Green Man Jenny Barnes Buys All The Things

This Jenny Barnes deck focuses on feeding her new Green Man Medallion as much as possible over the course of the first few scenarios within a campaign, with the goal of having a much stronger deck much sooner than she normally would. This, in my opinion at least, puts emphasis on the theme of Rogue decks, which seem to start out with level 0 cards that are a little on the weak side (or rather, highly focused on utility versus raw combat/investigating power), and have very powerful cards available for purchase later on (cough The Gold Pocket Watch cough). Seeing as higher level rogue cards also tend to be very expensive, and experience points are all but plentiful in Arkham Horror...this is where Green Man Jenny comes in, guns blazing! If you play your cards right, it's not unheard of to earn an extra 7-15+ experience points over the course of a campaign using Jenny's Green Man Medallion.

First, the elephant in the room: Dark Horse. "Why in the world would you run Dark Horse on Jenny Barnes, of all investigators!?" you might ask. Well....

Consider the fact that your Green Man Medallion has a free trigger which allows you to exhaust it and place up to 3 resources on it during any player window. This means you can either: take your 2 resources during upkeep, see what the encounter deck has in store for you, then place those resources directly onto your Green Man Medallion before resolving your encounter, which will allow you to either test with a 4-4-4-4 stat line if you spent to 0 with Dark Horse in play, OR hold on to those resources to play a card such as Think on Your Feet to dodge an enemy attempting to spawn on top of you! Further, once you have your other critical cards in play (Leo De Luca, Flashlight etc.), Dark Horse enables you to play the rest of your turn with that very attractive 4-4-4-4 base stat line. In this way, you are boosting Jenny's overall capability while also shifting as many resources as possible onto Green Man Medallion each turn! I have found Dark Horse to be hugely effective in enabling Jenny to have a greater level of consistency and impact during the first few scenarios within a campaign, which is when Rogues tend to feel extremely weak.

Now, we can't get too carried away discussing Jenny's new signature accessory without discussing her new signature weakness... the Sacrificial Beast. This weakness sucks early on, and was obviously designed to throw off exactly this type of strategy which aims to utilize the Green Man Medallion to its fullest. Similar to Searching for Izzie, Jenny's new friend Sacrificial Beast spawns in the location furthest from you, and disables your resource economy for as long as it remains in play...it's also sort of a reverse Searching for Izzie in that it can be absolutely crippling if you draw it early on, but not much of an issue if you draw it late when you are (hopefully) fully set up with weapons, ways to boost your , and with all locations revealed. And, unlike Searching for Izzie, if you're close to ending the game, you can choose to completely ignore Sacrificial Beast if you need to!

One limitation of this strategy is that you only have 1 copy of Green Man Medallion, and it is highly possible that even with a full mulligan and the inclusion of all neutral skill cards which allow you to draw a card upon successful completion of a test, you might still have trouble digging it up! Enter No Stone Unturned, which is essentially our version of Prepared for the Worst, but with more flexibility. While 2 resources and 1 action is a considerable cost for what is essentially another card draw, No Stone Unturned allows you to search the top 6 cards of your deck, choose 1, and return the rest to your deck and shuffle. This significantly reduces the likelihood that your Green Man Medallion will be buried toward the bottom of your deck for the entire scenario. Even if you have already found your medallion by the time you draw your first No Stone Unturned, it will allow you to search for your other core cards such as Dark Horse or Leo De Luca. As an added bonus, No Stone Unturned features a ? icon, which means it will never be a dead card, and unlike Prepared for the Worst, No Stone Unturned can be used to help other investigators search through their decks for their own critical cards. No Stone Unturned helps you feel more comfortable entering a scenario with a game plan that revolves around 2-3 cards in your 33+ card deck.

The entire aim of this deck is to endure the struggle associated with generating as many additional experience points as possible during each early scenario that will leave you strapped for cash, with the goal of turning Jenny into a force of nature by the fourth scenario or so, which brings us to our remaining OOF card: Delve Too Deep. This deck is primarily geared toward multiplayer, and running 1-2 copies of Delve Too Deep will help solidify your role early on in the campaign as a sort of support character, and the promise of added XP should further incentivize the other investigators at the table to help ensure you having enough breathing room to play them (e.g. not swarmed by monsters or getting too behind on clue gathering.) (NOTE: If you find yourself running only a single copy of Delve Too Deep, consider Ward of Protection or an additional Dark Horse for your remaining OOF slot, for added deck reliability.)

Other impactful Event cards like Emergency Cache and Sleight of Hand further enable this low-resource playstyle early on, with Emergency Cache helping you pay the initial install cost for expensive cards like Leo De Luca, Dark Horse, and Hard Knocks, while retaining the ability to continue placing resources on Green Man Medallion. Elusive is an extremely powerful card that allows you to more aggressively play your resource shuffling mini-game without worrying about painting yourself into a corner in the event that a horde of baddies swarms you, and happily enough, it costs just 2 resources to play, the same amount Jenny receives during upkeep.

Sleight of Hand is a fantastic card which not only helps to keep costs down, but allows you to get by with only a few deck slots dedicated to items for fighting or investigating, which each have limited charges (e.g. 2x Flashlight 2x .41 Derringer.) For example, you can play Flashlight via Sleight of Hand, making it Fast (which is already very powerful), then investigate 3 times, utilizing every charge of the Flashlight, and at the end of your turn it is bounced back into your hand, ready to be used again at full charge!

Double or Nothing and Quick Thinking provide powerful action economy, but only provided you are passing tests by a comfortable margin, which is less likely to happen until you have acquired more powerful cards, so I wait to rotate them in later on when my deck is stronger via Adaptable.

Lone Wolf is another card to consider depending on the size of your group and its collective playstyle. If you are playing with more than 2 investigators, Lone Wolf is typically not worth running, as it will not activate often enough to merit the deck slot.

As you transition into mid-campaign, your game plan changes a bit as you begin to realize the fruits of your labors...

Once your deck is fairly boosted (2x Hot Streak) and your economy is better, use Adaptable to swap out Dark Horse for other cards. In this deck I wanted to heavily prioritize Hot Streak to further raise my chances of ending a scenario with at least 6 resources on Green Man Medallion. I was fulfilling the role of a clue gatherer while my partner (Yorick) focused on fighting, and by the end of the first scenario, I was able to afford 2 copies of Lockpicks and a copy of Hot Streak AND an upgraded Switchblade, via the discount provided by Green Man Medallion (bringing the cost of Hot Streak down to 2xp). After that I picked up Streetwise and the other copy of Hot Streak. This is when you will notice the power of your deck begin to spike upwards, and you can transition into a number of different specialized roles by shifting around your OOF cards via Adaptable.

Initial Upgrade Priorities (Skip ahead to more expensive cards based on GMM success when possible):

1. (Core) Lockpicks x2 (2xp) (Do not replace Flashlight unless you have another dedicated clue-gatherer on your team! Lockpicks can only be used once per turn!)
2. (Core) Streetwise (3xp)
3. (Core) Hot Streakx2 (8xp) Replace Emergency Cache
4. (Core) Adaptable (1xp) At this point, you should swap out Dark Horse and shift towards a more traditional build
5. (Core) Switchblade x1-2 (2-4xp)
6. (Luxury) The Red-Gloved Man x1-2 (5-10xp) & Charisma (3xp) (Add 1-2x Calling in Favors if using The Red-Gloved Man)
7. (Luxury) Sure Gamble x1-2 (3-6xp)
8. (Luxury) The Gold Pocket Watch (8xp) (Don't feel pressured to pick up Relic Hunter, at this point your build is likely almost complete and you are nearing the end of your campaign-- your Green Man Medallion has two (? ?) icons on it and is essentially a third Unexpected Courage at this point, which is not bad at all for committing to tests.)
9. (Luxury) Sneak Attack (2xp)
10. (Luxury) Chicago Typewriter (4xp)
11. (Luxury) Ace in the Hole (6xp)

Other situational upgrades: Moment of Respite, Bulletproof Vest, another Charisma

Once you have achieved your core, you can begin to shift around your OOF slots via Adaptable to best prepare for each upcoming scenario and adapt to cover up any of your team's weaknesses if needed. Some of my favorites include:

• Ward of Protection
• Alyssa Graham
• Dynamite Blast
• Physical Training (When coupled with Streetwise, Jenny can utilize her considerable wealth to boost any stat she needs for any test she comes across!)
• Beat Cop
• Teamwork
• Vicious Blow
• Lucky!
• A Chance Encounter
• Peter Sylvestre
• Magnifying Glass
• Dr. Milan Christopher
• Deduction (Tip: Can enable a flashy (if not always practical) combo with Double or Nothing and Flashlight or Lockpicks to grab up as many as 4 clues with a single action!)