Every rule of thumb, on one page.

Health is your life in the game: every lost fight costs some of it, and the last player with health left wins.

Early health is cheap and late health is expensive: spend the first, protect the second.

Save to the interest cap while your health allows it; past the cap, or once health runs low, gold should become board strength.

Early on, buy pairs and play the strongest board you have; keep what pairs or fits your items, and sell the rest.

Level to where your carry's cost is common, and only as fast as your board can hold your health on the way.

Roll at a moment you chose, for upgrades you can name, and never get knocked out with gold in the bank.

Pick your carry, then every damage item goes to it until it is full.

Match the item to what the unit scales with and where it stands; when unsure, follow its popular builds.

Field enough frontline for your level, and give at least one of them real defensive items.

Let your items and early upgrades pick the comp, scout before you commit, and finish it once you do.

Pick the augment your game needs: power now when health is short, payouts early while you have the rounds, and a trait only when your board already leans that way.

Pick a side and stay on it: a streak either way pays, and the rounds in between only cost health.

Gold above the interest cap is free to spend; below it, spare gold buys the next step; the whole bank is free once you have fewer rounds left than it needs to pay you back.

Let the carry's cost pick the plan: reroll comps buy the third star at a low level, then level up to finish the board; fast 8 and fast 9 comps buy the level first and need two stars.

Roll at the level where your carry's cost is most common, and buy the next level first only when it raises those odds by more than its experience costs you in shops.

A ranged carry goes in a back corner behind your tanks; a melee carry goes beside the front line. Then check what each one reaches from there.

Scout before the fight: put your best tank where their carry hits first, and keep your carry out of what their leaps reach.

Spread out against area damage, stand together when shields and focus fire win the fight, and never leave your carry in the biggest group.

Give every new slot a job before a hex: tanks to the thin side of the front line, damage dealers to the back, apart from your carry.

Slam the item that makes your board stronger now and still fits several comps; hold a component only when you know which item it finishes.

Build around the core item, and fill the other slots with whatever fits when the components come.

Feed the part of your carry's damage it has least of, with items carries like it actually hold.

Put the carry's items on a unit that deals the same damage, and move them once the carry can use them better.

Scout before you commit, again before every roll, and before every late fight: copies first, then strength, then matchups.

Count the copies left, not the players: contest only from a better spot, and pivot early along what you already hold.

Hold the pieces that fit many comps until the game picks one for you, then let the rest go.

Commit when an upgrade, your items and the lobby agree; until then, finish only the items that keep several comps open.

Before you call it a buff for you, read which star levels moved and whether it is a number your unit plays for.

Read the notes from the most played thing down: a change matters as far as the boards it touches.

In the first days of a patch, read the notes and your lobby, and treat the stats as a hint that firms up as the games come in.

Before your first game on a patch, read your comps from the carry out, then keep one, drop one and try one.