The Cursed Ritual (Lv0)

“A blessing we do not understand, or are not ready for, can be a curse.” ― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Why we should Curse, and Curse them all!

Since the taboo August 2022 there are some interesting options for supporting mystic and play in more effective ways. In particular the replacement of 'bad symbol' triggers for becoming "a symbol" or "a non- symbol".

This is build primarily a multiplayer combat build but do ensure your other party members are planning to work with or around in some way otherwise they will be leaving the bag much faster than you can put them in (your fellow investigators as much as the tokens!)

There are not that many new concepts from the Innsmouth player cards here but looking on the db, there were not many builds that leaned into both and the new taboo. And even fewer that used Akachi Onyele to do so!

This build explores the following ideas:

• Utilise Ritual Candles to reduce to -1 or 0 modifiers: draw all the tokens and never worry! Similarly a token modifier going to +3 to +4 will offset almost any token in the bag on standard. The candles also takes the sting out of the bad symbols significantly.

• Ensure meaningful of payoffs when needed for tokens with the suite of spells Armageddon, The Eye of Chaos. Using Akachi Onyele ensures there is more staying power for these assets, more charges means more fun. That said you could easily translate some of this build into any 0-5 mystic to lean into their respective abilities.

• Control the bag draws with Olive McBride, Curse of Aeons, Dark Prophecy, Grotesque Statue, Counterspell and the two favors; Favor of the Moon and Favor of the Sun

• These manipulations should allow Paradoxical Covenant some space to fire more effectively.

You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to curse 'em

Although there is some focus on the curse mystic payoff, just having ritual candles and the other bag manipulation will make passing tests much more viable. For this reason alone the Ritual Candles are a priority mulligan. For mystic if you don't get a good mulligan, push hard for some draw from Scroll of Prophecies and/or Crystal Pendulum

For resources, use Voice of Ra with Olive McBride and/or Dark Prophecy for a tasty payday. Save Uncage the Soul for Eye or Armageddon. There is also a weak drip economy from Favor of the Moon

An important aspect to note for the curse spells is that they don't really rely on curses to function well, but they do opportunistically recharge or give you bonuses should a appear. They also have no intrinsic bad things that happen, which is rare for spell assets. While Favor of the Moon can trigger these, with Olive pulling often you should probably save the moon to support Paradoxical Covenant firing.

Talking about loading the bag with and , it is fine for there to be not many of these tokens around but put them in as you find them with Tempt Fate and seal them when efficient to do so. Rite of Equilibrium is the main bag filler, but Curse of Aeons is a great way of keeping them in the bag too. Counterspell is another nice way of stopping too many curses emptying the bag.

Tides of Fate should really be combo'd with Favor of the Sun, but can be used without to give you better bag maths for a turn, especially with Olive and a few kicking around.

Another little cheeky move is Manipulate Destiny, with Olive and the firing both favors, that is if you really want to heal and damage an enemy, but that is a lot of work to build just for that, however the option of damage or heal seems the perfect replacement for painkillers on the upgrade path for this build.

Curse me once? Better Curse me again!

While primarily built for fighting, investigation can be a problem without Eye of Chaos but not impossible with Promise of Power or reasonable Olive draws. It is certainly an option to lean more into investigation, take out the Delve Too Deeps and Sword Cane to add in Read the Signs another Eye of Chaos or Sixth Sense. The new Dowsing Rod could be a great replacement for Sword Cane too if you decide on different enemy management plans.

Similarly you could forgo investigation tech and push for Shroud of Shadows for more enemy management option. In this build Sword Cane is a get of jail card and is a bit more versatile than a shroud but that movement is gold at the right time and is always only a away.

A good thought generally for Akachi is to have low cost, high charge spell assets like Brand of Cthugha that can be drained for resources by Spirit-Speaker or used to clear off Angered Spirits. Hopefully with spirit speaker and spell assets recharging it should be possible to have enough charges for the Angered spirits, but as always it depends when it appears.

For more oddball moves, you could utilise Curse of Aeons to help fire off Song of the Dead, and add in Eldritch Inspiration to go maximum damage.

I'm not sure how well this would fare solo and probably needs a different overhaul. Switching to one Armageddon, two Eyes and two Shroud (which may give more mobility and action efficiency) could help. But it will still probably be too inefficient to cope with the rigours of solo. The spell events (Spectral Razor, Read the Signs, Ethereal Form) are fantastic to shore up areas and there is space to drop out the unexpected courage and delves to put some of them in.

Curses of you, Curses of me, on the wall for the world to see!

Suggested upgrades:

(View at arkham-starter.com)

Anyway, hope you like the build