Подія

Insight.

Cost: 1.

Шукач

Play only if you are not engaged with an enemy.

Move. Choose an unrevealed location. Move (one location at a time) along the shortest path toward that location, until you enter that location. End this effect if you reveal a location, if an enemy engages you, or if your movement is blocked.

Greg Bobrowski
Devil Reef #154.
The Truth Beckons

FAQs

No faqs yet for this card.

Reviews

This card is no Shortcut, that much is for sure. It's not fast so you have to get at least two moves before it does anything, and it costs a whole resource too. Your target has to be unrevealed, and not only that but your path toward that target will be interrupted if any locations along the way are also unrevealed or if there are non-aloof, non-massive enemies between you and your destination. But, for all those conditions, there is no built-in upper limit to the number of moves The Truth Beckons grants you, and in the right scenario, you can easily move three or even four times with it. To make this work, you need to either double back along a long path where you revealed multiple locations, or you can chase after a teammate who went out of their way to reveal a bunch of locations, in which case you can "leap frog" them with The Truth Beckons to the next unrevealed one. Not every scenario is going to have opportunities like this though, and while you might be satisfied that this card wasn't completely dead if it grants you just a second move, it will be strictly worse than Shortcut in that situation. So, where does The Truth Beckons pull ahead of Shortcut?

Slight spoilers for some scenarios ahead, in particular the location layouts.

Obviously, completely linear scenarios where you are crammed in with your teammates like The Essex County Express are right out. If this card is in your deck for a scenario like that, it's just its lackluster icons. A lot of Exploring in The Forgotten Age results in new locations being revealed in a linear fashion and players moving to and revealing new locations as they put them into play, so you can probably forget this for the majority of that campaign. In the core set mini-campaign, The Truth Beckons is probably okay for The Midnight Masks as the city of Arkham is quite a sprawl, and you might double back to search remote locations for cultists and clues.

Carcosa contains a couple of scenarios where this is a winner, though. As the most compelling example, The Unspeakable Oath ends by asking the players to trek all the way out from the depths of the asylum to escape, a task which is made difficult by the fact that the exit is a whole five locations away. Happily, unlike a lot of "resign to escape" endings, you do not start off revealing the exit, so in an ideal scenario (maybe you ask a teammate to clear out enemies that spawn along the way) this card generates four move actions and comes close to ending the game on the spot, which is unparalled value for a level zero card. Bonus points if you get your buddy out too using their Safeguard!

Spoilers over now, back to general analysis and a conclusion.

The Truth Beckons is far too narrow and conditional to be a staple movement card, but there are scenarios where it has the opportunity to blow you away with just how many actions it can generate. Foreknowledge of what you're up against helps a lot - don't play this into a scenario you know nothing about - and so does collaboration between you and your team to make it work. This is another level zero card that really makes Adaptable shine too, so any Rogues with access to The Truth Beckons should keep this card in mind. When it comes to interesting deckbuilding, I think the "narrow but situationally powerful" design of cards like this blows the "universally good but rarely fantastic" design of things like Shortcut completely out the water. I am delighted that a card like this exists, even if it won't make the cut over Shortcut in the majority of decks.

Trinity_ · 201
I'm running this card with Amanda in Innsmouth Conspiracy. It has been exceptional on the big Arkham maps. Last night in In Too Deep, we had to backtrack a long way to get a key to a flashback location. It couldn't have happened without this card. — acotgreave · 842
(to clarify: I backtracked a long way to a previously revealed location, and then my teammates cleared the way for me to move 5 locations to the next unrevealed one, ahead of the other investigators) — acotgreave · 842
There’s also a and unintuitive benefit of this card that it lets you slip past massive enemies. This is for the same reason that Zoey hates them - there is no actual timing point when a massive enemy engages an investigator (see the FAQ on Zoey’s page for more details). Instead, investigators at the same location as a massive enemy are inherently considered to be engaged. Thus, The Truth Beckons lets you wander past them! (Just not if you started engaged with one.) — Death by Chocolate · 1440
@DBC you da real MVP — Pinchers · 128
this card is stupid good in Pit of Despair, but generally very good in most Innsmouth scenarios — Zinjanthropus · 227

-Sometimes- better than Shortcut, usually worse.

The Truth Beckons is a bulk move card that might save you 3+ actions at once. It's the might that's the defining problem.

At the start of a scenario you'll probably stand faced with a middling map with many places to go, in singleplayer every location is unrevealed, so you're generally moving 1 unrevealed location at a time and never coming back to old spots, which is not what this card does at all. In multiplayer there's WAY more to work with, your buddies can clear the way a bit and open doors for you, as the cluever it's your job to get into the nooks and crannies anyway, that's what this card is for! bridge the gap on big moves in a big party of 3-4 players where it's one player's specific job to get as many clues as possible.

A big let-down is the "unrevealed" clause on a target location, but at least an inaccessible location is still a viable target, so if there's a closed path you can still take some shortcuts. But the unrevealed clause really gets you, because you'll inevitably draw this card once everything is revealed and you're in the endgame mad-dash with no unrevealed stuff remaining, and that's going to make you feel bad and never-ever slot this card again -instead- of Shortcut. In addition to shortcut? Now that's something I might consider!

Tsuruki23 · 2522
It's actually really good in many scenarios of Innsmouth even in true solo. Otherwise I could see it being good in a scenario that has a lot of unavoidable backtracking like Unspeakable Oath. Potentially a fair number of scenarios in Carcosa, actually. Pretty bad in most of TFA (though could be good in Threads of Fate). — Zinjanthropus · 227
Trish can take it with adaptable. — MrGoldbee · 1443
Finn and Jenny can also take it with Adaptable if you can spare the splash — Zinjanthropus · 227
Scout Ahead killed this card. — AlderSign · 236

"This card is no Shortcut," says the previous review.

"True," I say. "it's better." :-)

In Innsmouth, this card got me across entire maps, cheaply. It enabled to us to win the final scenario with a 7 location move in one action. Shortcut? I'd have been doing a fast stroll to get to that place.

Note: it is situational. You need big maps. And multiplayer might help. That scenario winning final move? My team-mates cleared the way to the final location, enabling the move to the final location.

acotgreave · 842
The trick with this will always be that Shortcut is fast and this isn’t, so you need to at least move two spaces to make it even equivalent to Shortcut. But yes, big maps definitely exist in this game and I like this card anyway for anyone wanting to get near an enemy. Trish and Tony both love being near enemies. — StyxTBeuford · 12985

Edit: I completely forgot the "unrevealed" condition. That really ruined the intent I wrote here for this card. It just becomes incredibly niche and I don't think it can get out of Shortcut's shadow.

Erdjo · 323
In the Doom of Eztli, you're unlikely to get a decent mileage out of this card to backtrack. Odds are there will be a pissed off Harbinger of Valusia on patrol. — Vathar · 2
So evade it, or just drag it once to the exit and resign. It's not that big of a deal. — Erdjo · 323
Limited to "unrevealed location" makes it bad for backtracking. If your guardian has safeguard 2, they get to move along. — Django · 5070
Indeed, at least two of the scenarios listed in this review (maybe more, I haven't played everything) have all locations revealed from the start, making The Truth Beckons worthless except for its icons. — Tamsk · 1
For the Innsmouth Conspiracy, this card can outshine Shortcut quite well with the size of the maps we've seen. However in many other scenarios it's affect is simply negated, whether that be from every location starting as revealed, or any explore scenario in TFA. There is at least a nice interaction with Trish and her special card, or with Ethereal Form to let you move to wherever it is you need to go to escape. — the1armedbandit · 1
Bandit is right. If Trish played her special card, she could move all the way across Innsmouth from the very first square, assuming no barriers blocked her way. So it’s functionally a teleport in some scenarios, except to unexplored squares. — MrGoldbee · 1443

This might be useful for Luke Robinson on some maps. If you have it at the beginning of the game: play 'The Truth Beckons' and pick an unrevealed location as far away as possible, move there hopefully revealing 3-4 locations on the way. All of those revealed locations are now connected to your 'Dream-Gate' (you can play events from your Dream-Gate to those locations -once per turn- or teleport there when you leave the 'Dream-Gate')!

should have read the card more carefully :(

11zxcvb11 · 3
How are you revealing multiple locations with this card? The effect explicitly ends when you reveal any location. — PowLee · 20
Also tricky for Luke because it specifically says you can only play it while you're not engaged with an enemy, so you can't play it from a location with an enemy based on how Luke's ability works. This is still a really nice card. It's another good insight for Joe, probably better compression than Shortcut in low player counts (though still less versatile and not fast). It's not a reveal tool though, it specifically can only reveal one location. There's also quite a few scenarios where you want to dart across the map quickly, where tech like I'm Outta Here or Track Shoes become really valuable, and this card doesn't help you in the same way in those situations since often you will have an enemy between you and the exit. But again, if you're Joe, that might work fine as you could just blast them to smitheroons. — StyxTBeuford · 12985
Makes a nice combo with Ethereal Form as you can ghost-zip past enemies — EnglishLord · 1