Heads should not explode! (Solo Hard FA report)

Foreword

Here's my almost succesful solo run through FA on hard. I hope you can learn on my mistakes and also embrace a strange build, since I do not include any of the standard offensive features, like Ornate Bow or Shrivelling. When I planned for this deck my #1 intent was to use Lola Santiago. It turned out I never really needed her. And after learning how strong Cat Burglar can thought that spending another XP on Charisma is just not optimal. Especially, that I was already low on cash. I know, low on cash in a money deck is weird, but money decks are well... buying a lot of skill. And you need every penny for that on hard. Green faction is perfectly suited for an evade deck with Streetwise. So the whole strategy was simple. Abuse Hot Streak and Premonition and "Watch this!" and sometimes even Double or Nothing to achieve financial stability and then just spend them on tests, that I always scaled for a -4. I considered -6 and as losing options. Before you get to Hot Streaks you can use a combination of Alchemical Transmutation + Guts + "Watch this!" + Double or Nothing. That's a really tasty shot of c-c-c-comboness

How to upgrade?

• Streetwise first
• Charon's Obol next
• Hot Streaks
• Lockpicks that are replacing Flashlights
• Cat Burglar before 3rd scenario is a great idea
• All the expensive super mega cards, like Ace in the Hole

Ok, so what went wrong, dude? You didn't win, right?

• Arcane Studies were a bad choice. They did help in a few scenarios, since FA likes to discard your assets. On the other hand I don't know which other card would play the role of a safety net for strong tests
• Sure Gamble did nothing. I never played it. It was supposed to be the silver bullet, when combined with Backstab and Double or Nothing or an occasional auto win. But there never was a moment to play it.
• In the end I think you can't count on passing FA on Backstab, hoping it will magically combine with Double or Nothing. From time to time you have to get your hands dirty. Ornate Bow seems like a natural candidate, but that requires to rethink Lockpicks. Let's be frank. Lockpicks are the best weapon against clues since Roland on a killing spree. But in the end... 3rd scenario went bad because of smashing damage lackluster which also made 8th scenario super hard. It turns out I should stick to my initial plan and go Lola. Hell, I think I'll do a rerun!
• You have to do your best in City of Archives. I went out with just 4 out of 6 goals and ended up with Out of Body Experience which is a dead draw and forces you to reshuffle your hand. EVERY time it comboed with Stars of Hyades which mean another card loss from hand. That happened more than once in 2 last scenarios.
• My "lucky" pick for a weakness as you can tell was not the one that promoted strong City of Archives game :)
• I was never poisoned and spend 4 supply points for medicaments... Blanket would have been golden instead.

Some technicals at the end of the run

Yig's fury: 9
Mental trauma: 3
Physical trauma: 0
XP gained: 5+6+3+6+4+6+7+5
Chaos bag: +1,0,0,-1,-2,-3,-3,-4,-5,-6,,,,,,,
Supplies: Torch, Binoculars, Pick Axe, Compass, Chalk

Captain's log

Scenario 1:
This scenario is VERY hard, since you have no Streetwise and thus it's highly possible you'll be forced to evacuate before reaching the right ending. Don't be cocky. Don't replay that scenario forever. It's boring. Just take that 3XP and run. I did that for you. I played it maybe 4-5 times with different combinations of cards. It's here where I learned that Cheap Shot is weak and Premonition is king and Think on Your Feet wins. Combine your 3XP with 2XP from Binoculars and get Streetwise +Charon's Obol. I managed to convince Ichtaca that I'm cool. I actually spent a ton of cash on it, since Premonition told me it will be necessary. If I would not do that, the Eztli Guardians would have an open season on me. There was one pivotal point, where a successful evade could push me forward. Premonition told me that I should not attempt it, so I Elusive'ed to safety and pressed the eject button before going to Act3. The scenario was saved by a risky "Watch this!" at the very start, since my setup was not giving me options to burst with resources and build a working rig.

Scenario 2:
5XP well spent. It's now a completely different deck, which investigates and evades effectively! But my initial setup is really weird. Almost all card drawing skills, just TWO events and Arcane Studies x2 + Lone Wolf x2. It looks like I'll be resetting the campaign, but... I'm drawing good cards with the skills and also good money with "Watch this!" x2. Encounter deck helps, by serving me tests for both and at the beggining. Taking advantage of the Torch in my supplies, I clear the exploration deck from 2 encounters. It's all going well but at one point all locations but one are filled with enemies, I'm almost out of cash and the Harbinger of Valusia is chasing me. I need loads of luck to survive. I have 2 actions. At least one of them has to move me to Chamber of Time. I'm lucky. On 1 out of 5 cards I'm pulling the right one from the exploration deck. Still I find it almost impossible to get back. So I'm drawing a card from the deck (already quite thin) and hoping for Elusive. Fortunes are once again in my favour. I have Drawn to the Flame in my hand, so I clear the chamber, rearrange the locations, so that I have an empty one closest to the exit (which is occupied by a snake) and safely run away. 4XP + 2XP from Obol. That one was very close. I owe one to the Elders.

Scenario 3:
Cat Burglar kept me safe from every possible enemy I encountered. This scenario locations are like a roundabout so I was playing tag with 4 hunters all day long. But I also learned that maybe in the end I DO need something to apply damage. Two acts that I pursued all ended with 5HP enemies to deal with and I just had a single Backstab. In the end I achieved nothing, other than clearing one XP location. All in all 3XP and well... story wise I'm pretty much lost. Relic is lost, Alejandro is lost, Ichtaca hates me... What now? What's next? Is there a point to continue?

Scenario 4:
Nothing to like about that scenario. Design wise the idea is sound, but the punishment you have to take to perform an exploration is just bonkers. And in the beginning it's usually a treachery that you pull from the exploration deck. Duh... horrific. Enemies spawned here and there, so not much to do for me here. I was able to clear 2 locations. The final one of course always has to be Templo Mayor, since it's where Padma Amrita spawns. Just before the fight I suddenly forgot what I planned to do. So It was just me, pockets full of money, Padma and a single Backstab. Testing .... all the drama and tension in the airrrr.... There were no tentacles for me this time. Job done, but rather unhappy about the score.

Scenario 5.1: 2 attempts. 3 paths on 1st. 1 on 2nd. This is a cool scenario to play, but what can I say?... Cat Burglar, Streetwise, multiple Hot Streak. Oh and by the way, even tough I had compass, there's really no point to use it on starting location, unless you have a map also. I had some funzies, but it was no funzies at all to setup twice... Especially that the second play was like 5 minutes. I understand what the design team had in mind and they certainly achieved it. But the cost of manual management is a bit too much here for the value. I learned something here. Protective Incantation does not sit well in a money deck. I know kids, I should have all the money in the world, but cloovering and running away for money is an expensive affair. It was fun to seal -6, but on the other hand I usually chose to just secure the -4 option at the very worst anyways, even if it was in the bag, so strategy wise it served no purpose. I still spend the same amount of money, expanding my chance from 13/15 to 14/15. Not much of a difference if you count an action and all the 5--8 bucks it might consume.

Scenario 5.2:
Ok kids, remember that you have to CLEAR the location here first, before exploring further. I noticed that like halfway through and decided a full reset is the only option to make it count properly. I managed to kill one enemy this time! :) It was a mediocre 3HP snake. Other than that it was a solid rush of Hot Streaks. That enabed me to overload every important test. I'm more inclined to think that upgrading Arcane Studies was a bit pointless, since I'm mainly happy to play it for icons. Unexpected Courage would've been better.... 6XP this time (including Obol). Alltogether 10XP to be spent. Geez... what now? :) Is it the right time to call for Lola Santiago and Charisma? Or mayber rather Ace in the Hole. I'll agonize on that while having a good night sleep.

Scenario 6:
For all non-fighting characters I'd recommend not cooperating with Yithians. It's a free XP, which I grabbed happily. Just before this scenario I picked up All In. And that was the winning card. The main challenge of this scenario is to build a hand of 10 cards, while your hand size shrinks. As you may imagine Amnesia is not the best pick for a low impact weakness here. The strategy - clear as many missions as possible, mill through the deck, face Amnesia and then try to build 10 cards before it hits again. Sadly it was the last card of the deck, so I already had some enemies walking around while still waiting for a full hand discard. What made it super fast to recover afterwards was in fact All In. 7XP to pickup. Good. But I suffer some damage and need to add Out of Body Experience.

Scenario 7:
I was lightning fast here. I had a chase full of monsters. But they never even saw me descending. Super, super fast money, with super super fast clue grabbing through Binoculars. That's a great scenario by the way, but this time it was very merciful. Or maybe I'm so strong? Not sure... 5 XP.

Scenario 8:
Too many enemies. Too little luck. I mean you can't just evade everyone. Exploration deck was the saddest mo-fo of them all, since I really milled through every possible card in it, before reaching A Pocket in Time. By the time I was there I had 1 sanity left. Then both Alejandro Vela and Ichtaca spawned, since as you remember, I haven't made a strong relationship with any of them... and that was it. In the final scenario all the mistakes that I made until that point told me I need to do it again. But what a fun deck! With just a few tweaks it will be golden and I sincerely recommend it. Sefina is just bonkers to play and also her special way of setting up makes some negative supply effects irrelevant.

Thanks for reading!