"Ashcan" Pete (2026)

“Ashcan” Pete – Dark Horse Drifter (0 XP)

A lean, low-cost Pete build around Dark Horse: keep your resource pool empty, let Duke do the heavy lifting, and turn every card in hand into either a skill boost or fuel for Pete’s ability.

The plan

Pete starts with Duke in play, so there’s no setup turn: you’re investigating or fighting from round one. Duke handles most of the work. His investigate lets you move first, and his attack deals extra damage. Pete’s own ability readies him by discarding a card, so the deck is full of cards that are happy to be thrown away.

Get Dark Horse and Peter Sylvestre on the table early and Pete’s stats climb across the board. Peter also soaks horror, which matters a lot with Pete’s fragile sanity and Wracked by Nightmares in the deck.

Economy: spend it all

Dark Horse rewards having 0 resources, so the economy here is about spending, not saving. Emergency Cache and Madame Labranche give you resources. Scrapper and Arcane Studies turn them into skill boosts mid-test, so you can pump a key check and still drop back to zero for Dark Horse. Most of the deck is cheap, which keeps this loop easy.

St. Hubert’s Key and the Desperate skills

St. Hubert’s Key gives +1 willpower and +1 intellect, but reduces Pete’s sanity by 2, putting him at 3 right away. That’s exactly what Desperate Search, Reckless Assault and Run For Your Life need: they can only be committed while you have 3 or fewer remaining sanity, and each adds four icons to a test.

The condition checks your sanity, not the tester’s, so you can commit them to teammates’ tests too. Before the Key is out, they’re still useful as discard fodder for Duke. Backpack can dig for the Key, and Scrounge for Supplies can bring it back. Peter Sylvestre’s horror soak is what keeps living at 3 sanity safe.

Clues

Duke is the main investigator. Flashlight and the Key’s intellect bonus back him up when he’s exhausted. Desperate Search and Lucky! help salvage tight tests.

Fighting

Duke attacks first. When he’s tapped, Backstab lets Pete attack with his agility, which is high with Dark Horse, Peter and Track Shoes, and hit hard. Reckless Assault and Scrapper push important attacks over the line.

Evasion and survival

Pete’s agility makes evading reliable, and Run For Your Life and Track Shoes keep him moving. Lucky! and Unexpected Courage turn near-misses into successes, and Last Chance is a huge boost once Pete has emptied his hand into his ability.

Recursion and search

Scrounge for Supplies brings back key level-0 cards from the discard pile, which pairs naturally with how much Pete discards. Backpack and Calling in Favors help dig for assets and allies.

Mulligan

Look for Dark Horse, Peter Sylvestre and St. Hubert’s Key. Keep cheap skills and events, since they’re always useful as discard fodder for Duke.

Upgrade priorities

Charisma, to run Peter Sylvestre and Madame Labranche together. Peter Sylvestre. Lucky! (2).

After that, consider a weapon that rewards staying at 0 resources, so Pete has a reliable attack when Duke is exhausted. Keep an eye on mental trauma too: it makes playing at 3 sanity with the Key riskier.