WHAT'S THIS?! A CLUE! A Rex Murphy Deck 2 Detective Boogaloo

2ND EDITION, NOW WITH MORE SURVIVABILITY!

If you read my first version of this deck (https://arkhamdb.com/decklist/view/23830/what-s-this-a-clue-a-rex-murphy-deck-1.0), then a lot of this will be familiar. This time around, there is a lot more survivability and consistency thanks to the additions of Leather Coat and Laboratory Assistant, in place of the more extraneous skill cards.

This is my first Rex deck, in which he obsessively hunts for clues like a spaz and ignores everything else, so make sure to bring a good buddy to kill stuff for you. Always aim to beat investigation tests by at least 2, of course. Multiplayer. Core x2 and Dunwich Cycle only (I'm broke and getting there, don't judge me!).

Scavenging to reliably bring Flashlight and Leather Coat. Upgrading Magnifying Glass also helps enable this since you can much quicker discard an empty flashlight with it. If you already have your flashlight and magnifying glass out, commit the second one to the test and then immediately scavenge it back. Totally nuts. Considering his ability relies on beating his tests by 2 anyway, this card was pretty much made for Rex.

Burglaries for when there is only one clue left (happens surprisingly often), or if you need more money for Higher Education, or if your sugardaddy hasn't arrived yet. Just be careful--this can be a trap. Be confident you can beat the test by two, or else you might end up with just the resources. And even then, I think a fully enabled Higher Education is worth an occasional clueless Burglary, as opposed to inconsistently succeeding on your beat-by-two goal.

Preposterous Sketches and Laboratory Assistant for finding your key assets (especially the doctor) and for bolstering Higher Education. Possibly the most questionable part of the deck because these are a little expensive for what they do, making them sometimes prohibitive to play. Consider Shortcut instead if you want to make the deck a bit cheaper and increase mobility so you can spend more of those actions hunting those sweet, sweet clues. Then upgrade those Shortcuts into Pathfinders for even more crazy mobility (but beware their cost). The more free movement actions you have, the more of those actions you can spend hunting clues, which is extremely powerful.

"I've got a plan!", Mind over Matter, and upgraded Strange Solution for when you get into a sticky situation or need to help with a boss fight. You probably only need one Strange Solution, since either you find it early (great!) or you find it late, in which case you most likely have some of your other combat cards (still great!), but this deck is suggested with two. Feel free to sub the second one for something (see previous paragraph?).

Only other downside I can think of is that once you run out of clues, there's not a whole lot you can do other than burgle the hell out of Arkham. Hopefully you didn't have to blow the offensive cards on trash mobs too much, so that at least you can use them to help kill bosses. I also once considered Old Book of Lore to make him more useful to buddies, but just couldn't find a good time to play it in testing, let alone taking up a hand slot for it.

(An aside on the above paragraph: I'm realizing more and more as I play through Dunwich for the first time that, unlike Night of the Zealot, there is usually plenty to do besides hunting clues and fighting. I'll update if this changes.)

Upgrade priorities:

Higher Education: No brainer. It's so good.

Magnifying Glass: This is really key as it lets you shove your flashlights in the trash for scavenging, AND keeps your hand padded for Higher Education. Nuts.

Strange Solution: See paragraphs above.

Deduction: Four clues in one action? Absolutely bonkers. Shame Rex can't take Double or Nothing.

Pathfinder: Less actions on movement = More actions finding clues.

Disc of Itzamna: Does fantastic with Scavenging, although you may find you have plenty of ways to deal with enemies already, in which case your resources might be better spent elsewhere.

Yep. Pretty straight forward.