Skids' Ol' Tools

Deck Overview

This deck has a simple premise: draw, steal or hunt enemies and kill them to death. The deck is packed with ways of taking enemies and other hazards from other investigators, tanking damage, shanking fools and generally being a boss. The humble Trench Knife is your cellmate when many enemies throng to your charnel grounds, but with succeed-by cards like Quick Thinking and various ways to get resources to fuel "Skids" O'Toole's extra-action ability, you'll have all the actions in the world to just punch them to death if you prefer. Play events then use their icons with Crystallizer of Dreams to kick up your skill values and generally be the awesomest ex-con on the block. So get ready to grab enemies and then stab them, all in the name of saving the world!

Piloting the deck

• Mulligan hard for a weapon, to boost your combat for fighting early on. Use any enemy-less opening turns to dig for assets and get set up.
• You want to draw enemies and you want someone else to draw the treachery cards (because enemies can be stabbed and treacheries can't). Use First Watch and "Let me handle this!" to control the mythos phase to your advantage. Use "Get over here!" or Taunt to drag aloof or distant enemies to you (and then punch them).
• You want as many baddies on you as possible. This means you moght have to tank some damage/horror. Use Flesh Ward and Leather Jacket to keep you alive. Or just accept you'll go down fighting. Comme un boss.
• Use Crystallizer of Dreams to get second use from your many event cards by committing icons to your attack tests, to compensate for Skids' middling combat.
• Trench Knife will give you a decent combat bonus if you engage with lots of enemies, and with the combat icon boosts you should be able to succeed by 1 or 2 most of the time. Use "Watch this!" and Quick Thinking on such tests to get resources or extra actions - and spend those resources on Skids' ability to get more actions. More action = more stabbing. You like stabbing, right?
• Use Vicious Blow to deal extra damage when stabbing, but if you can get 4 or 5 actions per turn to fight, you might not even need to. Stabstabstab.

Upgrade possibilities

Some obvious upgrades include better versions of your existing cards:

• .41 Derringer >> .41 Derringer
• Vicious Blow >> Vicious Blow
• "Get over here!" >> "Get over here!"
• Taunt >> Taunt (but not Taunt, sadly)

Since Skids probably doesn't enjoy drawing curse tokens, you could upgrade Faustian Bargain >> Hot Streak or other high-reward economy cards. If you go harder on resource generation in this deck then you could pack Hard Knocks to help fuel your fighting.

Guard Dog is here to help you kill enemies more quickly, but an upgrade to an ally like >> Delilah O'Rourke would get you more consistent damage pings per turn, though of course your opponents are unlikely to be exhausted. If you want moar actions, try Leo De Luca.

Finally, you may find you lack draw power, so Lucky Cigarette Case plus Relic Hunter is an attractive later pick.

Alternative deck options

This deck is best-suited for 3 or 4 player games, where you can happily run around taking hits for everyone else. But in smaller player-counts, or if you just want a change of focus, here are some suggestions for how to modify the current level 0 deck to suit your role.

Clues and killing:

• 2x Guard Dog >> 2x Grete Wagner
• 2x Taunt >> 2x Evidence!
• 2x Flesh Ward >> 2x Scene of the Crime

Exploding knife:

• 2x Flesh Ward >> 2x Dynamite Blast
• 2x Taunt >> 2x Heroic Rescue
• 2x Guard Dog >> 2x Beat Cop

Ultra-tank:

• 2x Quick Thinking >> 2x Something Worth Fighting For
• 1x Prepared for the Worst >> 1x Solemn Vow
• 2x Faustian Bargain >> 2x Solemn Vow

Solo stabber:

• 2x Faustian Bargain >> 2x Lone Wolf
• 2x First Watch >> 2x Scene of the Crime
• 2x Taunt >> 2x Evidence!
• 2x Guard Dog >> 2x Lonnie Ritter
• 1x "Let me handle this!" >> 1x Narrow Escape or 1x Delay the Inevitable or 1x Elusive or some other "get me out of a tight space!" splash.