Card draw simulator
| Derived from |
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| None. Self-made deck here. |
| Inspiration for | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| C.I.A. - Covert International Axe-wielder | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1.0 |
Emyriad · 119
Current iteration of a Handcuffs Roland for Scarlet Keys, designed to play a balanced guardian role while keeping both fight and investigate lanes open.
Directive choices are the ones that incur the least terrible penalties - while both double ally slots and fast actions are appealing, both tend to lead to Roland getting stuck in positions where he can't do interesting tricks and dies quickly to his Cover Up. Picking Leave No Doubt allows Roland to mostly ignore his weakness, functioning as a 9/8 investigator who only addresses trauma when he feels there's time, while his extra action per turn comes from drawing cards under enemies to spend on his wide array of Tactics. Due Diligence is the restriction most often flipped, but before it is flipped gives Roland the ability to easily succeed tests on Handcuffs, Bolas, Followed and Interrogate.
The key in Keys is Kicking the Hornets Next and On the Hunt. Both pull concealed enemies out of the deck and spawn them engaged with you, disabling their concealed keyword and, in the case of cultists and coterie agents, their on-play doom. Both also give Roland resources (once upgraded), and Kicking the Hornets nest immediately gives a clue for Seek the Truth. This is crazy action compression that leaves the encounter deck bereft, giving your guardian plenty of time to do clue seeking.
To do that, we have the handcuffs package. The new Handcuffs 2 costs little, clears doom, and leaves you with a ready to engage enemy who will then be dragged around on quests, giving Roland bonus due diligence on his investigates as well as allowing him to make everywhere a Scene of the Crime and a place to Interrogate.
Finally, to make up for Rolands 4 fight stat (I play on hard, so this is just not good enough for guns), we use his enhanced .38 Special (which can reload bullets or shoot at +4) and a few other guns, adding Custom Modifications and Ace of Swords to get the #'s up.
Upgrades: From here, Roland should pick a lane. He can tech into gun sorcery using Custom Mods and upgrades/events or keep going on cluevering. Either way, Grete Wagner (3) is a first pick, with Bizarre Diagnosis to heal her and allow for even more scooping. Beat Cop (2) hits great with the same for fight and popping concealed cards, or you can swap to Field Agent (2) for clues. Of course, Stick to the Plan and Ever Vigilant are still always and ever exceptional.
For Fight: Vicious Blow (2) is critical, as Rolands primary weakness is being unable to fight more than twice, but you can also do mods like Custom Ammunition or Enchant Weapon, both of which are quite strong with Custom Mods Counterbalance and Leather Grip. Don't bother with Quicksilver Bullets on Custom Mods unless you're playing on lower difficulties, Roland hitting those values is sketchy even on the best shots. Upgrade the .45s and get some Extra Ammunition, as your signature is one of the strongest +strength shots in the game if properly fed.
For Investigate: more Handcuffs! Existential Riddles! Under Surveillance! Roland can get away with lots of cheap options like Seeking Answers and Burn After Reading, all while drawing lots of cards and picking up tons of free clues. Preposterous Sketches and Directive: Seek the Truth will continue to keep his hands full and combined with his excellent resource gain options he can dunk more clue events than a dedicated seeker.
| 7 comments |
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Dec 20, 2022 |
Dec 21, 2022Out of curiousity, how exactly does Directive: Red Tape cause Roland to become "stuck in positions where he can't do interesting tricks"? The deck runs 6 fast events, so the chance of you wanting to play cards 3 or more times a round looks slim. Even in setup playing 2 cards instead of 3 isn't crippling, and with the amount of cool tactic + insight events this deck runs you'll practically be operating on 4 actions for the rest of the game. In addition the ability to make events fast opens up a lot of interesting plays that weren't possible before, like playing Bolas after an enemy has moved, but before they attack you. That's at least my experience with Red Tape. But I am curious about why you rate it so lowly, is there something I'm missing? |
Dec 21, 2022`@Dummy Doctor Eavesdrop, Working a Hunch and Evidence! are all good choices! There's a lot of useful events to jam - too many to fit, honestly. For Daring I'd just swap in an Overpower and plan to upgrade it. @Sledgehammertip The question for me comes down to whether I'd like to play a Followed fast (Red Tape) or succeed at a Followed every time (Due Diligence). Rolands stats suck and the only way to get them up are by pushing out assets quickly before fights. There's a bit of a thing going on where when you have effectively four actions you want to play more cards but when you have effectively three two per turn is likely. Roland thrives on good setup, so playing three cards a turn to get those fight values boosted is really good, and a lot of the upgrades I would prefer are things that make other items fast, like Ever Vigilant, Leather Grip on Custom Modifications, etc. But Red Tape isn't an insurmountable obstacle, it's a perfectly valid way to build the deck I didn't decide on this time because I wanted access to more encounter deck control and action compressed tools (like Handcuffs). |
Dec 21, 2022What happens to Handcuffs if the enemy they are attached to is killed? It doesn't say on the card and I can't find an answer on Arkham DB. Instinct says that it should be discarded, because if it should be returned to your hand surely it would say on the card. |
Dec 23, 2022@screamingabdab, if the element the attachment is attached to leaves play, it is discarded. See arkhamdb.com |
Dec 23, 2022Thank you for the substitution recommendations, |
Jan 30, 2023
Cover Up is a much softer weakness when you are a 9/8 investigator. You can ignore it when you don't have time and address it when you do, and it can't kill you instantly or make you lose a scenario unless you make bad choices about it. Our Scarlet Keys Roland ended up with 4 trauma at scenario 8 because he pulled his weight where it mattered. The main reason to take the swap signatures (or take both) is to do something kooky with an extra clue on a location, and I think that's hyperspecific and not that great. Even as a fully dedicated seeker I would find it hard to justify those two. |
Love the look of this deck! Playing cards like Handcuffs, Interrogate, and Scene of the Crime feels very thematic for Roland. I've never played Parallel Roland, so I might go with this build for my first play-through of The Scarlet Keys.
I don't own any Forgotten Age or Dream-Eaters cards though. Do you have any recommendations for what I could replace Scene of the Crime, Followed, and Daring with? Though if they're irreplaceable, I can just proxy.