Soul Sanctification

Soul Sanctification

This card is probably going to allow 'heal decks' to become a thing.

Right now, there are cards that ask gently to have a 'heal engine.' Cards like Field Agent, Beat Cop (2), Agency Backup, Guard Dog, and Spirit of Humanity allow you to convert healing into positive tempo.

The problem with these cards is that while the combination is positive tempo (You can trade, for example, a card and action from Soothing Melody into 2 clues or 2 damage with the 'pain for gain' guardian allies) you need to hit very exact numbers to actually get those benefits. If you heal 1 damage from beat cop but he doesn't have any lost sanity (or to be honest even if he does a bit) you are paying a card and action for just 1 damage, which isn't great. It is... fiddly.

Soul Sanctification makes focusing on healing allies a lot less fiddly because you now can utilize healing cards to get a fairly good effect whenever you have excessive 'flex-heal' or when you have a heal and nothing to use it on. +2 to a skill test for every point healed often is going to be just a bit less efficient than these little auto pings of damage and clues. You are paying a lot for the ability to just ignore healing the asset (and you need to not heal the asset for 'single target' heals), but luckily it is also good enough to run as its own self contained strategy, which is what I think really seals this as an 'archetype.'

Good heal cards in Arkham tend to heal at least 2 per-action, meaning that Soul Sanctification allows them to become a more flexible activation of Encyclopedia you can bank. And that is a lower end good heal card, you can do MUCH better.

For example, in survivor and mystic, assuming you can hit at least a 6 test value on Earthly Serenity, your looking at 'spend 2 actions, get +12 spread across important tests. If your Daisy, you can utilize medical texts alongside or instead of Dream Diary in order to constantly generate 2 phantom unexpected courage cards every turn which is an extremely competitive use of her free book activation.

Not every deck wants to run this, but it completely changes the value of healing for a lot of characters. Outside of the obvious of Carolyn and Vincent, some other good candidates for this card include Mark, Leo, Daisy, and Skids (especially || front, X back Skids) of all people.

Edit to clarify how strong the impact of this card is, because I nerded out about the conceptual space it opened and burried the lead.

Its easy to think 'its just a skill test bonus' its critical to look at how strong any sort of spammable skill test bonus is in Arkham. Cards like Well Connected and Dream Diary (which Soul Sanctification compares to extremely well) are super valuable because guaranteeing a pass on anything but autofail once per turn tends to be a game winning effect, and more impactful than being able to do something like guarantee an extra clue once per turn, because the main way you lose in Arkham is getting put behind on tempo by negative effects from the scenario. Clue acceleration helps you catch up, but often the best strategy is to just literally never fall behind.

This may be the best card of that genre now. While Well Connected provides massive over-success numbers, it costs you something to fire it twice per turn. While that fits into the decks it wants to be in very well, it limits its generic applicability in some ways. Dream Diary, if you are dreaming the 'correct' dream, is usually an 'auto-sans-tentacles' once per turn for the mere cost of a hand slot, but you can't bank it, meaning that while it applies to the most critical test of your turn, you can't 'burst' with it in the same way you can as well connected.

What makes soul sanctification absurd is that for every 2 healing you can generate, you get a better version of essence of the dream that will stack until you use it, and even 1 healing will match it depending on context. This is a huge deal because it means you can do things like run your 'essence of the heal' for mythos defense without reducing your ability to use it to land a clutch attack, or to solve an important scenario test, or do whatever. The only cost is how hard it is to generate healing.

The worst case scenario is usually that it becomes a very good upgrade on encyclopedia to do whatever your doing: wasting 1 action to generate +2 on two different actions. That is still a very good use of a card and some XP, encyclopedia isn't bad (even outside of Daisy) and the flexibility of converting dead actions into future value is huge. Imagine if every action you didn't take let you pass a mythos card test automatically. That would be an action worth taking most turns on characters with middling mythos defense, and even really defensively solid characters would take it often.

But it can get SO much better. If you can find a way to either get more than 2 healing off a card, or to get healing without spending actions, suddenly you will start generating a LOT of offerings for soul sanctification that start pushing you to the 'never fail tests' category of play, which can be silly.

Its sorta like taking the time to generate 20 resources for a well connected deck. Even though generating 20+ resources isn't a normal goal for decks, the promise of never failing a mythos test and generally passing any critical test on your turn on top is so potent it is worth not just doing that, but making significant sacrifices to do that.

When you make that comparison, soul sanctification is clearly 'easier' to get test value from: you get a +4 for generating 2 healing on 1 action, which is going to be easier and often more repeatable for a deck than generating 8 resources over even 2 actions, but its also more 'bursty.' Well connected takes a lot of effort to 'take off' and then basically rockets to the moon, while soul sanctification 'coasts' more: You never are going to be without it when you really need it and you have a WAY stronger level 0 and early scenario deck than well connected decks, but your going to probably 'smear' the actions you sacrifice to soul sanctification over a scenario more.

dezzmont · 218
Thanks for the write-up! — Innsmouth Conspirator · 63
What gimps this card for me is that it only applies to excess heals for investigators, not allies. There are actually less cards in the game that heal investigators specifically rather than allies. I know you mentioned the combo with Daisy. However, I don't think Daisy wants to spend her time building up a stockpile of Unexpected Courage that she can use twice per test. As a Seeker with an investigator ability that synergizes with Tomes, she has a lot more interesting and powerful options than spending time with Earthly Serenity. The build you say is viable, but it doesn't sound optimal and more of a way to utilize a new and fiddly card. — Innsmouth Conspirator · 63
What makes heal decks more viable now is not this card but Vincent Lee the investigator's deckbuild options. Because he can use any cards 0-5 that can heal, he has a wide library of deckbuilding options. Runic Axe becomes monstrous with him, and he can be a very effective fighter even as a primary cluever. Coupled with cards like Shrewd Analysis, and suddenly Vincent has even more access to a whole gamut of cards he otherwise normally wouldn't have. — Innsmouth Conspirator · 63
The fact a card heals allies and investigators and not just investigators in no way makes this card worse. While it is true you must heal the gator to get the benefit, thinking that makes the card worse with soul santification is like saying Faustian Bargain is worse personal economy because you can use it to give cash to others. Having played multiple Soul Sanctification decks (Daisy and Roland specifically) on both normal and hard, I can say quite definitively its 'worth it.' For example, in Daisy, medical texts becomes 2 dream diary charges per-turn, which is USUALLY better than dream diary on its own. The ability to bank the bonuses is absurd too: You can use them to get pretty much immune to the mythos phase in concert with a dream diary (testing at +6 is a HELL of a drug!) while also letting you ensure every critical action you make goes off without a hitch. Gathering a ton of clues or doing a lot of damage is flashy, but 'I literally don't fail tests this game' is a huge effect that is arguably better than either of those, and soul santification allows it. Vincent (and Carolyn) are obvious candidates for it, but do not sleep on the idea of playing a heal deck outside of them, and I think honestly the 'heal Daisy' deck is a stronger heal synergy deck than Vincent's is.. — dezzmont · 218
it says "investigator", not allies — Lobstrocity · 2
The actual reason this is even better in Vincent than in Carolyn is Bonesaw. Just use it on your self and don't care about the trauma. There's your action economy. — AlderSign · 309

Soul Sanctification

Soul Sanctification

Edited because idk what im doing in this forum and i cant delete a review. 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters 200 characters

LunR · 21
Normally you can't trigger an effect if this don't change the gamestate. But put an offering on this card is a game change. So with this card you should be able to heal a healthy investigator. — Tharzax · 1
Here is the review section, not the question section. Anyway, as I know, that's arguable ruling. Could you ask this question into FFG and update into this review? That may be great contribution to this community, I think. You can ask into FFG via https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/contact/rules/ — elkeinkrad · 499
Yes that would still work, that's the big draw for the card. " — Vlishy · 3

Stealth

Stealth

This card is going to have a second life with Kymani, the evader’s evader. The tricky thing is, this card isn’t for the first evade you do a round; it’s for the second. That one doesn’t matter if you exhaust an enemy, because they’re exhausted. Combined with the police whistle, it might feel that the grappling hook becomes secondary in many cases. (It really depends where clues are versus enemies on the board.) Still, a +2 and a free action for something you want to do almost every turn of the game in multiplayer, hard to beat.

(There’s also a combo using stealth on your nemesis weakness or the Guardian of the crystallizer, because those enemies won’t engage anyone else, even if you leave them in a room with three other investigators!)

MrGoldbee · 1470
I see no real value of the Riot Whistle in Kymani? They has (have?) any number of free engage built into their ability, as long as they are exhausted. Sure, they could engage enemies off other investigators or aloof ones, but that seems not enough value to me. — Susumu · 371
Depends on the team really, if they are primarily an enemy manager in group with 3 seekers, they will probably be taking an engage action most turns. If they are solo clearly it's all but useless. Most games will be somewhere between those two extremes — NarkasisBroon · 10
Many of the people that you want to discard but can’t kill are aloof. The best example is probably silver twilight lodge members. — MrGoldbee · 1470
Fair, that sounds like sick deck tec for "For the Greater Good". I can see now including the Whistle for certain scenarios with Adaptable. But I think in most cases, Kymani will have better cards in that slot. — Susumu · 371
I think both opinion are good. That's your preference, and I think either is not bad. — elkeinkrad · 499
Here, I add one more opinion. Kymani could evade any enemy in their location using Breaking and Entering; then, they can engage for free. Morever, Breaking and Entering (2) will be released, so that they can play it for each round. — elkeinkrad · 499
Enemies exhaust after they attack you during the enemy phase, so you can actually use this as Kymani to kill them for 0 actions in the enemy phase, though you eat an attack for doing so. — belphagor · 8
The fast trigger for Stealth (3) only works during an investigator's turn so you can't activate it during the enemy phase, except through Honed Instinct (with the taking damage/horror trigger) shenenigans, and I'm not sure if that works because the true meaning of "as if" still eludes me. — koaexe · 29

Mist-Pylon

Mist-Pylon

I am wondering can it cancel Sophie’s direct damage by Mark Hurrigan? Since there is no such constraint that this effect can only be activated once per turn, Mark may have infinite skill value. Do I understand the effect correctly? Or maybe the direct damage from Sophie cannot activate this effect?

wzh719 · 1
You can, but you won't get + 2 skill value, because taking damage from Sophie is a cost, so when you cancel damage, cost won't be paid, and effect from Sophie won't resolve. — Kryha30 · 17
Compare the rule for canceling. There is written that canceling something the effect is not initiated. This means you don't initiate the payment and therefore can't use the card effect. — Tharzax · 1
Just to be contrary. While "if you cancel the costs you cancel the effect" is common in ffg rpgs, and could perhaps be inferred from some rulings. It's not written anywhere in the rules or faq. The closest thing is when it comes time to pay the cost if you cannot pay the cost the effect is cancelled. That's in the advanced initiation sequence which is in the faq iirc — NarkasisBroon · 10
*lcgs not rpgs — NarkasisBroon · 10
That being said the section on cancelling in the rrg only says that you can cancel effects, so it could easily be argued you can't cancel costs at all, the word cancel doesn't even apply to costs — NarkasisBroon · 10
You can also argue that the active wording of taking damage is not covered from the pylons description which implies that the damage is dealt — Tharzax · 1

Toe to Toe

Toe to Toe

I just wanted to add a little note of great value here, since the other reviews here already cover it nicely: when an enemy attacks, they exhaust and do not attack again in the enemy phase. They do stay engaged. Exhausted enemies do not make attacks of opportunity.

Imagine you go toe to toe with an enemy, then you you become besties for the rest of the round because they stick with you even when walking!

It’s weird an I like it. Please correct me if I’m wrong! See rules for enemy phase for the exhaust rule.

Weges · 92
The enemy does not exhaust due to Toe to Toe. The enemy exhaust only if they attack during eneny phase 3.3. All other attack does not cause exhaustion. — elkeinkrad · 499
It seems that another review covers Daniel's ability, but it's not common case. — elkeinkrad · 499
Yeah, it would make Daniela's ability to evade totaly moot and AoO much less of an issue, if the enemy would exhaust when attacking outside of enemy phase as well. Note, that they semi-erratad "Watcher's Grasp" in the Return to Box, because this card let the Watcher exhaust, because it attacks, as if it were the enemy phase. — Susumu · 371