Minh Feasts in a Post-Scavenging World

It's not like we can't still play "Scavenging Minh," but a new taboo always seems like a good reason to try something different.

The Feast of Hemlock Vale was sneaky good for solo Minh with numerous Wild Skills, Intellect-based Parley cards that address her Achilles heel, and a mask that replenishes easily and boosts her two main stats.

The Basic Idea

This deck is designed for true solo and focuses on recurring Events instead of Items. It uses Forced Learning for filtered draw while filling the discard pile with cards better played from there. It adds Eldritch Tongue to get additional uses out of enemy management Seeker events.

Mulligan and Setup

Choose Grizzled's traits as appropriate for the campaign.

This deck aims for minimal setup by making the most of the cards in your hand (and discard pile) and relying on zero "true" static boosts.

Keep a couple Assets and Seeker Events. Dump Survivor Tactics and hope they get snagged by Short Supply.

An early Sleuth makes set-up cheaper (due to the discount on Charms) and then boosts skill tests on the Survivor Tactics. Eldritch Tongue can wait.

Magnifying Glasses are Fast and cheap (but note that they don't boost your Parley tests). Play out a Grisly Totem or a Mouse Mask when you can. Unless you get unlucky in your Short Supply result, Professor William Webb can wait.

Between Professor William Webb, Resourceful, and Scrounge for Supplies, you can fish out any unfortunate victims of Short Supply or Forced Learning. Seeding the discard pile with Survivor Events is worth the risk.

Piloting the Deck

You want to wrap up each scenario as quickly as possible. Don't play more than one asset per turn, and don't chase VP locations or enemies.

Forced Learning, a deep discard pile, and a plethora of Wild Icons allow you adapt to new challenges as they arise. Ideally, you'll draw one Skill card or Seeker event to keep and one Survivor event (or a duplicate asset) to discard. That won't always happen but realize that Sleuth is the only card you can't eventually get out of your discard pile if you actually end up needing it.

Clue-getting

Boost Minh's 4 Intellect with Magnifying Glass, Mouse Mask, or almost any of the Skill cards. Note that many of the Skill cards have a single Wild icon that can be committed to any test (and become two Wilds with Minh's ability), so don't feel like you need to hold Well-Funded, Well-Dressed, or Grizzled for a "perfect" opportunity. Use Deduction and or Winging It on multi-clue locations.

Enemy Management

Play like time is the REAL enemy and one-shot them if at all possible. Slow them down with Confound, Existential Riddle, or Persuasion. Eliminate them entirely with Improvised Weapon or Occult Invocation (which can also dump Survivor Events to the discard pile).

Economy and Card Draw

It's not an especially expensive deck, even less so considering you neither need nor want to take an early turn for set up. If your typical turn is to deal with an enemy or treachery in a single action, move, and investigate (often without needing to commit a Skill card), you're spending perhaps one resource and one card per Action phase. You're probably committing a card during the Mythos phase, too, and you'll probably play six assets spaced out over the course of the scenario. Consider, however, that every Upkeep phase includes filtered draw (thanks to Forced Learning) and your discard pile is largely an extension of your hand, so limited card draw and economy are not nearly as restrictive as they would be in almost any other deck.

Survivability

I don't recommend In the Thick of It for this deck. Make the most of the 7/7 balance. Use Skills to pass every Treachery test, allowing you to hold onto your sanity and avoid being bogged down by lost actions. One-shot every enemy you can, either by defeating it or leaving it in your dust. Don't waste time and risk injury by trying to maximize VP--this deck doesn't need a lot. You have little soak and zero healing and the trade off is using essentially every action to advance the game.

Fun Combos

A Glimmer of Hope can add three cards to your hand before you play Existential Riddle.

Professor William Webb loves to hang out behind a Barricade and grab stray clues from connecting locations.

Sleuth effectively boosts Minh to 5 Combat on Improvised Weapon and 5 Agility on Impromptu Barrier. Or for higher-difficulty tests, use one of the Sleuth resources to pay for that event, boost it with the other Sleuth resource, and add a Minh-boosted skill card to the mix.

Minh with even one Magnifying Glass loves Well-Funded as the latter can easily be three Wilds to use on any test.

Other Level-0 options

Sparrow Mask trades Mouse Mask's Intellect boosts for Agility boosts. It's tempting, but the Parley events rely on high Intellect that the Magnifying Glasses can't supply. Mouse Mask should replenish quickly in true solo, where you hope to move to a new location essentially every turn.

Even at "only" 4 Intellect, I don't think Minh needs Dr. Milan Christopher's boost in this deck, but he would keep you from the occasional, momentum-killing Resource action. I think Professor William Webb gives you more flexibility from turn to turn.

Dark Horse with Madame Labranche would be an interesting alternative to Sleuth with Professor William Webb, but Confound and Existential Riddle cost two resources each and are integral to enemy management.

Key Upgrades

I wanted to keep the initial deck under 10xp and the Level 0 Parley events didn't allow me to easily demonstrate the power of Eldritch Tongue, but you're pretty sunk if your only Sleuth ends up in the discard pile or on the bottom of your draw pile. Therefore, a second of those should the first upgrade.

An upgraded Grisly Totem will accelerate card draw, allowing you to replace the Level 0 Neutral Skills with the cheap but excellent low XP Survivor Skills without missing the draw of Perception and Manual Dexterity too much.

Strength in Numbers is a no-brainer once you have Sleuth in play.

Persistence is a (nearly) infinite Unexpected Courage.

Professor William Webb probably makes Barricade redundant in True Solo, freeing up a couple of deck slots.