Gloomhaven – Triangle Class Guide

So now that I have played Triangles all the way through 9th level I wanted to put a guide out there for the character. I guess less of a guide (“take these cards and build your character this way!”) and more of a review/talk about my experience with the character sort of thing. Obviously there will be huge spoilers for the Triangle class, so be warned! One other warning: this post is looooooooooooong 🙂

The Elementalist (Triangles) is, not surprisingly, all about generating and using elements. At low levels you start mostly using the 4 “basic” ones (Fire, Ice, Air, Nature) and eventually incorporate the “advanced” ones (Light, Dark) into your deck. The Elementalist is versatile, a little unpredictable, and a character that you both have to plan ahead with and react to when you play him. Some people don’t care for him (my group was super happy I got him instead of one of them) but I love him. He’s like a classic D&D wizard: starts out weak, but gets more and more powerful as you level up until he can devastate entire groups of monsters.

How much you enjoy the Elementalist and how your experience goes is going to depend on several factors: Prosperity level of the town, number of other characters, and the makeup of the rest of your party (both characters and players). That’s true for all characters of course, but I think it’s especially so for the Elementalist. I was the first retiree in our group and we were only at Prosperity level 2, so that made it a bit rougher on me than it would others (I didn’t know that at the time of course, I was still very new to the game). If the other players in your group are willing to help you out by buying a Mana Potion or other helpful item, letting you loot once in a while, and generating elements for you when they can it will make your life a lot easier.

Let’s take a look at the first level cards and I’ll give you my take on them.

 

These 4 cards are going to be staples early on in your career. The basic idea with the Elementalist is to create elements on one turn then use them the next. Create, use, create, use. Incidentally, that’s one reason you almost never want to long rest as the Elementalist; long resting means you won’t be able to create elements (there are exceptions…) and you’ll have to start your elemental generation all over again, putting you a turn behind. At low levels these cards will be one of your biggest ways to create those elements. Each one has a Move 2, an element generation, and good initiative. The bottoms are very similar but with the varying tops they play differently:

• Stoking Hail is a nice reusable stun attack if you can generate some Ice for it, and will be something you can use for quite a while.
• Infernal Vortex and Lava Eruption both have losses on top, but they can be extremely powerful. They are cards you can use all the way to the upper levels. IV can easily hit 3 or 4 creatures for pretty good damage, and LE can hit ungodly numbers of creatures for low damage. They both also create at least two elements for you and very possibly more. And they have the best two initiatives of the group.
• Tremulant Cyclone is the least useful of the four; I used it a bit at low levels but it got subbed out pretty quickly. Nature isn’t the most useful element, and the top attack is not all that great.

 

 

These 2 cards are similar in that they have a reusable attack up top that can be enhanced and a loss attack on the bottom. Their usefulness is pretty marginal; the bottom loss is never going to be worth it except at the end of a scenario, and in the meantime you’re stuck with either a Move 2 or a so-so attack.

• Ice Spikes – I used this a little bit at the very beginning. 2 attack with Wound isn’t amazing, but it’s not bad. Of course without fire it’s terrible. It didn’t last too long in my deck.
• Frigid Torrent is just plain bad. A melee attack? No thanks! Even if you “power it up” it’s still not that great, especially for our fragile Elementalist. I never used it.

 

Ah yes, Formless Power. This was the first card I played (for the bottom of course) in many scenarios. I found that if I didn’t play it first I had trouble playing it later, since you would usually need to start moving right away. Gets you 2 XP (it’s not on this image for some reason, but trust me it’s there) and is a consistent way to boost damage. Is particularly great for all those wonderful AOEs. I never took it out of my deck.

 

Ugh, and now for its ugly cousin, Shaping the Ether. I played this in my very first scenario with the Elementalist and then never again. The penalty is just too big for what you get. I actually really like the top; stunning 2 targets, an XP, and 3 range is fantastic. But I never was able to squeeze it into my deck for even a trial run. It’s really hard to put a card in your deck when you know you’re only going to ever use one half of it.

 

Pure Augmentation and Raw Enhancement are the exact same card with the elements flipped around. These will be staples for you at lower levels. Move 3 by itself is acceptable, and making it a Move 5 or Move 7 is fantastic (and gets you an XP). The attack up top isn’t great unless you have both elements, but if you have those and one more for Formless Power, Attack 6 Range 3 (again with an XP) is great. I took PA out first since I moved away from the Nature element, but RE stayed in my deck for a fair length of time.

 

Encompassing Shadow seems like it might be decent; good initiative, Invisibility is always handy, and it generates an element. If you could target yourself with the Invisibility this card would be a winner, but unfortunately you can’t, and the bottom is basically a default Move 2; when you’re the squishy mage the idea is to not get targeted at all, not get targeted at disadvantage. I used it the first time I played the character but never went back to it, although I thought about it once or twice for specific scenarios.

 

Malleable Evocation is a crazy card. It was also the first card we saw when I opened the Elementalist’s box (and that was the first new box we opened), so it was like, “Umm, what the heck…?” It’s hard to use because at low levels you won’t have enough element generation to make it worthwhile, but when you get to the point where you do have a lot of elements you’ll want to do other things with them. I like the bottom much more than the top; the Shield doesn’t matter, but the other three abilities are nice to have available. The big problem with this card is the top: 1 XP is nice, but Range 2 is a huge drawback. The difference between Range 2 and Range 3 doesn’t sound like much, it’s only 1 hex, but it makes an enormous difference. You’re in so much more danger at 2 hexes away than you are at 3, that it makes the top attack hard to use. I did have this card in my deck for a while during the middle levels but I never really got much usage out of it.

 

I think Brilliant Flash is a very underrated card. Loot actions on the bottom are not ideal, but the Elementalist only has 2 Loot actions in his entire deck (this and a 4th level card….well and a 9th level card but come on), so you take what you can get. And you do need to do some Looting, because you’re going to want to buy lots of items and enhancements to make this character shine. I think you need to have this card in your deck just for that reason. And you don’t need to wait until there’s 5 or 6 coins around you to use the Loot; if you can grab 2 or 3 that’s great. More is a nice bonus. With my group I was lucky to get any coins so I had to grab what I could.

As for the top, Heal 3 Range 3 is pretty standard for a level 1 card, but the great thing about this is it generates a Light element for you. That’s nice for 2 reasons:

• You don’t have a lot of uses for Light at low levels, but it’s perfect to feed to Formless Power for that +1 Attack, saving the other elements for another use.
• You can use it to generate an element even when there are no monsters in range because you can heal someone (including yourself) even if they’re not hurt. You can’t attack unless you have a valid target though, so sometimes (such as when you start a scenario with no monsters in your face) this will be the only way to generate an element with your top action.

I kept this card in my deck until 8th level, where I got a perfect replacement for the top and by that time I didn’t really care about gold anyway.

OK, that takes us through all the cards available at 1st level. You’re typically not going to be playing the Elementalist at 1st level since your Prosperity level will be higher than 1 by the time you unlock him, allowing you to start at a higher level. I started him at level 2, which is probably the lowest level you’ll see in most cases. But for a 1st level deck I would recommend something like:

• All 4 of the Move 2 element generators
• Formless Power
• Raw Enhancement and Pure Augmentation
• Brilliant Flash
• Ice Spikes
• One more filler card, depending on what looks like it will be most useful in that scenario

OK, let’s look at the higher level cards:

 

When I first created my Elementalist I took Boiling Arc because I didn’t even realize it was a melee attack. Having played two mages so far (the Spellweaver and the Elementalist) I still get confused whenever I run into a melee ability (“What, stand right next to someone and attack, what is this?!”)

After one session I asked the group if they would mind if I switched to Crystallizing Blast and of course they didn’t care. The Move 4 on the bottom of both cards is very nice (and worth an enhancement, either with a +1 or a Jump), but the added ability is worthless (I never used the Shield on CB once). It’s the top attacks that make the difference: the melee on BA is going to be very difficult for us to use safely, whereas CB has killer range (remember, only 1 of those hexes has to be within Range 3, and it doesn’t even need a target on it) and tons of element generation potential. This is a card you will use over and over again, and a popular choice for your Stamina Potions.

 

 

3rd level brings us 2 pretty similar cards. Both have an interesting AOE loss attack on top that can generate 2 XP. Some people like Chain Lightning for its top attack, but I think Burial’s top attack is just as good, and the bottom is worlds better. Having a bottom attack is so so nice because it gives you a nice bit of versatility and lets you get in 2 attacks on turns you don’t need to move. With good range and the ability to generate an element (one that will be essential later), Burial was the easy choice for me. I used the bottom attack often, and got some good mileage out of the top loss attack when the situation called for it. Attacking is much better in Gloomhaven than healing, because if you can kill a monster it prevents the need to heal at all. And it’s more fun of course.

 

 

4th level was the first choice that I struggled with. I really wanted both cards, but I ended up taking Primal Duality. The best initiative in the whole Elementalist deck (well, except for an 8th level card that you’re not going to take), the ability to Move 2 and generate 2 elements (which will be super important later), and the fantastic loss attack on top for the end of the scenario made this card irresistible. Gravel Vortex is pretty nifty as well though. Loot 2, even if it’s on the bottom, was so tempting. By the time I hit 4th level I was getting very money hungry, and like I said with my group it was hard to gather cash. But the poor initiative and the fact that the top attack is melee, along with the awesomeness of PD, steered me away.

 

 

At 5th level I took Winter’s Edge, and it was the most disappointing card of my Elementalist career. The Attack 5 on top with the ability to add range and Pierce looks tasty, but here’s the problem: generating 2 specific elements consistently is very difficult. One specific element and one of any type is much more doable, but that doesn’t work here. So it’s going to be very hard to enhance this attack, and while that leaves you with an Attack 5 (6 with Formless Power), the problem is the range. As I mentioned, Range 2 is so much more difficult to use than Range 3. It made Winter’s Edge very hard to use effectively, and it ended up being an afterthought in my deck. You’d think the Heal with 2 elements on the bottom would be good, but Heal 2 is pretty much nothing, and I didn’t find much use for it either.

So you should take Obsidian Shards, right? Well, if I played the Elementalist again (not out of the realm of possibility) I would go back to level 4 and take Gravel Vortex. Yeah the top attack is going to be tough to use, but that Loot 2 should make up for it. Obsidian Shards can be nice but it’s got the same problem: you need 2 specific elements to make it worthwhile.

 

 

So far a lot of the levels have given us a choice between 2 similar cards, but not here at 6th level. Simulacrum is a neat card; the summon on the bottom has a pretty interesting effect, and the top reusable attack can be very effective. Unfortunately the bottom, like all summons, is a loss and with a 10 card hand size we have to be pretty judicious with our losses. And trust me when I say you are very rarely going to have all 6 elements available for the top. I think I had that situation once or twice the whole time I played the Elementalist (again, more helpful teammates could make this happen more often). It could be a super effective card, and if I play the character again I’ll definitely try it.

And that’s because I took Eye of the Hurricane, and like the card I took at last level it was a bit disappointing. The move on the bottom with a Jump and the decent initiative were nice, no problem there, but the top action wasn’t as cool as I thought it would be. I imagined one of our fighters getting surrounded and I’d get to hit a bunch of targets but it never really happened like that. Plus Attack 2 is not all that exciting anyway. And it’s a loss, so you don’t want to use it early, except you kind of do want to use it early so you can take full advantage of the elements it will generate. Loved the bottom, but the top was sort of a dud.

 

 

And here we are at 7th level, where everything changes for the Elementalist. And I mean everything. Up to this point the goal was to try to generate elements, see what you ended up with, and figure out the best way to use them. But once you take Vengeance, it boils down to generate Dark and something else (often with Primal Duality), remove normals, recover cards, repeat. It makes the Elementalist way more powerful but also way more straightforward and predictable. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a lot of fun just removing monsters off the board even when they’ve got 20+ HP, but you definitely lose the essence of the character once you take this card. Also note that you can add a 4th hex to the area of effect. I was a little hesitant to do so because of the cost (216 gold) and I wasn’t sure how much it would help, but trust me it helps. Big time. Now you can get two normals that aren’t even adjacent, and when you line up 4 at once it is a thing of beauty.

Pragmatic Reinforcement is a really cool card, but it can’t compete with Vengeance, one of the best cards in the game.

 

Elemental Aegis is a fantastic card…for a different class. Unless you for some crazy reason decided to go with the melee Elementalist build this card isn’t even a remote possibility, especially at 8th level. Admittedly, it would be fun one time to kick down a door and go Shield 6 and just sit there and laugh. But just the one time.

I love the bottom of Volatile Consumption. Combine that with some Boots of Striding and you can do a Move 9 Jump with Wound and Immobilize on all enemies you touch. Wowsers. I was tempted, but in the end I went back to 7th level and took Pragmatic Reinforcement. At this point I didn’t care about money any longer, so it was easy to sub this in for Brilliant Flash. Having a second bottom attack is great, and either half can soak up excess elements you have floating around.

 

9th level brings us two very interesting cards. The summon on top of Ethereal Manifestation seems really cool because it can generate elements for us (which we could use immediately since they weren’t created on our turn), but a summon with 3 HP at 9th level? Yikes. You’re constantly one stray hit or AOE from losing your 9th level card for the rest of the scenario, which seems a little too nerve-wracking. The bottom seems like fun except by 9th level none of those abilities on their own are very exciting. Sure, doing all 4 of them could be cool but you can probably find better things to do with 4 elements at this point.

I took Eternal Equilibrium and had a good time with it. If there aren’t any normals around or you just feel like doing something different you can use Primal Duality to generate light and dark then stick a bunch of curses in the enemy deck. First time I played with this card the enemy put curses in their own deck (some monsters can do that) then I threw 3 or 4 more in on the second turn and the enemy had 7 curses in their deck two turns in. Our Three Spears ended up getting not-hit by curses/nulls like 7 times in a row, it was crazy. And it’s reusable, so you can curse to your heart’s content. Oh and attack 4 or 5 against everything within range 3 ain’t bad either. The bottom is a nice heal/boost for your favorite tank character as well.

OK that covers the cards, let’s look at the Elementalist’s perks:

Usually the goal is to make the attack deck produce bigger numbers, but that’s not really the Elementalist’s thing. The goal here is to create as many elements as you can with each flip. It’s strange to be disappointed when you draw a +2 but that’s how this class rolls. Still, removing negatives is always good, so my first picks were “Remove (2) -1 cards” twice and “Replace (1) -1 card with (1) +1 card”. After that it went something like:

• Add (3) +0 cards with fire infusion
• Add (3) +0 cards with ice infusion
• Add (3) +0 cards with air infusion
• Add (3) +0 cards with nature infusion

That gets you good odds of drawing an element whenever you flip, netting you more fuel for future turns. After that I took:

• Replace (2) +0 cards with (1) +0 with ice infusion card and (1) +0 with air infusion card
• Replace (2) +0 cards with (1) +0 with fire infusion card and (1) +0 with nature infusion card
• Replace (1) +0 card with (1) +2 card twice

And then…I was done. At that point I didn’t think there were anymore worthwhile perks so I purposefully quit earning battle goal checkmarks. Which is a strange thing. In fact I should have quit a level or two earlier since you’re required to take a perk when you level up. I ended up taking the +0 stun and +0 add target perks, which weren’t around long enough to have much impact. Also, once you take Vengeance at 7th level you end up drawing way fewer attack modifiers.

As far as items, I don’t want to spoil anything so I won’t go too far into it, but as usual stamina potions are very helpful. One of the biggest weaknesses of this class is mobility, so the Boots of Striding can be huge. If you can’t get your hands on those (like I couldn’t for a while), the jump boots are OK (but Striding is way better).  A mana potion is obviously a necessity. Power potions are great for all those AOEs you’ll be throwing down. The only enhancement I did along the way was Vengeance; I spent all my gold on items and didn’t regret it. There are a ton of great items for the Elementalist, so use that loot card as much as you can and save up (and try to get your teammates to spend the 5 or 10 gold on a mana potion for you!)

Whew, I think that’s it for now. If you made it all the way to the end thank you! I appreciate it, and comments are always welcome.