This is kind of a thought-provoking card.

Normally you don't want to fail tests, because failing tests means you lose anything you contributed to the test (skills, resources, items, actions, etc.) in addition to suffering the consequences for failure. Does Take Heart make it worth failing a test?

I think failing a test is normally bad enough that it's not worth deliberately failing in order to get cards and resources. So, I don't think this card will see a lot of play on its own merit. However, I think it has good interactions with the following cards:

• Calvin Wright
• Silas Marsh
• Live and Learn

Calvin Wright is a natural fit for this card - his low stats guarantee that he is going to fail tests, and so using this card in the beginning will help him get his early-game engine going. Silas Marsh also may want this card because he can contribute it to a test and then pull it back to his hand using his ability if the test succeeds unintentionally. Lastly, Live and Learn can let you fail a skill test, collect the benefit of Take Heart, and then let you take the test again with more cards, resources, and a +2 bonus. That's really good.

I don't know if it's worth a card slot on its own - conventional wisdom is that playing cards to avoid failing tests altogether are normally better than cards that let you salvage something out of the failure - but there are some interesting interactions that I think make this card effective if it's used thoughtfully.

Of the triple skills available at the time, I think that Rise to the Occasion is one of the more difficult ones to use. If the test is that much more difficult than your base skill level, then this card alone is probably not enough to guarantee a success - chances are you're going to need a little extra help.

Generally speaking, I'd normally rather have Unexpected Courage - it's one less icon, but it's much more flexible.

The exception, of course, is Calvin Wright. With base skill values that are all 0, he can use this card on almost every test. In most instances I think he's going to want to take this one with him!

My basic claim for Norman is that, if you aren't buying the 4-5 XP mystic cards, then you're better off with Daisy Walker (who has access to Higher Education and tome-shenanigans). Norman's strength is that he can go big - so do it. Go Big, or Go Home.

So I like Shrivelling(5) and Grotesque Statue, two of the biggest and most powerful mystic cards. That's 18 XP right there (assuming you don't Arcane Research), and the core of your power. It means you're a Seeker who can drop the pain on enemies if needed, as well as guarantee key passes on Seeker activities with your statues.

Beyond that, my second point is that every time you use Norman's ability, its the equivalent of drawing a card and possibly gaining a resource, so its almost 1-2 bonus actions (ish). In other words, you want to use it as often as you can, every turn if possible. This means he favors events and assets over skills (you can't use his ability to commit cards), and favors lower cost "stuff" that can be played in most situations.

So Working a Hunch, Mind over Matter(don't save it, just use it), Magnifying Glass(0), No Stone Unturned - all these are better for him than for others. Even Emergency Cache and Shortcut are better, as they are playable from the top most of the time, netting you +1 card. Value.

Beyond that you've got St. Hubert's Key and Dr. Milan Christopher or Alyssa Graham. Dr Milan is the best, as always, but Alyssa is still pretty good for Norman, so you could be generous and let a teammate run Dr Milan (maybe even Finn if you are feeling very kind) . The Holy Rosary I feel is a bit of a trap. Despite all the Purple, Norman is still a Seeker at heart and will be Investigating a lot. +int is more valuable to him than +will, and therefore the Key really delivers for him. Plus you're probably not running Arcane Research and your mind is still healthy (ie, the Key sticks around longer).

All of this is standard Norman, irrespective of the campaign. For FA and others where the encounter deck can be rough, I do like Scrying(3), though Mists of R'lyeh is also a fair call for the second Arcane slot. Between them, Ward of Protection, the Statues and potentially other cheats like Counterspell and Time Warp, you should be OK. Dr. William T. Maleson and Seal of the Elder Sign are possibilities too, though you sacrifice a lot for them in terms of the Ally slot or XP. I do also like Protective Incantation just to burn some of the Dr. Milan Christopher money (no Higher Education remember) and FA, on any difficulty, has some pretty horrible tokens in the bag worth sealing. I'm less keen on the Spirit Athame or Crystalline Elder Sign. The latter is a solo card for me, no good for 2+. The former is for pure mystics... Norman should be using his Intellect for searches 75% of the time, with his spells coming out to save the day at key times.

Mystic splashes for me are then Ward of Protection, St Hubert's Key and Delve Too Deep (rotating out once you have XP). Alyssa could sub for one of these if needed. Ideally you want 2 of all of those, so you have hard choices at the start which to drop to 1. It gets easier once you drop the Delves, or on Standalone where Delve is not needed. I try to avoid starting with Shrivelling, as then you are paying XP to bring in your level 0 purples once you upgrade the Shrivelling (which you surely want to do). This means you are probably leaning into Shrivelling(3)/Shrivelling(5) as your very first upgrades then, and running a couple of games building up to "Maximum Firepower!".

I haven't talked much about his Signatures - and to me, they are not that important. His unique deckbuilding and game ability are far more defining. Split the Angle is a bit iffy. If you run Scrying(3), or Alyssa Graham, it sometimes has value, particularly in encounters with obnoxious cards, but even then it's often worth chucking. Without either of those, its just not worth it, and you should never be using the first "waste an action" effect, even on solo. The Vengeful Hound is extremely annoying yes, and you can draw it in the first turn before any actions (truly as horrible as it sounds), but beyond that it's just a bad-guy. Kill it or get your friends to help kill it, then move on.

My one complaint with Norman is that he can feel a bit slow-and-steady. As he often spends a lot of time dropping assets and events, and as he doesn't have access to Higher Education, Pathfinder, Shortcut(2), Deduction(2), In the Know, etc, he doesn't dash around the board hoovering up things really quickly like Ursula or Rex (or Daisy/Minh if you build that way). You just need to let your teammates know that. But he makes up for it by turning up to boss-fights and times of stress with virtually unshakable destruction, as well as being efficient and value-driven in his cards. I really like him, he's quite unique.

I feel Investigator reviews should put their money where their mouth is with a sample deck, so here is my Norman that I've been using for Standalone scenarios.

Standalone Norman - Go Big or Go Home

IMPORTANT: DOES NOT WORK WITH TRY AND TRY AGAIN

The card is added to the effects of step 7, while checking for failure/success is step 6. Super unintuitive, but that's how it works.

Still good though.

Madame Labrance is... OK and fits in certain decks, but I probably see a lot more people running her than I should do. Yes, obviously she works with Dark Horse, and if you're going to be running on empty, you can hopefully use her every turn, and she has some nice interaction with Lucky! here. So all that's good. But even then the opportunity cost in playing her is quite large, and you might be better running something else.

Firstly, how often will you play her in time to make a decent profit? Most of the time you will be using her for resources rather than cards; all the decks that build around her tend to do that, so lets focus on that. (We're doing her a tiny injustice here, as a card is slightly better than a resource, but not by much. If you assume x1.2, you need 5 card draws to count as an additional "resource" which almost never happens with her. There is probably a cardless Survivor archetype with this and Last Chance waiting to be discovered, but for now its not well served enough to build around, so resources it is). To be better than Emergency Cache, you have to reliably use her ability 6 times. With the average game lasting around 15 turns, that's not unfeasible, but there will be games where she arrives too late. She delivers her value slowly, and generally we prefer spike value to drip value. She also has a 2 resource hump, so sets you back a moderate amount. None of this is major, but often you can get to the end of the scenario, have used the Madame 5 times and think, "wow, that was great", but it really wasn't - it was poor. You need 10 uses to say "wow!" and that is quite rare. A lot of people love the 2/2 soak for 2, and sure it is quite good, but it's not hugely significant compared to other allies (and Survivors are quite well served for damage soak anyway).

And that brings us to the big problem, the big opportunity cost - the Ally slot. The Ally slot is the strongest slot in the game, and by demanding this slot off you for her drip-feed of loot, she is punishing you quite severely. You're missing Peter Sylvestre(0), Peter Sylvestre(2), Yaotl, Aquinnah(3), and thats before we get into cross-faction allies for Wendy, Yorick, Pete, Minh and others, not to mention the campaign allies in Dunwich/FA (or the to-be-proven On Your Own). Yes, there is Charisma, but now you're paying XP for a moderate drip-economy card when you could be buying Will to Survive instead.

Anyway, I don't want to hate on the Madame. Like I say, she's not bad. But most of the time when I see her, I just wish my friend was playing Peter Sylvestre(0) instead.