Film Noir

## Overview

*“It was a cold, rainy night when I first stepped foot in Smashopolis. Another Partner in Crime had called me here… something about a First Victim getting destroyed. I pulled my fedora down, the brim shielding my eyes from the harsh lights of Sunset Avenue. No Fatal Attraction would stop me now: this Hardened Detective was on the case.”*

With Film Noir, rumors of self-destruction being bad are greatly exaggerated! Destroy your First Victims to play powerful minions, then save those minions with Femme Fatale and other "before a base scores" abilities. Use self-destruction to recur your best cards, then place them back on top with The Sardinian Eagle. With a slew of powerful abilities that activate after destruction, murder and mystery are on the menu—and with Film Noir, it's a minion-eat-minion world.

Download this faction on Google Drive: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1T-qBZiUhQdsMKa64SWutERaHtgbw0Hdp?usp=sharing

## Details

### General

* **Name:** Film Noir
* **Author:** SirErrant
* **Complexity:** 4/5
* **Version:** 2.0
* **Last Updated:** June 3, 2023

### Special Details

This faction was featured as an honorable mention in Crank It Up's Custom Faction Month #2 contest.

## Cards

### Breakdown

    Film Noir has the standard set of 10 minions and 10 actions. They have a total minion power of 30, or an average of 3 per minion. Their actions feature:

* 3 play-on-base actions: Single Indemnity, The Sardinian Eagle, Sunset Avenue
* 2 play-on-minion actions: A Getaway with Murder, Flirting with Danger
* 5 standard actions (2 that directly affect one or more minions, in **bold**): **Fatal Attraction** (2x), Rumors of My Death Were... (2x), Private Eye
* 1 action that directly increases a minion's power: Flirting with Danger

### Minions

* **1x Hardened Detective (5) -** Search your deck for a card and place it on top of your deck. Ongoing: After a minion is destroyed here, this minion may gain that minion’s power until the end of the turn.
* **2x Partner in Crime (4) -** Talent: Destroy one of your minions here. Ongoing: After a minion is destroyed at a base, you may move this minion to that base OR move this minion and another one of your minions from there to another base.
* **3x Femme Fatale (3) -** Ongoing: Before this minion is destroyed and goes to the discard pile, give a minion here this minion’s power until the end of the turn. Special: Before this base scores, you may destroy this minion to move or transfer one of your cards here to another base.
* **4x The First Victim (2) -** Ongoing: Before this minion is destroyed and goes to the discard pile, search your deck for a minion of power 5 or more and play it here as an extra minion. For each The First Victim in your discard pile, decrease this ability’s power limit by 1.

### Actions

* **2x Fatal Attraction** **-** Choose one of your minions. Destroy a minion with lesser power at its base. Special: Before a base scores, play this card. Choose one of your minions at the scoring base.
* **2x Rumors of My Death Were…** **-** Special: Play this card after one of your minions is destroyed at a base and goes to the discard pile. Choose another base. Bury your minion there or play it as an extra minion there. Cancel its abilities until the end of the turn.
* **1x Private Eye -** Reveal the top three cards of your deck. Draw a minion revealed; you may play it as an extra minion. Return the rest in any order. Special: Before a minion is destroyed and goes to the discard pile, play this card. Play the extra minion there.
* **1x Single Indemnity** **-** Play on a base. You may destroy a minion of power 2 or less here. Special: After this base scores, if you destroyed a minion here this turn, you may move or transfer one of your cards here to another base.
* **1x A Getaway with Murder** **-** Play on one of your minions. You may destroy a minion of power 2 or less here. Ongoing: After a minion is destroyed here, you may move this minion to another base, then draw a card.
* **1x The Sardinian Eagle** **-** Play on a base. Ongoing: Once per turn, after a minion is destroyed here, you may search your deck for a card and place it on top of your deck, then transfer this action to another base.
* **1x Flirting with Danger -** Play on another player’s minion. Ongoing: This minion has +3 power. At the start of your turn, you may destroy this minion to give one of your minions here this minion’s power until the end of the turn.
* **1x Sunset Avenue -** Play on a base. Ongoing: After a minion is destroyed here, you may place a card from your discard pile on the bottom of your deck.

### Bases

* **Detective's Office (19, 3 1 1)** **-** After you play a minion here, if it is your only minion here, you may search your deck for a minion and place it on top of your deck.
* **Nightmare Alleyway (21, 3 2 1) -** Before this base scores, each player may destroy one of their minions here to gain 1 VP.

## Clarifications

**The First Victim -** "Power limit" refers to the ability to search for "a minion of power 5 or more". For each First Victim in your discard pile, this is decreased by 1. For example, with one First Victim in the discard, you could search for a minion of power 4 or more.

**The First Victim, Femme Fatale, Private Eye** **-** "Before this/a minion is destroyed and goes to the discard pile" means that its ability activates before the minion goes to the discard pile, allowing other minions that are played as a result of this ability to witness its destruction and trigger "after a minion is destroyed" abilities.

**A Getaway with Murder** **-** You can draw a card even if you do not move your minion to another base.

## Strategy

### General

Film Noir has two main strategies: destroying your First Victims to play higher-powered minions and destroying your Femme Fatales to conserve key cards on another base. Partners in Crime help facilitate the first strategy with their Talent, while their Ongoing allows them to either converge on your target base or pivot to another base. In addition, their Ongoing can trigger after a Femme Fatale is destroyed, allowing you to gain access to powerful Phase 3 movement. Finally, the Hardened Detective ties it all together; not only is it a fantastic 5 power minion to play from your deck with the First Victim, but it also absorbs the power lost from all destruction at a base, allowing you to swing a base in phase 2 or 3 with Fatal Attraction. While risky, Hardened Detective can double the power gained from Flirting with Danger, resulting in an extremely powerful minion that can be moved to another base in phase 3 with Femme Fatale.

The other cards act as additional benefits to soften the blow of self-destruction: Private Eye gives you an extra minion to replace the one you destroyed, while Sunset Avenue can place the minion you destroyed on the bottom of your deck (or another key card if you so choose). The most powerful of these is probably Rumors..., which allows you to replay the minion you destroyed on another base; this can help you pivot along with Partner in Crime. The Sardinian Eagle stands out as an incredibly important card, as it grants you access to key parts of their gameplan; combined with Sunset Avenue, this could allow you continual access to 5-powered minions like Hardened Detective. Finally, Single Indemnity and A Getaway with Murder mirror the benefits of Femme Fatale and Partner in Crime respectively, while also allowing you to destroy lower-powered minions in the event that you lack access to destruction.

Thus, Film Noir relies on destroying a minion primarily to trigger all of their abilities; this makes them more of a burst faction that lies low and spends time gathering their key cards before striking (either in Phase 2 or Phase 3). While other destruction factions are obvious pairings, factions that can help them stall the game (Russian Fairy Tales, Aliens) or burst out of nowhere (Itty Critters, Killer Plants) will be great partners for them, as will partners that have powerful Phase 3 abilities (Spies, Spiderverse).

### Partner Suggestions

#### Published

**Superheroes** and **Princesses** **-** Film Noir, Superheroes, and Princesses make for quite the transitive synergy triad, and they're best worth mentioning in a group. Superheroes and Princesses offer lots of 5-powered minions for The First Victim to take advantage of, while they in turn help make Film Noir more versatile. Superheroes offer great burst potential with Captain Amazing, while The Burst combined with Partner in Crime and Private Eye help them pivot to other bases quite effectively. Cards like Rumors... can be used defensively against another player destroying your Mild Mannered Citizens, while the Everything Glove gets countless chances to come into play. On the other hand, Princesses have incredibly potent 5-powered minions like Snow White and Eliza that pair well with Film Noir's movement and stall tactics, respectively. Cards like Skillet gain new life, as they can be used to destroy First Victims, while Marie DeGraw allows you to draw the minions you place on top of your deck with Hardened Detective and The Sardinian Eagle. Both of these combos stand out as some of the best ways to take advantage of The First Victim.

**Polynesian Voyagers -** This pairing instead focuses on Film Noir's potent double score potential, capitalizing on powerful Phase 3 cards like Femme Fatale and Single Indemnity to save powerful minions. Boosting Hardened Detective's power by +6 with Femme Fatale then playing a Sun Tattoo on Hardened Detective results in 13 mobile power, which can be further accentuated by cards like Fatal Attraction or Flirting with Danger. Polynesian Voyagers love to spread out but are weaker at converging at one base, which Partner in Crime can help with, and cards like the Sardinian Eagle and the First Victim can help them search for/play key cards like Wayfinder and Sun Tattoo. Finally, Film Noir gives Polynesian Voyagers some destruction via Flirting with Danger to help them stall for time while building up Wayfinders and other powerful minions.

#### Custom

**Soul Sanctum -** This is a classic have/have combo: both factions bring similar things (namely, self-destruction) to the table. Partner in Crime can destroy a Mistake, reducing the breakpoint of another base, then move to that base to break it that turn. Soul Twisters can help get First Victims and Femme Fatales back from the discard pile, while Sunset Avenue can recur Soul Twisters. Destroying a First Victim to play Soul Master allows you to play yet another minion; paired with Private Eye and Pure Focus, this can be a devastating way to burst onto a base with minimal investment. Lastly, Mistakes reducing another base's breakpoint after their base scores make it even easier for Film Noir to double score with Hardened Detective, Femme Fatale, and Single Indemnity.

## Author Notes

* This faction uses Pages Grotesque for its font.
* Many action names are based off of popular film noir movies, such as Sunset Boulevard, The Maltese Falcon, and Double Indemnity.

This was one of the first factions I made, and I'm really happy with how they turned out! It's become a running joke on the Discord server that I really like self-destruction, and I think Film Noir comes closest to achieving my goals for a self-destruction faction that works. I couldn't have gotten them to such a polished state without lots of help from people in the Discord community, especially ludichrisness and Bandit. Creating Film Noir for the Custom Faction Month contest helped me learn a lot about making custom cards, and I came out of it with a much better understanding of how Smash Up works in general. I hope you enjoy playing with Film Noir as much as I enjoyed making it!