Dr. Henry Armitage
  • Can you use this ability when you draw a treachery weakness card (like Abandoned and Alone)?
  • Is the drawn card considered "in hand" when you use this ability? If not, it would allow you to discard agnes's weakness without effect.
Django · 5154
As I read it, the revelation keyword triggers as a part of the draw, so you never get a chance to use Armitage. — NatesPromNight · 896
I also seem to remember the rules saying somewhere that you are also never allowed to discard weaknesses by choice. They can be hit by deck milling or in odd cases like Agnes's Dark Memory i believe if something caused you to discard randomly from hand it has a chance of being hit. But not by a player sort of directly targeting the card. — StartWithTheName · 71660
Note that Dark Memories does not have a revelation effect, so it is possible that this card could be used to avoid that card. — FBones · 19414
@FBones, it is correct that Dark Memory does not have the revelation keyword, but Armitage's reaction triggers "After you draw a card", so the card is on the player's hand at that moment. And under Weakness there's this rule "A player may not optionally choose to discard a weakness card from hand, unless a card explicitly specifies otherwise." The text on Armitage does not specifically exclude Weakness cards, so - no, Armitage can not avoid any Weakness. — Synisill · 803
Dr. Armitage's triggered reaction ability fires "after..." (p.3) the card draw is fully resolved. Rex's Curse's revelation ability must be resolved before the card is "in play" (p.18). Resolving the revelation ability puts the card into Rex's threat area. As it is no longer in hand, the rule about not optionally discarding weaknesses from hand (p.21) no longer applies. I see no reason Rex's Curse can't be discarded per Dr. Armitage's triggered ability. — TonganJedi · 53
You can't, as per the FAQ: "Armitage's ability cannot be used on encounter cards." And Rex's Curse is. — jd9000 · 76
as of version 1.3 of the FAQ, you can't use Armitage to discard a weakness — jd9000 · 76
Abandoned and Alone

After this card is resolved, it's placed in the now empty discard pile. So if this is the last card in your deck, it removes the remaining discard pile from the game when you draw it and when you're required to draw a card again, it's the only card in your new deck. So you take 2 direct horror each turn, because it's the only card to draw each time.

Django · 5154
I don't understand that recursion, can you explain it further? Because once the treachery is in your discard pile, how can you ever draw it again? — banania · 409
Because once your deck is empty, you have to shuffle your discard pile, which becomes your new deck. — bricklebrite · 533
Actually, it's even worse than that. You would take 2 horror from that card, but also 1 more horror from recycling your deck — SilverFox · 1
I would have to disagree. From the Rules Reference, p.21: "When an investigator draws a weakness with a player cardtype (for example, an asset, an event, or a skill weakness), resolve any Revelation effects on the card, and add it to that investigator's hand. The card may then be used as any other player card of its type." Please correct me, if I 'm wrong. — Ereshkigal · 1
Please disregard my previous post. I was wrong. From the RR: "When a treachery card is drawn by an investigator, that investigator must resolve its effects. Then, place the card in its discard pile unless otherwise instructed by the ability." — Ereshkigal · 1
"A single card cannot be shuffled into an empty player deck or encounter deck via card effect. If this shuffling would occur during the playing or revelation of a card that is typically discarded after it is resolved, such as an event or treachery card, it is discarded. Otherwise, the card remains in its current game area." — kongieieie · 26
Can't edit comments but ignore my previous one. — kongieieie · 26
I woundn't worry too much, since her amulet lets you place events on the bottom of you library when you play them. — NotSure · 22
Liquid Courage

I'm not sure about about Liquid Courage for many of the investigators in the core set/Dunwich legacy. To be honest, the investigators who struggle with Sanity - e.g. Roland Banks, or "Skids" O'Toole - also tend to have low willpower, so this isn't so useful for them.

Zoey Samaras can make pretty good use of it, particularly if she has something to give Willpower a boost, and her sanity is low enough to need a little help.

However, I've found it fantastic for... Agnes Baker. Yes, she can't actually take this card herself - but another investigator can, and then use liquid courage to heal Agnes' horror. This lets her use her ability to inflict damage when she takes horror even more often, which is awesome, and her 5 makes it unlikely that she'll fail the test to heal the second horror very often.

So if you're hunting Great Old Ones with Agnes at your side, embrace sociable investigating! Come 'ere Agnes, and have wee dram for yer nerves...

AndyB · 955
If you don't plan on using this on other investigators and you got experience to spare, i'd rather use the elder sign amulet, as it's more action efficient and gives you 4 more sanity instead of 2 and does not require a test, that might fail. — Django · 5154
Okay, I agree - mostly due to reliablity - but Liquid Courage could heal 8 horror. Elder Sign can only sink 4 horror, and costs XP, and clashes with Zoey and Agnes' signature Accessory items. It is a gamble, though, and is expensive in terms of actions, so yeah, I actually agree for most investigators - but healing 8 horror off Agnes is a gift... — AndyB · 955
I think that for Jim this card is fantastic. Much better then Clarity of Mind: it is cheaper, it has more supplies and it can heal twice as fast - which means less actions needed. The downside is it uses slot for possibly another fantastic card if might want to use. — XehutL · 47
.. he might want to use. — XehutL · 47
How many resources does Carolyn Fern get if Liquid Courage is used and the test is passed? — unremb · 247
@unremb: One, twice; two total. The ability sets up two effects, one of which definitely heals horror, ands another which may heal horror. Each one of these is a separate effect as far as her ability is concerned. — SGPrometheus · 841
@unremb: More accurately, the single effect set up by paying the cost (spending the action and the supply token) has two possible instances of horror heal, both of which Carolyn's ability can react to. — SGPrometheus · 841
as;lidfjapowijinfqpwonfaw; turns out I'm totally wrong, you only get 1 resource from this heal because the second point of healing is "additional" and therefore not a separate effect, as per the FAQ. — SGPrometheus · 841
Can you heal horror from allies? — Dethvir · 1
One kind of funny fact about this, is that the controller is the one using the ability, so you could force your teammates to do this test and potentially have to discard cards from their hands. I don't know why you'd want to do that, but you could. — Zinjanthropus · 229
I think it's potential a must-take for Dexter. Reasonably reliably healing 8 Horror for four actions is a decent trade and lets you throw around Shrivelling (5) with abandon. — Frandroid · 1
Ritual Candles

The ritual candles to me are something that I thought were considerably good at first glance, but started to come around on them after further investigation.

The typical approach that I tend to take for any test that matters to me is to get to the +2 range in a 'standard' scenario. I mention 'standard' because my opinion of ritual candles changes when we start thinking about 'hard' difficulty and beyond. In 'standard' difficulty level play the +2 that I aim for on checks is going to succeed the majority of the time regardless of whether I draw a , , or (less so on the symbol). That means that the ritual candles are doing nothing for me in those situations that I really care about it. In the hard difficulty level you can still aim for a +2 and all of a sudden the candles are now bringing that -3 into the +2 range of success for the investigator and the chances for success go up significantly.

So as far as using it for standard scenario play, I am a little down on the card, but in hard mode play I am feeling positive on the card.

The other way to play when you get the ritual candle when there are several -2 symbols would be to then just provide a +1 to your skill check and possibly get an extra pull of the bag that would be in your favor. You still have a -2 or two in the bag that are now bad for you though. However, you do keep the negative effect of the symbol from affecting you at that point that the -2 didn't. By putting yourself at a +1 with the ritual candle you fail on -2 pull but might pass on a "-1 if you fail, drop a clue at your location" which is a better situation to be in.

If you have no hand-slots in use as is on some characters, the ritual candles can provide some improvements, but on the most part, I am somewhat down on it unless I am playing on harder difficulty levels and then at that point I find it quite beneficial.

Bronze · 187
This would turn Skulls into +1s for Jim Culver. So in campaigns where there are usually two Skulls in the bag, that is a very huge deal imo. — majer3raistlin · 23
I look at it similar to Bronze put from a different angle. On Standard I plan to be at +2 to pass tests. I can fail on the worst negative numbers (this doesn't help) or on the special tokens (these help). This is a cheap +1 that can prevent a failure on those special tokens and passing instead of failing which sometimes has a terrible side effect. I will be trying these out in Diana. They will probably get dropped at some point but they should work alright. — The Lynx · 993
Blackjack

This card is a bit hard to quantify. The obvious comparison to it is against the Knife that is available to every other role in a neutral form. At the same cost and strength, there are only 2 factors to consider when deciding which one is better over the other.

Perhaps you don't consider blackjack or Knife, because you prefer to carry .45 and machete as your includes in your deck. For those types of decks, then this isn't even a consideration. But in several cases I have considered machete and Knife/blackjack as it is a considerable cost savings over the .45 and 80% of the time the machete does the job of the .45 anyway.

Also, if you are solo, blackjack isn't for you. In large groups, you may be required to peel monstrosities off of people and help them out. In these situations, with the blackjack you expect to get some action efficiency.

1 health enemy (blackjack) - Action 1 swing 1 health enemy (Knife) - Action 1 swing or Action 1 Engage, Action 2 swing

2 health enemy (blackjack) - Action 1 swing, Action 2 swing 2 health enemy (Knife) - Action 1 sacrifice swing or Action 1 swing, Action 2 swing or Engage, Action 2 swing, Action 3 swing (sacrificing if needed on the second swing if the first missed.

There might be a scenario or two there missed, but that covers the majority of what you are looking for in comparison. The main situation where blackjack is best is obvious in the 1 health enemy category because the blackjack can save you an action and it doesn't make sense to sacrifice the Knife when it is on someone (in most circumstances).

If you don't care what happens to your allies, "swing away" and choose the Knife so you have an option for a burst damage opportunity.

If you do care about your friends (how nice of you), then the majority of the time you are using this weapon you are saving an action for fighting enemies for your allies. That was my thought pattern with using this for a four player campaign. On average over three scenarios so far, this has saved me perhaps 1 action per game. Also, if you wiff on your strong attack with the Knife you are left without a weapon anymore and the blackjack doesn't tempt you with that.

What I do like about the Knife though is that you could save an action with a single attack doing 2 damage when you need. So, this can also save you 1 action per game. Also, when you have that machete out in a situation such as this, the Knife can possibly be useful still for taking out 1 of 2 enemies engaged with you to turn that machete back online.

Is that worth having over the Knife? I tend to think that it is not in practice. The Knife just seems to be a better choice from my perspective. Just in case someone was going through these considerations as well, I thought I would share the experience I have had with the card here.

Bronze · 187
Compared to #machete, on 2 HP enemies, this card saves you the action of engaging enemies so can still kill them with 2 actions, with no risk of harming allies. — Django · 5154
The bit about not dealing damage to your buddies engaged with the enemy you're attacking is nice, but I can't help but feel that this should have another line of text: "If the attack is successful and the enemy is *humanoid*, exhaust that enemy." Bop them on the back of the head to knock 'em out. — ArkhamArkhanist · 10
The knife is better. — Andronikus · 1