Look at his Warden Resolute ability, it nets you 2 resources each time you assign him damages. In my first generalist Hank deck, I didn't think how rich that actually ended up. And also didn't think about what kind of situation he'd always be in at that point.

Scenario tends to ramp up in tension towards the end. New soaks at that point are OK but often it is now too messy to refresh. What's really handy are evasion utils that doesn't care about AoO to splurge on to go with his already high fighting accuracy, and risky 4 sanity.

This is a cheap to build Hank deck with many other ways than fighting and tanking to survive while playing on the border of life and death on his Warden Resolute side.

Accolade : Won The Circle Undone 3 players Standard as the main fighter!

► About "2 Packs Deck Guide"
　A series of decks made with the new distribution model in mind, requiring a Revised Core Set box + just 1 more Investigator Expansion box. ✂ character on the deck's name means the additional box it uses is The Feast of Hemlock Vale Investigator Expansion.
　It maximizes the chance of newcomers being able to build and learn to play the game, enjoying the story on Standard difficulty ASAP. They can then get into deck-building later if they wished to do so. See other decks in the "2 Packs Deck Guide" series here.

(View at arkham-starter.com)

How it works

Soaks

Full collection Hank deck might ask for popular "immortal" assets like Peter Sylvestre, Jessica Hyde, or Precious Memento. Or perhaps agile damage prevention cards like Bandages or Perseverance. If you don't know or don't have those cards, don't worry! I have been playing limited expansions a lot and there is a way out with just Revised Core Set.

We start from looking at the soaks. Of course the in-faction Leather Coat will always be in this deck, and then use 6 XP to help with horror by purchasing 2x Elder Sign Amulet. These are critical as when he go Resolute he has just 4 sanity. (This deck also has tons of icons to commit.) Playing it equals to longer time he get to run around with that 6 , and less trauma. More trauma = Easier to slip into resolute too early in later scenarios. Oh, and the investigator is deleted if you get 5 in either side.

Hemlock Vale's new Devil Ally also help licking out your damage together with Leather Coat. Though he spits back out some damages, it allow Resolute Hank to continue farming more 2 resources in the mean time. If you can prepare Leather Coat to get the Devil damage, you effectively move the damage counter out of Hank card where it could 2 resources.

Make use of resources with events

In 80% of scenarios in The Circle Undone where I tested this deck with, Hank is swimming in 10+ resources while engaging with some nasty enemies / Elite in Resolute Warden side. Limited collection might lose to full collection deck in variety of soak assets. But if soaks came up at this moment they are hard to play.

This deck make up with powerful and expensive events in the remaining deck slot. In a deck full of weapons with chances to disappear like Pitchfork, Hatchet, and the classic Baseball Bat, Hank might not want to just Fight x3 like Guardian. Use some of your actions for Survivor-style event to defy the odds. You will get Hank that survives better at the end of scenario despite simple assets he has. Please be patient with this Hank!

First 4 cards (2x each) are the "distractions" and their extravagant cost go perfectly with his Warden Resolute 2 resource ability and his Devil + Leather Coat trick. Hank is fun with higher player count so there is more chance he could be at the same location as other to take the hits. What naturally follows this is area effect cards that don't care about engagement, and don't care about AoO, are very useful.

• Cunning Distraction : The last time this card got its spotlight was when Preston Fairmont arrives, and perhaps a Carson Sinclair that got bored with Dynamite Blast. Hank makes it usable with his raining 2 resources each time a damage is assigned! (You would try to assign 1 damage at a time to maximize income, the rest goes to Leather Coat / Devil / etc.) The icon is just a cherry on top that gets Hank 6 in Resolute form. I tested this deck on The Circle Undone campaign, this is very useful to not get weird ailments.

  Hank has insane 6 and can go toe to toe with scenario boss. But scenario boss often came with Retaliate and some kind of trick that gets disabled briefly on exhaust that prevents him from going ham. This card's ability to exhaust Elite enemy instantly without any risk is low key insane, now that 5 resources are unlikely a problem anymore. It can also fix goons piling up while you are fighting the Elite. You can even surely replay soaks after, as everything are evaded.

• Elaborate Distraction : Similar vibe to Cunning Distraction with less cost but 2 actions. The ranged effect is handy when your clue finder is trying to split and gets an enemy. The 1 damage works on Elite, and also good to pair with Pitchfork (makes 4 damage) or Hatchet (you throw it to 3 HP enemy so you lack 1 more to get it back). I think this is a real "red Dynamite Blast" and I like it even more that I don't have to take AoO using it.

One each of new Hemlock events for different kind of enemies :

• Stall for Time : This is splashed 1x to make use of his improved 4 when going Resolute Warden. You can also add Fearless to it while you still have them. It allow you to drag the enemy around and perhaps even pick up your Pitchfork you left behind. Parley keyword is useful to exhaust enemy on others without engaging. You can exhaust even Elite enemy (doesn't get a long exhaust).
• Pushed to the Limit : Covered below in "Weapon talks" section.

And classic XP cards from Revised Core Set make their return... (1x each is enough) :

• Will to Survive ••• : You can afford 4 resources more easily now. Using this with Baseball Bat is just classic. But other than that you use it to do chores like on threat area treacheries, or get around harsh bag towards the end of scenario with unboosted / . Unfortunately not so good with Pitchfork / Hatchet as they are weapons you can't repeat quickly, but you can make an accurate finishing punch to take back Hatchet.
• Close Call •• : This can get rid of "Where's Pa?" enemy if Elusive is looking to be too annoying to deal with. If you are really rich, it could be used with both Cunning Distraction and Elaborate Distraction. (For Elaborate Distraction you need to be at the same location.) If you got a better evader you can also play it while other evades for you. Pair it with Sparrow Mask / Manual Dexterity / Lucky! if you are doing it yourself.

Weapon talks

Hank's deck is 35 cards, not 30. And he is mono so you don't have that many weapons to prop up this fat deck in limited expansions, nor pseudo-proxy like Prepared for the Worst.

I'm skeptical about just 2x Baseball Bat + 2x Pitchfork in the 1st scenario 0 XP deck. I add 2x Knife to make weapon dense enough for this bigger deck size. They'll be replaced with Hatchet in the 2nd scenario. (Please earn at least 2 XP...)

Knife is also useful when you want to let the Pitchfork go to your friend briefly. When your friend pick and lands the Pitchfork and drop it, then you should also thrown the Knife and pick back the Pitchfork. This way you can maximize damage output of the team. Prepare to commit Overpower for your friend which is probably not a fighter like you.

There is 1x Pushed to the Limit lurking in the deck that serve as an another weapon redundancy, or for Baseball Bat / Knife setup when you want 4 HP enemy dead.

With Hatchet, Pushed to the Limit gets you more peace of mind to just kill an enemy with it since you know you can get an another 2 damage hit from discard and also take Hatchet back to circulation. (Often this is when you think that + bonus is critical to not get if you fail effects, you fear you get it when punching.)

If you are already doing great with Hatchet and found Pitchfork, you can commit Pitchfork as a part of your neutral punch to grab the Hatchet back. Now that it is in the discard pile you can Pushed to the Limit to deal 3 damage out of nowhere AND still holding Hatchet. This might be key to burst Elite down in Hank's 3 actions where you can't just stab-pick-stab with Pitchfork.

It is not that rare to eventually ended up with Hatchet on both hands, if you are good with the first one you found. You can use that setup to deal 4 damage accurately and still get 1 Hatchet back as a result of throwing the 2nd one to finish it.

2x Guts / 2x Manual Dexterity / 2x Overpower do help forwarding your deck to the weapons while you work / survive. I think they are really good to recover from bad mulligan.

Evasion mattered

Evading is very helpful for Hank. He ideally wants 4/4 to the brim on him before going Resolute in each scenario, and when you really have to take hits, disabling the right enemy with Evade can ended up making his full heal the most effective.

The best thing to consistently evade is setting up Sparrow Mask. Note that slip horrors from "Where's Pa?" also replenish the mask.

When using Pitchfork, sometimes it gets awkward when you have the fork on ground but an enemy engaged and you can't pick it up without AoO. Evasion can fix this situation too.

Both Baseball Bat and Pitchfork are weapon that could be suddenly gone from your hand. If you have an another one on hand to play, then evasion might grant you a moment to do that.

2x Manual Dexterity are not removed ever because the importance of evasion. The also let you take less damage fail-by and keep your health for friends. For bosses that really wants you to successfully evade, often you want +3 advantage and you can get that with Manual Dexterity + Sparrow Mask at the same time (if vs. 4 ). This makes you a flexible fighter ready for many kind of bosses. They also pairs with Close Call which you'll buy 1x at 19 XP.

Cunning Distraction / Elaborate Distraction has been covered and all deal with evasion.

Hank punch

No other investigators would like to perform a neutral Fight especially in later scenarios. But Hank's Resolute 6 can!

Often this punch is high value. Maybe to get Hatchet back from 3 HP enemy that is now 1 HP, or punch 4 HP enemy to 3 HP then stab with Pitchfork.

If you feel like you lack +1 for this important punch, Persistence is the perfect card. Long Shot unfortunately won't add accuracy, but still very handy to solve the HP math while punching. And of course Lucky! is a helpful insurance.

Tips

• Leather Coat : This humble asset allow you to take 2 damage hit and only assign 1 to Hank and 1 to Leather Coat in order to farm as many 2 resources as possible. Since play cost is 0 you often make profit.

• Elder Sign Amulet ••• : Boring but good! What's stopping you from having fun is being in Resolute Warden with 1/4 sanity, and don't know when you will get hit with 3 horror fail-by. It also give Wrong Place, Right Time a chance to work so you have somewhere to also move horror away.

  Warning: Don't let his sanity get to 3/4 when "Where's Pa?" isn't out yet. If you draw that in Upkeep, you immediately gets 1 direct horror afterward and Elder Sign Amulet can't help you!

• Persistence • : When you still have Fearless, try to pair the commit together with this to get 5 and get the horror heal easier. The card effectively boosts +1 to 2 tests, so when you have to Pitchfork then punch to kill 4 HP enemy it can add accuracy to both tests in one card. Handy! (Hatchet is accurate and likely don't need it when throwing, but you do need an accurate punch to get it back.)

• Long Shot : This Vicious Blow for Hank is very useful to use when you are forced to lose Pitchfork / Hatchet in the middle of fighting. Making your punch 2 damage could fix the situation many times so you can get Pitchfork / Hatchet back in time.

  This is also an another way to kill 4 HP enemy when Pitchfork is already on the ground : Evade Long Shot deals 1 damage, pick up with no more AoO, skewer 3 damage.

  Since it does not add accuracy, it is recommended to also dig up Persistence to add +1 to it and now it works like Vicious Blow. Remember that you can also throw a brick when is fighting with their or / yourself evading, unlike Vicious Blow.

• Keep Faith •• : This luxury upgrade can work like a ranged Guts (and Manual Dexterity) for other investigators by adding some right before they pull tokens. A plus if your team also use payoff cards but you don't need to. They replaces Emergency Cache completely, but at 20 XP+ point you likely will go Resolute faster due to trauma and higher scenario difficulty, that'll take care of some of your resource problem you once had when starting out.
• Wrong Place, Right Time : Even as a one-off, you are right if you feel like this card is very hard to get the right situation to use. (Thematically to its name.) Unlike the other Double card Elaborate Distraction that gets plenty of use, I have not able to use this one properly even once in 8 scenarios. But the icons are nice, mostly you'll just commit it. I add this in the context of this deck, where you might want to try out many different Hemlock Vale cards you just purchased in one campaign. You can't just left this out in a Hank deck right?