Bum's Rush

This card is nuts, and I don't think people quite understand the sheer power creep it bring for a level zero card (granted, there are leveled up cards that are even more insanely power crept than this, even at Level 0)

At first glance, this can looks as just a slightly more powerful version of Cheap Shot, with the extra bonus of moving an enemy to make up for the fact it can only be used against foes engaged with you.

That is not even half of the story

In the framework of the Rogue cardpool, this being an Evade is a game-changer, as it has more direct synergy with what Rogue likes to do: Evading! This can benefit from both Pickpocketing and String Along at once, in ways cards like Breaking and Entering cannot, and it can get around Retaliate, unlike Cheap Shot which counters Alert. That seems a minor thing, but Retaliate, is much, much more common as a Keyword than Alert (in fact, Alert didn't exist until Forgotten Age) so most of the time, you are going to avoid a painful counterattack in case you auto-fail the skill test

Bum Rush has also much better synergy with certain Investigators than Cheap Shot and Breaking and Entering:

1) Finn can use with his extra action to basically disable an enemy for a turn or more and still do whatever he wants

2) Jenny and especially Preston aren't good evaders by default, but the cards let's them move a non-elite enemy even if they fail the evasion attempt. Look at the wording: it's listed as a separate effect, unlike the evasion and damage being part of the reward for succeeding the skill test. So this basically becomes "spend 2 resources to move a non-elite enemy 1 location away", which against enemies that are not Hunters, Patrollers, Warring or move by any other effect, it's often as good as killing them: the rest is the icing on the cake for them

3) Rita and to a lesser extent Wendy can use this card in combination with Belly of the Beast to gain a clue. Belly of the beast is a crappy event, and this will basically bump the resource cost to 3, but turning an evasion attempt into a clue is often less work Roland has to do fighting an enemy multiple times to defeat it.

4) Combining this with Cheap Shot lets both Michael and Tony have ways to reliably and regularly evade enemies. That opens so many shennanigans with Dirty Fighting for them that Tony couldn't enjoy with Stunning Blow

5) But I think the worst abuser of this is without a doubt this gender fluid bastard: Kymani can use this on their evasion attempt on an exhausted enemy to also add their Combat on top of their Intellect: that already doubles their skill bonus to +4 before addtional modifiers and bonuses. AND deals them one damage, which if it does have the same timing as resolving their reaction ability, can make the test even easier. It's insane the amount of crap Kyman can get rid off with this, even Agent Fletcher eats shit here.

I am probably missing some other very good synergy with some Investigators or cards, but I believe I made my point none the less. I am just glad that FFG decided not to print a Level 2 version of this in the style of Breaking and Entering and Cheap Shot. But if it ever gets made... Oh god.

Calvin Wright

I wish he had extra ability to help him with action economy and push his high risk/reward playstyle. Something like "If you have 2 or fewer health and sanity remaining you may take an additional action during your turn".

TheMrWsell · 4
Survivor has so much soak now. Who needs economy at 5/5/5/5? — MrGoldbee · 1510
@MrGoldBee He needs it, so Calvin can do something before he dies. — HeroesOfTomorrow · 75
"Skids" O'Toole

The Drowned city expansion actually added a cool new way to play Parallel Skids. You can now play 6 Glimmers of Hope since A Glimmer of Hope and A Glimmer of Hope are both cards with the fortune trait. I believe since Glimmer refers to the name of the card it will pull out all copies (the level 0 and level 2 ones both). This in turn makes it very easy to trigger his front +3 resource ability, and/or to go for overachieve cards such as Pilfer.

I'm thinking we can use Daredevil to get all copies to the discard pile and Friends in Low Places to dig out daredevil and/or other fortune cards to make this more consistent (or other card draw effects).

Saphox · 8
Nice find! Another advantage of the Daredevil discard is, that Skids will get his weakness in play early in the game, so he will allways easily take care of it. — Susumu · 383
Detective's Colt 1911s

Let's talk about hunch deck. Of course you want to use it every turn, so the possibility to refill it seems great and it is surely if your hunch deck is made perfectly, so that you can use all the hunches each turn during scenario. But scenario usually have 14/15 turns and your hunch deck have 11 cards. So if you recycle i.e. 2 out of 11 cards, it means that there will be need for replenishing two more cards max and that is only if you did not reveal any . Therefore Detective's Colt 1911s ability is almost unnecessary and you can ignore it, unless you're certain that you have built perfect hunch deck and even if you did you have to deal with its low stats and high costs. Overall pretty disappointing signature.

Drostt · 162
Yeah, +1 to hit on a two-handed weapons is INCREDIBLY bad. Compare that to Roland's .38 Special, which is one-handed, cost less to play AND it is far more accurate than the Detective's Colt 1911s. I have no idea why they felt Joe's had to get a straight up bad weapon as his signature, to avoid overshadowing Guardians? Then why give him access to Guardian cards at all? What is worse is that the basic version of Roland's signature doesn't care about killing enemies for its fuctions, so Roland can still use other weapons to trigger his ability; the Detective's Colt do, and it is a massive struggle to kill anything but the weakest fodder enemies with it — HeroesOfTomorrow · 75
You're kind of skimming over the fact that these essentially take no slots up though. The reason they're kind of weak is because you can still double fist magnifying glasses while using these to get yourself out of trouble occasionally. — Spamamdorf · 5
@Spamamdorf I love you mention Magnifying Glass, because that is the only thing you will ever attach to this, because after paying 4 resources, you ain't gonna have money for any other tool. Granted, it's good, but makes Joe's decks super samey — HeroesOfTomorrow · 75
Confiscation

I have now run through a campaign with this weakness and I can safely say that this is a new contender for the absolute worst weakness in the game (up against Agnes Baker of course). Flavorfully, it is a very good card, but shuffling each Firearm asset into your deck is absolutely devastating, even if you only have one or two in play (which you realistically always want to have at least 2). It is bad enough that I recommend taking Friends in Low Places just so that you can search out this weakness and draw it when you have a cheap gun, rather than later.

Vardaman · 2
I disagree with this review, and with the corollary reviews that talk about what an awesome card Confiscation is because it reloads all your weapons. It’s something you play around and that gives the character a strong identity. I love Michael McGlen’s design, and this weakness’s impact on your deckbuilding choices and in-game strategy is a major contributor to his strong identity. — Eudaimonea · 6
I've played Michael through Drowned City and while I know, from experience, that drawing his weakness can be painful at times, it makes playing Micheal interesting. In a way. Because you have to take this surprise into account when playing him. This and running out of ammo keeps playing Michael interesting. At times this weekness can be very helpful (shuffling big gun into deck). — bugiel_marek · 26
Yeah, and it’s cool the way he’s the big quiet guy in the corner you just know is packing but when the cops pat him down they only find the one gun. Then the action scene starts and he’s a walking arsenal somehow. The mechanics trick you into finding ways to be that guy, which is clever and good. — Eudaimonea · 6
The truly worst-of-the-worst weaknesses are the ones there are no solutions/playarounds for, and there are quite a few solutions for Confiscation (in the legacy environment, at least). On top of Friends In Low Places, there’s Robert Castaigne 4 and Joey The Rat to help you get guns back into play efficiently, and many solutions for getting guns into your hand (Underworld Market, for instance, as well as Michael’s built-in solution of Viola Case). All of these are cards Michael would get value from even if he had a different weakness. Yeah, this one can punch you in the teeth occasionally (especially at low xp), but a well-designed weakness should wreck you every once in a while. — Pseudo Nymh · 68