Tarot Sefina

Card draw simulator

Odds: 0% – 0% – 0% more
Derived from
Tarot-Tastic Testing 5 2 1 1.0
Inspiration for
Sefina loves cards 0 0 0 1.0
Sefina loves cards 0 0 0 1.0
Sefina in Action 0 0 0 3.0
Sefina in Action 0 0 0 4.0

Chew · 332

Upgrade path:

Start with Charon's Obol as it is quite an exp hungry deck. Consider also Adaptable if you're familiar with the campaign or want to try out 0 exp cards from fresh packs.

Core upgrades are David Renfield Anna Kaslow, and Holy Rosary + Lone WolfThe Moon • XVIII+Four of Cups. This costs 12 exp in total, but with high probability yields free and boosts at the very start of each scenario.

Aside from huge opening hand Sefina is famous for copying events, allowing her to amass huge piles of resources, hence further exp should be spent on Emergency CacheHot StreakHot Streak. If you can maintain the economy adapt in Well Connected/Money Talks instead of Uncage the Soul. Don't forget you need to keep 18 event cards in your deck to have positive odds of not burning cards in the opening hand.

Evidently, card draw is very poor, hence for the ultimate solution go All In. If you want to reliably and often use this card Suggestion is a must. The latter after tarot boosts allows to evade at base 10, which by adding Premonition+Double or Nothing+Quick Thinking cards quite literally breaks the game.

P.S. Arcane and hand slots should be adjusted according to your party composition, and the intended role for Sefina. Consider The Chthonian Stone+Protective Incantation (the latter Sefina can definitely afford with all her money printing events) for support sealing role; or replacing Sixth Sense by Wither, Sign Magick by Spirit Athame, and picking up a second copy of Storm of Spirits for more fighting power.

11 comments

Jun 12, 2019 GreatGopher · 409

Nice build! The Anna Kaslow preview definitely had me thinking Sefina as well, and this looks like a really good starting point.

I disagree about De Vermis Mysteriis, though - in this deck, it only hits Drawn to the Flame and Storm of Spirits, the latter of which probably earns you an attack of opportunity. All the other "Spell" events are either reactionary (which won't work the the tome's timing) or remove themselves from the game.

I hadn't considered the Suggestion/All In/Double or Nothing angle - that seems really fun!

Jun 12, 2019 Chew · 332

My bad. Thanks for pointing this out @GreatGopher, you're absolutely correct! I've forgot the part of the De Vermis Mysteriis being usable only on Spells/Insight events.

Jun 12, 2019 Sassenach · 173

I posted a deck like this only yesterday, but it seems to have been buried already :(

This is probably a little better than mine, but I'm not sure about the upgrade path removing Holy Rosary. I found that I could reliably get a will boost at the start of the game pretty much every draw, but nevertheless I do think there's value in also having the rosary option in play because that way you almost guarantee hitting 6 will from the outset as well, sometimes 7. This may be perceived as overkill but the deck doesn't include a whole lot of cards that you'd necessarily want to commit to tests, so having a high base ability is likely to be important.

Jun 12, 2019 Chew · 332

I really liked you deck @Sassenach, and it did indeed inspired me for to create this one!

My main motivation for cutting down Holy Rosary early on is to make room for all the Tarot cards, without sacrificing event quantity or Spells in arcane slot (although the latter can be dropped depending on the role in the party). While 5 is sufficient for majority of skill checks on treacheries (on Standard), for those absolutely crucial tests Sefina can use Premonition. Plus with the inclusion of All In and Suggestion committing cards won't be an issue.

Jun 12, 2019 Sassenach · 173

Yes, I probably didn't include enough events in my deck (I believe I had 16, which is not quite enough). I'm not convinced that you actually want 4 tarot though. One of them will inevitably go to waste, and it's a completely wasted card with no pips. That said, it would probably be worth testing a few draws to see what benefit the extra tarot gives to early tempo, because it may be worth it.

My build was designed to give a reliable tempo boost while not necessarily hitting all three tarot early but equally not having any dead cards. I still think it's probably a better approach, but the difference is marginal I guess. Without having tested it, I do think that retaining 1 copy of Holy Rosary over the 4th tarot would be more beneficial most of the time.

Jun 14, 2019 Sassenach · 173

Actually, having thought about this a little more I think you're probably right to include the 4th tarot. When I did the calculations that I wrote out in my thread I worked on the assumption that an opening hand that had Anna + 1 tarot in it gives the same tempo boost as Anna + 2 tarots, wrongly assuming that the 2nd tarot would have to remain in hand and then be played for an action and 3 resources, while you use the reaction ability on Anna to search your deck for a tarot to play instead. But of course, that's not true at all. Each tarot in your starting hand has the same reaction ability, so if you draw Anna + 2 tarots then you get to play Anna, search your deck or a tarot and play it and then also play both tarots in your hand as well, meaning that you'd have all three tarots in play before the game even begins. This is a saving of 5 actions and 12 resources ! Keep in mind that when I did the simulated draw I got Anna + 2 tarots 6 times out of 25, which is 24% of the time. I did it with only 3 tarots in my deck as well. It would be interesting to see whether the introduction of a 4th tarot to the deck improves those odds of hitting the dream combo. Clearly it will improve them, but by how much ? If you can get up to 35-40% of hitting all three tarots on turn one then that must surely be worth having to put up with a dead card.

Oh, and I'd add btw that the old assumption with Sefina that you need to have 18 events in your deck is no longer true with this tarot setup. You're going to be drawing a tarot with almost every opening hand. This means that you can afford to have fewer events because even though you can't guarantee hitting 5 of them tom place under her, at the same time you're not likely to be forced to discard any cards from your opening hand.

Jun 14, 2019 Chew · 332

I did some calculations and found out that 4th Tarot cards gives a significant probability boost. If you want Anna+2 tarot cards in starting hand then with 3 tarot cards in deck you'll get the combo with ~17% probability, while having 4th card yields ~26%. Having 5 tarot cards makes the combo pop every 3rd hand draw, but IMHO 2 extra cards are redundant.

You're are correct in saying that tarot combo ease up the requirement of having certain number of events to prevent burning, but the card quantity still has to be maintained (even though it can be more loose) to maximize the benefits and the ability to copy those events in the future.

Jun 14, 2019 armin321 · 1

With only 1 tarot slot, I don't think its efficient to have many tarot cards as you only can have 1 in play at the same time and with no symbols they can't comitted to tests and every tarot card after the first is a dead card.. But maybe I'm overlooking something..

Jun 14, 2019 Sassenach · 173

You're absolutely right. Chew and I have been experimenting with a deck built around the Anna Kaslow card, which isn't out yet but was spoiled recently. It's an ally that gives you two additional tarot slots, can be played instantly for free if in your opening hand and when it hits the board lets you search your deck for another tarot and also play that for free.

Jun 14, 2019 Chew · 332

@armin321 the key ingredient is Anna Kaslow that grants you 2 extra tarot slots AND searches your deck for a tarot card. The ideal starting hand includes Anna and 2 tarot cards, allowing you to have 4 assets in play before event starting the first turn (and of course saving you a lot of resources on the way).

Jun 14, 2019 armin321 · 1

So that's what I was missing. Thanks for explaining that :)