What Happens Beyond the Veil Stays Beyond the Veil

well, maybe shooty but (probably) really slow

This started out as a joke deck (an abominable joke), but it shows some promise, even if it's a crime against nature to sacrifice Ancestor Spirits to bring Wretched Abominations and run naked all around the place

So, better think of it as a "dream" and remember your MST3K mantra ;)

I like* the idea of harnessing poor ancestral spirits into high-stud monstrosities! Especially as the topic on the Pinebox forum supports it.

I imagine economy is an issue. You lose lowball, your ability to find, let alone pay for, a Ghost-rock-generating Deed is low.

Vitality Tonic will be a chancy pull.

* I mean, utterly reject as an abomination against all that is divine, how dare you... but it's just a show, I should really just relax.

I agree, economy is a big problem in the first rounds, but changing starting shaman Lydia Bear-Hands to Black Elk gives a little extra GR without affecting the success chance for pulls. You might lose in the first turn because of the 2 influence drop, though.

Kabeda and Margaret are more essential to using the "core aspects" of this deck, so I'd be more hesitant to change them.

I also thought about having Ezekiah Grimme as the Legend who got on mushroom trip. Having that extra GR bit will surely help, having access to more spells too, but that's just postponing the inevitable economic collapse (like Real Life™!).

Vitality Tonic will never fail its pull, and it made think of maybe going for more experimental gadgets, which might make it also less of a turtle deck in the first rounds.

The influence drop in the first round might be countered if you're lucky enough to have a Totem and a deed in your first hand, or if your opponent spawns a deed to bring CP's ingame, and try to win (and you have a totem in hand).

The odds are favorable (40-64%) if you use Deuces, and greater (54-80%) if you have Ezekiah instead of Raven.

It might make a very agressive first round. Bait with low Influence, attach totems, boost Influence, summon spirits, pew pew pew

@Polarbeast about Vitality Tonic, I get now what you meant by "chancy pull" ^^' but once ingame, its own ability pull will always succeed.

For the values that fail, mostly I just love having 3*666 for "flavour". One of those 6es, and also the Fire of Nanahbozho make the deed a _Holy Ground_, for a deck that tries to run abominations. "Not a bug, a feature"

The raging mama bear, for flavour and kick too. I imagine it's going to be mostly Dr Dawn Edwards who tries to make the Tonic (it's her invention, after all). Mad Scientist 0, she's going to rage a lot ;)

btw, Raven Ruin's art is spot-on with the "spirit quest" :P

My biggest advice, if you wish to hone this deck for further use, is to concentrate on the draw structure. As it stands, you could have 2 or 3 Wretched in a shootout and will likely still not be able to get higher than a rank 6 (flush).

In its current iteration, your only hope of a decent hand is a flush or straight flush. But as you play cards, your chances of that will likely get worse and worse over time, as the hearts are much cheaper and easier to play, where the dudes and deeds are more expensive and not something you can dump onto the board whenever you get them in hand.

I would suggest 1 of 2 options:

*option 1: If you want to keep the flush/SF structure, perhaps remove a few of the dudes and put them into your hearts, and/or change the dudes so they are extremely cheap (3 GR or less, if possible, and no upkeep) so you can consistently play them out of your hand.

Also make sure you have 4 of each heart value, of at least 6 values in a row (7, 8, 9, 10, J, Q - 4 of each, for instance). Also realize that if you play on the board more than one of any individual one of those values (2 8's, or 3 J's for instance), your chance at a straight flush is drastically reduced.

*option 2: (which is a better option, I think) Is to pick a 'backup value' that you can use outside of the flush/SF option. 8's make the most sense, since you already have 4 8-value dudes and 4 8-value hearts. If you change things around to have 4 deeds and 4 clubs on 8 value, you will have a much better chance in shootouts, especially early in the game.

Good luck! Tweaking draw structures to fit the deck (and what you want) is not an easy process, but if you keep playing and tweaking you will learn fast.

@Prodigy thanks for the feedback! I kept working on the deck, and Ghosts an Gadgets v3 was the latest update, 2-3 days ago. I think I instinctively went with "option 1". I also dropped the 0-clubs thingy to auto-succeed the experimental pulls (also dropped the experimental gadgets).

There is still work to do, both on the deck and on the player driving the deck ;)