Signum Crucis

Wondering how this interacts with cards that test at a different base skill value.

E.g. Amanda Sharpe attacking a strength 4 or 5 enemy with a Strange Solution.

The wording on strange solution says to attack “with a base skill value of 6”; and signum crucis wording says “your base skill value”

So is “your base skill value” the value of the attack (6) or does “your” refer to your investigator (so in this case the base value would be 2)

I’m reckoning “your” and “a” are one and the same thing here: namely the unmodified skill value of the test you are taking which in this case is 6… so strange solution wouldn’t enable Amanda to commit this card to a test.

But I’m just checking to see what people think cos it would be quite a sweet turn to spend 3 actions doing 9 damage to a nasty enemy while also loading 6 or so bless tokens into the bag.

Phoenixbadger · 198
You are sadly correct, while using strange solution your base skill value becomes 6 making it very hard to find an enemy capable of committing signum Crucis to — NarkasisBroon · 10
This goes both ways right? If Your base is 6 and the enemy has only 2 you get 4 blesses? — Django · 5108
Commit only to a skill test you are performing, and only if the difficulty of that test is higher than your base skill value. — MrGoldbee · 1470
Oh yes django! Didn’t see that! — Phoenixbadger · 198
The Red Clock

This card can help a lot a parallel "Skids" O'Toole "rich" deck to start a scenario . The The Red Clock first gives a bonus resource, then Skids spends 3 resources for his capacity and tests at 7 against 3 to get 3 additional resources. In case of success he now has 4 more resources so an increase of +1 to the bonus given by Well Connected.

Of course the +4 from the Clock would be more interesting for a test that gives you something that advances the scenario but if you use it on your resource generation for a couple of turns you get faster a great Well Connected boost (and so a total of 3 great boosts per tun.

AlexP · 252
I played P-Skids with this, The Black Fan and Well Connected (3) in a 19xp standalone a year or so back and it was great. — Krysmopompas · 360
Could you use haste after two movements? — IntoxIcatIon · 1
@Intoxication no as they are not Move actions. — screamingabdab · 99
Flute of the Outer Gods

If this card was 0xp and had limit 1 per deck instead of being 4xp and exceptional, it would still not see any play, or maybe in some weird cases someone might play it for fun, but it would probably need another enemy or it would provoke AoO, but still it would suck. Is this the worst card in the game lol? What the hell were they thinking? Compare it to the The Necronomicon which for 5xp gives you so many options, is tutorable, and you can play with secrets and stuff to refill it otherwise abuse it. What a joke of a card

Blood&gore · 434
It's not a bad effect... sealing curses (which means they can't be added back) or testless damage/movement are both good options in multiplayer. You can make an enemy punch itself once per turn without an AoO. But 8xp is an absurd cost... maybe they were afraid of cheese with sealing all 10 curses, which isn't that hard to do? — Hylianpuffball · 29
I think this could have cost 2 and kept seal X Curses and even then it may not have seen play. False Covenant protects you from curses so well for a 2xp permanent. — Zerogrim · 295
The main problem of the flute is that there are plenty cheaper options for mystics to handle enemies. So the only remaining advantage is the option to seal curses and you either want them in a curse build or you can easily avoid them outside of the innsmouth campaign. — Tharzax · 1
Seal up to X curses for X cost is cute (and would be fun in Rogue) Unfortunately Mystics are a resource starved class. If this was a Rogue card... if only. Yes, as it is, it's terrible. — fiatluxia · 66
Yeah honestly at 0xp I don't know why anyone would still take this, especially now with Power Word, which is a cheaper, more versatile, and slotless way of doing the same thing. — StyxTBeuford · 13028
Signum Crucis

Using with Amanda Sharpe deck and investigate to high shroud location Because this card would commit to all Investigating and Encounter resolve You get the following

  • Investigating - 1 Blessing token for 3 times (Repeated from her ability)
  • Treachery card test - 0 to 2 Blessing token for 1 times (Enemy or some card may have no test)

For my use I can add around 3-8 Blessing token in a single round.

That's promising because you can try to add more if you found higher shroud location

AquaDrehz · 198
But be sure you can pass the test without those bless tokens (by the way this card takes the basic intellect not the modified) if you don't do it, you might waste your turn and in my experience time is the winning factor — Tharzax · 1
Seal of the Elder Sign

If you know Ragnarok Online (damn I feel old), this card turns your into a Soul Linker. Kinda sad alone. Selfless and painful to build such a character (takes a chunk of 5, 10 XP from your plan). But it unlocks a special ability differently for each character that make their mouth water.

+X effect became strategic (can "snipe" an exact disadvantage number and win), turning into a kind of pass-a-test effect you usually see in Exile card. For example, Agnes Baker gets a boost for each horror. Normally you will not think "Let's take this test at 3 disadvantage. I have 3 horror. If I get , I pass the test!", you will boost to at least equal or higher before taking it. Therefore these effects works no different from 0 token in a character without over-succeed mechanics. With this card, your current horror count becomes strategic element. Basically turns Agnes's ability into something like : "If you take a test at disadvantage no higher than your horror, this test is automatically successful. (limit once per game)" Now that sounds a bit better.

But, these success sniping for "pure +X" investigator aren't the core target of this card. The highlight is when it also has situational side effect that was normally left to being doubly lucky. (Lucky to get in the first place, and also happened to benefit from it.) This card can give new look to the ability. I have looked at some that seems impactful beyond succeeding a single test :

  • Core
    • "Skids" O'Toole : Guaranteed +2 resources since you can plan for success. You can chain into something you lack 2 resources or less on your hand, like expensive Event you need to use mid-fight.
  • Dunwich
    • Zoey Samaras : Automatic damage depending on your weapon +1, at up to -1 disadvantage. Aims for an exact killing blow at will.
    • Rex Murphy : Can plan to perform a test that is inconsequential to failure to draw 3 cards. (Or benefit from failure, like Rabbit's Foot)
    • "Ashcan" Pete : Deal 2 "automatic damage" with Duke as long as disadvantage is no higher than 2, with potential for an attack and one more discard-ready attack that you can put in your commits. (Just Duke 3 times in one turn without ammo limit.)
  • Carcosa
    • Minh Thi Phan : Try and Try Again that works for everyone. Snipe the over-succeed criteria for the powerful 2XP Dunwich commits with the +1 and even get them back.
    • Sefina Rousseau : Compress actions and plan with all your events. (e.g. Start with evade and immediately get an event that do stuff to exhausted enemy.)
    • William Yorick : Revive a card without any limitation at exact timing you want, like 1-2 XP Guardian events/skills that Resourceful cannot get.
    • Akachi Onyele : Anything with 1 charge left can be used twice, or leading into something that was previously out of charge.
  • The Forgotten Age
    • Ursula Downs : When you know you have to move away after, e.g. after getting the last clue.
    • Finn Edwards : Make sure you get 2 over and make sure there is a clue to pick.
    • Father Mateo : Plan for a turn that an additional action matters.
  • The Circle Undone
    • Joe Diamond : Pop after you just used high value Insight.
    • Diana Stanley : Pop after you just used high value cancels.
    • Rita Young : Make sure you can take advantage of an entire round limit, e.g. pop in mythos phase.
  • The Dream-Eaters
    • Tommy Muldoon : Make sure you have 2 damage/horror to move and also a target of the move.
    • Patrice Hathaway : You can be selective on timing to reset the deck with good stuff you just used, or after you had dealt with the weakness to left it in the discard.
  • Innsmouth
    • Trish Scarborough : Make sure that this is an investigation.
    • Dexter Drake : Plan the shenanigans in higher complexity.
    • Silas Marsh : Pick a special effect commit since you already know you will succeed. (by what amount)
  • Edge of the Earth
    • Lily Chen : Supercharge Discipline which has a built-in test to be usable twice, knowing it will flip back right now.
    • Daniela Reyes : Merges the Mechanic's Wrench to her effect. You can tailor made any custom follow-up attack knowing that it will automatically succeed, in addition to her regular counter attack tricks.
  • Starter
  • Scarlet Keys?
    • Carson Sinclair : Stick to someone that is going to get -ed.
    • Amina Zidane : Make some doom plays in comfort of knowing you can then drain all of them to Sin-Eater to eat?
    • Charlie Kane : Pop on an exact test that you exhausted Bonnie Walsh. Make multiple plays with Chuck Fergus, Michael Leigh, etc.
    • Vincent Lee : Make sure there is something to heal.
5argon · 10747
Don't forget that this card has a wild icon, so all your "up to X disadvantage" statements in this analysis should actually be one farther from zero. — Thatwasademo · 58
Whoops, I actually forgot about that completely! — 5argon · 10747