Dark Horse Duke (Solo) - Updated (my best solo deck)

Really nice one! Like it! But it still fells like he could get insane in one round... maybe cherished keepsake? Would fit with the zero cost....

I was wrong, calling in favors to heal allys is way better!

@nebukandezar42yeah I love cherished keepsake but with me trying hard to get out St Hubert’s Key early and also taking up that accessory slot, i just couldn’t justify including it. But more importantly between calling in Favors and Pete Sylvestre, my sanity has always been just fine. Fun deck. Thanks for your thoughts

@jamjams32, Hey, I have not yet tried Ashcan, but this build looks really interesting.

What are your options for upgrading the deck with the earned experience? I guess Peter Sylvestre is the first thing that comes to mind. Lucky!? Flare? Stroke of Luck? Any other options you'd consider?

Thanks for sharing your deck.

@JuSTiNSo my first upgrades were Charisma and then upgraded Pete Sylvestre and Lucky. After that it’s not as concrete but I’ve gotten good mileage out of cards like Red Gloved Man, Stroke of Luck, and even upgraded Aquinnah.

@jamjams32, but isn't Charisma like opposing Calling in Favors? I always thought it either one of the other that you should play. As having both is a bit counter-productive. Was I mistaken?

@JuSTiNnot sure what you’re alluding to. They actually work synergistically together. Charisma gives you the freedom to not just play more investigators but also include more investigators in your deck which in turn makes Calling in Favors better. So I actually find they work better together and are both very strong in this deck

why do you have 2 dark horses it says on the card you can only have 1 per investigator

@NoelleYou can only have one in play at a time but can have two copies in your deck (to have a greater chance of drawing it)

@jamjams32, Thanks. I somehow always thought that Calling in Favors and Charisma don't work well. But then again, I haven't played the game that much :) Will give it a try!

@JuSTiNNo prob at all. Keep playing. It’s an absolutely fantastic game. So much fun

It's really counterintuitive, but you're not allowed to play lucky like you think you are. You can't have 0 resources, fail a test, activate Labranche, and then play lucky. There's no player action window in there to activate the Labranche. www.reddit.com

@dubcity566 I’m not using her that way. I’ll use Labranch before a skill test to ensure I’ve got that resource to play Lucky if needed

Just building an "Ashcan" Pete deck so very interesting. Just checking once you activate Madame Labranche you have a resource so dark horse no longer gives stat bonuses... luck effectively becomes a net +1 skill check taking that into account? Seems like a lot of cards / actions for a situational net +1... or have I missed something?

Ah... maybe just answered my own question! You test without dark horse (because you have a resource) but if you fail then play luck and as you no longer have resource dark horse also kicks in? That makes more sense I think and effectively makes playing luck a net + 3 which sounds awesome...

@Stebb Thanks so much for your thoughts. Yeah Lucky is one of the coolest cards/tricks in the deck. You can use Labranche to gain 1 ressource before making a check and when you need to use lucky, you'll get the horse back on track before the test resolves, so it's effectively +3 instead of 2. If the test succeeds you saved an action and a card. Later you even get to draw a card, if you upgrade Lucky!. So in essence if I have Lucky in hand I will gain a resource at the end of the round so that if i need to use Lucky, I can spend that resource to gain not just plus two but actually plus 3 as dark Horse automatically turns back on. Hope that makes sense. In short Lucky is phenomenal in this deck.

@Stebb I must have posted my previous comment before i saw your second comment. But yes that’s exactly how it works! Getting essentially a plus 3 is ridiculously good and just adds to the consistency of the deck to pass skill tests without much issue. Have fun!

For upgrades, do you usually get 2 Charisma before moving on to upgrading Pete and Lucky? Or just 1 Charisma?

@Zedd I usually upgrade Pete first and then usually just one Charisma and then Lucky after that. I don’t think the order is critical but yeah my first 3 upgrades are typically Lucky, Pete, and Charisma.

Just a really great deck, congrats. Thoughts on Inspiring Presence? Tough to find an off class swap, Hubert is obviously crucial, but maybe instead of Vicious Blow? Replicates ability but gives the damage and horror heal on an ally. Also maybe because there isn’t a ton of draw, throwing cards for the ability might be more limited.

Also wonder if Perception might replace Desperate Search. Love the Hubert/desperate card synergy and reckless and say your prayers are keepers, but base investigate with duke looks good even with minimal setup and the draw off perception might be helpful.

Just thinking out loud though, super deck.

@Barkash Thanks for the comments. YES, I’ve looked long and hard at Inspiring Presence. I love the card and think if you included it, you wouldn’t be wrong. It’s solid in this deck. I just liked Vicious Blow to get that extra damage so you don’t have to ready and attack again with Duke with those odd health enemies. But they fill a similar role. I think since I’m playing Calling in Favors, the healing you get from Inspiring Presence isn’t quite as impactful as I’m often putting a lot of damage on Duke, bringing him back in hand (which essentially heals him totally) to play another ally, and then will quickly pay 2 to get Duke back out there.

I do love the Desperate skills. However I think i do agree with you that Perception can and probably should replace Desperate Search as I often am already pretty high in my investigate stat. That extra card draw would be huge. Thanks for the recommendation!

Yeah, solid reasoning and i think you’re right, no small number of 4 health enemies and better to take one test rather than ready and take two.

I'm not a fan of leather coat, what would you suggest swapping it with?

@dogzbody So Fine Clothes would be a good replacement for Leather Coat. Or you can never go wrong throwing in a few more skills in this deck like two copies of Unexpected Courage. Those would be my substitutions

@jamjams32This deck seems very interesting and I would like to try it. I only have a couple of questions. Why you have included only 1 Magnifying Glass (I don't like very much using only 1 copy of a card in my decks...) and why don't you prefer Lantern? How do you use Scavenging in this deck? Thanks in advance.

Lantern won't stack with Duke may be one reason. Scavengingis probably there to mainly get St. Hubert's Key back if it gets discarded. 1x Magnifying Glass may just be compromise to keep the other cards but you could go with 2x Magnifying Glass and no Scavenging. i'm sure it was a tough choice so will be interesting to see what @jamjams32 says.

@Gizmo_86``@Stebb So with Ashcan’s deckbuilding restrictions, you can only include 5 out of faction cards. So I knew I wanted two copies of both St. Hubert’s Key and Vicious Blow because they’re amazing cards in this deck. So that leaves only one more out of faction card I could include so in my mind Magnifying Glass is another cheap, useful card giving a static boost to my stats. You can probably tell but that is absolutely one of the goals of this deck is to consistently pass skill tests of any type and that is largely done by cards that give me static boosts - such as Dark Horse, Pete Sylvestre, St Hubert’s Key, Magnifying Glass, etc. All of these push my base stats so high that it becomes very easy to be passing tests consistently - especially with Dukes ability. And my goodness, this deck becomes off the charts good when you can upgrade into Key of Ys. Being able to get another +2 or +3 to all of your stats is HUGE. Especially knowing that Pete Sylvestre can keep your horror/sanity safe after you do get Key of Ys out with a couple horror on it.

Scavenging is probably not a lynch pin of the deck but is a nice card if I see it. I’ve had games where i didn’t see it and the deck still performs just fine. But when I’ve got it, the primary use of it is to keep recycling my Leather Coats which adds to the survivability of the deck. Being able to recycle a cheap asset to help soak up damage is awesome. But yes if i do need to fetch St Hubert’s Key or eventually Key of Ys, yes Scavenging can be useful. Another reason I like this deck is because it is so resilient to damage with cards like Leather Coat, Scavenging, Calling in Favors, and of course Pete Sylvestre. I hope these comments help. Have fun with the deck!

@jamjams32Thanks for the explanation! I am very interested about upgrade this deck with the newest Key of Ys... Why don't you write an upgrade guide for the deck? It would be very useful! I think to update first Peter Sylvestre, then Charisma and then Lucky! on your suggestion. After these I would like to include in my deck the Key of Ys and the other card I love: Aquinnah. What do you think about these last 2 card? With which other cards could I replace them?

@Gizmo_86 Yeah I would say I’ve always upgraded these first:

Pete Sylvestre Charisma Lucky

But with Key of Ys now in the card pool I may even consider trying to upgrade into that first. It’s such a clutch card and so so good especially in this deck. So in some combination my first three upgrades would be Key of Ys, Pete, and Charisma. Lucky would be my fourth upgrade. After that, I think upgraded Aquinnah is a solid include as is Stroke of Luck to just continue to pass tests without issue. Upgraded Emergency Cache is also good for the card draw.

As far as what cards to replace, it’s really up to you. I think I’d pull maybe one copy of Calling in Favors and/or Desperate Search/Perception as your book stay is already pretty boosted. Let me know what you would replace or what upgrades you’d do first

@jamjams32Thanks again! I like this upgrade order!

@jamjams32I think I will add to my deck 2 Key of Ys instead of 1 Perception and 1 Say Your Prayers (to balance intellect and willpower boost).

When I will add 2 Aquinnah I think I can remove from my deck 1 Calling in Favors and I don't know which other card remove... Maybe 1 Madame Labranche?

What about the Stroke of Luck? With which cards would you replace it?

Question on upgrades...all the base cards are good...what do you drop for say adding Charisma?

@Tiltowait Since Charisma is a permanent card, it doesn’t count towards your deck size so you don’t need to drop anything to include it! Good stuff. Game on

It is a really cool deck! Why do you consider it as a “solo” deck? Does it pose problems in multiplayer?

@yepesnopes Thanks! Yeah this deck would still perform just as well multiplayer as it does solo. I’d say that in general, solo decks have to really be well rounded and be able to handle everything because it can’t rely on a teammate to pick up the slack. So yes I feel this deck absolutely can handle anything the game can throw at it by itself which makes it a great solo deck. But if you wanted to run it multiplayer it would still perform really well. In fact i just played through the first scenario for Forgotten Age with 2 of my buddies and one of them was running this deck and he was a powerhouse in the game. So yes either solo or multiplayer it’s strong. Game on

What do you recommend to mulligang for? I guess from the description that you have to hard mulligan for Dark Horse. Then? The keys? Peter? Thanks

@yepesnopes Luckily Duke is so strong on his own that if for some reason your initial or mulligan draw isn’t perfect you’ll still be fine.

BUT....absolutely I’m looking for Dark Horse fairly early. I’d also love to see my emergency cache early to help me get set up. After dark horse I’d say I’m definitely looking for the key and then maybe even Madame labranche as she’s so flexible and has such a solid ability. Obviously getting Sylvestre out early is always good too. Again the deck doesn’t need a ton of set up to be effective but my goodness once it’s set up with the key, Dark Horse, Pete, Labranche, Fire Axe, etc it’s nearly unstoppable. So consistent and powerful

Can you post a guide how develop this deck throughout a campaign?

Came across this deck while making one of my own. I was wondering what do you use to consistently get extra investigates or clues? Duke can be readied with a discard...if you have an item for scavenging, etc...what else is there? Some missions require a frightening amount of clues, not even my specialized Rex could keep up.

@Tiltowait Yeah I’ve never had a hard time getting clues with this deck. Between magnifying glass, Dark Horse, st Hubert’s Key, dukes ability, and eventually key of Ys, there is so much investigate skill and it passes investigate skills consistently. It’s not grabbing multiple clues at a time like Rex or with Deduction, but in a solo game you often don’t need more than 2 or 3 clues to advance the act deck. So yeah I’ve played this deck so much and have always been just fine in terms of clue gathering

wow! played this deck tonight for the 1st time solo Curse of the Rougarou. Hard mulligan and took the 1st few cycles to get set up. This deck was a "beast". I'm always worried about dyeing or going crazy but with this set up the clock is now the new enemy. Just running out of time on the agenda got me the R1. This deck seemed to have sustain for hours. Maybe lucky draws or chaos pulls but I never felt weak. Im going to run it threw dunwich camp. blind Fingers crossed

@Faith + 1 Awesome! I’m glad you enjoyed it and that it performed well for you. It is a really strong deck. With dukes ability, you can get going right away with getting clues and killing monsters. But yes like you said, once this thing is “set-up,” oh my goodness it’s amazing and so strong and consistent. Not sure if you’ve played with Key of Ys yet but that card in this deck is just silly good. Good luck with your upcoming campaign! Hope it goes well :)

Any thoughts on putting Yaotl in the deck? It seems to work so well with Duke!

So I guess with Key of Y's you go ahead and take out St. Hubert's, which in turn makes Reckless/Desperate/Prayers pretty pointless (6 cards), transforming this deck into something completely different. St Hubert's being gone opens up room for another cheap ally, etc... Honestly, the addition of Key of Y's really seems to require a new decklist, Jamjams -- and I'd love to see it.

I built basically the same deck, without knowing there was an update of the old version of Dark Horse Aschan. It's a very strong deck.

For those who are sceptical, you to understand that you're not gonna roll over on every scenario. Sometimes, it's gonna be very painful, but most of the time, you will survive, wandering for some place to another, like a real hobo, enough average in every part of the game without having a real weak. If you don't have St Hubert key on board you can always take some horror waiting to have the asset in hand.

Usefull skill : inspiring presence which matches with Duke.

I don't get all the allies, are you saying that you sacrifice Duke for them?

@Cthurkey Duke doesn’t take up the ally spot. So an early upgrade is Charisma so you can have both Madame Labranche and Pete Sylvester our at the same time (along with Duke)

when you enter a skill test the timing says that ST.5 calculate skill value if you have money, Dark Horse now work at ST.6 determinate the result then you could play Lucky!

no player window between 5 & 6 that means with Dark Horse lucky only cound +1

A year later, how would you update this deck with cards that have become available since?

Great deck, I'm playing a variant of it right now. Does it make sense to include Relic Hunter to upgrades and try to run both St. Hubert's Key and Key of Ys or is one of those enough and is better to spend XP elsewhere?

Nice job! Im playing Carcosa and Its going on correctly! Im a newcomer in this game... What are the most important upgrades? Charisma, Pete... and? Im lost! sorry! thnx for all!

just built this deck and drew paranoia as my random basic weakness. lol

@Stebb @jamjams32 @kybconnor kybconnor is correct - according to the skill test timing rules, you can't use lucky and dark horse in combination like that. Dark horse is either counted or not counted during ST.5, and if it's being counted then you won't have the resource for Lucky in ST.6 It's very much an either/or sort of deal, not a combo.

Why is no one talking about how amazing Lone Wolf must be with this kind of Dark Horse setup? I haven't tried it out yet, soon will, looks great on paper!

• You can easily get 2 resources to play 2-cost assets.
• You get to have 0 resources for Dark Horse bonuses during the mythos phase but still have one resource at the beginning to play a 1-cost asset, or to deal with a spawned enemy by fuelling fire axe, or Scrapper for evasion, or Scrapper to attack before you get fire axe out.
• You can get two resources to fuel fire/scrapper if you know an enemy is coming.

1 Question, for what do we need Scavenging here? and why only 1? There are very few Items we can get back from Discard (if any at all). Plus with only 1 Magn. Glass is heavy to find it in the Deck. Plus how to manage to get St. Hubert when you are spending your resources for Dark Horse, and maximum for Pete Sylvestre, Key is 4 Resources, where should you get this when you are on the Dark Horse mode?

Hi, do you have options instead of lucky here or is it extremely important?

Everytime I build this deck in TTS I end up with 29 cards plus the two weaknesses and Duke is MIA. Are my missing something?

Correction - after a few retries, I now have 31 (plus the weaknesses), but Duke is still MIA.

@jamjams32 Your deck inspired me to play all the official campaigns in true solo, thanks!
I updated the deck with new cards up to 2023, I would love to hear your thoughts
"Unstoppable Survivor" arkhamdb.com