Old Hunting Rifle

Asset. Hand x2

Item. Weapon. Firearm.

Cost: 3. XP: 3.

Survivor

Uses (3 ammo).

Spend 1 ammo: Fight. You get +3 and deal +2 damage for this attack. If a or symbol is revealed during this attack, the rifle jams. (This attack automatically fails. Before you can activate this ability again, you must perform the following ability: ": You clear the jam.")

John Pacer
The Depths of Yoth #273.
Old Hunting Rifle

FAQs

(from the official FAQ or responses to the official rules question form)
  • Automatic Success/Failure: Some card effects make an investigator automatically succeed or automatically fail a skill test. If this occurs, depending on the timing of such an effect, certain steps of the skill test may be skipped in their entirety.
    • If it is known that an investigator automatically succeeds or fails at a skill test before Step 3 (“Reveal Chaos Token”) occurs, that step is skipped, along with Step 4. No chaos token(s) are revealed from the chaos bag, and the investigator immediately moves to Step 5. All other steps of the skill test resolve as normal.
    • If a chaos token effect causes an investigator to automatically succeed or fail at a skill test, continue with Steps 3 and 4, as normal. - FAQ, v.1.7, March 2020
Last updated

Reviews

It's pretty good, but not the best.

This gun looks good, with 3 damage and +3, then it looks bad, with that and effect.

Another thing that's easy to miss, this thing is -ridiculously- cheap for a 3-shot weapon with a large bonus and 3 damage. You can easily play this in an asset heavy deck full of 3 cost assets (of which there is a lot in ) or some out of faction options.

That much damage and bonus is great, also the great price, but isn't the gun just completely kneecapped by that effect? Not quite.

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Old Hunting Rifle is a weapon the rewards a flexible playstyle combining and , ideally when the gun jams you evade and fix it, the missed shot can be recursed with cards like Oops! or Live and Learn so the gun does get good support from the faction. Will to Survive is nice but not always needed (although recommended if you intend to kill a boss). Edit: Eucatastrophe circumvents the autofails pretty beautifully.

The two stat reliance means that a classical combat specialist like William Yorick probably wont want one unless he's got all the support cards too (also Bandolier and Act of Desperation), characters like Silas Marsh and Rita Young however love them some Rifles.

One problem for 3 damage weapons is 4 health foes, in this instance it's good to have a high base and perhaps a Lucky! and/or skill cards handy to try and land a basic punch, Rita Young has a little advantage here thanks to her ability, which lets her simultaneously get distance to fix a broken rifle and damages the enemy.

"But random person on the internet," You might say, "dont Silas Marsh and Rita Young prefer Ornate Bow?!" Yes, the bow has more ammo in the end, and it might very well be more dependable, but the reliance on reloading seriously dampens what you can accomplish in a round, it's much easier to get the rifle to do 6 or 9 damage in a round. Rita in particular has no access to bonus actions outside Ace in the Hole and even that's just a one off, so despite her higher she actually might prefer the Old Hunting Rifle a bit. The big difference between the Rifle and Bow boils down to a lot of splitting hairs, the really fun thing is that you can take them both!

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Old Hunting Rifle isn't the best weapon in the game, it's risky, but it is very destructive and extremely cheap.

Tsuruki23 · 2522
I think the risk still outweighs the benefits, especially with only 3 ammo and no empty hand for a secondary weapon. — Django · 5070
Hold on to a Eucatastrophe and this is sort of like a cheap almost Lightning Gun. Another reason to play Eu with Yorick. — StyxTBeuford · 12985
@StyxBeuford Eucatastrophe helps against the auto-fail, but not the skulls, since the skulls aren't tokens that reduce your skill value to 0 - they are tokens that trigger an ability on the card and THAT ability reduces your skill value to 0. — Death by Chocolate · 1440
@DeathbyChocolate a plain reading of the rules does seem to support your interpretation. do we have an official ruling on this? — 11zxcvb11 · 3
I guess, @DeathbyChocolate is wrong. Firstly, if it doesn't work with skulls, it also doesn't work with tentacles since the card specifically modifies both these tokens for some specific result. Second, the card explicitly says that jamming means "this attack automatically fails". Than we are checking the rules: "If a skill test automatically fails, the investigator's total skill value for that test is considered 0". With +3 Fight from the gun itself it's highly unlikely for you to have "0" fight when you initiate the test, so your skill value is reduced to 0 due to revealing test modifier (either skull or autofail). Eucatastrophe should work. — chrome · 56
It works with the autofail. The autofail reduces your skill value to 0 regardless. Then, in addition, you Jam. However, you set your skill value to 0, so you can cancel it with eucatastrophe, thus making it so an autofail was never revealed. If the skull takes you to 0, that also works, but if the skull takes you to 0 you probably shouldn't have been using this card. — Lailah · 1
I agree - it isn't the best weapon in the game but it is very good. I think I will run it with Silas as mentioned. It will be combo'd with Nightmare Bauble which cancels autofail tokens and the Black Cat which doesn't help the Rifle but that combo makes him immune to a lot of spooky symbols. And the deck will be full of limited use weapons (or the retrievable net and harpoon) and keys. — The Lynx · 967
Discovering that this is almost perfect for Parallel Pete, who lacks Chainsaw access, but has tools that mitigate most of OHR's downsides. His traps do most of his work but he needs something to deal with Elites, and this is the ticket. He's fine w 2H weapons (Baseball Bat is also good for him). He has access to several reload options via Cleaning Kit, Quick Reload, even One In The Chamber. His base 3STR loves the +3 fight. And outside of Elites, a jam is 80-90% less likely to be a disaster for him thanks to his always-starts-in-play Guitar. — HanoverFist · 712
To anyone and all: does the "Snipe" event cards work with this, essentially turning the revealed tokens with symbols including the tentacle to 0's? — Quantallar · 7

The fun part is that when it jams, while shooting an enemy engaged with your partner, it still sort of "shoots" him :)

Dear FFG, this is a terribly Arkham-ish outcome :) C'mon, it jammed! It ain't gonna hurt my friend :)

But jokes aside. Is it any good? Well, it is very good at killing enemies with 3 hit points. Now this is of course great, since 3 is the new 2. And you're doing that with a bonkers bonus of +3 BUT:

  • it takes 2 hand slots
  • it is just so so bad, when it jams, with the enemy engaged

So not only you need an action to unjam it, that grants you a sucker punch from the enemy, but you also lost a precious shell and 2 actions. And recently enemies also like to Retaliate. So... it's a no-no in a lot of scenarios.

But let's find setups in which it may be good, I'm certainly not iterating through all possible options, but what I thought is:

  • You're William Yorick in multiplayer, since your core ability let's you replenish ammo easily. Your company has to have options to help you out, when things go south. So advocate to go first on most occasions, which by the way plays nicely with Take the Initiative. Pack some options, for those corner cases, when your weapon will crap on you, like for example Stunning Blow, to shake off the enemy, or Dodge. You don't want to be that jerk damage dealer, that shouts "Mommy!", just because a mediocre mob got lucky
  • You're Wendy Adams on a solo run and not really using hand slots a lot. Any weapon jams you can succesfully counter with her core ability. And all of a sudden you can deal with some enemies effectively, just like with your evade action. Only now it's for good.

Am I missing something?

Onetribe · 331
Maybe... You are Calvin, you need some heavy destruction tool and you plan to run Against All Odds anyway - you can combo it with OHR for a sure strike; you are Silas, have cool combat stat but the only reliable weapon you can have is Fire Axe so OHR is the second best Survi weapon (unfortunately for OHR some good neutral weapons were released in FA cycle). Still you are right - jamming is painful. Maybe sealing teammate is your uncle? Anyway, that note about pseudojamming during a friendly fire rocks :D — KptMarchewa · 1
I think it’s a good point that this weapon can leave you high and dry against enemies on occasion, so having a high Agility is handy in case of emergencies. Other than that, the big thing I think you missed is Will to Survive, which when paired with this gun will shred through a stack of enemies or a boss. — Death by Chocolate · 1440
If you are Wendy and you aren't really using hand slots why would you not play Ornate Bow instead?? — matt88 · 3116
Side note, baseball bat does not automatically fail with skill. This weapon is just bad on so many levels... — Django · 5070
I was thinking about adding this to an aggressive "Ashcan" Pete deck. The gun raises the terrible two fight to a decent 5 (or 6 if you have a beat cop in play/Dark Horse). If Duke is in play, you aren't as desperate if the gun fails. What do you think? — brerlapine · 19
Wait a minute!!! Will To Survive and Old Hunting Rifle is better than a Lightning Gun. Let that soak in... Survivor has a guaranteed 9 damage round. INSANE — brerlapine · 19
Rita with Ace in the Hole and Swift Reload actually has a guaranteed 15-18 damage round O_O — Zinjanthropus · 227

The first ever interesting upgrade for survivors is...(drumroll)...not that good. Well it's good until it's not, then you're in a lot of trouble (barring a reliable self-eject button). I'm still holding out for a chainsaw. They have to make it eventually, right? And it would be for survivors. But that could jam too.

jmmeye3 · 620
It makes a good backup weapon for Pete when Duke is already busy, or better in a William Yorick deck with the soon to come Act of Desperation. — mogwen · 254
@mogwen Act of Desperation? What is this and where did you see it? — SGPrometheus · 809
It is plenty good. Play it with Act of Desperation and Live and Learn and you are going to be in great shape. Play it with OOPS! 2 and you will be in win/win situations. — Myriad · 1219
Well, with Eucatastrophe, the reliable self-eject button has now arrived. — Katsue · 10
And, two years later, here we are. — spannertheodd · 1
@Katsue Eucatastrophe helps against the auto-fail, but not the skulls, since the skulls aren't tokens that reduce your skill value to 0 - they are tokens that trigger an ability on the card and THAT ability reduces your skill value to 0. — Death by Chocolate · 1440

Rita Young + Old Hunting Rifle + Swift Reload + Stunning Blow = lots of fun and lots of hurt for the other guy...throw in Oops! if you wanna cover your butt!

Did I mention Easy Mark in there too, even to get to 200 characters?

Krysmopompas · 358
You forgot Ace in the Hole! — Zinjanthropus · 227
oh hell yeah:) — Krysmopompas · 358
And True survivor to counter the jam effect, on +3 actions too! — LeFricC'estChic · 86
Strangely enough, I've absolutely loved this on Silas using Defiance (2), and just pulling back Defiance if it's not the skull! Works like a charm :) — MorriMorreu · 1
@MorriMorreu That doesn't work. With Defiance, the skull is only 'partially' ignored (see ruling on Defiance's page), so OHR will still see it being revealed and so get jammed. Something like Third Time's the Charm CAN help, but obviously doesn't work with Silas's ability. — anaphysik · 94

You will never jam if you run this with Ancient Covenant and Favor of the Sun, though that only works once per round. The funny thing is that if you run this combo, .35 Winchester is a better gun if you can take it. It costs one more resource but has 5 ammo and is a level 0 card (plus 1 less but that shouldn't matter).

MindControlMouse · 41
Yeah, this card wasn't that good even when it came out, but nowadays the powercreep got to it — Blood&gore · 418