Introduction:

I recently played a lot of solo games with Ursula and I wanted to share my experience with you. I have listed you the 0 (3) XP deck and will give you a clear upgrade path.

Why Ursula?

In true solo, action compression, clue getting and handling the encounter deck are the most important features of an investigator. Ursula handles all of that with ease. Her ability let's you take a "free" action almost every single turn (action compression), with 4 intelligence she can clue alright from the beginning and 3 willpower + 4 agility protect you from the encounter deck. Her deckbuilding options give you access to a lot of relics, which I am trying to exploit in my deck.

The deck:

Getting XP:

The final deck I have in mind can be very XP hungry (~40-50) so we should start to do something about that from the get-go. Taking In the Thick of It and Charon's Obol from the start, will net you 14 extra XP over the course of one campaign. We try to mitigate the price of the trauma with Hallowed Mirror.

Assets:

Hawk-Eye Folding Camera is a prime mulligan target since it needs to come out early to be worth it. However, when it's fully functional it provides the two most important stats for us. We will keep it a two-of until the very end.

Magnifying Glass is pretty nice early on since Urusulas' book of 4 is a little on the low side. We can play it together with Dr. Milan Christopher on the first turn and investigate for 6, which should really help our odds of getting one resource back. Later-on we will replace it with Hyperphysical Shotcaster and Grotesque Statue when we have more card draw to have a skill card ready on the first turn should be really need it.

Grotesque Statue will help immensely will important skill checks. I like this card a lot in solo.

Hyperphysical Shotcaster is a flex spot. However, I found it worthwhile to be able to shoot-down minor enemies and use up all charges on some of the bigger ones where constantly evading was compromising my game.

Accessories:

Hallowed Mirror helps is with keeping trauma in check and generally come in handy in campaigns that toll your health and horror a lot.

Tooth of Eztli helps our stat boosting in the beginning but Crystalline Elder Sign is generally a better card for us since we don’t really need the additional card draw later. I find the tradeoff very worthwhile in true solo play. Having permanent +2 to every stat is just good!

Eon Chart comes in late to give us more action compression when we really need it. Wait for it until we have our second Relic Hunter

Allies:

Dr. Milan Christopher is just all around good. We need the book and the resource generation

Jake Williams is alright, card draw and useful abilities are always welcome and his 3 health can really help sometimes

Whitton Greene is good and we will have a lot of relics to enable her stat boosts and make her search ability worthwhile. However, unless I need to find one specific relic quickly, my priority to play her are pretty low. Really make sure that you need her until you pay 4 to get her in play.

Other:

Fieldwork is good but not awesome. Remember that you need a clue on the location for it to trigger. This can sometimes be problematic since in true solo there are not that many clues around and backtracking will happen in some scenarios. You can cut this card entirely later if you feel like you are not getting enough out of it. It is nice however to have the +2 when you are “investigating in the dark” via moving to an unrevealed location and then taking the free investigation action.

Hyperawareness stays relevant the entire game and it is really helpful to be able to boost your evade value from the very beginning. We can upgrade it later to reduce the resource cost. I wish it had fast..

Pathfinder is awesome and if you want to cut Fieldwork entirely I would add a second copy of Pathfinder for it. There are very few scenarios where moving for free is not useful.

Events:

"I've got a plan!" can really help when you need to deal more than 2 damage in one action. I like to keep it around for emergencies. Be mindful how fast you spend clues to progress and keep 2 in reserve if possible, to have a 3 attack ready all the time.

Burning the Midnight Oil fuels (pun!) our resources. We keep it!

Crack the Case is really, really good. I’d play it even at a 3 shroud location.

Deep Knowledge helps to smooth out our card draw early one. Obviously CCryptic Research is much better but it’s XP cost is hefty too.

Shortcut can stay in the deck until we get Pathfinder ready.

Skills:

Just the standard suite of things I would say. We cut Unexpected Courage by the time we get our 2x Crystalline Elder Signs ready.

Permanents:

Charon's Obol is just amazing and lets us accumulate XP much more quickly

Miskatonic Archaeology Funding lets us play all of our 3 allies

Relic Hunter will enable us to play 2x Crystalline Elder Signs which you should do

Studious this card is the MVP for me here. It smooths every out so much and we can much more reliably find Hawk-Eye Folding Camera und Dr. Milan Christopher in our opening hands. Don’t underestimate this card!

# Upgrade Keep in mind that we have 1 XP left over from deck creation. Shortcut -> Pathfinder (1 XP)

2x Studious (7 XP)

Magnifying Glass -> Hyperphysical Shotcaster w/ Railshooter (9 XP)

2x Tooth of Eztli -> 2x Crystalline Elder Sign (15 XP)

Relic Hunter (18 XP)

Miskatonic Archaeology Funding (22 XP)

2x Unexpected Courage -> 2x Whitton Greene (26 XP)

We should be able to get here after Scenario 4 (campaign dependent) by getting 18 XP from scenarios and 8 XP from Charon’s Obol. With that we are basically set up now. I would prioritize Cryptic Research and Grotesque Statue next.

Let me know how the deck did for you!!