So this time around I am pretty meh. The Talents are cool and give options (skill boost without resources), but at the end of the day another skill boost is a bit boring.

So here goes:

Guardian:
Second Wind: I like this card. Its solid for what it does.
Take the Initiative: Frankly I struggle getting skills into my Guardian decks. A conditional +3 to a skill check is nice, especially against those treachery cards that hit your sanity for a Guardian. Plus its flexible enough to handle other stuff. I should look at skill cards more, Guardians need to cut costs.
Well Prepared: I like this one a lot. relatively low price, a recurring +1 or +2 a turn for 2 resources is nice. You need to build your deck smart around it, as you want to make sure you have enough assets that have double icons and that will get that +2 consistently. Currently double icon cards for Guardians are Armor of Ardennes, First Aid 3, Physical training 2 and Shotgun.

Seeker:
Truth From Fiction: While this card does seem to have some good uses, its pretty limited at the moment. +2 to intellect is nice. I expect it to get better as the card pools expands, we will see.
True Understanding: The first Seeker skill card I am meh on. Seeker appears to be starting a theme of "versus encounter deck", which suits the class well.
Quick Study: This is a pretty good card, +3 to a skill for the cost of an action or part of an action. Another way of getting a bonus to checks that doesn't require resources and can address any check. I still don't think it will knock Higher Ed off

Rogue:
Hatchet Man: I like this card in the right deck.
High Roller: I like this card the most of all these types of cards.

Mystic:
Enraptured: The effect is good but with only a +1 to book, there are limited decks that can use this.
Recall the Future: I like this card a fair amount. With the ability to stack the chaos bag and Jims ability, you can get a lot of mileage out of this.

Survivor:
Try and Try Again: I still don't like the effect even if its cheaper. This is probably because I play normal, I can see it having more uses at higher difficulty.
Cornered: This has uses as well although is not my favorite. I can turn a card with a +1 skill into a +2 skill or use a card without the right skill icons to boost a check. That being said, survivors have a lot of +2 icons on them.

I agree with this assessment. The rogue cards are probably my favorite, followed by mystic. I can see enraptured being pretty solid but only in certain decks. The issue is that you have to investigate, and mystics like to use will to do that rather than intelligence and you can't commit a card unless it matches the test type. This means that it is probably best suited for a flashlight carrying mystic or a Seeker/Mystic. It could be useful for Daisy, for instance, but you won't be able to charge a really powerful spell like Shrivelling 5 because most high intelligence investigators don't have access to those cards. We may see this on Marie though, particularly when she has better deck-building options.

I'm trying a Try and Try Again on Calvin in my FA right now, but I don't really have high hopes for it being useful. I'm trying to build him into an innate skill/True survivor with a key of Y's. But I wonder how often I'll actually need to return skills to my hand when I'm playing on easy and running rise to the occasions. Early on in a scenario, it might get more use, but near the end will be likely never to be needed, though it is nice for those GD auto-fail situations.

(The scenario was pretty fun though! It was pretty rough on us, but it had a lot to do with our locations draws and blind playthrough)

I agree with the majority of your assessments, though there are a few places where I strongly disagree. Either way, it's nice to have them! Here's my thoughts on the cards (including their art and flavour text, because why not?)

Second Wind is clearly great, even before thinking about how mandatory it is for Mark. It differs from the other Bold events in that it's a lot easier to make it work - as its effect is reactive, you can just use it whenever you happen to have an opportunity rather than needing to engineer a specific situation where it works. Efficient, useful, cheap and worth it. Could have really done with a badass line of flavour text; the art is fine but forgettable.

Take the Initiative is just...not good enough to justify the inclusion in a general sense. It might end up like Fine Clothes in Carcosa, where it's useful enough for the first couple of adventures where it has a specific application and then you upgrade out of it. Compare with Unexpected Courage: I rarely have room for Unexpected Courage, or indeed many skills at all, on guardians as it is, and the situational extra +1 is nowhere near worth the huge loss in flexibility compared to Unexpected Courage. Art is cool, though, assuming that I'm right in seeing it as someone shoulder-barging a door down.

Well Prepared is great, as it doesn't cost anything to use and guardians generally get a good variety of icons to choose from. Also rehabilitates Armour of Ardennes and to a lesser extent Physical Training (2). You may find it hard to get a +2 from it but that's fine - getting a no-questions-asked, flexible +1 every round is worth it. The art is also some of my favourite in the entire game! So many awesome, evocative details!

Truth from Fiction is not remotely worth using right now. No-one is going to use a 2-cost event to put two extra charges on Forbidden Knowledge, and the only other option is In The Know - it looks like they're trying to make the "stationary seeker" more of a thing with improved barricade as well but why bother, when Seeker has the best mobility in the game anyway? In The Know is handy, but it's not worth 2 resources and an action to add two charges. As you say, it might be a lot stronger as things go along. At least it has the double icons, which is great for any situational card, like Hiding Spot or I'm Outta Here! Of the four cards in this pack featuring someone reading a book, this has by far the least interesting art.

For True Understanding, see my thoughts on Take The Initiative only even more so. It might be nice action compression for certain scenarios but it probably won't make the cut - and if it does it'll be one of the first things cut to make room. The art is also just silly.

Quick Study is by far the worst of the new Talent cards in this pack - assuming you need your clues to advance the scenario, you're trading a minimum of one action or whatever other resources to pick the clue back up in order to get a +3 bonus. There may be times that a +3 bonus is worth it at any price, and there may be times you have more clues than you need if you're chasing victory points, and there may be times that you want to put a clue on your location to make use of various card effects that require that – but that's all very situational and not worth 2 resources, 2 exp, 1 action, 1 card to put in play as a just-in-case. However, I could definitely see myself using it on Roland, as I can see a lot of situations where I really want to kill an enemy, and I'm at a location without any clues on it - in that case, assuming the attack with the extra +3 kills the enemy, you can use his reaction to pick the clue back up - and being able to put a clue on a low shroud location is great if Cover Up comes up. Fighters really need to make their attacks - and their ammo and other finite resources - count, and this card goes a long way to ensuring that. Art looks like a 13-year-old wearing his dad's suit and trying to look grown up – I guess that's the point, but it still looks a bit silly.

Hatchet Man is potentially good but situational. It's definitely one of the more interesting cards to give an extra bonus to evading and it combos nicely with Sneak Attack. I'd definitely consider it on Wendy or Finn, and it might even be good for Skids if he's packing Beat Cop (2). It may encourage you to make suboptimal choices, though, as it gives you a bonus to one way of neutralising an enemy (killing it) as a result of using a different way (evading it) - if an enemy is already evaded, killing it is often unnecessary as you can just move away. Really nice for situations where you're evading in order to allow people to attack a boss without being attacked, or in order to avoid Retaliate, or to open up an enemy for your Guardian while you run off elsewhere. The art is cool, and the flavour text couldn't be more wonderfully stereotypically 1920s gangster if it included "Nyeh, see!"

High Roller is really cool. Obviously there for the Jenny Barnes style throwing money at the problem situations but the fact that it can work on any skill is great - nice to shore up the weaknesses of Streetwise, for example. It also works really well alongside the succeed-by-two-or-more build as you're much less likely to find that you didn't need the bonus anyway and big bonuses are less likely to be overkill. Designer of Opportunist take note: This is how you make a card that supports the oversucceeding mechanic, and refunds you if the bonus ended up being unnecessary. Love the art as well, fits perfectly alongside Hot Streak and all the probability manipulation cards, just like the mechanics of the card do.

Enraptured is interesting. At least in multiplayer, it's a mistake to look at it purely in terms of your own actions - if you need another charge of Shrivelling or Rite of Seeking, you can put the card into your Seeker's investigate check and get the bonus. You eventually want to upgrade it into Recharge as having both is a waste, but it's nice to tide you over until then. Loses a lot of utility for Akachi, as her unique asset is already a great way of getting more charges on your spells and she already has more charges than anyone else. Not really worth it for Daisy, unless you end up investing heavily in Arcane Insight or Archaic Glyphs. If you don't have a seeker on team it's a lot less worthwhile, but I do like the suggestion of using it with a Flashlight charge on a 2-shroud location. I imagine Norman Withers will love this card, and it will go well with Marie, especially with the Mystic cards that improve Intellect (Arcane Studies, St Hubert's Key, and Alyssa Graham). I know academics and tomes of forbidden lore are cornerstones of Lovecraft and the Mythos but how many different cards are going to just be someone with an open book?

Recall the Future is great and gets better at higher difficulties. It has so many uses depending on what you're trying to do. If you have a test you absolutely have to pass, you can pump up to the second-nastiest token (excepting auto-fail of course) and let Recall the Future insure you against the nastiest. You can select a common token that would cause you to fail but would cause you to pass with a +2 (e.g. Skull or -3). If you're taking a test you're otherwise guaranteed to fail and can't or don't want to commit resources to have a chance of passing it (e.g. Grasping Hands comes up and you have an agility of 2), you can declare a token that will make you pass with the bonus and be in with a chance of success. And unlike similar cards like Defiance, if the effect doesn't go off, you can use it for the next test. This is a good card for sure but it's also fantastic game design and will make for loads of interesting decision-making. This picture of someone with a book is one I can get behind. It's cool and evocative and generally awesome.

Try and Try Again (1) is interesting, I suppose. I haven't played with Try and Try Again (3) so I can't evaluate it fully but if you're going into Try and Try Again (3) eventually it's nice to have the 1 exp stepping stone. I feel like Silas and maybe even Ashcan Pete would get a lot of mileage out of this. And just as how Quick Study is best used for Roland, Try and Try Again (1) is gonna be really strong on Minh. As a side note, calling the charges of this asset "tries" is awful. "If Try and Try Again has no Tries", "Exhaust Try and Try Again and spend 1 try" - the repetition is absurd and the word "try" just sounds silly as a word for a tangible resource you can track and monitor (as opposed to ammunition or supplies or charges or even secrets).

Cornered is the most straightforward of the Talent cards in this pack and it's probably the best, or at least the most versatile and universally useful. Being able to use any card in your hand as Unexpected Courage, once per turn, is fantastic. That benefit alone is worth a look for pretty much anyone who can take it. It wouldn't be my first use of exp but it will get into almost any survivor deck sooner or later. Plus the synergy with Yaotl (who is already shaping up to be as game-breaking as Key of Ys) is incredible. It is a lot less handy for Minh, of course, who wants actual skill cards so she can put them into tests for all her various abilities. Bonus points for the art and the flavour text evoking the name, art and flavour text of Unexpected Courage, as if to say "This is Unexpected Courage mk. 2".

Second Wind: Fantastic for Mark, bordering auto-include. For other guardians its sorta meh? Guardians have a lot of health cards that compete here. Aside from Mark, the Guardians dont usually need the healing for themselves, so cards like True Grit or Brother Xavier are still superior in many ways. Still, this is good and doesnt cost any XP. Not bad.

Take the Initiative: As Jobu pointed out, this is cheap defense against the Mythos. In a world where Guardian toys are just getting more and more expensive, this is a nice reprieve. Fantastically flexible card, allows Guardians even with poor skill to lend a hand investigating if need be, or evading if there is something they cant fight yet (no weapon, etc). I think this is one of the best cards in the pack. This is great.

Well Prepared: I guess this is fine. It's hard to say no to free skill boosts. Going with what I said earlier, Guardian stuff just keeps getting more costly, it's nice to have a few options for efficiency. Zoey's Cross has Combat/Combat/Wild. Just saying.

Truth From Fiction: I mean obviously this can't be judged right now.

True Understanding: This seems a very underwhelming card. The ability to get a single clue in a class that already is by far the best at getting clues, I'm unimpressed.

Quick Study: This has a home in the right decks I think. One of the things I struggle with is that on hard mode it is sometimes hard to land hits with Strange Solution (Acidic Ichor). 6 Combat is not good enough, and seekers have very little else in the way of skill boosts for combat checks. I can definitely see this being of use in an Acidic Ichor deck. Other than that it's great for Roland.... but I dont know if I am going to take it anywhere else.

Hatchet Man: I have to successfully evade, and then after that make a successful attack (or somebody else needs to). Seems like a lot of work to go through for +1 damage. No thanks.

High Roller: Rogues definitely need more money. I say this completely non-sarcastically. While they can get a lot of money, its very hard for them to spend it efficiently. This helps. A little.

Enraptured: Hard to judge for the same reason as Truth from Fiction, but still... 1 charge can be pretty good if it's the right charge.

Recall the Future: I guess this lets you hedge against a difficult token like a -5 or something. Could be helpful. Mystics have a lot of ways to boost their skill values through the roof though, at least on spells. Might not be needed. Might be better on Jim, since he tends to do a lot of non-willpower checks and could use a way to boost cheaply there.

Try and Try Again: Well... nobody used this card the first time so I guess the designers took the theme to heart. Unfortunately I still don't see this being any good.

Cornered: Cheap +2 again. And Survivors can often get things back from their discard pile very easily. I'm liking this one.

I am only commenting on Recall the Future:

I don't think that this card is good without the other cards that let you pull more than one token. Let's take the chaos bag from the Dunwich campaign as an example (normal difficulty).

+1, 0, 0, -1, -1, -1, -2, -2, -3, (another -3 which is added very early during the campaign), -4, Skull, Skull, cultist, Tentacle, Elder Sign for a total of 16 tokens.

So on default you would take the test when you are 2 above the difficulty as most of the chaos tokens are covered (Skull and cultist are seldom beyond -3). That leaves 4 out of 16 tokens to be a failed test (2x -3, -4 and tentacle). Your chances of success are 75%, with "Recall the future" it increases to a whopping 87.5 %. That is 12.5% more. Which means you have to take a test with "Recall the future" 8 times until it actually paid off. 2 Ressources and an action to pass 8/8 tests instead of 7/8 seems pretty weak to me where as with the latter option you reach the same result but with 2 resources saved (and don forget that you actually had to spend an action to play the card).

"But wait", you might say. I also have a heart and a stone tablet token in my chaos bag! Well, as it turns and without spoiling too muich the stone tablet modifier is most of the time somehwere at -2 while the heart token is most of the time at -3 and more.

Which means that if our chaos bag has now 18 tokens to pull from. Whe ntaking a test with 2 above the difficulty level we should succed with a chance of ~ 72%. With recall the future we're at +11 % (83% total). Which is even worse that the example i gave before. Now you need to take 9 tests on average until you are "even" (still two resources short".

Though i could totally see it work in combination with grotesque statue, Olive McBride or Dark Prophecies since you have more control over what you are pulling out of the bag.

Other than that I think that ritual candles are superior to this card.

TL;DR: The card is a waste of an action and resources. The more variety in the chaos bag, the worse this card becomes. It is only decent in combination with cards that let you pull more than one token.

I am really not seeing it for normal difficulty. What am i missing? Please enlighten me ?

41 minutes ago, Raahk said:

I am only commenting on Recall the Future:

I don't think that this card is good without the other cards that let you pull more than one token. Let's take the chaos bag from the Dunwich campaign as an example (normal difficulty).

+1, 0, 0, -1, -1, -1, -2, -2, -3, (another -3 which is added very early during the campaign), -4, Skull, Skull, cultist, Tentacle, Elder Sign for a total of 16 tokens.

So on default you would take the test when you are 2 above the difficulty as most of the chaos tokens are covered (Skull and cultist are seldom beyond -3). That leaves 4 out of 16 tokens to be a failed test (2x -3, -4 and tentacle). Your chances of success are 75%, with "Recall the future" it increases to a whopping 87.5 %. That is 12.5% more. Which means you have to take a test with "Recall the future" 8 times until it actually paid off. 2 Ressources and an action to pass 8/8 tests instead of 7/8 seems pretty weak to me where as with the latter option you reach the same result but with 2 resources saved (and don forget that you actually had to spend an action to play the card).

In this example you give, Recall the Future is equivalent in value to +1 to your skill. To my mind, +1 to all tests is worth 2 resources, 1 card, 1 action. That's not quite fair, of course, as if it does trigger it's exhausted, but the chances of drawing the same -3 token in two tests in a row are low (and if it does trigger, it's done its job and made its investment worthwhile). Looking at this game in terms of pure chance of success/action efficiency is misleading at best - If you had a test that you need to pass or you lose the game or otherwise suffer a horrible fate (last charge of Shrivelling vs. a monster who'll defeat you in the enemy phase, last Rite of Seeking charge and the last 2 clues you need to win, enemy who has retaliate, location that punishes failure to investigate, chaos token effect that draws a monster if you fail, etc.), you'll do whatever you can to make that check reliable. Mystics in particular are all about high impact with a low number of actions, after a lot of setup - they don't take 2 full turns to collect 6 clues like a Seeker does, they do it in 2 actions with Rite of Seeking (4), having had to draw the card and play it beforehand and use one of their limited charges, and if one of those actions fails they're out more than just the 1 action cost. Besides, looking at it the other way, in your example, Recall the Future is halving your chance of failure.

Also, taking all tests at +2 with no investment is unlikely at best. Sure, Akachi with a Rosary is at 6 willpower, but that's no help if you face Grasping Hands from the encounter deck, or an Investigate action printed on a scenario card. The same chaos bag against an Agility (3) test where your base agility is 2 leaves you with 2 tokens that would pass (Elder Sign, +1); recall the Future targeting -1 would bump that from 2/16 to 5/16, more than doubling your chances of success. Beyond that, you're definitely correct that a more varied chaos bag makes the card weaker, and yet I think it is better on Hard where you have a more varied chaos bag - where you have to account for -4 and -5 tokens in the bag, and tablet/skull/cultist/elder thing effects that can quite happily reach up to -7 and/or punish you heavily for failing, it's a lot harder to reliably pump up your test to almost guarantee success. If every token in the bag is -5 or less except the Elder Thing which is -7 (as an example), you'd need to pump up to +7 to guarantee success notwithstanding autofail, but Recall the Future would mean you only need to get up to +5. The flexibility in how you use it most efficiently is also more useful, as I outline above.

I like recall the future. You can hedge your bet against the highest tokens or you can just use it as a cheap way to hit a higher average.

If your bag for example has two -2's and two -3's in it and you can stay +1 Ahead of the curve naturally (For example with intellect 3 against Shroud 2 or Willpower 5 against Fight 4) then rather then spending the extra 1 resource for each and every test to net you a +2 you can just pick the -2 or -3 token , this effectively saves you 1 resource on every single test you try for the rest of the scenario (Actually triggering the talent notwithstanding).

The key here however is that this thing works on all tests. Suddenly you can pick up clues in-bulk without Rite of seeking, Jim can swing a Machette whilst Agnes and Mateo can do a little more evading. This talent isn't a priority pickup for someone like Akachi who beats entire scenario's with just her willpower, but it sure is gonna be helpful to everybody else, even Daisy and Rousseau might find uses for it.

I am still very sceptical but i will be glad to hear from you that this card actually is as good as you are saying

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

In this example you give, Recall the Future is equivalent in value to +1 to your skill. To my mind, +1 to all tests is worth 2 resources, 1 card, 1 action. That's not quite fair, of course, as if it does trigger it's exhausted, but the chances of drawing the same -3 token in two tests in a row are low (and if it does trigger, it's done its job and made its investment worthwhile).

This statement is true only to some extend. You are not getting +1 (if we're sticking to my example) to all tests, only on those tests you "foresaw" which token you would draw, which is 1 8th of the time.

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

If you had a test that you need to pass or you lose the game or otherwise suffer a horrible fate (last charge of Shrivelling vs. a monster who'll defeat you in the enemy phase, last Rite of Seeking charge and the last 2 clues you need to win, enemy who has retaliate, location that punishes failure to investigate, chaos token effect that draws a monster if you fail, etc.), you'll do whatever you can to make that check reliable.

This is so true and i can agree with that. But time warp somewhat achieves the same thing, doesn't cost an action and one less resource. I rather go for 2x 75% chance instead of 1x 87.5% (and save one action and one resource in the process). Yes i know, you can use recall the future multiple times but in the scenario you're mentioning we're talking about one crucial test that we have to pass. And in this case i think that Time Warp is superior.

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

they don't take 2 full turns to collect 6 clues like a Seeker does, they do it in 2 actions with Rite of Seeking (4), having had to draw the card and play it beforehand and use one of their limited charges, and if one of those actions fails they're out more than just the 1 action cost. Besides, looking at it the other way, in your example, Recall the Future is halving your chance of failure.

That is also true. Failing an action with one use of a spell is always a setback. Having a Recall the Future out might help in some rare instances.

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

Also, taking all tests at +2 with no investment is unlikely at best.

Yes i think i didn't make that clear, but with +2 i am talking about a test that is already boosted to that level.

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

The same chaos bag against an Agility (3) test where your base agility is 2 leaves you with 2 tokens that would pass (Elder Sign, +1); recall the Future targeting -1 would bump that from 2/16 to 5/16, more than doubling your chances of success.

Having Ritual candles out achieves the same thing (Skull, Cultist and tablet. Sometimes there are more than 3 of these tokens in the bag which would make the candles superior to Recall the future! Of course here is where calculations start to get a little fuzzy because the modifiers are not always -2...). Even better, passing a test with a special token is better since sometimes they are linked to a drawback if you fail. Thus, Ritual candles have a chance to triple your chances of success for one less resource. And they dont even exhaust.

Edit: nevermind, Ritual candles still fail the test. You are right.

21 hours ago, Allonym said:

And yet I think it is better on Hard where you have a more varied chaos bag - where you have to account for -4 and -5 tokens in the bag, and tablet/skull/cultist/elder thing effects that can quite happily reach up to -7 and/or punish you heavily for failing, it's a lot harder to reliably pump up your test to almost guarantee success. If every token in the bag is -5 or less except the Elder Thing which is -7 (as an example), you'd need to pump up to +7 to guarantee success notwithstanding autofail, but Recall the Future would mean you only need to get up to +5. The flexibility in how you use it most efficiently is also more useful, as I outline above.

I have no experience whatsoever on hard so i can't really comment on this. But i think you're making the mistake of thinking that Recall the Future bumps all your tests to +2, which it doesn't. Only one small percentage of the tests.

6 hours ago, tsuruki said:

If your bag for example has two -2's and two -3's in it and you can stay +1 Ahead of the curve naturally (For example with intellect 3 against Shroud 2 or Willpower 5 against Fight 4) then rather then spending the extra 1 resource for each and every test to net you a +2 you can just pick the -2 or -3 token , this effectively saves you 1 resource on every single test you try for the rest of the scenario (Actually triggering the talent notwithstanding). 

The way to describe it, the card sounds great- I concur. But staying only one ahead is such bad odds that when you have the choice, you would rarely take the chance (at least we do so in our group). And as i mentioned above,

Recall the future lifts your odds from bad to slightly bad (approx. 45% to 55% in my example).

6 hours ago, tsuruki said:

Suddenly you can pick up clues in-bulk without Rite of seeking, Jim can swing a Machette whilst Agnes and Mateo can do a little more evading.

I can hardly believe that but please, go head and teach me a better one. I would actually enjoy such a scenario ?

What are your thoughts? Has anybody playtested the new cards yet?

1 hour ago, Raahk said:

I am still very sceptical but i will be glad to hear from you that this card actually is as good as you are saying

Disclaimer: I don't guarantee that the card is fantastic, nor that you will enjoy using it - merely that it seems like it can be effective and I like how it's designed.

1 hour ago, Raahk said:

This statement is true only to some extend. You are not getting +1 (if we're sticking to my example) to all tests, only on those tests you "foresaw" which token you would draw, which is 1 8th of the time.

Perhaps I was not clear. Obviously Recall the Future (let's call it RtF) only triggers if the right symbol comes up - but if it instead said "you get +1 to all tests" that would also not do anything unless you drew a token where you would otherwise fail by 1. All bonuses only actually do anything if the test would have ended up failing without them, meaning that all bonuses only help if you draw certain chaos tokens. In the theoretical example we were using, RtF would increase your chances of success by the same amount as a static and unconditional +1 bonus.

1 hour ago, Raahk said:

This is so true and i can agree with that. But time warp somewhat achieves the same thing, doesn't cost an action and one less resource. I rather go for 2x 75% chance instead of 1x 87.5% (and save one action and one resource in the process). Yes i know, you can use recall the future multiple times but in the scenario you're mentioning we're talking about one crucial test that we have to pass. And in this case i think that Time Warp is superior.

Well, in any given scenario you're likely to have multiple tests that are so crucial that you're not happy to shrug your shoulders and say thay "75% is enough", and Time Warp doesn't work for tests triggered by the mythos deck. Also, working on the assumption that you have deck space and exp for both, why wouldn't you? Just because Time Warp is a better solution, doesn't make a weaker but repeatable solution worse. I'd probably take 4 copies of Time Warp if I could - sometimes you won't have it in hand, or you want to use Time Warp on an ally's action or for its many other uses other than redoing a skill test (e.g. undoing a bad draw on Recharge, undoing a situation where someone moved to an unexplored location only for its "when you enter this location..." effect to turn out to be horrible), and more options for ensuring consistency is a good thing. To be clear, I would probably prefer to get 2 copies of Time Warp (and, exp cost notwithstanding, 2 copies of Seal of the Elder Sign) before buying RtF, but I haven't played with RtF yet so that's just theorycrafting. The big concern, which is definitely valid, is that mystics already have so much they want to spend their exp and deck space on, but the same applies to some extent for all new cards, unless they're so good that you wouldn't go without them.

1 hour ago, Raahk said:

Yes i think i didn't make that clear, but with +2 i am talking about a test that is already boosted to that level.

Well that's kind of my point - if you're boosting all your tests to improve your chances of success to a level you're comfortable with, you're spending resources (skill cards, cards and resources for passive buffs like Holy Rosary, resources each test for Arcane Studies, etc.) to do so. RtF could be one such resource. By keeping the composition of the chaos bag in mind, RtF could make a significant contribution towards improving your chances of success for all tests and, once in play, is an unlimited resource aside from exhausting once it triggers.

1 hour ago, Raahk said:

I have no experience whatsoever on hard so i can't really comment on this. But i think you're making the mistake of thinking that Recall the Future bumps all your tests to +2, which it doesn't. Only one small percentage of the tests.

See above about when bonuses matter. If it's one of the clutch tests where you want to do everything you can to pass, it can be extremely difficult on Hard to actually reach the point where no token other than the auto-fail will fail the test, as there's only so many ways to improve your skill. This is a repeatable bonus to all tests that doesn't take up a slot. Sometimes it will be worth roughly the same as +1, sometimes it will be worth a bit less, sometimes it will be worth a bit more, possibly as much as an unconditional +2. But unless you're already succeeding on a test on any token other than autofail, which is basically never going to happen without using finite resources, it's going to help.

After reading your post that you play only on hard, I value your opinion more than mine ?

3 minutes ago, Raahk said:

After reading your post that you play only on hard, I value your opinion more than mine ?

Hey man, playing on Hard doesn't make me some kind of super elite player, just means I enjoy the game differently. I'm still wrong about stuff all the time, and it may be that I'll play with RtF and end up finding it way too marginal and fiddly to be worth the investment, and all those words above will just be empty theory. But I suppose playing on Hard does mean you evaluate stuff differently – it makes you really respect that chaos bag!

On 7/25/2018 at 5:54 AM, Allonym said:

In this example you give, Recall the Future is equivalent in value to +1 to your skill. To my mind, +1 to all tests is worth 2 resources, 1 card, 1 action. That's not quite fair, of course, as if it does trigger it's exhausted, but the chances of drawing the same -3 token in two tests in a row are low (and if it does trigger, it's done its job and made its investment worthwhile).

8 hours ago, Raahk said:

This statement is true only to some extend. You are not getting +1 (if we're sticking to my example) to all tests, only on those tests you "foresaw" which token you would draw, which is 1 8th of the time.

Following this example:

You can think of Recall the Future as always committing a +1 wild skill icon to every single test (like committing a card or a resource). Except, if you fail the test, or draw a +1 or elder sign and end up not having to have committed that +1 card/resource (as you would have passed anyway without it). You get the card/resource returned to your hand, so you can use it again for the next test. Then no matter what happens, it gets returned to your hand at the end of the round...

Whether you think that is worth it or not, for the 2 resources, card, and an action. For the rest of the game, having a free +1 wild skill icon you can commit to everything, and it only gets used up, if it is actually needed. Then, you get it back at the end of every turn anyway... is up to you. But sounds pretty sweet to me.

I agree that it's a pretty good card. At first I didn't realize it was an asset. I'm kind of surprised it doesn't take an arcane slot. The only trick here is that you need to know what is in your bag, and also have the ability to do mental maths accurately enough to name the correct token (shouldn't be that hard). I like that it's available to Sefina, because you could lean harder into her rogue side and work a lot of those succeed by 2 cards into your deck and use this card to make them succeed by two if they otherwise wouldn't.

Lucky Cigarette Case, Opportunist (2), pickpocketing (2), possibly Suggestion (nullifying the auto-fail because you're hardly going to otherwise fail the will+agility evade test) and quick thinking all pair well with this card. Opportunist may even be worth taking if using Recall the Future to guarantee you even more bonuses to all tests. If Sefina had decent strength, it could even be good with the Derringer or Switchblade. Might be an ok idea to take a switchblade with Jim if you have this card, but there's probably plenty of better options for his out-of-class cards.

I feel like the oversucceeding build is better served by High Roller and that taking both would be overkill, but either would probably work relatively well. I'm not sure what you mean by "nullifying the auto-fail".

What doesn't work relatively well is Switchblade (0). I would say that it's never worth putting into any deck under any circumstances, least of all as one of your 5 out-of-class cards as a Dunwich investigator. If you're playing Jim and you think you want the ability to kill enemies beyond Shrivelling you should take Machete, or failing that .32 Colt, .45 Automatic, Fire Axe, Knife or even Kukri or Baseball Bat over the Switchblade. You can't guarantee hitting at an additional -2 with every attack and when you don't, you've wasted your time. Compared to the machete, the switchblade needs you to achieve +3 more to get the extra damage. Regardless of whether you're using Recall the Future, the investment you need to achieve that with any reliability is unsustainable.

Currently, i am playing a campaign as zoey (50XP+, 4 physical Trauma, 1 mental Trauma, half was through dunwich and Carcosa completed) with my Friend playing with Sefina (also 50XP+, 3 trauma) and he is considering to buy this card next for his deck. I am curious to see how it turns out.

6 hours ago, Allonym said:

I feel like the oversucceeding build is better served by High Roller and that taking both would be overkill, but either would probably work relatively well. I'm not sure what you mean by "nullifying the auto-fail".

What doesn't work relatively well is Switchblade (0). I would say that it's never worth putting into any deck under any circumstances, least of all as one of your 5 out-of-class cards as a Dunwich investigator. If you're playing Jim and you think you want the ability to kill enemies beyond Shrivelling you should take Machete, or failing that .32 Colt, .45 Automatic, Fire Axe, Knife or even Kukri or Baseball Bat over the Switchblade. You can't guarantee hitting at an additional -2 with every attack and when you don't, you've wasted your time. Compared to the machete, the switchblade needs you to achieve +3 more to get the extra damage. Regardless of whether you're using Recall the Future, the investment you need to achieve that with any reliability is unsustainable.

I don't disagree that it may not be optimal choice, but there's an argument that switchblade is not a bad backup plan simply because it is fast. Nothing sucks more than having to take an AoO as a mystic because shriveling is in your hand, but you can't play it and have to figure out how to fight or dodge with just 2's and 1's. I would never consider lvl 0, which is a good point because out-of-class cards on Jim need to be lvl 0 (oops!).

By nullifying the auto fail, I had thought, for some reason, that the auto-fail would just put your test at 0 and the you would get +2 (which I know is not correct, I just had not had my coffee yet. ?)

Soooooo my post was very badly thought out regarding the card specifics. That being said, those edge cases weren't the purpose of noting that Sefina can take it and it could have some interesting synergy with rogue cards. Still true. Also possibly viable for Diana Stanley if she is some form of Rogue/Mystic. And I really like fast weapon options (unfortunately, lvl 2 switchblade isn't an option for Jim, and sefina's low combat makes it very unlikely you would ever bother with her)

7 hours ago, Soakman said:

I don't disagree that it may not be optimal choice, but there's an argument that switchblade is not a bad backup plan simply because it is fast. Nothing sucks more than having to take an AoO as a mystic because shriveling is in your hand, but you can't play it and have to figure out how to fight or dodge with just 2's and 1's. I would never consider lvl 0, which is a good point because out-of-class cards on Jim need to be lvl 0 (oops!).

I understand now, sorry for the assumption. Switchblade (2) is an excellent card, it's such a night-and-day difference from the level 0 version.

Mystics do have tools for the situation you describe, though. You can cancel the AoO with Hypnotic Gaze or an out-of-class Dodge or Narrow Escape, but that requires both the cancel card and the asset in hand. You can use Storm of Spirits, Blinding Light or even Bind Monster to kill or evade the enemy using your willpower without provoking AoO. A niche benefit of Mind Wipe (3) is that it can neutralise enemy AoOs entirely if the enemy does only 1 horror and/or damage. Or you can just take the AoO if the enemy isn't too powerful - I find it best to treat health and sanity as a resource to be managed and spent when necessary, rather than something precious to defend at all costs, as long as you bear in mind the possible threats in the mythos deck and the soak you have available to you.

7 hours ago, Soakman said:

By nullifying the auto fail, I had thought, for some reason, that the auto-fail would just put your test at 0 and the you would get +2 (which I know is not correct, I just had not had my coffee yet. ?)

Oh man if only it worked that way. Only way to get around the tentacles that I know of is either to not draw it in the first place (Dark Prophecy, Grotesque Statue, Will to Survive, etc.) or to use the Survivor cards that give you an effect when you fail by 2 or less - those will still trigger if the test difficulty is 2 or less. This is why Look What I Found and Dumb Luck are so effective - against a location of shroud 2 or less or an enemy of evade 2 or less, you're guaranteed to get clues or deal with the enemy, and often drawing the tentacles is better than succeeding as you get a more potent effect (albeit at a cost). Oops is the third such card but it's a lot more marginal - can still be worth taking though as it has the double icons making it useful regardless.