Daisy Walker: Astounding Manuscripts

Now that Astounding Revelation is a thing, I think that Pnakotic Manuscripts needs to be revisited. Putting free secrets on this thing is very powerful and this deck is built in a way that tries to maximize its value. Since Pnakotic Manuscripts is a card whose value can vary from being ok to being gamechanging depending on player setup and scenario layout, we 've built an engine that guarantees we get maximum value out of it every time we use it. How we 're doing that? What's better payoff for testless actions in class than Archaic Glyphs: Guiding Stones? Guiding Stones will translate our testless actions into additional clues and wipe off entirely the lost tempo from our long setup, as well as give us the clues without touching the chaos bag. Let's see the core parts of deck:

Deck Breakdown

Pnakotic Manuscripts: Core card of the deck. The deck is built around this card. We can avoid treacheries and bolster other investigators' actions, but most importantly it gives us testless clues with Guiding Stones.

Archaic Glyphs: Guiding Stones: Our testless-action payout. Don't use this thing without the help of Manuscripts unless you really have to. It's too expensive.

Higher Education: Probably the most important card in the deck. During the Manuscripts + Glyphs combo, every resource you spend means 1 additional clue from your location. Also great in general, for treacheries and regular investigates (obvious things).

David Renfield, Forbidden Knowledge, Crack the Case, Astounding Revelation: Your economy cards. David Renfield is your primary economy engine and Forbidden Knowledge along with Crack the Case and Astounding Revelation boost your economy further. Doom from David Renfield is removed via Forbidden Knowledge and Calling in Favors. Calling in Favors is also critical to find Mr. "Rook" early.

Old Book of Lore, Mr. "Rook", Eureka!: Your search cards. Astounding Revelation is a great card and we try to maximize search in order to minimize the chances of accidentally drawing into it. We also want to find our key cards as early as possible, as they are critical to the deck's performance.

Calling in Favors: Important card, not only to remove doom from Renfield, but also to search for Mr. "Rook" (as well as trigger Astounding Revelation), but -most importantly- to replenish Mr. "Rook"' secrets without receiving the tempo hit of paying another 3 resources. If you accidentally draw into your second copy of Rook, you can use Forbidden Knowledge to kill your first copy in order to play the second.

Enraptured, Truth from Fiction, Astounding Revelation: They add more secrets to Pnakotic Manuscripts. We are using the Manuscripts to great effect, so we need more secrets. Enough said. Enraptured can also add a charge to Archaic Glyphs.

Quantum Flux: Key card of the deck. It will shuffle Astounding Revelations back into your deck after you 've drawn all of them in order to add free secrets to Pnakotic Manuscripts later. Make sure you also shuffle some econ options along with them.

Deduction (2), Inquiring Mind: They give you additional clues when combined with Archaic Glyphs. Deduction (2) can also be used outside of a Glyphs play and that can be useful in the early game, where you 're still setting up, as it will give you some fast clues if you 're pressured. Inquiring Mind can additionally be used for treacheries, but its main purpose is to give you extra clues with Glyphs. If used right, it can net you +2 clues.

Magnifying Glass (1): Boosts your in a flexible way. You can play it when if you don't need the handslot yet and pull it back when you need to play a Tome. With Daisy's Tote Bag you can also have it in play beside your other tomes.

Deny Existence: For additional encounter protection. You want to save up those Manuscripts secrets.

Studious: Not very important card, but it helps you find your key cards before the mulligan so that you don't risk into drawing Astounding Revelation. We 're basically using this card mostly due to excess XP floating around.

Daisy's Tote Bag: Allows you to have all 4 handslot assets in play at the same time (your weakness is the 4th) which is important (see below).

The Necronomicon: In my opinion, this is not a terrible weakness to hang around. I believe the biggest damage it does to you is when you try to clear it. Wasting 3 actions and receiving 3 horror is much more painful than having an extra auto-fail in the bag. Since this deck uses Quantum Flux and Forbidden Knowledge, clearing this weakness is a bummer. We don't want to clear our weakness. We want it to stay on the board to avoid reshuffling it back into the deck. This is why Daisy's Tote Bag is an important card in this deck. So that we can keep The Necronomicon in play alongside our other Tomes. Besides, if you consider that we will be taking testless actions often, the extra autofail doesn't hurt you a lot.

Playing the Deck

Mulligan is a bit tricky. You want to proritize on econ and search cards, but you should try to avoid mulliganing a lot of cards in order to not draw Astounding Revelation. You actually like seeing Astounding Revelation before the mulligan though, as tossing it back means you won't draw it. Generally, the top cards you want to see are Mr. "Rook", Old Book of Lore, David Renfield and Eureka!. Other cards you like are also Forbidden Knowledge, Calling in Favors and Crack the Case. If you have enough of these cards you can even consider keeping your whole hand. You really don't want to draw those Astounding Revelations.

The deck is slow. During the first turns of the game you should focus on setting up and building up resources. As said above, David Renfield is your main economy engine and he is implemented by Forbidden Knowledge and Calling in Favors. Try to avoid taking draw actions. The only cards you should ever get to draw aside from search effects are from upkeep. Use any actions left to investigate. You do want a location to be cleared fairly soon so that you are able to play Crack the Case.

As slow as the deck is in the beginning, that fast becomes the clue gathering later. The payoff is big. Mid-late game, you focus on getting clues as efficiently as possible using the Pnakotic Manuscripts + Archaic Glyphs combo in conjunction with Higher Education. This way, you can simply empty locations from clues with 1 action each. In the meantime, you can use your other actions to keep Mr. "Rook" and Pnakotic Manuscripts loaded (with Calling in Favors and cards that add more secrets respectively) and generate more resources. Play Quantum Flux strategically. As said above, you want to shuffle back all 3 Astounding Revelations at the very least, but you also want to return other useful cards along with them. You need to keep your econ at good shape, so Crack the Cases and ditched Renfields are good to shuffle back, but you should also keep an eye on skills like Deduction (2) and Inquiring Mind and events like Deny Existence and Calling in Favors. Such cards are good to be shuffled back into your deck, as they give you flexibility and more efficiency.

There are 3 reasons why I prefered David Renfield over Dr. Milan Christopher for this deck:

1. I'm trying to keep the deck as much taboo-friendly as possible by trying to stay away from cards that have been hit by the Taboo as much as I can.

2. David Renfield can generate resources without having to take investigate actions and early game we focus on setting up.

3. David Renfield is a better Calling in Favors target than Dr. Milan Christopher. We want Mr. "Rook" on the table as soon as possible and being able to search for him is critical.

Speaking of the Taboo List, you can still use it with this deck. It only makes Higher Education more expensive. Getting it early is critical though, but if you pack some Delves you can mitigate the high XP cost and get it sooner. You can also skip buying Studious entirely. As said above it's not an important card in the deck.

Concluding, I think there isn't really much else to say about the deck, I believe I 've covered most of its important parts. I personally love late-game decks with big payoffs and this one is exactly that. And most importantly, it's very fun to play. Hope you guys liked it and I wish you to have fun if you choose to play with it.