Advantages

• Along with Calling in Favors, the second neutral "tutor" type of card, so it can be added to any investigator's deck.
• Cards below this one don't count toward your handsize.
• Cards below this can be played with stuff like Ever Vigilant
• Treacheries like "discard X cards from your hand" won't affect this one
• Thins out your deck. You don't have to play the cards below this one
• Can be recovered with Scavenging to be played again and again...
• Very useful to search for specific cards, like signature stuff with matching types (Zoey's Cross, Finn's Trusty .38,...)
• Can "find" a second copy of itself, which can be played as normal. Be aware that this discards the first copy and you may lose other cards below it.
• Play this card with William Yorick and discard it while 3 assets are below it (for ex. by playing another body slot item) to get more assets into your own discard pile to make more use of his special ability

Disatvantages

• Cards below this cannot be commited
• Treacheries that discard this one put all assets under it into your discard pile as well
• It's effect can be wasted a bit, if only 1 or 2 cards were found

Not a review but to clarify rules on this tricky card: when you return the token, its effects are not canceled, but its modifier is. So you apply the modifier of the second token, but the effects of both. (edit: this include both tokens that have effects that apply immediately when you pull them, as well as tokens having delayed effects, such as "if you fail"). To fully understand this interaction you should read the skill test timing chart in the rules reference!

I was not too clear on the new FAQ wording for slots so I requested some clarity from FFG. Official answer:

Greetings,

The new FAQ entry changes the slot rule to the following: “If playing or gaining control of an asset would put an investigator above his or her slot limit for that type of asset, the investigator must choose and discard other assets under his or her control simultaneously with the new asset entering the slot.” This is different from the previous rule, which said “If an investigator is at his or her slot limit for a type of asset and wishes to play or gain control of a different asset that would use that slot...”

The difference here is that with the way the rule is now worded, you only have to discard other assets if playing a card puts you above your slot limit. Previously, if I had an ally in play and wanted to play an ally, I would first have to discard that ally because I was “at my slot limit” for allies. With the new rule, I only have to discard the ally that is in play if playing a new ally would put me above my slot limit.

This means that you are now able to play an asset while you are at your slot limit without discarding an asset, provided that asset gives you the slots you need to keep them both in play.

I hope that helps! Cheers,

Matthew Newman Senior Card Game Developer Fantasy Flight Games

So, the caveat - I've only used Yaotl once, in a Desperate Skills deck with "Ashcan" Pete, and he was the cornerstone of that deck. I found him pretty awesome.

Recurring 4 icons? Yes please! I found that between committing the card, then using Yaotl, and then using Yaotl again at the start of the next turn, I was using the same card 3 times - and it was pretty easy to do so! That is pretty incredible.

The second free triggered action "Discard the top card of your deck" - this is useful if you end up with a non-iconned card, like a weakness, on top of your discard pile. You could pull the next card from your deck and hope it has icons you can use. However, I didn't actually use this - I didn't want to risk discarding those Desperate skills.

So, it can work nicely in the right deck ... but generally, I suspect Yaotl is a bit "meh". You want a deck with lots of icons, and that probably means a skills-heavy built - and there aren't so many of those. Also, most cards don't have more than 2 icons. It's quite a limited user-space.

• Calvin Wright - You don't want lots of icons, so Yaotl doesn't seem to work well with Calvin, the other obvious candidate for a Desperate skills deck, given that Rise to the Occasion seems made for Calvin. Yaotl might work here.

• Minh Thi Phan - Seems good for a skills heavy deck, so Yaotl might be useful here. With a little creativity about who you help out, you might be able to make sure you've got the 'right' card at the top of your discard pile for the start of your turn. Yaotl might work here, but is up against great Seeker allies. If you're using Dark Horse in Minh then you're probably not using Dr. Milan Christopher, so in that case I'd give Yoatl a look.

• Wendy Adams - Might have some interesting synergies between her abililty and then being able to use the icons on the card discarded. However, I imagine our little evade-tank will want Peter Sylvestre more.

• William Yorick - Probably has more combat-focused allies to put in play.

Otherwise, it's hard to see how Yoatl can displace other allies for other investigators.

I guess this could also work nicely with True Survivor, to haul skills back out of your discard to reuse again.

In short - a really useful tool in the right deck, but possibly rather specialised for general use.

(Though I might have that wrong and people have lots of unusual builds that work with him...)

TL;DR: You will routinely play this for 3 or 4 icons and be happy for it.

Don't underestimate this beute. Depending on your investigator, having just 2-3 cards in your hand isn't an unlikely scenario. If this is one of three cards in your hand when played, that means you're getting 3 icons. One of two cards, 4 icons. Last card, 5 icons.

3 icons is by no means bad for a skill card, if a 3 icon "Play only if you have 2 or less other cards in your hand" existed, people would play it. This is that card, and then some.

4 Icons for one card is terrific, and definitely and achievable play once or twice in a scenario.

5 Icons is the golden-egg-laying goose that you think you're picking this card for, but believe me, this is not going to happen a lot.

Wendy and Ashcan, with their card discard mechanics are the obvious optimal character to use this card with, thanks to their innate discard abilities, on the other hand if Last Chance doesn't look playable they can discard it for their abilities.