Doom Curious? Ask Sefina.

Hello, and welcome to the third in a series of decks designed to make the doom mechanic less intimidating and more fun. The first two decks can be found here https://arkhamdb.com/deck/view/2723575 (Pete) and here https://arkhamdb.com/deck/view/2720399 (Jim). For the reasons I outline at the beginning of the Pete deck, I'm aiming these primarily at solo play. I also don't claim that they are especially powerful--rather, they are functional decks designed around an inherently challenging mechanic.

With this deck, Sefina avoids direct confrontation by using Onyx Pentacle, Enchanted Bow, and Think on Your Feet. The Pentacle and Moonlight Ritual are the only doom cards in this deck, but they bring a lot to the table for Sefina. I'm not denying this deck has a fairly high jank factor, though the associated risk is somewhat mitigated by Sefina's huge opening hand. Stay with me here!

Fighting (4/5):

It's a combo setup that starts like this...

Familiar Spirit can give you an additional arcane slot.

Astral Mirror converts (in this case) one of your arcane slots to a hand slot.

Voila! You have three hand slots and two arcane slots. Use them as follows:

Hand slots: Onyx Pentacle, Enchanted Bow, Enchanted Bow

Arcane slots: Sixth Sense, Enchanted Bow

Now...

1) Use the Onyx Pentacle to evade an enemy at a connecting location, testing at 6 Agility. For a 3-health enemy, throw in Hatchet Man for 7 Agility and a subsequent +1 damage.

2a) Use Dirty Fighting to take a FAST shot with the Enchanted Bow with 6 Agility. If you used Hatchet Man in Step 1, you do 3 total damage; or, if you need clues off that location...

2b) Move into the location with the exhausted enemy and play Sneak Attack on it for 2 (or 3) total damage (or fire up Dirty Fighting to punch it at 4 Combat for 1 damage).

In either case, the enemy does not engage you, which in a certain campaign is huge. With Sefina's low health, keeping enemies at a distance is universally helpful.

Investigation (3/5):

Sixth Sense lets you try to find clues remotely. It's not something you can rely on, but if you have clues at both your location and a connecting one, there is no downside. But, regardless, you're still only investigating at 4....

Evasion (5/5):

Onyx Pentacle keeps enemies at bay, Think on Your Feet gives you breathing room when a baddy drops in uninvited, and your natural 4 Evade will handle clumsier enemies.

Economy (4/5):

Easy Mark and Faustian Bargain are staples.

Play Enraptured on Read the Signs to add an arrow to your Enchanted Bow's quiver.

Uncage the Soul works on Sixth Sense, Astral Mirror, and Enchanted Bow, so if you can get it under Sefina at setup, it's going to do some work.

Card Draw (2/5):

Easy Mark is your only potential draw acceleration. Your full opening hand will offset that in the early game, but it could be in an issue by the midpoint of a scenario.

Vitality (3/5):

With 5 health, and no room in the deck for soak or healing, you need to use your Deny Existence and Ward of Protection wisely. Sefina is naturally strong against the encounter deck, but dealing with enemies at arm's length is her safest bet. Familiar Spirit is essential to this engine, so its (minimal) soak is effectively unavailable to you unless (maybe) you draw two very early.

Action Compression (4/5):

Since you'll probably only fight evaded enemies, Dirty Fighting gives is huge. You will rarely need to waste an action to engage aloof enemies. You'll save a ton of movement by using ranged actions to avoid doubling back to pick up missed clues or deal with hunters.

Doom Management:

Doom is less risky and easier to manage that in most doom builds. You can remove doom from the Onyx Pentacle by alternating between its action options, but you also have Moonlight Ritual to fall back on.

Cards to place under Sefina:

I think the cards you most want to effectively recur are Deny Existence, Moonlight Ritual, Think on Your Feet, and to a lesser extent Uncage the Soul and Read the Signs.

Other cards to consider:

Honestly, I realize investigating at 4 is not going to cut it outside of Easy. One alternative is to swap the Astral Mirrors for Hidden Pockets, and Sixth Sense for Lockpicks. I just like to keep the starting XP of these decks as low as possible, and I think Sixth Sense plays nicely into the connecting-location theme of the Enchanted Bow and the Onyx Pentacle. Another is to squeeze in Crystallizer of Dreams to commit the Wild, Will and Knowledge pips on your spent event cards. Some of these swaps might add enough items to make Versatile-ing in a Geared Up worthwhile in a 13-card opening hand, but be aware that some of the essential assets that might seem like items don't actually have that trait.

What about Multiplayer?

I don't think this deck suffers leads to nearly as much analysis paralysis as many doom decks can. However, even with a fair number of card swaps, it won't gather large numbers of clues with efficiency. And while I think it is as effective as it is fun for solo combat, it won't generate enough firepower to handle a large volume of enemies and/or scaled-up bosses. I suppose it could work as a "flex" in a three- or four-player game, covering the cluever from a central location, picking up the odd clue here and there, and running interference in the boss fight.

Upgrade ideas:

Well, it's Sefina, so Double, Double! But Power Word can do some of what the Onyx Pentacle can do and you can add the health healing option to round it out. (Just realize that "Cower" doesn't activate Dirty Fighting.) The upgraded Moonlight Ritual is fast. Snipe helps ensure you don't waste your limited supply of arrows. And the only reason I left out the second Dirty Fighting from this build was to keep the XP cost down, but it's also the only non-essential (though still highly desirable!) asset in this build.

Please let me know what you think about these doom decks. I have another in the works (it'll be a real brain burner to play), so stay tuned if you're enjoying them!