Card Reviews · ArkhamDB

Michael Leigh

This dude looks to me much better for a seeker than a guardian, for several reasons.

The +1 will likely be wasted on many guardians, while a seeker with Acidic Ichor will appreciate to fight with 7, rather than 6.
He offers unpaired soak for the class, that is generally on the squishier side. He should particularly well synergize with Miskatonic Archaeology Funding, because he is not Miskatonic, which makes him a good pick for the single natural Ally slot, every investigator comes with. (In particular, if you don't plan on taking Mr. "Rook" or Charles Ross, Esq.)
He is easy to fill up with evidence for a seeker. Much harder for most guardians, even with his buff. They will likely have to pay through the nose on Keen Eye to get anywhere, which does not appeal to me, given how resource hungry guardians are. The one Guardian who would particularly appreciate the can't take Michael, while Sister Mary could get away with some Mystic Investigate-spells, but is not that interested in either stat-boost.
He costs a lot of XP. You will probably not get your second copy until late in the campaign. Seekers are the class to easier get away with that, consistency wise.

Of course, you need to build a flex seeker like Joe Diamond to get full value. I'm imaging him very strong with Amanda Sharpe. The downside of him is that he exhausts, if you use his evidence. This makes power turns to vitriolise bosses with Vicious Blow (2) below her less efficient. Still, I'm very eager to try out this combo.

6/13/21

Susumu · 381

I got to play him on TTS with Roland. He works really well with him. The synergy of both clue finding and damage is phenomenal. I image he could work with Leo as well. — gmmster2345 · 2 6/20/21

it can work with leo with double G (Geas+ Grete) — Pawiu14 · 196 10/13/21

Joe might be off better with Scientific Theory (3) as it is cheaper in xp, resources, actions and slots - unless you really care for the damage boost. — jcdenton · 10 2/25/22

Re: Assuming he has the evidence to spare, can a player exhaust Michael for +1 dmg, play a Fast event that unexhausts him, and exhaust him a second time for another +1 dmg, on the same attack? (net +2 dmg on one attack) Looking specifically at the Guardian event "Galvanize". — HanoverFist · 746 3/9/22

I would say, this does not work, at least with "Galvanize", which is a Fast event, that specifies a duration or period of time, which according to the Fast rules require a player window. During an attack you only have two player windows, before and after commiting cards to the test, which is later than when you initiate the attack. — Susumu · 381 4/22/22

It actually should never work, even with whatever future card. It's a reaction ability, so contrary to a free trigger ability, you can always only trigger it once per timing point. — Susumu · 381 12/26/22

Vicious Blow

Vicious Blow is an absolute staple card for anyone who wants to fight monsters (and has access to it). Dealing 1 extra damage is critical for dealing with 3-health enemies with a single attack from a standard 2-damage weapon.

This card will save you 1 action every time you commit it, assuming you hit. No frills.

Rabbit's Foot

This card is so essential in Stella they even gave her an upgrade for it.

When I’m playing as the postmaster, this is worth keeping in your opening hand unless you’re really driving hard for your chainsaw or an upgraded ally. One extra card for almost every turn of the game, and it’s especially fun when treacheries make you discard your hand. Even better paired with Labranche, to commit cards, get new ones, then get new ones.

6/12/21

MrGoldbee · 1485

The upgrade is from Return to Night of the Zealot, predating Stella by quite a bit. It is nice that the upgrade (and this card) finally found a more powerful home in Stella Clark builds. — Soul_Turtle · 493 6/14/21

Rabbit's Foot

This is a fine specialty card, but not a great general purpose card. The problem I have with this is that in general, the goal of Arkham Horror is to find a way to rarely fail skill checks, which means this card will rarely activate. Frequently failing skill checks is a good way to lose the game. Now, the cost of this card is fairly low, that isn't really the limiting factor. The limiting factor is that this costs an accessory slot, and there are many other good choices for that slot. I think this is a reasonable card for most characters to play if they weren’t planning on using the slot for anything else, but I tend to find that most characters have other things they really want in that accessory slot, and this item isn't really competitive with them.

If you have designed your deck to intentionally produce a lot of skill failures that will trigger this, Rabbit’s Foot is a fine specialty card to put in your deck.

6/12/21

ChristopherA · 113

I think rabbit's foot may be the best card in all of arkham because it helps you justify only being a little up on unimportant tests, like if you are going to pass 60% of tests on base stats then 60% of the time you are wasting commits, rabbits foot says "until you fail a test why bother committing, drawing cards is a decent compromise for failure" and if you never ever trigger it you have wasted 1 accessory slot and 1 resource and won the game trivially. — Zerogrim · 295 6/13/21

@Zerogrim You’ve also wasted 1 card and 1 action. That said, I agree that the card is good. The accessory slot is more competitive now than it used to be, but you WILL fail some tests in a scenario, even if you aren’t a fail-to-win deck. Especially if you are a survivor. At its cost, it only needs to trigger 3 times to ‘repay’ itself. And it’s a wild pitch, so even if it’s drawn late or in duplicate, it’s pretty useful. — Death by Chocolate · 1489 6/13/21

It's neither the best card in the game nor a fine specialty card. It's a good card that not all investigators want but most would benefit from in some capacity. Regardless of how you set up your deck, you can usually expect to fail some tests. Some investigators are more conducive to that than others- Preston Fairmont can expect to fail virtually any treachery he draws and therefore RF becomes a very reliable way to keep his hand filled. Obviously it works as a real specialty card in Stella where you intentionally fail, but even outside of that I've had good success using this card in Yorick, Silas, early Calvin, and even Rita. The fact is you will fail tests, so what RF offers is a way to soften the tempo loss of failed tests, and it does so very cheaply. Combo with fail cards like Look What I Found (remembering that most Survivors have subpar intellect), or cards that intentionally draw failure like Drawing Thin. Drawing lots of cards is usually pretty good, and while RF may never be as reliable of an engine for as many investigators as Lucky Cigarette Case, it's still a solid pick and one I carefully consider anytime I build a deck. — StyxTBeuford · 13049 6/14/21

One might argue failure is inevitable with this game, you may as well benefit from it. — LaRoix · 1646 6/16/21

You will naturally fail a test every few turns, but that has to happen 4 times to get a net advantage over the initial cost of playing the card. While that will happen if you play this card early, in my experience it takes quite a long time, and there is usually some other accessory with more punch and tempo. — ChristopherA · 113 7/26/21

Scrying

Must-have card for Gloria. No action required, and Gloria can look 4 cards; all encounter cards drawn at next mytho phase can be checked and distributed even if 4 player game. (If she discard one, then she will check another by Alyssa or Scroll of Secrets.) If she trigger scrying for each round, you cannot meet any Ancient Evils at all! Of course, the number of charges is limited. However, Twila solves this. The remaining problem is taking horror. In my experience, whenever I trigger scrying by Gloria, I take 1 horror (except very few scenario).

6/11/21

elkeinkrad · 500