Card Reviews · ArkhamDB

This is part of my mass deletion for the reviews I have written as I am no longer proud of them of what I have wrote and I feel uncomfortable leaving them up for everyone to see.

The quick brown Duke jumps over the lazy fox dog creature.

6/23/25

fishingbrogl · 21

I think I agree with this review 99.99% but I do think this card has one niche - I think it's easy to forget if you play the game a lot just how non-intuitive and overwhelming deckbuilding can be when you try it for the first time. I think if you're playing your absolute first full campaign and it's clear to you that your first attempt at a deck isn't up to the job. If you stagger to the end of the campaign, I think you'll learn more about what makes for a viable deck than if you give up halfway and start again, and this card gives you a bit of support with that and doesn't require a lot of planning or forethought from you. So I think that's a narrow niche for sure, but I play with people who are playing their first ever deck building game reasonably often and I do think this card has a teeny little bit of value to them in helping them learn what they do and don't need in a deck for themselves. That said, 100% , if you have got to the end of a campaign ever then you've outgrown this card. — bee123 · 31 6/23/25

I agree that there's a lot of good damage and horror management tools out there. You haven't even mentioned the composures, which solve damage and horror in a lot of decks almost for free. But I've gotta say. Im still gonna take this card. Why? There just are some decks where towards the end of the campaign, every card in your deck is doing something specific, and doing its job. In those cases when you do your second to last scenario and you are eyeing up this or like observed, if I've got a couple of trauma I will, at some point, take this. The reason people dont take the TFA offer (and by the way I have taken the TFA offer in RTTFA) is that after scenario 3 you are still building your deck. If you had the same offer at scenario 8 it would be much more worth considering. — NarkasisBroon · 15 6/23/25

You know, maybe I was a little bit too biased with this review. I play like a greedy bastard, squeezing lots of greed into my deck so this goes completely against my playstyle. But both Bee and Narkasis brought up excellent points. The vast majority of time you should not be taking this, but if you have literally nothing else to spend it on or want to teach a new player about XP spending, this is a great card for that. — fishingbrogl · 21 6/23/25

On the other hand, it's a 0 action, 0 card heal for your weakest health bar. And that's clutch when 1 sanity fine, 0 sanity = insane. — MrGoldbee · 1567 6/23/25

You've got a lot of examples here of soak without really acknowledging the point of this card is its a permanent. Not every card in your deck is going to be soak and they almost all cost resources. Guaranteeing you get your heal (or allowing you to take one more trauma without being killed) is why the card exists. — Spamamdorf · 5 6/24/25

No need to delete all of it. You had some good points. — MrGoldbee · 1567 6/25/25

I also don't get why you removed your review. You put a lot of effort into it. @bee123: In the circumstances you describe I would still prefer Ascetic over this card ;P — AlderSign · 469 6/25/25

No, I must really agree with the original review and argue against some of the comments here: You never die because of the trauma, but because of the damage and horror the scenario gives you. THAT is the reason you run soak and healing. Trauma is just one reason more, but if you include soak and healing in your deck just because you got some trauma you are probably playing another game. So I would definitely not take it as an argument that this card saves you resources and deck slots, because you would/should run those cards anyway. I know what you mean, though, it's comparable to Another Day, Another Dollar. But I still would take that one or Observed over this card, 100% of the time. — AlderSign · 469 6/25/25

I would think about this card, if my traumas hit me so hard, that my next grasping hands or rotten remains remove me from the game. It's advantage is as mentioned, that you don't need to find and play it like the usual soak or healing options. — Tharzax · 2 6/25/25

I agree with Aldersign and MrGoldbee. I think the original review was really valuable, and if you can restore it you should. I really respect your ability to have strong feelings about a card, back it up with a ton of work, and then see some other opinions and say "hey, maybe I was a bit biased". That shows real character, and it doesnt at all undermine the fact that your review was a really good list of ways to manage damage and horror in this game and deserves to exist :) — NarkasisBroon · 15 6/25/25

You linked the 3xp Composures. — MrGoldbee · 1567 6/26/25

I'm aware. I recommend the 3XP composures over the 1XP variations. — fishingbrogl · 21 6/26/25

Yeah but you say "Notice how a lot of them costed a grand total of 0XP". — MrGoldbee · 1567 6/27/25

Mostly agree with this card, but I have played a game, where it would have had it's niche. "Remember, trauma doesn't kill investigators" can be wrong for Calvin. If he already is on 5/5, the next "Voice of the Messanger" will kill him instantly (or draw him insane). We had the situation after "Depths of Yoth". I as Akachi bought 2 copies of Scrying (3) and he managed to Yaotl' the voice to his discard pile during "Shattered Aeons" because of that, and we won the campaign. It was the best, we could do in this situation, but it could have gone bad, if he would have drawn his weakness before I fond the spell. This card would have been failsafe, and cost the group 2 XP less. — Susumu · 389 6/27/25

Affirmed by the suspenders, I would also say, the card has Calvin in the artwork. Quite rightfully so! — Susumu · 389 6/27/25

But especially for Calvin it robs you of the stat boost. Isn't that what makes him strong, accumulating trauma? — AlderSign · 469 6/28/25

@MrGoldBee Sorry about that! That was an organisational issue. When I said "Notice how a lot of them costed a grand total of 0XP" I was referring to all of my suggestions as a whole, not the Composures. I've edited the review to remedy this issue.. — fishingbrogl · 21 6/28/25

@AlderSign Calvin can't use his high stats if he is dead: bringing him to 4 Mental/Physical Trauma from 5 means he won't risk dying mid-scenario and doom the campaign because of Voice of the Messanger. And Calvin can definetly still perform well enough at 4 Willpower and Intellect/Combat and Agility instead of 5 anyway — HeroesOfTomorrow · 95 6/30/25

Otherwise the best niche for this is getting people out of a range where they risk getting one shoted by some treacheries, like Roland with 2 Mental Traumas can just perish on turn 2 if he gets unlucky and draws Rotting Remains before he gets any tool to absorb and nullify horror. It's a niche use, but by the point it matters, you probably have extra exp to spare and no space in deck to upgrade or buy new cards. If you are also transfering people from one campaign to another, you can also sacrifice 4 exp to carry one less trauma in the next one. — HeroesOfTomorrow · 95 6/30/25

Card is a nice capstone to a completed deck build when running a high xp campaign and heading into the final mission, though pickup observed first. — SweetJoePapa · 1 9/16/25

I do wonder - how does she interact with The Wicked Witch?

If I first use Katarina and then subsequently use Witch on the token Katharina pulls, do I fish for 4 symbols to eventually use 2 of them? Might make a horiffically efficient way to pull Elder Signs. And even nicer way to find Skulls for Song of the Dead, particularly for Jim. Also might make fishing for 2 matching symbols for Breath of the Sleeper or Eyes of the Dreamer fairly feasible.

That makes hell of a combo or I got too excited too easily? There are quite a few mystics with solid Elder Signs.

Father Mateo (obviously) but also
Diana Stanley
Dexter Drake
Kōhaku Narukami
Jim Culver (for SotD, as explained above)
Luke Robinson
Marie Lambeau

Also some can take the combo off class, notably Sister Mary and Sefina Rousseau

6/22/25

Eruantalon · 107

Based on the text of the two cards I'd say the effects overwrite each other. You could technically overwrite Katarina with Olive but that's pretty nonsensical. — Redsnabba · 1 8/17/25

More reasonably: You could reveal 2 tokens from Olive and if you don't like the result you could use Katarina to pull a different symbol instead. The "ignore" texts are kinda contradictory though but I'd argue that Katarina's "Resolve that token and ignore the rest" is what should count in this scenario — Redsnabba · 1 8/17/25

As per the ruling on the interaction between Olive and Grotesque Statue, you must declare all card effects before the token pull. So my interpretation is: You declare using Olive on the symbol that Katarina pulls. So Olive pull 2-3 tokens after Katarina pulls the symbol, then you decide which 2 to resolve. — MindControlMouse · 50 8/21/25

I emailed for a ruling on this and the answer was that with cards that reveal tokens "until" it creates an opportunity you react before each of them. There is an implied "one at a time". So you have the opportunity before each Katarina token pull to apply Olive's effect. My (shakier) understanding of Olive is that her two tokens count as one, so if either of them was a symbol you'd stop Katarina's sequence. This doesn't contradict MindControlMouse, there are just multiple token pulls to react to — dayorbyte · 1 2/11/26

Spiritual Healing

Katarina Sojka

Cowl of Sekhmet

Cowl of Sekhmet

"Catch!"