Strings & Cats

Since the release of Patrice Hathaway, players have been fascinated with the deckbuilding opportunities challenges she poses, but also frustrated with the results in campaigns. In fact, it's not uncommon for veterans to put Patrice at the bottom of tierlists. This decklist is here to prove that Patrice is one of the most powerful survivors out there when the right cards collide.

First things first, onto the expansions required to play the deck: the core of the deck is Miss Doyle, Gift of Nodens and Resourceful. Everything else can be adapted to your collection! Check out the upgrading & card choices section for more info on alternative options and a version of only Chapter 1 cards.

The template for this guide was kindly made available by Valentin1331.

• Overview

• Main Strategy

• Upgrade Path

• Full Card Choice Breakdown

• Final Thoughts

This is a flex combo-like deck and as such it intrinsically suffers from consistency problems which do not show on simple ratings. Therefore, great care was taken to make the floor of the deck as high as possible.

• It can repeatedly cast Shed a Light twice per turn and get up to 10 clues per turn!
• It can also play the Pushed to the Limit + Sledgehammer (4) combo every turn and deal up to 14 damage per turn!
• It has access to automatic successes on all the basic action on demand every turn with Miss Doyle.
• And finally, it can take tests very well with powerful skills backed by the security of Will to Survive and Premonition.

You can run this deck on expert safely.

• Early Game (6-7 turns): play normally while trying to get as many assets into play as you can. Use the cards that you are dealt as best as you can.

  • (High Priority) Getting Miss Doyle and Gift of Nodens into play is the priority so make sure to have the resources to play them the turn you draw them.
  • (Accidental Discarding) Resourceful and Do-or-Die can get your assets back from discard should mistakes happen.
  • (Optional) Some other remarkably powerful cards to play as soon as you can are Idol of Xanatos, Patrice's Violin, Scavenging (2) and Drawing Thin.

• Late Game: After these first turns, you should find yourself with an (almost) empty deck, you want to not reshuffle by shoving cards back into your deck using: Miss Doyle's cats (Hope, Zeal and Augur), Gift of Nodens, Persistence, the improvised events (Impromptu Barrier, Improvised Weapon, Winging It) and Pushed to the Limit. This allows you to consistently get Miss Doyle's automatic success actions every turn to commit one Resourceful from hand and another with Gift of Nodens and use your discard pile as a toolbox.

  • Get back Shed a Light for clues
  • Or Pushed to the Limit for damage with Sledgehammer (4). By the way, don't ever play that Sledgehammer (4), just discard it.
  • Trigger Drawing Thin during the automatic success for resources.
  • Get back Fickle Fortune twice during the Witching Hour for full healing your team. On the final agenda, use it to remove doom instead!
  • Before you get Gift of Nodens (which hopefully is only the first scenario), you may need to reshuffle. That's completely okay!
  • Beware the Watcher from Another Dimension! When you can, use Hope or Zeal to deal with it. Alternatively, keep it in your hand to curb your card draw while you can't reshuffle enough cards into your deck.

For the table below: you should most likely pick both (Path A) Cluever and (Path B) Monster Hunter before moving on to the Advanced Upgrades, it's just a matter of order depending on your team necessities. The later (Option N) upgrades are optional kits to get if XP is plentiful.

(View at arkham-starter.com)

Link to the full xp deck

Link to the Chapter 1 only starter deck

• Hands

  • Best in slot: Flashlight (3) & Ice Pick (3) depending on the circumstances. Both can be Scavenged. Flashlight (3) can be used with Winging It and Matchbox for up to -5 difficulty and combined with Shed a Light for up to 4 clues. It can also combine with Impromptu Barrier for -3 difficulty evades. Ice Pick (3) provides +1 clue or +1 damage on demand and will be the go-to target for Scavenging (2).
  • Alternatives: Patrice's Violin for resources and bumping emptied Flashlights. Old Keyring & Flashlight for 0 XP.
  • Exclusions: Old Keyring (3), Winging It enables +1 clue without any XP and the additional -1 difficulty from Old Keyring (3) can easily be made up for with Matchboxes.
    Fire Axe, there are better ways to do enemy management, especially in higher difficulties.
    Fire Extinguisher (3) can be fun with Pushed to the Limit, but there are better alternatives.

• Accessory

  • Best in slot: Idol of Xanatos. Up to 3 damage/horror cancellation (works with direct damage/horror) by the measly price of that many cards. Patrice does not care about discarding.
    
  • Alternatives: Rod of Animalism & Mr. Pawterson.
    
  • Exclusions: Eye of Ghatanothoa, always powerful, but better suited for someone else to carry.
    Precious Memento (4) or Precious Memento (4), best soaking item, but there are almost as good options in other slots for less XP.
    
  • Note: As usual, competition is fierce here, but trust me, Idol is best. If XP is plentiful, I wouldn't blame you for getting Relic Hunters.

• Ally

  • Best in slot: Miss Doyle. Absolutely necessary. Strings and Cats.
    
  • Alternatives: "Devil" & Peter Sylvestre (2)/Aleksey Saburov go well with Rod of Animalism alongside The Cat General. Aquinnah (3) is strong too but expensive, both in resources and XP.
    
  • Exclusions: Madame Labranche, just not the way to build Patrice.

• Arcane

  • Best in slot: Gift of Nodens absolutely necessary. It is the card that makes the deck what it is.
  • Alternatives: Spirit of Humanity is good but may prove unnecessary.
  • Exclusions: Talisman of Protection, too expensive for a small and unreliable effect, even though it can be Scavenged.
    Mystic spells would require too much effort to buff , we have other (better) options.

• Body

  • Best in slot: Hunting Jacket. Resource generation, soak and even cute ideas with saving cards for later. Scavenging (2) will target this a lot.
  • Alternatives: Fine Clothes or Leather Coat for 0 XP. Cloak of Resonance, though a bit too expensive.
    
  • Exclusions: Tool Belt & Astral Mirror are too cute, too clunky, believe me.
    Protective Gear, Hunting Jacket simply outclasses it.

• No Slot

  • S Tier - Get this!
    Drawing Thin - Insane resource generation when you have automatic successes. Additionally, empties your deck.
    Scavenging (2) - Recursion, action economy, consistency, what more do you need?
    Loner - Certainly feels like free Pathfinder.
    
  • A Tier - Can get, won't regret.
    Matchbox - Difficulty 0 enabler.
    Hunter's Instinct (2) - Scavenging's less broken cousin.
    Sparrow Mask - Contender for best mask. Helps a lot with encounter cards.
    Schoffner's Catalogue - If you can, start with one of these. It helps later on with Scavenging (2) and all the resources it asks you for.
    Cornered - A consistency card. Gets better the less skills you have access to.
    
  • B Tier - Ehh...
    Captivating Performance - Certainly feels like bad Pathfinder. Which is still good.
    Survival Technique - Here to be used with Shrine of the Moirai if you go that route.
    Extra Rations - Healing that might be unecessary due to all the soak Patrice Hathaway has.
    
  • C Tier - You sure?
    Anything not mentioned here.

• Notable Events

  • Shed a Light is the main cluever upgrade.
    
  • Sledgehammer (4) is the main enemy management upgrade.
    
  • At a Crossroads is an extra action (often just a move action though) later in the game and faster deck emptying earlier.
    
  • Fickle Fortune is a contender for the best healing card in the game. Oh and it can also get an additional turn for you. The best way to use it is to first take the heal & doom early on (which will sometimes feel bad), then at every Witching Hour, you use it twice with the Resourcefuls. And finally, later you take the remove doom option. If you have 2 copies, you can use one of them immediately to remove doom.
    
  • Nature of the Beast is an option for getting tricky clues.
    
  • Alter Fate (3) seems to always find a target.
    
  • Keep Faith (2) is probably at its best with Patrice Hathaway. Especially good if teammates care about tokens.
    
  • Lastly, Makeshift Trap is an expensive but very powerful option with: Improved Timer, Simple, Remote Configuration and Explosive Device. Turning it into 1-costed Dynamite Blast (3) or close to it.

Empty for now, but I may add other options based on the feedback!

To create your own guides, find the template here.