All factions
The Obligatory Cthulhu Set
MISKATONIC UNIVERSITY
Medium
Draw and discard Madness cards to gain powerful effects, and play cards that relieve you of them afterward.
Description
:This page is about the faction. For the base of the same name, see Miskatonic University (base).
The Miskatonic University is one of the 4 factions from The Obligatory Cthulhu Set.
Demonstrate your mastery of the occult, drawing and discarding Madness to unlock your full potential, or just like, a totally passing grade!
Other factions from the same set: Elder Things, Innsmouth, Minions of Cthulhu.
Cards Overview
The Miskatonic University has the usual 10 minions and 10 actions. The total minion base power (not counting any abilities) is the usual 30 or an average of 3 per minion.
Among their actions, there are:
* 0 play-on-minion actions,
* 1 play-on-base action: Gate to Beyond,
* 9 standard actions (4 that affect one or more minions, in bold): “Old Man Jenkins!?”, ... It Just Might Work, Field Trip (2x), Jinkies! (2x), That’s So Crazy..., Things Best Not Known, Those Meddling Kids,
* 3 actions that directly increase a minion's power: ... It Just Might Work, That’s So Crazy..., Things Best Not Known.
1x “Old Man Jenkins!?” - Special: Before a base scores, destroy a minion with the highest power there.
1x ... It Just Might Work - Discard a Madness card to give each of your minions +1 power until the end of the turn.
2x Field Trip - Place any number of cards from your hand on the bottom of your deck and draw a card for each card you place there.
1x Gate to Beyond - Play on a base. Talent: Draw a Madness card. You may play an extra minion here.
2x Jinkies! - Return up to 2 Madness cards from your hand or discard pile to the Madness deck.
1x That’s So Crazy... - Draw a Madness card. Each of your minions has +1 power until the end of the turn. You may play an extra action this turn.
1x Things Best Not Known - Special: Before a base scores, choose a minion there. Draw up to 3 Madness cards. That minion gets +2 power for each Madness card you draw.
1x Those Meddling Kids - Destroy any number of actions played on one base.
Actions
1x “Old Man Jenkins!?” - Special: Before a base scores, destroy a minion with the highest power there.
1x ... It Just Might Work - Discard a Madness card to give each of your minions +1 power until the end of the turn.
2x Field Trip - Place any number of cards from your hand on the bottom of your deck and draw a card for each card you place there.
1x Gate to Beyond - Play on a base. Talent: Draw a Madness card. You may play an extra minion here.
2x Jinkies! - Return up to 2 Madness cards from your hand or discard pile to the Madness deck.
1x That’s So Crazy... - Draw a Madness card. Each of your minions has +1 power until the end of the turn. You may play an extra action this turn.
1x Things Best Not Known - Special: Before a base scores, choose a minion there. Draw up to 3 Madness cards. That minion gets +2 power for each Madness card you draw.
1x Those Meddling Kids - Destroy any number of actions played on one base.
Characters
1x Professor - power 5 - Talent: Discard a Madness card. If you do, you may play an extra action and/or an extra minion.
2x Librarian - power 4 - Talent: Discard a Madness card. If you do, draw a card.
3x Psychologist - power 3 - You may return a Madness card from your hand or discard pile to the Madness deck.
4x Researcher - power 2 - You may draw a Madness card.
Strategy
The University's mechanics are fairly self-contained, so it works fine alongside most factions.
Synergies
The University's mechanics are fairly self-contained, so it works fine alongside most factions. It has a few hooks to help it work with them, like extra card draws and plays, decent on-play and talent abilities, use of Madness, and your other faction can cover your lack of protection.
*Minions of Cthulhu: Take the fast track to get ahead of the game. The Minions hand you plenty of Madness cards, so when the University allows you can simply choose not to draw if you don't want to. You also get to replay cards like Psychologist, Jinkies!, and Field Trip.
*Ninjas: Use Ninja Acolytes to control when and where your talent and on-play abilities come to the field. Set traps, make surprise moves, and burst ahead at just the right moments.
*Innsmouth: Miskatonic University enjoys the light use of Madness cards, and supports Innsmouth in several ways.
Tips
The only card that forces you to draw from the Madness deck is That's So Crazy..., then grants you an extra action play in case you want to return it (or play ... It Just Might Work). At all other times, you have the choice whether you would like to use Madness at all. Ideally, you will want to budget the Madness cards you draw, sustaining a steady flow from draw, to discard, and back to the Madness deck before they make it into your deck. The variance built into Smash Up doesn't always allow this to happen, and you will often be pressured to take out and spend more Madness cards than you can afford to return. The challenge of this faction is managing to do this while staying competitive in the game.
The benefits for using Madness can be very powerful, such as those granted by Professor and Things Best Not Known. The University directly discards Madness cards for alternative benefits, largely bypassing the need to spend action plays to use them. You can still play some Madness to draw cards from your deck, an endeavor Field Trip helps you with. You can set traps for your opponents with "Old Man Jenkins!?" and Things Best Not Known, neither of which consume an action play.
Remember that when you discard a Madness card, it goes into your discard pile, not the Madness deck. Only by specifically returning them to the Madness deck can you be totally rid of them!
Mechanics
Draw and discard Madness cards to gain powerful effects, and play cards that relieve you of them afterward.