I have started working on a Leo deck and this is another of case of only getting 30 cards. I am still having broad thoughts.

I am going for 6 weapons and 6 generic allies.

What I am really liking is the synergies with Ventuer and Flashlight & .45 although, I would like to see that expanded beyond that, adding additional cards to help with that but am struggling.

I can't imagine building him without the Crystal Decorated Skull.

Calling in Favors also seems so strong on him, I feel its an auto include.

Any thoughts?

Here is the deck I am working on. I agree, there are a ton of cards I want to include, but cannot find room for.

https://i.imgur.com/VBHEgFR.jpg

I'll post my whole deck later, but key points:

Weapons: I went with 2x Colt -- I figured I have enough boosts that I'd prefer more ammo and damage. Plus it looks more like what Leo would carry Also 2x Survival Knife, which is SWEEET, and one Machete for good measure

I skipped Prepared For The Worst. I figured that if I'm going to do that, I might as well put another weapon in that slot. He has plenty of valid choices.

Allies: 2x Beat Cop, 2x Guard Dog, 1x Venturer

2x Skull - it will get charged, don't worry about that

1x Calling In Favors

2x Flashlight

2x Lone Wolf

3 hours ago, Wyndam said:

Here is the deck I am working on. I agree, there are a ton of cards I want to include, but cannot find room for.

https://i.imgur.com/VBHEgFR.jpg

Thats very close to what I have.

I am thinking Trusted may be anti-synergistic with the skull so may be dropping that. You want your allies to die (and then get replaced with new allies that you play as a free action at reduced cost).

1x flashlight and 1x bandolier is hard. You mostly want the bandolier so you can have the flashlight +2 weapons, and only having one of each can result in a low chance of pulling both. If one is on the bottom of the deck, you won't get to play the other.

2 hours ago, CSerpent said:

I'll post my whole deck later, but key points:

Weapons: I went with 2x Colt -- I figured I have enough boosts that I'd prefer more ammo and damage. Plus it looks more like what Leo would carry Also 2x Survival Knife, which is SWEEET, and one Machete for good measure

I skipped Prepared For The Worst. I figured that if I'm going to do that, I might as well put another weapon in that slot. He has plenty of valid choices. 

Allies: 2x Beat Cop, 2x Guard Dog, 1x Venturer 

2x Skull - it will get charged, don't worry about that 

1x Calling In Favors

2x Flashlight 

2x Lone Wolf 

I would rather have the Venturer than the Guard Dog or the Cop. I would drop a GD for an extra Venturer. I like the idea about 1 Machete.

Also, I have been thinking, First Aid also has uses(supply) and while Level 0 is bad, it might be worthwhile if you plan on upgrading to Level 3. That could synergize well with the skull.

EDIT: yeah I am mixing up the Venturer and Skulls abilities above.

Just now, Jobu said:

I would rather have the Venturer than the Guard Dog or the Cop. I would drop a GD for an extra Venturer. I like the idea about 1 Machete.

Also, I have been thinking, First Aid also has uses(supply) and while Level 0 is bad, it might be worthwhile if you plan on upgrading to Level 3. That could synergize well with the skull.

I wasn't planning on using much ammo, which is plenty in the Colt anyway. On the other hand, could have used a Flashlight boost in the first scenario. My dogs pulled their weight, though.

I'm definitely wishing I had some healing, though. I may get Adaptable as my first upgrade. Maybe two....

4 hours ago, Jobu said:

I would rather have the Venturer than the Guard Dog or the Cop.

Am I the only one underwhelmed by Venturer? Wouldn't an early upgrade to Emergency Cache or Extra Ammunition be better (and quickly give the advantage of not having to draw it)?

Even for an initial deck, especially for Guardians, I feel there are far better uses for the ally slot. 4 resources (admittedly 3 for Leo) is really expensive, and since he'll need to stick around for 3 turns to get the benefit out of him you can't even really use his soak.

2 minutes ago, Buhallin said:

Am I the only one underwhelmed by Venturer? Wouldn't an early upgrade to Emergency Cache or Extra Ammunition be better (and quickly give the advantage of not having to draw it)?

Even for an initial deck, especially for Guardians, I feel there are far better uses for the ally slot. 4 resources is really expensive, and since he'll need to stick around for 3 turns to get the benefit out of him you can't even really use his soak.

But he will soak something eventually. You make valid points, but, to me, he has pros and cons. I would rather have other allies, yes, but if I didn't have any, I'd rather have venturer than none. I don't like his 4 cost though.

7 minutes ago, Soakman said:

But he will soak something eventually.

I actually see this as a trap. How long do you keep him around, not getting the fight boost from a Beat Cop, or your teammates taking hits because Brother Xavier is waiting in the wings? Sure, you can replace him early, but now you've gotten at best a 1:1 return on the resources, and potentially less. That's less efficient than just playing another Flashlight or .32 even before you consider the slot he's sucking up.

That's why I don't like his cost, because you can't replace him early without losing out. But like I said, if you are running a deck that is not going to rely on the fight from a beat cop etc, it's better than not having any ally to soak damage or horror in my opinion. For instance, I might consider Venturer on Carolyn to help recharge her liquid courage or first aid. She isn't much going to need the bonus fight from a beat cop (a guard dog would still be useful though). You can't compare Venturer to Xavier as Xavier is not a 0 xp card. Carolyn's issue, however, is that she has to tote around Foolishness so she doesn't really have the spare ally slots unless you get her charisma anyway or choose to ignore her signature asset.

Lets not forget, he is a level 0 card. It's not really fair to compare him to cards that cost XP....

Venturer also allows you more ammo in your deck, and can be run along side of Extra Ammunition. Venturer is better if you have a better gun. You could main a level 2 .45 Automatic and not miss the bonus from the Beat Cop since the level 2 .45 will make up for it. You could also main a shotgun, or lightning gun, and continually reload it with Venturer and Extra Ammunition.

I think Venturer is really good if you plan to to upgrade to Shotgun, because you can never have enough ammo for the Shotgun.

Venturer is really a Leo thing (although I can see him with Carolyn as well). 4 resources is a lot. 3 is reasonable. Although the idea of getting a beat cop, a decent weapon and a Venturer out in play is really expensive.

On a slightly different topic, I could also see Leo running with Treasure Hunter and/or Hired Muscle, which are normally pretty terrible. He can play the card for zero cost and no actions and then decide if he wants to pay 1 to keep them another round or discard them. Depending on how expensive your deck is in general, this can be a great way to cut costs in general and if you are planning on doing three investigations in a single turn, its a good set up.

3 hours ago, awp832 said:

Lets not forget, he is a level 0 card. It's not really fair to compare him to cards that cost XP....

Venturer also allows you more ammo in your deck, and can be run along side of Extra Ammunition. Venturer is better if you have a better gun. You could main a level 2 .45 Automatic and not miss the bonus from the Beat Cop since the level 2 .45 will make up for it. You could also main a shotgun, or lightning gun, and continually reload it with Venturer and Extra Ammunition.

Says not to compare Level 0s and XP cards, then proceeds to consider multiple XP cards as advantages for one of the cards? Hrm...

Once you're talking about upgraded decks, Venturer is the WORST possible option for keeping rounds in the chamber. If you get full use out of him, he's 1 resource per ammo (assuming Leo). Extra Ammunition is 0.67. Upgraded Emergency Cache is also 1 per if you consider opportunity cost, but is instant and doesn't need you to have the requirements.

FWIW though, I think it's perfectly fair to compare cards with different XP costs as long as they're not too far apart. If we were talking about a 4 or 5 XP ally, sure, that's not a meaningful comparison. But a 1 or 2 XP card is cheap enough that it's going to be an early and easy upgrade. Even L3 isn't out of reach to upgrade after the first scenario. So comparing him to a L1 or L2 card is perfectly fair, because they'll be able to be side-by-side for the vast majority of a campaign.

So is the Venturer worth it once you hit the second scenario and he's fighting for slots with the L2 Beat Cop or Xavier? I don't think so. And if he isn't worth it then, I don't think he's really worth it at initial deckbuilding either.

I agree when you consider "supplies", venturer is underwhelming due to emergency cache. However, when considering ammo, I believe it's only the second card to add ammo without needing to have ammo. When using high lvl guns like mentioned before, you usually run through ammo fast.

I personally think venturer works well in Mark harrigan.

Here's my full deck.

https://arkhamdb.com/deck/view/148527

Here's, mine:

https://arkhamdb.com/deck/view/150511

The idea behind is to get as much extra actions as possibles by using skill cards( to gain resources and heal) and finishing enemies with the survival knife. Still to be tested since the skills cards may be still optimized a bit.

I wasn't saying don't consider XP cards at all, I was saying it's unfair to compare a card worth 0 XP directly against a card worth 1 or more XP. Of course Extra Ammunition is more efficient than Venturer, no argument! It's supposed to be, because it costs XP! Emergency Cache only adds supply counters and not ammo counters, so it's not really relevant to the idea of keeping well stocked in ammunition.

And I feel that it is absolutely viable to run him instead of level 2 beat cop or Brother Xavier. Presuming you have 2 of them, that's up to 6 extra ammunition for your favorite weapon. That's quite nice, especially once we start upgrading weapons, using Shotguns, Lightning Guns, Chicago Typewriters, etc.

6 hours ago, awp832 said:

I wasn't saying don't consider XP cards at all, I was saying it's unfair to compare a card worth 0 XP directly against a card worth 1 or more XP. Of course Extra Ammunition is more efficient than Venturer, no argument! It's supposed to be, because it costs XP!

This may hold up in a laboratory comparison, but in practical terms it really doesn't. Sure, Extra Ammunition does more, so the question becomes whether the extra cost of including it is prohibitive. You can't just say "You can't compare them because one costs XP!" The important question is whether the extra benefit of the XP card is worth more or less than its cost. At 1XP the cost is fairly minor, but it's a much greater benefit.

<shrug> To each their own. Given the almost overwhelming usefulness of ally slots, filling one up for multiple turns for an agonizingly slow trickle of ammo seems like a poor use to me.

To be fair, I honestly dislike most of the firearms anyway (I don't play guardian often) and wouldn't take either ammo nor Venturer in most cases. A nice machete or fireaxe does the trick instead of extra ammo unless you're packing a lightning gun or something.

11 hours ago, Soakman said:

To be fair, I honestly dislike most of the firearms anyway (I don't play guardian often) and wouldn't take either ammo nor Venturer in most cases. A nice machete or fireaxe does the trick instead of extra ammo unless you're packing a lightning gun or something.

Somewhere, an Avian Thrall is struck by a sudden feeling of contentment without knowing why ?

1 hour ago, Assussanni said:

Somewhere, an Avian Thrall is struck by a sudden feeling of contentment without knowing why ?

Being not-the-guardian, I always rely on the kindness (and firearms) of strangers. Always use the buddy system, friends! ?

This is what I have, between the first 2 missions.

Assets
2x .45 Automatic
1x First Aid
2x Machete
1x Guard Dog
1x Beat Cop [2XP]
2x Leo De Luca:The Louisiana Lion
1x Hard Knocks
2x Cat Burglar [1XP]
2x Flashlight
1x Charisma [3XP]
2x Lone Wolf
1x Mitch Brown: Sole Survivor
2x Survival Knife
2x Venturer
2x Decorated Skull: Doom Begets Doom
1x Backpack

Events
1x Emergency Cache
1x Teamwork
2x Prepared for the Worst
2x Trusted
1x Calling in Favors

Treacheries
1x Random Basic Weakness (Core Set)
1x Bought in Blood (The Forgotten Age)

It's built on top of the suggested deck. The .45 Automatic is in case you don't draw into the Machete & Survival Knife pairing, while Prepared for the Worst and Backpack, are tutors to get them or the Decorated Skull into your hand. Teamwork is there to give Cat Burglar to Ursula and an extra Lone Wolf if possible. Charisma has to be the first thing to spend XP on in a Leo deck.

I've found that Beat Cop [2] with Trusted allows you to use his ability 3 times, before Calling in Favors to remove him, put into play a Venture or Cat Burglar or Guard Dog for free or Leo de Luca for 2, and then still being able to put that Beat Cop into play again latter works really well.

Ursula does a really good job of evading and moving and clue hounding, while Leo (Anderson, not de Luca) moves around cleaning up monsters. I haven't played with a pair of characters who so complement each other and are capable of being at different locations almost every turn.