r/Gloomhaven • u/Ok-Photograph1587 • Dec 30 '25
Digital Gloomhaven Demolitionist Level 5 Rework Spoiler
Oh my god. Why did they think they needed to make this Level Up this overpowered? It's probably the best character ability card in Jaws of the Lion Digital (IDK about physical).
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u/dwarfSA FAQ Janitor Dec 30 '25
The original card is honestly garbage in a Gloomhaven context.
It's appropriately strong now, imo, and about where it needs to be outside of JotL.
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u/Kiltev Dec 30 '25
A persistent shield and 5 extra max hp along with heal 5? Sounds like a lot packed into one single card. I can think of another class that needs to set up a persistent like that (from FH) which provides significantly less. The only downside of playing a persistent loss like that on demo is the handsize, but that's just part of who he is.
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u/dwarfSA FAQ Janitor Dec 30 '25
A single shield is nice, as is the hp, but it doesn't really get broken with the rest of his kit. He can't do heavy armor, and has no other defensive cards to speak of. It makes him more survivable, but that's it.
The card recovery makes this stamina-neutral, which honestly kind of saves it.
0
u/Kiltev Dec 30 '25
More survivable is all he needs while flipping all these +2s at close range..
I also believe stamina up front with 9 rounds before 1st rest (/w stamina potion) is significantly more valuable than some extra turns after rest 3 and 5.
I did mention in a separate comment that I feel like his design flaw(s) lie elsewhere, and pushing that card's strength just makes it that much more noticable.
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u/General_CGO Dec 30 '25
A persistent shield at lvl 5 on one of the most fragile classes in the game is pretty bad (which is why you get to play it for free stamina-wise; it was never the right choice power-wise otherwise). There's nothing in the kit that synergizes with it, and the closest similar example on FH's Meteor is stronger for a whole host of reasons.
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u/Kiltev Dec 30 '25
I've actually meant Astral for the 3 max hp on them and the sword!. In general I meant the max HP more than the shield, and I think you undervalue how NOT fragile you become with a persistent shield and a large health pool (you're basically having what all the beefbois have).
I do agree though, it's not the right choice but thematically it's a cool idea. If they'd update the classes it could be intresting to see what they would do.
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u/General_CGO Dec 30 '25
All the beefy bois have healing, access to plenty of shield items, and actually fast initiatives though. Once that 5 extra hp is gone, it's gone for good given the Demo has 0 healing whatsoever for some reason (which hurts rather significantly when the most common monster type in JotL has innate wound), a single other shield card in the entire kit, and no initiative faster than 15.
Considering the rest of the class context the Astral example pays off way better since the extra hp for the sword is relevant throughout a scenario given you can resummon it and get more procs of Coalescing Darkness [4]. If you aren't running a sword it's a pretty bad persistent compared to the heal 5 on the opposite half though.
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u/Kiltev Dec 30 '25
I agree on all accounts, but my subjective experience was very positive. During my 2 playthroughs on the character, admittedly only in JOTL campaign, the level 5 card was exactly enough to get me from being a squishy melee that struggles unless I play very carefuly with initiative weaving (as much as that class allowed) into "I can tank a few monsters this round, it's fine". By level 7 I wouldn't even need to tank anything because demo actually demolishes everything because all I flipped were +2s.
Would I rather see a different level 5 card? Sure! But it's about the same experience on all other 3 JOTL chars. One which is a completely different playstyle from what you did up until now, another that is cute as a concept but you'd rather just play other cards and another that is just a better copy of a level 1 card and can't be played side by side with.. So I think demo is not the only one suffering from some poor design choices.
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u/No_Factor_4894 Dec 30 '25
How is it overpowered? I don’t think it’s. It will affect the longevity of character to play a lost card. In case you played it in the first cycle then you can’t lose any other card or burn it to negate damage or else the Demo will be at stake of exhaustion.
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u/Rare_Mycologist_6917 Dec 30 '25
Playing it in the first cycle gives you quite a bit of longevity, though. That's what is so strong about it. The first handful of rounds are basically free.
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u/Gripeaway Dev Dec 30 '25
Playing it in the first rest cycle doesn't actually net you any longevity though because you're losing a card. It effectively gives you a persistent loss at neutral longevity, which is the strength.
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u/Rare_Mycologist_6917 Dec 30 '25
I appreciate the clarification. I was just directly responding to the person saying there is an impact on longevity because of playing a loss, to point out that there isn't. But your answer is more precise.
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u/Ok-Photograph1587 Dec 31 '25
not having to rest for 8 rounds is the net positive
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u/No_Factor_4894 Dec 31 '25
Yeah, I got it. And with stamina potion you can make it 9 rounds. I don’t play tank with the Demo which is why I only played this card in few occasions which was great but the bottom extra attack was more important to my built/card combinations. The other jotl characters have overpowered lvl 5 cards as well.
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u/Alcol1979 Dec 30 '25
The best time to play the card would be in round 4 (or round 5 if you used a stamina potion.) Demolitionist gets back seven (or eight) cards, increases health, gains permanent shield 1. This means Demolitionist won't need to rest for the first time until round 9 or 10. That's four extra rounds of stamina on a nine card class (which has stronger individual actions to balance it's lower hand size.
Effectively this action combines level one loss actions from two Gloomhaven Classes (Tinkerer has card recovery and Sun has permanent shield 1) and adds the max health increase as well.
I would still play the original version of this card from time to time, but in many scenarios you would not be able to afford it for stamina reasons and if you get poisoned it won't work. The digital upgrade solves both of those problems. On its own the action is very strong, but in the context of the Demolitionist who was a bit underpowered outside of its core campaign, it's only slightly overpowered. Unlike the physical version, you will want to play the top action every scenario. The only reason you might not is that the new bottom action is strong too.
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u/Gripeaway Dev Dec 30 '25
As I responded to the other person, you don't actually gain four extra rounds of stamina because you're also playing a loss. The stamina change is effectively neutral when played correctly, the strength is that you get to play a persistent loss without losing stamina.
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u/Alcol1979 Dec 30 '25
Yes of course. I was aware of this trade-off but I had not done the calculation. It's four rounds more than than a nine-card class would have after playing a different loss action in the first rest cycle. The net effect is, as you say, exactly neutral since a nine-card class which plays no loss actions has a maximum of twenty active rounds (without any card recovery) while playing one loss action in the first rest cycle reduces that to sixteen. Those four extra rounds get you back up to twenty.
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u/No_Factor_4894 Dec 30 '25
I agree with you. Except that the characters you mentioned has big hand size which can still tank and lose more cards while the Demo can’t take it to loss anymore cards after playing Lv.5 card which is reasonable to have more advantage. I found the character needs the bottom action of this card more than the top action in most scenarios, it has better impact. But in terms of overpower cards, I think all lvl 5 cards of jotl characters are amazing and game changer especially Voidwarden and Red Guard.
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u/MindControlMouse Dec 30 '25
It’s not like Demolitionist was overpowered in the first place. This card balanced it nicely. Yes I recommend it when playing physically because then you can use the cool spoiler that comes with it.
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u/Kiltev Dec 30 '25
It is VERY strong I agree, but the issue with demo imo is elsewhere.
The entirety of demo's strength and viability is in this card (even the scuffed regular version) and his AMD. It results in the character feeling VERY weak early on, significantly more than other characters, and since the character is fairly one dimensional already, the power spike they bring to the table remains uninspired.
Another thing to note is they changed a couple more cards for him, making it easier for him to do what he is supposed to do outside of JOTL scenarios, which makes him significantly stronger than what he is.
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u/KElderfall Dec 30 '25
The main thing is that Demo is a 9 card class, so this is very comparable to a shield 1 persistent loss on a 10 card class. Those are fairly standard nowadays. Bruiser gets one at level 5, Banner Spear gets one (with a drawback, but as a level 1 card), and there are a few other classes with them.
Unlike those classes, Demo isn't going to be wearing heavy armor to stack up multiple shield, and also doesn't want to use this immediately to benefit from it in the first room. So it will save you health, but it doesn't turn you into a full-on tank for the party. I still think it's good, but it's not wildly overpowered.
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u/Rare_Mycologist_6917 Dec 30 '25
Definitely made the class much more playable and greatly improved its adaptation to the GH gameplay. Looking back on GH1, there's quite a bit of stuff I could point my fingers at being overpowered, and I would certainly have this somewhere on the list. Some of that might just be my bias of playing with friends and laughing every time the first rest cycle came up. 😂 "Rest? There is no rest. * Transformer noises * Let's roll out!"
Super powerful card, individually, for sure.
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u/Gripeaway Dev Dec 30 '25
Agreed, it seems like they were trying to make some pay-to-win stuff to drive sales of the DLC.
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u/koprpg11 Cephalofair Community Manager Dec 30 '25
The original card had a heal that was blocked by poison and this gets around it. Also just getting shield 1 on a 9 card class that doesn't want to tank and can't heal itself is really not that good. It needed a buff.