Defect card rankings

His strongest Defect card: universal boss scaling that needs no upgrade and is easy to support in the game's slower fights.

The double-evoke buff makes this an exceptional payoff for Dark, Glass, and Lightning Orbs, often ending fights outright.

Permanent Focus is among the strongest scaling available, though the upgrade is important enough to create real campfire pressure.

A nearly universal one-card block solution that efficiently fills Orb slots and remains reusable without an upgrade.

Premium front-loaded Frost that fits almost every deck and can solve dangerous multi-enemy openings by itself.

An enormous damage-and-defense package: Weak buys time while its Dark Orb grows into a fight-ending payoff.

One of the easiest commons to take repeatedly; Frost is excellent early and it naturally enables Hailstorm.

The built-in passive trigger makes Dark strategies accelerate quickly, especially alongside Null, Shadow Shield, and Shatter.

Defect's best damage Power: one Frost Orb turns it into consistent hallway and boss damage while the deck focuses on blocking.

Effectively three Cold Snaps in one card, providing dense damage and Frost that scales well with Defect's burst energy.

An acceptable block card and Status enabler that rises to the top because it is a one-card Aeonglass solution.

Defect's best energy engine, turning its naturally Power-heavy decks into smooth draw-and-energy engines after an important upgrade.

Reliable passive draw that supports temporary Focus decks and is slow enough to pay off in every current boss fight.

A run-winning build-around: once upgraded to Innate, every created Status produces substantial random Orb output.

It grows into an Apparition-sized block surprisingly quickly and becomes a dependable answer to a dangerous turn.

Excellent turn-one protection that saves HP without bloating later draws, with few current fights punishing its Innate timing.

Stops several game-defining large hits and is generically strong enough that even its upgrade can justify Defect's scarce campfire time.

Exceptional draw with extensive Status synergies, but actively awkward in slow, compact Frost decks that repeatedly reshuffle.

Wonderful Frost and draw for many engines, but inefficient in fast Status decks and less dense than Defect's premium Frost cards.

Excellent passive block in slower multi-Orb decks, but effectively does nothing when a fast engine intends to win immediately.

The best temporary Focus card and outstanding when that plan matters, but some established engines avoid temporary Focus entirely.

A strong early block-and-Dark package that becomes unnecessary once a deck has already solved both damage and defense.

Excellent when extra Orb slots matter; otherwise its repeated, increasingly expensive redraw becomes a meaningful liability.

A massive short-term Focus spike whose downside rarely matters in the damage-Orb decks that want it.

Defect's strongest burst-energy option after Subroutine, provided the deck has enough draw and retrieval to spend it productively.

A premium common multi-hit that can carry early damage and scale with Orb slots, Strength, relics, and enchantments.

A dependable early block common whose delayed energy remains useful without requiring any Status payoff.

A powerful engine and combo enabler, though early draw order and its important Exhaust-removing upgrade can be awkward.

Dense block with enormous Status payoff potential, especially for Flak Cannon, Trash to Treasure, or Compact plus Iteration.

Strong temporary Focus when upgraded or supported by abundant draw, but a dead card in decks that do not need that scaling.

A less consistent Status payoff than Trash to Treasure, but its ability to trivialize Aeonglass makes it highly valuable on this patch.

A strong early damage common that opens temporary-Focus lines, especially after its high-value upgrade or with Strike Dummy.

Permanent Focus is rarer, but Dark Orbs are powerful enough that repeating the rightmost Orb still provides excellent scaling.

A strong Barrage and multi-Orb enabler that naturally fits Subroutine decks, but some fast or Status-heavy decks ignore Orb slots.

Common, efficient draw that fits most engines and becomes especially productive when multiple Orb types are present.

The until-played cost reduction makes this reliable free damage in any deck creating Status cards, especially when upgraded.

Flexible energy for draw-heavy engines with the added benefit that its Void activates Defect's new Status payoffs.

Energy-hungry but powerful enough as a Dark Orb payoff to justify building draw and energy around it.

Weak remains excellent, but Null outclasses it and its low-density output can fall off quickly or miss enemy attack turns.

Primarily a strong two-card engine with Compact, ensuring Status cards are drawn and converted cleanly after reshuffling.

Better supported than before by Boost Away, TURBO, Overclock, Chill+, and Hotfix, though it still needs the right zero-cost pool.

Broken once Status payoffs exist and weak without them; Charge Battery is the safer speculative block common.

A valuable early AoE solve whose multi-hit and Glass Orbs exploit enchantments and dangerous multi-enemy matchups.

Outstanding combo-enabling draw once energy exists, but too energy-dense to add before the deck can support it.

A solid early block-and-AoE card that adds Glass for Compile Driver and Coolant, but lacks the ceiling of premium options.

A major early boost to Strikes and Defends that can anchor a non-Orb plan, though it becomes harder to add later.

Usually free output, but card-count relics, Aeonglass, and occasional draw-condition failures keep it from being an automatic addition.

The one-cost Exhaust rework makes Plasma easy to add and much stronger, though the placement remains relatively untested.

An exceptional Dark Orb payoff in the decks built for it, but usually inferior to other Ancient choices without Dark support.

Provides useful Frost and Dark access, but two energy is inefficient now that better dedicated Orb cards exist.

Awkward generic Dark access, yet an explosive fast damage engine when paired with Shatter.

Random Powers are unreliable, but Subroutine can turn Creative AI into a bizarre and genuinely strong energy-and-scaling engine.

A flexible delayed-energy card with useful curse and hand-clog cleanup, but it needs draw and a real energy payoff.

Extremely strong with a worthwhile scaling Power, but both its target requirement and valuable upgrade make it situational.

A serviceable persistent AoE solve whose Rare timing is often too late compared with Hailstorm, Refract, or Glasswork.

Powerful only after both a five-energy enabler and a reason to exploit the resulting Plasma engine already exist.

Excellent AoE inside a developed Status flowchart and essentially unpickable everywhere else.

A strong early fight and AoE solution that does not contribute to Defect's late-game engine and is punished by more matchups.

Free draw with growing downsides from curses, large opening hands, and slower fights where reshuffling early is undesirable.

Substantial damage with repeated Lightning evokes, but those payoffs usually require other niche Lightning cards first.

A solid early common and Lightning entry point that falls off sharply as soon as a real engine appears.

The buff makes it acceptable early damage with occasional free-Power upside, though Navegreed remains uncertain about it.

An early damage solution trapped in the Rare pool; it arrives too late and cannot solve meaningful late-game damage.

Perfectly serviceable early damage, but comprehensively outclassed by Defect's unfairer common and uncommon options.

The weakest energy option unless upgraded, supported by Ice Cream, or used with four base Energy.

Usually a worse Barrage that adds a Slimed, though multi-hit enchantment scaling can justify an emergency early copy.

Definitionally fair block: useful when an early Underdocks deck lacks better defense and unexciting everywhere else.

A fair common AoE fallback when the deck must solve multi-enemy fights before finding stronger uncommon options.

Mediocre but functional early damage that enters only when the deck is desperate for a basic attack.

A multi-hit engine payoff with too many moving parts and too little utility for a Rare card.

Can become a full damage solution with Claw or other zero-cost attacks, but badly wants an upgrade and existing support.

Acceptable multi-hit damage whose random replay becomes worthwhile only after removing Strikes or assembling unusual support.

Can explode in zero-cost decks, but often discards crucial Defragment or Echo Form setup cards.

Power-heavy Lightning decks can make it excellent, but Lightning often pushes out Defect's stronger Orb types.

The upgraded card deals real damage, but spending a scarce Defect upgrade on an Attack requires a narrow situation.

Only attractive when a physical-damage deck or a large enchanted multi-hit specifically needs Vulnerable.

Needs Game Piece, Mummified Hand, an upgrade, or abundant draw before its random Power is worth the slot.

Almost never worth taking outside a dedicated Lightning payoff such as Voltaic or an early Metronome.

Best Defect card for every deck

A poor unupgraded card that becomes acceptable only when it arrives upgraded or no better upgrade target exists.

Far too expensive and setup-dependent outside multiplayer, despite eventually scaling in a dedicated Lightning deck.

A begrudging emergency AoE Rare whose Focus loss clashes with nearly every normal Defect strategy.