Leo & Leo smash 25 Pounds of Steel on enemies Before they Can can even see Them.

Credit: Christine Mitzuk

Introduction:

To celebrate the release of The Forgotten Age Investigator Expansion, here is my new take on our favourite ol' man Leo, using some of the newest cards from The Scarlet Keys and The Edge of the Earth.
A notable achievement is that for the first time, you will be thrilled to draw Relentless.

If you only have the cards from the Repackaged Expansions and Investigator packs, you can easily proxy or replace Haste and Enchant Weapon with 2 copies of Well Prepared (look at the icons of the hammer!) and downgrade Safeguard.
It is also important to know that this deck is not necessarily tailored for a blind run of The Forgotten Age campaign, though it will still deliver. I suggest a few adjustments at the bottom if you decide to take Grand Père on a trip to the jungle.

This series is a celebration of the 20k points on ArkhamDB to thank you all for all the support received.
Click here to see all the previous decks and I will keep releasing a new standalone-ready deck concept every week on Friday, so stay tuned and keep pressing the ♥ button if you want to see more!

Let me know which investigators you would like to see next in the comment!

Table of Contents:

• Overview

• Main Strategy

• "He came in like a wreckin' baaaall "

• How can 25 pounds feel so light?

• Other Cards

• Upgrade Path

Overview:

Main Strategy:

• Eradicate enemies with the of the Sledgehammer (4)

• Gain actions with Leo De Luca, Haste, Honed Instinct, Quick Thinking and Safeguard (2) to compensate for the heavy attack.

• Use the insane damage output to store resource on Relentless and spend it on Keen Eye to collect up to 5 clues with Leo De Luca and Haste during empty turns.

"He came in like a wreckin' baaaall ":

All you do is... wre-e-eck (ene)my!

• Use the with 9 to overkill anything.

  • Legend says that the designers use this Leo deck to flatten enemies and then place them on the 2D cards that the players use.

  • The massive damage overshoot is collected by Relentless for an insane income. View it like this: if you have to hit twice for a 3hp enemy, then you better use the bigger attack and store 3 resources on Relentless that will later be used on Keen Eye. I once had 20+ resources on Relentless just by cleaning the board.

• Once you have Enchant Weapon on the hammer, you can either use the big attack for 7 damage and 12 or kill 3hp enemies with a simple hit and 9 .

• If you have multiple enemies to take down, Keen Eye can boost your for the whole turn, and you can spam the smaller attack like a Hasty whirlwind and deal up to 11 damage without using any event.

"How can 25 pounds feel so light?:

This deck's concept is to add so many actions that the will not feel like wasting your turn anymore.

• What is better than Leo? 2 Leos, of course. Once the Louisiana Lion from Mississippi is in play (faster and cheaper with Mr. Anderson's ability), you will be able to either move and then perform the attack, or start with the heavy attack and still have another action for a second enemy. If you have Haste, that second attack will even trigger a third one!

  • Once Leo De Luca is out, you can start your turn playing Kicking the Hornet's Nest and then smash whatever you found with the attack for cash, clue, and cash again on Relentless.

  • It is also smart to use Leo De Luca's action to engage enemies potentially engaged with a teammate not to have to call the morgue on an .

  • Later, we will add Guard Dog (2) for the engage.

• Haste, unfortunately, doesn't work well with the attack as it still counts as one (three-action-costed) action. Still, it adds another action when using the small attack or investigating.

• Top this up with 3 Honed Instincts and 2 Quick Thinking, and you'll be swinging that Sledgehammer as if it were a Switchblade!

• These additional actions combine extremely well with Keen Eye's specificity of being expensive but lasting the whole phase. You'll spend some turns collecting more clues than your dedicated clue-getter, making them feel like they're only here to piggyback you around.

• Safeguard (2) completes the set by saving you tons of move actions, as well as engaging enemies while you are carried by your VIP.

• When fully set up, the peak performance of this 19xp-friendly deck is:

  • Do the attack for 6 damage. Commit Quick Thinking and play Honed Instinct as you oversucceed.
  • Do the attack again with the 3 actions from Leo De Luca, Quick Thinking and Honed Instinct, for another 6 damage.
  • Haste gives you a third attack on which you make a simple attack with Enchant Weapon for a final 3 damage.
  • This results in 15 damage with space for 2 Vicious Blows to bring the total score to 17 damage!
    • In a campaign, we will upgrade out of the Vicious Blow because the damage output is already so high that they are barely needed.

Other Cards:

• Lucky Cigarette Case and Glory turn these ridiculous skill values and enemies-purée into faster cycling of your Action Cards.

• Prepared for the Worst and Enchanted Blade secure that you can defend your team even if the hammers are buried deep.

• Keen Eye is one of the convenient cards that boost your 2 offensive stats: and , and it synergises extremely well with this deck as the bonus lasts for the whole phase.

  • boost will be useful in turns when you have to deal with several enemies and you want to repeatedly use the simple attack.

  • is perfect for boosting your already decent 3 when all the enemies are cleared off and you want to support the advancement of the game.

  • To pay for Keen Eye, the deck runs really high in resources, coming from multiple sources: Kicking the Hornet's Nest, "Watch this!" that turns into On the Hunt and the often overlooked Relentless. The first copy of Relentless will often pay for Leo De Luca, and the second one can remain on the table until you need it.

• "You handle this one!" and Savant help you survive, despite your painful knees and chronic arthritis.

  • If you use Keen Eye during the phase when you want to test and add 1 , then your lowest other skill other than agility becomes 4, and Savant gives you 5.

• Your personal weakness, Bought in Blood, is as easy as it goes. Only play Leo De Luca when you have one copy of Leo De Luca or Mitch Brown in your hand so you can protect the one in play.

Luxury Upgrades:

• Guard Dog (2) comes in later in the campaign to engage enemies , making sure that you don't wre-e-eck your teammates when you pull the . And trust me, if you don't engage, Chthulu will know and you will.

• On the Hunt (3) is also a fantastic card to pull out victory point enemies, while making sure that you don't pull a nasty test.

  • As On the Hunt (3) cannot whiff, unlike Kicking the Hornet's Nest, it is better to play the latter first, while there are more enemies in the encounter deck.

  • At this point, On the Hunt and Kicking the Hornet's Nest will proactively pull many enemies out of the encounter deck, giving you more turns without enemies, which can be dedicated to investigating.

The Forgotten Age:

If going for The Forgotten Age blind run, I would suggest a couple of changes that will make your experience better:

• Do not take In the Thick of It.
• Replace the 2 copies of Kicking the Hornet's Nest with one copy of Scout Ahead and one copy of Elusive.

Upgrade Path:

Link to the 0xp deck

(View at arkham-starter.com)

Link to the full xp deck

To create your own guides, find the template I have created here