Arkham Deck Tech: Limited pool Hank Samson

FFG recently announced a new direction for their living card games. Starting somewhere in 2026, they will begin to divide the card pool into Standard and Legacy. The latter will be what we have known so far, all cards can be legally used. Standard mode will have a rotating card pool, most likely based on the recent releases. While we don't have all the details yet, not to mention the Standard mode will be optional, this has inspired me to experiment with new decks. Here comes Hank Samson, handyman and Survivor investigator from Hemlock Vale. The card pool has been limited to the base revised Core box and the last three campaign releases, Hemlock, Scarlet Keys and Edge of Earth. 

Full deck on Arkhamdb

Hank is like a Pokémon, his second form is better than the original. Part of the strategy here is to kill him once to switch him to his Resolute side. With only 1 in his book stat, Hank has one job: destroy his pesky enemies! Fortunately, his base 5 might is a good starting point. Let's equip him for the task. 

• Baseball Bat: Don't fear the discard possibility, 2 base damages at +2 is really good!
• Sledgehammer: The single action attack isn't strong, but Hank can mitigate the penalty. The double action is what I'm looking for: 3 damages, a single test at base 7! 
• Knife: It's cheap and we don't have many options. This card value raised in my mind when someone told me to treat this a 1 cost event for the discard effect. 
• Pitchfork: If you don't kill your target in one attack, its value is terrible. In a full card pool, I would absolutely not take this one. 

Hank can use a splash of 10 cards with either the Innate or Spirit trait. I bet there's a way to help his killing abilities or even bring him closer to his second form. 

• Toe to Toe: More damage at the cost of being attacked? Deal! His higher base might also help with this kind of flat Fight action. 
• Get behind me! : Protects your friend, free engage, some mitigation, what's not to like? 
• Ward of Protection: Some mythos protection is always good, taking 1 horror helps to get to his second form. 
• Helping Hand: For when you really need to succeed a test.

Uhm... Only 8 cards out of 10. A bit disappointing, but there are not many options for what my goals here. With a full card pool, I would have easily taken something like One-Two Punch or Clean Them Out. Time to throw in a few Survivor key cards. 

• Lucky: Look, at some point, you're going to miss a test at the wrong time. 
• Pushed to the Limit: Basic recursion effect, you get to shuffle back one of your tools back in your deck and this card a good skill icons if needed. 
• Long Shot: It's like Vicious Blow, but worse. Sometimes this single damage could prevent losing your pitchfork for nothing. Definitely a candidate to be swapped out with experience. 
• Wrong Place, Right Time: While this deck is thin on assets with health or sanity, the card could still be a life safer down the road. I will gladly sacrifice the allies of other investigators! Nice skill icons too. 
• Jury-Rig: More of an investment for the future. It should later in the campaign when monsters have higher fight values, since we will get limited help from our weapon upgrades.
• Sparrow Mask: I should help with dealing with treachery cards, giving Hank a nice 5 willpower or agility. We should have no issue replenishing the charges either.

Let's add in a few skill cards like Overpower and Unexpected Courage, it should pass even more tests. At this point, I feel like I'm already stretching things out, the limit pool is really hindering me. 

• Heavy Furs: Some damage mitigation, the passive effect can be useful. Worth a shot. 
• Making Preparations (x1): Could be a versatile card? I don't know, seems dubious, but we'll try it. 

Big oof ! I'm not very confident in this deck. I'm curious to see how it will fare in its trial run in Hemlock Vale. It really feels like the current campaigns aren't made for the Standard mode, some design decisions might need to change in the future. It also made me realize I rely on a lot of the starting investigator boxes. There are so many good cards in NatCho and Stella card pools I could have used here! It was an interesting thought process for sure.