Preston is a Fancy Little McDandy Who Desires a Treat

Title and deck inspired by: [https://lifestyle.clickhole.com/may-i-papa-mcdonald-s-is-releasing-a-new-fig-and-l-1825121492] (please read)

Now that must-read article is out of the way, this fancy little man and his plebeian compatriots Rex Murphy and Mark Harrigan just successfully wrapped Return to Dunwich.

Preston here is a bit slow to get going in the first half of each scenario, but once he gets rolling, he crushes tests like someone who has, you know, actual skills in life. And he really can crush them too, sometimes twice at once.

The most fun thing about this deck is purchasing dainty trinkets for your snazzy boy, adorning his pocket linings with ostentatious baubles to suit any predicament. His final list of upgrade cards going into the last scenario was:

• Charon's Obol
• Lucky Dice
• The Gold Pocket Watch
• Ornate Bow (x2)
• The Council's Coffer (x2)
• Ace in the Hole
• High Roller
• Relic Hunter
• Streetwise
• Devil's Luck (x2)

So as you can see, Preston quickly morphs into a pretty fancy boy.

Charon's Obol was the first XP pickup, netting him a cool 12 extra XP over the campaign. Devil's Luck helps offset the downside to the risky Obol, but Preston never really even came close to ever having to use them, rarely getting over three damage or horror on him (because he rarely fails tests).

The MVP of this deck, aside from Family Inheritance, is Well Connected, which gets him to outstanding skill values pretty fast. Money Talks is amazing in mid-late portions of scenarios, as you're usually at 10+ for a skill test (I got up to 47 resources in one game, so was +24 for a test). Lucky Dice saved me failing a lot of tests, especially in the last scenario where some special tokens were -8s. I probably dumped around 20 resources into the Dice that game, haha.

"Watch this!" is a great burst economy card in the early part of a scenario, making for a fun 7-resource action off Family Inheritance (just make sure you save an action after the test, as the money lands on your Inheritance), or a lot more if you Double or Nothing it, which I sometimes did. Dario El-Amin speeds the get-rich process up as well, with a nice skill bonus to two skills after 10 resources, and the large swathe of skill cards helps in the early game of scenarios while Preston is busy making his millions. I thought about taking things like Emergency Cache and Hot Streaks, which would help speed his money game up even further, but Preston is totally fine without them. Dario El-Amin fills this role pretty well, and has the added bonus of +1 to his mental skills and gives 2/2 damage and horror soak.

With Rex on the team (it was pre-Taboo when we started), it became clear very quickly that no one else needed to gather clues much at all, so Intel Report got cut (though it's good in Preston in solo or a more balanced team), as did Able Bodied, once more itemy trinkets started lining his vests. I actually ran Grisly Totem instead of Lucky Cigarette Case in the actual deck, since it was new and shiny at the time, and there are a lot of skill cards here, but the Case would have been better (naturally too, since it's a fancier trinket), as card draw needed some expediting for Preston here. I also wish I'd thought to include Quick Thinking for even more extra actions.

Basically, this deck is fun if you like a slow build toward massive, impactful turns near the end of scenarios, doubling down on heavy Bow blows, Backstabs, etc. Preston is happy to get the odd clue once Streetwise is down (which now at 8XP if you're using the Taboo list, is still absolutely worth getting as early as possible). His main role in the group was evasion, and in the last scenario, he put down The Council's Coffer on turn one, which we cracked early, to get a free Ornate Bow for him, Timeworn Brand for Mark, and Pathfinder for Rex, so bending the rules of time, cost, and draw were other roles.

If you like figs and ladyfingers in your gilded ice cream saucer, give this big-money fancy boi a try!