Event

Tactic.

Cost: 1.

Guardian

Fast. Play after you successfully attack a non-Elite enemy using a Melee asset.

Attach Grievous Wound to the attacked enemy.

Forced - At the end of the round: Deal 1 damage to attached enemy.

This is gonna hurt.
Pixoloid Studios
The Scarlet Keys Investigator Expansion #27.
Grievous Wound

FAQs

(from the official FAQ or responses to the official rules question form)
  • Q: After initiating a standard fight action or triggered fight ability on a non-melee asset can the reaction ability on Ice Pick be used to play Grievous Wound? A: No. With Grievous Wound, you need to have initiated a fight/attack with an ability on a melee asset. Ice Pick does not initiate a fight/attack. (August 2023)
Last updated

Reviews

Disclaimer: Pre-Scarlet Keys release review.

Another niche card that is a bit hard to understand for now. Tactic is one of the least interesting Trait since it only matters for Mark Harrigan but he already accesses 0-5, Chuck Fergus (so "Skids" O'Toole) but it's already fast and doesn't involve a test, Directive - Red Tape but again it's already fast and Sleuth but it's probably one of the least interesting 3-class talent.

So, why would you ever use this card??

The main issue is "At the end of the round", meaning after the enemy phase.

  • Daniela Reyes can automatically evade an enemy with her . Trigger it with the Mechanic's Wrench and attack with it, applying the wound. Since your turns are often a bit empty, applying a DoT to an enemy and leaving to engage another one is potentially really good. And on top of that, lvl 0 cards are not so hard to slot in her.
  • Survival Knife (0) if, for some reason, you are already considering getting some hits, you can now do so with a 3-hp enemy and kill it after you get attacked. It's not great, but if you planned on taking the Survival Knife already, then it's worth considering.
  • Butterfly Swords allow you to perform the first attack on an enemy and the second on another one. So you could technically do the smaller attack combined with Grievous Wound on a bigger enemy and the 2-damage attack to defeat a 2-hp enemy and evade the wounded enemy. That is a veeeery niche situation since it requires you to have 2 enemies in play, one that justifies this and that you are able to evade after... Let's see what other cards come in this pack. As of now, I see an opportunity here, but not enough yet for something viable.
  • As suggested in the comment by @Veronica212, "Skids" O'Toole could be somehow a bit interested, as he is more able than others to evade and leave the DoT behind. Cheap Shot (2) is a good way to add 1 damage and exhaust, and Switchblade, Enchanted Blade without using a charge as suggested. It doesn't save you much time unless you can change location and the enemy is not a hunter.
  • In the same vein, William Yorick could see use with Stunning Blow, attacking with a Gravedigger's Shovel, Fire Axe without going down to 0 resources, Meat Cleaver without spending the Horror, etc... The problem is that you need both Stunning Blow and Grievous Wound in your hand at the same time, which can be complicated with the little Draw ability of Yorick.
  • Honorable mention to Trusty Bullwhip would have been nice with this since you can attack, exhaust to evade and apply the bleeding.

Conclusion: As of now, except for Daniela Reyes, I wouldn't really consider this card yet, but that may change in the near future!

Valentin1331 · 68192
Hey Val! Appreciate you doing all these reviews. One thing I think you missed for this one is that in lower player counter, especially solo, I could see this in Skids? Stab an enemy with your unempowered Enchanted Blade, then evade them and leave them to bleed out slowly. Cheap and relatively efficient way to deal with a big-health enemy. — Veronica212 · 294
Since it is an event and trigger at the end of the upkeep phase he could easily deal 2 damage. The main problem might be the melee weapon — Tharzax · 1
I mean of course Nathaniel Cho. — Tharzax · 1
It's for foes who explode or go Aloof on you. — MrGoldbee · 1447
The main problem with both these both types and this card is that you usually engaged with the enemy and most guardians will have problems to escape them. — Tharzax · 1
Counterpoint: Tactic is the MOST interesting guardian trait because it lets you stash one under Stick to the Plan for guaranteed availability. Is that useful for this card in particular? Probably not. — Death by Chocolate · 1447
Our friends from Undimensional and Unseen will love this card: https://arkhamdb.com/card/02255. So now it would be as easy as dealing a single wound to big guy and watch (two of them, one per card copy) die. — bugiel_marek · 21
It’s worth noting Skids can use this with Dirty Fighting to deal with 2-3 hp enemies in one action. — MaximilienQC · 1
Now that Parallel Lines Pete came out, this card is quite insane on him. It's a recurrring vicious blow that doesn't work on Elites, but deal damage over time: Pete can watch them slowly die while he makes them dance with his guitar to heal horror or gain resources — HeroesOfTomorrow · 49

A terrible card that is actually somewhat useful in Hemlock Vale.

Enemies in HV have Elusive, meaning they disengage and move away after getting smacked once. Some of them have 5hp. Grievous Wound solves that problem.

As another review said, perfect for alternate Pete because it can be recurred every round, and also situationally nice for alternate Zoey, if you can stick it on a beefy enemy and let it bleed blesses into the bag for several rounds.

CombStranger · 264
Brilliant realization with the Elusive combo. Finally, Grievous Blow gets some time out of the binder! — NightgauntTaxiService · 398
It's also decent tech against enemies which reduce damage taken to 1, or punish attacks. — OrionAnderson · 67

This card is hard to use for most guardians, but it seems custom-built for Parallel Ashcan Pete. It's a nice solution to 3+ health enemies for him.

You attack a 3 health enemy, attach Grievous Wound, and then move the enemy away for free with his Guitar. The guitar gives you a resource, which refunds the cost of Grievous Wound.

At the end of the round, the enemy takes 1 damage and dies, and Grievous Wound returns to your hand. You can do this infinitely to kill 3 health enemies in a single melee attack, as a kind of reusable Vicious Blow.

It could even kill bigger targets like a Deep One Bull, although you probably want a nice trap to keep it from moving while it bleeds out (like Snare or Net from Makeshift Trap).

Jack · 56
Why the trap? You could use the Guitar just for moving the wounded enemy away for consecutive rounds? — Susumu · 366
Snare doesn't prevent the bull from moving. I'm also not sure if there's a fast player window between the movement and engagement as result of the force effect. — Tharzax · 1

This card is a great example of Power creep, and why it prevents the use of newer cards.

This card is in direct competition to vicious blow, and begs the question "why would I ever use this over vicious blow?"

The short answer there is that you won't. Everyone that can take this card can also take vicious blow, and vicious blow outperforms this in all scenarios.

What about taking it AND vicious blow? I could see some use in the fighter style characters without access to the heavy hitting guardian weapons. Yorrick and Silas come to mind right away. But you still have to wait for this card to take effect, meaning the enemy will most likely get an attack off. This somewhat defeats the purpose of attacking the enemies then. Most enemies have 3 HP, and the ones that have more usually have 5-6. So you do a vicious blow augmented standard attack on a 5-6 HP enemy, and it lives and your turn ends. The enemy attacks you and then this ticks. So the enemy now has ~4 damage on them. This translates to you having to attack the enemy again your next turn to finish them off, or leaving them evaded for two turns someway to make this card eventually run its course. You very quickly then get into a Rube Goldberg style problem with "why didn't you just kill it with another attack", which begs the question again of why did you take this card.

So when do you use this card? The only reasonable excuse I could see would be on enemies with exactly 4 HP, using an investigator with smaller arms and probably that also has stunning blow and can outmove the hunter keyword.

It ends up being a lot of very specific criteria to make this card worthwhile, so I can't honestly say it has a place in any deck.

If future upgraded versions had a draw attached to it, we may be talking though.

drjones87 · 190
Actually, parallel Ashcan, while he can take Grievous Wound and Vicious Blow, VB occupies one of his 5 guardian slots, while GW he could take without restriction. It also synergizes with his ability. So while it's likely still not a good card, there might be a deck here. — Susumu · 366
It's a joke of a card that should not be restricted to Non-Elite enemies, as the only enemies that might stick around for more than 1 turn are almost always Elite enemies with a lot of HP. This feels like it is designed for a parallel game where enemies are actually a threat and not blown into oblivion as soon as they come out of the encounter deck — Blood&gore · 419
The more I think about it: it does not only synergize with II Pete's ability, he can also easy scare away the enemy with his guitar. It's a bit of a pitty, the card is restricted to melee cards, does not include creatures. An infectious dog bite would sure make the wound grievous? But like that, he would need a Baseball Bat, Fire Axe, Fire Extinguisher, Gravedigger's Shovel or Machete. So, there are ways. Notable, NOT Chainsaw or Sledge Hammer (4), as he is restricted to Survivor level 3. — Susumu · 366
Probably useful in deck which have no problems with exhausting enemies like Daniela Reyes or some nice builds for skid. Also Finn and Kymani seems Investigators who might profit from this card due to their evade mechanics. — Tharzax · 1
Power creep occurs when new cards are more powerful than older cards. This is not an example of power creep, it's the exact opposite. — Soul_Turtle · 441