The Butcher

Agnes Baker loves the Meat Cleaver because it can both activate her power and heal horror from her. And she has lots of ways to get down to 3 remaining sanity. But she needs help with her puny combat strength, so this deck uses Dark Horse and lots of combat/wild pips.

Combat: Meat Cleaver is the star, backed up by Fire Axe and Shrivelling. Fight or Flight can turn on her weapons for a whole turn. Reckless Assault and Rise to the Occasion are for high fight enemies (the latter works well with Dark Horse because it brings her to +2). She can also evade reasonably well once Dark Horse and Peter Sylvestre are in play. Agnes Baker's power can add the last damage to finish off an enemy, and can be activated on command with Meat Cleaver, Forbidden Knowledge and Painkillers.

Damage control: Peter Sylvestre, Agnes' boyfriend and the best horror soak in the game, is really important here since Agnes wants to take horror when it suits her but stay alive. Notably, horror from Meat Cleaver, Forbidden Knowledge and Painkillers can be placed on Peter when not needed for Agnes' power. Damage soak/heal is found with Leather Coat and Painkillers.

Investigating: Drawn to the Flame. This deck is designed to pair with a cluever.

Economy: This deck runs relatively light at just under 1 average resource cost per card. Fire Axe will be the main use of resources once the key pieces are in play. 2 Copies of Forbidden Knowledge are enabled by Peter and Emergency Cache boosts you up to play any of the 3-cost cards at will. This deck does not use Madame Labranche, even though she would be awesome, because Peter is so important (see above). And there are too many important upgrades to go the Charisma route.

Mulligan plan: Hard mulligan for Meat Cleaver, keeping Fire Axe, Shrivelling and Dark Horse.

Choice upgrades:

1. Shrivelling. For Shriveling level 0.
2. Clarity of Mind. For skill cards or Drawn to the Flame.
3. Peter Sylvestre. For Peter level 0.