"Greatest Hits" Mandy (19XP, taboo compliant)

Article for this deck in more detail on Ancient Evils: https://derbk.com/ancientevils/deck-tech-greatest-hits-mandy/

When people say that Mandy took a huge hit to her power because of the latest taboo (which forces her to play 50 cards), they do overlook one crucial thing:

She can play yellow and green cards. So finding 50 good cards is hilariously trivial.

This deck uses her Rogue access in combination with her investigator ability to let her pick and choose from the "Greatest Hits" of Seeker's fantastic array of assets, then get the most out of them without ever losing tempo the way that inferior classes do when setting up their board. The result is a deck where you don't really have to care much about what you draw, it's chock full of redundancy and interlocking parts that make sure you are putting most 30 card decks to shame. At the same time, you are drawing a bunch of extra cards and still don't cycle your deck very often, so your weaknesses don't matter much.

Let's start with the assets. Mandy's job is picking up clues. All the clues. And to that end, she has two of the best clue gathering assets in her deck that are around: Fingerprint Kit (aka "A Box of Deductions") and Grim Memoir (aka "A Box of Perceptions") which give bonus clues and tempo. I threw in a singleton Mag Glass, but tbh that is the card in the deck closest to being filler, i'll take a Memoir over a Mag Glass any day in this deck. Our investigation assets use charges, but we'll get to that.

We got an Occult Lexicon which is a great tutor target for Research Librarian and can be a fantastic source of independece when ghouls, Deep Ones, spiders and similarly fragile enemies are the main antagonists.

Finally, Old Book of Lore combos with Mandy's ability very well. This list has only one of them upgraded, see that you get the second one up to par relatively soon too. It's a really remarkable upgrade that plays very well into what our events are trying to do.

Two copies of Backpack are there to find what you need. Mandy can use them to dig 15 cards deep which is just amazing.

On the ally side, we have a Miskatonic Army, supported by Archeology Funding. Two Research Librarians go hand in hand with the Backpacks to find the OBoL, Lexicon or Memoirs. They also are great to trigger your weakness early on so it doesn't surprise you later. If the weakness is already out, they can trigger Revelation or Occult Evidence instead while doing their thing. They are a Mandy staple, why am i still talking about them?

Abigail Foreman supercharges your OBoL, but is mostly here to get even more juice out of your Memoirs.

Library Docent has some interesting jobs in this deck. It does recharge your Memoirs or OBoLs, but it can also return Occult Lexicon to your hand. That can be useful if you do that while two or more Blood-Rites are already in your discard. Since the latest errata on Lexicon, the Blood-Rites can now be returned to your hand and deck when playing the Lexicon again which can be quite valuable. Notably that doesn't work with a level 3 Lexicon, so think before you upgrade it!

Milan, Lab Assistant and Medical Students are simply good cards and don't require any special introduction.

Notably absent: Mr Rook didn't make the cut. Since this deck is (mostly) sticking to current taboo, i think that OBoL is just straight up superior to Rook and i don't think i ever need both.

Half of the deck is events. Let's start with the Rogue ones. The green events are focused on economy and cheating stuff into play. We have both Sleight of Hand and Hit and Run to get something into play for a turn and make profit of its abilities or its "enters play" trigger. "I'll take that!" puts stuff into play for oversucceeding at investigations which is easy to do for Mandy. Spending the last charge on a Memoir to "I'll Take That" a Fingerprint Kit in its place feels gooooood. Faustian Bargain provides some money for the whole team and Breaking and Entering is either a nice panic button or a setup for I'll Take That. Or both. Without ever stopping to pick up clues.

Calling in Favors main job is finding Abigail in the top 12 cards, but just stringing together any Miskatonic allies while triggering Research cards is already excellent. The final piece in our "Never stop investigating" package is Burning the Midnight Oil for some extra money just in case we do have to actually pay for a Fingerprint Kit or Milan some time.

"I've Got A Plan" rounds out our defensive suite. I like my clue getters to be able to defend themselves and not be completely dependent on a bodyguard. Between Breaking and Entering, I've Got A Plan and Occult Lexicon we are good on that front. We also got two Manual Dexterity to capitalize on the innate 3 agility that Mandy has. This is useful either for enemy handling or for encounter protection.

While on the topic of skills, aside from Man Dex, there's only the three cards that are in pretty much every Seeker list i ever made: Deduction, Perception and Eureka are just hard staples for me. And Eureka is of course even better in Mandy than usual.

I think the only card i didn't mention now is Stirring Up Trouble. Uuuh... good card? Finds clues good! Play good card!

Upgrading the deck: The one big disadvantage that a 50 card deck has is the lowered impact of upgraded cards. For that reason, i usually prefer making multiple small purchases instead of a single big one. Abigail can be found with Callings and is super high impact (also i just really enjoy playing Abigail), so i made an exception for her but that is the reason why none of the Seeker mini-quest cards like Ancient Stones or Dream Diary are in here. Putting together a 19XP version of the deck i am currently playing through a campaign (Innsmouth, together with the Arcane Archer Luke i posted before) was actually not that easy. I have thrown a considerable amount of XP at the deck already and there are absolutely different option of what goes into a 19XP list. So lets look at some pits to throw XP into past 19XP:

The skills: This one is obvious. Deduction and Perception both gain a lot from upgrading. Fingerprint Kit: FPK(4) is amazing. As a level 4, it does however no longer work with Sleight of Hand if you follow taboo. Personally, i don't believe in nerfing fun cards just because Necronomicon(5) exists, so i play Sleight as printed, but that's of course a personal thing. Occult Lexicon: Upgrading that thing makes it more powerful for sure. It does remove its interaction with Library Docent, though. Then again, upgraded you can flash it into play with Sleight and keep the Blood Rites in hand and deck! Your call. Old Book of Lore: Get the second one. It's soooo good. Unearth the Ancients(2): The level zero isn't great, but the upgraded one does fit very well in with all the asset cheating that this deck is doing. I'll Take That is better, but there is merit to having Unearth(2) as well. Mind over Matter(2): More encounter protection and enemy handling if you feel like you need it. Like with Unearth, i think the level zero is pretty bad, but the upgraded one is respectable. I'd probably upgrade my I've Got a Plans before i reach for the Mind over Matters, though.

Of note, this deck runs neither accessory slots nor arcane slots. I don't think anything too worthwhile is available that i'd want to cut something from the list for it. You could make a case for a singleton Tooth of Eztli, Disk of Itzamna or Eon Chart, i guess. Or for Dream-Enhancing Serum or Ariadne's Twine if you want something for the arcane slots. I don't think it's necessary at all, though.