Well Prepared

Well Prepared

Where does it say in the rules that the skill icons on the chosen asset must be of the same type of the skill test being performed? The way I read the card, it boosts your general skill value for whichever test you're performing by an X ammount, which is calculated from the matching skill icons on an asset. But it never says that the icons matching on the asset need to be the same as in the test.

Drakkions · 1
You seem to be ignoring the word “matching” on Well Prepared. What would one match these icons against beside the type of skill being tested? — Eudaimonea · 9
What do you think Matching means if not...'the same?' — MrGoldbee · 1568
It just says you get +X and X is the number of matching icons, it doesn't say X can't be 0. — Gsayer · 1
It is true that Well Prepared doesn't explicitly spell out that the icons have to match the test bring performed, which means that the linguistic rules of the English language could theoretically allow the card to be interpreted 'icons that match each other' rather than ‘icons that match the skill test.’ However, the rules also don't explicitly spell out that I can't spend painting supplies from my garage to pay for Streetwise (even though it is correct usage of the English language to describe my brushes and tools as ‘resources’). When the vagaries of the language you are using allow multiple interpretations of a card we should go with the one that is consistent with the rest of the rules of the game, meaning that Well Prepared is referencing icons that match the skill test being performed. — Pseudo Nymh · 68
The comparison to "spend painting supplies from my garage to pay for Streetwise" is quite ridiculous, as the card explicitly states "Exhaust Well Prepared: Choose an asset you control.", giving you an open choice to choose any asset you control, and not creating any reference to do something completely unrelated to the game. Not that it would change anything, you would just exhaust WP for nothing then. For me it isn't allowing any multiple interpretation, it is quite quite clear and obvious as it is. — Gsayer · 1
@Gsayer I think I agree with you that you can exhaust Well Prepared to get +0 to a skill test. What I am trying to suggest is that it would be contrary to rules precedent to add the three Combat icons on Chainsaw to an Intellect test (even though they can be considered 'matching icons' as they match each other). Perhaps my example was a bit fanciful. I am trying to suggest that any game quickly becomes absurd if we allow any rules interpretation that isn’t explicitly textually forbidden. That’s how you get golden retrievers playing basketball! :) — Pseudo Nymh · 68
Oh, looking at it again, it seems I misread the OP, now I understand the point of you guys in the comments. My point is that you could exhaust WP and choose any asset and X can be 0, but of course the "matching icons" refers to the skill test, you'd never be able to add a different icon (as in @PseudoNymph example of Combat icons to and Intellect test). Sorry about the confusion. — Gsayer · 1
For the record, you can't exhaust WP to choose an asset with 0 matching skill icons because in that case its effect wouldn't change the game state. — Thatwasademo · 59

Solemn Vow

Solemn Vow

Tommy Muldoon loves this. In a pinch, another investigator can free trigger this to heal some damage/horror, move it on to one of Tommy's allies to kill it, and Tommy can use his ability to take that damage as bullets for Becky. Even better if that ally is Tetsuo Mori, so you get bullets/resources, an item (maybe Becky or Bandolier if you already have Becky out), and your buddy got some healing, all without spending any resources or actions.

TartanLlama · 1

True Understanding

True Understanding

This is a top-tier card that continues to fly under the radar. For zero actions and zero resources this grants a clue. And in a game where every scenario is a race to advance the Act Deck via clues, it's hard to overstate how great that is!

Yes, you do have to pass a test on a "Scenario Card". But between location actions and treacheries I've never had this be a dead card.

If you're running Milan Christopher and have resources to burn, Working a Hunch with its $2 cost is just as good, but in decks without him I argue that True Understanding is the superior pick.

This should be a staple in every deck that runs Deduction, because it's essentially 2 more copies of Deduction. Happy hunting!!

An_Undecayed_Whately · 1444
While I will agree that this is a good card, it is often in my early picks, and always ends up being cut in profit of core elements to the build I am working on, or value cards (draw, resources). This card was better when it was published and now suffers from the overcrowdedness of the card pool, in my opinion. — Valentin1331 · 94781

Esoteric Method

Esoteric Method

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.

fishingbrogl · 21
"Now, the Curses will inevitably have you fail a test at some point. That's just how it is." That's not quite true, if you play Mystic with taboo. Two "Ritual Candles" will make you literally fail no test, you would not fail otherwise. (And with "Occult Reliquary" you still have a third hand to hold the rod.) For the advanced "Final Rhapsody" Curse Tokens are quite the opposite, really bad. Elder Sign and Blesses are the only symbol tokens, that won't hurt you. — Susumu · 389
Thank you very much for bringing those points up! I've edited the review to reflect them. — fishingbrogl · 21

Geared Up

Geared Up

Note to all you new players out there who freshly cracked this card out of the box and thought, “Man, that’s lame. It’ll only play like 4 or 5 items most of the time.” The card does not read as printed. They wanted to let you have a little fun with it so they issued an errata to add the clause “One at a time, play …” to empower some degenerate combos.

Okay, wait, I see that little sinister grin curling the corner of your lips, but not so fast, Speed Racer. They noticed that some players were now abusing the card for degenerate combos. So they added another clause by taboo to fix the clause they added by errata. Got that?

So in short, you must add the clause that breaks the card, and then you may optionally add the clause that unbreaks it. What you may not in any circumstance do under rules as written, is play the card by it’s printed unbroken text, so don’t even think about that.

I hope this information was helpful.

Eudaimonea · 9
This was discussed ad nauseam 3 years ago. Some people said, the addendum "one at a time" was necessary, others (including me) said, playing cards is a sequential process, playing them simultainiously does not make sense, and this phrase was a mere clarification. But however people see it, the design team clearly meant the card to work like that from the beginning. And later reconsidered, that it potentially can get to strong, so they taboo'd it. Besides, this card gets really bad in "Hemlock Vale", with or without taboo. — Susumu · 389
Indeed, Geared Up is so absurdly bad in Hemlock Vale (it triggers at the beginning of Preludes, with the extra insult that you cannot transfer more than one played asset out of a Prelude) that we simply house-ruled that Geared Up triggers at the beginning of the ‘real scenario’ instead. There are a lot if mechanical annoyances for Preludes that I’d like the designers to have spent a bit more time thinking about :/ — anaphysik · 105
Yeah, it's no good in Hemlock Vale but way too good in its errata'd form. The notion I'll take strong exception with is that we can safely assume MJ Newman's original intent is reflected in Alex Werner's rulings. We can in no way assume the sequence of intent, realization, and revision @Susumu references occurred behind-the-scenes anymore than we can assume that the original intent for Backpack was that it would offer a timing window in-between the playing of each item and that Nimble would offer one in-between each move. I don't want to rehash original intent because it's inscrutable. All I — Holy Outlaw · 287
... intend to do is smirk at the way the clean-up occurred. There is both an errata and a taboo of the errata, rather than a removal of the errata so the card works as it reads. — Holy Outlaw · 287
Agreed, let’s not revisit the argument from years back. Susumu, you made some good points then and now. I can see I’m reopening an old can. I was just trying to be whimsical. — Eudaimonea · 9