Carnemagos helps summon Pokemon (Standalone Ready 29XP)

Realistically a primary cluer, but you've got some firepower with the Servant of Brass. This is my submission for the "Rod of Carnamagos ruling should be reversed" informal contest involving abusing it.

The Idea

Rod of Carnamagos has a very cheesy FAQ ruling (no seriously, click through and read it.) but it works great for our purposes:

Step 1. Load the bag with , as many as you can. (note, Absolution can't heal the summons, in this deck it's basically the third and 4th copies of Keep Faith for generating )

Step 2. use Word of Command (2) to search out your masterball Seal of the Elders (5), and Backpack (2) to search out your pokedex Rod of Carnamagos.

Step 3. Trigger the Rod on any test, doesn't matter what, hope to draw at least 2 of each between rod and the actual test, to bring out both Charizard Servant of Brass and Detective Pikachu Keeper of the Key and hum the pokemon theme-song to yourself.

Rite of Equilibrium (5) and Call for Backup (2) help keep Keeper of the Key Sane so it can find more clues. Token of Faith turns on the "heal 1 damage" on Call for Backup so you can put out a little extra damage with Servant of Brass too.

If you want to add In the Thick of It you could swap the St. Hubert's Key with another token of faith, or really, anything else of interest in the sideboard.

When your minions aren't out, you can use Eye of Chaos to investigate, or try to succeed at random tests (and possibly get extra actions) using Eye of the Djinn

Side Deck

Arcane Initiate and Summoned Hound (1) are alternatives to Professor Ivy Priest of Two Faiths (1) - the first helps you find Word of Command (2) or Seal of the Elders (5), the second is just another rattatta minion to do your bidding.

If you don't have return to TFA, could do Rod of Carnamagos (2) x2 and use Backpack (0) instead, probably cut the St. Hubert's Key in that case.

Could easily do 2 Seal of the Elder Sign (5) and 0 Rite of Equilibrium (5), but you'll need to cut 2XP somewhere else in that case (maybe swap the priests for the initiates.)

The assets are other options for turning on "heal 1 damage" on Call for Backup (2).

If you prefer a more clue-centric build, cut the Token of Faith for a second Rite of Equilibrium (5)

Campaign Starter

The deck isn't really any good without Seal of the Elders, fortunately we start with 5 as Father Mateo - so buy Seal of the Elders (5) with that.

Replace the other XP cards (11 cards) with:

• 2 Backpack (0)
• 2 Arcane Initiate
• 2 Drawn to the Flame
• 2 Spectral Razor
• 2 Ward of Protection
• 1 Sword Cane

or whatever other general purpose nonsense catches your fancy.

Upgrade Priorities are probably the Backpack (2) (or Rod of Carnamagos (2)), the Word of Command (2) and then Rite of Equilibrium (5) to keep the Keeper of the Key healthy. Eye of the Djinn is a really good card in a dual but we're trying to live the 8 gym badge dream and it's just not a priority.

Variations

You could run almost the same list in || Wendy Adams or Kōhaku Narukami. But the core combo of generation plus Rod and Seal of the Elders can be run in any character which has access to Survivor 0 or Guardian 0 and Mystic 5, which includes Agnes Baker, Jim Culver, Marie Lambeau, and Diana Stanley

If in a campaign or looking to go beyond 29XP, either Ancient Covenant (2) or Paradoxical Covenant (2) would be good choices, as are additional copies of Seal of the Elders (5), or direct card upgrades like Keep Faith (2), etc.