Joe Diamond: Psychic Detective

Card draw simulator

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Derived from
None. Self-made deck here.

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Whimsical · 35

Disclaimer

This is my first time writing one of these descriptions, so I hope you'll forgive me if it's not perfect (or missing this or that normal element or such).

Intro

This is a deck I've been a little (too?) enamoured with as of late, and I thought it worth sharing (as someone that normally runs homebrew investigators exclusively, having a real deck to share is a bit of a novelty to me). Thus, I introduce Joe Diamond: Psychic Detective

Core Engine

The focus of this deck is assembling the following cards in play.

The Framework: Observations

The engine our deck is built around is predicated on the following simple observations:

We start the game with 5 resources and 5 cards.
Playing Joe Diamond discounts us a card draw and 2 resources each round.
Farsight can discount an action when playing a card each round.
Anna Kaslow allows us to have two copies of The Fool • 0 and The World • XXI.
The Fool • 0 discounts a resource from a card we play each round.
The World • XXI effectively discounts a card draw from a card we play each round.

The Framework: Conclusions

The end result of all the above is as such:

The card in our hunch deck becomes a completely free card we play each turn. (Completely free as defined as costing no card draws, resources, or actions.)
The Fool • 0 and The World • XXI allows us to play another card each round at only the cost of the action.
Tempo is really the name of the game with this deck. We can use our 5 starting resources and consistent resource and card draw discounts to perform all of our setup without (ideally) needing to spend actions on resources or card draw.
With most of our cards not actually requiring resources to to play now, we can effectively cut all of the economy other than The Fool • 0 from our deck, allowing our deck to be dense with high impact cards that are now very low investment on our part.
As we do gain a resource a turn, but don't need to really spend resources, we can use our savings to fuel Higher Education on high impact tests, this also means we're free to cut most static stat buffs to go even more in on point 4.

Requirements

I would consider Farsight and at least 1 copy of The Fool • 0 as the "minimum viable product" for this deck. The 25 experience indicated on this page is where I would be comfortable as calling the deck fully operational. The next two purchases should probably be Studious which is actually an engine card in this deck (as it allows you to find your tarots and Anna Kaslow in your opening hand more often) and Higher Education so you don't need to see the level 0 version to put your resources to use.

Everything else in the deck, aside from its core engine, is basically a matter of preference. The only level 0 cards outside the core that I consider to be "canonical" to this deck are Thorough Inquiry, Occult Lexicon, and Hallowed Mirror. That being said, I do have some comments on the card choices

Card Notes (Aside from the core cards, as they've been covered)

Celaeno Fragments: This card plays well with what we're aiming to do, costs 0 (normally 1, but this deck rarely spends the resource on it) and takes up a slot we don't overly care about (we're going to want Occult Lexicon anyway, so the loss of Detective's Colt 1911s isn't that much of a concern).
Grim Memoir: The World • XXI is card draw, so this should tide us over until we get it.
Occult Lexicon + Hallowed Mirror: This play very well with Dream-Enhancing Serum, as do cards with the actual myriad trait, allowing us to have two targets with can pair with an existing card. Blood-Rite is just a good card in general as well and Hallowed Mirror helps with some durability problems we have.
Short Rest: This deck does have a little durability problem, especially in regards to Joe Diamond's 6 sanity and 2 willpower. While Higher Education and Soothing Melody can help, I find I want just a little more healing in the deck to tied me over. That Short Rest also plays well with Dream-Enhancing Serum makes a very choice pick for that little bit of added healing.
Detective's Colt 1911s: This deck doesn't play these, though if you hold it in your hand you can maybe use it at the end of a scenario to assist with a boss. Normally I tend to use these as a commit though, probably for my first Breach the Door since we don't have as many other good ways to get our up.
Astounding Revelation: Can probably cut (probably for another Deduction), but being able to snipe it at the start of the game off of Anna Kaslow seems like too much fun to pass up.
Task Force: Very much optional. This deck doesn't actually run a target for the action ability so you do need to be mindful of the other investigators if you intend to include it.
Trusted: I think this might be a better card that I've valued it for previously. An additional 1 health and 1 sanity for a single resource and no action cost at level 0 is a favourable comparison to Five of Pentacles (though people tend to run that more for its synergies) and actually I think might just be good. Regardless, I think it's extra important in this deck, Anna Kaslow is squishy and important, so we lose the normal soak we get from our ally slot and this also helps us be a little resilient to encounter sets that like to force us to assign damage and horror to cards other than our investigator.

Card Notes: Potential Hunches

For the most part, I would say that Preposterous Sketches , Thorough Inquiry, and Working a Hunch are the cards that should always be in the hunch deck and the rest comes down to preference and you should be good with any subset of these cards.

Breach the Door: Generally you're going to be testing this at a skill value of 4 though your Detective's Colt 1911s are two combat icons for this test. When I normally play with this card, I tend to have the tools to drop even high level shrouds to 0, if that also matches your experience, it's important to note that in this deck you probably don't want to go that all in on this and instead settle for something in the range of -1 or -2 shroud (-3 if you can find a card or two to toss in). That being said, it can still be a decent hunch (or go in your main deck, either or) and still contributes value when you get it out.
Extensive Research With how this deck is built, you probably don't need the upgrade. Even if you can't quite drop the cost to 0, you'll probably have the resources on hand to play it.
Map the Area: Nothing too special in the card, though it can make up for Joe Diamond's kind of bad defensive stats. Ending your turn on a Map the Area location to deal with Frozen in Fear gives you more of a chance of tossing it than you had before.
Preposterous Sketches: Put it in your hunch deck, pay 0 resources to draw 3 cards. Basically it does exactly what it needs to do. The Level 2 version I don't even think is a could have as all just lets you go to a cost of 0 from (with this deck) a cost of 0.
Scene of the Crime: A good level 0 hunch, 2 clues at no cost is basically the basis of what this deck does. Ideally the enemy isn't engaged with you though, since we don't exactly focus on combat here.
Testing Sprint: This one can be a little finicky as we can be a little short on the stats to get value out of it. There's a reason it gets cut to 1 copy later, and it's probably also find to just cut it for something else. That being said, it is a more worthy consideration when it doesn't cost resources.
Thorough Inquiry: Unlike the other Double events that were "good" to "ok"-ish, this card is basically everything we want in a card and them some. In this deck it basically reads "spend 2 actions: draw 5 cards", it can easily be 1 action with Farsight, though I find this tends to be the card you use to enable Farsight or (if it's early enough in the game) you use to draw into it. The only "downside" I'd say is that because we're running a big hand deck, your fellow investigators probably shouldn't count on spare card draw from you. That being said, in the scenarios before you get Farsight it's more reasonable to toss cards to other players, and if it shows up later it can then take on its role as more of a supporting card. Regardless, the initial premise of two actions into 5 cards is exactly what you need, and cutting that down to 1 action is quite the increase to your action efficiency.
Working a Hunch: A free clue and a free action (since you can now throw Farsight to something else). What more is there to say? The upgrade is probably at the top of "could have" as well.
Unsolved Case: Does "Fast. Remove this card from the game" count as a weakness?

Card Notes: Upgrades

Deciphered Reality: This card is the embodiment of a dream... one that could be reality... Being honest, if you're running this, you're going to try to set up for that dream, and while doing so will feel good in the moment, and objective analysis will probably conclude that doing so was the wrong thing to do and you probably should have just used it to get like 3-4 clues. That being said, lets talk about the dream... about the stars aligning. Basically you want to have all the locations on the board revealed, at least 1 clue on each, only then do you flip this while you have your full engine online, at which point you Farsight with double The Fool • 0 and dump your resources into Higher Education to fast and at 0 cost (ignore the Higher Education, or better yet just pass a difficulty 5 test down by 1) pick up 1 clue from every location (and an extra from yours... as Deciphered Reality doesn't say "instead of discovering clues at your location") and wait for the applause of the table. I actually think this is going to functionally turn into "5 experience to encourage a sub optimal playstyle", I'm still going to put the card in my deck because I didn't come here to play Arkham "well".
Seeking Answers/Confound: Two flavours of "discover 2 clues", that's it really. While these cards have their other uses, and can come in quite handy, the reason for their inclusion is the ability to pull multiple clues.

Card Notes: Other Considerations

Some other cards that you might find worthy of consideration.

Existential Riddle: We are able to pass the test and it is able to basically delete enemies. I have nothing bad to say about this card other than I kind of just want to run every other card in my deck just a little bit more.
Crafty: I ran this in one of my initial test runs of this build. My experience was that it put just a little too much strain in terms of number of engine cards and upfront resource investment for this deck to find time to slot it in, and with double The Fool • 0 you didn't need that much cost reduction on top of what you have. That being said, I could have just had a bad run of things, or my build might still have some inefficiencies that, if cleared out, would make this a strong contender. As it stands, I personally think it's a bit of a trap card, but I could very well be wrong.
Vantage Point: Fast is always a fun trait on a card, and I've run it before to acceptable results. It's also a good stand in for Seeking Answers if you want a level 0 option that can pull from a connecting location. I might have put it in over Testing Sprint, but as I play 4-handed solo, I tend to have the issue where I forget to actually play this card when locations are revealed.
Rite of Sanctification: This can work really well if you have support, and can stand in for The Fool • 0 instead of Emergency Cache. Alternately, if you include Occult Reliquary you can run it in along side The Fool • 0 and just double down on what we do best. My only concern there would be the cost of said Occult Reliquary as this deck already has a bit of an upfront experience cost.
Interrogate: If you can find the commits (maybe run a less event focused deck with some cards like Inquiring Mind and Unexpected Courage) this can very much work, but ultimately it does require a way to pass a non-trivial test.

Upgrade Path

I try to keep the level 0 stand ins for my cards in the same role as their upgraded version. That being said, since this is my first published list, I didn't go about that as aggressively as normal, so that hopefully there aren't too many off choices (for example, Magnifying Glass doesn't really cover the same action saving role as Farsight, but it's probably a more acceptable level 0 card for most people).

(+ = Direct upgrade to card with same name)

Must Have

Should Have

Could Have

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