Dreamy Doctor (Hunka Hunka)

The Dreamy Doctor

This deck aims at using Geared Up to get the best set up at the very start of the game to make Vincent get the DREAM start. The primary role of this deck is fighting, with some clue getting here and there. Let's go through each card and define its use.

Bonesaw: Good fighting tool. Only one in the deck though, so we are going to have to either get lucky, or really dig for it.

Dream Diary: We want to get access to Dream Diary to improve upon the naturally weak fighting stat that Vincent has.

Grim Memoir: This is a throw in for the lvl 0 deck to grab some extra clues here and there before we eventually get Gray's Anatomy

Runic Axe: The primary fighting weapon for Vincent. It's new, it's exciting, so why not. It's not the best option but I want to play with it, so that is that. The heal on the card allows Vincent to go up to 10 pips on the Runic Axe. The inscriptions we are looking for are Glory, Elders, and Hunt. Then we go into Sage and Scriptweaver if the experience lines up.

Arcane Enlightenment: Ahhh hand slots... I hate you. So yes, this is the weakness of the deck. Sometime having an okay hand slot as your unique card can be a bummer. But hey, that is what makes deckbuilding fun and want to pull your hair out. This gives the deck a lot of flexibility with hand slots. Bonesaw, Dream Diary, and Grim Memoir? Runic Axe and Dream Diary? You could even do two more hand slots if you get both of them out there. Not only does this provide more hand slots, but it also allows those extra Essence of the Dream and On the Mend to stay in your hand and/or discard other cards to keep them in your hand.

Hallowed Mirror: Soothing Melody provides amazing heal damage/horror which triggers Vincent Lee's ability (If you at least heal one damage) and cycles itself. For me, this card is a no brainer.

Backpack: This card combines with Geared Up in the most amazing way. If you pull one of these in your opening hand, play it during your Geared Up and trigger its ability to hopefully get more items to then subsequently keep playing with Geared Up. Because the wording says one at a time, you play,trigger the ability, and keep playing cards until you can't anymore. Any cards underneath Backpack are considered in your hand, making them valid candidates. Mulligan hard for this one.

Bandages: A solid item card which takes up no slots and allows you to get On the Mend's in your hand, or your allies. Nothing exciting, but works incredibly well with Vincent.

Schoffner's Catalogue: Another amazing card that works well with Geared Up. Plop this down and you have extra resources to feed all the assets you are going to play. It can also be retrieved with Backpack! Definitely a card you want in your opening hand.

Geared Up: The bread and butter of the deck to get set up as fast as possible. I feel like I have talked about this card enough already, so I will move on.

In the Thick of It: 9 health, 6 sanity for a total of 15 stats, which is more than the usual 14 with the exception of Dunwich investigators and a few others. The deck requires a decent amount of experience and with plenty of ability to heal the damage off, 2 physical trauma allows us to get multiple On the Mend's in our hand as well as 3xp to get the deck off to a good start.

At a Crossroads: This card is also an amazing combo with Geared Up as per the the dilemma ruling, one at a time starting with the lead investigator, each investigator may reveal a dilemma and resolve its effect before any turns have started. Therefore, if this is in your opening hand, you can reveal and choose yourself to draw three cards when your turn begins and lose an action which we are already losing to Geared Up. Not quite as good as Studious as it is not guaranteed, but still quite powerful you manage to pull it off.

Emergency Cache: Extra resources and able to be pulled by Backpack. Again, nothing exciting, but extra resources are good and the more cards that are targetable by Backpack the better.

Lucky!: To be fair, this has been a staple for so many years and its hard to pass up. As easy way to get out of a bad pull can be the difference between things running smoothly or going horrendously wrong. Just a solid card which fills out the deck nicely.

Guts: With only three will, this is a nice bonus to those heinous treachery cards that will cause us to curse and hate this game. We want to like this game. So put this in. Not only that, but extra card draw is great in case we didn't get the ideal opening hand.

Inspiring Presence: This is more of a personal flavor card for me. I want to able to use it with Girish Kadakia to get 2 checks at +2. It also triggers an On the Mend for whoever you are using it on. I would say feel free to replace this card, this is just something I want to try. Look to the notes on Girish Kadakia below for more info.

Overpower: We need extra fight for the crappy 3 fight stat Vincent supports and as previously started, more card draw is nice.

Take Heart: With only 1 evade, there will surely be a time where there will be a treachery or a monster where you can slap this down at get some more economy.

Vicious Blow: This is for the pesky 3 health enemies that we suck at killing off the start. Both of the weapons in this only do a maximum of 2 damage (unless you go Ancient Power on the Runic Axe which would be much further along).

Upgrades:

The first upgrade we should consider is Backpack since it allows the Geared Up to reach even more cards. I would start by doing this first.

Dream Diary would be the second thing to consider, but obviously only if you have "interpreted the dreams".

Runic Axe: You could probably put 3 pips into Runic Axe at this point for the different incriptions (Hunt, Elder, Glory) and save Sage and Scriptweaver for later. Honestly, I am going out on a whim with this because I have no idea when you should start upgrading these customizable cards.

Gray's Anatomy + The Raven Quill: This is the card I was stoked to try. This card fixes the damage problem, however, it has some weaknesses you should be aware of. It is an action to use, which means as the primary fighter, you are most likely going to take an AoO if you use it. The second is that it is a test of (1) against the base stat of 4, which depending on what difficulty or what campaign you are doing, might be hard to achieve a pull of -1 consistently. The Raven Quill can fix both these problems. Mystic Vane and Living Quill allow you to not take an AoO and allow a more consistent effect. The heal effect is a bonus if you have nothing else to do, but it's use is primarily to do extra damage to those big baddies.

Surgical Kit: A solid item card which takes up no slots and allows for some bonus effects when you are using Soothing Melody or Bandages. With Soothing Melody you could heal 1 damage, 2 horror and draw 2 cards. Ummmm. Yes please.

Girish Kadakia: This is a personal preference. He is new, has some awesome soak, and an awesome ability to pump up any check you need him for. Not only that, but he can trigger a On the Mend for yourself. The other option is Jessica Hyde who gives you a flat 1 str bonus and can trigger an On the Mend at the end of your turn. Not bad for 1exp. I would say either of these is good, Girish Kadakia is better for your allies and has better sanity soak than Jessica Hyde, but Jessica Hyde does provide a passive stat boost which can't be ignored and costs significantly less exp. Go with whatever your heart desires.

Note: The extra experience from In the Thick of It is being saved for after the first scenario.