Best Arcana Card Builds in Hades 2

by

Melinoe’s Arcana cards provide her with subtle yet impactful improvements in Hades 2. These enhancements vary from increased movement speed to additional health, and a well-chosen set of Arcana cards can allow skilled players to achieve incredible feats.

This guide covers a few builds for Arcana cards in Hades 2, designed for two distinct ways to play. We’ll also highlight some key Arcana cards to help new players create their own effective builds.

Best Arcana Deck in Hades 2

This build is a well-rounded option that prioritizes early-game improvements. It works well with any weapon, and with just a few adjustments, it can also suit the different ways you can play based on the various weapon aspects in Hades 2.

Best Hades 2 Arcana Build
Card Name Cost Effect
The Sorceress 1 Omega Moves are faster.
The Wayward Son 1 Restore 3 Life after exiting a location.
The Huntress 2 Your Attacks and Specials deal more damage when you have less than 100% Magick.
Eternity 3 Everything moves slower while you are channeling your Omega Moves.
The Moon Your Hex charges automatically.
The Furies 2 Deal more damage to enemies in your Casts.
Persistence 2 Start with more Max Life and Max Magick.
The Messenger 1 Your Casts make your Impervious for a short duration, and you move faster.
Night 2 You gain bonus Critical Chance with each move in an Omega Combo.
The Swift Runner 1 Sprint faster and you can pass through most enemies in your way.
Death 4 Gain Death Defiance.
The Centaur Gain Max Magick and Max Life after 5 Locations.
Origination 5 Deal more damage to enemies affected by Curses from at least two Olympians.
Excellence 5 Boons have a chance to include Legendary or at least Rare blessings.
Divinity Boons you find have an additional chance to include Epic blessings.

This setup gives you a well-rounded experience, though it doesn’t include the extra chances and Obols you’d get from the cards located on the bottom-left of the Arcana screen. However, the Excellence and Divinity cards should provide enough luck to balance things out.

Look, I usually like to tweak things in the second row – sometimes I’ll ditch a few cards if I really want those extra rerolls and starting cash. But honestly, always keep The Furies active. That damage bonus is just too good to ignore, seriously. It’s a game changer, and I don’t want to mess with that!

Best Glass Cannon Arcana Build in Hades 2

This build is different from the previous one; it prioritizes maximizing damage output through stacking various effects. It’s particularly effective for attempting no-hit challenge runs, but also allows for some customization so players can adjust it to be a little safer.

Hades 2 Glass Cannon Arcana Build
Card Name Cost Effect
The Wayward Son 1 Restore 3 Life after exiting a location.
The Huntress 2 Your Attacks and Specials deal more damage when you have less than 100% Magick.
Eternity 3 Everything moves slower while you are channeling your Omega Moves.
The Moon Your Hex charges automatically.
The Furies 2 Deal more damage to enemies in your Casts.
The Messenger 1 Your Casts make your Impervious for a short duration, and you move faster.
The Unseen 5 Passively recover Magick every second.
Night 2 You gain bonus Critical Chance with each move in an Omega Combo.
Origination 5 Deal more damage to enemies affected by Curses from at least two Olympians.
Excellence 5 Boons have a chance to include Legendary or at least Rare blessings.
Strength 4 While you have no Death Defiance, take reduced damage and deal more damage.

To really maximize the potential of this glass cannon build, consider using a couple of Keepsakes. Artemis’ White Antlers Keepsake boosts your critical hit chance by 20% for an entire Region, though it reduces your Life to just 30. Alternatively, Athena’s Gorgon Amulet Keepsake offers a chance for Athena to appear during your run, as long as you don’t have any Death Defiance charges.

As a fan, I’ve found the Strength Arcana is really awesome for certain builds. You *can* pair it with the Death card, sure, but honestly, it might not be the best idea. The thing is, Strength’s effect only kicks in when you’ve used up all your Death Defiance charges, so you’re kinda limiting it!

Best Arcana Cards in Hades 2

If you want to make a build of your own, always have the following active:

  • Origination and The Furies are excellent for scaling up your damage output, provided you can meet their trigger conditions. Always have both of these active, and try to incorporate their trigger conditions into your usual playstyle.
  • Death is highly recommended for players who are new to the game or those who are having trouble winning their runs. Extra lives are always going to be useful.
  • Excellence gives you a higher chance to get Legendary blessings. Getting the right one can easily set you up for success.
  • The Messenger is a one-point wonder that makes you immune to damage for a split second upon using your Cast. This can save your life if used correctly, and the bonus movement speed is nice to have as well.

Strong but Situational Cards

  • Night is great if you want to stack up crit chance for your Omega Moves. However, to activate it, you need to alternate your Omega Moves, and not every weapon or playstyle benefits from doing that.
  • The Enchantress and The Champions give you Change of Fate reroll dices; the former lets you reroll Location rewards, while the latter lets you reroll Boons. Pick one, or use both plus The Boatman card to activate The Fates, which will give you even more rerolls.
  • If you want some extra variety in your runs, The Queen will give you a higher chance of getting Duo Boons. Some of these Boons are very powerful, and they could result in some very fun runs.
  • The Huntress is another amazing damage-boosting skill, but it requires you to have less than 100% Magick for it to activate. This is best used with caster-type playstyles that rely on spamming Omega Moves.
  • The Unseen and its passive Magick regeneration are also great for Omega spam builds, and while it pales in comparison to Boons that restore Magick, it lets players skip those and pick other Boons instead. Just be mindful not to spend all your Magick at once.

Read More

2025-10-02 14:35