"At any time, an investigator at your location may reveal to you the Item assets in their hand." This is not just the first step to use the 2nd paragraph's ability, but a flavorful play with the "Table Talk" guideline stated in the Revised Core Set booklet that the hand (and the deck) is hidden information. And I recommended trying this out to get the most fun out of this character. I opt-in to "Table Talk" for the first time recently and it makes the game really interesting. (e.g. Cannot say "Perception" or an amount of icons you can contribute. You have to believe in friendship and go for it if someone says "I can help!".)

It means player cannot just outright say, "I just draw .45 Automatic, let's group up and you play it for me." while being remote. You may hint that you needs Bob's help to buy an item, before finally revealing it once you grouped up.

Cards on hand are not necessarily telling the story that the investigator suddenly found a gun, it maybe that he brought a gun all along but need "resources" to use it, which is an abstract value, in this case it might take some time putting bullets into it, or finding it from deep in the bag, or gathering courage to use it. But when playing with Bob, the story changed to that when you reveal your .45 Automatic from hand, you are asking Bob to order this specific gun (maybe you forgot bringing it) and then pay for it together. This is a win for flavor for your table.

Bob's resource count is an open information, so you may hint that Bob has enough or not enough resources to pay, without saying "4" cost of .45 Automatic before you group up. (However with more talks/probing, it maybe easy to deduce the cost of the hidden information card.) This affects Bob's decision if Bob also need to use resources for his own and adds to the fun of declining or accepting the group up.

On the other hand, Bob with Shrewd Dealings make this more complex to ask for stuff that might be useful for him from all players. e.g. Even if Bob knows someone put Painkillers in the deck and wants it, since deck is also a hidden information, Bob cannot ask for a specific card. No one can answer that they have Painkillers on hand without breaking the character, either.

Instead, the other players need to give a hint to Bob once they see Shrewd Dealings in play (now an open information), and Bob needs to give a hint that he is in trouble. Even when Bob is not in trouble, Bob don't know what could make him even better with cards of other player's hand. So the table needs to speak up (intentionally vaguely). The secret to success as a salesman is persistence, after all!

The game’s areas of hidden information (the cards in a player’s hand and deck) exist to maintain the feeling that each investigator is a unique individual in the game world, and makes their decisions without complete and perfect knowledge of what everyone else knows or is thinking. A good means of maintaining this illusion is to not name, read off, or allude to individual cards that are hidden information (i.e., in a player’s hand or deck)

For example: Wendy wants her partner, Roland, to take an investigate action, and she desires to communicate that she can help. Instead of saying something like, “Take an investigate action; I can commit Perception” or, “Investigate our location; I can contribute two icons,” Wendy stays in character by saying, “You should investigate. I can help!”

I recently wrote a review of the butterfly knifes, and I mentioned this weapon, I really liked using this spear with sister Mary and Tommy, but I wrote in that review that you could make a blessish build with lily, but then I thought can you really build for bless with cards she takes?

Let's talk about the cards she can take.

Tempt Fate - this is an excellent card that not only helps fill the bag up with bless tokens, but it is also an automatic cantrip. The down side is that is also fills the bag with curse tokens as well. This card really shines in paradox build where using both benefits you. But with lily, it really doesn't benefit her at all.

Guardian cards-.there is not many options that she has, but their is a few.

1 - Book of Psalms- this is actually a really good bless generator, especially in horror heavy campaigns like tcu and ptc. But in this case, unless you have bandolier, it gets in the way of using the spear.

2- Blessed Blade, this is definitely not a weapon I recommend, but if you are stuffing the bag with tokens, you have a good chance of doing the +1 damage. It does only put 1 token in the bag per round. It still interferes with the spear.

3-Hand of Fate.- expensive in terms of resources, but a bless version of dodge, depending on the attack, it will yield 1-4 bless tokens. There can be times where this is more, but you usually want to use this when the bless payback is good. Which also decreases it's value somewhat, compared to dodge.

4- Holy Rosary(2) starting the lvl cards that generates bless token, this card is pretty good in terms of providing not only soak and a bonus Stat, but a somewhat reliable means to add tokens. The drawback is that it's not any will test, but only treachery cards. You can do this with any will treachery(weather it being you or your friends.)

5- Righteous Hunt(1). This so a good zone clearer. And depending on the horror it does, can provide a decent 1-2 blesses, you can easily fit this into a deck.

These are all the guardian cards I can see that generates bless, the rest of the bless token cards they have requires the token be already in the bag to actually do anything. So unless you Sister Mary, you don't have a reliable means of adding bundles of tokens to the bag. She also has lvl 0 mystic access, and there seems to be 2 cards that add bless tokens, but she may only use 1 of them(Tides of Fate). As Rite of Equilibrium is a lvl 5.  Tides of Fate is very tricky to use, especially if you don't have ways of putting curse in the bag.

So, with the cards she can take, she is very hard pressed to fill the bag with bless tokens. BUT... thank God this is a co op game, where you can play with more investigators. I built a preston deck along side her that try to lean a little on getting clues, and adding some bless generation. There is no better feeling then playing Keep Faith(0) twice with Double,double(4) "8 bless tokens at once?! Yes please!!!"

So, if you have the means of generating bless, the spear will carry you. But I would not just take the spear as the only card that uses blesses, cards like Hallow(3) or Ward of Radiance(0) are stand out cards that provide decent support. But having cards like this as well as the spear makes taking bless tokens alot more worth the trouble putting them in,another example is in this preston deck, he utilize Ancient Covenant (2) so he can skate pass some test.

So the long and short of it is, this is a good meh weapon when you only meet the requirements and only use the bless tokens with the spear, but this weapon becomes extraordinary with additional bless tech. While lily doesn't build bless well by herself, with team work, she can be just as good!

Untimely Transaction + Teamwork = Corruption

Basically spend extra 2 actions to get 100% credit cash back on the item regardless how expensive it is.

Challenge is you and your partner in crime slot need to be free while committing this shenanigan.

Allow me to offer a thought exercise to help you consider this card. In case you weren't aware, if you ever can't draw, you take one horror to reshuffle.

Think about what would be different if this card said "discard the BOTTOM 10 cards of your deck." Doesn't feel as bad, does it? Statistically, this is the exact same effect until your 16th card draw, which for most games is very late anyways. Sure, it's a bummer to see your signature card in the discard, but is that actually different than that card being in the last 10 of your deck normally? Where this gets worse: cards that search your deck like Research Librarian or Old Book of Lore. Where this obviously gets better: Scavenging or any of the many discard searches survivors have.

The biggest benefit here other than scavenging items is that of information.

This and Mysterious Raven need to be reconsidered with Charlie Kane. The biggest knock against this card (takes up an Ally slot for a one-time use) is not an issue, as Charlie has 4 slots. And unlike other investigators, Charlie can still use Art Student after it's played as a +2 boost. Furthermore, there is no opportunity cost for doing so—unlike say Lola Santiago where if you exhaust her for the boost, you can't use her ability.

The other consideration is that Art Student and Raven are cheap. As much as I'd like to dream of an all-star Gené/Grete/Lola/Peter lineup, that's a lot of resources and Charlie's going to need some cheap allies in his deck to balance (and shield) the more expensive ones. For that purpose, an ally that automatically picks up a clue when played isn't bad. And nothing says "Politician" more than a person who uses interns to do his dirty work (and as shields against monsters attacking him).