What the Act 2 Pick Actually Is
After you kill the Act 2 boss, one of three Ancient gatekeepers walks up: Tezcatara, Orobas, or Pael. Each one carries a curated pool of ten Ancient relics, split across three sub-pools the game offers in sequence. You see one batch, pick one option, and that single decision pivots the back half of your run more than any card you have taken since Neow.
The Act 1 Neow choice rewarded breadth. The Act 2 Ancient rewards commitment. Tezcatara hands you fire and tempo. Orobas hands you reroll, transform, and energy generation. Pael hands you draw, energy floor, and turn-control toys. Picking the wrong gatekeeper for your deck is how a clean Act 1 turns into an Act 3 wall. For where every Ancient relic lands across the full meta, the Slay the Spire 2 relic tier list covers all of them.
This guide covers all thirty Tezcatara, Orobas, and Pael relics, plus the Darv detour that some runs see in place of one of the three.
How the Pick Works
Each Act 2 NPC holds ten Ancient relics, organized into three sub-pools the game presents in order. You do not see all ten at once. You see one batch, you choose, and the offer ends. There is no skip-and-come-back.
The NPC you encounter is locked by run state and route by the time the boss dies, not chosen at the reward screen. Tezcatara, Orobas, and Pael rotate as the standard Act 2 Ancient. Some runs route into Darv instead, a twelve-relic mixed pool with effects that change between an Act 2 visit and an Act 3 visit. If you are earlier in your run and still picking your Neow blessing, see the Act 1 Neow boss relic guide first.
Every relic in these pools is universal. There are no character-locked Ancient relics in any of the three Act 2 gatekeepers. The decision is always about deck fit. Empty slots in your deck, leftover energy at end of turn, multi-hit attacks already in hand, the count of Strikes and Defends you still carry: these variables decide which offer is correct.
Tezcatara Pool
Tezcatara is the consensus-weakest Act 2 Ancient. Every option in her pool can feel bad simultaneously, where the other gatekeepers always offer at least one decent pick. The counterweight is ceiling: item:storybook (Brightest Flame) is the highest-ceiling single relic any Ancient hands out, and a clean Tezcatara hit can swing a run harder than a clean Pael hit. Variance, not weakness.
Mechanically she is the fire and Ember gatekeeper. Half the pool either enchants Strikes with Tezcatara's Ember (a permanent fire effect), generates raw energy, or hands you ramp through the Soot mechanic. If your deck still uses Strikes as primary damage, this pool is the warmest invitation in the game. If you have transformed every item:strike-silent out by Act 2, half of Tezcatara's offerings stop functioning the way they read.
item:nutritious-soup: Upon pickup, Enchant all Strikes in your deck with Tezcatara's Ember. Ember turns Strikes into a permanent fire-damage source that scales without further investment. The relic got a beta buff that pushed it up a tier, and the ceiling is real: with card draw plus a per-attack-trigger relic (Shuriken, Kunai, Kusarigama, Nunchaku, Ornamental Fan) plus any Strength enabler (Lighter, Strike Dummy), 0-cost Strikes hit for 18-50 by late Act 3. Auto-pick for Ironclad runs still carrying Strikes or for any attack-count or Strength engine. Auto-skip if you already removed every Strike. Four or more left, take it. One or two, the math drops fast.
Very Hot Cocoa: Start each combat with an additional 4 Energy. Four energy on turn one, every combat, for the rest of the run. A brutal opener for decks that want to slam down a Power and a heavy attack on the same turn. The drawback: it does not affect later turns, so prolonged-scaling decks gain less than burst decks.
Yummy Cookie: Upon pickup, Upgrade 4 cards. Four random upgrades. Random is the load-bearing word. In a lean deck full of high-impact cards (item:demon-form, item:limit-break, Wraith Form), the value is enormous. In a deck loaded with basic Strikes and Defends, you upgrade four pieces of chaff. Trim before you take it.
Biiig Hug: Upon pickup, remove 4 cards from your Deck. Whenever you shuffle your Draw Pile, add a Soot into your Draw Pile. Four removals is four Rest-Site removes paid for in one click. Soot is a status card that triggers Tezcatara-themed effects when drawn. For a deck choking on basics, the single biggest tempo gain in the pool. For a deck already at fifteen cards, the four removals undershoot.
Seal of Gold: At the start of your turn, spend 5 Gold to gain Energy. Gold converted into a permanent extra energy per turn, as long as you have gold to spend. Five gold per turn burns through hoards fast in long Act 3 fights, and once you run out the relic does nothing. Strong if your run banked gold; weak if you spent at the merchant.
item:storybook: Upon pickup, add 1 Brightest Flame to your Deck. Brightest Flame is a 1-cost retain Skill granting 3 energy and 2 draw (3 upgraded) at 1 max HP per play. The highest-ceiling single relic in the Ancient catalog: a reusable Adrenaline-plus that saves more HP via faster kills than it bleeds, and Defect or Regent can chain multiple plays per combat. Take it on any aggressive deck. Anti-synergies: Doorwarden, Test Subject, Normality count Skills played. Never let Dolly's Mirror copy it.
Toasty Mittens: At the start of your turn, Exhaust the top card of your Draw Pile and gain 1 Strength. Free Strength every turn, paid for with one card off the top of your draw pile. For Strength-scaling decks (Ironclad mostly, but anyone running Limit Break or item:inflame chains), one of the strongest relics in the game. For decks that want to play their full deck every turn, the exhaust is a real cost. Steam discussion threads flag this as the standout Tezcatara pick, and the math agrees. For the deck that puts this relic to work, see the Ironclad Strength build guide.
Golden Compass: Upon pickup, replace the Act 2 Map with a single special path. The map-warp option. Collapses the rest of Act 2 into a single forced path, trading routing flexibility for a guaranteed special encounter. Take it when you have already cleared most of Act 2, or when you specifically want what the path leads to.
Pumpkin Candle: Gain Energy at the start of each turn. Extinguishes at the start of Act 3. A permanent free energy for the rest of Act 2, then it dies. A crutch for runs that need help cracking the Act 2 elite-and-boss gauntlet but expect the deck assembled by Act 3. Critic opinion calls it pure crutch, and that framing is correct: take it when Act 2 is the actual problem.
item:toy-box: Upon pickup, obtain 4 Wax Relics. Every 3 combats, your left-most Wax Relic will melt away. Toy Box is undervalued. You pick the burn order, and many wax effects are permanent: max HP gains, one-time card upgrades, transform-card effects, gold from Old Coin, Potion Belt slot expansions all stay paid after the wax melts. Put immediate-payoff relics (gold, HP, card upgrades, Potion Belt) at the leftmost slots so they fire before vanishing. Save always-on per-turn effects for the rightmost slot. PSA: wax relics are also valid sacrifices in relic-trade events. Ranwid will trade two permanent relics for an about-to-melt wax, so the set is effectively worth two real relics on top of the temporary Act 2 power. Conservative pathing can keep the rightmost relic alive into the Act 3 boss.
Best Tezcatara picks by character. Ironclad with Strikes still in deck takes item:toasty-mittens or item:nutritious-soup. Silent and Defect with cleaner decks lean toward item:very-hot-cocoa, item:pumpkin-candle, or item:yummy-cookie. Necrobinder with a fat deck takes item:biiig-hug. Regent often skips Tezcatara entirely if Orobas or Pael are on the path, because Tezcatara's pool rewards Strike-based archetypes and Regent does not really run those.
Orobas Pool
Orobas is the transform, reroll, and energy gatekeeper. The pool rewards decks that want to reshape themselves: cards from other characters, upgraded starters, prismatic rewards, potion ramp. If Tezcatara is the pool that rewards what you already are, Orobas is the pool that rewards what you are willing to become.
High-ascension players call this the Tiny House of Act 2: love for the character, not the power. The headline picks (item:archaic-tooth, item:touch-of-orobas on the right class) still hit hard, but the middle of the pool is softer than Pael's, and Orobas's best pick swings hard on which character is in the chair.
Electric Shrymp: Upon pickup, Enchant a Skill with Imbued. Imbued gives a single Skill a one-time bonus when played. The value depends entirely on which Skill you enchant. A high-impact Skill (item:bash, Footwork, Calculated Gamble) becomes much stronger; a basic item:defend-silent stays a basic Defend with a bow on it.
Glass Eye: Upon pickup, obtain 2 Common card rewards, 2 Uncommon, and 1 Rare. Five card-add rewards in one pickup, drawn from your character's pool. Decks adding scaling (combo, infinite-engine, scaling Powers) get massive value. Decks already at fifteen cards and trying to stay lean should skip.
Sand Castle: Upon pickup, Upgrade 6 random cards. Six random upgrades, the bigger sibling of item:yummy-cookie. Same caveat: the bigger the deck, the bigger the chance four of the six land on chaff. Trim first, or the upgrades land where they do not matter.
Prismatic Gem: Gain Energy at the start of each turn. Card rewards now contain cards from other colors. Free permanent energy plus access to other characters' card pools. The energy alone justifies the relic; the cross-color effect is the upside. Strong on every character, with the caveat that you actually need to want cards from other classes (and know which ones to pick).
Sea Glass: See 15 cards from another character. Choose any number of them to add to your Deck. Fifteen cards from a different class, free, no cap on how many you take. An instant build pivot. The danger is bloat: take five extras and your deck-cycling math falls apart. Pick two or three high-impact cards.
Alchemical Coffer: Upon pickup, gain 4 potion slots filled with random Potions. Four extra potion slots, all pre-filled. Potion economy in Slay the Spire 2 punishes runs that cannot hold what they brew, so the slot expansion is a real upgrade. The pre-fills are random, so expect a couple of duds. The slots are what you are paying for.
Driftwood: You may reroll each card reward once. A free reroll on every card reward for the rest of the run. Value compounds: every reward screen now has effectively double the option pool. Decks that know what they need get the largest gain. Discovery-phase decks get less because they were going to take something useful from the original three anyway.
Radiant Pearl: At the start of each combat, add 1 Luminesce into your Hand. Luminesce is a free card added to your opening hand every combat. As a relic, item:radiant-pearl is a permanent first-turn card-draw effect that scales linearly with combat count. Solid, never busted.
Archaic Tooth: Upon pickup, Transform a predetermined Starter Card into an Ancient version. Transforms one of your Starter cards into a powered-up Ancient variant. The exact card is character-specific and the upgrade is large. If you still carry the targeted Starter, one of the strongest single upgrades in the pool.
Touch of Orobas: Upon pickup, replace your Starter Relic with an upgraded version. Replaces your Starter Relic (item:burning-blood, item:ring-of-the-snake, item:cracked-core, item:bound-phylactery, item:divine-right) with a buffed Ancient variant. Varies harder by character than any other Orobas pick. S-tier on Defect (Quadcast turns Dualcast into a 0-cost evoke-four) and Necrobinder (Phylactery Unbound doubles your per-turn summon and grants an extra). A-tier on Regent (Divine Destiny doubles starting stars). B-tier on Silent (Ring of the Drake stacks +2 draw for three turns, weakest because Silent already opens with a draw bonus). C-tier on Ironclad (Black Blood only buffs the post-combat heal). Sometimes offered side-by-side with item:archaic-tooth: take Touch of Orobas on Defect or Necrobinder, take Archaic Tooth on Ironclad.
Best Orobas picks by character. Ironclad skips Touch of Orobas and takes item:archaic-tooth for the Bash-replacing Break, or item:glass-eye for scaling. Silent picks item:sea-glass for cross-color access to Defect's lightning cards. Defect locks Touch of Orobas for Quadcast and otherwise leans on item:prismatic-gem. Necrobinder takes Touch of Orobas for Phylactery Unbound, then item:driftwood. Regent benefits most from Glass Eye and Archaic Tooth (Meteor Shower as a 0-cost AOE).
Pael Pool
Pael is the most consistent Act 2 Ancient. There is no bad pick. Every option has a deck that wants it, and the Reddit thread arguing Pael is worst was downvoted to zero while the top defenses pulled 40-plus upvotes. If Tezcatara is variance and Orobas is character-fit, Pael is the floor.
Mechanically he is the energy-floor and turn-control gatekeeper. Most of the pool grants extra energy, extra cards, or rules-text manipulation that bends how a turn works. The pool rewards decks that already win when they have one extra resource.
Pael's Flesh: Gain an additional Energy at the start of your 3rd turn, and every turn after that. Permanent extra energy, but only after turn three. Long boss fights get the full benefit; elites dying on turn two see nothing. A scaling tool for stalling decks (Block, item:defend-silent, Frost), not a tempo tool for burst.
Pael's Horn: Upon pickup, add 2 Relax cards to your Deck. Relax is a Pael-themed card. Two free copies added to your deck. Whether they help depends on what Relax does for your archetype, which makes item:paels-horn a card-add wearing a relic costume.
Pael's Tears: If you end your turn with unspent Energy, gain an additional Energy next turn. Energy carryover with a condition: you only gain the bonus if you did not spend everything. Block-heavy turns that park one energy now generate two next turn. Combo decks that always spend everything see no benefit. A tempo-smoother for decks that periodically have leftover energy.
Pael's Wing: You may sacrifice card rewards to Pael. Every 2 sacrifices, obtain a Relic. Trade card rewards for relics at a 2-to-1 rate. The relic comes from a regular pool, not Ancient. Decks already bloated benefit most. Decks still hunting key archetype cards should pass.
item:paels-claw: Upon pickup, Enchant all Defends with Goopy. A mini genetic algorithm on every Defend. Each play stacks +1 permanent Block on that copy then exhausts it, so the longer a fight runs, the harder your remaining Defends hit. Scaled Defends realistically block 20-25 each by the Act 3 boss, which locks this in as S-tier and has players speculating it gets nerfed before main release. Synergy: long boss fights with multiple reshuffles. Anti-synergy: infinite or exhaust-prevention decks that need Defends in the draw pile.
Pael's Tooth: Upon pickup, remove 5 cards from your Deck. After each combat, randomly add 1 back Upgraded. Mass removal followed by slow upgraded re-add. Five cards gone instantly is enormous; the post-combat re-add returns one upgraded card per fight. You do not pick which card returns, so you might lose a key card and get a item:strike-silent back. Best for decks where any of the five removable cards is acceptable to lose temporarily.
Pael's Growth: Upon pickup, Enchant a card with Clone. This allows you to duplicate every card with Clone at a Rest Site. Card duplication at Rest Sites. Mark one keystone card with Clone, then duplicate it every Rest Site for the rest of the run. Build-defining for decks scaling on a single card (item:demon-form, item:catalyst, Apotheosis, Echo Form). Modest for decks that want variety.
Pael's Blood: At the start of your turn, draw 1 additional card. One extra card every turn for the rest of the run. Critic consensus calls item:paels-blood the safest top-tier pick in the Ancient catalog, and the math earns it: a permanent draw bonus scales across every combat, character, and archetype. Lean decks (fifteen cards or fewer) gain even more because the deck recycles faster. The relic stacks correctly with item:fiddle and every other start-of-combat draw modifier (Bag of Preparation, Machine Learning, Ring of the Snake), so a Pael's Blood plus Fiddle opener stacks the bonus instead of overwriting it. There is no run where Pael's Blood is wrong.
Pael's Eye: The first time each combat you end your turn without playing cards, Exhaust your Hand, and take an extra turn. A free extra turn, once per combat, paid for by exhausting your hand. The trigger condition is awkward: you have to end a turn without playing anything, which usually means taking hits to set up. Skill-intensive but high-ceiling. Bursty decks can chain Power-setup turns into full damage turns.
Pael's Legion: Doubles Block gained from a card, then goes to sleep for 2 turns. A 2-turn cooldown card-Block doubler. The first Block-granting card you play gets doubled, then the relic naps. Heavy Block decks (Defect Frost, Silent Footwork-Reflex chains) get the most value because their highest-Block card already produces a meaningful number. Aggressive attack decks can skip.
Best Pael picks by character. Pael's Blood is the universal top pick across every character, every deck. Beyond that, Ironclad benefits from item:paels-growth on Demon Form, Silent likes item:paels-tears for Catalyst-pivot turns, Defect runs item:paels-flesh into the long-fight Frost stall, Necrobinder takes item:paels-tooth for the lean-deck pivot, and Regent uses item:paels-eye for the burst-turn setup.
The Darv Detour
Darv is the rarest Ancient by design. He is the only dual-act NPC, eligible in both Act 2 and Act 3, and his per-act spawn rate is halved. Most runs never see him. The runs that do see him win at near-100% rates per community report, because his pool is a curated set of returning STS1 boss relics with no bad pick.
Some Act 2 routes lead to Darv instead of the three standard gatekeepers. He carries a twelve-relic pool with effects that shift between an Act 2 visit and an Act 3 visit. If you see Darv in Act 2, you typically will not see him again in Act 3.
The Act 2 Darv shortlist leans on the curated STS1 picks: item:runic-pyramid (no end-of-turn hand discard, arguably the strongest relic in the game), item:dusty-tome (S-tier on Regent and Necrobinder), item:philosophers-stone (energy plus curse tolerance), item:ectoplasm (energy at the cost of gold), item:sozu (energy at the cost of potions), and item:calling-bell (three relics plus one eternal Curse of the Bell). Act 2 Darv can also offer item:astrolabe (transform 3 cards then upgrade them), item:black-star (elites drop an extra relic), item:empty-cage (free 2-card removal), item:snecko-eye (draw 2 extra per turn but start Confused), and item:pandoras-box (transform every item:strike-silent and item:defend-silent at once).
If Darv offers Runic Pyramid, take it on almost any deck. If Darv offers Pandora's Box, take it on any run still carrying its starting Strikes and Defends. If Darv offers a curse-tagged option (item:calling-bell with its Curse of the Bell, Ectoplasm with no gold, Sozu with no potions), accept the curse only when the energy gain solves an actual problem in your current deck. Free energy is never actually free.
Cross-NPC Strategy
Three near-universal picks, one per gatekeeper: Toasty Mittens out of Tezcatara when Strikes and Strength scaling are in your deck, Archaic Tooth out of Orobas (S-tier insta-pick on every character because the upgrade is always a flat improvement on a card you actually carry), Pael's Blood out of Pael for the permanent draw bonus. Touch of Orobas is a fourth headline pick, but only on Defect, Necrobinder, or Regent; Ironclad and Silent should usually take Archaic Tooth or another option instead.
Three character-fit picks that punch hardest in specific decks: Nutritious Soup for Ironclad runs that still carry Strikes, Sea Glass for Silent and Defect runs that want cross-color tools, Pael's Growth for any deck built around a single keystone card.
Three picks that are bait for the wrong deck. Yummy Cookie and Sand Castle look great until you remember the upgrades are random and most of your deck might be chaff. Pael's Wing trades cards you actually want for relics at an unfavorable rate. Pumpkin Candle is a strong Act 2 crutch but disappears at Act 3, and runs that took it for the energy floor often discover their deck is not built to function without it.
Read the run state. If your deck is bloated and full of basics, Tezcatara's item:biiig-hug and item:paels-tooth do mass removal that no other Ancient pool offers. If your deck is already lean and looking for scaling, item:paels-blood and item:glass-eye add raw power. If your deck still carries its Starter Relic and starting cards, item:touch-of-orobas and item:archaic-tooth produce the largest single-step upgrades in the game.
FAQ
Which Act 2 NPC is best? None of them is best in the abstract. Tezcatara is best for item:strike-silent-based decks that still carry their starting Strikes, since half the pool enchants Strikes or generates raw burst energy. Orobas is best for decks willing to pivot via card transformation, cross-color access, or Starter Relic upgrades. Pael is best for decks that win when given one extra resource per turn, especially energy floors and card draw. The right answer is whichever pool matches your deck right now.
Can I influence which Act 2 NPC I encounter? The gatekeeper is locked by run state and route by the time the Act 2 boss falls, not chosen at the reward screen. Some routing options open the Darv detour, which replaces the standard gatekeeper with Darv's twelve-relic pool. Outside of that detour, you cannot pick which of Tezcatara, Orobas, or Pael shows up. Plan for whichever pool the run delivers.
What's the single best Act 2 pick across all three pools? item:paels-blood is the safest top-tier pick. A permanent extra card every turn scales across every fight, every character, every deck. No archetype fails to improve from drawing one more card per turn. item:toasty-mittens and item:touch-of-orobas compete for the same crown but require deck-specific conditions to peak (Strength scaling for Toasty Mittens, Starter-Relic synergy for Touch of Orobas).
How does Touch of Orobas interact with the rest of my run? Touch of Orobas replaces your Starter Relic with a buffed Ancient version, and the value swings hard by character. Defect (Quadcast) and Necrobinder (Phylactery Unbound) get run-defining upgrades; Regent (Divine Destiny) gets a strong A-tier hit; Silent (Ring of the Drake) gets a modest draw bump; Ironclad (Black Blood) only buffs the post-combat heal and rarely fixes a struggling deck. Read the upgrade for your character before you take it; the relic is S-tier on two characters and C-tier on one.
Should I take a Darv option if offered? If Darv offers item:runic-pyramid, take it on almost every deck. If item:pandoras-box and your run still has multiple Strikes and Defends, take it. item:snecko-eye is build-defining for any deck that can play around Confused (random card costs each turn). The economy-trade options (item:ectoplasm cuts gold, item:sozu cuts potions, item:calling-bell adds a curse) only make sense when the permanent energy gain solves a real problem in your current deck.
What about Act 3? The Act 3 boss relic decision uses a different pool with different gatekeepers, and the pivot logic shifts because deck building is mostly locked by then. For the next decision in your run, read the Act 3 boss relic guide before you click.