CRANK DAT JANK UP: Boss killer Amanda Sharpe

As part of the CRANK DAT JANK UP series, there's enough jank already to deal with, no need to worry about taboo compliance. There's no question it is a suboptimal deck.

But there are dream plays, marvels to be had. Note this is meant to be multiplayer, as the combat investigator, NOT as the cluever. Does that already sing red flags to you?

When I was building up Amanda's deck, there were so many combat orientated Practiced skills. Since her base investigating stats were already no different to her combat stats, I thought why not? Her recurring skills can gain so much value out of simple skill tests. Got an enemy with 3 health? Overpower 3 times successfully, and draw 3 cards! I've tried to provide many wild icons to flex a little, but also really because Amanda doesn't have many combat skill icons available to her.

You should mulligan for 2 things- timeworn brand, and Key of Y's. Timeworn lets you lay a smack down, and you'll likely always have at least one skill in your favour, so that's at least 5 combat and 2 damage. Key of Y's can increase your base stats consistently, such a dream with her ability.

But wait, that sounds like a good plan. Where is this jank dream wombo combo that you speak of? My friend, I'm glad you asked. That's where Versatile come in.

In the Nathaniel cho investigator deck came One two punch. An event card containing two separate fight actions, each adding one and then two combats separately. ORDINARILY you would need separate skill cards for each instance of Fight, but NOT for Amanda! If you have Key of Y's, your base stat is increased with horror on it. it's a luxury you may or may not have. But I've packed quite a few 2+ wild/combat skills in her deck, most notably- Vicious blow level 2. That will do WORK on a final boss, with One two punch. And if you have timeworn brand, just go to town on whatever big mythos baddie there may be with the rest of your actions. It's a combo deservingly used on a great big baddie or an ancient one, everything else is too squishy to be worthy of such damage. Potential damage? Let's say you have Vicious blow lvl 2 under Amanda, timeworn brand out, and 2 one two punch in hand, and 3 horrors on Key of Y's - yikes! The first one two punch does can do 3+4 damage (testing at 8+9), play that again, and then timeworn brand epic attack 7 damage. My friends, if all goes swimmingly, in just 1 round of 3 actions you have just done 21 damage! It's possible to dig this combo out of the deck by taking out Versatile and one two punch, but then it doesn't deserve to be in the CRANK DAT JANK UP series. The thing Amanda has for her is drawing 2 cards a turn, so I hope it softens Versatile a little.

Of course this is all theoretical. Playtesting it...is janky as expected. Amanda failed a 8-3 test by pulling the autofail, and died before facing the final baddie. But also tried her in a blind Read or Die scenario which had light of Aformogon (every damage/horror is direct for the duration of the act/agenda. and only 1 act/agenda) Key of Y's was useless in that. But I'm sure there's a time to shine. And maybe one day when you hear of one solo investigator team dealing 42 damage to the blob in one turn, instead of asking which Guardian investigator that team was playing, you might ask: was that Amanda?