Shroom and Gloom Tips: 8 Things the Demo Never Tells You

1. The last hit is a decision, not a formality

ROAST reads “Deal 12 damage. If FATAL, make TOASTY.” Cards with fatal triggers only pay out when they finish the target. Since eating is your healing, choosing which card kills is one of the highest-value decisions in a fight.

2. Free cards are extra turns

Energy sits at 3 in the official screenshots and most cards cost 1. KEY costs 0. In a game with three actions per turn, a zero-cost card is not a cheap card, it is an additional action.

3. Your explore deck decides your combat deck

The explore deck is what “modifies your cards” and “unlocks new weapons and abilities”, per the official description. Every locked door you cannot open is a card upgrade you did not get. Judge explore hands by what they unlock, not by whether they help you survive right now.

4. Difficulty spikes are depth, not punishment

A demo player argued that upgrading cards made enemies grow thorns and negates. The developers replied it “isn’t how the game works at all” — enemies get harder with depth, full stop. Do not sandbag your own deck to stay safe.

5. Watch for the use counter

RAT JERKY shows 3 USES. EVERLASTING TRUFFLE in a late-run hand shows 97. Cards carry charges, and the charges themselves are something growth can inflate absurdly.

6. Maximum health grows during a run

The health readout goes from 25/25 early to 64 maximum in deeper screenshots. Damage taken in the first tunnels is far cheaper than the same damage later, because your ceiling rises.

7. Most videos you will find are the wrong version

The June 2026 update rewrote exploration entirely — it was the first demo update since August 2025. Torch-lighting, feeding creatures and the prologue chapter did not exist before it. If a guide never mentions camping, it predates the current build.

8. Several demo annoyances are already fixed

From the developers on the Steam forum: rest is no longer mapped to E in Early Access, save and quit is “obviously a given for the full game”, achievements ship with Early Access including hidden ones, and controller support is being worked on. Complaints in older demo videos may already be resolved — the demo page tracks them line by line.

Related

• Beginner guide — how the two decks fit together.
• Builds — the growth levers, with sources.
• Cards — the card text these tips come from.