Card draw simulator
| Derived from |
|---|
| None. Self-made deck here. |
| Inspiration for | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Darrell Simmons 0 to hero | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1.0 |
Valentin1331 · 68453
Darrell snoops around to capture Evidence on his Note Book and his real Tog Material
Please don't forget to press the ♥ if you like the write-up and want to say thanks :)
Credit: Fantasy Flight Games
Introduction:
Now that the Scarlet Keys - Investigator Expansion has hit the table, it's time for some deck guides with the new investigators! This deck is meant for multiplayer, with at least one other investigator dedicated to enemy management.
The number of variables may be overwhelming for beginners, requiring you to pay attention to your Evidence, keep track of the ones on cards in play, be aware of what is in your discard pile, ready exhausted assets, take additional actions, move automatically when you empty a location and drop clues. For that very reason, this is one of the most fun decks I have ever played, and it never gets monotonous!
Disclaimer: This deck guide was created before the Campaign Expansion was released. Some cards and assumptions in this guide may be made irrelevant later on. I will keep it updated with a changelog if that is the case.
Table of Contents:
-
Overview
-
Main Strategy
-
Drop Clues Forwards
-
Collecting Evidence
-
Customizable Cards
-
Scavenging
-
Other Cards
-
Upgrade Path
-
Make Your Own Deck!
Overview:
| Difficulty: | ★★★★☆ |
| Enemy Management: | ★★☆☆☆ |
| Clue-getting: | ★★★★★ |
| Encounter protection: | ★★★★☆ |
| Survivability: | ★★★☆☆ |
| Economy: | ★★★☆☆ |
| Card Drawing: | ★★★★☆ |
Main Strategy:
This deck is centred around 2 main mechanics:
- The newly improved clue-dropping for double benefits: the direct effect obtained while dropping one or more clues and (ab)using the compensation tools introduced in this box: Research Notes and Press Pass.
- The well known Scavenging (2) that plays your Items and let you commit Newspaper (2) and The Raven Quill for 2 and get them back to your hand.
Drop Clues Forwards:
This deck takes full advantage of the clue-dropping mechanic introduced in Dunwich and is improved in TSK. Dropping clues used to feel wrong. Gaining a clue was not only complicated and time-consuming, but it was also using cards and resources. Placing them back on your location felt like a step backwards toward the game's resolution. Let's see how this changed now:
Benefits of Dropping Clues:
The clue-dropping cards compensate for the loss in tempo with a pretty powerful effect:
-
Captivating Discovery makes you draw 2 cards per clue dropped. In this deck, we benefit from dropping a lot of clues, so you will often draw 4 to 6 cards and drop 2 to 3 clues based on if you find a weakness and if you would rather wait to draw it or not. Choosing when you draw your weakness is a powerful effect and should not be underestimated.
-
Dr. William T. Maleson was always the #1 Meat shield in the game. Let's now use him for his other benefit: re-drawing Encounter cards you don't want to see. If you are playing with 2 or more players, you will most likely be paired with another investigator dedicated to enemy management.
- Shuffling enemies back is a great way to stream them towards your fighter while taking your share of treacheries. You can also use William's capacity for filtering out tests that would threaten you if Ruined Film seriously depleted your sanity
- The upgraded version is icing on the cake: protect your team at any location, choose between 2 cards instead of 1, and most importantly, discard the encounter card that you didn't select, potentially getting rid of really annoying cards like Ancient Evils or Beyond the Veil.
-
Quick Study was niche, but it can finally shine now.
It allows you to drop a clue to succeed at more or less any test, thanks to the +3. With the Research Notes, you are also granted 1 Evidence that you can turn immediately into a +2 with Darrell's ability. With this +5 at any stat, Darrell Simmons can break any test the scenario throws at him. -
Analysis completes the set. This seemingly weaker card actually has the highest clue-dropping capability and can be committed to any test.
- This can be used to secure success on a critical test if your clues do not matter so much anymore, like during a fight with an Elite enemy.
- Alternatively, you can use it on a teammate that would like to fish certain tokens like / for instance.
-
Forewarned was an option, but unfortunately, only being able to drop 1 clue for an effect that is eventually not so critical since Quick Study can help us pass almost any test and Dr. William T. Maleson sorts the annoying cards like Ancient Evils.
Double the Gain:
This deck can drop a significant number of clues each turn, which is the fuel for our new shiny toys, turning each dropped clue into a potentially huge profit:
-
Newspaper (2) rewards you for dropping your last clue by giving it back to you the next time you discover a clue. This means that it works with the ability of Research Notes!
- Since it is not unique, you can have 2 copies in play, increasing the speed at which you collect back your dropped clues.
- Note that Newspaper (2) does not exhaust, and thus, it can be used multiple times per turn!
-
Research Notes collects 1 Evidence per dropped clue, and since it is not unique, you can have 2 in play. This means that with each clue dropped, you gain 2 Evidence (1 on each copy) that you can use to get clues later.
- The best way to use the Research Notes is to drop clues on lower shroud locations to accumulate Evidence and collect them back easily. Then spend the Evidence on a high-shroud location to test (0) and gain clues easily.
- Another positive thing about Research Notes is that you can drop clues at a non-VP location and then use the Evidence to easily empty locations with Victory Points.
-
Press Pass gives you an additional action if you dropped a clue during your turn. With this deck, given a few setups turn at worst, it should be possible every turn. This virtually makes Captivating Discovery or compensates for the action spent on Research Notes to get the clues back.
What's best is that it is not unique, so for the additional price of a Relic Hunter, you can get a second additional action per turn!
Synergies:
-
You can drop a clue with Quick Study to increase your while using the on Research Notes. This combo dramatically increases the chances of spending all your Evidence stored on one copy in a single test, while collecting an additional Evidence on your second copy!
-
Same goes for Analysis, which can help you to succeed by a significant number while getting all the clues dropped back.
-
Knowledge is Power gives an huge burst in tempo by allowing you to perform the ability on the Research Notes without spending the action and any Evidence since it ignores all costs. As this is considered on the edge of how Knowledge is Power should be used, I only used 1 copy of Knowledge is Power not to break the game completely. If you do not mind, then go for a 2nd one ASAP; if you do, remove the one copy.
Conclusion:
Once the engine is running, this deck will allow you to gain various benefits out of dropping clues: collecting Evidence, drawing loads of cards, guaranteeing success to a test, choosing your Encounter card or boosting a skill value.
- All the Evidence collected will then translate into even more cards with Empirical Hypothesis, lower test difficulty with Darrell's ability and easy clues no matter the shroud value.
Icing on the cake: you will do all of this without spending any of your 3 basic actions, thanks to Press Pass.
Collecting Evidence:
As discussed in the earlier section, the clue-dropping mechanic will generate an insane number of Evidence. Let's review where:
-
Darrell's Kodak is in play from the beginning of the game. Mainly thanks to Dr. William T. Maleson, you can sort out the Encounter card that you draw and keep only the ones that would enable you to collect an Evidence on the Darrell's Kodak and that you feel confident enough you can collect before it is gone. For instance, if you draw an enemy and want your fighter to kill it before your turn so you can investigate, you will not be able to collect the Evidence on it. So be smart!
-
Research Notes, as explained earlier, will collect 1 Evidence per clue dropped and per copy on the table.
-
Empirical Hypothesis will also collect Evidence. regularly as it is highly likely that you will succeed by 3 or more at least once a turn, especially while testing on the Research Notes.
-
While you are likely to play most of your Evidence on the turn when you get them, you can still collect and store a high number up front to prepare for fast cycling of your deck and therefore seeing your Ruined Film often.
Scavenging:
As every good Deck, Scavenging (0) and Scavenging (2) bring a fantastic value in 2 different ways:
Fast setup:
-
Short Supply place a lot of your Items in your discard pile from the beginning of the game. Play Scavenging (2) to play them as soon as you succeed an investigation by 2 or more (which should happen every turn). Scavenging (0) is already good to tutor your Items.
- Scavenging (2) and Arcane Enlightenment is your priority for Mulligan, and you shouldn't feel bad doing a hard mulligan for it. If it turns out that both copies go to your discard pile because of Short Supply, you are still very likely to get at least one back with Resourceful. If not, well... cycle fast with Captivating Discovery.
- Some cards are more annoying than others if discarded by Short Supply since we cannot get them back with this deck: besides Quick Study and Empirical Hypothesis, I want to emphasise on Arcane Enlightenment. This is your second priority for the mulligan, and you should not shuffle it back. which will prevent you from having 2 Newspaper (2) in play. If it is a victim of Short Supply, you will not be able to play both Research Notes before you cycle your deck once.
-
To play items from your hand , commit them to tests and then Scavenge them into play directly. Except for the Hiking Boots and Press Pass, they conveniently all commit for tests.
-
The Schoffner's Catalogue is here to pay for your Items since you can cycle it. Note that it says Item assets and therefore cannot pay for The Raven Quill, unfortunately.
Higher value:
Newspaper (2) and The Raven Quill are both Items that commit for , which is fantastic to play them in a loop to oversucceed. This works before you even upgrade your Scavenging.
Customizable Cards:
- The Raven Quill is another cornerstone of this deck. You name the Research Notes and let it tick its own boxes at the end of each scenario. Before you have the Research Notes in play, you can loop it with Scavenging (2) to commit it for and return it to your hand.
- For the upgrades, we will choose the Spectral Binding first, for 1xp, making the one copy of Research Notes not take any slot and therefore making it possible to replace the second copy of Arcane Enlightenment and still have 4 hand slots.
- As the The Raven Quill gains more experience, we can choose Interwoven Ink, which readies another asset when we use the ability of the attached Research Notes. The assets that we can ready this way are Press Pass for another additional action during your turn and more clue-dropping shenanigans, Empirical Hypothesis to collect another Evidence during the same test, Scavenging (2) if you still have some setup to do, Hiking Boots or Quick Study in more specific situations.
You do not really need to tick any box on this card to get value, but as you run out of upgrades for your deck, there are 2 that can be interesting:
-
Peer review: if you do not need more card draw and want to support your team, this makes it more likely for you to gain an Evidence and get the most out of it by offering others to draw cards.
-
Research Grant: depending on what your team needs the most, being able to help your teammates with paying for their cards can be extremely useful, especially in the early scenario and late campaign when cards tend to become more expensive.
The interaction of the two:
To clarify the way The Raven Quill - Interwoven Ink works with Empirical Hypothesis, here is the sequence:
- Use the on Research Notes with The Raven Quill attached.
- Succeed by 3 or more and exhaust Empirical Hypothesis to collect an Evidence on it.
- After resolving the test, Interwoven Ink will ready Empirical Hypothesis, which is then ready to use again for another Evidence.
- Exhaust Empirical Hypothesis immediately to collect an Evidence during the same test.
Disclaimer: This interaction requires an FAQ to be 100% confirmed, but as of now, it is the most probable interpretation of the rules.
Other Cards:
0xp Cards:
-
We are using Schoffner's Catalogue because, contrary to events, it is not wasted if you discard it with Short Supply at the beginning of the game. It is also since we use Scavenging (2) and if you have it in your hand, simply commit it to any test before recurring it. It also has a slightly better tempo than Crack the Case, as it won't be re-shuffled in your deck once your deck is running out of cards and, therefore, won't take one draw.
- Once all your items are in play, the catalogue is not useful anymore, and Crack the Case becomes better as it brings some cash to fuel Plucky (3).
- Another idea is Astounding Revelation, as you do not need to drop a clue to use it while searching your deck with Captivating Discovery. I did not go for this one because it is "only" 2 resources.
- Cryptic Writings is also available as an alternative. It can be played fast when drawn via Captivating Discovery/Empirical Hypothesis and worst case scenario it commits for a .
- You are free to use whichever of these cards you want to play the most, they will all do amazing.
-
Resourceful, as explained, compensates for Short Supply that could be trashing both Scavenging (2), affecting the set-up pace tremendously.
-
Deduction and Sharp Vision accelerate the rate of collecting the clues you've dropped, bringing additional tempo. We upgrade later to Deduction (2) to get another tempo boost.
-
Arcane Enlightenment is for holding the second Research Notes, so you can have 2 Newspaper (2) in play too. When you don't need it, it also commits for 2 .
-
True Understanding brings an added value, especially on treacheries like Locked Door, since you can then discover the clue before it is discarded, thus collecting the Evidence on your Kodak, which would be impossible otherwise.
Higher XP Cards:
-
Hiking Boots will bring good value as you will empty locations more or less every round (depending on the number of players). We prefer it over Pathfinder because it is cheaper in XP and is Scavengeable since it's an item. The is the cherry on top.
-
If there is one thing that I hate as a cluever, it is to spend my actions playing assets rather than investigating. No wonder Unearth the Ancients (2) is one of my favourite cards; playing your assets as you keep getting clues.
- The targets are Dr. William T. Maleson, Empirical Hypothesis, Arcane Enlightenment and Quick Study.
- When you have all your Assets in play, it turns into a commit which is always nice.
-
Plucky (3) brings interesting stat boosts, a skill pump to get rid of your excessive resource, and most importantly, a very needed Horror soak for the Ruined Film and the fast cycling speed once fully set up.
-
Quick Learner (4) is an excellent way to spend your last bits of XP when you are done with all the rest. With 2 Press Pass in play, you will have 5 actions each turn, so 3 of them with -2 test difficulty. Spending 1 Evidence with Darrell's ability almost assures you to bring any test to (0) difficulty.
- Alternatively, dropping a clue with Quick Study or spending 1 Evidence on your first action if you need to take a test will compensate for the downside of Quick Learner.
- Finally, you can use your first action to do something that doesn't involve a test, like moving, playing Captivating Discovery (which activates Press Pass for 2 additional actions with -2 difficulty), clearing someone's Weakness...
-
At the very end, if we do not know what to do with our XP anymore, Versatile can be a fun option.
- Bring whatever makes you feel good, but I thought that Breaking and Entering was a cool card to bring. The "add" stat helps to compensate for the fact that you're probably using it as your first action, and so you get +2 difficulty with Quick Learner, and it helps collect Evidence on enemies easily!
- The other cards that we can add with the 4 more slots available are Exploit Weakness and Shed a Light because the -2 difficulty during 3 turns with Quick Learner opens a lot of doors for testing at difficulty 0 by using 1 Evidence with Darrell's ability.
Upgrade Path:
Scavenging x2 Scavenging (2) x2 - 4xp - Total 4xp
Arcane Enlightenment x1 + The Raven Quill x1 Press Pass x2 + Relic Hunter - 7xp - Total 11xp
Hawk-Eye Folding Camera x2 Newspaper (2) x2 - 4xp - Total 15xp
True Understanding x1 Plucky (3) x1 - 3xp - Total 18xp
Empirical Hypothesis x1 Unearth the Ancients (2) x1 - 2xp - Total 20xp
Lucky! x2 Quick Study x2 - 4xp - Total 24xp
Dr. William T. Maleson x1 Dr. William T. Maleson (2) x1 - 2xp - Total 26xp
Eureka! x2 Hiking Boots x1 + Knowledge is Power x1 - 3xp - Total 29xp
Quick Learner x2 - 8xp - Total 37xp
Deduction x2 Deduction (2) x2 - 4xp - Total 41xp
True Understanding x1 + Crack the Case x1 Sharp Vision x2 - 2xp - Total 45xp
Make your own Deck!:
-
To understand some of the archetypes and cards available to Darrell, there is This Great Video made by Veronica from Until the End of Time. I will try to explain here a couple of them that I have also considered and explain the strategies of each deck very briefly.
-
Here is another proposal for a Deck that uses Darrell's test reduction to reduce the difficulty to 0. This deck is better for True Solo and Flex and is also super fun to play!
- Combine the shroud reductions of Old Keyring (3) and Flashlight (3) to bring locations with a shroud of 4 and less to 0 and get an additional clue. This also allows you to play Shed a Light if there are more than 2 clues. If the shroud is 5 or more, you can add Gumption or spend an Evidence from your Darrell's Kodak.
- For enemy management, you can use Exploit Weakness thanks to your Flashlight (3) that reduces the difficulty of evasion tests and if the enemy has 3 or more evade value you can complete with Gumption or with spending an Evidence.
- Finally, one fun way to collect Evidence on enemies with that deck is that you can evade it, then use Belly of the Beast to collect a clue and the Evidence on it, and if you bring the test difficulty to 0, you can discard it during the same action!
- Since the deck highly benefits from certain events, I added a lot of draw with Practice Makes Perfect to abuse Perception (2) on investigations and Unrelenting on evasions.
- The weak spot of this deck is the lower Evidence count. To absorb the horror of the deck reshuffling and Ruined Film, we take advantage of the Cherished Keepsake and Scavenging (2) combo and why not Plucky (3) later.
- For a level 0 version of that deck, here's how I would approach it.
-
Since Darrell can turn any test to a difficulty 0, are not an issue to him. We can imagine a Deck like this that would also take advantage of the cursed cards available, for instance, to heal himself with Spirit of Humanity or to draw cards with Deep Knowledge.
- This also allows Token of Faith to bring a steady flow of that can be used later for A Watchful Peace.
-
There is also a basic Scavenging (2) Darrell Deck possible that simply cycles Ice Pick (3), and other than that, is relatively similar to a Minh Deck. But come on, I couldn't come back to the community with Yet An-Other Freaking Deck using this combo.
To create your own guides, find the template I have created here
| 68 comments |
|---|
Oct 12, 2022 |
Oct 12, 2022Thank you for the shout-out! |
Oct 12, 2022The main assets on this (Newspaper II, Research Notes, Press Pass, Maleson, and Arcane Enlightenment) are so hot, looks like such a great engine when it gets going. In my first campaign game with my Darrell, I managed 3 clues and 4 evidence with one action and felt like a god! |
Oct 12, 2022I love your decks! Thanks for posting this, I'm definitely going to try it out. Do you have any dedicated fighter in the works that uses a TSK investigator/player cards? |
Oct 12, 2022
|
Oct 12, 2022"Knowledge is Power gives an huge burst in tempo by allowing you to perform the ability on the Research Notes without spending the action and any Evidence since it ignores all costs." I may be wrong but imho this isn't working this way. Knowledge is Power let's you surely ignore the action cost, but you should not get to discover any clue without spending evidences. My arguments are:
|
Oct 12, 2022
|
Oct 12, 2022
Knowledge is Power's FAQ defines De Vermis Mysteriis's cost as everything before colums, by the (rule) book. Old Book of Lore's FAQ answer they very carefully never define spending secrets as a "cost" of any kind. I will add, instead, that Divination's FAQ explicitly says that spending charges is not a cost. |
Oct 12, 2022This means that you cannot, for example, discover clues with Divination without having to spend charges even with Knowledge is Power, because it only ignores cost, and that part of the spell is not. |
Oct 13, 2022
"Knowledge is Power reads:
Old Book of Lore reads:
If I use Knowledge is Power on Old Book of Lore, do I need to spend a secret to use the "immediately play that card" part of the ability? Clearly Knowledge is Power does not allow me to ignore any costs of the card I'm about to play (c.f. ruling on De Vermis Mysteries), but does the "may X to Y" templating here mean spending a secret here a cost? Thanks! - To answer your question(s): Knowledge is Power allows you to ignore ability costs on the chosen asset, which includes costs printed in its text box; this means you are able to immediately play the card you fetched with Old Book of Lore without spending 1 secret. Feel free to reach out to us if any more questions arise! Sincerely, Alex Werner, FFG Game Rules Specialist" |
Oct 13, 2022Thanks, i missed this. I still think this is an oversight and i can't help thinking it contradicts the ruling on Divination, but ok. |
Oct 13, 2022Thanks I was a bit torn on whether I should add this card to the deck or not. It feels weird and inconsistent, but as it works, I felt like it had to be there, with a little explanation in the guide as to why I did not put 2 copies and how I felt about this combo. As a cooperative game, I think it makes perfect sense to house rule it as not working and play another copy of Unearth the Ancients (2) instead! We avoid certain cards and combos at my table, no matter if they are allowed or not, when we feel like it breaks at least one aspect of the game. This one will probably be one of them soon. |
Oct 17, 2022May I ask for true solo deck with 0 xp? |
Oct 17, 2022I love your ideas for this deck! I played Darrell through Standard-Difficulty Edge of the Earth partnered with Wini in late July/early August 2022 (pre-Taboo update). Unfortunately, that means I didn't get to try out Research Notes and the related archetypal cards, which could solve the clue compression and evidence density problems I had. Some questions I have about the build:
I'll admit that Forced Learning probably hurt me as much as it helped me, but it did let me handle having seven assorted copies of MILD SPOILER in my deck at one point. Even so, I don't think I would include it again. The consistency problems it added to my deck gave me a slow start more than once. Though this next problem is Edge of the Earth-specific, it's still a problem. While the large deck size prevented me from drawing MILD SPOILER multiple turns in a row, Forced Learning made me discard a lot of cards I would have liked to draw when I saw one of those MILD SPOILER copies. |
Oct 17, 2022Hey,
To explain a bit further, I thought about Forced Learning too, but my experience is that it doesn't work with combo decks, and this one heavily relies on a few assets to function: Research Notes, Press Pass, Scavenging (2). In this situation, Forced Learning makes it much harder to find these, diluting all the searches. I hope that answers at least partially your questions and makes you want to try that deck!
|
Oct 24, 2022I ran a slightly different different version of this build through the Dream-Quest and it worked beautifully. The engine stalled when I ran out of clues and couldn't investigate, but that's pretty true of any Seeker build. Loved it. It's going to be hard to move on to another build for the next game |
Nov 03, 2022Maybe I've missed something in the write up, but can you explain why the 0xp deck has 32 cards in it? |
Nov 03, 2022
I made the change, so it should be correct now! I hope you like the deck, and let me know how it goes if you decide to take it on a ride!
|
Nov 03, 2022
|
Nov 09, 2022I started playing this in our Innsmouth Campaign. All I can say is WOW! This is a fun deck. I decided to play it as described without any personal modifications. It's amazing! I love how the Scavenging and the Resourceful play together. Resourceful is specifically to get back Scavenging and Lucky! Then Scavenging, once in play, can be used to continually return any of the items that you can continue to contribute to skill checks (if needed) or get them into play. Both of my Arcane Enlightenment hit the discard right from the beginning. I thought I was going to struggle. Nope! We were able to succeed quite majestically. Thanks for a FUN deck! |
Nov 09, 2022One thing I forgot the mention, you don't have to spend the XP to upgrade The Raven's Quill card if it made it into play. You can also spend XP to check the boxes. So there are multiple paths to upgrade the card. |
Nov 14, 2022Hey About The Raven Quill, indeed, if you play a campaign, it will upgrade itself, allowing you to spend your xp elsewhere :) Let me know how it went when you're done with the campaign, and I hope you're still enjoying it! |
Nov 18, 2022I'm fucking sick of these non 0 xp decks |
Nov 18, 2022
|
Nov 18, 2022
I used to propose 0xp decks for my campaign guides, but 2 things changed my mind:
|
Nov 18, 2022
|
Nov 21, 2022So just out of curiosity. What difficulty would you suggest playing this deck at? |
Nov 28, 2022This looks amazing. I just built a Darrell Deck focused on the "get shroud to zero" and then saw this. Will definitely need to try it out once I finish my current game. |
Nov 28, 2022
If you are more interested in hard/expert, then I suggest looking at the Difficulty 0 alternative that I propose in Make your own deck! at the bottom of the guide.
|
Dec 02, 2022Question about the Newspaper, how often do you actually have 0 clues? I've played a couple of games with the level 0 deck and you have 0 at the beginning, again once you drop some clues with captivating discovery, but otherwise it seems like they only help like 4 times a game total. Could you explain the pattern you would typically use? |
Dec 04, 2022I'm such a fan of your great work for all the decks you built ! Thanks a lot for sharing with us. Like many others, I had huge expectations with the capacity of Darrell and I thought had seen all the combos available for him, with evidence and such, yet you got me with Knowledge is Power ! Still think of it as a glitch. :) About the interaction between The Raven Quill and Interwoven Ink, I would agree with your first 3 points but not with the fourth. You first fully resolve the ability, after that you exhaust The Raven Quill, and then you could no longer exhaust Empirical Hypothesis since the criteria isn't met at the moment. What do you think of it ? |
Dec 12, 2022I've a question about Research Notes and Empirical Hypothesis: can I spend evidences from other assets (i.e. Hawk-Eye Folding Camera)? I think so, in my opinion, because they aren't cards with "USE". |
Dec 12, 2022Yes! Anything that is an "Evidence" can be spent. This includes Hawk-Eye Folding Camera. That's what makes these cards so broken. The combos you can achieve are amazing! |
Dec 13, 2022
Cards do not allow you to use the uses from any other card unless mentioned. It is the same with spells like Shrivelling. It doesn't specify from Shrivelling, and yet you cannot use a charge from any other spell. So Research Notes can only use the Evidence on itself, and same goes for Empirical Hypothesis. You can consider them as another type of Ammos or Charges. They are the same type of use, but they are not a single pool of evidence, so to speak. BUT! Darrell's ability allows you to use Evidence on any asset, so in that one particular instance, you can do it. |
Dec 14, 2022Ooops! Yep, I was thinking of Darrell's ability. |
Dec 19, 2022
On the other side, actually Darrell's ability specifies that Evidence can be spent on any asset. Here it is clearly stated. I then doubt that, in the absence of a clear mention on the card, an ability that spends Evidence can only spend those that the card itself generates. Quite a dilemma.... |
Dec 19, 2022
|
Dec 19, 2022The question was asked and answered on this BGG Post. Here is what it says: "When a card has “evidence” placed onto it and has an ability that spends “evidence”, that evidence must be spent from the same card. Only evidence on Michael Leigh can be spent on his second triggered ability. Only evidence on Research Notes can be spent on its activate ability." Credits to @Tika for helping me find the ruling about this and @Killbray for asking FFG. |
Dec 19, 2022That's great to have an official ruling. But those cards need an errata or they need to add something more specific about "typed" resources I think. Uses (0) on those cards would have made them crystal clear. |
Dec 20, 2022
|
Dec 23, 2022I'm a bit confused here. In the Upgrade Path section, why does it direct you towards removing your customizable cards? |
Dec 28, 2022In the thick of it too risky for him? |
Jan 01, 2023
|
Jan 04, 2023
|
Jan 04, 2023Played through a Scarlet Keys using this deck with my wife using your Kymani Deck. For this to really work you need multiple research notes, at least one quick study, and either two press passes or one and an upgraded raven quill. Due to my consistently terrible luck with short supply, I found I was consistently on my second pass of the deck before really kicking off. When it is rolling, it absolutely rocks but cant really work without 12 XP, and still takes some time (and luck) to get rolling. I had only one scenario where I had all the important assets in play. |
Jan 05, 2023Thanks for the feedback Bad luck is always a factor, and I'm part of your club. Most of my testing actually went a similar way you are describing. I decided to still publish because of how good it went with only one Research Notes. I personally really like these decks with an extremely high ceiling, becoming insane when the pressure is at the highest, as long as they are still productive during the set up, which is the case here in my experience. Did it still go well for you overall? And how about Kymani Jones? They also need quite some set up, though Underworld Market helps. |
Jan 05, 2023Yes, the ceiling was unbelievable! I just was only able to hit it once, and come close twice. At worst, I was getting clues the hard way and using evidence to cover treacheries. The deck works because the cards work on their own or in pairs, but when it all comes together it is unstoppable! Kymani played well. The deck did take time to gather speed, but Fence and I'll Take That allowed continual building even in the thick of things. The critical step was to get pickpocketing OR a lucky Cigarette case in the first two turns, and almost every scenario we were able to end with 10 resources on Embezzled Treasure. The extra resources from upgraded pickpocket were critical, and times it didn't turn up early I was able to make up for it with recursive Schoffner's or Crack the Case. We skipped Stealth, as Kymani was our fighter. It felt like the action compression was more consistent with Kymani, at at worst they were using Evade for Hidden Enemies. |
Jan 06, 2023I have been also playing a lightly modified copy of this deck in The Scarlet Keys campaign. Out of all the decks I have tested, I think this has the most moving parts and a lot of things to set up and track during play. But great fun when it works. Kudos for the deck design and detailed instructions behind this! |
Jan 07, 2023Hi, dunno if someone already asked but the "link to the full xp deck" say "you are not allowed to view this deck" maybe is set to private |
Jan 15, 2023
|
Jan 16, 2023Who could be a good partner for this Darrell’s deck from SK campaign? We need a fighter, right? |
Jan 16, 2023Hey Good luck, and have fun with these! :) |
Jan 19, 2023Hi, nice deck as usual. After some research it seems you cant use an evidence of an asset for another asset (research note) |
Feb 02, 2023Where's the level 0 version? Faggot! |
Feb 02, 2023
Please make sure to check the upgrade path at the end of the guide for a direct link to the level 0 version, as well as the detailed upgrade plan, and finally a proposal a fully upgraded deck. I hope you’ll enjoy the deck, seems like you need a bit of chill and fun! Cordially, |
May 15, 2023Thank you for another wonderful deck, Valentin! Question about Newspaper (2), are you interested in playing it, or do you just want to pitch it and recur with Scavenging? I did notice you had the arcane enlightenment, and I was just wondering about clarification. Thanks again! |
May 17, 2023Also, I don't understand where the 'Tog reference comes from??? Does that have something to do with an old timey camera model? Or is it from Pho'tog'raphy? Or something else entirely? |
May 19, 2023Tog stands for Photographer |
Sep 18, 2023With the new Errata, Knowledge is Power will still consume the evidence. Just wanted to drop this, since y'all discussed this in the comments. |
Nov 05, 2023Can Empirical Hypothesis really trigger twice off the same test if you ready it with Raven Quill/Research Notes? I thought that was illegal or something. |
Dec 27, 2023I hate to say this, but this is the first deck that I want to switch mid campaign. It is just weak. We play on Hard, Dunwich campaign on 6th scenario. While my teammates do their jobs and progress the scenario, I spent the better half of it to set up my assets. In 2 out of 5 scenarios I managed to set up everything. And guess what - even then my actions seems mediocre given all the preparations. I've figured that when I was doing good it was because of the investigator himself and the evidence generation of Empirical Hypothesis. So the one thing I'll drop is the deck itself. |
May 10, 2024The theory of this deck did not convince me, but I wanted to try it anyway and I will switch away as well. There is just way to much setup and cost until you get to the fun part. Its also not even that easy getting the clues first to drop, if your hypothesis doesnt show up. Newspaper in 3 player was unplayable and also I had to use clue dropping cards just to fire the engine as opportunities were not always there. That said it was still enough to carry clueing for 3 players on hard, but the clue dropping package does not convince at all. I will try 0 dif, but I suspect, dark horse compass probably is the most efficient Darrel dexk |
May 11, 2024Hey The clue dropping package was the most exciting stuff to me when the expansion just got out and that's where I took this deck, but with a bit more experience with Darrell and the cards, I would have recommended Difficulty 0 to people asking what build to play first with Darrell. This has now all changed because of the Taboo hitting Scavenging, Research Notes, Shed a Light... Since all of these got nerfed, I would also agree that |
May 16, 2024Playing this through Return to Dunwich (hard) currently and it's been fantastic. Once the Press Passes go in, the deck feels very strong, even with the taboo to Research Notes. The only change I made was to throw in a Pelt Shipment and the obligatory In the Thick of It. |
Jun 18, 2024Hi, I'm looking at using this in an Dream Eaters run soon. While studying the upgrades it looks like a Dr. William T. Maleson disappears along the way, as the 0xp deck has two copies but the full XP deck has just one! I'm not planning on using Taboo, so I don't have the XP cost on Knowledge is Power. That means I can either replace one of the Malesons with it at the start, or keep and upgrade both Malesons. Do you have a recommendation on which would work better? Thanks in advance! |
Jun 19, 2024Hey The idea behind having only one Maleson is to cut some deck space and assume that the deck, past a certain point, has enough steam to draw him reliably. If I had to re-make this deck today, I'd run something with more draw, and a quickened setup, taking in consideration some of the above comments. And to focus more on your question, there's no going wrong with having another Dr. William T. Maleson (2), the challenge in this deck is that every upgrade is essential and adds a lot of value to the deck, and the earlier you have Maleson, the faster you can get value out of him. |
Jun 26, 2024Cheers, I understand why you'd use one Maleson, I just couldn't figure out where the second one had gone to in the upgrade charts! I went with two for the current campaign as I'd never used him before. |
Aug 15, 2024
|
Very nice looking deck! I was trying out Darrell with another deck that takes advantage of forcing tests down to 0 by using Shed a Light, Exploit Weakness, Flashlight, Gumption and of course his evidence system backed up by his Darrell's Kodak but also Hawk-Eye Folding Camera and Empirical Hypothesis. He is certainly much fun to play and I'm going to try this one out soon!