Song of Sophistry

Hello, friends! Whether you're here from my Eldritch Sophist Primer or just browsing ArkhamDB, let Marie serenade you with a slightly unusual decklist!

Deck concept

This deck intends to achieve a substantial amount of clue-gathering while remaining well-protected against whatever the scenario throws at you.

The deck shown here contains the core combo of the deck and is basically entirely complete - it is possible to make a substantially lower-exp version of this deck and it has a great deal of flexibility as shown below under "Variants".

Marie is more or less uniquely able to achieve the core combination of this deck, short of using Versatile, but something similar could be achieved with Trish Scarborough and Pendant of the Queen.

Core combo

The core of this deck is Suggestion (4), Eldritch Sophist and another charge-using asset. Suggestion (4) has 3 charges, but its ability can be used even if it has no charges left - meaning that the Eldritch Sophist can safely siphon off those charges for a different purpose while still being able to evade enemies; if the attack cancellation ability is needed, you can simply transfer a charge back over as a free triggered ability. The Sophist's own secrets keep Dayana Esperence working indefinitely, though you could easily use them for any number of other purposes.

Mulligan priority

This deck is built around Eldritch Sophist, Suggestion and Rite of Seeking; I would keep any of those as well as economy cards and Hawk-Eye Folding Camera, and mulligan away everything else.

Piloting

This deck is a primary investigation deck, intended to investigate with Intellect several times a turn before ending with Rite of Seeking for a potential 5 clues per round. Suggestion keeps us alive and Alter Fate and Ward of Protection will prevent treachery effects ruining our day. It's basically a roundabout way of achieving a Seeker playstyle - grab all the clues you can as quickly as possible and leave.

Between Dayana Esperence and Eldritch Sophist, we have a substantial amount of soak for damage and horror, so even if something does get through our multiple layers of prevention, we can take a hit or two and keep moving.

Economy and setup are substantial issues for this deck, so using an action or two to draw or resource may be necessary early on - we counterbalance with Rite of Seeking/Blood Pact to still investigate until everything's online and we can shift gears.

We need to make sure we're using Eldritch Sophist every round if possible - we want to siphon off the Suggestion charges as soon as possible so none are lost to its "If you do not succeed by at least 2" clause, and keep Rite of Seeking and Dayana Esperence well stocked so they can be used with impunity. Don't be afraid to transfer a charge back onto Suggestion if needed to cancel an attack, but that's definitely a situation we want to avoid with our other tools if possible.

Dayana Esperence should probably be used to replicate Alter Fate or Ward of Protection (depending on what kind of treachery cards you have in the scenario); if we're really hurting for resources, she could copy Voice of Ra, and if we are in a scenario with several short Agendas, using her to copy Moonlight Ritual so you we keep our ability online as often as possible is a good choice. Spectral Razor is an expensive choice but may be an option if we need to deal a lot of damage (e.g. a scenario where we need to kill a boss enemy).

Upgrade priority

The level 0 deck (shown in the Side Deck) is similar in design to the deck shown here, with Obfuscation taking the place of Suggestion. We can therefore upgrade to the deck shown here in whatever order we prefer. I would emphasise at least one copy of Charisma as quickly as possible, and a second copy as soon as you have taken Dayana Esperence, in order to accommodate Baron Samedi - since he elbows his way into one of our ally slots, he can take out our ally cards which are so crucial to the deck if there's not room for him.

Once we have assembled the deck shown here, there are some incremental upgrades that can help - Guts (2), Fearless (2), and possibly Four of Cups; we could also replace Spectral Razor with Storm of Spirits (3), especially if we're in the Dreamlands.

Rite of Seeking (4) is certainly a substantial improvement if we're playing in a 3-player or 4-player game. Likewise, in a game with other investigators, Ward of Protection (2) is a useful upgrade; conversely, in true solo, Ward of Protection (5) is expensive but powerful. Seal of the Elder Sign is a luxury if we're flush with exp, but can replace Moonlight Ritual.

Variants

The core of this deck is Eldritch Sophist and Suggestion. As such, we could change the asset onto which we transfer the charges to Shrivelling or similar to have greater flexibility. Likewise, Dayana Esperence is powerful but expensive; Scroll of Secrets or Scroll of Prophecies are alternative uses for the Eldritch Sophist secrets to gain more draw power, albeit awkward with hand slots (since we won't be able to have two Hawk-Eye Folding Cameras as well).

Blood Pact is the most reliable way to have access to doom for Marie's ability, but not the only option. If we don't intend to use Dayana Esperence, David Renfield is an excellent choice for resource economy and more willpower, or if we want more combat ability, Abyssal Tome is a strong option. Both of these options also enable us to replace Moonlight Ritual with Sacrifice if we prefer.

Rite of Seeking was chosen since this deck only wants to use it once per round anyway, but Clairvoyance is a perfectly acceptable option that will allow us to gather far more clues if we're in a pinch. Alternatively, we can really emphasise the intellect investigation idea, taking Alyssa Graham in place of Dayana Esperence, and take Archaic Glyphs (Guiding Stones and/or Markings of Isis) in place of Rite of Seeking - this will let us concentrate more heavily on Intellect as your main stat and properly feel like a weird seeker.

Arcane Research is included since this deck has a lot of spells to upgrade; however, it's by no means mandatory. Conversely, we could take Thermos in place of Fearless, especially if we're going into a trauma-heavy campaign like The Forgotten Age.

It could be possible to use the core of this deck to create a Curse build with Eye of Chaos and Armageddon, but that's outside of the scope of this guide.

Conclusion

This deck showcases one of the less obvious ways to use the Eldritch Sophist, and provides an alternative clue-gathering playstyle with the additional gameplay elements of doom management, involving quite a bit of decision-making. That said, there's plenty of ways to rapidly gather clues - this is designed to be different and interesting rather than optimal.