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Deckbuilders Diary - Octarine Offerings, by Gentlemaniac This deck just happened when I realised I had the cards for a rather interesting combo. I'd been looking at Balance of Thoth, wondering how to make the most out of it; I knew I'd need some characters with Toughness, and a reliable way to get them wounded. The obvious answers were in the Cthulhu faction: Sacrificial Offerings was the perfect wounding card, and there were plenty of T+ characters to choose from. That's when I realised I have four copies of Military Advisor. With him, Sacrificial Offerings becomes twice as good, and Balance of Thoth turns the double wounding into a double advantage. Looks like I have a deck idea to work with. Expanding from the Combo With the three core cards in place, it's time to make the deck tick. I quickly added 2x Shining Trap, a rather obvious choice in a deck that is based on two 1-cost events. Since I, at the moment, only had two copies of Balance of Thoth, I also added 2x Pnakotic Manuscripts – being able to search for a vital combo piece is very handy. It's a bit slow, but it's better than not being able to get some key card. I have since gotten another copy of BoT, but the manuscripts are still good to have. The Shriek of Cities is too perfect not to add, even though I only have one copy. Getting Toughness +1 on all my characters is a great advantage. The same goes for Forgotten Isle; since I'm going for a strong wounding theme, it'll be handy for removing Invulnerability and Toughness. More characters along the same tough theme After some deliberation, I also added Shoggoth-Twsha for the same reason. Besides, it's cheap. It's always good to have cheap cannon fodder, so I added Innsmouth Troublemaker too – he works extremely well with Sacrificial Offerings, and can stand in for the Military Advisor until I get him into play. Speaking of which, Military Advisor costs 4, which is a bit steep, especially since I can't use the generic 1 cost cultists to make him cheaper. The solution is 2x Egyptian Contact, and I'd add another 2x if I had them. So far, the characters were a bit weak, so I added Servant of Nodens and Guardian Shoggoth; GS is an excellent speed bump, and fits the concept nicely. To round out the characters I took 2x Living Mummy and 2x Ravager from the Deep – since I'll have the advantage of Toughness against just about any opponent, their mass wounding effects will come in extremely handy. Adding some speed and destruction It's beginning to look promising, but it's still a bit slow. Adding 3x Screaming of the Spheres will help; in addition to toasting Day cards, it gives me better access to all the icons, something I can really use. 4x Unspeakable Resurrection is a given; with several self-wounding effects, I can really use some recursion. As the deck approaches 50 cards, I notice there are no Attachments and no support destruction. I therefore add 3x Helpless, Hopeless and Doomed, and hope fervently that I won't need anything else. I could take Political Demonstration instead, but I feel I have enough neutrals in the deck already, and I suspect I'll be unable to dominate the icon struggles sufficiently. Time and playtesting will show. Final deck list
When playing the deck, I will eventually build one domain to four, and try to have one Yog and one Cthulhu resource on the others. Depending on the length of the game, I will usually end up at 4-2-1 or even 4-3-2 if I consider it necessary. For the first couple of turns, I will use my weenies to keep my opponent from stories while sniping steadily with Sacrificial Offerings; Screaming of the Spheres is also handy for grabbing stories quickly against apparently superior characters. When the combo gets rolling, I'll be able to kill off most enemy characters before I even go on stories, and with Balance of Thoth, I can earn tokens from the comfort of my Operations Phase. So far, it seems to work well, if not quite tier 1.  - GentlemaniacIf you want to discuss this deck, go to this thread on the deck construction board. Many thanks to Gentlemaniac for writing this DD. I hope you all found it interesting and usefull. I know some players have wondered if that Balance of Thoth is any good. Build this deck and find out. Then off to the message boards to discuss. See you there! :) - xedric
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