The Mad Father Mateo, Servant of Chaos

Father Mateo has sold his sold to the Devil in service of the Lord.

This deck is one man's mad attempt to get Father Mateo better at bless than Sister Mary. I was pulling my hair out, jealous of Sister Mary's constant output of bless tokens, and trashed two deck attempts. But as soon as I saw what Rite of Equilibrium did, and that it was errata'd to be a 3xp cost card, I pivoted into bless+curse deck centered around that card that you see today.

Let me be upfront: this is a very jank deck that requires support. But I had a LOT of fun playing with two other investigators that had Holy Covenant and Blasphemous Covent, who then spec'd into bless and curse strategy respectively. And it was a delight to our team every time our Rogue could play Tristan Botley for free.

And personally, I was proud to make a deck that went in complete extreme against Father Mateo's general strategy. Instead of reducing chaos bag size, I double it. And thematically, I loved roleplaying the crazy mad priest. Interesting aspect is that it is also a coin flip what role I filled depending on the opening hand. Either I fight (Armageddon, Spectral Razor), clue (Eye of Chaos, Read the Signs), or land in between.

NOTE: Before you say anything, yes, Kōhaku Narukami is made for bless+curse and would utilize Rite of Equilibrium much better than this deck. I made this deck like last year (summer 2023) before was introduced. Still had a lot of fun roleplaying the crazy mad priest.

Strengths:

• Father Mateo has a relatively weak weakness that can be easily dealt with as long as you stick with the fighter.
• When this deck works, it WORKS, almost always autopassing one check per round no matter the difficulty.
• Cards that other investigators play that adds curses actually benefit you.
• Cards that other investigators play utilize bless token becomes much more useful. For example, .35 Winchester!

Weakness:

• Unreliable economy. If you can get Voice of Ra or Rite of Sanctification, and also get Tempt Fate or Rite of Equilibrium, great. But the times that you don't, you will struggle to play the pricey spell cards.
• Needs other investigators to contribute to curse and bless pool. You would be surprised just as I was at how quickly 10 bless and 10 curse tokens disappear with only 3 players.
• Uncertainty of outcome that other players need to deal with. I remember the amusing exasperation our team had not uncommonly when a heavily invested action got cancelled out by drawing multiple curse tokens.

Opening Hand strategy:

• Keep Rite of Equilibrium or Tempt Fate if you also get Olive McBride, Rite of Sanctification, or Voice of Ra.
• It's always good to keep Spectral Razor, just in case you draw Serpents of Yig early*.
• Armageddon or Eye of Chaos. Not both.

Upgrade Path:

• Beloved -> Eucatastrophe
• Armageddon -> Armageddon (4)
• Eye of Chaos -> Eye of Chaos (4)
• Rite of Sanctification -> Favor of the Moon (1)