Luke and the Thick Learning Rabbit : anything, anywhere

This deck leans heavily into Luke's ability and Forced Learning so that you can always play a relevant event on your turn. There are a lot of cards that synergize with Luke's ability, but it might be hard to pack all of them in a single deck. Not anymore! Forced Learning is an ideal card for decks that don't rely on a couple of must draw/play cards, but are steady in their power curve and flexible. With this deck ou will always have something useful to do, most likely a strong play that fits the board state.

This build is designed as a 100% cluever, multiplayer, taboo compliant deck. It's been tested in Edge of the Earth standard and hard, where it proved extremely strong (but that might just be Luke as he trivializes some aspects of that campaign). But above all: extremely fun!

The stat boosts:

St. Hubert's Key, Hawk-Eye Folding Camera and Whitton Greene (remember, you start with a relic in play!) will help you boost all relevant stats as this deck uses both Willpower and Intellect. It's a big deck so you have a lot of draw to dig for these assets: Scroll of Secrets (Greene can find those), Deep Knowledge, Preposterous Sketches... Once you're set up, discard the duplicates with Forced Learning!

The resources:

Once set up the deck is quite cheap, with lots of low cost events and skills. To help you get there, you've got Crack the Case and Astounding Revelation. Remember that going into the Dream-Gate triggers the search on Whitton Greene!

The clueving:

This deck uses test-free events like Drawn to the Flame,Working a Hunch and later Stirring Up Trouble. And when you do need to test, you're likely to pass thanks to Read the Signs, Seeking Answers a low-shroud location or simply Practice Makes Perfect. Sixth Sense will be more useful once upgraded: keep it for when you don't need to waste an event (low shroud locations with only 1 clue).

The skills:

Given the size of the deck, you need a sizeable amount of skills to not whiff on practice make perfect. But those are all good. Deduction for extra clues of course. Enraptured for an extra charge on your box. Perception will shore up your 3 intellect and Promise of Power will shore up, well anything. You have the amazing Occult Theory to top it off.

Note: as per the comment below, Occult Theory does not work with Practice Makes Perfect, as it as no icons while in your deck... It's still a very helpful card that I would keep, but if you find the consistency of Practice Makes Perfect lacking you could still put Prophesy or Plan of Action instead.

The combos:

If you're not familiar with Luke's ability, it is a very strong power that allows to save lots of move actions. But coupled with his box, it becomes truly insane, as you can teleport to anywhere on the board and ditch enemies for no action. Once your Dream-Gate, you can play events anywhere on the board, as long as the location is revealed.

Luke can use Drawn to the Flame on adjacent location and not deal with the attached treachery or the non-hunter enemy that could come out. Play Shortcut on a location with a enemy, skip him and actually move 2 spaces. Use Working a Hunch on that hard to reach high shroud location without moving there. Go in your box and grab a clue from anywhere with Vantage Point and switch to a 0 shroud location. In your box again, pass an easy investigation test and grab two clues from anywhere with Seeking Answers. No clue on your location? Still draw from somewhere else with Preposterous Sketches.

The mulligan:

Look for your assets first, especially Sixth Sense and Whitton Greene. Practice Makes Perfect will also help you fish out Astounding Revelationearly. Crack the Case is obviously good as well. Lastly any draw will help you going fast into round 2.

I'd say this is the only (minor) weakness of the deck due to its size. But yo have enough draw to stabilize fast if you have a bad opening (like a hand full of skills and more niche events). After a couple scenario and some XP you probably won't ever see a really weak hand.

The upgrades:

There's two ways to play with Down the Rabbit Hole. You could upgrade a couple of cards every scenario, and take one new card, so you end with 1 XP bonus. Or, and this might be stronger, take has many upgraded cards as possible, and pay extra in the latter half of the campaign for the new cards. You may not end up with as many bonus XP, but your deck will have a huge burst at the beginning that will put it above the curve.

An easy fix to avoid the headache is to take In the Thick of It for 2 mental trauma and 3 cards between Stirring Up Trouble and Occult Theory. If you want to start without it, Plan of Action is a nice placeholder.

Anyway, the absolute priority upgrade is Sixth Sense as it will allow you to investigate with your willpower reliably. Also priorize Seeking Answers as the lvl 0 is lacking.

Then it's your call if you need more clues, stats, draw, icons, protection... All cheaper thanks to Down the Rabbit Hole!

You will need to pay extra XP for the Blasphemous Covenant and Stirring Up Trouble second copy; but it's a very strong package, especially with Deep Knowledge and Promise of Power already in the deck.

Crystalline Elder Sign is a nice, expensive upgrade but not a priority. It's also a relic for Whitton Greene to find.

If you still have XP then go crazy with Scroll of Secrets or I don't know Seal of the Elder Sign.

The cards you may need to remove are Plan of Action, Shortcut, Vantage Point or Deny Existence.

The flex:

This is a 100% cluever, but if you need a bit more enemy management, just take Spectral Razor (remember you can kill an enemy in a adjacent location), Barricade (very fun if you put it on an adjacent chokepoint: the enemy will be stuck on the other side of the map), or Occult Lexicon.

Fingerprint Kit or Magnifying Glass might be fine if you struggle with investigation. Consider Dream Diary but you can't upgrade it, how unthematic...

Burning the Midnight Oil synergizes well with Luke's ability if you need more resources but you should be OK.