Once you join the Circus, there is no turning back

Strategy Deck Lists
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Originally published at: http://gomorragazette.com/2015/07/01/once-you-join-the-circus-there-is-no-turning-back/
by Joe Oberbeck

06001

Welcome everyone to the circus of abominations and freaks, the greatest show in Gomorra. Tonight’s main attraction is going to be Oddities of Nature, featuring the crowd-pleasing clowns Bobo, Funtime Freddy, a quartet of Paggies, along with other special guests. This is a fun deck that deploys several different combos that take time to set up, but when all is said and done, delivers a three-ring wallop.

http://dtdb.co/en/deck/view/9771

If you’ve followed along this far (e.g. http://gomorragazette.com/2015/06/10/starting-off-with-grifters/ ), you know that I like to use Grifters to get off to a good start. While I love Gina and her card draw, this deck starts Funtime Freddy. Funtime tutors out two of our three spells, one of which remains in my opening hand. Raising Hell is the desired keeper, but if my opponent aces that, not to worry, there are three more copies in the deck and I keep a useful Hex such as Forget or Blood Curse. Rest assured, Funtimes will return from the grave and direct to the town square as a Huckster/Stud with influence. For now, the dearly departed Freddy leaves behind fellow Aboms Pagliaccio and The Brute, both ready and able to perform in the town square. Of course there is more to Gomorra than the town square, so our man about town is the Ringmaster, Ivor Hawley, who just so happens to be an Abomination himself. With those starting abominations we are going to be starting with 6 influence in town square (remember Freddy takes one for the team, so that Ivor gets his hex right off the bat), and a stash of two ghost rock and one income.

While st00pid clown tricks can make some ghost rock, I find that death sells, so let Gommora Parrish and No Turning Back ace off-value abominations. While they’re on the way to Boot Hill, why not have the Undertakers make it a not-to shabby net gain of three ghost rock. Fortunately (or not so fortunate for your opponent), death in Gomorra is a temporary inconvenience. Raising Hell brings those aboms back, and the Whateley Estate recurs the hardest working Hex in show business.

Since this combo takes a couple of days to come together, it needs to deal with early cheatin’ and aggression. Flight of Lepus catches opponents cheatin’ during lowball and keeps their dudes away from my deeds. For shootouts, Point Blank aces dudes before taking casualties. It’s Not What You Know… lowers hand ranks even if they don’t cheat. Over two-thirds of the deck is dudes and they all serve their purpose. Leon is a backup huckster and Arnold saves dudes. Both provide additional influence and abilities to keep you in the game. Most of these dudes, however, serve to prime the Abom engine and/or are studs that kill dudes at Point Blank range. Enjoy the show!

 

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I want to point out there’s little point in using Freddy to get Raising Hell, since you’re losing a dude to get a spell which can get that dude back. In that scenario, why not simply keep Freddy around in the first place? I prefer to get a combination of Soul Blast/Fetch in these situations. If you’re anyway running Ks in your deck, that soul blast becomes extremely scary, and if they let you keep fetch, you can use it even on T1 :wink:

1 Like
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[quote=“jedilanni, post:1, topic:312”]
Funtime tutors out two of our three spells, one of which remains in my opening hand.[/quote]
One of which is aced and the other immediately attached to Ivor, you mean?

[quote=“jedilanni, post:1, topic:312”]
Raising Hell is the desired keeper <…> Rest assured, Funtimes will return from the grave[/quote]
Acing Freddy to get Raising Hell to then raise Freddy is a net loss of 3 gr. What’s the point?

[quote=“jedilanni, post:1, topic:312”]
Since this combo takes a couple of days to come together[/quote]
What is the combo exactly? No Turning Back + Raising Hell + The Whateley Estate doesn’t do anything by itself. Gomorra Parish + The Undertaker provide 3 gr per turn - something you could get by playing One Good Turn, or just by having a decent economy in the deck.

What are the benefits of this complex combo over a regular deck with standard actions and deeds?

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Actually a nice combo is using Raising Hell to play an Abom from your hand. If you have an Undertaker in play, that’s a discount of 2 GR. I used to have a deck around the Undertaker like this. It’s not super impressive but it’s fun.

No Turning Back I suspect is used in shootouts, not in Noon. Along with Undertaker and Raising Hell, that’s one round saved, +2 stud and if you killed a Pagliaccio you can get it back for free due to the Undertaker.

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This passage makes me think he plans on using the Noon ability of NTB.

Yes, it’s nice, if your abom died of… natural causes. But acing your abom specifically to raise it later, netting 1-3 gr in the process, doesn’t look like a very solid economy engine…

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Nono, you ace the Abom from your hand using Raising Hell (not, NTB) and raise it immediately using the same effect. I.e. you’re playing an Abom into the shootout directly from your hand with a 2 GR discount.

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Ah, that. Yes, it’s a nice utility/opportunity move. I’m not questioning the general usefulness of Raising Hell, but I don’t quite understand the benefits of setting up the ‘combo’ in this particular deck. You need several turns and cards in order to gain some extra ghost rock, but to what avail? This deck cannot really spam the board with cheap dudes and outshoot the opposition, or take control of all their deeds. And there isn’t a Fireball spell to dump all your free money into and kill the opponent. Maybe it’s an all-around effective deck with the combo suite fueling the economy, but the deed selection makes me think it’s gonna be clumsy. Especially considering that you actually have to hold the town square for several turns before you set up the combo.