Some cards you see and you underestimate. I felt that way about "I've had worse…"; if you’re playing guardian right, I thought, you should have plenty of money and not take any harm at all!

When I saw Hand of Fate, my mind filled with those horrible bosses that have 4/4 damage/horror. And if you put this on your deck and team up with Trish, you’ll once per campaign enable the play where she investigates to evade the main boss, you flood the bag with tokens and everything is hunky-dory.

But a lot of the times, you’re going to be with enemies that are 1 or 2 damage or horror.

Now, most cards go well with Diana, this one goes super well. You get a one buck refund, +1 will power, a card, and can save it outside of your hand (underneath her) and bring it back when you need it with Twilight Blade.

But most people associate any card that gives bless tokens with Sister Mary, and this one would be harder to fit for her. Guardians are already clogged with costly assets, so three bucks is a lot to carry around. (You likely won’t be able to get the cash when you need it, because opportunity attacks mean enemies, and if you’re sitting around collecting resources while an ally is engaged at your location...)

If you’re Playing Leo, you can bring this in with adaptable when you know you’re going to be facing bosses. With a rogue splash, you can certainly have three bucks for a fast event.

The best reason to slot this card is if you meet many of the following factors:

*You’re Diana.

*Your deck makes a lot of money or your fellow investigators give you a lot of money.

*You have a lot of uses for blessed tokens, like Rite of sanctification, Ancient Covenant, and Radiant Smite.

*The card art reminds you of Alonso Quijano de la Mancha, and you loved the musical.

Previously, the consensus on this card has been that while the +2 Combat boost and the 5 ammo are nice, the damage boost just isn't reliable enough to make it an effective weapon -- unless you have access to cards that let you pull multiple tokens, which basically means Olive McBride (Grotesque Statue occupies a hand-slot, unfortunately). With the new taboo list that was just released, this consensus needs to be reassessed. To give the conclusion up front, thesis-statement style: you still need Olive McBride to make the Winchester sing, but there are now ways to make its note even more... piercing.

For those who haven't checked the list, here's the change. In order to get the +2 damage from Winnie's attack, ANY token with a non-negative modifier will do. It doesn't have to be a zero, +1, or elder sign.

What other tokens have non-negative modifiers? Depending on the scenario, sometimes the special tokens will fit the bill. For instance, the skulls in The Gathering will often be zeros (assuming your location is ghoul-free). Same thing in The Untamed Wilds, until you have vengeance in the victory display.

But that's a minor, scenario-specific situation. The real change here is that bless tokens, with their +2 modifier, now score you the head-shot, too. Let's see how pumping the chaos bag with bless tokens changes the calculus.

For most campaigns, you start with around 16 tokens in the chaos bag. Usually four of those would trigger the original Winchester. That means that, pre-upgrade, you had a 25% chance to do 3 damage, and a 75% chance to do one damage or miss. (We're assumining that you're going to hit if you pull a zero or better.) Not great for a four-cost, two-hand weapon. Now, by adding bless tokens, you can improve those odds, though only to a point. If you fully load the bag with 10 bless tokens, you have about a 54% chance to do 3 damage, and a 46% to do 1 or no damage (this isn't exactly true -- there's a chance you pull a bless token and then follow it up with an auto-fail or a -5 for example; just not sure how to calculate that).

Those odds are respectable, but it's hard to earn them. Sniper Mary, I mean Sister Mary, would seem to be the only character capable of maxing out the bag reliably. Others would need either Sister Mary in the party, or a pretty massive commitment to bag-pumping via cards like Blessed Blade, Hand of Fate, and Book of Psalms, The first and last of those cards take up a hand slot, which can create timing problems unless you're sporting a Bandolier. (There are a handful of survivor cards that can pump the bag, too, but if you have access to them, you probably don't have access to the all-important Olive McBride. Those cards can still be helpful, though, if another player is running them).

And this brings us back to the original Winchester strategy -- drawing multiple tokens. If you can pump the bag AND draw multiple tokens, the story changes. Let's say you have Olive McBride as your ally and a certain number of bless tokens in the bag. Now you're turning into a true deadeye!

Odds of a critical hit with Olive and X Bless tokens, assuming a standard 16-token bag:

0: 61%. 1: 68%. 2: 73%. 3: 77%. 4: 81%. 5: 83%. 6: 86%. 7: 88%. 8: 89%. 9: 90%. 10: 92%.

Of course, with Olive, there is now a slightly higher chance that you find a token you want but still fail the test. In most cases, if you draw a zero or a bless token, you're passing, but if you have to pair that zero with a -4 because of Olive, you may fail. Still, the math is now firmly in your favor, even if you're only lightly padding the bag.

What's the upshot? The new and improved Winchester is now a legitimately good card for a particular kind of character -- namely, one who is blessing the bag (or has a partner who is) and who has access to Olive McBride. It still has drawbacks of course -- until you get Olive out, Winnie will be hit-or-miss, and mainly miss. But once you do, the advantages are substantial -- huge damage for a level 0 weapon, plentiful ammunition, and a very handsome boost to combat. And there are upgrade paths that make it even better: Custom Ammunition brings you up to seven, highly impactful shots; and Telescopic Sight could create an interesting playstyle as well, as long as you are not the tank. So, who can make it all come together? From best to ok, I'd say:

1) Sister Scary, I mean Sister Mary. She checks all boxes. The Winchester also converts her mediocre 3 combat into a very respectable 5, without the need for a Beat Cop or skill card.

2) Jim Culver is a sneaky candidate, since he treats skulls as zeroes always. Even without bless tokens, as long as he's rolling with Olive McBride, he has a massive 79% chance to trigger Winnie's effect -- though if you want him to be able to bugle while he blasts, you'll need a Bandolier.

3) Diana Stanley is another character who might benefit from the strategy, since it usually takes a few turns to get her to a spell-worthy Will value. The new Hand of Fate, which cancels an attack and adds bless tokens, is doubly effective for her if she goes this route. It fattens the bag, making Winnie more accurate, and it can be placed under her investigator card for a draw, a resource, and a Will boost. Like Jim, though, Diana will likely run into hand-slot issues: her signature asset occupies one, too.

4) Zoey Samaras. I don't know that she has any special synergy with the Winchester, but she has access to all the cards you need to run this strategy. She doesn't need the +2 Combat as badly as the characters above, but it's still nice to play one asset and suddenly be at a 6. Also, Zoey's Cross is an accessory, so no difficulties with hand slots there.

I've been rambling quite a bit in the comments of the other recent review of this card, and I think it's time I actually write up my own review.

This card was printed in Winifred Habbamock's starter deck, alongside a few very strong firearms, a context which makes the other review of this card wrong on all three counts.

1) Having to have a firearm in play is really not a huge burden. You already weren't going to be fighting enemies with your fists given you have 3 (and basic attack actions are also just ... never good anyway, given the game pretty much expects you to always deal at least 2 damage per action). The resource cost is also actually quite cheap for what you get: 2 resources, paid once, for +2 to one test per round forever without occupying a slot. Only using the card on attacks isn't that troublesome, either: in a multiplayer game, there's usually a pretty steady flow of enemies coming out of the encounter deck, and you can't get away with evading and ignoring most of them.

2) Wini has 3 and 5 . 3 is enough to be decent with a gun in hand especially given Wini's focus on skill cards (in case you can't find this card or have to make multiple shots in the same round), but the difference of 2 is a fairly hefty base boost. Then add on top of that the fact that if an enemy has lower evade than fight you can choose both options, so you sometimes get even more. And on top of that, there are a couple of Rogue skills that have agility icons and good effects, and the Rogue tarot card boosts agility... And it's not like that boost is going to waste if you were already going to pass the attack, since the guns FFG clearly wants you to run with Wini and this card give bonuses for over-succeeding. (for instance, turning the Beretta's 7 in Wini's hands to 9 sounds excessive, then you realize you want to be succeeding by 4 if possible, or maybe the enemy just has that high of a fight value...)

3) All of the alternative cards listed simply don't work as well for the job this does. Delilah O'Rourke takes up your ally slot (whereas this is slotless -- basically a dealbreaker when you're trying to make that sort of a direct comparison), costs one more resource, and gives half the boost (admittedly to every test, but then that also includes tests made with Sharpshooter?). Hard Knocks ... sucks. You pay the same 2 resources, and same play action in advance, to get the same +2 boost. Without getting to use the enemy's evade value if it's lower, or those agility skills I mentioned. And to do it again, you have to pay the 2 resources again. The only upside is that you can use it multiple times in the same round, if you can afford to throw away money that frivolously (a hard ask with Wini's card draw rate). Well Connected is a card that I love dearly... for Preston Fairmont or Jenny Barnes. Banking 10 resources for a +2 boost is probably also doable for Wini, but it takes more effort than just playing this card and immediately using it. It is a level 0 card though... maybe look into starting with Well Connected and upgrading into this card later? There is one card that was mentioned in the comments which actually stands a fighting chance against this: High Roller. One fewer XP, same resource and action cost, just as free to repeat if you succeed, and can be used on any skill test. It has its downsides which I think are just barely worth more than the 1 XP and added versatility though: You have to hold on to those 3 resources (not nearly as onerous as Well Connected's requirement, but it can bite you). If you fail the test you use it on, you lose 3 resources. You don't get more than +2 against enemies with low evade values.

In short, while this card is fairly niche (the 3 5 statline that makes this card shine like it does with Wini is pretty rare, though it might be okay for a 2 4 rogue?), it is, in fact, the best there is at what it does. Conveniently, as an investigator starter deck card, you have the cards to run alongside it and make it work included in the same pack.

I'm wondering: is it possible to double up on this card's bonus and get +4 to all skills for one or more tests?

There's no limit on Showmanship's ability, so if you put multiple assets into play in the same round, you can apply the +2 bonus to each. But under normal circumstances you won't be "resolving a triggered ability" on more than one asset at a time.

But suppose you play Haste and, say, Shrivelling in the same turn, triggering Showmanship on both. Now activate Shrivelling twice (getting +2 from Showmanship each time), and then exhaust Haste to activate Shrivelling a third time. Do you get the +2 from using Showmanship on Shrivelling and the +2 from using it on Haste? I would think so, but I'm not sure.

Granted, this is a lot of effort to go to for an extra +2 on a single test, but maybe there are other ways of accomplishing the same thing that I haven't thought of. The best I could come up with was to use De Vermis Mysteriis to play Knowledge is Power (via Versatile) and activate Shrivelling as above ... but that's even more effort for the same minor benefit.

For new players, you might think lockpicks (1) is a super amazing upgrade for lockpicks. But actually, level zero lockpicks are a lousy downgrade.

The reason why is because of how the game is structured. Losing assets is terrible. And the law of eventuality says that you’re gonna miss a skill test.

So for three bucks and two actions (one to put out, one to play), you have a chance of losing your lockpicks! You have to be at a +4 vs the skill test to reliably not lose'em. And they're once a turn.

This card solves a problem that doesn’t really exist: needing to get to a +8 to pass a single investigate test in scenario one of a campaign. (Yes, these exhaust after one use, even in the best of cases.) For the same cost, you can get a flashlight, which will give you a +2 and a huge chance of automatic success on shroud one or two locations. You can try it three times, and more if you can reload charges!

Maybe this is to teach new players that leveling up their gear can be very, very useful. So if you’re a new player, please learn that.