· 3 min read
Welcome to the Vault
Meet Vault Raiders: a nights-and-weekends project blending Slay the Spire's deckbuilding with XCOM's turn-based tactics.
Vault Raiders started as a hobby project. An experiment conducted on nights and weekends, to see if I could build the game I'd always wanted to play.
My goal was to combine Slay the Spire's deckbuilding with XCOM's gritty, turn-based tactics. The result is a new kind of strategy game where building the perfect deck matters just as much as finding the perfect position in every room.
Slay the Spire + XCOM 2. The starting point for Vault Raiders.
Every room is a puzzle
In Vault Raiders, enemies show you what they intend to do before they move. You can see the trouble coming. The fun is working out what to do about it with the hand you've drawn.
Do you get behind cover, find a flank, or change the room entirely? The same cards can lead to a very different turn depending on where you stand and the order you play them.
Deck builders are ultimately about combining cards that turn impossible odds in your favor. I wanted Vault Raiders to give you that same moment of satisfaction when the right cards come together and allow you to storm through a run. Here are four examples from the current build.
Make every bullet count
The Marauder can stack bonuses to each shot, then cash them in with a full magazine. Here, Stim and Hot Reload set up Full Auto. One card empties the magazine, and every round benefits from the setup.
Stim → Hot Reload → Full Auto. Build the damage, then empty the magazine.
Punishing enemy attacks
Take Cover gives you Shield, Deflector Shield reflects the damage it absorbs this turn, and Shield Burn punishes shots that hit it. The enemies' turn becomes part of your damage plan.
Take Cover → Deflector Shield → Shield Burn. Let the incoming fire work against its owners.
Blow it all up
Cover is something you can build around destroying, too. Shrapnel damages enemies beside destroyed cover. Add Pipe Bomb, Dynamite, and Hail of Bombs, and the room becomes a chain of opportunities to cause some serious havoc.
Shrapnel turns destroyed cover into more damage. Explosives do the rest.
Or find a completely different way to play
Ghost, the second character in Vault Raiders, has an entirely different set of tricks than the Marauder. Cloak lets her slip away from the position enemies are tracking and set up an Ambush. Smoke Bomb puts her back into Cloak, then Misdirection moves her Echo into the wrong line of fire. In this example, a Gunner ends up shooting another Gunner.
Cloak → Ambush → Smoke Bomb → Misdirection. Change where the enemies think you are.
Want to play?
Vault Raiders is still in development, and I'd love to get more people playing it. I want to hear about the builds you find, the turns that feel great, and the places where the game leaves you confused.
If that sounds like your kind of game, join the Discord and let me know you'd like to playtest. I'll share the next steps there. You can also wishlist Vault Raiders on Steam and follow this diary as I keep building it.