Disc of Itzamna

Disc of Itzamna

If I use the disc on a deep one that is spawning on me does it ever engage me or does the when interrupt it fast enough to prevent the enemy to have been considered engaged with me? (either by evading it or dealing it 2 damage and killing it)

Zerogrim · 296
Before. — MrGoldbee · 1497
Yeah, sadly it does engage you, then you evade. Compare the wording with Think on Your Feet, which definitely takes place before engaging. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
Technically due to the word "when" you evade or deal damage just before the enemy engages you. It's probably not intended to leave you with an engaged exhausted enemy (though that would be possible), so I'm not sure about the evade case. However, in the damage case, it definitely prevents the Forced effect from applying, since you made the enemy leave play before the "After" timing point for its forced effect. — Thatwasademo · 58
"If the card is an enemy, spawn it following any spawn instruction the card bears. (A spawn instruction is any text bearing a "spawn" precursor.) If the encountered enemy has no spawn instruction, the enemy spawns engaged with the investigator encountering the card and is placed in that investigator's threat area." PLUS The word "when" refers to the moment immediately after the specified timing point or triggering condition initiates, but before its impact upon the game state resolves. The resolution of a "when" ability interrupts the resolution of its timing point or triggering condition. (For example, an ability that reads "When you draw an enemy card" initiates immediately after you draw the enemy card, but before resolving its revelation ability, spawning it, etc.) — MrGoldbee · 1497
MrGoldbee I have no idea what you are saying, before....before what, the enemy engages before the disc OR the disc kills/evades before the enemy, reposting the rule book isn't very useful without any insight, I too read that section and found it ambiguous as Thatwasademo says, it being evaded doesn't actually stop it from engaging based on the spawn rules. — Zerogrim · 296
I don't think it's ambiguous. Before it spawns, it is evaded, disengaging it and exhausting it. Then, it spawns exhausted in your threat area unless it spawned at your location due to a spawn effect, in which case it spawns exhausted and unengaged at your location. — suika · 9522
it spawns engaged with you, then it is evaded (or killed). if it is evaded, the forced effect still triggers, if it is killed, it wont — Adny · 1
Adny, that's not correct, at least with the rules as written. Then "When" triggers before resolving the spawn (aka before placing it into the location/threat area), so the enemy is not yet engaged with you when you evade or damage it. Afterwards, if it is still alive, the spawn continues to resolve, which will result in it being placed either on the location (if it has a spawn effect for the location) or in your threat area (engaging you even if it's exhausted), if you drew it. For it to function as you describe, the trigger needs to be "After" a non-Elite enemy spawns. — suika · 9522
...actually, you could interprete the "When spawn" triggers to be after the enemy spawns in your threat area and engages you, but before resolving the effects of the spawn and engagement. In which case the resolution would be that it'll be properly evaded and disengaged. In such a situation, the enemy will have engaged you, but you won't trigger the effects of the engagement since it dies or is evaded before those effects would resolve. — suika · 9522

Tony's Quarry

Tony's Quarry

Another enemy weakness, which are usually pretty tame. Looking at the two elements, the effect and the discard condition, we get:

The effect: An enemy that needs killing, which is, ironically, just what Tony likes to do. It even comes with it's own bounty, so Tony can engage it for free. It's 4 combat, which is stronger than most enemy signature weaknesses, but Tony should be prepared to dish out 3 damage to such an enemy, and if he's using Tony's .38 Long Colt, it boosts him and rewards him for the kill. It would be a signature asset if it didn't come in with a Doom on it, which makes it a weaker Ancient Evils that you can cancel if you are fast enough or if it gets drawn during the Witching Hour. It has the usual "loophole" that any investigator can deal with it, although the Quarry's Aloof keyword makes that less appealing than some of the "on the board" weaknesses. If you are on a small map, killing this maybe a turn and change. In a larger map, you might just want to take the Doom hit or deploy cards like Nimble (although Tony will need some boosts before that's going to happen) or Elusive to get close, if not in, the space.

The discard condition: Kill it, if you don't feel like ignoring it.

Taken together, this is a below average signature weakness, which is almost more a benefit, except for the slim possibility of Dooming out a scenario.

LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
"On a big map, lose a turn. Below average" — MrGoldbee · 1497
Compared to "get a trauma?" Yes. You're a tough audience. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
For whatever it's worth, yeah, giving a clean linear rating to cards will almost always be impossible in a game as multidimensional as this. But I'm finding the actual evaluations of the weakness effects & discards to be educational & helpful for deck-planning. Keep it up! — HanoverFist · 758
I agree with the effort but I find @LivefromBenefitSt's reviews of the signature weaknesses quite contentious. Comparing this review to Smite the Wicked that's rated as above average, for example... — suika · 9522
Losing a full turn can mean losing the scenario, which can have consequences ranging from immediately losing the campaign to adding additional weaknesses to your deck, or to take trauma anyway. There are scenarios where you can afford to lose, but even in such scenarios losing can easily translates to the team losing out on a VP they would have otherwise gotten, which would be a 4XP swing. In contrast, trauma is bad only if you repeatedly take the same trauma to a low base stat. That doesn't usually happen! The chances of Smite the Wicked causing a trauma is far less likely than the chances of Tony's Quarry causing the team to lose a turn. Zoey can even decrease the chance of Smite the Wicked coming up late if she digs through her cards during spare guardian turns and plays Daring/Overpower/Glory, while Tony can't effectively do that, since the window to dig for his Quarry during the Witching hour is so narrow. These reviews makes me wonder if I'm playing very differently from how LivefromBenefitSt plays. — suika · 9522
In this case I actually think Live is on the money. This is one of the easiest enemy weaknesses to deal with. I can only think of Graveyard Ghouls as less of an issue. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
The reason this one isn’t so bad is because 1. If you dont care about the doom, then you completely ignore it and it cost you nothing (aside from a draw) and 2. If you do care, the chances are pretty good you have the time to kill it before the doom matters. It is at worst Ancient Evils and at best an extra bounty for Tony (and a way to trigger card effects like Glory or Evidence!) — StyxTBeuford · 13052
In terms of actual actions forgone for a weakness, this still ranks up quite high no matter which way you resolve it, either in terms of move actions to/from the Quarry, or from the actions lost to the doom advancement. I agree that this isn't that bad on average because the action cost is deferred rather than paid immediately, and sometimes it just spawns close by or where you want to go anyway. But the worst case scenario is the same as the worst case scenario for an Ancient Evils: triggering an untimely Agenda advancement due to doom on the board or on Arcane Initiates/Renfields, which then leads to a scenario loss. It's not so bad. But it's certainly worse than most other signature weaknesses! — suika · 9522
Compare, for example, his rating of Siren Call as "Average" despite it costing 2 actions to remove, when Quarry will cost at least 2 actions. — suika · 9522
Honestly I think it’s below average. Maybe if there’s more threats on the board, but this is kind of like Call of the Unknown sans reshuffle. Just as Ursula will use her ability on a location without clues to satisfy the weakness, Tony can usually find a spare engage action he wouldnt be able to get on some turn otherwise. So you don’t have to pay too many actions to kill it, and Tony has the best action economy in the game. I think sure it costs a fair chunk of actions, but the fact that it plays into what Tony gets benefits from anyway makes the net cost fairly low. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
Maybe I'm just traumatized from the time this derailed us in Essex County Express. — suika · 9522
The doom effect of this card is more like an Acolite than an AE. Because it can not advance the agenda it will often NOT loose you a turn. Unlike "Dark Memory", which will always do so, if you play the card. Heck, the quarry is even less thretening than an acolite in that regard. Because, if you can ignore the doom on it, it won't trigger "Mysterious Chanting". Regarding "Smite the Wicked", I agree, this weakness is not the worst. But Zoey is beefy enoght with her 4 willpower and 6 sanity. Roland, the wimp, with 3 will and 5 sanity is a different story. I find his weakness on par with "Doomed" in 8+ scenario campaigns. — Susumu · 383
What if you draw Quarry during upkeep tho? — MrGoldbee · 1497
Honestly, re: the ratings, I think some of us as reading "an average signature weakness", but LiveFromBenefitSt often means "an average threat". I think most of us agree that signature weaknesses aren't really that bad, especially compared to the encounter deck. I'd rate this as an average weakness, which is an ancient evils in the worst case and a dead draw in the best case. — Hylianpuffball · 29
It has been mentioned on the card's review page, but I say flip it and Interrogate the s**t out of the f****r! — AlderSign · 423

Shocking Discovery

Shocking Discovery

A unique, flavorful, and annoying weakness. Looking at the two elements, the effect and the discard condition, we get:

The effect: only goes off during a search, cancels the search entirely, and you draw an encounter card. Another very situational card. It can wreck your plans or kind of fizzle. I mean, you could build a Mandy deck with no search effects beyond her . You'd be abandoning her ability and signature asset, but you'd also neutralize her signature weakness, making her kind of a bland "generic seeker." That's not a good idea, mind you, but I am not sure there is another investigator who can render her signatures irrelevant, so that's one mitigation strategy....

More practically, you want to find a big search card to draw this out. Like thakaris, I think Research Librarian is probably your best choice to "rip off the band-aid" and get this out of the way early. (I'm also very impressed by their subversion of Treacheries, but, Arkham being Arkham, you would probably draw one of them as your draw from Shocking Discovery instead of before it.) Another strategy is to use Whitton Greene to dig for, say, Segment of Onyx. Since her search ability is limited by revealing locations, it hurts less than searches driven by card play or secrets. Cards like No Stone Unturned (5) are pretty expensive to spend on a wasted action and an encounter card. Depending on your "off class," Mandy has some ability to cancel or redirect the errant encounter card as well.

The discard condition: It discards itself.

All in all, this is a below average signature weakness, maybe even way below.

LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
I found the most annoying thing about this to be I always drew my powerful search cards early, where they sat in my hand while I frantically dug for her weakness. Truly the threat of this card is worse than its effect. — SGPrometheus · 855
I think Seekers have the worst weaknesses in the game for the simple reason that they draw so many cards, it's not unrealistic to deck yourself, sometimes multiple times in a scenario. Which means they have to tank their weaknesses over and over and over. Maybe ironically, Shocking Discovery is probably the easiest and I'd agree with a way below rating. Shocking Discovery is similar to how Mr. Rook breaks the game: drawing a weakness on YOUR TERMS where you can be adequately set up for it is leagues better than a random problem at the wrong time. And finally, Mandy can get a larger deck to help nullify the need for decking out. — LaRoix · 1647
I literally run a couple throwaway Research Librarians in my Mandy deck solely to be used as "Pay 2 resources: Pull your weakness when YOU want to. Own your situation!" — HanoverFist · 758
Drawing an enemy with it can ruin the rest of your turn and hurt you, if no one deals with it before enemy phase. — Django · 5171
Yes, drawing an enemy is a real problem, but again, if it's on your terms, you can have a mind over matter or whatnot to be prepared for it. Additionally, it is worth noting that most of your searches are going to take place EARLY in your turn and not at the end so that provides you with some time to deal with the problem. — LaRoix · 1647
In my experience this is a very annoying weakness. You more or less loose an action and draw an encouter card for it. If you draw an enemy, it can wreck your game. Yes, you can choose when to draw it, but it has to be in the early game. I really don't feel this is below average. — Carcharoth · 1
Yeah Im not sure I agree with any responses calling this one harsh. First, you perform a search on your own terms ie if you cant handle an enemy, dont search. Even without using her ability constantly, you have Mandy running around with 5 intellect and the entire Seeker cardpool. She’s already strong. Add to that the fact you can utilize your splash to deal with enemies. Rogue for instance has Decoy, Slip Away, and Think on your Feet, as well as You handle this one! for multi. Shocking Discovery is usually there to just put a speedbump to Mandy’s ridiculous search engine. Once its out of the way, you’re good to go. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
I will agree that of all the Seeker weaknesses, this is the tamest (except possibly Amanda’s). — StyxTBeuford · 13052

Stars of Hyades

Stars of Hyades

A weakness where the worst element is that it recurs and recurs and recurs. Looking at the two elements, the effect and the discard condition, we get:

The effect: This is a fairly complicated weakness with 3 parts.

  • First, you need to discard one of the 5 special events under Sefina. Losing one of her events can be trivial or damaging, depending on the event and situation. It's pretty common to have a card or two under her that aren't useful in that scenario or that you've used up your The Painted World and don't have a free action to get them into your hand; that doesn't hurt so much. Other times, you were counting on that Deny Existence or Slip Away and now what's the plan? Sometimes, you've drawn a lot and pulled all the cards out, so no discard!

  • Second, if you can't discard, you take damage and horror, which is pretty punishing for a 5 Health investigator. Under normal circumstances, this isn't going to happen until you've drawn the weakness 3-6 times, but that can happen. and aren't all that great with soak, so Sefina doesn't have great options -- maybe Leather Jacket or Robes of Endless Night (2) and Lonnie Ritter?

  • Third, you shuffle it back into your deck unless that deck is very thin. Without this, this wouldn't even be average badness, but here we are. There is very little mitigation -- she can take the basic Scroll of Secrets and hope to snipe it off the bottom of the deck. Quantum Flux can make your odds better.

All of these are very situational; draw this once, and it's no big deal; draw it 5-6 times, and it will wreck your day and probably the scenario

The discard condition: You kind of don't, except just before decking yourself.

This is a hard weakness to rate because it's so situational; everything considered, it's above average, especially if you have a draw-heavy deck or bad luck.

LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
As with Abandoned and Alone, this is also more of a deckbuilding restriction that discourages draw and cycling on Sefina. A Sefina that draws a lot will run headlong into this; conversely the easiest mitigation is not building Sefina as a draw-heavy investigator — or to only selectively draw. Her usual drawing tools (Arcane Initiate & Scroll of Secrets) won't run into Stars of Hyades and she always has the option of drawing a event under her instead of drawing from the deck. If she wants to smoke, she'll want to take the expensive (3) cigarette case that lets her sidestep this. — suika · 9522
This is truly the worst weakness, because it discourages the painter from drawing. — suika · 9522
Yeah this one is super annoyin — StyxTBeuford · 13052
Agreed, it's a pain in the butthole. — LaRoix · 1647
@suika: +100 internet points for the pun — AlderSign · 423

Abandoned and Alone

Abandoned and Alone

A bad weakness or the worst weakness? Let's see. Looking at the two elements, the effect and the discard condition, we get:

The effect: Wendy Takes 2 direct horror and removes her discard pile from the game. The first effect is bad but manageable; Wendy has 7 base Sanity and has ways to heal horror and/or soak future horror. The second effect ranges from mild to devastating. Depending on when you draw the Weakness, it can remove most of your deck, killing recursion tricks, shutting down Wendy's Amulet, and possibly leaving you in a very short horror spiral to trauma for decking yourself and more horror for drawing this again. There are not many was to mitigate the effects, with Rabbit's Foot (3) being probably the best way to dig for it early, maybe abetted by Drawing Thin or Take Heart to increase your failure and draw more cards. Of course, if you don't hit it early, this tactic may exacerbate the damage when the Weakness hits. If you have a Seeker in your party, they can help out with No Stone Unturned, but that's a lot of cooperative building, and none of these solutions are XP-cheap (especially since Rabbit's Foot vies for the Accessory slot with the Amulet, so you won't be doing them in the first few scenarios.

The discard condition: You do the terrible thing, then this card becomes your discard pile.

All in all, this is a way above average signature weakness, and in competition for the worst weakness, able to wreck a scenario or end a campaign.

LivefromBenefitSt · 1091
This is not anywhere close to the worst signature weakness. Even within the core set, this is one of the tamest ones. It’s just 2 horror and then it’s gone forever. Wendy has 7 sanity which is protected by her 4 willpower, and often she will run Peter Sylvestre. You essentially just play Wendy as if she’s actually 7/5 instead of 7/7. The worst thing about it is how it removes your discard from the game, but that is very very rarely an actual problem more than it is an additional deckbuilding restriction ie Wendy can’t rely on discard recursion as readily. Annoying and restrictive, yes, and certainly worse than, say, Shell Shock. But I would not call this worse than Dark Memory or even Cover Up. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
Sorry, not gone forever since yes it will go into your discard pile. But even still, the scenario is likely to end soon anyway if you pull it late, so the chance it hits you more than once is pretty miniscule. I’ve literally never had that happen. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
I should add also that the core set weaknesses are mostly above average in my eyes, this being no exception. But I push back hard the idea that this is the worst one in the game. It is, however, I think the least well designed weakness. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
Yeah, I'm inclined to agree with Styx. Abandoned and Alone is a bad weakness , no doubt about that, but I think you're evaluating it in terms of the impact that it has if you draw it at the worst possible time and all weaknesses are pretty bad in that context. Even really low-key ones like Bought in Blood or Unsolved Case can wreck your tempo if you draw them in a tight situation. And like, the worst possible context for Dark Memory is something like Before the Black Throne where it will probably be campaign ending. It's a really really un-fun card tho, just taking options away... — bee123 · 31
Mark takes two horror: Below average. Wendy takes two direct horror and loses her discard pile: Worst weakness! — Hylianpuffball · 29
It is for sure a worse weakness than Shell Shock, but the impact is more comparable than I think the review implies. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
I would say that Survivors aren't usually churning through their deck quickly, and Wendy if she hits her amulet early will be putting cards back in. What I'll conclude instead of saying that this is a really bad signature weakness is that it's SUPREMELY swingy depending on when you see it. If it's early you barely care, and if it's late you hopefully found the amulet and put some cards back in to mitigate its card removal. But if you see the amulet late and only shortly after the weakness, then it can be very sad. — DjMiniboss · 44
I'd have to agree that while it has the potential to be extremely punishing, due to the equally extreme swingy nature of the card that it's more to the average to above average pile (if I'm understanding the scoring system correctly). Having played Wendy a decent amount, if it triggers late game and decks you out, then the scenario is basically over so it doesn't get reshuffled... Dark Memory is still the worst IMO. — LaRoix · 1647
The easiest way to avoid decking out from this is to get amulet out early. Since Backpack (2), this is far more reliable than it used to be (and guarantees that Wendy sees the Amulet before the last 12 cards), and Wendy will be hard mulling for the amulet in any case while playing Winging It and the like. Once Amulet's in play, the risk of decking out is basically none if your deck is build correctly. As Styx says, this is more of a deckbuilding restriction that discourages draw and cycling on Wendy and encourages deck bloating and events. Speaking of bloat, Versatile also acts as a great check against the worst case deck-out scenario and Wendy's one of the best Versatile users too. — suika · 9522