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Malaise is a Rare card for The Silent which permanently reduces one enemy's Icon Strength Strength and applies many turns of Icon Weak Weak. As an X-cost card, it consumes all remaining Energy when played.

Strength Reduction is applied before Weak, and will be negated by Icon Artifact Artifact in that sequence. Enemy with 1 Artifact charge will have only Weak applied on them, as Strength Reduction is blocked. 2 or more Artifact charges will completely nullify this card's effect, removing 2 Artifact charges in the process.

Upgrading Malaise increases the Strength loss and Weak count by 1. This will trigger even if you play Malaise with 0 Energy remaining, effectively applying 1 Icon Strength Strength Loss and 1 Icon Weak Weak for no cost.

Strategy[]

Malaise is a deceptively strong card. It has a potential to be the strongest source of permanent Strength reduction. Its Strength reduction severely punishes the Snake Plant, Hexaghost, and other enemies that rely on multi-strike, low damage attacks. Its Weak applied can also cripple a hard-hitting enemy for many turns.

The Silent has access to a number of Energy-increasing cards, which can power Malaise up further.

Synergies[]

  • Well-Laid Plans can Icon Retain Retain Malaise until a turn with respectably generated Energy.
  • Burst interacts with Malaise the same way as any other X-cost card: Malaise will be played twice at X Strength, where X is the amount of Energy remaining.
    • For example, playing Burst at energy 3, then playing Malaise (with 2 energy), will reduce Strength by 4 and apply 4 Weak (barring Artifact). This is particularly powerful with ChemicalX Chemical X, as the bonus application is applied twice.
  • Malaise applies two debuffs for the purpose of Sadistic Nature.
  • IceCream Ice Cream helps the Silent accumulating energy even further.
  • ChemicalX Chemical X overperforms with this card, permanently reducing an enemy's Strength by two or three points for free.
  • PaperCrane Paper Krane cripples enemy even further with empowered Weak, softens even a single, hard-hitting attack to be more manageable.
    • Malaise can also applies a longer-lasting Weak with a single use, making PaperCrane Paper Krane even more effective in a longer fight.
  • BagofMarbles Bag of Marbles, RedMask Red Mask, and TwistedFunnel Twisted Funnel help clear innate Icon Artifact Artifact charges to allow Malaise to be used with its full potential.
  • Hexaghost, Snake Plant, and Byrd are severely crippled by this card, as they mostly rely on multiple hits attack.
  • Malaise, especially its upgraded form, can be used to clear 2 stacks of Icon Artifact Artifact in a clutch. This is generally not advised, but it can be used in a case that you want to apply other debuff, such as Icon Poison Poison.
  • Corrupt Heart can have its Blood Shots, a rapid attack, nullified once with Malaise. However, its Strength Reduction will be periodically cleared, and its first use of Buff grants it 2 charges of Artifact, making future Malaise harder to use.
    • Corrupt Heart however cannot remove Icon Weak Weak via Buff and has to wait until it runs out, which could be invaluable if Weak is applied beforehand in a large quantity.
  • Malaise is very impractical when there is a large number of enemies, as you can use it on only one of them and it consumes all of your remaining Energy.
  • Enemies with innate Artifact, such as Sentry, Spheric Guardian, and Donu and Deca make it harder to efficiently or quickly use Malaise.
    • Donu and Deca are especially good at countering this card. They come in a pair, have innate 2 or 3 charges of Artifact and steadily and rapidly scale their Strength up, rendering Malaise moot in no time.
  • The Champ, Awakened One, and Time Eater can remove all debuffs. While Malaise could make the beginning of the fight easier, you could potentially still have to face their fully-powered attack later in the fight.
    • All three of them can also regain Strength lost before gaining even more Strength to top it off.
    • Awakened One and Time Eater also regain their health, making the long fight much harder.

Update History[]

  • Weekly Patch 34: Malaise
    • Malaise card is now Rare (was Uncommon).
  • Weekly Patch 10: Quality of Life
    • Removing 'Spend all [R].' from all X-cost cards for consistency.
    • Fixed bug where cost X cards do not work with energy gain cards if played too fast.
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