So I have question about a potential combo for this card. Jim can take Double or Nothing, Eldritch Inspiration and Seal of the Elder Sign. The latter allows him to guarantee drawing a skull, so that's three damage. EI could then be played to recur the skull effect for a further two damage. How would DoN then interact in that scenario ? Both it and EI have an effect to resolve an effect an additional time. The question then is which effect kicks in first. Does DoN double up all of the effects inc the additional two damage you get from playing EI, or would it merely double up the initial result of the attack ? Either option is pretty awesome of course, but one of them would deal 8 damage and the other would deal 10. Guaranteed !

Also, is there anything to stop you from playing two copies of EI on the same attack ? Depending on the interaction with DoN this could get you all the way up to 14 damage on a single action.

Who would use this?

1. Ashcan Pete: the combat bonus stacks with Duke, so he would strongly consider it.
2. Calvin Wright: too weak early game but the repeated healing is good for his longevity and might make it worth it for him.
3. Rita Young: she would rather have Peter Sylvester.
4. Silas Marsh: he also needs more help with sanity than health.
5. Wendy Adams: not interested.
6. William Yorick: might use it in a build without the typical recurring allies.
7. Agnes Baker: she’d Rather have Peter Sylvester.
8. Minh Thi Phan: not interested, unless you really want to push her combat, a la Strange Solution.
9. Preston Fairmont: hard to imagine him taking this but I could be wrong... the bonus is too little.
10. Lola (silence)

I think Ashcan Pete and Calvin Wright are the most likely to use it.

TL:DR, nice effect, there is not a character around that doesn't want this in their deck. Problem is that a free action, at that cost and a cardslot, probably not be what the doctor ordered, therefore it'll rarely see play.

Swift Reflexes is a free action, it even gives you some leeway in when it happens, sneaking actions into someone else's round, useful for example to grab an enemy or snipe a persistent encounter card so that another character might do their thing better. An extra attack, a move, actions are good.

But the problem is the economy, you get 3 actions per turn for a dozen+ turns every game "for free", paying 2 resources and a card is steep but fair, but can you spare the card slot?? You need those slots to build that carefully orchestrated deck, how valuable is that lone bonus action over, say, an extra card draw from a boosted action with one of the neutral skills on it? Do you have enough weapons? Most cards are about generating extra success value from every action, "More success in less actions", a flat +1 action is therefore weirdly often unhelpful, at such a steep cost that is.

Swift Reflexes has 2 on there, so it might reasonably replace a Manual Dexterity, run them together with Backstab to have a pretty good range of options.

It's not a bad card, it's mostly a case of an effect that in of itself is so small that I wonder if it'll be worth it's slot, at that price too. I would be glad to see an XP version that grants some bonuses during that extra action.

Edit: Some more experience.

I started finding more use for this card, mostly outside the faction. folks tend to pay through the nose for stuff, especially , which is where non-repeating extra actions really shine. Characters with large bonuses already will find Swift Reflexes much more routinely useful then those with 3 or less. Tony Morgan and Leo Anderson for example.

Pay 2 exp for the privilege of removing this from the game, preventing yorick from recurring them. Seems bad, but then I've never tried out the base versions of these cards, so maybe I'm terribly underestimating them.

This card is pretty bad. Get that straight. Its bad. But its not irredeemable. A few characters are so action starved that theyll take what they can get.

If you find it in the mulligan, its a free action, nice, but, not groundbreaking. We already have Quick Thinking and Swift Reflexes.

If you dont find it, and have to play it... you pay 3 resources to -move- an action, bank it. That is so goddamn terrible that it begs belief that this is a printed mechanic, yet, even so. There is a demand for it.

Some characters are so damn hungry that they will take any old garbage card to sate that hunger.

• Rita Young has some of the tightest rounds an investigator can have, its all those Engage actions that really muddle her rounds. She likes to bring tricks like Cheap Shot and/or Bait and Switch to circumvent lost actions. For her the ability to generate 4 action rounds is valuable. Typically that 4 action round reads: Dodge, Shoot bow, Reload, Shoot again.

• Mark Harrigan can be hella action effective with big guns, Shortcut and Elusive, even so he might feel the need to make a 4 action round happen every now and then, probably to attack 4 times with his Machete or .45 Thompson.

• Calvin Wright has very few options for action economy, and the bonus isnt bad.

You get the picture now, decks that lack access to action economy might want to teck a couple of these every now and then. If there's any other action Economy card in your cardpool, that one is better than this one.

.

Another, small, consideration for using Ace of Rods is that it's not a bad tagalong tarot for Anna Kaslow, she's an ally with a deathwish and having tarots that self-discard solves some issues that might arrive when she kicks the bucket.

.

Ace of Rods is not a good card, but i'dd like to say that it gets less credit than it deserves. I highly recommend you try it out, 2 copies, even if only to never try it again.