A simple card, but a highly effective one for multiplayer Guardians. You spend one action, and the team essentially nets +3 cards and +4 resources in exchange (remembering here that Stand Together is itself a card you're giving up). That's pretty awesome. Compare Emergency Cache II, where you spend an action for essentially +0 cards and +3 resources. Or Cryptic Research, where you spend zero actions for +2 cards. Now, both those cards beat Stand Together in terms of flexibility (since you can play them when you're alone, or in the case of Cryptic Research even when you're engaged with an enemy), but in terms of efficiency, Stand Together just crushes both of them.

Stand Together shines the brightest when played Turn 1. Lots of investigators have multi-card setups that cost 6-7 resources, and Stand Together facilitates that. Zoey and Roland want to play Machete and Beat Cop (7 resources). Daisy wants Old Book of Lore and Dr. Milan Christopher (7 resources). Wendy wants Fire Axe and Leo De Luca (7 resources). Agnes wants Shrivelling and Peter Sylvestre (6 resources). Stand Together is just perfect here. It not only gives investigators higher odds of drawing these key assets, but it lets them get them all into play right away without having to use the inefficient "take a resource" action. This really gets things off to a roaring start.

Stand Together will of course still be good if drawn later in the game. It also offers double Will icons to be used in an emergency. Obviously, playing it for the event is better, but that's another nice little benefit over something like Emergency Cache.

Now, this doesn't mean two copies of Stand Together are an automatic choice for a Guardian's first 6 XP. There are plenty of other strong options. Beat Cop II is one of the best cards in the game. Keen Eye is underpriced and overpowered, like all the stat-boosting XP permanents. A super-weapon like Lightning Gun is not a bad idea, either. But Stand Together is definitely competitive with all of these, and a great thing to pick up before the campaign is done.

PROS

• Moderately priced in terms of resources, at least compared to other Guardian weapons (4 resources, same as .45 Automatic)
• +3 Combat and +2 Damage, so the Springfield will kill most monsters with a single shot
• Great against aloof enemies

CONS

• Expensive in terms of Xp
• Cannot be fired at monsters engaged with you
• Two handed
• Massive enemies needs to be exhausted before you can fire at them

Say hello to the sniper rifle of Arkham Horror. It's a fantastic weapon if you're firing at a distance and a fish bicycle if anything comes within hands reach.

So, is the Springfield a good weapon or a bad one? Well, it's not awful but its situational as heck. Since its twohanded, you'll either stick to this gun alone or invest in Bandoliers. And by the time you have paid for those bandoliers, you might as well have just bought a Lightning Gun or a Shotgun.

Who can make best use of the Springfield, then? Zoey probably, since she's not that reliant on weapons. She can use her fists and Cross to murder monsters engaged to her, and then shoot anything else from safe distance. It's a really bad fit with her ability to gain 1 Resource when she engages an enemy, however.

Generally speaking, this is probably one of the most forgiving special weakness cards in the game so far. You don't have to take the horror off of it if you don't want to, and let's be honest, how many times do you actually pull that blue token out of the bag anyway? That particular portion can be quite swingy in its effect, I have lost at least one scenario where I drew the blue and then the red token and we lost. But overall I find the worst part of John Dee's Translation to be how it usurps a hand slot. You didn't need that Magnifying Glass, right? Daisy's Tote Bag is insurance against losing that hand slot to The Necronomicon. On a more positive note, it's a much better translation than the Simonomicon or whichever version was in that cabin in the woods that summons a demon horde AND you can use it's ability as a free action thanks to Daisy Walker's special ability.

There is a lot to like about Agnes Baker. However, the Heirloom of Hyperborea is not one of those things. In fact, I'd say it's the weakest investigator-specific card in the game.

Think of it this way: you have to spend an action to put the Heirloom into play. It costs three resources. And when you play it, you're giving up a card. How many cards does it have to draw to start before it generates real value above and beyond that 3-resource, 1-action, 1-card investment? I would say about six. Are you really going to play six spells over the course of the game? Even as Agnes, I would say that's a tall order. Bear in mind that several Agnes staples like Drawn to the Flame and Forbidden Knowledge do NOT have the spell keyword.

Moreover, playing the Heirloom will massively slow you down in the early game. Agnes has more strong assets she needs to get into play early than any other investigator. There's Shrivelling, of course, and Agnes really wants Peter Sylvestre as well. She probably needs Rite of Seeking or Flashlight to do some investigation, and lots of Agnes builds use further things like Fire Axe and Ritual Candles, among others. Can she really afford to invest critical early-game time and resources into a card that might, if everything breaks right, turn a very small profit over the course of the game? (But more probably will end up in the red?)

The Heirloom's effect only gets worse if it's drawn later in the game. If it's not played in the first couple turns, it has basically zero chance of paying back its cost.

It also eats up an Accessory slot, which is inconvenient because Holy Rosary is typically more powerful for Agnes.

Of course, the Heirloom is by no means a crippling thing for Agnes to have in her deck. She just uses it for +2 to a Strength or Will test. But all the other investigator-specific cards are at least occasionally worth actually playing. (Daisy's is a little borderline, but you can imagine scenarios where it would be worthwhile.) Agnes's is basically only skill test fodder.

I would say this is the second-strongest investigator-specific card in the game, behind only Duke.

Zoey's Cross might not seem too amazing at first glance, because it inflicts a seemingly modest 1 damage per activation. But the 1 damage is guaranteed and action-free, and guaranteed, action-free damage is incredibly strong in this game. So, every time you fight an enemy with odd-numbered health (and there are plenty of those), you can kill the enemy in 1 fewer action than would otherwise be possible. That is amazingly useful and lets you win scenarios far faster than would otherwise be possible. If you combine it with something like Vicious Blow or Beat Cop, it will let you buzz through even-health enemies faster, too. And it works great with something like Lightning Gun--now you can kill 4-health enemies in just one shot!

And remember, every time the Cross saves you a fight action, you are not only saving time; you're spared a draw from the chaos bag, the necessity of committing skill cards to boost your odds, the chance of drawing the autofail or suffering a bad special token effect, and so forth. The Cross basically lets you skip a ton of skill tests and saves you a ton of actions over the course of a typical game. For an initial investment of only 1 resource, 1 action, and 1 card to put the Cross into play, that's incredibly powerful.

Unfortunately for Zoey, her odds of drawing the Cross are not so great, even if she mulligans for it. But when the Cross does make it into play, it makes Zoey an incredibly fast and efficient monster hunter.