Act of Desperation

For "Ashcan" Pete, Finn Edwards, Wendy Adams, Jenny Barnes, Preston Fairmont, Tony Morgan and Rita Young:

Have some real money-making fun by using Sleight of Hand to cheat an expensive item into play, then use Act of Desperation for a whopping payout! It's like cashing in a refund for something you didn't buy!

snacc · 1021
Except sleight of hand needs the item to be IN PLAY at the end of the turn to return to your hand. You get the money, but you lose the item... — aurchen · 262
Correct, but you still paid one and got back probably a lot more than one. — StyxTBeuford · 13051
@aurchen yep that tends to be how refunds normally work! — snacc · 1021
Of course, there are only about 8 one hand resources that cost more than 3, so you might be better off playing Emergency Cash rather than 3 other cards, although, to be fair, you don't get to shoot your enemy twice with Emergency Cache and then throw it at your enemy's head. So, hilarious but not efficient? — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
Someday, though, I want to empty the Guardian .45 Thompson (getting 6 resources), throw it at an enemy's head for 2 damage, and get 6 resources for my troubles. I am working on a Tommy Muldoon deck, so my dream might come true. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
Note that, in addition to Tommy, Mark, Zoey, and Finn can also do the Guardian Thompson + Act of Desperation combo — Zinjanthropus · 231
This card is the single biggest tentacle magnet in the game. I can't tell you how many times I — Pinchers · 133
(Continued) I've pulled that blasted red token when the stakes are so high: +6 to hit, 2 damage, and 6 resources to cash out an empty gun and keep the party going. And guess what? Act of Desperation is somehow linked to the autofail on some infallible metaphysical level. But yeah--it's a great card. — Pinchers · 133
Considering the most recent taboo allows sleight to be used on Thompson again, you could sleight the Thompson into play for 1, shoot as many times as you can (Finn could play Ace in the Hole), then AoD for just a massive swing of resources. — Zinjanthropus · 231
Sister Mary

((UPDATE: Revising my notes, as the campaign continues it’s clear there are a lot of seal and release tokens for bless effects. So the goal of Sister Mary is to fill the bag and autosucceed, then trap them again. With that in mind, she doesn’t need to level up her weapons much from the Winchester, can focus on assets and events that put that weapon into play.))

Most of the reviews on this site do a good job of telling you what a card does and how to use it. They point out cute little exceptions, tell you whether something is worth a second look or not worth your time at all.

It’s super hard to write that review for Sister Mary. At the time of writing, the TIC pack is just coming out. There are cards for all five classes that use bless and curse tokens...And we get four very interesting, clear-cut investigators. Amanda likes skill cards, especially ones that get her clues. Silas likes to dodge and fight. Dexter likes putting new assets into play and using rogue chicanery to get rich doing it. Trish can evade and take advantage of monster presence to get even more clues...

Sister Mary adds good tokens to the bag. Now, if you’ve been playing Arkham for a long time, (and during the pandemic you probably have), you’ve internalized a lot of thoughts about the chaos bag. It’s best to have a skill +2 above the challenge you’re trying to beat. if you’re ever stuck, look at the bag and chart out how many of those tokens will give you a success.

But what if some of those tokens give you a +2, with a chance of driving the autofail? What if some of the tokens are negative, with more draw?

So already the anchorite is tricky.

Then you get the card pool. She’s the first five blue/2 purple character, and those are deep carpools with many many ways of playing them.

With access to Mystic cards between 0 and 2 XP, you might try Mary as a mage. But eventually, you’re going to find you want the really upgraded versions of spells and they’re not available.

With guardian level 0 to 5, you might try for a build similar to Carolyn. But Miss Fern has a few things going for her that Mary doesn’t: horror healing cards like Peter Silvestry, seeker access, built-in moneymaking, and a four next to the little picture of a book.

So you have a mago-guardian who is extremely indirect. You have an evasion of three, which neither class will help you with. Same with your fight score, and with five health you don’t wanna be sitting on top of monsters whiffing all day. At the same time, paying three bucks for a spell to give you plus one to your fight or evade seems like a nonstarter in an already asset-heavy deck.

That is why sister Mary is, at least at the start of the cycle, a three or four player character. Because you can do some fabulous support. Ward of protection (and ward level two), word of radiance, stand together, I’ll handle this…the power is yours to mitigate the mythos phase. The book of Psalms heals horror from people like Silas and Roland. while massively boosting the token pool, and it doesn’t exhaust. You can put scrying mirrors in each hand or teamwork them over to allies, so that your pals have no excuses for failing checks. You can make sure everyone is properly equipped (passing money between rogues and survivors, or passing weapons to Amanda.)

And when nobody fails checks, the game goes faster, there are fewer problems with the mythos deck... Everyone’s happy.

There are already inklings of what blessed tokens can do. Rite of sanctification protects you from Mary’s weakness, can be played in both slots, and gives passive economy to your teammates. (They’ll definitely appreciate putting a six resource Tommy gun into play for two bucks.) Combo with tides of fate to turn a very ugly bag into a pile of future money.

And the future abbess has another neat trick: her ability is automatic. She doesn’t need to trigger an action, play a card or move.

Over the next few months, we’re going to get dozens of cards that give us cool new uses for blessed tokens. There will be spell and guardian upgrades, cool covenants, and everything will make sense.

But until then, it can feel like solving a jigsaw puzzle with half the pieces. Is it worth three bucks for a token adding version of dodge? Is a beat cop reasonable? Physical training?

If you can’t make sense of her, that’s OK. All will be revealed in time. You’re simply lacking the one thing that sister Mary has in spades: faith.

MrGoldbee · 1493
Cute ending. Don’t forget one major thing the sister has over the psych: She can take Lightning Gun. While the +5 has long been considered a bit overkill, it makes you barely care that she has only 3 base combat. Flamethrower’s pretty good too. — Death by Chocolate · 1484
I may just try it! — MrGoldbee · 1493
The BAR might be worth considering, as well. — Zinjanthropus · 231
The issue with the BAR is that without a high base combat, you lose a lot of the value from being able to attack with 2 or 3 ammo for smaller, efficient hits. — Death by Chocolate · 1484
Sister Mary is probably a cenobite rather than an anchorite, considering that her card talks about fellow monastics. Sorry for the pedantry. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
You’re probably right. They didn’t teach me this while I was prepping for my bar mitzvah. — MrGoldbee · 1493
You cannot pass Sea Change Harpoon to Amanda. Signature cards cannot be controlled by other investigators (see FAQ). — Yenreb · 15
Fixed. — MrGoldbee · 1493
There are some decent offensive options for her like Radiant Smite and Spectral Razor. Similarly, for clues, there are various event options from guardian and rogue that should be plenty. — Chitinid · 14
Rogue? — MrGoldbee · 1493
He must mean mystic: i.e. Read the Signs, Drawn to Flame. — SGPrometheus · 849
Agreed with the update. Paradoxical Covenant, Tempt Fate, Rite of Sanctification, and Olive, make Sister Mary very capable to do just about whatever she wants, at least once a turn. The updated spells make it so that she can not only succeed almost on demand, but decide if she wants the cursed benefit for each spell. Bonus if you use Eldritch Inspiration (1), then you can fire off the curse benefit twice... Eye of Chaos = 4 clues, or 3 clues and 1 charge. Armageddon = 4 damage, or 3 damage and 1 charge. and these are level 1 spells. — Abbojm01 · 5
Forgot to mention that Favor of the Moon is the card that makes this all happen. — Abbojm01 · 5
why she can only add a beat cop not 2 of them? — natartnat · 1
Smuggled Goods

This is the rare signature card that gets better the more XP is in your deck. Because it does one thing that rogues don’t do very often: go through the discard pile.

Most of the illicit things you’re going to find are guns. (It will also get you back your Tennessee sour mash, if you use hair of the dog to deal with the encounter deck.)

But for an action, you can get back that expensive 3, 4 or 5XP card you used up. Maybe it’s time to pick Lupara back up. It doesn’t go into play, it goes into your hand, so if you want to do some Sleight of Hand... Well, why not use it twice? Or even more often, if you have nine cards left in the deck and you know the good stuff is down there?

The “no ready enemies at your location“ might be a problem… If this wasn’t the card of Finn Edwards, dodger extraordinaire. He even has a signature gun! So remove the side panel and take out something that will really give those deep ones a surprise.

MrGoldbee · 1493
Finn becomes so much fun with Fence and 10+ Illicit cards. Smuggled goods just adds to the fun. — The Lynx · 999
"Eat lead!"

“This is stupid,” Mark repeated, loading more ammo into his Browning automatic rifle. “Statistically dubious, but also just, well, stupid.”

Finn handed him another pouch of ammo from a crate labeled STEMWARE. He knew better than to argue with the soldier. And besides, he was pretty sure his deals with the guy in the red gloves were part of the problem.

The smoky velvet kept her peace too. Promises of power had kept her from some awful snake bites, and the tides of fate had turned against them. If the party was suffering bad juju, it was anyone’s guess on how to fix it.

She pointed out the beast from the crystallizer. She had warned the bootlegger that they would be consequences but… Well, her life was mostly consequences at this point.

Mark took aim. Then started firing. And kept firing. And kept firing.

The creature was completely unharmed, even as the trees around were shattered or leaked a dark gray sap.

A burst of sunshine blazed through the space where the trees once were. A cool breeze came, smelling of huaya.

Finn turned towards Wendy, squinting his eyes. “That’s not your normal necklace.”

“No. It’s not.”

MrGoldbee · 1493
Occult Scraps

Just in case anybody else has rules questions...

While Weaknesses are generally not allowed to be discarded from a player's hand, it's perfectly legal to discard a Weakness from play... assuming, of course, that the card doesn't say otherwise. And wouldn't you know it, this is the first Investigator Weakness asset that doesn't explicitly say "This can't leave play because reasons"!

Note that you still need to have an effect that discards it; you can never just remove cards in play because you feel like it. So yes, it works with Drake's ability, but you are also allowed to pitch it to Crypt Chill if you get so lucky.

Yeah, like the Tower, it can serve as an annoying shield with the right encounter stes, but it's not too hard to get rid of with Dexter's ability (unless Yaztaroth is in play, too, in which case, you did that to yourself). One quibble: most weaknesses tell you how to discard them, which is not quite "This can't leave play because reasons." Occult Scraps is kind of unique in that you have to intuit how to get it ff the table rather than spending actions or cards or something to do it. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
"This can't leave play because reasons" is in reference to the first line of each of the linked cards, which all literally say "this can't leave play while [condition]" — Thatwasademo · 58