Inscryption cards guide: The best Scrybe starting deck for Act 2

So, you’ve just escaped Leshy’s Cabin after defeating all the bosses and solving all the secret puzzles. That means you’ve reached Act 2 of Inscryption, a world that’s akin to an old-school RPG (think Game Boy graphics). Now, you have to make a choice regarding your starting deck. Here’s our Inscryption guide to help you with the best Scrybe starting decks for Act 2.

Note: For more information, check out our Inscryption guides and features hub.

Inscryption cards guide – The best Scrybe starting deck for your journey in Act 2

To be clear, this just means that your character will have a starting deck with multiple cards that follow a particular theme for that Scrybe. However, you’ll still acquire additional cards as you explore (seen below). The problem is that cards follow a certain mechanic, and some might be too complex or confusing at this stage. In any case, I’ll list down the ones that I was able to obtain.

Note: If you want to try other choices down the line, you can copy “Savefile.gwsave” and “Savefile-Backup.gwsave” from the game’s Steam installation directory. You should find these files in: steamapps\common\Inscryption.

Grimora: Scrybe of the Dead

Here’s Grimora’s starting deck in Inscryption:

• Skeleton – 1/1; free; perishes after attacking.
• Draugr – 0/1; 1 bone; can’t be sacrificed; release a creature inside it when it perishes.
• Gravedigger – 0/3; 1 bone; generates +1 bone at the end of your turn.
• Zombie – 1/1; 2 bones.
• Frank & Stein – 2/2; 5 bones.

Grimora‘s cards rely heavily on generating and managing bone tokens. This option is actually viable since there’s no resource deck in Act 2. Without a Squirrel pile that you can pull cards from each turn, you’ll want to ensure that you have cards that rely on a different resource. Likewise, the battle interface has a hammer icon that lets you destroy your cards whenever you wish. Since you obtain bones from various means, like the Gravedigger and whenever your cards get destroyed/killed/sacrificed, you can amass bones often.

Leshy: Scrybe of Beasts

Here’s Leshy’s starting deck in Inscryption:

• Squirrel – 0/1; free.
• Stoat – 1/2; 1 blood.
• Warren – 0/2; 1 blood; when played, a Rabbit (0/1) is created in your hand.
• Adder – 1/1; 2 blood; automatically cause a creature to perish when it’s damaged by this card.
• Hawk – 3/1; 2 blood; directly damage your foe even if there’s another creature opposing it.

Personally, I think this is one of the best starting decks for the second act of Inscryption. You’ll get seven Squirrel cards and five Warren cards (with those free Rabbits). You do need some RNG luck for them to pop up. But, once you’ve beaten your first opponent (preferably one of Grimora’s minions), you can offset this issue with additional cards that use the bone resource as mentioned above.

PO3: Scrybe of Technology

Here’s PO3’s starting deck in Inscryption:

• L33pB0t – 0/2; 1 energy; blocks a creature with the Airborne sigil.
• 49er – 1/1; 2 energy; will move to the direction inscribed in the sigil at the end of your turn.
• Automaton – 1/1; 3 energy.
• Thick Droid – 1/3; 5 energy.
• Steambot – 2/2; 6 energy.

P03’s cards have a slightly more complicated mechanic due to the energy resource. This appears as a blue bar at the upper-left corner of your HUD when you’re engaged in a battle. By default, you start with +1 energy, and it increases gradually every turn.

There are other factors to take note of, such as cards that can boost energy build-up, as well as support cards that can buff your robots. However, this usually means waiting for each turn to pass until you have the energy you need for better robots. Likewise, if support circuits get destroyed, you’ll lose the buffs, too.

Magnificus: Scrybe of Magicks

Here’s Magnificus’ starting deck in Inscryption:

• Emerald Mox, Ruby Mox, and Sapphire Mox – Free; can’t be sacrificed; used as resources so you can place down other cards (explained below).
• Mage Pupil – 1/1; free; destroyed if there are no Mox cards on the board.
• Junior Sage; 1/2; Emerald Mox.
• Mage Knight – 1/3; Ruby Mox; destroyed if there are no Mox cards on the board.
• Blue Mage – 0/1; Sapphire Mox; draw cards equal to the number of Mox cards on the board.

Magnificus cards are quite powerful, but their mechanics are even more complex due to the usage of Mox. These are magic crystals that pertain to a specific color (i.e., green, blue, or orange). Several creatures in this category require a Mox card with the matching color before you can place them down. In some examples, like the Mage Pupil and Mage Knight mentioned above, the cards will be destroyed if you don’t have Mox crystals on the board. This can also happen if an opposing creature destroys that Mox card, so watch out if your enemy likes to use swarm tactics.

Building your deck and the auto-complete option

If you press the tab key, you’ll see all the cards and their respective categories. You can click on 20 of the ones that you want to use in upcoming battles.

You may also click on the auto-complete button to have a deck readied immediately. As you obtain additional cards from battles and chests, you can mix and match accordingly to come up with a hybrid deck.

The world map in Act 2 of Inscryption

The interface might be quite different, and the mechanics and deckbuilding might be confusing at first, but combat during Act 2 of Inscryption still follows the same rules.

Anyway, to progress further in Act 2 of Inscryption, you’ll head to Grimora’s Crypt, Leshy’s Cabin, P03’s Factory, and Magnificus’ Mage Tower. Likewise, there are secrets and tricks, such as the Myconid Key, Bone Lord Key, and unlimited Foil/Ouroboros exploit.

Inscryption is available on Steam. For more information, check out our guides and features hub.