On 1/4/2020 at 4:30 PM, Antimarkovnikov said:

Yes, if you compare SOS directly to SG I think that the SG is better and should be better. But it's not supposed to be an apples to apples comparison. The SOS can be taken by many investigators who couldn't previously take a shotgun at all. And in a class that seems to be all about big turns and going wildly over the test value. This seems pretty much perfect.

Even if you ignore the direct comparison to the Guardian's Shotgun - as, fair enough, you shouldn't really directly compare cards between classes - this is a Weapon you're investing 5XP into that isn't providing a base accuracy boost, or a fixed (and therefore reliable) damage boost.

Let's look at it from a wider perspective - I've just run a search on ArkhamDB for Weapon player cards which cost 3 or more XP. Of the 15 results I got (which don't include the SOS), how many didn't have an accuracy boost? None of them. How many didn't have a fixed damage boost? Just the Shotgun - and even then, the fact you're getting +3 to hit off the weapon increases your chance of getting bonus damage from its ability, which the SOS doesn't provide.

Moving away from the SOS for a second - now that A Thousand Shapes of Horror is out, what's the right route to request clarity regarding whether you have to spend XP if you add 0XP cards into your deck when you add Versatile to a deck? I've been looking at it for Patrice, and it'd be good to know if it is a 2XP or 7XP investment.

5 hours ago, dysartes said:

Moving away from the SOS for a second - now that A Thousand Shapes of Horror is out, what's the right route to request clarity regarding whether you have to spend XP if you add 0XP cards into your deck when you add Versatile to a deck? I've been looking at it for Patrice, and it'd be good to know if it is a 2XP or 7XP investment.

I haven't seen an official ruling on Versatile. However, every other situation where your deck is below the required size has allowed you to add Level 0 cards at no cost. I see no reason to think Versatile is any different than what's been established.

6 hours ago, dysartes said:

what's the right route to request clarity regarding whether you have to spend XP if you add 0XP cards into your deck when you add Versatile to a deck?

You could try the contact form for rules questions: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/contact/rules/

I haven't always received a response when I've used it, but if you do get one it will probably be from Matt Newman himself.

Like @CSerpent, I also think that it is unlikely that you have to spend xp to buy the level 0 cards that you're missing when you add Versatile to your deck.

Thanks for that - I suspect you're both probably right, and 0XP cards don't cost any extra (like if you add them after a card has been removed from your deck via Exile), but it isn't very clear. I was hoping there would be a note on the scenario sheet to clarify either way, but sadly not.

I know this is probably going to sound crazy, but I have been intrigued by Versatile since it’s release. So I dove in for Patrice and used it to add to her deck, (since I am blowing through it like crazy) and got Lone Wolf. She has resource issues and I have followed good advice by keeping her deck cheap, although she has a couple of more expensive allies. It came up pretty early and was very effective for her, since we are only playing with 2 investigators and she is alone more often than not. Maybe not the best way to spend 2 experience, but it generated easily 10-12 extra resources for her.

I've been interested in it too, but havent used it yet. I think it's probably best on characters who have good card draw, since the +5 deck size is a bit of a downside. Patrice does seem like a good choice, maybe some of the Seekers too. Mandy is an option since she can probably find whatever she takes. While there are several nice level 0 cards out there, it had better be very good to be worth it. You are paying 2 xp for a level 0 card, after all.

Honestly, I think it's best to start up a separate Versatile thread. The conventional wisdom is that unless you are using it for a very specific reason, the downside of +5 cards in your deck is too much to be worth it (to say nothing of the exp), which applies even for investigators with lots of draw power (like Patrice or Mark), albeit to a lesser extent. If you aren't using neutral "cantrip" skills (Overpower, Guts etc.), one way to mitigate that downside is to fill the remaining 4 slots with those skills (or other self-replacing cards) which have a good chance of attenuating the downside of a bigger deck.

However, it would be good to properly get all the discussion in one place - I already intend to use one copy it in my next Mark Harrigan deck, for instance, and it would be good to see what specific ideas people have for its use (and, you know, have a resource for people to look at when deckbuilding).

What'd you reckon?

12 hours ago, Allonym said:

Honestly, I think it's best to start up a separate Versatile thread.

I'm in favor.

I'm adding it to my TCU Carolyn who is two draws away from The Bell Tolls with three scenarios to go. I'm padding her deck and adding Alyssa and Scrying to get a heads up (she already has 15 non-healing Seeker/Mystic cards; I'm adding a 16th with Versatile)

On 1/7/2020 at 4:33 PM, Allonym said:

However, it would be good to properly get all the discussion in one place - I already intend to use one copy it in my next Mark Harrigan deck, for instance, and it would be good to see what specific ideas people have for its use (and, you know, have a resource for people to look at when deckbuilding).

What'd you reckon?

I for one reckon that is a very good idea. Let’s do it! (An an hour later, I finally notice it has already been done.)

To skid like hot butter on a griddle to a different topic (your use of the word “reckon”seems to have channeled forth some of my more countrified colloquialisms), my Dark aside of the Moon arrived today and I’m interested in your thoughts on some of the new player cards. I’m shaking my head at one of the new seeker cards and very excited for a Patrice with one of the new survivor cards... assuming she has the resources.
And has this question been asked. Lucid Dreaming, since it specifically uses the “search” keyword could Mandy resolve that search twice?

1 hour ago, Mimi61 said:

And has this question been asked. Lucid Dreaming, since it specifically uses the “search” keyword could Mandy resolve that search twice?

I don't see why not. Holy myriad!

But her weakness will kill it, so you have to get that out first.

Her weakness would, I know, but pretty worth the risk. I was thinking Black Onyx for one. Or the new Rogue myriad from Dark Side of the Moon.

23 hours ago, Mimi61 said:

To skid like hot butter on a griddle to a different topic (your use of the word “reckon”seems to have channeled forth some of my more countrified colloquialisms), my Dark aside of the Moon arrived today and I’m interested in your thoughts on some of the new player cards. I’m shaking my head at one of the new seeker cards and very excited for a Patrice with one of the new survivor cards... assuming she has the resources.
And has this question been asked. Lucid Dreaming, since it specifically uses the “search” keyword could Mandy resolve that search twice?

You know, I haven't even given my thoughts on A Thousand Shapes of Horror, so I'll do those first. (my hot take for Dark Side of the Moon is that Survivor and Mystic get a cool pair of cards each, Practice Makes Perfect is cool, and the other cards are all very weird).

Anyway. So. Thousand Shapes of Horror...

Tetsuo Mori

A pretty solid ally, really. A substantial amount of soak who then replaces himself by searching Discard or top 9 cards in deck for a new card. Limited to Item assets but Guardians have lots of good gear. He's one of those cards that improves as your deck increases in power - using him to find a new .45 Automatic or recur a previously discarded .45 Thompson (0) is good, but using him to recycle a Lightning Gun is better. The cost is substantial but not excessive (compare to Brother Xavier who costs 5). The ability to take horror and damage for other investigators at the location is shared with the aforementioned Brother Xavier, as well as Agency Backup, True Grit and Something Worth Fighting For, but since Tetsuo Mori is reasonably priced, costs 0 exp and has a nice effect when defeated, he might free up deck space by making the other tanking assets less important (I wouldn't really bother having both True Grit and Something Worth Fighting For when I could just have Tetsuo Mori, unless my ally slots were otherwise spoken for). Certainly a good card to take in a starting deck, even if he might end up replaced once you get Stick to the Plan to always have access to Prepared for the Worst.

So who wants Tetsuo? He's obviously fantastic for Tommy Muldoon, since he can be thrown to the wolves for soak and a resource refund (or optimally, profit) to let you pay for the card he pulled out. Mark Harrigan might like him because he likes having some extra horror soak and doesn't need the boost from Beat Cop as much (though Beat Cop (2) synergises with Mark's investigator ability). He isn't necessarily a good choice for Carolyn Fern since she doesn't need that many Item assets and has a huge range of allies to choose from, but certain builds will still like him - I think she's more likely to go for a Guard Dog if she wants a soak ally. Roland has other draw options with his Seeker access and has loads of cheap soak allies by having sacrificial students. Leo Anderson has loads of great allies to choose from already and unique allies are a harder sell for him since they don't work with Mitch Brown. Beyond that, Tetsuo Mori works really well alongside the .45 Thompson money build, since he can recur a used up Thompson from the discard pile to keep the engine going - eventually he might end up replaced once Well-Maintained is in your deck, but it might be worth using both if the rest of the team isn't very fighty. Tetsuo is also a great choice for off-class slots - he's a good way to allow a combat-heavy Diana or Joe to search out (or recur) their weapons, since they can't take Stick to the Plan, or allow Diana to recur Grotesque Statues. Not sure he's a prime pick for Skids, but could be OK for certain builds. The Dunwich investigators might really like him - certain "Ashcan" Pete and Jenny builds want specific items from their decks, and the ability to recur Item assets is as nice for Jim as it is for Diana.

The art is pretty good and has nice, moody background and lighting. The mechanical flavour is a bit unclear - the "too noble for his own good" subtitle explains the tanking ability as he's self-sacrificing, but it isn't clear what's going on with the item search/recursion. It's also nice to continue seeing diversity in the characters in the game - I hope we'll see Tetsuo turn up more in art (like Alice Luxley last cycle).

"Fool Me Once"

Every class except Guardian already had a way to protect themselves from Encounter card draws - Mystic has Ward of Protection, Seeker has Forewarned, Survivor has A Test of Will, and Rogues have "You Handle This One!" (though it's not quite the same). I had assumed that Guardians were already well-served with "Let Me Handle This!" as their encounter manipulation and it was just part of their mechanical flavour. But "Fool Me Once" is about the only possibility for a Guardian encounter card cancel that makes sense. Leaning into both the Guardian 'tanking effects for other people' and 'preparing themselves ahead of time' mechanical themes, this is one of my favourite effects. It's a deceptively simple effect, really - after you've personally dealt with a specific treachery card, you can cancel the next copy of that card drawn by any investigator. However, there's a number of considerations that make things a little more complicated.

The first, and most obvious, is that it scales by player number. Once you have resolved a given effect, playing "Fool Me Once" doesn't help the team until a second copy is drawn - this is more likely to happen with more players. With certain small encounter decks, you can cycle through quickly enough that this doesn't play a big role, but in conjunction with the next point, it's worthy of consideration. The second is that you're more at the mercy of the luck of the draw than other effects. You need to be the one resolving the card initially. If, for example, you really want to be cancelling Ancient Evils, it needs to be you who resolves the effect the first time around - and therefore, this scales by player number in a disadvantageous way - with four players in the game, it's that much more likely that the other players are going to be drawing a specific treachery card, so you may not be able to set up your cancel. The third is that it breathes new life into "Let Me Handle This!" - while it's very wasteful to use "Let Me Handle This!" purely to set up the cancel for "Fool Me Once", it can still be worth it if you're cancelling a truly awful card, and if it's a card with a test in it (say, Frozen in Fear) or a card that you are better suited to resolve anyway (say, a card that summons an enemy for you), you might want to use "Let Me Handle This!" anyway, so the benefit for setting up "Fool Me Once" is just an extra upside; sadly, it doesn't synergise with Self Sacrifice below, even if you are resolving effects of a card that another investigator drew, since Self Sacrifice doesn't cause you to resolve the treachery itself and "Fool Me Once" requires you to be the one discarding the treachery. The fourth is that it only works on cards that are discarded - take for instance Terror in the Night from TCU - if you fail the test and it's put in play next to the agenda deck, you can't use "Fool Me Once" on it. The fifth, conversely, is that it takes the targeted card out of circulation - again, consider Terror in the Night - if you do pass the test on Terror in the Night, it's discarded and you can use "Fool Me Once" to capture it; the cancel effect on "Fool Me Once" is a Response so you can choose not to activate it, and once you have one copy of Terror in the Night captive, the card is neutered as there can never be three in play next to the Agenda deck; likewise, there's three copies of Fate of all Fools in the deck, the first comes into play assigned to the one who drew it and the second and third wreck that person's day, but if you capture one or both, the threat is hugely reduced and you might never need to actually use the cancel.

So who wants it? It would be a bit pithy to say "All guardians" because it's a bit more nuanced than that - Zoey and Tommy are very tanky and good at handling treacheries so they are better suited to tanking the first copy of a treachery and cancelling the second, but conversely, Skids and Roland would really appreciate being able to cancel the second Rotting Remains after the first has already wrecked their sanity. More or less anyone could use it, but its utility differs from scenario to scenario and campaign to campaign. A thorough look at exactly what treachery cards come up could help inform your decision, but that's a lot of work. The short answer is - it's a good card, you won't regret it. Of course, Diana Stanley should definitely strongly consider it - another cancel card to add to the stockpile!

The mechanical flavour is outstanding, very Guardian and very cool. I can just imagine the glee of thinking "Not this time..." as you lay your trap for the encounter deck. The art is a bit goofy with its colouring and angle, but very evocative.

Self Sacrifice

This is a weird one. It reminds me a bit of Leadership, which is another card intended for use only in another investigator's test. However, while Leadership is complete rubbish, Self Sacrifice has some uses. On first blush, it seems very similar to Take Heart, but that is a bit misleading. First, the test in question definitely needs to fail, and I believe there need to be at least some effects that resolve as a result of failure, for you to get the card draw. It's essentially an extremely cumbersome card - you need to be at the same location as another investigator, who is going to fail a test, and who will suffer consequences for doing so, and you need to be happy to take the consequences instead. This makes it a very niche card - for instance, Roland or Mark should stay far, far away since anything that will cause horror is just not an effect they want to resolve, substantially reducing the number of options.

I think this is only worth it for an investigator who is happy tanking effects for another investigator, needs card draw, and is able to spend time next to another investigator. Carolyn is more than happy to take on horror for other investigators, can always use card draw with her excellent resource economy, and has access to Pathfinder so can easily follow other investigators around. Zoey also likes card draw with her economy and is extremely tanky, so it might be an option for her. And Tommy might like being able to take on damage/horror for other investigators to use his ability, and desperately needs card draw. Even for those three, it's by no means a staple card - still niche at best. It does synergise well with another Survivor investigator - they can use Drawing Thin to ensure they do in fact fail the test, and use Take Heart. It's worth bearing in mind that the effects of Take Heart will still affect the investigator actually performing the test - while Self Sacrifice will cause the Self Sacrificing investigator to resolve Take Heart, it does specify that it's the perfoming investigator who gets the cards and resources. Overall, though, I think if you want to improve your tanking abilities, you're better off sticking with "Let Me Handle This!" and the soak assets that can take damage/horror for other investigators.

The mechanical flavour is a bit weird, it's a much more cumbersome effect than similar cards. I don't dislike it, but I also don't think there's a need for the card. A big meh, which applies to the art as well.

Otherworld Codex

Speaking of "meh", there's this card. The effect reminds me a lot of several effects from the Lord of the Rings LCG, and it has a great deal of potential. The best possible result is that for 3 resources and 4 actions, you can kill 3 enemies, or remove 3 pesky treacheries, or any combination thereof. However, you need to get a lot of ducks in a row to achieve this - you need the card in play and ready to go, with an action to spare, while an encounter card is in play, and know that one of the top 9 cards of the encounter deck match that card (or get lucky). And...that's not very likely. You could combo with Alyssa Graham to constantly check the top of the encounter deck to see if it matches (that's at least 1 of the 9). You could use Scrying (0) or (3), or Scroll of Secrets, to look deeper into the encounter deck. Or you could wait until there's only 9 or fewer cards left in the encounter deck and learn what those cards must be by process of elimination (sort of counting cards). But those are all cumbersome and either require a very specific set of circumstances or cost you more cards, more resources, more actions and more exp. I just don't think this card will ever consistently pay off unless you are building specifically for it, and then it's very much a gimmick rather than an effective build.

I'm not really going to talk about who wants this because it's pretty obvious - Daisy gets the Tome action, Mandy can boost the Search. But even they shouldn't take this card. It's just not very good. Hard pass.

The flavour is pretty weird - I don't really know what the book does to remove enemies from reality, and while I could maybe get tapping into cross-dimensional whatever to undo a hex, it makes a lot less sense to magick rats or scared bystanders away because there's more rats or bystanders in the near future. The art is pretty awesome, though.

Dream-Enhancing Serum

This, on the other hand, is a card that could be very fun. For most investigators it probably won't do all that much, but for the right build, it will utterly shine. This is basically a card that you only take if you know you want it - but if you want it, you really want it. It clearly synergises well with Myriad cards, since you're both more likely to trigger the Response effect, and potentially get more out of the passive effect. It's expensive and slow to get going, however - compare with Lucky Cigarette Case, which will more consistently get you draw and costs 1 resource less. It also uses up an arcane slot - making it very unattractive for mystics, but also meaning that it doesn't suffer much slot pressure for most other investigators, and is ultimately just an interesting choice - I would love to see more non-Mystic cards that use arcane slots.

So with that in mind, who wants it? I can imagine doing absurd things with this for Minh Thi Phan - I've seen some obscene Minh builds that cost very little and tear through her deck at an incredible rate, and being able to have a hand size of up to 20 even before considering Myriad cards (assuming a Laboratory Assistant) would enable an incredible amount of power. Since it synergises well with drawing cards, I think it could be a good choice for certain Jenny builds that use All In and Lucky Cigarette Case for massive draw. I'm even toying with the idea of using Versatile to take a copy on Mark Harrigan. I don't think this card is powerful by itself (certainly, there's no build it enables, since if you're reliably getting benefit out of its abilities you're already doing well - it's kind of a win-more card), but it will do well as a force multiplier for other builds that emphasise card draw.

The art is pretty middle-of-the-road, though I do like the "Muscimol" text on the bottle (that's the hallucinatory agent in fly agaric mushrooms). And the mechanical flavour is cool - not only is it about broadening your mind and giving you benefits in an unconventional way, it synergises with the Myriad card type which is a focus of Dream Eaters, and itself represents a substance to amplify dreams. I like it.

"Let God Sort Them Out..."

Not a great card, is it? It's very hard to reliably trigger this even as a dedicated killer (Leo, Zoey or Tony). You need to kill 6(!) toughness worth of monsters and still have an action left over to play it. This is made a bit easier with area attacks (Dynamite Blast, Rogue .45 Thompson (3), Mk. 1 Grenades, Storm of Spirits...), especially if dealing with Swarming enemies. It scales very strongly by player count - if there's 4 players all drawing encounter cards, you are that much more likely to have 6 toughness of enemies on the field at once. You don't need to deal 6 damage, merely kill enemies of 6 health, so if you finally kill a boss with lots of health, or finish off enemies that others have softened up for you, you can still trigger it. On the flip side, you need to be the one getting the killing blow, which can be hard to finesse. Amusingly, it could combo well with Delve Too Deep, since that's likely to bring out more enemies for you to kill. It's slow, unreliable, and only benefits you, and has pretty bad icons. However - I like the design. A dirty secret of mine is that I hate Delve Too Deep. I think it's one of the worst-designed cards in the entire game, encouraging degenerate play and devaluing interesting game decisions built in to Victory locations and enemies, while also potentially unbalancing campaigns by reducing the designers' control over the exp economy, and it's banned in my group by gentlepersons' agreement. But a card like this, that instead gives you a bit of a side-mission to complete and only benefits you, is a bit more fun. It's very hard to game this card, and it opens up interesting deckbuilding and gameplay choices.

Who wants it? If I'm being honest, really maybe only Tony or Leo. No other Rogue has the fighting ability to consistently get it to work (except for some very weird Sefina or archer Skids builds, I guess), and it's not really worth using a limited off-class slot for. However, rogues and guardians can be extremely exp hungry, so it has a place there. It's interesting to ask exactly when you should get rid of it - my advice would be to upgrade out of it once you have your initial setup, but there's some merit in thinking that it will be easier to achieve the condition once you have better guns. It synergises well with other monster-finding effects, like On The Hunt or "Let Me Handle This!", as well as weaknesses that are enemies.

The art is just badass, too. (I am a sexy, suited god of war! ...how's that for a nerdy reference).

Swift Reload

This card is great. The card that Contraband (2) looks at with envious eyes. A full reload on a card for 3 resources and no actions is basically an excellent deal. Any build that relies on ammo weapons really benefits from it.

However, there's a problem - which is the Rogue firearm selection. Swift Reload doesn't work with Colt Vest Pocket and is only situationally useful for Lupara, and the .41 Derringer isn't really worth reloading. So for Rogues, you only really want it if you're using the .45 Thompson or the Chicago Typewriter - which, not coincidentally, are the best Rogue firearms.

So it's basically only for Leo or Tony. Unless Tony is relying on combat tricks (like just Sleighting Luparas in and out) or the Switchblade (2), he's going to be using one of the two tommy guns, and reloading his signature guns can also be beneficial to keep his engine running. It's so good for Leo Anderson that I think it actually bumps him up a tier in my mind - I actually want to play him for basically the first time since he was released. For a Lightning Gun, it's like Extra Ammunition only Fast (and 1 more resource and exp, but a good deal), and it's better than Extra Ammunition for any weapon of 4 ammo or more (.45 Automatic, .45 Thompson, and above all the 1918 BAR). If you're going for like, a Contraband build to have absurd amounts of BAR or Thompson ammuntion, Swift Reload is still great - you can reload up to full before playing Contraband, meaning that you don't have to wait until you draw Contraband before using your gun. I love the .45 Thompson Guardian build and initially I thought it wasn't good for Leo, because he can't access Act of Desperation. But Swift Reload also works well with it. And, I guess, you could use Versatile to give Leo Act of Desperation. Hmmmm...

The art isn't bad but it's a bit weird - it looks like a soldier (or possibly an explorer) reloading a standard revolver, which is very Guardian and not very Rogue at all.

Gregory Gry

This honestly feels like a second bite at the "gambling for resources" ally design space apple, after Henry Wan from TCU was such a complete failure. And I have to say, I think it works. It's not unlike Watch This, only without directly risking you losing resources (aside from, I guess, the initial investment of 3 resources). Rogues really lack for soak allies, since their worthwhile allies are all long-term investments you don't want to lose, like Leo de Luca or Dario el-Amin, so it's nice to have an ally you just use until he runs out of steam and then throw under the bus. The gambling choice is very interesting, since you have to choose your "succeed by" threshold each time.

With that in mind, I think he's best for anyone with a severe weakness - I particularly like Gregory Gry for Sefina Rousseau, since she is really vulnerable to damage and she often needs loads of resources up front (and Gregory synergises very well with Premonition). I also think he works well with all the big money builds, since he can give you a lot of extra resources in short order without taking up extra actions. He might also be a good off-class splash - not bad for Leo Anderson since he has a strong ally focus and is likely to run Calling In Favours, a card that really works well with Gregory, and potentially worth it for Wendy, though she already has loads of great ally options. Really, the competition for ally slots is the big problem, since Rogue has a number of exceptionally powerful allies. But all that said, I think he's still very worthy of consideration because he makes your board state far less fragile (ever lost Leo de Luca the turn after you played him? That will set you back for the rest of the scenario...)

Flavour-wise, it's always a joy to see characters from the Call of Cthulhu LCG - Gregory Gry appears in two different forms in the Dreamlands cycle of the old Cthulhu LCG, as a member of the Syndicate faction (criminals, so very fitting for Rogue). In addition, this is one reason that I love his synergy with Sefina, since the story of that cycle in the Cthulhu LCG was about his doomed love affair with his painter girlfriend. The art is fine and the mechanical flavour suits his gambling aesthetic - it's nice to see more of the rogue "gambling" flavour, which was a strong theme earlier on in the game's life cycle.

Healing Words

Hey, remember how inefficient Clarity of Mind was? Where it takes an action to put into play and then an extra action for each point healed? And it's expensive, and there's far better options in the game, and it takes up your spell slot, and it's strictly outclassed by First Aid (except for like, Charge/Spell synergy)?

Yeah, well at least horror healing has synergies - Carolyn Fern can use it for her playstyle (though just use First Aid, seriously), there's the slightly less useless Clarity of Mind (3) and so the level 0 version can be included for cheaper upgrade with Arcane Research, Mystics take horror from Shrivelling and Arcane Research and Forbidden Knowledge, and Agnes likes to take horror.

Healing Words is the same card as Clarity of Mind (0), with "horror" replaced with "damage". And as such, it's more or less just worse than that already bad card because it just offers less for anyone who can take it. There are some upsides - Mystics tend to have more Sanity than Health so damage healing might be a bit better, there's no other Mystic tools for damage healing (except like, Deny Existence (5)) so it at least has a unique niche, and there's one worthwhile card that deals health damage backlash (Storm of Spirits). But this card is still completely pointless. Never take this in any deck, it has no substantial synergy for any investigator, including it is probably just making your deck worse. If you're that worried about health damage, take health soak (David Renfield, or upgrade to Dayana Esperence or Bulletproof Vest, or something from your off-class), or just Painkillers.

The art isn't bad and actually is nicely creepy, though it is very much recycled from many other Arkham Files games. The mechanical flavour is just...dry and uninteresting.

Ethereal Form

Much like Read the Signs, this is a great card for almost any mystic. Adding willpower to an existing stat allows any mystic (aside from like, non-willpower Diana) to have a high base score, and also allows investigators with the right statline (a high agility as well as a high willpower) to get an extra bonus. However, it also makes for some interesting synergies - since Ethereal Form is an agility test and an evade test, you could commit Hatchet Man or Survival Instinct (2) for a greater bonus and an extreme likelihood of getting the special effect off, though conversely you can't commit Willpower skills like Fearless.

So to talk about the specific effect of Ethereal Form, it disengages from all other enemies (being a solution for situations where you're overwhelmed by multiple enemies) and then makes you "ethereal", which is defined as "enemies cannot engage or be engaged with you, and you cannot attack or deal damage to enemies". This is significant in several ways. First, you can still be attacked if a card effect causes you to be (but it does prevent most attacks in the Enemy phase, including from Massive enemies, since they are generally contingent on engagement). Second, the other enemies other than the primary target that you were engaged with are not actually Evaded (unless you also committed Survival Instinct (2)), so they could engage and attack other investigators, and indeed will immediately engage other investigators if they are at the same location. Third, you can then escape in safety - running through other locations with enemies in them without being engaged, making Ethereal Form an excellent escape card and excellent for scenarios where you need to run to the exit. Fourth, since you remain Ethereal for the rest of the round, you can prevent lots of enemy attacks by sitting in the same location or a connecting location from Hunter enemies and having them come after you instead of other investigators (which may take some finagling with certain Prey conditions) - being Ethereal does not mean that enemies will ignore you when moving, merely that they can't then engage you. And fifth, since the card says "you are ethereal" and then defines "ethereal", rather than simply saying that "for the rest of the round, enemies cannot...", does this mean that the concept of being Ethereal will be found in other cards, and may be the start of a synergy?

This means that Ethereal Form has a lot of aspects and can help in a lot of different situations. There are many Evade events in Mystic - Blinding Light (0) and (2), Bind Monster (2) and Banish (1). While these have the occasional niche application, and Blinding Light (0) is fine with a limited card pool, they are generally bad cards that aren't worth using. Ethereal Form is the first Mystic Evade event that I genuinely consider to be a good card. This is because it incorporates a bonus to the test, and because it is reasonably priced, and because it has a flexible and useful effect. Mists of R'lyeh is a good card that can be very useful, but it has a negative backlash effect and takes up a spell slot (when many mystics probably want to keep their spell slots for a Fight spell and an Investigate spell). It's an excellent emergency option if you're overwhelmed, an excellent evade solution for tough evade tests which scenarios sometimes ask for, a good enemy management tool if you're caught without Shrivelling charges or haven't drawn an attack yet, and can provide lots of defensive and niche benefits.

It's particularly cool for Luke Robinson - not only can you use it to evade an enemy on another investigator at an adjacent location using his ability, you can still disengage from all enemies engaged with you at your current location (again, yet another rules question - would the enemies disengage from you at your actual location or your "as if" location?), allowing you to rescue beleagured other investigators and still benefit yourself. However, the trick of using it to neuter Hunter enemies is less impressive for Luke, since he can already do that with his gate box (but hey, it might save you a charge). It also works very well for Sefina, since she can easily build towards using all the evade economy tech with Pickpocketing and Lucky Cigarette Case, and she loves events - it's like a single use of an extra-strong Suggestion, but that's good for her - Suggestion exhausts on use so they aren't redundant. Otherwise, I'd skip Ethereal Form for many Diana builds but take it in my starting deck for almost everyone else - works well for Agnes as she can access Survivor evade tech and Peter Sylvestre (2) gives you a +2 to the test - might even be a card to pick up on Wendy via Versatile (though really I think she'd be more likely to pick up an asset like Shrivelling or Sixth Sense).

The art is just wonderful. Not only does it keep the impression of magic being quite horrible and harsh, but the smug look on the spellcaster's face as the ghoul fruitlessly swipes at him is gold. I love it. And the mechanical flavour is grand as well.

Scrounge for Supplies

I'm not that enthused by this card, to be honest. It can be transformed into any level 0 card in your discard pile...for the cost of an extra action. There's not really that many level 0 cards that are game-changing if recurred. For example - you could recur a testless clue-gathering event or attack event, but then by doing so that event is far less efficient - Working a Hunch is solid as a Fast event, 2 resources, 1 card and 0 actions for 1 clue. But if you Scrounge it back, it effectively costs one action (though you can spread that cost across turns), and 1 action, 1 card, 2 resources for 1 clue is pretty weak. The same calculation needs to be used for anything else you might Scrounge - is recurring a card from your discard worth an extra action to play it (or commit it) again? Why not just take a useful card in place of Scrounge?

It's nice for a weapon-user (as the art suggests) if they run out of ammo, or their baseball bat breaks, or their machete is discarded by Crypt Chill, or whatever, and it has potentially great uses in specific decks - allies that are crucial to decks (such as Dr Milan or Leo de Luca) can get killed and Scrounge for Supplies is a more permanent solution than A Chance Encounter (0). There's some extremely solid level 0 cards that are worth recurring (basically the same list as the cards that are worth considering Versatile for, plus neutrals) and it's also good for a toolbox deck - there's definitely times where I'd be happy to spend an extra action to have another Dodge or another Dynamite Blast or whatever, and some choices provide action compression themselves so it sort of balances out (e.g. Vicious Blow saves you an action if you need 1 extra damage to kill, so Scrounging it back is action neutral and still gets you the +1 Combat icon and saves you an ammo...if the test passes). For a while after Yaotl came out, Dredge decks were quite popular, and Scrounge works well with those - if you fill up your discard pile quickly, Scrounge lets you take your pick of cards there. It could be good for Yorick, who can use his ability to take whatever assets he wants from discard, and then Scrounge to choose the best skills. Or any Yaotl build, really. Scrounge for Supplies to recur a Desperate skill to keep the Yaotl train rolling is a very solid play.

However, aside from the efficiency downside, there's two further problems with Scrounge for Supplies. The first is that it is a terrible early-game draw. Later in a scenario it can be powerful to recur anything in your discard, as the above examples show. But aside from extremely aggressive dredge strategies, if you see Scrounge in your opening hand, it's a dead card. It has no icons at all so can't be committed, and doesn't help you in early game whatsoever - while you can hold it back for later on, you're at a substantial disadvantage compared to having drawn a card that can be proactively useful. Of course, "Ashcan" Pete, Wendy Adams and anyone with Cornered can simply discard it instead, but that's not much of an upside (that's more or less just saying "yes, Scrounge for Supplies is a card"). The second is that it gets worse the better your deck becomes. Scrounging back an ally is no longer possible if your allies aren't level 0. Upgrading your weapons means they're no longer valid targets. It can very quickly become almost useless - or conversely lead you to making poor deckbuilding decisions to keep it online.

So all in all, Scrounge is either a card of some mild utility in a starting deck, that should be replaced quickly, or an extremely useful card for very specific builds. If it isn't obvious that Scrounge for Supplies synergises with your build, you probably don't want it (or at least don't want it after the first scenario or two).

The art is pretty cool (very Survivor), but the mechanical flavour is off - scrounging up an extra gun, sure, scrounging up an ally I can just about understand, but how are you scrounging for the concept of being fearless, or a magic spell? You could come up with handwaves, but it still doesn't quite work with the card.

Brute Force

This may be a skill, but think of it more like an event, since it can't combine with any Fight abilities on events or assets. It's pretty solid, if you can reliably hit the +2 damage threshold. On that basis, there's not as much interesting analysis for the card. For the most part, it's a card that's good for specific builds, and you'll know if you can make good use of it.

It's obviously great for William Yorick, who has trouble dealing more than 2 damage per attack - he obviously has Vicious Blow, but the Old Hunting Rifle isn't a particularly good option and he can't access any of the Guardian +2 damage weapons, and he has access to static boosts rfrom Guardian to help hit that test threshold. It's even more obviously a strong option for Silas Marsh, who can't even use Vicious Blow...if you can hit the +2 damage threshold - it works obscenely well with Silas' Elder Sign effect, so obviously works well together with Eucatastrophe, but otherwise, Silas can have trouble reliably hitting high Combat thresholds - but at least you can pull it back to hand with his ability if the chaos bag doesn't play nice. It's also a very solid pick for certain Minh builds - if you're focusing on getting your signature asset into play early, being able to provide a +2 damage attack to any investigator anywhere on the board (together with her additional +1 and the bonuses from Grisly Totem) is really helpful, and you can even use it yourself in a pinch. Otherwise...certain Patrice builds can make use of it, since she can achieve strong scores in basically anything with her ability to throw card commits and Cornered discards around all the time, and likewise lacks for other means of dealing more than 2 damage per attack, and I guess it might be useful for Calvin Wright if he can spare the deck space, since he aims to have high base skills but needs cards that help him leverage them.

I really like the design space they're going for here, and judging by the next pack it may be a space they're expanding on.

The art is a bit goofy, actually - while the scene is very dynamic, it took me a while to work out that the victim's face isn't horribly misshapen and pock-marked, and is instead covered up by a weird cartoon-style outrush of air from his freshly broken nose together with some blood spatter. It also doesn't really work in terms of framing or perspective - it seems like the victim has been punched a moment prior to the artwork, but his outstretched hand is further in the background than the right hook thrown by the attacker, so he must be several feet away - but he doesn't LOOK several feet away, especially comparing his size to that of the attacker (who is right up next to the viewpoint). It just doesn't look good. The mechanical flavour, however, is grand.

Versatile

There's a whole 'nother thread for that. However, there's a few other things to add about it. The first is that I think this card is potentially a trap for the unwary - an inexperienced player might go "Hey, I want to have a cool off-class card, and increasing my deck size will let me take those cards that I wanted but couldn't fit in my deck! Win win!", without realising the substantial downside of having a larger deck. The second is that the name "versatile" is kind of a misnomer, since it actually is mainly useful to specialise in a very specific way. The third is that it makes design of new cards much harder, since any level 0 card can now (theoretically) interact with any investigator and any other card in the game, regardless of deckbuilding options - and we already have the dumb Wendy infinitely recurring Premonition build. The fourth is that I do really like the idea of cards modifying your deckbuilding - enabling new builds or changing how you approach your deck is what I think Permanent cards should do, rather than the Permanent cards that just make you straight up better without needing to make any build decisions or even choose cards to replace (Keen Eye, Blood Pact, especially Scrapper, Streetwise and Higher Education and above all Another Day, Another Dollar and Studious).

Finally, while the art is cool and extremely evocative of the idea, that flavour text seems very vague and doesn't really land for me.

Awesome as always. A couple of thoughts, not that I can add anything much of value.

I feel like Fool Me Once could work synergistically with First Watch. That would give some control at least in that round as to who draws what.

(I’m with you on Delve too Deep. We keep it out as well. If someone is that hep on the extra XP, they can be a rogue and take Charon’s Obal!)

Swift Reload is gold for Jenny. We built her for a stand alone when we had unexpected company this week and put it in her deck. She brought out her 2 Colts and had 7 initial ammo on them and 2 rounds later doubled it! She was pretty deadly from there on out!

Ethereal Form. Thanks for talking through all the applications of that card. I saw almost all of what you shared, except drawing off Hunters. (You would be terrifying to play chess against) I haven’t had a chance to use it yet, as I am playing Patrice right now and it’s too situational for her, but it piqued my interest right off the bat.

Scrounge for Supplies looked good at first blush, but the more I looked at it, the more cumbersome it felt to me. Survivors have so many ways of getting cards out of their discard pile without having to pay an extra action for the privilege, that they are spoiled! If it were being able to play any 0 level card from your discard pile, I’d be far more inclined.

13 minutes ago, Mimi61 said:

I feel like Fool Me Once could work synergistically with First Watch. That would give some control at least in that round as to who draws what.

Swift Reload is gold for Jenny. We built her for a stand alone when we had unexpected company this week and put it in her deck. She brought out her 2 Colts and had 7 initial ammo on them and 2 rounds later doubled it! She was pretty deadly from there on out!

Ah yes, First Watch would also be great with "Fool Me Once..."; I honestly haven't played a Guardian since Dream Eaters came out so it didn't really come to mind. Good call.

So with Swift Reload, just to be clear, it refills your weapon up to its starting ammo - it doesn't add extra on top of it. Swift Reload on a .45 Automatic will leave you with 4 ammo, regardless of whether it had 0 or 3 ammo when played.

Also, Swift Reload doesn't do anything at all to Jenny's Twin .45s - the "x" value is only defined during the process of playing the card and at all other times is 0, so Swift Reload would reload the weapon up to 0 ammo tokens (and therefore couldn't be played in the first case as it wouldn't change the game state).

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here: if Mandy or Lola were to use Three Aces (from Dark Side) to auto-succeed on the Ancient Stone - Unidentified, that would treat the difficulty as zero, leaving them with nothing on the upgraded Stones? That's a shame, though maybe it's for the best since they could also commit Double or Nothing to that.

1 hour ago, CSerpent said:

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here: if Mandy or Lola were to use Three Aces (from Dark Side) to auto-succeed on the Ancient Stone - Unidentified, that would treat the difficulty as zero, leaving them with nothing on the upgraded Stones? That's a shame, though maybe it's for the best since they could also commit Double or Nothing to that.

Looks right to me.

3 hours ago, Allonym said:

Also, Swift Reload doesn't do anything at all to Jenny's Twin .45s - the "x" value is only defined during the process of playing the card and at all other times is 0, so Swift Reload would reload the weapon up to 0 ammo tokens (and therefore couldn't be played in the first case as it wouldn't change the game state).

Thanks for that clarification.

So anyway, Dark Side of the Moon...

.35 Winchester

What on earth is going on with this card? Like...what? First off, this card is rubbish, but also, its existence is very confusing. Was this an attempt to take the Springfield M1903's crown for worst weapon design?

It reminds me of Song of the Dead, a spell that is usually not all that good (should be level 0 or 1), but if you draw Skull tokens, it does 3 damage in one hit - which synergises with Mystic chaos token manipulation, the Seal mechanic, and Jim Culver's investigator ability, and it results in lots of interesting decisions since the number of Skull tokens in the bag is different in each campaign and can be changed by certain story decisions.

But the .35 Winchester is +2 to the test, and deals 3 damage if you draw...0, +1 or Elder Sign. So what is going on here? Does this represent a headshot or critical hit, or something? Mechanically, it doesn't make any sense for the Guardian class, since there's very little in the way of token manipulation - I guess you could use Eat Lead!, but then you're using multiple cards and blowing all your ammo to maybe do 3 damage once - a whole lot of expenditure for nothing. And unlike the Symbol tokens, the number of +1, 0 and Elder Sign tokens is different depending on difficulty. Take Night of the Zealot, for instance - on Easy, there's a total of six matching tokens. But on Expert, there's only two. This is just terrible design - it's a weapon that isn't worth using unless you can get the relevant tokens, and you are three times more likely to trigger that effect on Easy difficulty than on Expert. I just have no idea what the thought behind the design is here. Perhaps we'll see a Guardian sub-theme emerging regarding specific tokens, but if we do, this will probably still not be a good card - it's not like Song of the Dead became super popular once more token manipulation came out. Beyond that, it's a level 0 weapon that costs 4 resources and takes up 2 hands, with 5 ammo - there's a lot of competition there. On average it does far less than 2 damage per hit, so just take a .45 Automatic for the same resources and only using up 1 hand, or the .45 Thompson for the same ammo and test bonus but reliable damage for 2 more resources.

Who wants it? Basically nobody. Diana or Jim can use it and go for the token manipulation effects but...why would you? Song of the Dead is a better-designed and more synergistic card that does the same sort of thing, and Song of the Dead is also barely worth using. This card, quite simply, should never have been printed. I don't do numerical scores for cards but if I did... 0/10. Who knows, in future it might become a great card for some weird mechanic, but I hope not.

Shame really, because the art is quite good. I always think that the background and framing is important for the art for weapons (since like...a .32 colt revolver just looks like a gun), and the framing here is pretty excellent. It's a bit like Old Hunting Rifle in that it implies that you've grabbed a weapon you had in the home, but for a more Guardian theme, it's like taking down grandpa's heirloom with pride of place. The mechanical theme is pretty hard to understand.

Safeguard

This is a weird card - but not necessarily a bad card. There's a number of Guardian protective abilities that require you to be at the same location as your ally, such as Self-Sacrifice and the various soak assets that can be assigned damage/horror taken by other investigators in your location, and so you want to be able to hang around with your ally. But even beyond that, you could get a lot of action compression out of it just by piggybacking on your allies' movement. Its utility will be very inconsistent (in a turn where you want to move to the other side of the board, you could save 3 move actions by letting your ally take them, but on other turns you won't be with your friend or won't want to follow them around). I suspect that this card could turn out to be essentially overpowered, especially in certain scenarios, by letting you move several times a turn for free, making the already fantastic Pathfinder look weak by comparison.

Who wants it? Basically anyone could use it, but it will be particularly important for tanky, fighty investigators like Zoey and Tommy, and certain Yorick, Carolyn and Leo builds. But beyond that, it depends on the other investigators. If you're in a team with Ursula, for instance, you could get an absurd amount of extra movement out of Safeguard, and it's far better as the player count increases, as you're more likely to be in the same location as other investigators and you will have a greater variety of options. Normally, I don't recommend two investigators just staying together since you lose your flexibility, but I think this could open up a legitimately interesting playstyle of two investigators who move as one and power through scenarios.

I honestly don't know how good this card is yet, because I'll really need to see it in action a lot - and I suspect its power will fluctuate wildly depending on many different variables. It might end up being fine or underpowered, or might end up finding itself on a future Taboo list.

The mechanical flavour is fantastic (though it could seem a bit funny - like you're protecting your seeker and they're giving you a piggyback) and the art and flavour text really sell it. I love the idea of playing a bodyguard.

Practice Makes Perfect

I think this card is really cool. It's a bit like pulling Silas' elder sign (at least before Eucatastrophe made it feel pedestrian), or the rogue Daredevil card. Needing to find a Practiced card can be a bit tough and requires specific deckbuilding, but Perception and Deduction are both Practiced, and there's several other options - Overpower and Vicious Blow are the most consistently interesting, making this card very interesting for Joe Diamond and Roland Banks, and Rogue has a couple of options, meaning that an investigation-focused Seeker!Tony Morgan could also benefit.

My issue is that this card seems too strong. It's 0 exp and essentially replaces itself and lets you thin your deck - while it could certainly miss, it could also find several possible targets and give you a range of options. And once the skill test is finished, if you succeeded (likely, since you committed an extra skill card to it), you then get to return that skill card to your hand, so you get a double benefit. This makes it a less-reliable (and slightly more expensive) but overall potentially much stronger version of the Rogue Daredevil skill. Daredevil costs 2 exp. It's a common complaint that Seekers get loads of really fantastic cards, for 0 exp. Seeker has always been the most powerful class in the game and still is now, and quite simply can be so powerful that it harms the game. And this seems to be more proof of that. I may end up being wrong, since this is mostly theorycraft, but my initial hot take is that this should cost 2 exp, or shouldn't return the targeted skill to your hand after the test. I love the idea behind Practice Makes Perfect, I imagine it will be great fun to use. I just wish it were a little bit weaker.

But aside from that rant, as said, Roland, Joe and Tony definitely should consider it, and Mandy clearly loves it because it's a Search effect and she could find 2 skills (and return both to your hand after), or search more cards to prevent it not finding anything, as well as potentially finding a Research event to trigger. I like that you can use it for allied tests as well, and I like the Trait synergy, more of that please!

The art is so...irrelevant. It's not a bad picture, but it doesn't do anything to relate to the effect or even the card name. The mechanical flavour, on the other hand, really works. Love it.

Extensive Research

This is a weird card. Together with Dream-Enhancing Serum, it seems like there's a proper "cards in hand" archetype emerging, in conjunction with Curiosity and Laboratory Assistant (sigh...and Higher Education). If you aren't using anything to increase your hand size, this essentially has a minimum cost of 3 (you could draw to above your hand size beforehand, I suppose), since once you play Extensive Research, it's no longer in hand and won't count itself. 3 resources and 1 action, 1 exp, 1 card for 2 testless clues is...OK, but doesn't seem to be quite as good as Working A Hunch. Additionally, you need to be in the right situation for it to work - you need a fat hand and to be in a location that needs testless clue gathering. If you have a healthy 5 cards in hand before playing it, Extensive Research will cost a painful 6 resources. And if you just pulled Amnesia, then you're looking at the full 10 resource cost!

So it's inconsistent, requires setup and doesn't pay off anywhere near enough to be worth the effort by itself. This is definitely not a card to build around. Instead, I would say this is a card to add if you're already looking to fill your hand up and increase your hand size, since it's free real estate. A 2x Grisly Totem Minh build with shedloads of draw and skill cards can easily hit a 10+ card hand without even trying, so why not add Extensive Research for some extra profit? That Minh build tends to run really cheap (enough to make Dark Horse tempting, albeit more or less unnecessary) so being able to play Extensive Research for `1 or 0 resources is nice. Aside from that build, it doesn't really synergise all that much with anyone - Mandy can fill her hand quickly thanks to her ridiculous investigator ability, and certain Daisy builds will be able to draw tonnes of cards with tomes. Since it is a Tactic card, you could use Extensive Research with Stick to the Plan (for Roland, I guess), which would at least avoid the issue of playing it decreasing your cards in hand, but that's hardly worth the effort (edit: it's definitely not a Tactic card, but is an Insight, see posts below). And ultimately, Seekers don't care all that much about testless clue-gathering, since they can hit massive Intellect levels and investigate manually, even on Hard or Expert. This is not a strong card, but is fine in certain decks. But I like it, and I hope we see more cards that care about cards in hand as a Seeker sub-theme.

The mechanical flavour is quite enticing and the flavour text is cool - and I love the art! It's nice to see the investigators working together. And Minh + Mandy would be a scary investigation team if they had a bodyguard or two.

Three Aces

So this is a really cool card. Exactly the kind of design space that Myriad opens up. Obviously, if you can get it to work, it's totally worth it - automatic success at a skill test, 3 resources and 3 card draw at the cost of 3 cards (so the card draw and use cancel out). However...until you do get all three copies in hand, it's just taking up space - and if you do have to use it for a commit (or some kind of forced discard effect) in the meantime, everything's ruined. This makes for an interesting piece of decision-making (similar to the Segments of Onyx).

However, you need to be able to actually reliably get the three cards in hand. As said above, until you get all 3, each individual Ace is more or less a dead draw. As such, it's very easy to determine who should consider this card. The benefits of having all 3 are more or less univerally useful (I guess a Dark Horse build probably doesn't care that much about the resources and it's annoying for Preston Fairmont as they'll go on his Inheritance, but otherwise passing a test, getting free resources and cantrip for the skills are good for everyone). If you can tear through your deck with lots of draw and/or search out the Three Aces, you should probably take them. If you can't, don't - I would never recommend taking this card if you're just going to wait until you topdeck all three pieces, it'll put a huge dent in your tempo for not much benefit. So basically, Mandy with Rogue secondary (the best option for her) should definitely strongly consider the Three Aces, since she can easily search for them and the automatic success could seriously benefit her in providing an emergency enemy management effect (to say nothing of how obscene it would be together with Archaic Glyphs: Guiding Stones). Most other rogues can go for massive draw tearing through their deck, with All In, Lucky Cigarette Case and even Easy Mark or Pickpocketing, though I can't recommend it as much for Finn Edwards (unless taking more draw with his Seeker/Survivor off-class cards) since he can't take All In - in this case, you want to get your draw engine ready first and then add Three Aces once it's ready. And Wendy Adams might be able to make good use of it too, since she can go for the Lucky Cigarette Case/Pickpocketing draw engine as well as Drawing Thin, Take Heart and the upcoming Nothing Left To Lose, though again she shouldn't pick up Three Aces until she has the groundwork laid. And that's about it - fun fact, Rogue is the class with the fewest investigators with off-class access to it, by a large margin.

The mechanical flavour is the ultimate iteration of the Gambling sub-theme - I can sort of understand how going All In or having an Ace in the Hole can be metaphors for fighting skilfully or whatever, but Three Aces is really obscure. The art is pretty good, though.

Burglary (2)

Cards I never thought I'd see include an upgraded Burglary. Well...if you're looking to use Burglary, the upgrade is solid. You can make up to 5 resources with it.

However...all the problems of Burglary are still present in the upgrade - you're making a skill test to get resources, so there's a good chance you'll fail and waste your time. You could trigger bad chaos token effects. You have to pay resources and an action to play the asset and then additional actions to use it. Rogues generally don't have enough Intellect to be able to use it without needing to use skill commits or other limited resources to improve your chances - which immediately makes it a far worse deal because it effectively increases the "cost" of doing so. An asset that gives you the option to get more resources further down the line isn't that helpful because you need to make good use of it to make it a worthwhile investment. What if you play Burglary then can't spare the action to use it for 3 rounds? You're just down a resource and an action and a card for no benefit, worsening your board state, to say nothing of the opportunity cost of the exp spend and the deck space that could have helped you out. And it gets worse at higher difficulties because you're less likely to pass. Unlike the level 0 version, the amount of resources earned is dependent on how much you succeed by, meaning that you probably need to overinvest on your skill test to get the extra resources - and if you succeed by 0, you only get 2 resources, making the upgrade sometimes worse than the level 0 version.

Additionally, there's loads of ways for Rogues to make money nowadays. Emergency Cache; Hot Streak; Dario el-Amin; Easy Mark; Another Day, Another Dollar; Investments; Lone Wolf; Three Aces - none of which require skill tests. If you do want to make skill tests to make resources, use "Watch This!" and tack the resource gain onto another test and save actions. Most of these effects are far more reliably, require less up-front efficiency loss and are far less situational. Granted, there are also many more ways to leverage having lots of resources, but you don't want to be reliant on only one card to be your resource engine (because what if it's buried halfway down your deck?), so the reusability and indefinite maximum potential of Burglary is pretty unimpressive.

If you want a more numerical breakdown - let's say that you use Burglary twice and oversucceed by 3 both times. You've spent 3 actions, 1 card, 1 resource to gain 10 resources (assuming actions and cards are equal in value to resources, that's a profit of 5). If you instead used Hot Streak (2), you would be spending 1 action, 1 card, 5 resources to gain 10 resources (by the same metric, a profit of 3). Sounds good...except that actions are far more valuable than resources, and the Hot Streak resources are guaranteed whereas the Burglary resources require exceptional luck to get, and the Hot Streak resources are available up-front. You could keep using Burglary and keep having a chance of more resources...but really, the odds aren't in your favour.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is - if you want to use Burglary (2) for fun, preferably on Easy or Standard difficulty, go right ahead. It feels cool and has lots of Rogue flavour. Otherwise, no-one should take this card. Just spend the 2 exp on Hot Streak (2) or whatever and be happy. Theoretically it's more useful for Finn Edwards than others (2x Magnifying Glass, Dr Milan, etc. will give you a solid basis), but even then, this card is simply not worth using.

The art is cool (I mean, it's the same as the core set card) and the mechanical flavour is also fine. But it's unremarkable.

Spectral Razor

This card is very much expected, since it's the attack version of Read the Signs and Ethereal Form. And it's awesome. Attacking with Willpower+Combat is solid for most mystics. The ability to deal with 3-health non-Elite enemies in one attack is extremely solid, especially early on - it will really help at the start of The Forgotten Age, for instance - but even to deal with 2-health enemies, an accuracy boost and lack of horror backlash makes it better than using a charge of Shrivelling (0) - and having attack Events is great because you can use them when you're engaged with enemies without provoking attacks of opportunity (whereas playing a Shrivelling from hand would provoke). Even as just "another combat option" to put in your deck to give you more options and make your deck more consistent, it's a strong card.

The "+2 damage to non-Elite" clause is interesting, because previous cards with Elite restrictions have tended to simply be unusable against Elite enemies (like Banish or Small Favour). By allowing you to still use it but for a lesser effect, it's more like Slip Away, which still works to evade Elite enemies but doesn't double-evade them. Obviously you ideally don't want to use it against Elite enemies since attacking for 2 damage is not as impressive, but it's still the same as a Shrivelling (0/3) charge - and having the option is nice. The limitation also helps keep the card nicely balanced, which is a great thing.

Who wants it? Well, adding Combat and Willpower together is great for many Mystics, since that will see Akachi attacking for base 8 and Jim and Agnes attacking for base 7 (for example), but Marie and Norman only have 1 Combat so the boost isn't very helpful. But even then, it's still worthy of consideration, since a 3-damage attack is great even without a substantial boost. So the short answer there is essentially "all Mystics should consider it, and those with 3 Combat should definitely take it". However, there's some further nuance. Luke Robinson doesn't have a great base chance to hit (a respectable 6, but not quite Akachi levels), but just like with Ethereal Form in the last pack, it being an event makes it very attractive for attacking at range. Diana is a funny one - with her 3 combat and potential to hit 6 Willpower, it could be an incredible card for her, but "guardian" Diana builds don't really care about boosting her willpower as much and at the start of the game, it's an attack for merely 4 (but still...not awful) - but since it's a Combat test that adds Willpower, you can commit Combat icons to the test; for most Mystics this is only important insofar as it means you can't commit Guts or Fearless, but for Diana with her access to Vicious Blow, it opens up a whole new angle, letting you make a very accurate and very powerful attack - particularly for those Diana builds that mainly use Enchanted Blade (3) for their monster-killing. The same applies to some extent to using Jim's off-class cards for Vicious Blow, or using Stunning Blow for Jim or Agnes, but those are far more niche - taking a skill card to use mostly with just one event card is not a good idea, since it requires a very specific hand configuration and could result in dead draws. But if you're going for a fighty Jim anyway, go for it.

Beyond Mystics, it could be a great card for Zoey to take with her off-class slots - she attacks at base 8 and, for a monster-hunter, having 3-damage attacks is particularly handy - the benefit of attack events helping you out if you're caught without ammo or if you haven't played or drawn a weapon yet apply for her too. It might even be a good choice for "Ashcan" Pete or Jenny Barnes. Sefina is likely to want to start with it due to her event focus, though she might want to ditch it sooner or later once she gets the right range of Rogue xp events. Carolyn Fern, Daisy Walker and Mandy Thompson don't have as much use for it (base 5, 5, 4 respectively) but it might be worth it as an emergency weapon for them - Daisy likes "I've Got A Plan" and that's a base 5 attack. Finally, I don't rate it that highly for Patrice, since she can't keep it back until she needs it, but if she needs to take over more of the combat side of things it could work, and if she draws it on a turn she doesn't want it she can just chuck it into Cornered or her violin.

All-in-all, this is an extremely solid, fun card. Gold star for card design.

The art is really cool. Nice to see Akachi on the art, not only because she's a great investigator who needs more love, but also because it's an extremely powerful card for her. Mechanical flavour is fine, I guess - as I said, I like how they handled the restriction for Elite enemies.

Word of Command

Hey look, another card name from LOTR LCG, alongside Unexpected Courage and Test of Will. I do like to see that. This card is very expensive - 2 exp to add and 2 resources to play, takes an action to find any Spell card in your deck. On the other hand, finding any spell in your deck is really awesome. Mystics live and die by their spells, and many mystics rely on one or two Spell assets - if you can't find your Shrivelling (5) or Sixth Sense (4), you can't contribute properly in that area, and you'll pay whatever you can to get online. It also gets stronger as your deck gets stronger - if Word of Command can fetch Shrivelling (5), Seal of the Elder Sign, Rite of Seeking (4) or Mists of R'lyeh (4), that's a lot of potential value in the card. However...it is very slow and expensive. It doesn't give you any card advantage (it replaces itself with one card), and costs an action and 2 resources. So if you use Word of Command to find Shrivelling (5), you're essentially increasing its cost by two resources and one action. It's a steep price to pay, and Mystics already have economy problems in terms of cards, actions and especially resources.

It's somewhat similar to Prepared For The Worst, in that it lets you find your most vital assets. However, Prepared for the Worst is cheaper, level 0, and can be attached to Stick to the Plan, meaning that most people can simply take a single copy, use it early on when it's most necessary, and sort of get card advantage. On the other hand, Word of Command can search your entire deck (anyone who's used Prepared for the Worst enough knows the pain of not finding any weapons) and has a much broader range of possible targets.

Many Mystics run Arcane Initiate - both because she essentially provides consistent draw, and because she can specifically help you find the crucial spells your deck needs. In a sense, Word of Command can fill that second niche, opening up your ally slot for something else (and not running the risk of doom for Arcane Initiate (0)).

Who wants Word of Command? It doesn't really synergise with any specific investigator - more or less anyone who uses spells can use it. About the only investigator-specific synergy is in locating Spell-traited signature cards - Sefina's Painted World, Marie's Mystifying Song, and I guess Norman's Split the Angle. However, it does synergise with specific builds - builds that only use a very small number of Spells, or that rely on a very specific spell, could use Word of Command to locate them. Word of Command is itself a Spell, so it synergises with effects like Marie's extra action. And, while Mandy can't use it herself, she could use her ability to boost a friendly investigator's Word of Command to pull out two spells if they're both in the same location.

I don't think this card is anything more than niche - it has substantial disadvantages. However, it could certainly help make decks a lot more consistent - and it might have some nice interactions crop up in future.

I really like the art (and again, it's particularly nice to see minority representation in cards). The flavour text is also quite good.

Moon Stone

So if you have a means of reliably discarding this card, it essentially has the Fast keyword. So 0 actions and 3 resources is a great deal for what it offers. The stats are great for any spellcaster, and are the two main defensive stats for the encounter deck, plus of course Agility is great for anyone who likes evading. In addition, if the method used to discard it provides a benefit (such as Cornered, or Wendy's investigator ability), you get a double benefit.

In essence, this is a fantastic card. If you don't have a reliable means of discard, it's basically worthless, but if you do, it's easily one of the best accessories - the cost is roughly equivalent to Holy Rosary (1 more resource, 1 fewer action, but a bit more cumbersome), but with two stat bonuses rather than one and no soak. It's the same stat bonuses as Peter Sylvestre (2), meaning that Survivors can achieve some really huge static bonuses.

Soooo, who wants it? Obviously, Wendy Adams and "Ashcan" Pete have built-in discard effects, and Patrice can play it simply by keeping it in hand so it's discarded in the Upkeep phase (at least until she gets Cornered or her Violin in play). Any survivor (or anyone with access to Survivor level 2) can discard it with Cornered, but then you need to either have it in your deck being completely worthless until you buy Cornered, or you need to spend an extra couple of exp to buy it back once you get cornered (there's other options, of course - Versatile or Exile cards open up deck slots you can fill with level 0 cards, and Adaptable will also let you sub it back in).

Otherwise, it's nearly impossible to actually play it - you could fill up your hand until you need to discard for hand size, but that's far too clumsy and unreliable to remotely be worth it. Negative discard effects can discard it for you, like the backlash from Mists of R'lyeh or Liquid Courage, or Amnesia, but again, not worth it if that's your only way to discard. Blood-Rite would work, but then you're reliant on finding your only copy of Occult Lexicon aas well as Moon Stone, again, not good enough, and who would have access and want to use that, Minh? She's far better off with Grisly Totem. Since it needs to be discarded from your hand, discard from deck like Yaotl or Scroll of Secrets doesn't work.

Aside from the difficulty of using it for most investigators, an additional problem with Moon Stone is that it suffers from major slot pressure - Survivors have some excellent Accessory slot cards in Cherished Keepsake, Grisly Totem and Rabbit's Foot, and there's plenty of other good options available in Mystic and Rogue (plus Yorick really likes the Police Badge). Relic Hunter is an option, of course.

If you really like really stupid jank, take Versatile to grab Moon Stone on Sefina Rousseau and hope to get it in your opening hand - if you only put 4 or fewer events under her investigator card using her ability when drawing opening hand, you choose and discard cards until you only have 8 left. Of course, once the game begins, it's a completely worthless card, but it could be funny alongside Tarot cards to end up with an awesome board state before anyone takes a single action.

I'm going to enjoy using this on Wendy and "Ashcan" for sure, and I'll definitely consider it for Patrice, at least in a build that uses Willpower for spellcasting.

The art is quite...goofy. It's cool framing, seeing the strange rock glow when hit by the light of the moon, but the colours and overall image are hard to take seriously. Mechanical flavour is quite...weird. Doesn't really evoke anything. It more feels explicitly like a mechanical synergy rather than flavour evoked via mechanics.

Sharp Vision

It's the investigation version of Brute Force from the last pack. In some ways, it's better. As has been pointed out, taking a "basic" investigation test is a common occurrence whereas a "basic" combat test is very rarely a good option, so this is far less of a niche card. Again, however, I think it's best to think of it as kind of like an event, since it essentially creates an investigation test that cannot be combined with other special Investigate actions.

It has a certain amount of universal appeal, since investigating for extra clues is beneficial in almost all circumstances, but Sharp Vision has less of a niche than Brute Force - whereas Brute Force is attractive for William Yorick as the fighty Survivor who has trouble achieving 3-damage attacks, and Tommy Muldoon might also like an extra method of dealing extra damage that costs no resources (especially if using the .45 Thompson or a melee weapon and therefore only hitting for 2 damage), there isn't an investigation-focused Survivor yet - though with the range of survivor investigation tools, it seems like a niche that's ready to be filled. Minh obviously really likes it, both for helping her investigate and for letting others investigate even at range using her signature asset. Mandy can also access Sharp Vision if she's secondary Survivor and it seems like a decent choice for her. At first blush, it seems like Sharp Vision may be quite redundant with Fingerprinting Kit providing consistent 2-clue investigations, but since the Fingerprint Kit exhausts on use, Sharp Vision can provide a second big investigate in the same turn. The same logic applies for "Ashcan" Pete, since "Ashcan" generally exhausts Duke to investigate locations, and often runs non-action bonuses to investigation (e.g. 2x Magnifying Glass, Dark Horse, St Hubert's Key) which allows him to make good use of Sharp Vision when Duke is sleepy. And again, Patrice decks that don't use spells to investigate can make good use of Sharp Vision, since it's free to use (and Patrice has huge resource issues). A Patrice deck that uses no spells or that uses spells to attack but not to investigate can work well - but it doesn't combine with Lantern, so that needs to be borne in mind.

Whereas Brute Force had kind of goofy art, Sharp Vision has amazing art, dripping in Mythos flavour and 1920's glitz (it reminds me of some classic Call of Cthulhu RPG material, too). The mechanical flavour is pretty good, but not as impactful (again, since a basic Investigate test is less of a rarity than a basic Fight test).

Lucid Dreaming

Soooo...this actually seems quite similar to Word of Command above. Being able to pull out theoretically any card in your deck (except 1-of cards) is very powerful, but in doing so, it significantly dents your efficiency. However, whereas Word of Command is sort of like a Mystic Prepared for the Worst, Lucid Dreaming only works on duplicates of cards already in hand or in play. In other words - for an action and a resource, it can become any card you have in hand or play, assuming there's another copy left in your deck.

It's really niche, basically. Niche and slow. It sounds nice to be able to select your gun or your Shrivelling and get your second copy, especially once your first is out of uses, but that requires you to draw Lucid Dreaming, have the first copy of the relevant card, and need the second copy, and be willing to spend an action and a resource for the privilege. While that's occasionally going to pay off, it's not worth the deck space for that offchance - to say nothing of the 2 exp. Don't use this card unless you're getting a special benefit out of it.

However, there are special benefits. The first is to find cards that become more powerful with or require multiple copies - if you have both of Tony's .38 Long Colt in hand, playing one lets you put the other into play for free - so the 1 action and 1 resource for Lucid Dreaming to find the second actually ends up being a net 2 resource saving. The same applies to Easy Mark, where you can play multiple copies for a single action, and the Segment of Onyx and Three Aces, above, both require you to have all 3 copies in hand before you can make use of them. The second is to make use of the search itself via Research cards - Lucid Dreaming searches your entire deck, so it's guaranteed to trigger a Research event (or allow Mandy to hit her weakness) if any is in your deck - and, of course, Mandy can find two targets, if possible (though it would need to be a Myriad card, where you have 1 in hand/play and 2 in deck, since her ability finds an additional target and doesn't repeat the entire effect, so both targets will need to be the same and you need one in play/hand first). The third is to help you set up a specific board state or combo that uses multiple copies of the same card - Evasion economy builds want 2x Pickpocketing to make huge profits from evading enemies, and the increased cost to find the second with Lucid Dreaming will be repaid quickly; finding a second Hot Streak (4) will let you make a huge amount of money immediately, getting a big-money build with Well Connected etc. online right away; if you are running the Hawk-Eye Folding Camera, you probably want to get a second copy out as well if you can spare the hand slots, so you can stack the bonuses (and because it's only worth using if you can charge it up early enough); pure tank gimmick builds want 2x Survival Knife out quickly; builds that like to repeat a combo (e.g. Act of Desperation/Well-Maintained/.45 Thompson) want to get more copies of their combo out to keep the engine going; and event-focused Sefina builds might want to get more copies of The Painted World in hand. I'm sure there's many other possibilities. However: Even in these situations, I'm not sure that Lucid Dreaming is necessarily going to pay off consistently enough. Since it represents a substantial exp investment, it's quite easy to work out if you pay attention while playing - if you often notice wishing that you could get additional copies of cards that you already have into your hand, give it a go - but generally, I would want a variety of good options for Lucid Dreaming, rather than including it for a single other card in my deck. It's not a useless card, but it is a very niche card - which is a perfectly fine place for a Neutral exp card to be.

That art is exceedingly pretty, though. And the mechanical flavour again works rather well - I like the thematic connection of dreaming with effects that key off the Myriad keyword associated with this cycle.

7 hours ago, Allonym said:

In essence, this is a fantastic card. If you don't have a reliable means of discard, it's basically worthless, but if you do, it's easily one of the best accessories -

Moonstone and Patrice’s Violin. If she can get her violin into play first, she even gets a resource to discard it and help her pay for it. Scrounge for Supplies can get it back out of her discard pile if necessary. Give her that, Hemispheric Map, Cornered and Peter and her stat line becomes pretty solid. Then with all of her skill cards, movement through her deck and the stuff she can play from her discard pile, she becomes her own little symphony!

I got sucked into Lucid Dreaming for Mandy for the greedy myriad card grab. I put it into her deck and when it came up and ran smack into her weakness. Serves me right!

The .35 Winchester left me scratching my head too, but I don’t play that many guardians and when I do, rarely use firearms (as my misuse of swift reload proved). So I wasn’t sure if there was something great about that card I just didn’t see. Glad to know that there wasn’t. And a Burglary upgrade seemed a little mystifying, but then I felt the same way about the Alchemical Transmutation upgrade.

Sharp Vision looks very promising and I’m excited for Patrice to give it a whirl.

Spectral Razor looks amazing and I’m with you, I was super happy to see Akachi, who I feel is a dark horse investigator, get some of the limelight.

Three Aces made the rogue/seekers in our group cheer. With Dream Enhancing Serum, search cards and Mr Rook, they finally seem to have a good myriad card, but for the rogue/slash any other class investigators, what are the chances of finding them all? Rogues aren’t best known for their patience and long suffering.

For me, Extensive Research was the oddest card the whole bunch. It was the one I wanted your read on the most, because I couldn’t really see any real advantages. Even now while I’m playing Mandy, I don’t generally have exceedingly large hands. I wind up using my cards for tests or have to discard them because of encounter draws or location requirement events or something. I hadn’t considered it in terms of a Minh deck though and appreciate your thoughts.

Allonym, I just want to double-check something re Practise Makes Perfect and Extensive Research, as I won't be picking up my own copy of Dark Side until this evening - ArkhamDB has PMP listed as a Tactic (and a Gambit), while Extensive Research is down as an Insight, not a Tactic. Is ArkhamDB correct here, or has it gotten the traits mixed up?

If it is right, would you consider Extensive Research in the Insight deck for a Joe Diamond build?

36 minutes ago, dysartes said:

is evening - ArkhamDB has PMP listed as a Tactic (and a Gambit), while Extensive Research is down as an Insight, not a Tactic. Is ArkhamDB correct here, or has it gotten the traits mixed up?

If it is right, would you consider Extensive Research in the Insight deck for a Joe Diamond buil

I’m not Allonym, but I’m still awake and have DoM, so I double checked for you.
Extensive Research is Insight and Practice makes Perfect is Gambit/Tactic. Hope that helps.

Joe Diamonds hunch deck would bring the ER cost down by two... that is an interesting idea. I’d like to know Allonyms thoughts on that as well!

I wouldn't be that excited about running Extensive Research in Joe. I think it's a bit situational for his hunch deck given the hand size requirement, which is significant even with a two resource discount. But if you can regularly have seven or eight cards in hand, go for it.

Practice Makes Perfect in Mark however (The Home Front is Practiced, by the bye)... I'm not sure whether to call that exciting or worrying.

To change topic abruptly: While Mandy could help a Mystic find two spells with Word of Command, they would need to be two copies of the same spell. 'Name a Spell' only resolves once.

Allonym, I wanted to say that I really appreciate your write-ups. I read every word of them; and if I often don't reply it's only because they are so thorough and well-thought-out that there's nothing left to add.

3 hours ago, dysartes said:

Allonym, I just want to double-check something re Practise Makes Perfect and Extensive Research, as I won't be picking up my own copy of Dark Side until this evening - ArkhamDB has PMP listed as a Tactic (and a Gambit), while Extensive Research is down as an Insight, not a Tactic. Is ArkhamDB correct here, or has it gotten the traits mixed up?

If it is right, would you consider Extensive Research in the Insight deck for a Joe Diamond build?

ArkhamDB is correct and I was mistaken (stupid mistake, but in my defense I am ill). So the analysis about Stick to the Plan and Extensive Research is wrong. Transposing that to Practice Makes Perfect, it's not really a card I'd prioritise for Stick to the Plan so the analysis is basically "yes, you can use it with Stick to the Plan if you want"...

Extensive Research for Joe Diamond is an interesting question. Joe gains a huge amount from Higher Education so if you're going that route you want to keep a healthy hand - 5 cards plus his discount makes it a not-terrible 3 resources. However, he also has a lot of things he needs to do - investigate like a Seeker, fight like a Guardian, and keep his economy stable to do both - so it's very hard to just keep lots of cards in hand for him. Later on, if course, it becomes easier to have lots of cards, with exp cards like Cryptic Research.

Generally, it's best to prioritise cards that are easy to play for the Hunch Deck, since you have no control over what order they appear in your hunches - Working A Hunch is naturally a perfect fit since you can play it for 0 and the only prerequisite is that there's a clue to discover; with Extensive Research, it requires an action, requires 2 clues to make proper use of it, and if is comes up on a turn where you happen to not have loads of cards in hand, the 2-resource discount won't do much to attenuate the cost.

Also, since Extensive Research is a 0 exp card, even if you do go Higher Education and lots of draw, there'll be a few scenarios before it comes online where you have a card you can't properly use - that isn't really worth the payoff.

So I think that Extensive Research in Joe's hunch deck will be poor at low exp, inconsistent at best, and run contrary to how he wants to play. Might still work out, but even at best will be low-impact.

3 hours ago, Spritz Tea said:

I wouldn't be that excited about running Extensive Research in Joe. I think it's a bit situational for his hunch deck given the hand size requirement, which is significant even with a two resource discount. But if you can regularly have seven or eight cards in hand, go for it.

Practice Makes Perfect in Mark however (The Home Front is Practiced, by the bye)... I'm not sure whether to call that exciting or worrying.

To change topic abruptly: While Mandy could help a Mystic find two spells with Word of Command, they would need to be two copies of the same spell. 'Name a Spell' only resolves once.

Allonym, I wanted to say that I really appreciate your write-ups. I read every word of them; and if I often don't reply it's only because they are so thorough and well-thought-out that there's nothing left to add.

Ah, you had the same analysis of Extensive Research but managed to do it far more succinctly.

Practice Makes Perfect in Mark is interesting. Being able to pull out The Home Front or Vicious Blow is potentially very powerful. However...there's not much else for Mark. You could run Overpower, and there's Take the Initiative (but Take the Initiative doesn't work all that well with Practice Makes Perfect), but Mark doesn't need skills like other people do, since he can use Sophie to get +2 and card draw every turn, or as much as he likes without additional draw, as long as he has healing available. He also tears through his deck very quickly. Most Mark decks I've run include only Vicious Blow and The Home Front as skills, and at that point you're very likely to miss with the search (especially if you've already seen one or more of your skills). On the other hand, being able to use The Home Front multiple times is a great deal. I'll certainly try it out with my next Mark deck.

That's a great point about Word of Command + Mandy, it's still quite a situational interaction. Getting both copies of Shrivelling out of your deck is awesome, but often you will already want to have one copy in your opening hand.

And thank you! It's great to know that I'm not just shouting into the void. Glad that you enjoy my posts.