2026-05-05-claude-opus-4.7-silent-run22

Summary

The run died on Floor 16 (Act 1 Boss: The Kin) on Round 9 with HP 6/70 going into a 28-damage incoming volley with only 19 max attainable block. The Silent deck never built proper scaling — no Footwork, no Catalyst, no After Image, and the only conditional damage card (Follow Through) failed to trigger its 2x condition all combat. Race-the-Priest plan was sound (Followers are Minions, flee on Priest death) and got Priest from 190 to 25 HP in 8 turns, but Frail (Orb of Frailty T1) and Weak (Orb of Weakness T2) starved early block, causing HP to bleed from 70 → 6 by T9. A Bottled Potential T3 redraw and Shadow Step T3 (T4 doubled-damage) carried mid-combat, but a doubled-damage T4 hand drew zero attacks (5 block cards), wasting the burst window. Final turn's Dagger Throw cycle drew a third Defend instead of an attack or Shadowmeld, so no defensive doubling existed and the math did not close.

Bridge findings

• UsePotion for self-target potions during combat appears reliable, but state.json revision can lag the actual effect by 1-2 ticks: T2 Block Potion (slot 0) and T3 Bottled Potential (slot 2) both initially read as "consumed but no effect" — Block Potion's effect was masked by C&D being played the same turn pre-potion, and Bottled Potential's hand swap did not show up until the next read-state after the in-game animation finished. Conclusion: do not panic-spam re-use or re-issue; one extra read-state after a potion confirms application. Logged via Log-Finding.
• HandSelectCard correctly resolves Survivor and Dagger Throw discard prompts. Dagger Throw can stall in handSelect mode if not followed up with HandSelectCard; the cancelable: false flag means EndTurn will not bypass it.
• Reading state during a target-required card play returns updated revision but the effect is not applied until the next combat tick. Use read-combat.ps1 after every PlayCard to confirm.
• CancelTargeting is not a recognized command type in v0.1.5 (unknown command type: CancelTargeting). No documented way to cancel a wedged target prompt; only solution is to pick any valid target.
• tools/boss-name.ps1 (added this run) uses $paths.StateFile (not $paths.State — that field does not exist on Get-IpcPaths).

Decision log highlights

• Floor 14 Nibbit-2 elite: T2 used Toric Toughness + Survivor + Neutralize Nibbit[1] for 13 block vs 10 dmg (0 dmg taken). T3 Strike Nibbit[0] kill + Dash+ Nibbit[1] (18 block vs 8). T4 Blade of Ink + FT(2x Vuln-doubled = 14) + 2 Inky Shivs + Strike = 35 dmg lethal on Nibbit[1]. Won at HP 31/70 with 0 dmg taken. Picked Dagger Throw (raw 9 + cycle).
• Floor 15 Rest: Rested over Smith for HP +21 (52/70). Tiny Mailbox proc'd Potion of Binding + Bottled Potential. Correct call given boss 1 floor away.
• Floor 16 Boss T1: Used Potion of Binding (Weak+Vuln all enemies) for opening burst. Slice Priest 9, FT Priest 21 (Vuln+2x), Dash+ Priest 19 dmg + 13 block. Priest 142/190, took 0 dmg + Frail debuff. Strong T1.
• Boss T2: Played C&D (4 block w/ Frail), Strike Priest, 2 Inky Shivs (1 Priest + 1 Follower[0] for Weak — saved 4 dmg/turn from Follower[0] across rest of fight). Used Block Potion — initial read showed "no block applied" but it did fire (state lag).
• Boss T3: Used Bottled Potential to refresh weak hand (Shadow Step + 2 Defends + Strike + Neutralize was poor offense). Drew Slice/Strike/Defend/Survivor/Toric — much better. Played Slice + Neutralize Priest (Weak) + Defend + Shadow Step (T4 doubled).
• Boss T4 (DOUBLED DAMAGE WINDOW): Drew all-block hand (2 Defends + Survivor + Toric + C&D). Played C&D (Shiv added at 8 dmg doubled) + Toric Toughness (5 + 5x2 future block) + Shiv Priest (8 dmg). Wasted the doubling on a single 8-damage Shiv because no attacks were drawn. Correct call given the hand, but in hindsight should have used Bottled Potential T4 instead of T3 to gamble on attack draws for the doubled turn.
• Boss T5: Drew strong attack hand. Blade of Ink → 2 Inky Shivs (6 dmg + Weak each post-BoI buff). Inky Shiv Follower[0] (Weak), Inky Shiv Priest (Weak), Dash+ Priest. Block 18 vs 21 weakened incoming = 3 dmg taken. Priest 89.
• Boss T6: Frail returned (Priest debuff). Hand: Strike, Shadowmeld, Defend, FT, Slice. FT failed to trigger 2x (only 4 other cards, needed 5). Played Slice+Strike+FT Priest = 19 dmg, plus Defend (3 block w/ Frail). Took 14 dmg. HP 26.
• Boss T7: Weak applied (Priest debuff). Survivor (8 block + discard Strike) + Defend (5) + 2 Inky Shivs (3 dmg each + Weak — Weak'd Priest). Block 13 vs 20 weakened = 7 dmg. HP 19.
• Boss T8: Neutralize F0 (Weak) + PStab Priest (6 + 3 Poison) + Strike Priest + Defend (5 block). Block 5 vs 24 weakened. HP 21 → 6.
• Boss T9 (death): Drew Dash+, C&D, 2 Defends, Dagger Throw at HP 6. Incoming 28 dmg (no Weaks left). Max possible block in hand = 19 (Dash+ 13 + C&D 6) costing 3E exactly. Played DT first to lottery for Shadowmeld; drew a 3rd Defend. With DT having spent 1E, only 2E remained — Dash+ (2E) gave 13 block. Took 15 dmg → death at HP -9. Ripple Basin (+4 block if no attacks played) was forfeited because DT had already been played.

Postmortem

• Mistake 1 — T3 Bottled Potential: Used Bottled to fix weak hand, but T4 doubled-damage window then drew all-block hand. If Bottled had been saved for T4, the redraw could have found attacks for the burst window. The T3 hand was bad but survivable; bigger value to gamble on the doubled turn.
• Mistake 2 — T9 Dagger Throw lottery: At HP 6 with 19-block-cap incoming-28-damage, DT (Attack) disqualified Ripple Basin's +4 block. If I had played C&D + 2 Defends + skipped attacks (block 6+5+5+4=20), I would have taken 8 → HP -2. Still dead. But discarding Dash+ via Survivor T7 and saving energy for the boss endgame might have changed it. The actual fatal mistake was earlier: not building enough block scaling in the deck during Act 1.
• Mistake 3 — Card pick floor 14: Took Dagger Throw over Prepared/Poisoned Stab dupe. Dagger Throw is good but I had no scaling card in the deck; a Footwork or After Image (if offered later) would have been the answer. Run had no scaling card period; pure stat sticks vs 190 HP boss = attrition death.
• Strategic call that worked: Identifying Followers as Minions and racing only the Priest. This is correct boss tactic and not all model runs spot it.
• Strategic call that failed: Treating Frail/Weak as recoverable. The Priest applied them every other turn; my Block-from-cards economy never recovered. Next time: Tiny Mailbox potions should have been used to mitigate the debuff cycle, e.g. Block Potion saved for the Frail turns explicitly.

Notes for maintainers

• tools/boss-name.ps1 was added this run; uses Get-IpcPaths's StateFile property (not State) to read map node info. Useful for boss-room previews.
• Bottled Potential's effect application has a one-tick state.json lag; tools/read-state.ps1 immediately after UsePotion may show no change. Recommend a short Start-Sleep -Milliseconds 800 between UsePotion and the verification read.
• Block Potion (and presumably other AnyPlayer-target potions) does not require targetSelf:true; the bridge auto-resolves Player target.
• Token and command-count fields left null; can be filled by maintainer parser.