I think this card is a good upgrade to the base card, the improvements it gives are well worth the extra experience points. Especially how the attack gives +1 damage, making it a proper and effective attack. However, the base card is spectacularly overpriced, so it is still a struggle to like this card.

The big virtue of this card is that, unlike the base card, if I found it in my hand I would consider it worth the cost of playing it. I think that if you are committed to making an alcohol-based deck, this card would be perfectly suitable, as long as you aren't worried about spending your XP efficiently. But in terms of the real value of the card, considering the high resource cost and the awkward ordering problem (in order to use the powers efficiently you have to use the two willpower boosts first and only then use the attack), I think it would be overpriced with an XP cost of 2, much less 3. You need a really good combo in mind before this becomes a solid way to spend your XP.

A really important feature of this card, as opposed to its cycle mates, is that it is often practical to play it at the very end of the game when its high cost is not as important. Early on, this card is somewhat specialized, there are situations where it can be very useful but it is very expensive. But a lot of characters tend to build up some extra money near the end of the game when they don't have time to play assets anymore, and this is extra true of rogues who are rich anyway. There are a lot of situations where you can wait till the very end of the game, then suddenly use this card to pick up the clues you need to win, or to earn some extra XP, and ignore the fact that the clues are on difficult to investigate late game locations that you simply don't have time to deal with. This makes this card far more useful than its mates Decoy and Small Favor, because they tend to only be useful in reaction to bad events happening, and are far less likely to be useful in the end game, and this makes it far more difficult to get away from their extremely high cost.

This is the classic standard 0 XP 2-handed weapon. If you don't need the other hand for anything, and want to fight lots of times, this is the weapon to get. It is more powerful and more efficient than pistols like the .45 automatic. Compared to the enchanted blade, it isn't as efficient, but a hard core fighter might well prefer a single expensive card they can rely on for a long time, rather than playing an enchanted blade, quickly using up the charges, then hoping to draw something else and play that. Rogues are even more enthusiastic about the weapon since they have an even more limited pool of good 0 XP weapons. Sometimes I give this weapon to characters who really do have a use for the other hand, just because I need more weapons in the deck and sometimes it's nice to have access to a really good weapon even if there is some sacrifice involved; then I replace it with a good one handed weapon when I get the XP. The only real disadvantage with this weapon is the high up front cost, so it can be a pain to get the resources together to play this card in the first place, and it isn't so great if you only plan to fight occasionally.

If you’re willing to use up an arcane slot, this can be a tremendously fun weapon for a guardian to Enchant for Agnes. Between two and four damage for an alpha attack, depending on your starting horror and whether you want to take one and/or heal. Using a holy meat cleaver has a huge impact on your sanity!

I'm not sure why the designers are so dedicated to making it difficult to get an extra arcane slot. An extra ally slot is more powerful, yet Charisma is way cheaper and more efficient than this card. It is true that a lot of characters would really like to have an extra arcane slot, but that is because the arcane slot limit is kind of an annoying inconvenience that would be cool to circumvent, not because it is some vital part of game balance that would be super powerful to overcome. Yes, it would often be worthwhile and convenient to play a third spell, but not at the cost of nearly doubling the cost of a spell (is that third spell you are playing really worthwhile when it costs an extra three resources and a card?). And on top of that this card still has a significant downside that it sits in your hand useless until you actually need to play a third spell. Again, Relic Hunter lets allows you to break the accessory limit as a permanent (!) for no cost other than 3 XP, so why does this card have to be so expensive? I’d think it was still a bit pricey, but more reasonable, if it had a resource cost of 2. A resource cost of 3 just seems mean for a card that does nothing but permit you to then pay for another card which is probably not even one of your best two spells (since those are in your first two slots).