Asset. Arcane

Spell.

Cost: 2.

Mystic

Uses (4 charges).

Spend 1 charge: Evade. This evasion attempt uses instead of . If you succeed, after evading the chosen enemy, you may move to a connecting location. If a , , , , or symbol is revealed during this evasion attempt, choose and discard a card from your hand.

Justin Adams
The Forgotten Age #29.
Mists of R'lyeh

FAQs

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Reviews

If you're a mystic on an awkward date (this ghoul does NOT look like his eHarmony pic...), the Mists will get you out of it more times than not. It's a great level 0 asset. Not too expensive at 2 resources, and with impressive longevity at 4 charges. How good is the ability to use will instead of agility? For Agnes, Akachi, Patrice, and Jim, that's a +2 on the check, with the skills unmodified. With Mateo, Marie, Daisy, and Luke, it's a +1. For Diana, variable. And for Norman, a hefty +3. And that's not counting the many will icons your mystic likely has in hand, or the odd static boost from David Renfield or Holy Rosary.

And the good news doesn't stop there. After the mists cease to swirl, where are you? Well, you could just be right where you were -- but you don't have to be! If you pass the evade check, you get a free move as well to an adjacent location. If you use use all your charges (probably not likely, granted), that's an impressive four free actions.

Like lots of mystic cards, there's a side effect if you draw one of the ugly tokens, but it's not too bad -- you lose the least important card in your hand.

It may be handy to compare the Mists to your other evade options as a mystic. They are mostly events:

Blinding Light: The same cost as the mists, but single-use. It dings your ditched enemy for a damage, but the side effect is a bad one -- a lost action. This makes evading on your second action a risky proposition. Even if you succeed, you could lose your third action, meaning that you'll start your next turn right back where you started: engaged with an enemy and needing a card to help you evade it, which card is now in your discard pile.

Banish: With this event, you don't just evade your enemy -- you punt it to the other side of the map as well. In many situations, that's as good as defeating it. But it costs you an XP. And even if it didn't, Ethereal Form and the Mists seem better to me -- Ethereal Form gives you a better shot at the check itself (without succeeding which, nothing matters), and the Mists give you four uses instead of one, while still letting you put some distance between yourself and your befuddled foe.

Bind Monster: If you enjoy watching flipped turtles try to right themselves, you'll probably like this card. But if you aren't evil, the 3 resource, 2 xp cost will likely turn you off. Sure, it theoretically lets you pin an enemy down for the whole scenario, but given all the various checks you'll have to pass, all the resources and experience, you may as well just put the poor thing out of its misery and shrivel it a couple times!

Ethereal Form: Not enough to swathe yourself in mist? Then BECOME the mist instead! When you let your too too solid flesh melt, thaw, and resolve itself into a dew, your evade check is almost guaranteed to succeed, since you ADD your will value instead of swapping it in. And you disengage with everything else, too. In fact, if you're mobbed, this card gets BETTER, because you can choose the enemy with the lowest evade to target. If your arcane slots are likely to be taken up by other spells, this is a good event to have in your back pocket.

Summary: None of the mystic evade events really impresses except Ethereal Form. If you're running a lot of other spell assets, consider a copy or two of Ethereal Form for your evasion needs. If not, it'd be a high-stakes mistake as a mystic to miss on a take of the mists... and that pun-spree's going downhill fast so time to sign off!

The main issue with Mists of Ryleh is that most Mystics can't not run 1-2 combat spells and 1-2 investigate spells in the Arcane Slots in their deck. This card is great but you will probably have to run Sign Magick to get it into play. — The Lynx · 967
I disagree with that. Mystics often run 4-6 spell assets and Mists is perfectly fine if you have other ways to get clues or do damage. In solo this card gives you move compression as well which is really strong. I really love this card in Luke for example because he can just use events to get clues. In fact with Dream Eaters events this has become more true. I've run Mists with Patrice, Luke, Akachi, and Jim, and I think it does incredibly well without Sign Magick. There's really no issue with Mists in my mind- it's an incredibly strong card and it's probably underplayed because people focus too hard on using Shrivelling and Rite instead of other options. — StyxTBeuford · 12987
I'm running this in Zoey for TFA. The only contest for arcane slots there is Enchanted Blade. And there are plenty of enemies you'd rather evade and leave behind in this campaign, rather than kill. — Yenreb · 15
I'm playing mystic and off-class mystics these days that dont focus on weapon spells, so the spell lineup is Investigation spell + Evade spell, rather then the usual Rite + Shrivell. I'm very impressed with the results. — Tsuruki23 · 2527
From the perspective of someone playing only with cards up to Forgotten Age - this card seems REALLY good. You can add it to your Rite of Seeking + Shrivelling package, and now you're way more consistent at actually being able to play the game. No Shrivelling? OK, you can now at least Evade enemies until you find one. The free movement has been straight-up action compression most of the time. — Blackhaven · 9

I feel I need to provide the contrary viewpoint and say that this card, while usable, is really pretty disappointing. I want to like this card because it forms part of the major theme of mystics. There are spells like Shriveling that let Mystics use Will to be good at fighting, there are spells like Rite of Seeking that let Mystics use Will to be good at investigating, and this is ostensibly the spell that lets Mystics use Will to be good at evading. Unfortunately Mists is really weak compared to these other two. The problem is that Shrivelling is much better than a basic fight action (+1 damage), and Rite of Seeking is much better than a basic investigator action (+1 clue), but mist is not really better than a basic evade action. In theory it gives you an action compression bonus just like the other two (+1 move), but that bonus is far less useful because you rarely want to use it. Indeed, it is so much less useful that it is barely makes up for the penalty of sometimes having to discard a card.

The most important use of evade is to keep an elite monster distracted while the party fights it, but if you are doing this you do not want to move away from the monster. Evade can be good against regular monsters for many characters who are not fighters and find it much easier to evade and let other characters do the fighting. But if you are a Mystic you have the option of taking your fighting spell instead, and it is almost always better to do 2 damage to the monster rather than evade the monster. Evasion can be better against monsters with 3+ Health if you can just leave and ignore them, and the +1 move bonus of Mists seems primarily designed for that exact circumstance. But FFG seems really reluctant to put many such monsters in their adventures, it seems like the great majority of the monsters either have Hunter, or have doom on them, or are otherwise better to kill than leave alone. To be fair, there are some monsters you can run away from, and there are some monsters you are better off evading than fighting because you get a penalty if you kill the monster, and here is where Mystic evading shines. The problem is that even in these cases +1 move isn't a great bonus because often when you encounter the monster you are not done investigating or otherwise interacting with the location it is on, and you still don't want to move away. This is compounded by the fact that Mists is not an event, it is an asset, so while it is conditionally useful, you have to play it before you know whether that condition will be satisfied; once you have played it, you are likely to end up using it mostly at times when you don’t want to run away.

Despite all of this, mists would be fun to play around with if it didn't take up a slot. But the fact is that it takes up an arcane slot, a slot that is in very great demand for most Mystics. This means that even if you decide to have a bit of whimsy and put this in your deck, you often regret playing it rather than waiting for a better spell to put in that precious slot. Mists is best for characters who have high Will and low Dex who have access to Mystic cards but don’t really use their arcane slots and have the resources to fool around with conditionally useful cards. Not a very broad selection of characters, to say the least.

If you don't have many expansions, Mists is a better card because you do not have many other options, if the only way you can fight is with the two copies of Shrivelling in your deck you may want to put this card in just so you can do something when you don't have Shriveling. On the other hand, if you have lots of expansions, the real nail in the coffin for this card might be Sword Cane, which lets you use Will to evade without spending charges or using an arcane slot.

ChristopherA · 110
I totally agree. There are always exceptions, but in general, fighting is much better than evading and fight spells are much more useful than evade spells. — CaiusDrewart · 3126
It's much better in true solo where the move action is much more reliably useuful. — suika · 9413
That is definitely true. — CaiusDrewart · 3126
I also take a fight and an investigate spell as my main arcane slots. But I do see some value in evade spells, if you have a build with 3 arcane slots. In particular in TFA but there are also enemies in other campaigns, like the Spectral Watcher from TCU, who are better evaded than exhausted in fight actions. Mists let do that relyably. The move is not always usefull, but more often than the damage ping from Ineffable Truth. Right now, I think the cat is the best option for that. I used her in Akachi through TFAm albeit I used Suggestion instead of the Mists in that case. With "Return to: TCU" we will get more excitng options to increase arcane slots. Although, I have to agree, Sword Cane might be the card, that makes these builds obsolete. I have not played with it yet, but it uses only a hand slot, and can also serve as Mystic's Garotte Wire" to conserve Shrivelling charges. — Susumu · 366
One disadvantage of Sword Cane seems to me be though, that it has no upgradeed version with willpower boost (yet). You also can't push it with Spirit Athame, so from my experience with Shrivelling (0) et all, it should get worse the later in the campaign you are. — Susumu · 366
Mists is an absolutely stellar card in solo where fighting everything is not as practical or as efficient of a solution. Your deck has to be more generalist, so an evade spell will let you save time and card slots from fighting. Mists is particularly great because of the move compression- evade+move is about as good as just moving if no enemy spawned on you. I adore this card in solo. It even gives you 4 charges for a very cheap price. You don't necessarily a spell slot really to investigate in solo (might take Sixth Sense) since 2 clue locations are rare, so it's not unreasonable to pair this with a combat spell either. — StyxTBeuford · 12987
Necessarily need* — StyxTBeuford · 12987
Will concur that Mists is crazy good in true solo. In particular, had a Marie deck in TFA who had Spectral Razor and Blood-Rite, which were plenty for must-kill enemies, and evade+move was often as good as not drawing an enemy, because I would have had to move anyway (actually, even better because I could use her free action for it). Patrice loves it because of the cheap cost and, again, the free move. — Zinjanthropus · 227
For a bit more janky application, you can combo it with Torrent of Power, especially the L2 that comes with 5 secrets. You could even refill it with Enraptured. This is probably only sensible in Patrice, though. — Zinjanthropus · 227
I’ve done exactly that with Patrice and it is great — StyxTBeuford · 12987
How are the opinions on this card with Norman? I have not played him, because I don't go for the novellas, but I think with 4 will and 4 books, RoS and friends are not that apealing to him, even though 3 clues per action are always great and he probably could make it work. I would probably build him with fight and evade and without investigate spell assets, if he gets a regular release. — Susumu · 366
I tend to just punt on evading. One of the joys of Norman though is that there are so many options for that second Arcane slot. The last time I played him I tried Twila Katherine Price + Scrying III (this was in 3-player) and it was great fun. But if you do care about evasion he can run Mists while giving up much less than other Mystics, yeah. — CaiusDrewart · 3126