Just A Bit Experimental

The fifth starter is Len, so it's actually 2 Wealth, 3 Income, 6 Influence.

So, this deck was terrifying for me. I love SF Gadgets, but it does not seem to love me back most of the time. I also made the conscious choice to not have a starting stud.

Game 1 vs. IronCache: IronCache was doing a pseudo-slide deck here. I remember that I struggled at first with getting enough gadgets out, however, this deck starts a ton of influence, and so many of the gadgets give more influence on top of that. I was able to keep my dudes spread out without too much fear thanks to my gadgets, and a few failed spells from my opponent helped me win at time.

Game 2 vs. Prodigy Another game vs. Hexes. I don't recall much from this game, but I do remember that we slung lead a few times, and I believe he hit at least one bad cheatin' hand that I was able to capitalize on heavily.

Game 3 vs Shekky Two Straight Flush decks means that suddenly Cheatin' Resolutions aren't nearly as good. Both of us were legal a lot of the time. I got lucky in low-ball I think every single time, which helped tremendously for being able to use my Hydro-Punchers. Looking at his discard, I managed to dodge an early Kidnappin' and he never seemed to find SiYE. Those would have been disastrous.

I got one good Straight Flush to his Flush, and that ended up starting the death spiral. I was able to attrition down.

Game 4 vs Zenarchist This was another game I went into expecting to have my deck fall down in. I started off with a couple of gadgets, and I was inventing at a good clip. I actually played Jen first turn, assuming he had some sort of forced call out, and I would need a stud. He didn't, but I managed to throw a Log-o-Matic and an Ornithopter on her. We went a few days with me ~~cowering at home~~ doing research while he camped town square, building up a sizeable army. After a few days, I finally came out, and managed to lose all of my studs to shootout plays (Suppressing Fire and a Vamoosin'). Thankfully, my 5 off the top was legal, and I managed to burn three abilities (including a Comin' Up Roses!) to make it a Straight Flush.

This pattern continued for a couple of days, with his Dr. Babcock's Office keeping him from losing too many casualties.

Finally, I managed to keep some stud bonus and wore him down with a few lucky draws and the Log-o-Matic (I'd been too afraid at this point to commit to a second round of shootouts). The next shootout I kept Jen out of the fight and he ran home, which left me to squat on deeds and use Smith & Robard's right as time ran out.

I was really lucky too, as he had Amity played and could Sword of the Spirit her up with an Adler's Needle.

Game 5 vs Kacheese This game started out pretty similarly to the last one. I built up a few gadgets and hired a dude (Al in this case). Kacheese got out two shotguns, including one on Thunder Boy. I managed to fight off the first assault (at my home, via Bounty Hunter), but then my opponent dropped the Judge. I picked a fight with his dudes who were still stuck in my Home in the hopes of whittling them down, but he was able to cheat through the pain too much for me to handle, and with two bad hands too many, I conceded.

Shout out to 2nd Bank Of Gomorra for giving him the rock to play out as much of the cards as he did. One of the best showings I've seen of that card!

Top 8 vs Laura I start with a joker in my opening lowball. Laura starts with two jokers in her play hand. I pull my second joker for an early invent on a gadget.

From there, the game keeps going weird. One of the first wins where I draw two Hydro-Punchers and don't have a natural stud dude on the board early. Laura gets none of her abominations until much later.

After a few days of her digging and me inventing an impressive amount, we go to brawl at my home. She loses a dude or two, and then she retreats. I manage to hold on to my Roses.

After that fight, I drop Adelaide Rose and we go into a fight or two at town square. I end up burning all of my ways to change to a straight flush and have to run. I hire on a Nathan Shane and slap a hydro-puncher on him to chase her away from my deed.

We finally have another fight or two, and a couple more straight flushes and a slightly risky cheatin' 5oak helps me seal the win.

Shout out to Scoop Hound for shutting down Landon Grimes in a couple of shootouts.

Top 4 vs. Carter Losing my two jokers in the first lowball really set the tone for the game. While Carter's deck may be janky, I could never find a Hydro-Puncher or a See-Through Spectacles to get me through longer wars of attrition. Holy Roller meant my fights had to be very strategic, even if he cheated.

He won on time with me sitting on 13 influence.

Some thoughts on this deck:

Whistle Stop I had been sleeping on this card. I don't think it's universally good, but it solves a big problem for this sort of deck by both dropping opposing bullets and cycling back into the deck.

See-Through Spectacles I honestly should have put in four of these. They're pretty crucial to fix your hands as you invent more and more. It's also pretty frail due to the last line of the ability. I can see if this deck becomes more popular, anti-hand rank modification cards start getting popular to match.

Adelaide Rose really came through in this deck. Xemo's Turban is not a card I use a lot, but it came in handy a lot here.

Steel Swarm ended up being kind of meh for most if not all of the games. It's certainly not bad, but the booting really didn't seem to matter for most of the games.

Ultimately, my performance in the tournament reminded me why I love and hate these decks. When it fires, you get strong hands, win low-ball, and can manipulate your way out of a bad shootout round or two.

When it fails, you end up with a pile of broken parts that feels like it should have worked.

One big example of that is in my deeds. I often couldn't play them because I couldn't defend them, which lead to having to just cycle them away instead of making them useful.