Improvised Weapon

I was trying to come up with a use for this card, and I'm got to say I'm pretty much stumped. Maybe I'm missing something. But given that this card cannot stack with a weapon, it doesn't seem good for much.

About the only use I found is that this card is good against Rats (since reducing the test difficulty to 0 means almost a guaranteed success.) Solo Wendy can actually find Rats pretty irritating on high levels, so maybe there. Rats are generally not a card I worry about countering when I'm designing a deck, though.

For most investigators, there's the risk that Improvised Weapon gets stuck in your hand as a really weak event (attacking for 1 damage is not very good) that has no skill icons. That's not great.

For all the investigators with high Fight and access to Improvised Weapon, like Mark or Yorick, this card seems clearly inferior to simply fighting with a weapon, and therefore not really worth the deck space.

Wendy and Pete, of course, can fodder off Improvised Weapon to their special abilities and then play the more powerful version from their discard pile. Which sounds great... except that they have 1 and 2 base Combat. They can't hit with this at all, not unless they're playing an Easy or they're attacking a 1-Fight monster. And there are just not enough of those to justify this card, I think.

However, I think this could be interesting in the future if we get more effects that can reduce monster Fight and stack with this. Quasi-guaranteed successes against 2 or 3 Fight monsters would be really useful.

CaiusDrewart · 3185
Conglomeration of Spheres — InnsmouthLook · 12
This is terrible against Conglomeration of Spheres. 2 resources and two actions to do half its health and then be reduced to punching it anyway... — The_Wall · 288
Attacking repeatedly for 1 damage isn't good, but there are a lot of odd-health bad guys that you don't mind attacking once for 1-damage. If you're fighting a 3-hp enemy, this card looks a lot like a fast machete. — Sechen · 53
Twice in this review having a monster with 1 fight is implied to be some special cutoff. Unless I'm mistaken, nothing in the rules stops an investigator's modified skill value from being negative. If Wendy used this on rats and drew a -2, I believe she would still lose. (It being a -1 to the difficulty rather than a +1 to the skill only makes a difference for things like Against All Odds.) — jj10dman · 1
Disregard, found it under "Modifiers", page 15. Sadly I can't delete comments. — jj10dman · 1
Very disappointed this doesn't have a wild skill icon at the very least. However, like you said, this could be very interesting in the future. I expect a 2-3 XP version of this turning it into a Flashlight for combat (enemy gets -2 fight) and aforementioned wild icon(s). — ArkhamArkhanist · 10
I can actully see it being played by Pete against Conglomeration of Spheres. 1. Use duke for +3 mod +1 dmg. 2. Discard IW, ready Duke, use him again. 3. Use IW for autosuccess kill. The main drawback of this plan is 1 res cost of IW so it doesn’t stack with Dark Horse. — trbvm · 1
Here's a question, since this doesn't have the <span class="icon-action"></span> icon, does that mean that it doesn't take an action to use? That is to say, can it be used with another weapon card, or dare I say, Duke, — AbsolutZer0 · 20
You could play Anatomical Diagrams for -2 then attack with this for an additional -1. Not sure it would be worth the deck space, but bringing a 3 fight enemy down to 0 seems decent. Also these days there's Cornered to discard it. — Zinjanthropus · 230
Dynamite Blast

Good old Dynamite Blast finally gets an upgrade. The changes from the original are:

Minus 1 to resource cost
Added icon
Doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity

Given the advent of Stick to the Plan it can be invaluable to get a decent selection of tactic cards. It could even be worth forgoing the 0 XP version entirely and then buying this only once it can start attached to that asset. Guardians are often strapped for resources and making a card cost fewer is often seen as XP-worthy, as evidenced by Leo De Luca.

Whether this card ends up being worthy of your time comes down to whether or not the ability to bypass opportunity attacks does anything for you. If nothing else it makes playing "Let me handle this!" and On the Hunt much more viable while already engaged with other enemies, whereas previously that would be a bad line of play because doing so turns off your Machete.

YMMV.

The_Wall · 288
Ignoring OA means you can use it on yourself, if 3 damage is no problem for you. True grit helps with that. — Django · 5154
It's also possible to blow up a connected location while engaged with an enemy. — Csys · 1
I agree that any consideration of Dynamite Blast should consider Stick to the Plan. It's a shame that you cannot commit cards from STTP though, which makes paying for the upgraded fist icon not useful in that regard. — duke_loves_biscuits · 1278
The main play I have had with STTP and DB is in Carcosa, as a reliable way to defeat the Man With the Pallid Mask. "spawn in an annoying place will ya? BOOM!". Sadly the upgrade here offers little for that gameplan, just a 1 resource reduction and the promise that you can use it locally more easily if you need to. I'd have liked this more at 1XP, not 2XP. — duke_loves_biscuits · 1278
Is there a reason Carolyn Fern can't take this card? It isn't listed as a weapon, but Arkhamdb won't allow it. — Monologued · 1
Not provoking AoOs also means you can properly sacrifice yourself now, in situations where the original Dynamite Blast would fail to resolve as the AoO defeated you. — Blackhaven · 9
Rabbit's Foot

Return to NoZ certainly brings some interesting upgrades. Rabbit's Foot is considered to be a good card because it alleviates the opportunity cost of failing a test, which usually boils down to wasting an action, by turning that wasted action into drawing a card. Especially in the class that often runs extremely light on resources, drawing a card can be the most valuable consolation action, and it doesn't usually face stiff competition for the relic slot.

Yet treachery cards exist therefore blindly drawing threatens disaster at any moment... So enter bunny memento mk II. Failing a test by more than 1 yields actual card selection rather than simply drawing, helping to dig for specific answers or important assets while avoiding poorly-timed treacheries (or even intentionally drawing them at a time of minimal impact).

Whiffed on grabbing Fire Axe after your mulligan? This helps fight those fires. Trying to bet on a Dark Horse? Bunny's got you covered. The very act of failing the tests as you attempt them will help you find the pieces you need to overcome them. If you get lucky then awesome, but if you fail then fail with style. In fact this card turns tests on their head so that is often going to be a better pull from the chaos bag than , , or !

The most interesting application seems to be with Silas Marsh because he can sometimes choose to fail non-essential tests and appreciates the card flow. Most survivors tend to struggle to spend XP after upgrading their ally suite and are forced to grab things like Lucky! for a tiny bit more efficiency. I can easily see this replacing that in many an XP schedule.

The_Wall · 288
Is there a difference between shuffle your deck and shuffle x cards into your deck? — Django · 5154
@django Mechanically speaking, I don't think so. — SGPrometheus · 841
Quick Study

Amazing Roland Banks card.

Drop a a clue when you fight a monster and regain it on the kill.

If he draws the weakness you can counteract it completely by investigating an empty low difficulty spot. Start investigating -> drop the clue -> chunk through the weakness in just one round.

Outside Roland though... is the clue gathering faction, an activity for which this card is counterintuitive. Rex Murphy and Ursula Downs can trigger it for to hit a rather decent 6/7, for the rest it's exclusively a booster.

Roland is the only secondary character in the game right now and I think its no accident that its so good on him, this card rewards your clue gathering by increasing your strength in other fields, when a is released who isnt quite so clue focused, a Dr. Francis Morgan kind of egghead, or a new character who is secondary then this will probably be good for them too.

Tsuruki23 · 2571
Decorated Skull

Does the ally or enemy discarded from field or deck, trigger this card? I'm thinking about use the disposable ally like

  • Treasure hunter
  • Hired muscle Or discarded from another skill to trigger this card.
AquaDrehz · 204
"Discard" is not "defeat." A card is only defeated when it takes as much damage as it has health (or more in the case of enemies/ investigators). Additionally cards can only be defeated if they are in play. — SGPrometheus · 841
...or an effect explicitly defeats them, like monster hunter. — Django · 5154
can you use Venturer to add charged to this? Seems like great combo with Leo — sneth · 8
you can't, just like you can't charge spells with venturer... — jd9000 · 76