I have to ask: other than being really fun flavor/theme-wise... what do you see this card most useful for? Who would you put it in, and what targets would you be looking for?

Additionally, is this the kind of card you feel should be discussed before played? Or is this the kind of card you're going to whip out just to cause some friendly hijinks and fun stories?

These sorts of cards are very interesting to me because they are verging on the edge of potential griefing tools. Ideally, they should not be used for that, but what should they be used for? And how much table talk will you allow?

I would expect it to be most useful for Rogues with lots of Resources, with Jenny and Preston topping that list, followed by anyone who can take it who could take advantage of a card that might not otherwise show up in play.

And that plays directly into what to use it on - anything that costs 4-7 Resources to play.
Remember all the discussion of who exactly would ever be able to afford Agency Backup? I'm sure Preston can.
Follow that up with Jenny grabbing Mark's spare Lightning Gun. Or better yet, Tommy managing it after a Hot Streak.
What if Sefina or Ashcan Pete snagged a spare Rite of Seeking (4) while the Mystic is Shriveling or Withering enemies with abandon.
And it can get a Seal of the Seventh Sign into play while the Mystic is busy.
Then let's team Preston with Charlie Ross so Preston is paying for one of those big ticket assets for someone every round.
Finally, almost anything that would be really useful to get on the table now, except, dagnabbit, whoever has it happens to be getting swarmed and just cannot spare the action without taking a ridiculous amount of damage.

You can take the Agency Backup your Guardian can't afford.

The part that I noticed is that the card does not explicitly say to play an asset. So, in the case that you would use "You Owe Me One" would you automatically choose an asset? Yes, there are plenty of high cost assets, but is that the best target for the card?

If you play "You Owe Me One" on Wendy, for instance, and choose an event, she may be able to simply replay the card herself on her next turn as it would be dumped into the owner's discard.

Barring recursion options, what other events would "You Owe Me" be beneficial to look at? If it weren't a Rogue card, I could see using it on a high resource generator like Hot Streak. Maybe one of the seeker card draw cards? Perhaps Sefina wants to make some "Presposterous Sketches" ?

If you happened to be fishing for events, it combos nicely with Double/Double.

Just so I am interpreting this correctly, this card takes two actions, right? It says you may play, not you may put in to play... So, if you play You Owe Me One, that's an action, you look at your partners hand, you choose to play Emergency Cache, since that isn't fast, that's another action... yes? Assuming I am right about this, this seems a pretty weak card IMO. Somewhat like Teamwork, maybe a little stronger, but not by much, and teamwork hasn't exactly been rocking the meta recently. If I am wrong about this, I still don't think the card is amazing, a reasonable, average card.

One tricky part is that you're not exactly allowed to ask what's in your allies' hand, meaning that what you play with You Owe Me One is kind of not entirely up to you. You could ask your partner if they had a strong asset to play, or an event that could help the situation, but other than that....

Your friend also has to include the card you want. Asking Roland to include Agency Backup in his deck just so that you can play it if you both happen to have the right card in hand at the same time, is a big ask. So even though Agency Backup seems great on paper, in practice it's probably not really something that is going to be accomplished all that much.

As far as targets that are good, big weapons seem like the most straightforward. Pathfinder is slotless and great, if your ally doesnt murder you for stealing it from them (maybe they are running 2 copies and you have YOMO when they have their second in hand?). Tarot cards are in a similar spot, if you dont fancy the rogue one and an ally of yours has a tarot card in hand that is a second copy or something...

Events are, by their nature, good possibilities but situational. I can see dynamite blast being handy, for example.

Hmm Good observation about the action cost. I’m actually not sure. I expected it to work like the painted world that lets you play a card essentially at no extra cost, but the painted world is playing itself as a copy of a different card which would be 1 action and is entirely different.

If it does in fact take 2 actions that would be very disappointing. Even in Rogue decks that sometimes have extra actions, it just would not be worth it.

EDIT: I submitted a rules question request for this one, as I am honestly not sure how it is intended to play. Will post an update if/when I get an answer.

I would definitely look to combo it with Double/Double and fish for an event. Double Dynamite Blast was the first thing I thought of once I got past Agency Backup.

As for the 2 action cost, sure that is a pain, but I look at the card again and note that it has the tag Favor, which immediately makes me think of Preston. Just what else is he going to with his state line of 1 but pay Resources and Actions for other Investigators?
And of course that makes the combo with Double/Double even more useful, reducing the action cost to 1-1/2 to use someone else's Event.

Preston has a lot of good options for his turn including very potent Fire Axe use, moving, banking his resources (if needed), or playing events like Money Talks, etc.

I also don't love a card that is designed with only a single investigator in mind. The majority of all investigators are going to be hurt by having fewer actions (or to look at it another way, by paying the action cost twice to play a single event that you should not know exactly how it is going to be used). Double, Double is exceptional and level 4 making it quite expensive experience-wise to include, just to get a level 0 card up to being decent for one investigator.

I'm hoping that the card is only supposed to take 1 action in total to play.

I would be very surprised if it takes two actions to play a non-fast card. We see the same "play" wording on Calling in Favors: "Then, search the top 9 cards of your deck for an Ally asset and play it, reducing its cost by X." My understanding is that Playing an event gives you everything on that event card, much like using Ursula's reaction ability gives you the investigate action for free. The "put into play" wording is used when you don't have to pay the resource cost of the card you are putting into play.

Edit: To answer the thread's questions, in my regular play group I would discuss the card before playing it, but I could see myself using it out of the blue for a laugh with other people. One of this games strengths is that there are a lot of ways to play it, different kinds of experiences it can produce, and I see "You Owe Me One" as a kind of microcosm of that flexibility.

One oddball idea I had was for Finn to use this card to play Telescopic Sight, the Circle Undone card pool gave him several two handed guns and Telescopic Sight might actually be useful for Finn. I also imagine him being able to pluck a Logical Reasoning from a seeker buddy's hand from across the map. This kind of thing is dependant on how you handle table talk but can be done even if you only allow indirect communication about your hand, for example, the Carolyn player might say "If you have "You Owe Me One" this might be a good time to play it.

More generally, if I am right about the action costs, the card is pretty good as long as you hit anything in your friend's hand that you are happy to play. You effectively get to play a card without reducing your (or your buddy's) hand size - it's like granting a free draw action. The downside is that normally, if you don't build around this card, the cards you put in your own deck are more use than cards in another investigator's deck.

A few kinds of cards are especially useful to hit: expensive cards in the hands of a big-money rogue, otherwise-useless duplicate copies of cards (Track Shoes (!)), or situational events -- they become less situational when another investigator has access to them (Astral Travel, Dynamite Blast, Logical Reasoning).

3 hours ago, Soakman said:

Preston has a lot of good options for his turn including very potent Fire Axe use, moving, banking his resources (if needed), or playing events like Money Talks, etc.

I also don't love a card that is designed with only a single investigator in mind. The majority of all investigators are going to be hurt by having fewer actions (or to look at it another way, by paying the action cost twice to play a single event that you should not know exactly how it is going to be used). Double, Double is exceptional and level 4 making it quite expensive experience-wise to include, just to get a level 0 card up to being decent for one investigator.

I'm hoping that the card is only supposed to take 1 action in total to play.

Okay, and when he has not drawn his Fire Axe? Or cannot move? Or needs to save Money Talks?
And as it goes, playing "You Owe Me One" then the subsequent card is the same action cost as banking his resources then using them to play a card.

As for a card designed for only a single Investigator, just because Preston is likely to have the most opportunity and resources to take advantage of it does not mean he is the only one who gains from it.
The only thing I would note on that account is that the card is useless except in multiplayer. But then there are already a number of cards like that.

As for Double, Double, is excellent in and of itself. That it also enhances "You Owe Me One" does not reduce the utility of either card.

It would be nice if "You Owe Me One" takes only 1 action, but requiring 2 will not ruin it.

I'm pretty certain that you won't need to spend a second action to play the chosen card with "You Owe Me One". This is for two reasons:

One, "Play" is an action you can take, much like Move, Fight, Evade, Investigate, etc. (RR, "Play Action"), but it is also a game concept separate and distinct from the Play Action (RR, "Play"). You don't necessarily need to take the Play Action in order to Play a card, if some other card effect allows you to do so (due to the Golden Rules). This is similar to how you can move without using a Move Action (e.g. Shortcut).

Reason two is Joey "The Rat" Vigil. His free triggered ability allows you to play an item asset, and to do so you have to pay all costs but you don't have to pay the action to take the Play Action. Indeed, if you did, he would be absolutely pointless. The ArkhamDB link contains a rules response confirming this interaction. If Joey "The Rat" Vigil lets you Play an asset as a free triggered ability, then "You Owe Me One" and Double, Double will let you Play the relevant card at no additional action cost.

Needlessly technical pedantry below:

Indeed, the designer response to Joey "The Rat" Vigil (found at the above link) could be a bit more clearly worded, as the action to play an asset is not actually part of the "cost" of a card at all - it's instead what you need to do in order to take the Play Action, which in turn permits you to play the card, as the actual cost to play a card itself is the resource cost in the top left corner of the card. Taking the Play Action is not the same as paying the cost to activate an ability that requires an action; you can take an action in order to fulfil the cost to activate an Action triggered ability, but other actions aren't technically "costs", merely ways to use your actions. The only things in the game that are "Costs" per se are the resource cost printed in the top left of player cards, any costs expressed in the cost portion of an ability printed on a card, and any game text or element that explicitly specifies that something is a cost. (RR "Action", "Ability", "Costs").

Now, I obviously can't speak to designer intent and there's every possibility that these cards are meant to cost an extra action, but the rules as they are indicate the opposite.

Uncage the Soul is another good example for the lack of an extra action cost. Have people actually been playing that it requires a second action, or has this one just come out of the woodwork for You Owe Me One?

I personally have not been playing that it costs an additional action (in the case of other cards), but I could see how it might read that way. I thought I might have been playing incorrectly, which is why I requested clarification.

I had originally (and currently) assumed that if a card's text instructed you to play a card, the action to pay for the initial card to be played would be the only action required. After all, you have triggered an effect that is telling you to play something, and it is not (in and of itself) a separate 'play' action.

Either way, I still think outside of this, that this card is a fascinating card to discuss. Is it a sneaky maneuver? Is it a fully realized plan? Is it more flexible than we might anticipate?

52 minutes ago, Buhallin said:

Uncage the Soul is another good example for the lack of an extra action cost. Have people actually been playing that it requires a second action, or has this one just come out of the woodwork for You Owe Me One?

This. Uncaged the Soul wouldn't be so good if it cost you an additional action. If a card tells you to play a card, that is part of that card's action.

I have not either, I dont know why it occurred to me on this card, when as others have pointed out there are other cards with similar wording. It didnt occur to me before. But either way, it's good to get a ruling if possible. Didn't want to derail the discussion too much. So let's assume it is the 1-action way.

As I said in my previous post, I'm still not super-convinced that this is going to make any sort of a splash, beyond people just trying it out. I can't really think of too many situations where I would want to do this. On the other hand, if it were purely a 0 cost event that read: "You and another player each draw 1 card" would that be playable? Maybe. So... this gives you more than that, I suppose... I just dont really like the idea of stealing my partner's tools.

1 hour ago, awp832 said:

I have not either, I dont know why it occurred to me on this card, when as others have pointed out there are other cards with similar wording. It didnt occur to me before. But either way, it's good to get a ruling if possible. Didn't want to derail the discussion too much. So let's assume it is the 1-action way.

As I said in my previous post, I'm still not super-convinced that this is going to make any sort of a splash, beyond people just trying it out. I can't really think of too many situations where I would want to do this. On the other hand, if it were purely a 0 cost event that read: "You and another player each draw 1 card" would that be playable? Maybe. So... this gives you more than that, I suppose... I just dont really like the idea of stealing my partner's tools.

That's an interesting way to look at it, but it would feel underwhelming to me without the additional effect. For you, it would be like using a card to do a standard draw action, while for the other player it would be okay I suppose, BUT the caveat is that in this case they are not gaining a card, they are replacing one that is chosen by someone else.

I think you have convinced me though that it is overall fine (at 1 action). I bet it would see more use or play if you reduced the resource cost of the card targeted though.

Ever Vigilant really sucks if every play takes an action (it doesn't).

5 minutes ago, CSerpent said:

Ever Vigilant really sucks if every play takes an action (it doesn't).

And it seems unlikely that they would design it that way given that it is a Guardian card, and they don't tend to get a lot of extra actions in the normal course of events... certainly not ones that could be freely used with this...

So in terms of the card's actual power level...I think it can have four different broad "levels" of power.

The lowest, kind of the "fail state", is that you play it, look at someone's hand, and then realise you don't really have any good options - or you choose something to play and it ends up being pretty pointless or at least an inefficient play. This is more likely if you are playing with very strict secrecy about what's in everyone's hands, but the "rules" regarding that are very explicitly optional rules for "flavour" and even then you can easily circumvent it, simply saying something like "Man, if you happen to have the ability to call in that favour I owe you, now's a good time", without harming even the spirit of the rules. But anyway, if you do use "You Owe Me One" (hereafter "YOMO") and end up using it to play a card that is completely pointless, you're down an action and 0 cards (both "YOMO" and the targeted card are replaced) - but this fail state is going to be rare or nonexistent with even the most basic level of team play and communication.

The baseline power if you use it "correctly" is that you kind of throw "YOMO" out there to pull off a decent play, like if you say 'I have some resources, anyone have anything they can't afford'; e.g. Preston doesn't have much to do with his inheritance, Jenny's swimming in resources, or you have a spare action and someone else doesn't because they're in the middle of a fight. This seems to be the "intended" power of the card. You could buy something from the Guardian's hand that they can't afford and therefore "share" your strong economy, play Art Student when you're at a high-shroud location and your Seeker isn't in order to more efficiently gather clues, get an ally out when you have an empty slot and the person holding the ally card doesn't, and so forth. In this case, your team is up one card - you've replaced "YOMO", your friend has replaced the card from hand, and the targeted card itself is now in play (or has had its effect, if an event). Since you get that "double cantrip" effect, it's as if, in terms of economy, the targeted event or asset replaced itself in addition to its normal text - unless it was otherwise fast, at which point the efficiency takes a major drop. I think this is kind of fine in terms of power but it's a bit too efficient. You're getting to play more efficiently (using cards that would go to waste from someone else's hand, using events at a more convenient location, using your superior economy to enable the team to play cards more efficiently) while also getting a strict economy boost over what the card would otherwise have been. I really think it shouldn't have had the double-cantrip, or should have cost a resource on its own, but it's not going to break the game as is, and the possibility of it lingering in hand until a good target arises in someone else's hand does counteract that a bit.

The higher level of power is using it to do something you couldn't normally do at all. Tony Morgan (or any combat rogue build) ignoring the poor selection of high-level rogue cards by taking the Guardian's spare Flamethrower; grabbing one of the "utility" spells like Seal of the Seventh Sign, Protective Incantation or Scrying (3) to use in one of your own spell slots which you otherwise have no use for, enabling the mystic to use their precious slots for other things; grabbing Shrivelling on Wendy (or Shrivelling (5) on Sefina) for higher combat potential than you would ever be able to achieve on your own; Leo Anderson or Zoey Samaras getting someone's Ace in the Hole to give them the actions they need to murder the boss in one turn (or Rex Murphy getting Ace in the Hole for 5 investigate actions in a single turn to utterly annihilate the act); "Ashcan" Pete getting a powerful exhaust asset like Agency Backup and using it twice as often as anyone else; and so on. I think this use is a bit of a problem, because, well, there's a reason that investigators have deck restrictions, as access (or lack of access) to cards from other classes is a crucial aspect to the power of an investigator. Carolyn Fern has a very flexible deckbuilding allowance and paid an entire stat point for the privilege, for example - giving anyone with Rogue 0 theoretical access (albeit very limited) to the entire card pool inherently weakens that aspect of the game design. On the one hand, you're reliant on what the other players have in their decks and hands, and there's no guarantee that, say, the Guardian will draw their spare big gun early enough for you to use it, but on the other hand, access to the entire (non-skill) card pool is a lot for a card that is already efficient and available to more than 1/3 of investigators.

The highest level of power is to break the game. Since "YOMO" lets any investigator who can get rogue cards access any asset or event from any class, the potential for combinations of cards that break the game increases massively. At some point, there'll be a combination of a level 5 Seeker card, a level 3 Survivor card and a level 4 Rogue card that previously would have been impossible, but "YOMO" enables this. Game-breaking combos aren't exactly conducive to enjoying the game, but the very existence of "YOMO" narrows the design space of the game, assuming the designers are assiduously taking into account possible combinations and degenerate interactions when designing new cards, because you can't think "well, these two would be amazing together, but they're both level 5 from different classes so they'll never see play together". Truly broken combos are never going to be a major concern (as much as I decry the whole "it's a co-op game, balance doesn't matter" argument as untrue and facile) because, well, if you are just sitting around until you assemble your game-ending supercombo, you might as well just play Solitaire and save time and money because you're no longer playing Arkham Horror, but it still worries me to see a card like this printed because the potential for combos that are "too good to be balanced" but not so good as to be obviously unfun is obvious, and it kind of signals almost...recklessness in terms of design. Given that we've recently seen a clear signal that balance concerns are being addressed, it's a bit baffling to me.

Leaving aside the possibility of super-combos, though, I think this card is overall a bit too strong. If used properly it will either be too efficient, or too efficient and also too good. Not like, Rex Murphy strong or Drawing Thin strong or Studious strong, but still a bit overtuned. In that regard, it adds to my anxieties about recent card design - in my view, we've seen a number of overpowered (or at least undercosted) cards, accompanied by a number of underpowered (or certainly overcosted) cards. And yet...I don't think I can be bothered to ever play "You Owe Me One", because it's so much work. In order to use it most effectively, you have to communicate with everyone about everything in hand, constantly think about whether you'll draw it and when you'll play it and what the best choice might be, you might even encourage your team to take it into account for deckbuilding and exp spending. And I can't be bothered with all that, and it could slow the game to a crawl. I'd rather have gotten a completely different Rogue card, perhaps a properly excellent high-level weapon to herald the release of Tony Morgan...

11 minutes ago, CSerpent said:

Ever Vigilant really sucks if every play takes an action (it doesn't).

Can you imagine? Leo Anderson with Leo de Luca (or I guess Zoey) would be the only one even able to use it to its full extent, unless you also pitch a Police Badge or something, and even then it would be strictly worse than Emergency Cache (0)...!

I too was a bit concerned about the potential to really not be able to monitor card synergies because of this card. It is completely amazing to me that Rogues can theoretically use any non-skill card in the game now (with the caveat that it is in somebody’s deck.) It is such a weird card design choice which is why I’m struggling with my feelings about it. Excellently organized thoughts about the power tiers the card could fall into. Thank you for that perspective.

This may be obvious, but there is a long list of fast, reactive (that is with the text: "Play when..." or "Play after...") events in the game; few or none of which can be used with "You Owe Me One". And even if it is possible it would probably require jumping through a lot of hoops to take an action at the right timing point.

On 7/29/2019 at 9:23 PM, Spritz Tea said:

This may be obvious, but there is a long list of fast, reactive (that is with the text: "Play when..." or "Play after...") events in the game; few or none of which can be used with "You Owe Me One". And even if it is possible it would probably require jumping through a lot of hoops to take an action at the right timing point.

I was just looking at this. There are 22 non-Rogue, non-Neutral events greater than level 2. Many of them are Fast, to be played as reactions or during player windows (would you be able to play those? It seems to me no, as you are in the middle of a Play action). Most of the rest, the owner is more likely the better person to play it. It's the few that grant a boon -- more actions, more resources -- that you'll really want this for, which means it's best for non-Rogues who can take it, as far as Events. Assets....that's a lot to look through.

But speaking of Painted World...I don't see any reason you couldn't use this to play that out of Sefina's hand.

For that matter, anyone's signature assets and events are game, right?

EDIT: No, they are not. The FAQ disallows controlling others' signature cards.

1 minute ago, CSerpent said:

I was just looking at this. There are 22 non-Rogue, non-Neutral events greater than level 2. Many of them are Fast, to be played as reactions or during player windows (would you be able to play those? It seems to me no, as you are in the middle of a Play action). Most of the rest, the owner is more likely the better person to play it. It's the few that grant a boon -- more actions, more resources -- that you'll really want this for, which means it's best for non-Rogues who can take it.

But speaking of Painted World...I don't see any reason you couldn't use this to play that out of Sefina's hand.

For that matter, anyone's signature assets and events are game, right?

Huh. I wonder about the signatures... That is also an excellent point. That could be a disaster. Signature assets say "X deck only" but it's not in your deck. Sefina with a "You Owe Me One" Wendy's Amulet? 🤔

Oh, good heavens! You can take Diana's Twilight Blade and play more of her cards!

Though I suppose that was already possible with Teamwork.

No, per the FAQ: An investigator cannot control another investigator’s signature cards