Ever wanted to play Mark with the actual weapon he is holding? Here's your chance.

Credit: Magali Villeneuve

Introduction:

I know it looks like the Chicago Typewriter, but it can't be. Mark's standards would never allow him to use such a rogue weapon. But what if I told you that it was actually a Pimped .45 Thompson all that time?

I made this deck for the Depths of Yoth: How deep can you go challenge made by PlayingBoardGames, which I, unfortunately, couldn't attend. But I made it to 7th depth with it, and I have to admit that besides the seemingly gimmicky aspect, it's probably the best fighter deck I have ever tried. I hope it'll work as well for you too!

This series is a celebration of the 20k points on ArkhamDB to thank you all for all the support received.
Click here to see all the previous decks and I will keep releasing a new standalone-ready deck concept every week on Friday, so stay tuned and keep pressing the ♥ button if you want to see more!

Let me know which investigators you would like to see next in the comment!

Table of Contents:

• Overview

• Main Strategy

• Pimp your .45 Thompson

• Pioneer of the circular economy

• Other Cards

• Upgrade Path

• Make Your Own Deck!

Overview:

Main Strategy:

• Recycle your .45 Thompson with Act of Desperation and Well-Maintained, returning all the attached Upgrades to your hand at the same time.

• Gain resources while shooting with the .45 Thompson (3) to pay for Upgrades, and store additional damage on Relentless for when you have to re-play all the Upgrades after they came back to your hand.

• Custom Modifications makes you draw for each Upgrade you attach to your gun, helping you deck cycling, which allows you to shoot infinitely!

Pimp your .45 Thompson:

Yo, dawg! I am M to the arkharrigan, and welcome to pimp my gun!

• Custom Modifications is the cornerstone of the deck. The core ability is useful, especially for oversuccess, but this is not our main interest.

  • Counterbalance is the real reason why we are looking at Custom Modifications. After playing it, each upgrade turns into a cantrip, which is fantastic for digging through the deck, especially because most of them are fast and cheap.

  • Quicksilver Bullet is another big one, turning oversuccess into additional damage, killing enemies in one blow and storing resources on Relentless.

  • Notched Sight is a steal at only 1xp! Don't take risks anymore and save loads of engaging actions. Note that Quicksilver Bullet will never deal additional damage to a teammate.

  • Leather Grip will make the Custom Modifications fast (and slightly cheaper), making the "reloading" of your .45 Thompson slick and smooth.

• Enchant Weapon is, of course, great in such decks and works to secure the additional damage Quicksilver Bullet.

• Custom Ammunition turns your .45 Thompson into a shotgun against Monster enemies (2 base damage + Enchant Weapon + Quicksilver Bullet + Custom Ammunition = 5 damage per ammo). The 3-cost is absorbed by the 2 additional ammo turned into resources by Thompson's ability.

• Reliable is a cheap and fast way to add more Upgrades to the deck and helps a lot with triggering Quicksilver Bullet during attacks when you are not using Enchant Weapon.

• Well-Maintained is free, fast, and brings everything (but itself) back to your hand when you are out of ammo!

• At the end of the campaign, Telescopic Sight can be added to snipe!

Pioneer of the circular economy:

Mark actively practices the "Reduce, Repair, Recycle" mantra: reduce use with increased damage per ammo, repair by pimping your gun, and recycle empty guns in an Act of Desperation!

• When the gun is empty, Act of Desperation will throw it away for 6 and 6 resources.

• Well-Maintained will return the gun and all the upgrades to your hand instead of discarding it.

• The 6 resources from Act of Desperation will pay for the new gun. If you already had Relentless in play, chances are high that you can discard it now to pay immediately for attaching all the Upgrades again.

  • As the Upgrades that return to your hand are all turned into draw with Counterbalance, you can consider that when they return to your hand, it's that much drawing from your deck. This deck will have up to 6 Upgrades attached to your gun, meaning that you will go through your deck really fast once you've done it once.

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Other Cards:

• Grete Wagner is not mandatory to the deck. Still, I often found myself bathing in resources and healing options around mid-scenario, so I thought she'd be the perfect spender, supporting with clue-getting and bringing a bit of horror soak.

  • Trusted x2 on Grete Wagner can be seen as additional clues and testless, fast horror heal, which is always appreciated in Mr. Harrigan. The more she can soak, the more you can drip damage 1 by 1 to Mark, optimising the use of his ability.

• Hallowed Mirror and Second Wind are both ways to heal, the latter helping, especially when you take damage to boost your skill value for a treachery test.

• "If it bleeds..." is useful in this deck as it can cycle a couple of times each scenario, inducing horror twice: once when re-shuffling, and once with seeing Shell Shock another time.

• .45 Automatic and Prepared for the Worst are basic consistency. We choose the .45 Automatic over the Enchanted Blade because it can also hold all the upgrades and play as a first mini-.45 Thompson while you dig through your deck.

  • We later add Stick to the Plan, especially as it can hold Prepared for the Worst, Custom Modifications and Act of Desperation, greatly increasing the consistency in the results of the deck.

  • It is important to note that the deck's main weakness is its reliance on a few cards: a weapon to start (this part should be alright), Custom Modifications to give drawing as we attach the other Upgrades, and maybe the most critical one: Well-Maintained. Do not attach Upgrades to your weapon if you do not have Well-Maintained, as you may be stuck with an upgraded empty weapon, forcing you to discard them all.

  • To increase early draw and mitigate this aspect, you can use Mark's built-in ability on scenario tests.

• Kicking the Hornet's Nest, turned into On the Hunt, is one of the main advantages of cycling your deck, as it will help you pull out enemies preventively, decreasing the likeliness of your clue-getters drawing them. The resources help with set-up.

• Keen Eye can be purchased at some point in the campaign, especially in 2 players, but another way to use the time is to heal yourself and use your built-in ability to scoop a couple of clues.

• Safeguard (2) is also a must-have in these highly specific enemy management decks. I couldn't fit it in 19xp while displaying the deck's main idea, but it is definitely high on the priority list.

• "Let God sort them out..." is fun as a single in a campaign mode, just because it feels good to pull it out, and this deck can easily afford it. I would replace it in a standalone mode with a Glory.

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Upgrade Path:

Link to the 0xp deck

(View at arkham-starter.com)

Link to the full xp deck

To create your own guides, find the template I have created here