This is the only way to get back Becky once it is in your discard pile for Tommy Muldoon if it got accidentally taken away from you...

One copy of Salvage and 1-2 of Resourceful and Becky is safe from anything that doesn't take it out of the game :)

EDIT : NOPE, I'm an idiot that can't read a card for years, see the comments ;)

In my opinion the best Dilemma in The Scarlet Keys.
For 1xp, it's basically a 0-cost event that makes you draw 3 (you want the second option most of the time).

The downside is obviously that you cannot precisely control when At a Crossroads will trigger BUT :

• Most of the time you can spare an action for this.
• Don't forget you don't lose 1 action "immediately" but on your next turn so you can plan accordingly. And it will never destroy what you were planning to do this turn if you drew it during your turn (thus not during the upkeep phase).
• Katja Eastbank will help you with the "draw-timing" if it is that big of a problem for you.
• You always have the first option if you need a burst of action right now and/or you already have a lot of cards in hand.

Overall a really good card. Just be careful if your friends at the table also play some Dilemmas though ! :)

At level 0

This card is great right from the bat at level 0. It's basically 1 action for 1 card in your deck and 1 resource. You will have the opportunity to play both copies almost every game as most scenario has at least 2 agendas and 2 acts ! And if it is not the case, Rogues tend to oversucceed anyway... To trigger this "play condition", you can play Winifred, Lockpicks or events thats add to of your skills together like Breaking and Entering, Slip Away, etc.

Honed Instinct is nice to :

• add more action to your ridiculous 5-8 actions turn in some Rogues (and maybe play Pay Day if you played it during your turn by oversucceeding).
• react to a bad "advance the Agenda" (or "advance the Act", like in TCU...) by evading the monster you now have to generate engaged with you !
• simply do more to win the scenario more quickly.

The main drawback of this card is that you don't want to have it in your opening hand (at least if you can't oversucceed on your turn 1) but you don't want to draw it too late either. So it might end up as a dead draw for sometimes. For this reason I think the more card draw you have in your deck, the better Honed Instinct is (like most cards, yes I know...).

It changes a bit when you unlock new ways to use this card obviously.

What upgrade(s) to take ?

• As a general rule, you should have at least 1 "play condition" for this card that you can hope to do almost every turn, or at least half of your turns. If you can easily oversucceed by 3, don't take any upgrade that adds new play condition. If you can't, find 1 that corresponds to your deck and/or campaign. You shouldn't take more than 1 of those "play condition" upgrades except if you have too much xp.

1 □ Reflex Response. Add the following play condition: "- You take damage or horror."

• Good if you are a Rogue with 1 or if you play a heavy damage and/or horror campaign (Carcosa, Innsmouth, TSK maybe considering all the healing ?) but not TFA as it gives you damage if you fail tests which you will usually less fail as a Rogue.
• You could make it very reliable with cards like Smoking Pipe, Painkillers, Forbidden Knowledge, etc.

2 □ Situational Awareness. Add the following play condition: "- A location enters play or is revealed."

• Overall not so great, there are scenarios with very few locations or where you don't really control when a location enters play or is revealed. If you know the scenario by heart it's nice but otherwise I think the other play conditions are easier.
• Might be good in EoTE though with that many locations !

3 □ Killer Instinct. Add the following play condition: "- An enemy engages you."

• The best one for a fighter/evader ! Just evade the enemy and deal with it when it reengages you or let a Hunter enemy catch up with you just to kill him (in 1 action though) before he attacks you.
• Also good when you draw an enemy card in the Mythos phase, which is quite frequent.
• Tony Morgan will love that.

4 □ Gut Reaction. Add the following play condition: "- A treachery enters your threat area."

• Situational... Might be okay in Carcosa (if I remember correctly) and mainly in TFA.
• Might also be useful if your weakness is an enemy (or can be solved in only 1 action) ! (Trish's Shadow Agents, Tony's Quarry, Kymani's Agent Fletcher)

5 □ Muscle Memory. Add the following play condition: "- You play an asset."

• Very good if you have an asset heavy deck. Just play something and use it immediately !
• This is the most reliable of the play conditions (with 1. Reflex Response + Smoking Pipe but it needs more cards).

6 □□ Sharpened Talent. During the action granted by Honed Instinct, you get +2 to each of your skills.

• Nice if you have a specific plan with your extra action (a fighter waiting for an enemy to appear, a cluever that reveals a location and immediately investigate).
• You become less flexible because it forces you to wait for an opportunity to make a test with your action but you're better at it and you generally do not take extra action just to draw a card so I guess it's pretty good !

7 □□□ Impulse Control. You may include up to three copies of Honed Instinct in your deck. Honed Instinct gets -1 cost.

• The basic card is good so this is gooder ! And free-er ! For 1xp per card :o
• A solid "play condition" is mandatory here, so most of the time this upgrade will actually be 4xp.

8 □□□□□ Force of Habit. When you play Honed Instinct, you may take 2 actions instead of 1 (one at a time). Then, remove it from the game.

• Unless you can easily cycle your deck completely twice in a game (very possible in Rogues but you need to work for it), this upgrade gives you twice as many actions. That changes a lot of things ! Now you can fight twice the enemy engaged with you (to manage those 3-health enemies), you can play a weapon then kill that cultist in time, you can take almost a turn when the agenda/act advances, giving you a lot of tempo in those sometimes critical moments, you can engage and evade an enemy on your friend, etc.

Upgrade combinations

• "I wanted to play Ursula... :/" : 2. Situational Awareness + 6. Sharpened Talent => 3xp Twice per game, enter a new location and Investigate with a +2. It's not really worth 3xp but hey, you should have played that Ursula deck !

• "Everything is a Lupara !" : 5. Muscle Memory + 6. Sharpened Talent (+ 8. Force of Habit) => 3/8xp Play any gun/weapon, play Honed Instinct, fight twice with a +2 , hopefully kill the enemy ^^' It could be nice with the Colt Vest Pocket (0) or (2) to empty all 5 ammo in 1 turn. Also nice with Tony Morgan or Dirty Fighting (you would need a Fast weapon to not take an AoO though). Note, that it is viable with inly 3xp but the 8xp is more like a Lupara, that's all :)

• "How many actions do you want ? Yes." : 7. Impulse Control + 8. Force of Habit (+ 1/2/3/4/5 ?) => 8/9xp For roughly 3xp per card you can get 6 extra actions over the course of every scenario by just doing what you would already be doing (because you bought the correct play condition for your deck/campaign). This is obviously only relevant if you have good enough Skills or boosts to your skills to pass that many tests every turn but still ! (For this reason, I feel like Preston would fall a bit short on gas (or money !) with 5 actions, same for Jenny (without the 8/8/8/8 build ^^) or investigators that relies on assets that exhaust (Lockpicks, Mauser C96, etc.)

Final thoughts

I like this card. I think it's better for a fighter or flex than for a cluever as you might have guessed with the examples I gave. That's because, bursts of actions are generally more useful when there is an emergency like an enemy or two to kill ! But you can easily do the same thing with Investigate actions, it's just a bit too overpriced in xp for that in my opinion.

Bonus idea : Put Honed Instinct in a Sefina deck with 3. Killer Instinct + 7. Impulse Control (4xp, level 2) to play up to 6 copies of Honed Instinct per deck-cycle and nuke enemies with your spells when they approch you !

It doesn't seem so, but there is quite some stuff to write about this card!

This card is going to be a staple in "clue-dropping" decks. It is the only card that can drop more than 3 clues at once, the others being limited to 1 and 3 for Captivating Discovery. Compared to Captivating Discovery, it doesn't cost you any resources, is fast if you have a test on a treachery card or had to spend an action investigating/evading, and it helps you pass a test at the same time.

Why drop so many clues?

• Because if you have 2 Research Notes on the table, you net 1 Evidence per clue dropped, get an additional action to get them back with Press Pass, and you can collect them all in one go if you succeed highly enough on the Research Notes test.
• It may also be interesting to drop some clues at a random location to collect some Evidence that you then spend on a location with Victory Points to clean it off easily. This is particularly good for locations that have a very high shroud or punish you for investigating there.
• Sometimes, there are simply too many clues on the board, and it is more important to evade a boss than to hold on to some clues.

Why would you want to cancel a chaos token?

• You are testing 0 or 1 skill point above the test. This card helps you to pick the token that will make you succeed.
• You want to succeed by X and are looking for a particular token
• You are dodging certain tokens, like with the symbol tokens for the Mystic Spells such as Azure Flame (5)
• You are fishing for the symbol tokens for Sixth Sense/Wither. Especially good in Nkosi Mabati - Jim
• Finally, this is potentially amazing in Blurse decks! Drop clues until you trigger your Ancient Covenant and automatically succeed.

So, who will want that?

• I would start by saying every Deck that is planning on using the Dropping Clue.
• Daisy and Luke for dodging symbols while using Rite of Seeking on their first action.
• Anyone playing a deck, but with a preference for Luke that can play Eye of Chaos and drop 2 clues to pick as many as possible to get clues at connecting locations, and find the 2 dropped clues back. Make sure to take the tabooed Ritual Candles to ignore all these modifiers.
• Jim to pick up more :ChaosSkull: when really needed.
• Shotgun Roland drops a clue on an empty location to reroll a token and get another chance while getting the clue back at the end if he kills the enemy.
• Grief Carson drops his clues to pick the -8 for his teammates. How would he get clues, you ask? Stirring Up Trouble obviously.

On top of all that, this card is Practiced and commits for a , so this is a perfect target for Practice Makes Perfect.

At level 0

This card is a nice generic tutor for anyone who can take Rogue cards. Now you can tutor events or skills (or some assets) way easier (the Backpack (0) and Calling in Favors already covered most assets).

• Compared to the Backpack, if you hit 3 targets, it cost you 1 more resource. And if you're unlucky, it costs you less/nothing so it's kind of similar.
• Compared to Calling in favor, it goes 3 less cards-deep but could potentially target 2 more cards for 2 more resources. Again, overall pretty fair.

So yeah, this card is pretty nice at level 0 if you have a plan in mind with your Traits !

Which Trait(s) to choose ?

• Favor : If your name is Preston (or you are a rich Dilettante) and you like paying people to do stuff, take Favor ! It will find your other copy of Friends in Low Places and a lot of good cards (Black Market, Money Talks, Intel Report, etc.).

• Illicit : If your name is NOT Preston and you love the illicit life that TSK brings (Finn Edwards or Kymani Jones most likely though it is a bit in competition with Finn's signature)

• Talent : Right now this is one of the ONLY way to tutor Talent cards (the other one being Molly Maxwell and that's all I think) ! That generally includes cards that boost your skill tests (Hyperawareness, Hard Knocks, etc.) or nice niche effects (Pickpocketing, Scavenging, etc.). Jenny Barnes would love that with her average Skills. The tri-colored Talent suite from EoTE is also great because it also pays for all the cards you'll add to your hand, compensating for the "1 resource each" cost.

• Firearm / Weapon : If you want to kill things, you get the idea (hum hum Tony Morgan !).

• Ally : If you REALLY are into allies (Charlie Kane, Leo Anderson...).

• Innate / Practiced / Developed : If you're building a deck with a lot of skills. Winifred Habbamock seems the best with direct access to this card !

And more genereally any Traits that appear on your Deckbuilding Options or in your ability (Item for Bob Jenkins and Dexter Drake, etc.) OR, and more importantly, on the other investigators at your table (Charm for Amina Zidane, Relic for Ursula Downs, Tactic for Mark Harrigan, Tome for Daisy Walker, Bless for Mary, etc.). There is no limit if you coordonate your decks !

What upgrade(s) to take ?

1 □ Helpful. When you play Friends in Low Places, you may choose another investigator at your location to resolve its effects.

• Generally hard to use but if you synchronize your deck with your teammates this could be very good ! Give a weapon to your Guardian, a Book to Daisy, and so on. The possibilities are almost infinite. Otherwise not that good because your teammate needs a specific Trait 'ideally in common with your deck) and resources to add the cards to their hands.

2 □□ Versatile. Choose another Trait: ____. When you play Friends in Low Places, you may choose one of the looked-at cards with both chosen Traits to add to your hand without spending 1 resource._

• Pretty good if you have a very focused deck. You could go with Illicit+Weapon (for most Rogue guns), Favor+Service (for the Intel Report suite), Spell+Cursed (for the Armageddon suite). You may not hit every time but when you hit it's good !

• Alternatively you could go with associations like Item+Weapon to have a broad list of possible targets and an occasionnal cost reduction. This is safer, probably the best option.

• Finally, the last option is to go for totally different Traits like Item+Ally. You will never have that nice cost reduction but you will hit a lot of targets. This is a good option if you can pay for it !

3 □□ Bolstering. Each card added to your hand by Friends in Low Places gains a icon until the end of the phase.

• Very situational but good for a Winifred deck built with skills that share a specific Trait or two. A skill for her is half a card so every resource you invest is better invested. But if you hit too many targets with Friends in Low Places+Bolstering, you will lose the icon. It might be better if you have a lot of action (or play at high player count) so you can have enough skill test to commit your skills to.

4 □□ Clever. Instead of shuffling the remaining cards into your deck, you may place each of them on the top of your deck, in any order.

• THIS is the best option in my opinion ! You could chose a Trait not even existing in your deck, this would still be good ! For 1 action and 0 resource you can now rearrange however you want your next (up to) 6 draws and/or locate a weakness and prepare for it. Very useful if you draw a lot, a bit less otherwise obviously.

• Be mindful though, there is a big anti-synergy with cards like [Lucky Cigarette Case (3) (not the level 0).

5 □□ Prompt. Friends in Low Places gains fast and "play during any window".

• 2xp FOR -1 Action on 2 cards is very good. It will ease your setup if you had a bad mulligan, give you more actions to use your new cards or maybe take a resource before playing this card to make sure a target is not wasted because you're poor !
• It is even better after you bought other upgrades for this card. You could play it before another investigator takes it's turn if you combine it with 1. Helpful or you can play a weapon or soak while engaged with 7. Swift.

6 □□□ Experienced. Increase the number of cards looked at by 3.

• Another VERY GOOD upgrade. You get much more value by looking at 9 cards (generally a third of your deck at turn 1).
• Combine it with every other upgrades for more efficiency. 4. Clever is even better now that you can rearrange a third of your deck (more later in the game) !

7 □□□ Swift. You may play one of the cards added to your hand (paying its cost).

• This one is reserved to really rich people or low cost decks that don't rely on Skills. Preston and Bob are perfect because they're rich, have access to Survivor's cheap cards and need a lot of assets !
• If you can manage to pay for your cards with a +1 cost though, this is bonkers ! You get back the action you used to play Friends in Low Places so this event almost gains Fast.

Upgrade combinations

• "I'm a philanthropist rogue !" : 1. Helpful + 2. Versatile + 7. Swift (+ 5. Prompt) => 6/9xp Help your fighter to find and play their only copy of Flamethrower at the right time !

• "Sort them all !" : 4. Clever + 6. Experienced => 5xp Rearrange from up to 9 cards of your deck everytime you play this card and avoid your weaknesses for days. It costs 5xp so, sadly, it becomes a level 3 card and splash-Rogues can't take it...

• "I'm a skilled person !" : 2. Versatile + 3. Bolstering (+ 5. Prompt) => 4/6xp Choose two mutually exclusive Traits on Skill cards (like Practiced and Innate), add a lot of them to your deck, play first this round and then draw 2-4 skills with +1 to commit this phase !

Final thoughts

It's good, not broken or anything but good like every other Customizable card. I'd say Preston (with Favor / Service Traits), Finn (with Illicit / Weapon Traits) and Winifred (with any two Practiced / Innate / Developed Traits) are the best users of this cards. But everyone could make good use of it and adapt it to its deck/group.

Bonus idea : Combine it with the tri-color Talents from EoTE like Antiquary to pay for all the cards you will get (and pay 1 resource each) thanks to Friends in Low Places !