Flashlight

TL:DR Grab Flashlight if your is low or mediocre, it's outright amazing solo but looses it's luster progressively with player count, it picks up again on hard and expert as a means to cheat low difficulty locations.

The ubiquitous Flashlight is at this point a legacy card, its one of the more decent cards in the core set, but it is a little specific.

When a difficulty test is (0) it's automatically passed regardless of what token you reveal (except if you get ), this means that a Flashlight outright wrecks easy locations, this is a good means for 1, 2 and 3 characters to help in the clue game. It has combo potential with some skills, netting you guaranteed hits with Double or Nothing, Deduction, Resourceful and so on.

In higher difficulty this ability to cheat some locations is even better, those -5's and -6's really don't impact you when everything but succeeds.

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Flashlight isn't a must have though, when player count grows and the clues start getting placed in bulk Flashlight just doesn't cut it anymore. A solo character who is bad at clues might be able to finish 2 easy locations with just 1 flashlight, and cheat the hard locations with other tricks, in 3-player it'd only get you through one location! Of course if the full team is doing their thing then beating one location isn't terrible rate, but specialization is the name of the game in multiplayer and a fighter spending 4 actions, 2 resources and the card slot to beat a 1 or 2 difficulty location isn't the best use of his time at all.

That said, Flashlight isn't bad for flex characters in multiplayer, dudes like Roland Banks who can pretty even-handedly do clues and combat, Wendy Adams until she gets Lockpicks, Sefina Rousseau as a means to conserve Rite of Seeking charges.

It's a fine card, but it's definitely better on higher difficulties and lower player counts (ideally: Solo).

Tsuruki23 · 2588
Something Worth Fighting For

Anyone who doesn't see the use in this card has never played the 5-Sanity investigators on Hard or Expert. Part of playing Mark Harrigan on high difficulties is being able to survive losing four Sanity in the mid game. Allies are great, but plenty of Guardians are limited to guardian allies which will only go so far. Roland Banks is in a slightly better place with his selection of throwaway allies, but is still very interested in this card. Guardians are ultimately fragile and more liable to die off mid-scenario than most other characters. Despite being the class most hard up for resources, cards like this can go a long way toward winning a campaign.

LordHamshire · 868
Seems like an obvious choice for the just spoiled Tommy Muldoon. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
Archaic Glyphs

I think The Skeleton Key should definately part of the conversation. I played a duo game with Daisy Walker and Preston Fairmont. Preston moved the key around & Diasy and stripped the clues from every location with Deduction, this card, and Perception.

Calprinicus · 6402
This card is just silly, it should be banned. I once took 38 clues with it in a single test: rex murphy, higher education + 16 ressources, double or nothing from other person (milan + burglary to gather 4 ressources +1 clue) — Django · 5171
@Django This sounds gamebreaking but how on earth did you find a location with so many clues on it?? — matt88 · 3229
I'm assuming it was 38 theoretical clues? — Talex · 1
This guy's a lying dick. Don't listen to him. — PatrickCS88 · 1
Got those locations with "2 clues per investigator", in your... 19 investigator games..? xD — victor.keirion · 1
4P Blood on the Altar could get to 38 clues because of the final act, if on hard, with a large number of clues added from the scenario card. It's not likely in a single run but not unreasonable to have happened considering that a huge number of people play this game. It certainly doesn't qualify for this much vitriol from Patrick in any case. But I'm not surprised someone with a homophobic profile description is being unreasonably vitriolic :) — roi · 77
DoN is banned now, so — MrGoldbee · 1497
ROI will die — ReturnOnInvestments · 1
Ace in the Hole

It's good.

It's very hard to not justify +3 actions for 0 cost. The only thing I can really mention is that it's better to get this upgrade at the end of a core build rather then to start with, you really want some good cards in play to capitalize on so get those upgrades before Ace in the Hole.

For example:

I.E, dont spend your first 6 Xp on this thing, spend your first 10-14 XP on key mechanics, then cash in on that with Ace in the Hole.

Tsuruki23 · 2588
I’ve actually cooled on this card a lot. If Im playing multiplayer Id much rather save up 2 more XP and buy Gold Pocket Watch. Otherwise 6 XP should just be spent on several other cards to make your deck more consistently powerful. — StyxTBeuford · 13052
I agree that the Gold Pocket Watch is realy awesome in Multiplayer. I just want to mention, that Finn Edwards cant take the watch, but can get a lot done with Ace in the Hole. — Shinkatsukyu · 8
Ace in the Hole also combos with Pay Day, while I don't think Gold Pocket Watch would. — Zinjanthropus · 231
Also, Ace in the Hole doesn't seem to get removed from the game after using it, so you can theoretically cycle your deck and see it multiple times (though I don't know if that's likely with any Rogues other than Winifred). — Zinjanthropus · 231
Oh wait, All In is a thing, nvm, Rogues can totally cycle their decks. — Zinjanthropus · 231
In case anybody is wondering, this card is bonkers powerful in Winifred. You can probably see it like 3-4 times in a scenario, and it helps you make use of excess cards that would otherwise be discarded if you used All In earlier. — Zinjanthropus · 231
Bait and Switch

This thing rocks, holy moly what a recovery from the trash-bin that is the 0 xp version Bait and Switch.

The original effect was never bad, not really, it just has a far too niche purpose, evading and moving an enemy engaged with you is so and so useful in many scenarios.

The new line, evading a neighbor enemy, is terrific. This new effect is way stronger than the original, you might for example bamboozle a hunter and take its place and keep investigating, dislodge a troubled friend and create space for them to do their thing without having to run away immediately, get a previously evaded enemy off-of a location where it's in the way and dump it in a corner you just finished investigating.

Having this new and useful ability resurrects the old effects usefulness, having this card in your deck is no longer a liability.

.

That said, this is obviously not a card to blindly include in every high agility deck. The most interested character is Rita Young, she can add insult to injury and get free damage or movement with her ability. Next in line is Silas Marsh, but he has very tight deckbuilding so perhaps he's not the ideal choice.

It will be interesting to see if there will ever be character other then Rita Young (and arguably Silas Marsh) who likes this card, but right now, at least for her, it rocks.

Tsuruki23 · 2588