Cultist Wini's Perfect Sealing | 100% Elder sign | Deck guid

A transfiguration-base, complete sealing deck. Diana Stanley reveals herself as the reckless Winifred Habbamock!!!

Introduction

This deck promises to reveal at every test and to provide unlimited card draw, resources, group healing, and the strongest defense against the encounter deck.

And on top of that, it can do up to 15 damage per round, without weapons.

First of all, thanks to the great @joster for the inspiration for a complete sealing deck. His was an Agnes -> Silas that used Unrelenting to seal tokens and the same idea of using Katarina to always reveal .

Warning #1 - Like all combo decks, it has many drawbacks, but in order not to spoil the party, I willl leave them for the last section.
Warning #2 - Do not take this deck too seriously. It is not intended to be played in real situations, but as a mere exercise to explore the limits of this game.
Warning #3 - I did not realize it at first, but in testing, by chance, I discovered that this deck turns one of the lowest rated card in this game into a super powerful card.

Deck's Goal

Once the set-up is done, you have sealed all the symbols but , so when using Katarina's ability in any test, you are going to reveal it.

Since you have Transfigured into Winifred Habbamock, revealing makes you getting back to your hand a committed card for every 2 points above the success. And you are going to over success a lot.

Your over success actions:

1) Over succes combat test

• Commit 2x Vicious Blow (2), Overpower (2), Leadership (2) and Inspiring Presence (using Bestow Resolve).
• Exhausts Katarina and reveal the .
• You get 11(cards) +3(Wini) +1() = 15.
• You deal 5 damage, draw 3 cards, ready and heal Katarina, and get 2 resources.
• If the test difficulty is 5 or less, all committed cards return to your hand.

2) Over success investigation test

• Commit 2x Enraptured (2), Overpower (2) (using Bestow Resolve), Leadership (2) and Inspiring Presence (using again Bestow Resolve).
• You get 11(cards) +3(Wini) +1() = 15.
• Exhausts Katarina and reveal the .
• You get the clue, draw 3 cards, gain 2 resources, ready and heal Katarina and gain 6 charges for your assets.
• If the test difficulty is 5 or less, all committed cards return to your hand.

3) Any other random over success test

• Commit Overpower (2) (using Bestow Resolve) and Inspiring Presence (using again Bestow Resolve).
• Exhausts Katarina and reveal the .
• You get +7 to your base skill.
• You draw 3 cards, ready and heal Katarina.
• If you pass the test by at least 4, you get back all committed cards to your hand.
• Worst-case scenario is a (5+) test. In that case, you need to commit something else that you do not mind losing, like Uncage the Soul or Transfiguration.

Complete Sealing

For enabling the endless over success tests described above, you need to have previously sealed all the symbols tokens but . This deck can seal up to 7 symbol tokens, so depending on the scenario, you do not need that much or maybe you cannot seal all symbols and this combo deck cannot work.

• The Chthonian Stone - Simple, you seal a symbol token.
• Seal of the Seventh Sign - Key card to seal the .
• Sign of Xelotaph - Seal more symbols, but you need a good generation of charges (thanks we have Enraptured (2)).
• Protective Incantation - Seal more symbols, but you need a good generation of resources (thanks we have Leadership (2)).

All these stuff requires some extra arcane slots:

• Sign Magick - Simple and fast.
• The Hierophant • V - It provides you 4 extra slots. One from the Hierophant itself and other three of from your accessories slots: yours and 2 from Relic Hunters.

How to play

1) Transfigure Diana into Wini as soon as possible.

• You get better stats and one of the best drawing engines of the game.
• Use Parallel Fates (2) and ask for some support to find Transfiguration soon (see below about the needed support).
• Once Wini, use Parallel Fates (2) and your ability as much as possible to draw your key cards.

2) Play your assets as fast as you can.

• Start with free-maintenance ones: The Hierophant • V, Sign Magick, Katarina, The Chthonian Stone and Bestow Resolve.
• Continue sealing symbols with Sign of Xelotaph.
• Try to have some saved money for the moment you play Protective Incantation.
• Do not seal the until you are sure you can seal all other symbols quickly.

3) Clean your deck.

• Play all three Solemn Vow as soon as you get them.
• Play Trusted on Katarina.
• Play both "Fool me once..." with your two worst basic weaknesses.
• Play the Backpack just to get your Useless Blade out of the loop, and with some luck, your second The Chthonian Stone.

4) Once you have sealed all the symbols, enjoy! but keep the engine running

• You need to commit 2x Enraptured (2) almost every round in an investigation action to keep Bestow Resolve and Sign of Xelotaph charged.
• You need to generate resources to play Dark Insight from time to time, so commit Leadership (2) as often as possible.
• By the end of your turn, you will probably have too many cards in your hand. Keep these 8:
  • 2x Vicious Blow (2)
  • 2x Enraptured (2)
  • Overpower (2)
  • Inspiring Presence
  • Leadership (2)
  • Dark Insight
• Try to be the first investigator playing in the round, so you can commit the rest of your cards to other investigators tests (you can even do it remotely with Bestow Resolve in case it has charges to spare).
• Keep in mind that with Bestow Resolve you can commit a second card to the test of your friend, triggering Wini's ability.

Other cards

• Uncage the Soul is useful to set-up all expensive Rituals. Once done, it is just a 2 card to commit. Play it with Sign of Xelotaph as soon as you have the opportunity, it helps the group to seal a symbol token and it is not dramatic to loose one Sign of Xelotaph due to lack of charges since you are going to cycle your deck.

• Twilight Blade, Dark Insight and Terrible Secret - No sure if Transfigured Winifred can play or even had in hand these cards. In case she can, Dark Insight can save you from bad Encounter cards. Terrible Secret will be returning to the deck until it is the last card in the deck, at which time it will no longer be shuffled and will be discarded.
  Terrible Secret can be very annoying during the set-up while you are looking for the last piece. Consider playing "Fool me once..." with Terrible Secret if you can live with your other weaknesses.

Drawbacks and needed support

Impossibe set-up! This engine require too many assets, actions and resources.

That's right. It almost impossible that you can set-up everything by yourself. Fortunately the game's designers have provided us with the Butler, an ideal partner for you. Playing a 4-player game, with a dedicated fighter, a dedicated cluever and a support Carson (like this one for example), it is more realistic to complete the set-up.

Even with the Butler's support, it is quite difficult to start the engine.

Yes, that is also true. After the set-up, you need a proper timing and cards to avoid losing a sealed token. However, nothing really worthwhile is easy to come by. In the tests I done I managed to set-up the combo in ~10 rounds after cycling the deck once.

10 rounds? It's not worth that much effort for the few turns that may be left.

It may not seem worth it, and I don't dispute that, but getting to unlock an unstoppable machine in the later rounds can be very useful in scenarios with a final boss.

This kind of decks are too much weakness-dependent. In addition, some scenario mechanics can easily break the deck.

Completely true. Playing with this deck requires a lot of meta-gaming, but it is an interesting experience to see the potential of some of the cards in the game. Remember to use "Fool me once..." for the two weaknesses more annoying. I hope that you can live the other three.

How about Blessed/Cursed tokens?

Sorry, this deck cannot work at all with Blessed/Cursed tokens.

Thanks for reading!!!

See you in the next crazy deck that comes up!