The Bell Tolls

Proposition:

Revelation: this card is played to your threat area. No other game effect can prevent this, or remove this card from your threat area. At the end of your turn, you are killed.

If you defeat yourself this turn as part of the effect of a spirit card resolution, you may carry over experience (half? minus some number?) when replacing this investigator after the scenario.

This would allow it to push the narrative and give some interesting incentives without the brunt of the devastating XP penalty it can burden the players with. It might actually be interesting to have to choose on the resolution of Doomed whether to defy fate (giving you Accursed Fate as it stands -- a longer timer, but enforce death with XP loss) or accept fate (giving you a different card with a shorter timer but allowing you to blow yourself up to carry XP over to a new investigator).

That's the problem with any investigator death, and a fair number of campaigns have scenarios where getting defeated or doomed out means investigator death (and even more that end the campaign prematurely). So there's always the problem of how do you continue to play? The base line is: start a new investigator at 0 XP. If your group is OK with it, you can always house rule it to have you start a new investigator with any amount of XP you all find fair. You do have to draw this 5 times in a campaign for it to kill you, which may be unlikely, depending on who you are playing. Tommy has such slow draw, for example (plus reloading his deck) that you see maybe a third of your deck in any given scenario. Amanda is likely to deck herself 2-3 times in a scenario. If this Weakness is ruining your fun, you could always remove it from the Random Basic Weakness pool. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1083
You're proposing house-ruling, which is I guess fine, but formalizing a compromise to basically do what you're saying seems... cleaner? — MrButtermancer · 56
When called to add this, when I saw what it did, we agreed with the other player that it was pure cheese, so we opted to house rule that I would remove it from the deck and replace it with either 2 or 3 random basic weaknesses. — Fodas · 1
Nightmare Bauble

It might just be me, but I never invested too heavily in the various -canceling options in this game. "It's just 1/17 of a chance," I always said. "Sure, I'll draw the tentacle a couple of times in each scenario, but them's the breaks. You're just gonna have to realize you'll fail a few skill tests in the scenario, and that's not worth investing a lot of XP and deckslots to guard against." (This goes double for the class, with all of its fail-forward schemes. You'll often be glad to see the . I wonder if that's why the token is red...)

And in truth, I largely still hold to that philosophy. My XP always goes to action-compression tools and testless autosuccesses before I spend anything on an insurance policy against failure. And let's face it, Nightmare Bauble has a hefty price to pay--3 XP and the forfeiture of powerhouses like Rabbit's Foot and Cherished Keepsake. But then I made a Rita Young deck based on Old Hunting Rifle and Ornate Bow, and in that particular case at least, my mind began to change.

When Rita's set up with Boyfriend and Adidas, she fires the Bow at a skill of 9. Depending on your difficulty, that's either an almost-guaranteed success, or at least some pretty damn good odds in your favor. The problem is that using Ornate Bow is a very action-hungry and unforgiving playstyle--if you miss a single shot, you're in a bad spot, and in this case, removing that from the equation does have real value. Similarly, the OHR can be your best friend, or leave you high and dry at the worst possible moment, so any way to prevent one of those worst-case tokens becomes almost mandatory.

So, to sum up: Nightmare Bauble could be considered when you have a specific reason to fear the , but I wouldn't find it worthwhile as blanket insurance against failure on general, ordinary skill tests.

You might have guessed that I'm speaking from experience here. Picture this: with the above-mentioned setup, I was engaged with a resilient enemy who dishes out some serious pain. But it's fine, right? I'm testing my 9 with the Bow against its 2. And.... Fortunately my evade and reload worked--but still, that's a whole turn basically lost from one nasty, extremely unlucky pull.

The problem is, I didn't have Nightmare Bauble on the table, since I typically mulligan for things like Bow, OHR, Peter, and Track Shoes. It's a "Limit 1" card, and Rita isn't strong on the card draw. It turned out to be the next card I drew for upkeep, but by then it was too late--I'm engaged with a boss, and can't spare the action to play it. So that's another hidden drawback: if you don't have this out from the beginning--which is easier said than done--you almost shouldn't bother, because you won't get repeated uses out of the Bauble, and canceling a single is the province of Eucatastrophe.

Pinchers · 132
I can relate to that last paragraph. Drew like 3-4 autofails once (it was a particully unlucky day) only to later put the Bauble into play and never drawing Autofail again --' — Nenananas · 267
I am preparing a Calvin Wright deck and I'm looking at this card to prevent the nasty autofail on a retaliate enemy for example, while running at 1-2 health and sanity. I am looking at mitigating the possibility of dying because of an unlucky pull mid-scenario. My other options are Third time's a charm, Against all odds. Both help me against -8 tokens for example, but are all preemptive, when the Nightmare Bauble is reactive. It also matters less that you may get it later in the scenario as it's only after a little while that dodging autofail matters. I am also betting on the fact that by the end of the campaign, I will have enough trauma to not need the Rabbit's foot at all anymore. — Valentin1331 · 78280
@Valentin Good thoughts. I generally skip the Rabbit's Foot with Calvin, too--but I always go heavy on the Cherished Keepsake and its upgrade. Let me know how it goes! — Pinchers · 132
The only use for this really is if you want a Pet Oozeling and you aren't Father Mateo. — Apologised · 4
I've got a question for this card: Via black market you could play a second copy of this. If you have relic hunter and the first one is still in game, are you allowed to play another one? It would be blank and kind of wasted but I thought the rules prohibt you from playing it since you cannot execute the forced effect in that case. — Scythe · 1
Nine of Rods

This card is absolutely sick. This is essentially one chance to re-draw if you get a monster. This is high-grade oil for your action economy. I wouldn't be surprised if this was released as "treachery," though that would make it a much more questionable ask outside certain scenarios.

Put this on a survivor generalist and run with a Seeker rocking Disc of Itzamna. Heck, run Gloria too for additional stupidity. Fourth slot can be Diana Stanley. The encounter deck isn't real and it can't hurt you.

Great protection in general for any investigator with a glaring weakness. Lets your redraw into something that won't be nearly so horrific. For a solid fighter, could also be used to proactively hunt the deck for a monster in the interest of VP-farming or to pull off cards that require monsters.. — Achire · 563
I really like that this is a very generalist-friendly Tarot for Survivors. Calvin loved the Five Of Pentacles, but it was really not worth the space anywhere else. OP's combos for neutralizing the encounter deck are terrific, but even without them, everybody would enjoy getting 1 saving throw vs the encounter deck per round. — HanoverFist · 746
Directive

Does this only count the basic move action, or all card effects with a "Move" effect?

For example, how does this interact with fast actions such as Shortcut? I guess that if Roland is targeted with this card, it would fail if he has already moved twice?

The other query is for vehicle assets (such as those in Innsmouth); Do they count towards the 2 move limit, and if so, what happens if a car or boat wants to leave and Roland is on board?

I assumed originally that all instances of the word "move" on a card are included, but then considered scenario effects when locations are removed from the game and investigators are "moved" to a new location by this effect, and realised that there must be at least "some" exceptions. Where are people drawing the line with this?

I can answer some of these questions. It does include all effects that move you, so shortcut for example would indeed fail to take effect if targeting Roland. As for being moved off of a location because it is leaving the game the faq features a new section which essentially says "if something is about to mean you are at no location, ignore that effect" so if your location is about to disappear from the game, you move from it even if you have this directive. As for vehicle assets, I don't have a good answer for that. I'd have to look again at the vehicle rules in the scenario to be sure. — NarkasisBroon · 11
I'm not sure but that vehicle cannot be moved due to Roland? Here are two rules with cannot: "While an investigator is in a vehicle, that investigator cannot move independently of the vehicle.", " — elkeinkrad · 500
(sorry to splited) "You cannot move". Thus, Roland cannot be moved, and vehicle cannot be moved with Roland. That's my oppinion. — elkeinkrad · 500
Related to this, would Scout Ahead count as one or three moves? It is one movement action to move 3 times. — dkilkay · 4
I guess I'd jusgrade safeguard asap.... those moves happen on another characters turn, sooooo, it's all good. Right? — tasman · 1
"Round", not "Turn." Roland is still stuck. — Lailah · 1
Well Prepared

This card was made for William Yorick with Chainsaw. Absolutely must take if you are playing him. +3 each round is amazing. Worth playing two copies so you can use it for two fights per turn.

Also, sometimes a fighter feels like they have great combat to break down those pesky locked doors (non-fight test), only to find out that it's been their weapon boosting their stat and they aren't really that strong in non-fights. This card does let you knock down those doors with ease.

If you have fighting under control you may have a pip down that you need to help pass a test.

Taevus · 782
Well Prepared is just a great card anytime you have a few double icon assets in play. A triple skill icon is great. I ran Yorick in TFA with Yaotl and 6-7 double combat cards for the exact reason that you mention. Well Prepared is almost universally useful but Yaotl requires pretty specific decks and the ally slot. I would certainly run Well Prepared instead. Or in combo with. — The Lynx · 993