For my personal experience with Joey. I've got scenario with 10++ resources, Jenny's Twin .45s and couple items on hand, Leo died. Is this finally the time for him to shine?? nop. I choose to keep Hired Muscle just for put guns in normally not even use all moneys. Yet again, Joey still on bench.
I know he is bad but still got some hope in him. Hard to win in action efficiency wise compare to Leo. Maybe I really need to focus on what he has in different.
-- it's | not mainly for action efficiency but for precaution. You don't have to equip weapon until enemy spawn. quickly put up Elder Sign Amulet when you got sanity treasury test? sound like cool moves which rarely happens.
-- how this ability has no limit per turn |For Leo, you got 1 action per turn but Joey you got infinite action for item until you broke. So maybe he might shine on some build. High resource might not be enough but might need big hand aswell. and burst playing item asset like some ultimate (for what tho. Only thing I can imagine that there are some location that give discount to item)