This guide is to a relatively new modded character which is... The entire USSR. What might seem at first like a joke turns out to actually be a very well thought out and high effort character mod from a chinese modder that is pretty mechanically interesting and has some good writing. It has good writing because every card you get as the USSR is connected to a part of Soviet history, and there is some well thought out jokes in how the card's mechanics synergize and push you towards an effective build that satirizes or exaggerates a piece of history/how we perceive that history. For instance, a Khrushchev centered build pushes you towards using destalinization and planting corn cards, and being constantly cursed by Nato or the Cuban Missle Crisis. The production quality of the mod is quite high.


The Mod can be found here, and all credits go to the those listed within the mod page.

https://steamproxy-script.pipiskins.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2938463316%E6%94%B6%E8%B5%B7

The USSR has 5 key unique mechanics, each of which can be central or secondary to a build.



Communized + Defection

The USSR's most impactful new mechanic is a status effect called Defection which will make enemies attack themselves instead of the player. If status effects are tied to the attack itself, they might be applied to the enemy or negated. Non-attack based debuffs can still be applied to the player. So while you can avoid getting Wound cards you'll still get Dazed cards and Slimed cards. Needless to say, getting the enemy to attack itself is both extra damage and prevents the player from needing to play defensive cards or tank hits, so its pretty powerful if it can be applied consistently. Defection can only be applied if the amount of communized an enemy has is equal or greater than their damage, barring unique modifiers like Thought. Applying Defection consumes all current stacks of communized, and Defection automatically applies when there are enough stacks to meet the enemy's attack damage. If the enemy isn't attacking or is already defected then communized can stack endlessly. The limiting factor to Defection based strats is the need to constantly apply it each turn the enemy attacks and the slow gain of communized applying cards.


Masses + Supporters

The USSR also gets a cross combat resource called Masses that can't be spent, but unlocks power spikes or new abilities in certain cards. Masses increases by 1 each time you kill an enemy who has the Tinder status, which lasts forever and is applied when an enemy first Defects. The Puppet status increases the amount of masses gained by 1 per stack. Supporters are temporary Masses that are only gained and then lost within a single combat. Masses matter because many cards become powerful only after certain amounts of Masses gained, such as the Muslim Revolution card, which becomes a 0/-1 cost 9 dmg attack if you have 20 or more masses, or the Che card, which deals your Masses in AOE dmg every turn for the rest of combat.


Leaders

The 3rd major mechanic of the USSR is its Leader cards, which are all Innate (1st turn) cards that define builds and have abilities which synergize with other cards. Everyone starts with a Leader Lenin, whose ability is to add 1dmg to all attack cards.


Future Cards

Future cards are cards which have a future effect after a stated number of turns. While the concept of a card which has a multiple turn effect is not new, Future cards are a new mechanically distinct category for build purposes.


War Cards

War Cards are cards named after specific historical wars and require an attack card to be sacrificed to play them. They are generally quite powerful to make up for the sacrificial cost. They can be either attack cards or skill cards.

Leader Lenin
The universally beloved leader (among communists) that everyone starts with. They're ability is to add 1dmg to every attack card through the Leader Lenin status, which can be stacked endlessly through the Trotsky power. A Lenin build is characterized by lots of Troskys and low cost attack cards.

Leader Stalin
Stalin's ability is to make Future cards future effects take longer or sooner to occur, and to gain block from using future cards. Upgraded Stalin can delay negative effects. Play lots of Assassinates and Permeates.

Leader Kruschev
Khrushchev can exhaust curses in your hand at the start of your turn, and draw extra cards for each curse exhausted. Intentionally taking curses is the goal. Plant lots of corn and try to destalinze.

Leader Brezhnev
Brezhnev can play war cards without sacrificing attack cards and get some energy for doing so.

Leader Gorbachev
Gorbachev is unique in that it does not give you a synergizing buff, but gives a 0 cost card which can give you 7 gold or heal you 2 hp per turn. The caveat here is that each turn a timer ticks down which will one shot you, and can only be delayed by choosing neither gold or HP. Normally it means you could get an extra 21 gold or 6hp healed per combat, but with a reliable way to duplicate the card, you could get huge benefits of gold or healing.

Leader Marx
Marx is not an Innate leader card, but comes through the Communism Form card which will spawn him in your draw pile. Once activated you will receive a Miracle and acquire the non-upgraded effects of all other leaders, allowing for hybrid plays.

WIP