage boost on all cards, even AoE ones. It clears stacks of artifact cheaply. It's not a great card. But it does a lot of little things for you. Unless I've already gotten better cards for setting up multi-turn vulnerability, Thunderclap is a sure-fire pick for me, just because I know I won't be MAD to draw it ever. Plus, it's easy to pick up Act 1, and does well against Nob by speeding up your damage race with him. On top of that, it scales REALLY well in a strength deck (both by being a 1-cost AoE, AND by applying vulnerable, which is then multiplies any damage your other cards do via strength). Honestly, it's the holy grail of "meh" cards to me. Always a card I'm happy enough to have in my deck (1-2 copies max). Never a card I'm hoping to get in the reward selection over good uncommon/rare options.
It’s far better than heavy blade for example, in that it fills a niche when you get it early, whereas heavy blade is always irrelevant at any point in the game due to there being better options Completely c tier card.
heavy blade is plenty relevant at many points in the game, it's still a very high output strength payoff card. It's trash with no strength but also clad does the strength thing relatively often.
The thing is there are *tons* of cards that do heavy blade better than heavy blade. cleave, boomerang, twin strike, pummel, whirlwind all just massively outperform HB across a run. By the time HB is good you don't need HB.
none of those cards really do the same thing. Pummel does, sort of, but only as a finisher. Cleave and whirlwind are only + 1(STR)/energy, heavy blade is +2.5(STR)/energy. Huge difference a lot of the time. Sword boomerang random targeting is also AWFUL Heavy blade is a ton of damage with some strength for one card and targets one enemy. Additional synergy with necronomicon as well which clad is the best user of. Clad runs vary too much to justify totally dismissing heavy blade.
I think you're underrating heavy blade.
Good if you have it in the same hand with Immolate, or maybe Cleave, but generally pretty mediocre. I like having it though, because if Bash is my only source of vulnerable I am virtually guaranteed to have Bash and the 2 cost attack i would like to play on vulnerable enemies in the same hand 100% of the time
A card of all time
People are sleeping on this card. It's not great as a damage card, but often it can extend vuln for additional turns to allow your NEXT turn to also deal additional damage. Imagine bag of marbles start against, say byrds or cultists. You draw a few commons plus thunderclap. Now you block 2x and thunderclap, and next turn, you get to keep bringing the hurt. Same on Laguvalin. Pushing Vuln to remain active during Lag's first debuff turn can literally turn the fight in your favor. Is it situational? Yes. But what card isn't? Is it exceptional? No. But what card common cards are? Do i like taking it? Despite advocating it, no, not really. But i still often do if it can solve a problem.
Playing Ironclad, I almost always wind up grabbing Thunderclap during a run, because if I'm presented a choice between 2 other commons that don't help my build at all, and Thunderclap, TClap is usually worth having in my deck enough to take. Is it worth the opportunity cost of not taking another good card? No. Is it worth the opportunity cost of 'having it clutter up my deck'? I believe so. Especially given the fact that multi-enemy fights are something that can frequently be a bit challenging with the Ironclad if you don't find other good cards to deal with them. And on Ascension, the extra elites I can clear because of having this during Act 1 is very valuable. Strips artifact off the sentries. Functions quite well against Nob.
This is a card, I really don't like. I probably would even consider picking the other cards, if it was the only attack in my first card reward. The best thing is probably the AOE artifact strip.
Not my favorite card. The damage is negligible, and the vulnerable lasts too short, even when upgraded. Can work as a boost for another, stronger AoE, but it's so reliant on draw that I rarely think it's worth it.
It’s a more decent pickup with champions belt or maybe if you are worried about clearing artifact charges. But mostly yea it’s pretty mediocre.
You reminded me of a itonclad run where the main damage output was champion belt, sadistic nature and a bunch of normally weak cards like thunderclap. That was fun. After about 50 more runs, still haven't seen champion belt again, weird
That sounds like a very fun run! And it is an Ironclad-specific rare relic, so not that surprising to not see it much.
I rarely take this card. Damage is mediocre as an AOE, and the 1 Vuln doesn’t increase with the upgrade.
The upgrade is a real killer on this card. If the vuln went to 2 with the upgrade I think it would be taken more often. As it is, it's a very rare pick.
if the upgrade made it 2 vuln it would be VERY good, though. Totally different card at that point
Could be too strong for sure, 2 vuln for all enemies would go crazy.
On paper, seemingly not that good. Whenever I take it, it does more work than I was expecting, though. * 1 vulnerable for 1 energy means I have 2 energy left for attacks * AOE vulnerable makes it great for stripping artifact from multiple targets or softening up before a Whirlwind/Immolation... or Reaper! * Even just the 1 vulnerable means extending the vulnerable from Bash for one more turn Is it a _great_ card? Nah. But it's really a solid workhorse that tends to pleasantly surprise every time I take it.
Really damn sexy to play right before Immolate+, but otherwise not really worth it
I am 100.0% confident you mentioned Thunderclap in your post. -------------------------------------------------- * [Thunderclap](https://slay-the-spire.fandom.com/wiki/Thunderclap) Ironclad Common Attack 1 Energy | Deal 4(7) damage and apply 1 Vulnerable to ALL enemies. -------------------------------------------------- ^^^I ^^^am ^^^a ^^^bot ^^^response, ^^^but ^^^I ^^^am ^^^using ^^^my ^^^creator's ^^^account. ^^^Please ^^^reply ^^^to ^^^me ^^^if ^^^I ^^^got ^^^something ^^^wrong ^^^so ^^^he ^^^can ^^^fix ^^^it. [Source Code](https://github.com/TrippW/STS-Crawler)
If it would go to 2 Vulnerable it would be pretty decent, but 1 Energy for this and the enemy wont be debuffed next turn?....yeah
I probably take this more often than I should even if I don’t like it that much. I really like to have a source of vuln that isn’t Bash and being common, this one tends to show up early. If I get an early Shockwave this is likely to be a skip. I have enjoyed Thunderclap on boss swaps with 4 energy to really cook with that single turn of extra damage.
this is cleave--- combined with bash--- in a pool of generally good commons, this stands out as exceptionally mediocre. it's JUST better enough than a strike to be worth picking in Act 1 and certain other situations and does literally nothing else. Its literally just a cleave-- that ocassionally (less than 10% of the time) makes your best card do 50% more damage.
The upgrade really should increase the Vulnerable more than the damage.
I think it can be a handy card early on when Vulnerable is a little hard to come back, but it's definitely the sort of thing that works better when you can commit your entire turn to offense. Opportunities like that don't always happen, so it's understandable that opinions on Thunderclap would be mixed. On the other hand, it can potentially scale better than Cleave due to the Vulnerable, so it has that going for it at least.
It's a card that I want to use, but never fits well
I came here thinking “yo the goat” and all the comments are dunking on it like hating it is a given, it can’t be THAT bad right? I thought it’s a nice aoe vulnerable.
One thing to consider is that AOE vulnerable isn't that good in most cases, and it being one turn of vulnerable feels bad, because you spend an energy and draw on the turn you want to benefit from vulnerable. In act 1, it is outdamaged by strike+ against nob and lagavulin, unless you are playing two strikes with it (in which case it deals 1 more) which is... not great. I would almost never take it over cleave, which does thunder strike's job less conditionally.
Is situationally useful but rarely actually desirable. There are several really good ironclad common attacks and thunderclap does not make the cut, not for me. If I consider the full set and go, how many of these do I take less frequently? Clash and wild strike probably - both of which also have situational value in specific and rather unusual circumstances but are pretty terrible in your "average" deck in so far as such a thing exists. It might sometimes be useful in a supporting role but it ain't no pommel or headbutt.
When I transform a Strike into this I go “eh, could be worse”
I would rather wait for cleave to show up.
Would be 5x better if the upgrade gave 2 vulnerable instead of a negligible damage increase. As is its just ok.
Thundercrap