Short Supply

I love this. This is such a clever, thematic, and uniquely indirect form of tutoring that's perfect for Survivors.

e.g. Imagine having Amnesia or Paranoia in your deck- basic weaknesses that are so brutal, you have to adapt how you play your entire deck until they're flushed. Now imagine that in ~30-40% of your games, you'll be freed of that on the first turn, and in the rest you're much more likely to hit them early and can prepare. Reliability- even for weaknesses- can be valuable in Arkham, just look at how many people deem Mr. Rook's ability to force weaknesses early to be a beneficial.

Downsides:

  • Some cards, once in the discard, can't be easily recovered, even for Survivors. Items, Allies, Innate Skills, L0, and Survivor cards can be recovered, and Yorick can recover any asset. If your deck hinges on something that's not in those categories, you may risk burying it first turn.

  • On which topic, remember, Signature Cards have no level... meaning they are NOT L0, thus not Scroungeable. So Silas can fish (heh) for Nautical Prowess using True Survivor, and Finn can Scavenge for his Trusty .38... but if Bob plans to be Shrewd or Minh plans to be Analytical, they may want to avoid this entirely.

  • Do NOT use this if you're playing the Dunwich campaign. Trust me... your deck will be in the discard pile soon enough.

HanoverFist · 746
I wouldn't recommend it for Wendy either due to her signature weakness — Tharzax · 1
EXCELLENT catch, thank you. This would absolutely be too high risk for Wendy. — HanoverFist · 746
Statistically speaking, it's actually good in Wendy - risky, but good. Since this happens after the mulligan, in which weaknesses aren't a factor, you have a much higher chance of a positive or neutral option than a negative one - signature in discard pile and weakness in deck. The possibility of that happening at all, though, is certainly a consideration. — SSW · 216
I know you cant willingly discard a weakness, but I think the forced effect here does make it fair to ditch a weakness since you aren't drawing the cards. Anyone confirm? — drjones87 · 200
It's completely legal, yes. I can't cite errata/rules, but your logic is the jist of it... by default, it's not a "weakness" until it's drawn, unless it contains exception rules on the weakness itself (e.g. Mandy's Shocking Discovery). Additionally, other cards have been used in strategies specifically to locate and burn dangerous weaknesses in a deck before they're drawn, or simply as a fringe benefit of cards with search mechanics. (e.g. Scroll Of Secrets(Seeker-3))) — HanoverFist · 746
I tried this card out and was unimpressed. It slightly increases the chances of having good targets for cards like Resourceful in early game but reliably increases the chances of taking a horror due to an empty deck in late game. — GeneralXy · 41
It does definitely raise your chance of decking yourself significantly, but then again Survivors have some of the best horror soak/heal available. (Patrice expects to get decked every single game). There's certainly a random component to it though; while it (more or less) triples your chances of having a line of sight on an important recurrable card on turn 1, one could still end up with all the wrong cards in the discard (like the Resourcefuls themselves).. — HanoverFist · 746
Nine of Rods

TIMING QUESTION: Legendary Duke ally Ashcan Pete's inherent ability is, as a fast action, to discard a card and ready any card he controls. Nine Of Rods here is a reaction ability.

You can probably see where I'm goin' with this... can Ashcan use his ability to get 2 re-draws from this during the mythos phase instead of just 1?

HanoverFist · 746
It's technically possible, but only if you're already drawing multiple encounter cards during the mythos phase and there is a skill test happening between them. Fast actions can only be taken in action windows, and the only guaranteed action window in the mythos phase is after all players are done drawing encounter cards. But if your two draws are not back to back (for example, agenda advancement makes everyone draw an encounter card and then after that everyone does their normal draws), you use Nine of Rods on your first draw and then there is a skill test somewhere, you can use one of the skill test windows to ready Nine in time for your second draw. — TheNameWasTaken · 3
Got it- I had a feeling it wouldn't be possible to squeeze a fast action between a Reaction and the trigger for that reaction. Thanks for the confirmation! — HanoverFist · 746
Beat Cop

The FAQ entry for Beat Cop and Beat Cop and the old comment from 4 years ago below are kind of misleading. I believed for a long time that Beat Cop could only trigger his ability 2 times. In fact he can do it 3 times, because, as it was pointed out to me, when the cost is paid the ability is not interrupted, even if the card leaves play due to being defeated by damage. As stated in the rules: "If the ability being initiated is on an in-play card, the sequence does not stop from completing if that card leaves play during the sequence".

The FAQ entry refers to the situation when lethal damage from enemy attack/treachery is assigned to Beat Cop. in that case there is no window to trigger ability. The FAQ entry does not apply to the situation, when a player deliberately uses ability.

So Beat Cop is even better for me now:)

SergSel · 371
Lily Chen

Hey everyone,

Now that the whole Edge of the Earth has leaked, how about having a new look at our new friend Lily Chen?

Please leave your suggestions for her in the comment section! What are your leads to build her deck?

That being said, it seems like there are 3 different Paths to take:

The Path, the Path and the Path.


1) The full Build:

A] How to get her to match the best ?

• Starting with the Discipline gives you 5 immediatly, which is the same as the best guardians.

Lily Chen has access to only 5 lvl 0 cards and no Firearm. That leaves us with little choice. Enchanted Blade is not only the best lvl 0 weapon, it also doesn't burn her slots. It can be upgraded in Enchanted Blade (3) for a bit of draw and heal (which are both useful, or so it seems based on the amount of healing cards). The other choice is potentially Survival Knife...

• To have good use of her weapons, she needs to improve her base : For this, the basis would be to use Grete Wagner (0) in addition with Beat Cop (2) once you purchased a weapon. You can finally add a Ace of Swords to go to 8 to be able to use most weapons available to her with a great chance of success.

B] How does Lily Chen compete with other ?

Drum rolls: Her Discipline!

• With this build, you only need 1 Stat: . Therefore you can use all the other Disciplines for their built-in capacities.

The Discipline for example provides exceptional card draw.

The Discipline gives a good burst. Note that you need to trigger Fight on different cards to use the 3 attacks, so one could be from Enchanted Blade, another from Machete and the last from Spectral Razor for example, but you cannot simply spam the Cyclopean Hammer.

The Discipline keeps you alive which is always appreciated.

C] What 5 lvl 0 should I choose?

In this build, it seems like a solid choice would be to have Prepared for the Worst, boring but necessary as even with XP, it's hard to find a better tutor, and the only solid option is Enchanted Blade. Hallowed Mirror is important to heal the damages of Grete Wagner and Beat Cop to get more uses out of them. Finally, Vicious Blow is always a good pick if Grete is too expensive.

D] Overall build:

It seems like in this build the Cyclopean Hammer is the best weapon, the chances of dealing 3 damage are important, even if you do not take the Discipline as you hit with 11 on each attack once fully set up. When choosing a support Discipline, I would advise to go first for the Discipline for the consistency, and the Discipline in the end of the campaign for the burst needed against great old ones or Discipline if you have a lot of traumas.


The Path:

A] Why should you take any in my deck?

There are multiple reasons why a focussed Lily Chen should still think of improving her later in the campaign:

• For solo/flex, a decent with Sixth Sense / Clairvoyance still makes you a good clue-support. Having some Arcane slots filled also make you strong in early campaign with your Dragon Pole.

• For better use of your Enchant Weapon and improving the chances to succeed by 3 on your Cyclopean Hammer, which deals 3 damage in one hit.

• For a better encounter prot as well as an increased generation of tokens if you decide to splash and you purchase the Holy Rosary (2).

B] Cards to consider to improve your

As a second priority, after the purchase of a reliable source of damage, as mentioned earlier, you can look at improving your with cards that have a double use:

• Bandolier (2) that could also allow you to bring other weapons such as your trusted Dragon Pole or an Enchanted Blade (3) for draw and heal, even a Book of Psalms...

Relic Hunter and a Police Badge, a bit out of theme but still good.

• Holy Rosary also for the soak upgraded into Holy Rosary as explained earlier.

• The Discipline. The Horror soak of the rosary + Heal of the Hallowed Mirror and this discipline allow you to take In the Thick of It without being that afraid.

C] What 5 lvl 0 should I choose?

Same as the previous build Prepared for the Worst, boring but necessary. In this build you will be using Dragon Pole alongside Enchanted Blade so no need to burn a slot on your weapons. Another good card in this build is "Let me handle this!". It helps you to protect your cluever by pulling the enemies or to get the tests especially once you have your Holy Rosary (2). The last one can be one Vicious Blow for a little kick, Glory (my preference) or Daring for a bit of card draw.

D] Overall build:

• This build benefits from having potentially a bit of generation, a better use of the Cyclopean Hammer once you buy it, and a decent clue getting when you are waiting for an enemy (let's not lie, it happens quite often in a 's life, especially when you hit that hard at anything that comes your way).

• Enchanted Cyclopean Hammer gives you double boost for an insane hit that is sure to hit 4 damages... Once per turn. This build can provide 10 damages per turn in the best case, 8 damages in the worst case.

• You can bring Arcane Initiate that can tutor your Investigation spells, attack spells as well as Enchant Weapon and replaces it later with Nephthys, for example.

• Example of a Deck using the [Cyclopean Hammer](/card/08093)


The Path:

A] Why should you take an a Path that leans towards ?

It seems like Lily Chen was intended to be built around and by the Game Designers. Look at Butterfly Swords, Sweeping Kick or the Fang of Tyr'thrha.

• This build is, therefore, more adapted to take advantage of these cards. Especially the Butterfly Swords that allow distributing the damages. It never mentions that your second attack with the Butterfly Swords has to be on the same target. If you are dealing with many even-health enemies, you can simply spam attack and not waste single damage, which can be the most action effective in certain situations like swarms or TFA.

• The Butterfly Swords also make you make a lot of tests. This has ups and downs. The upsides are: you have more chances to draw an Elder Sign which make you more likely to have a lot of uses of your Disciplines and Lily Chen's lets you flip your Disciplines. The impact of a bad draw is decreased: Draw an autofail, and you only cancel one of the 2 attacks instead of the whole attack (though it also prevents you from doing the one-off 3 damage attack).

B] Cards to consider to improve your

• Bandolier (2) to get 2 copies down, you can Enchant both Weapons and the beauty of it is that if you exhaust one pair and then the other, that would count as 2 attacks for your Discipline.

• Use your Enchant Weapon boost on your first attack to give it all the chances to land and trigger the second one.

• Keep Galvanize in hand for an extra burst, or your Fight Events like Spectral Razor, Toe to Toe or Sweeping Kick.

• Combat Training (3) gives you the perfect combination of stats for this build.

C] What 5 lvl 0 should I choose?

Same as the build, Prepared for the Worst is boring but necessary. Then, you will want to maximise the use of your Discipline, so you need to get some Fight events, like Toe to Toe, then Vicious Blow to try to kill enemies using the Exhaust in one . Finally Glory is always good to get better access to your card pool.

You can also choose to take the Black Cat to mitigate the impact of Symbol Tokens.

D] Overall build:

• This build is quite good when it comes to Disciplines, it allows to go first for the one, then the and finally the for the built-in capacity. You also want to look at cards that give you a passive boost as you need to consistently land your first attack with the Butterfly Swords (2) to activate the exhaust action. You can take Beat Cop (2) x2 and Charisma, Combat Training (3), Grete Wagner, Ace of Swords, etc...

• This build is, of course, more thematic, so if you are the role play type, this can be an important point.

• The downside is that it seems slightly less effective and offers a slightly decreased Encounter Prot (unless we have a more TFA style campaign).

• Example of a Lily Deck using [Butterfly Swords (2)](/card/08025)


Overall good cards for her:

A] level 0 cards:

• In the beginning, you will likely want to run the Dragon Pole, so you need to fill in your Arcane slots. The best way to do this is to have some cheap assets that are at least a tiny bit useful: Scrying, Alchemical Transmutation or the new Talisman of Protection that is Fast.

• Spectral Razor is also a good spell as you can use it during the 3 attacks of your Discipline. Promise of Power is also always useful even though it doesn't provide a "special effect" on success.

• Ward of Protection is great to keep your Partners alive in EotE.

• Scroll of Secrets is overall good if you are using the Taboo.

• Holy Rosary gives a bonus for Cyclopean Hammer and Rite of Seeking.

• Arcane Initiate helps you finding Rite of Seeking, Spectral Razor and most importantly Enchant Weapon.

B] Overall good level 1-5 cards:

• Safeguard to offer better protection of your cluever, as well as an insane action compression, especially in this campaign where we expect huge maps.

• Hallowed Mirror (3) with their friends Soothing Melody to provide some good healing to your whole group. Especially good if you take the Discipline.

• Fang of Tyr'thrha will most likely find use in enemies with Spawn at the other side of the map and dooms or bad effects. You can also use it as the first attack of the Discipline to make sure to clean a location immediately.

• Enchant Weapon even if you're not going down the Path will most likely still be an amazing investment.

• Well Prepared to take the best out of the of the Cyclopean Hammer or the of the Butterfly Swords.

• Reliable is a great addition to both Cyclopean Hammer and Butterfly Swords as they Add stats.

• The classic Stick to the Plan with Ever Vigilant, Emergency Cache and Prepared for the Worst.

• Overpower (2) and Vicious Blow (2) for more draw and more burst.

• Empty Vessel is always good especially if you take In the Thick of It or a lot of trauma. It shines especially if you take the Butterfly Swords to capitalise on all the token draw.

On the Hunt (3) that is a great way to get less bored and make resources for your setup, or make sure to hunt down the Victory Point enemies when you are fully set up.


Conclusion:

It first seemed that Lily Chen was intended to be a mix of and , which was weird as she also started as a ...

Now that we know all the cards, the most surprising is the lack of cards available that boost her , especially with all the multi-class cards that boost agility, but they are almost all for Monterey Jack...

That makes the build good, thematic but not flashy.

On the other side, a more Sister Mary style build with first and second seems to be really promessing and offers an impressive perspective of damages, especially with the release of the insane Cyclopean Hammer. On the downside it decreases the use of Disciplines.

Finally, the full build seems reliable, offers a lot of options to adapt the style based on the campaign you're running and gives the most out of your Disciplines.


How about you, how would you build your Lily to be the best investigator??

Valentin1331 · 77889
@Valentin1331 - as a note enchanted blade (0) doesn’t take up the limited slot. — crusificton · 3
without having tried it, I think Dragon Pole is a bit of a trap. I would just go with E-Blades, event based damage, and maybe Sled Dogs to start out. XP gives you a lot more options for using combat over will. i could be way off though. the other thing i would mention is bless. her options for generating are a bit limited, but trying to get elder signs with blessings seems good, and holy spear is probably the strongest weapon she can take (well, Cyclopean Hammer also seems amazing) — Zinjanthropus · 229
I'm trying a Lily as cluer build for a Carcosa campaign i'm starting. It seems like a strange build when she's so clearly a fighter, but my idea is that with her combat rating and (hopefully) her Dragon Poles in hand, she's well able to defend herself - so she can concentrate the rest of her deck on investigate using will spells and resource spells. The problem with the build is that she can only level up into Guardian cards so as the campaign goes on she will get gradually more fighty and less investigatey. — majiming · 8
You cannot add two disciplines with the same bonus. "...you may choose and add a different Discipline asset to your deck." DIFFERENT!!! — Jarex_HellCry · 1
First Watch

I feel people are missing the main power of this card. If the encounter deck has less cards than the number of players, you don't shuffle and draw extra cards.

This means in a 4-player game, when the encounter deck gets down to 3 or less cards, it is burning an encounter draw as well as letting you assign cards. If the deck has 2 or 1 cards left, you are burning up to 3 draws.

This effect is just amazing. It's comparable to multiple Wards of Protection (2) or (5), or A Watchful Peace, both of which are much more expensive XP wise. In a 4-player game, it's not uncommon to go through the deck twice, giving you two shots at this.

The effect is so powerful, for so little cost (0 XP, 1 card, 1 resource), and there is so little downside of it not happening (the card is still really useful in 4-player if the stars are cruel and you don't draw it in time), that to me this makes it a MUST have in a 4-player game. I'm struggling to see any reason why you wouldn't run this, unless the table already has it covered.

It is good, but there is the caveat that 1. encounter decks, some of them at least, reshuffle often before they have any chance of emptying, and 2. playing First Watch later in the scenario requires not playing it earlier when you might have a particularly important round to use it on to protect yourself. For this reason, I really like the push and pull between wanting to play it late when the deck would empty, and wanting to play it at a possible inflection point in the scenario. It is a very strong card. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
I agree it's basically a must. Even when Surges aren't throwing off your encounter deck count, the ability for the Guardian to eat all the encounters themselves to free up the team on a crucial turn is invaluable. — Teag · 54