<Snipped quote by Dynamics>
It not being a rouguelike makes it boring. It's the same exact thing until after the first boss and I could swear I've had the same 6 fights in a row every time I've made it to the City. And then the final boss is obscene. If there was some actual benefit to replaying instead of just "now there's more mostly useless cards you *might* get" it would be much less "oh great now to do the same boring things again for 30 minutes until I maybe get to new stuff."
It's roguelike by definition.
"Roguelike is a subgenre of role-playing video game characterized by a dungeon crawl through procedurally generated levels, turn-based gameplay, tile-based graphics, and permanent death of the player character. Most roguelikes are based on a high fantasy narrative, reflecting their influence from tabletop role playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons."
The fights are random as well as the layout, there are three different bosses you can get in each dungeon, and you do get something. You get better every time you play and then ascend when your deck building skills are high enough to win. What it sounds like you want is a rogue
lite, an offshoot of the roguelike genre where every playthrough helps you succeed a little more. StS is a true Roguelike with permadeath and virtually no help from previous runs other than your whale boost. Not sure what you mean about the final boss, since it depends on which you get. If you mean Donu and Deca, yeah. Absolutely. But the Timemaster? He's reasonable if your deck scales well, especially if it scales passively.
