I feel the other review underestimated the value of this card in one investigator: William Yorick. I play him in Innsmouth right now with 2 other players (one scenario to go, and until now we are rocking the campaign on hard, but without taboo list), and from my impression it's time to say: In him, this is no niche card, it's a staple!

• It can be used to pay for other assets in the discard pile in later rounds. Unfortunately no Ally or Talent (up until now Beat Cop, Safeguard and Well Prepared were the only non-permanent assets without the Item Trait in my deck), and it won't be needed for Mr. Pawterson or a Leather Coat, but there was always use until late game for me, gaining extra actions recycling a Police Badge or getting a new weapon into play.
• With level 0-2, Yorick has no access to Stick to the Plan. Yet, in an excessive Asset build, which you likely do with him, Ever Vigilant is still a solid pick. But having the resources for optimal use, if you don't get it into the starting hand, is normally not a given. With a catalog, either in your hand to be played as the first card, or just played after killing an Enemy, it's so much easier to use this event efficiently even later in the game, when you've used up your starting resources.
• I have "greedy" partners. Maybe 30 to 40% of the revenue went to them for playing their Items. Since there were turns without enemies on the board, getting a bit into support for the others was a good way to put additional value to my role in the team.

There was not a single game, where I didn't play the catalog at least 4 or 5 times, in one game it might have been up to 8. But the secrets were hardly ever wasted. I will keep going shopping into the Maelstrom.

I think one aspect wasn't mentioned so far by the other reviews: the Schoffner's Catalogue can pay for a second copy of itself, because it is also an item.

I think this has a fun combo potential with for example two Ice Axe(3) and Scavenging/Scavenging(2) in Minh Thi Phan. If you have two catalogues in play/discard, you will never run out of money for recursion of the axes or the second copy of the catalogue, provided once in a while you don't use your scavenge on an axe but to return an empty catalogue. Of course you have to find all this, but with the search-tech of and Minhs tendency for a lot of card draw its fairly doable.

Also the Backpack or better the Backpack(2) can dig deep to find all pieces exept scavenging. As a nice side effect it can also find other nice stuff like her favorite dairy or totem, which of course can also be paid by the trusty catalogue. As mentioned by others, you can even go for a dark horse-item-skill-build with this combo.

Schoffner's Catalogue isn't a good card on its own. The reason is obvious; having to pay 2 resources, a card and a play action for 5 resources is a lousy deal. Yes, you can pay for other investigators' stuff, but the item assets-only clause is a severe limitation in a game with events, spells, allies and whatsnot. Also note that most investigators tend to play their items early-to-mid game, making Schoffner's Catalogue less relevant as the rounds pass by.

Still, it's a good card for a few investigators:

• Bob Jenkins really likes this card, as he can play it as an extra action and use it to pay for all his other items. The catalogue as an item based support package is literally designed for him.
• It's also decent for parallell Daisy Walker, as the catalog is pocket sized and requires no hand slots. And =Daisy can use it to pay for her other tomes and as a target for tome-related shenanigans.

Other highlights:

• Recursion. The catalogue is automatically discarded when empty, making for an easy combo with Scavenging. With Scavenging (2) you can even get it in play without spending a play action.
• Tome interactions. Whitton Greene to find it, Library Docent to bump it or play it for free, etc.
• It's also a possible source for harvesting secrets (Eldritch Sophist).

All in all, a niche card that works well for Bob and possibly parallell Daisy. Other investigators will have to find ways to make the catalogue more efficient to make it worth their time - such as a support Minh with Scavenging or a Yorick build with enough costly items to make the catalogue worth using his ability on.

This was a pretty useful addition to my Dark Horse Patrice deck. It let her stash resources "off the books" and use them to pay for the relatively limited number of items in the deck that she absolutely had to be able to play when they came up (Moonstone and Patrice's Violin are very timing dependent), plus the odd extra. It's more or less an Emergency Cache where the action to play is divorced from the time you use the resources. I suspect the "stashing" effect is a benefit in most Dark Horse decks, but I've only played the one.

I also love that it uses secrets; I am sure Schoffner's motto is "The Secrets are the Savings!"

This card is so dang good it's actually ridiculous.

At worst, it's sort of like a net Emergency Cache anyone on your space can spend on items (not a huge restriction for most decks). At best, it's a complete loose cannon. It allows for such crazy plays. If Yorick has both this and Chainsaw in his discard, he's set -- no other moving parts required. Minh can Scavenge it into absolutely filthy combos recurring high value seeker assets. It even discards itself so that happens smoothly. It's red and level 0, so an easy target for a lot of Survivor recursion if someone's running low on dough -- which is practically your starting hand if you're running Short Supply. And Dark Horse can't see it. I'm sure there are things I'm missing.

It enables so many shenanigans in the most wonderful ways. Just a brilliant card.

Can you use Knowledge is Power to get a fast 5 resources to pay for an item? And as an option discard the catalog for a fast card draw?

Also can you do this as Lola Hayes in Seeker role to target any color item?

Thanks.

After reading the other reviews, I found it curious how so many good points were brought up, yet the logical comparisons between Catalogue and Emergency Cache didn't mention the factor of asset-hating treacheries, of which there are quite a few. One secret could be left on the Catalogue to effectively replace a Crypt Chill's "Discard an asset you control" effect with a more palatable "Lose 1 resource". Besides the asset-hating treacheries, one could also consider the asset-loving SU-21 investigator who can devour the Catalogue with the last secret left. Plus, unlike investigators who might have no use for the Catalogue once fully set up with all the items they want, SU-21 always hungers for more cards to eat including items the Catalogue will help pay for.