William Yorick was a blast to play, and I recently won a two-player Dunwich Legacy campaign with Daisy Walker so here are some observations for people considering our favorite actor-turned-gravedigger. This will be a slightly biased review towards multiplayer implications, as I exclusively play in 2-player or 4-player games. Yorick has real issues with consistent clue-gathering (i.e. investigating when he doesn't have tricks up his sleeve), so I think he's a better fit in multiplayer anyways.

This is going long, so here's a TL:DR:

Pros: ability provides flexibility and value, the combination of guardian/survivor can provide great burst potential, good enough stats (in a purely bodyguard role).

Cons: not a consistent clue-gatherer. Resource economy is an issue. Card draw comes down to drawing Rabbit's Foot or using off-turns with nothing to kill (in a multiplayer game).

Now for the long version (you've been warned)

Front of the card: Yorick has fine stats except for a lack of investigation; and a decent 'fighter/bodyguard/tank's healthy and sanity of 8/6. Whether you'd rather have 9 health and 5 sanity instead of the 8/6 split is up to you and your playstyle. His ability is incredibly impactful; letting you replay assets from your discard pile when you kill enemies. This gives him tremendous flexibility to meet different challenges any given scenario can present. At 0XP; this lets you recur Leather Coat and Cherished Keepsake for defense, First Aid for healing/support. Gravedigger's Shovel gives him guaranteed spot clue-gathering, Baseball Bat can be recurred after an unfortunate chaos bag pull. Lantern is an option, but I'm not sure if it's a great one (-1 shroud isn't great, and Yorick is well set up for dealing damage). Later in a campaign, you have access to Police Badge for bursty turns. Key of Ys because... it's the Key of Ys. Yorick's ability even synergizes with the Key's penalty of making you discard 10 cards off the top of your deck if it goes away. If you aren't satisfied with Teddy bears to protect your sanity, Elder Sign Amulet is a reasonable choice, especially at a resource cost of 2 and XP cost of 3. The only downsides of the ESA are that Cherished Keepsake is free (and it turns out saving resources is really important for late-game Yorick), and Police Badge takes up an accessory slot.

And that doesn't even cover allies. You can go in many different good directions with allies with Yorick. The upgraded Aquinnah can act as his 'boss-killer', along with the combination of baseball bat + Will to Survive. Baseball Bat + Will to survive + Police badge can deal 10 damage in a turn! Brother Xavier is a great sanity soaker and chaos bag-free damage source. Both Beat Cop varieties are reasonable choices. Charisma can be a great way to go with him.

Elder sign effect: +2 and if you win you get to return a card from your discard pile to your hand: +2 is nothing to complain about, and the bonus is great for grabbing Emergency Cache, which you're going to need to keep using his ability to the fullest.

Back of the card: Guardian 0-2 gives him access to great allies as previously mentioned. You don't get access to the best guardian weapons, but Yorick has alternate boss killing options at hand. Shotgun and Lightning Gun aside, you still have a great assortment of weapons. Both .45s, Machete, shovel, and baseball bat do work, and Yorick won't have to settle for inferior options like knives or kukris. Of course, Survivor 0-5 has benefits. Lucky!, "Look what I found!" (although his low investigate skill means he can easily fall below the requirements), Will to Survive is one of the best 'clutch' cards available. And for later scenarios Survivor brings some high-powered Exile cards such as Flare, Devil's Luck to help prevent backbreaking hits to health or sanity, and A Test of Will as a form of a Ward of Protection.

Signature cards: Another place where Yorick shines. Bury Them Deep removes an enemy from the encounter deck. This is handy in several scenarios to remove a particularly annoying baddie. And extra XP are always welcome. His weakness Graveyard Ghouls is not that big of a deal; usually just another enemy to add to the pile. There are worst-case scenarios to draw it, but you can say that about most weaknesses. As long as you have a weapon out, and especially with a good ally or two, the Ghouls are very manageable.

Mulligan strategy: It's very important for him to start with a weapon, so mulliganing events (minus emergency cache, probably) and skill cards for weapons is advised. Having an ally in your opening hand is an important secondary goal. It's hard to overstate just how good Leather Coats/Cherished Keepsakes are for him; if I have a weapon in my starting hand it's a good idea to mulligan for those.

I've already gushed about his strengths, so now I'll talk about weaknesses. As previously mentioned, he's no investigator. He can dig up the odd clue or two in a pinch, but it's night and day compared to a dedicated cluver, or even most 'generalist' investigators like Rogues and Wendy Adams with Lockpicks or Mystics with Rite of Seeking. So as a solo, probably not a good choice. But in a multiplayer campaign, his biggest weakness is his resource economy. His allies and assets aren't cheap, unless you want to run with Peter Sylvestre and/or Stray Cat. Madame Labranche as a secondary charisma ally may be a consideration; I wouldn't want her over a beat cop however. A real plan b (or plan a) for allies would be to save up for The Red-Gloved Man. You could kill something and play Red Gloved Man from the discard pile to boost investigate for some sneaky weakness mitigation. Graveyard shovel and Baseball Bat aren't expensive, but replaying them can be. In multiplayer, if you're not killing something, you're often going to be trading actions for resources, instead of helping to gather clues and advancing the act deck.

You have limited card draw as well; it's just Rabbit's Foot and Prepared for the Worst. This means Yorick isn't well-equipped for poor opening draws. I found this out the hard way, mulliganing 5 cards without finding an ally nor a weapon during one scenario. It's really important in this game to get set up in the opening turn of a scenario.

In conclusion; Yorick is well-positioned in a specialist role for a 2-4 player group. You can cover for his weak investigate potential much better in that setting. Turns out the combination of guardian/survivor is incredibly good for fighting. His ability really elevates specific disposable cards, and is one of the better abilities in the game IMO. For people who want to play the monster killer/bodyguard role but want something a little different than a Guardian, Yorick is both fun and effective.

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...)