YIKES. I'm sure your first thought is "Well, it IS two free clues," but there are MUUUUUCH less expensive ways of getting clues. The XP cost is just the sewer icing on this giant cake of crap, built from the mound of curses you just dumped into your bag. This would be a fantastic card to add IF you're really diving into a curse-heavy build, but with that specific exception out of the way, it's reeeally not good.

This card costs an action to play, so right there it's already netting you no more than any other card that discovers an additional clue in an investigation attempt like Deduction, most Mystic investigative spells, Sharp Vision, those are just off the top of my head and either cost one XP OR a reasonable amount of resources for the use you get out of them (and that's not counting Deduction). But I hear you: testless clues are more valuable than you'd think on paper. There are plenty of ways to get testless clues (Working a Hunch, arguably "Look what I found!") that cost you a reasonable amount of resources while still completely bypassing the need for success. But this card is just 1 XP and 0 resources, right?......right?

No. Determining how bad this card is in normal play just boils down to understanding how expensive putting a curse token in the bag is, so let's compare this card to one I actually like: Faustian Bargain. Let's assume you play this on a 2 shroud location, costing the same as FB. FB gives you 5 resources to distribute among players, making it provide virtually the same number of resources as a Lvl. 2 Hot Streak, except 1.) you don't require the overhead of 5 resources, 2.) you can distribute to other players, and 3.) It's a Lvl. 0 card, all massive, massive boons (lol sorry, didn't mean this to veer into a FB review). The difference is that it adds two curse tokens, and with all things considered, I STILL hesitate and consult my friend before playing this card sometimes (I usually end up playing it) because curse tokens strengthen the chaos bag in a game that's already very unforgiving.

Stirring up Trouble gives you a very, very mild advantage over other clue-granting cards, and it costs 2 curse tokens AT A 2 SHROUD, a shroud that you'd likely rather just investigate yourself. When you get to shroud 4 or higher (or even 3 on harder difficulties), that's way too many curse tokens to even CONSIDER adding. I think........you could maaaaaybe argue using this on 1-2 shroud in expert because testless cards are......just really, REALLY good in expert, and you're kinda expecting to fail many of the tests there anyways, so 1-2 curse tokens could be passable in a bag with -7 and -8. Even on expert, though, it doesn't change the fact that there's going to be many tests where you're already struggling to succeed against the average token pull, only to be kicked down the stairs by a curse token. Personally, I'd be getting nervous even at 2.

I hope you've been noticing that I've been reviewing this card primarily at 2 shroud; I would never dream of playing it on a shroud higher than that. The only good use of this card is at, like a 5 shroud or something with Cryptic Grimoire, Tides of Fate, etc. in hand, and at that point, you're not planning on playing with those tokens in the bag for long. As far as paying the cost in curse tokens go, this card is way too rich for my blood.

tl;dr, if you were just scrolling through cards that might look interesting to add to your deck and didn't have a curse token-fueled plan in mind, PLEASE do your chaos bag a favor and skip RIGHT over this one.

This is a rough one, and you want to draw it as early as possible--or have an insurance policy that NEVER leaves your hand. There's been a couple of times where I had almost a full bag of bless tokens, and got hit for 4 horror AND 4 blessings changed to curses right about the time you're gearing up for that boss fight at the end of the scenario. Yeah, I powered through it, but it doesn't feel too good. And for that reason, thematically, I love this weakness.

This card has nothing to do with the bless/curse gimmick of the cycle; just another addition to a no-resource playstyle right next to Dark Horse and Fire Axe.

With a twist.

I want to say this is really is just the investigation version of Fire Axe. You know the one: very nice if you plan returning to 0 resources frequently and gives you a method of returning to 0 with some bonuses if you have a couple resources to shave off. However, there are some differences to keep in mind that make it much less ideal to such a playstyle.

1.) It costs 3 as opposed to Axe's 1 while still taking up a hand slot, so this isn't an easy play from a no-resource deck. You could play it to GET to no resources, maybe.

2.) This card expects you to have a good investigative stat already. Each additional resource committed to its test gives you a bonus of +1 as opposed to Axe's +2. The consistent extra clue for having no resources is great, but you need to be able to reliably pass that test on your own because the compass ain't gonna help you. And also because.....

3.) This bad boy exhausts. Pull the brakes, stop the presses, you get ONE use out of this each turn. To be fair, if it didn't exhaust, it would be an incredibly busted card, netting you a potential 6 clues each turn at lvl 0. However, this also means that you'll likely (preferably) need a couple other methods to help you gather clues more efficiently, and to do that you usually need...........resources. And your minimalistic lifestyle thrives off starvation.

Now, this doesn't necessarily mean this card is bad, but it does mean that you really shouldn't just run this expecting it to be your no-resource Flashlight or something. Fire Axe you could do that with because it was inexpensive and, frankly, didn't need to you to be broke in order to get use from it. Being broke was a fantastic bonus to an otherwise good budget fighting tool. You can't do that with the Mariner's Compass because the +1 to 1 resource bonus isn't worth the 3 resources it takes to play it. The compass, costing you 3 resources and a hand slot, expects you to have absolutely nothing before helping you at all, so if you pull this out AFTER using other cards, it can help you MAINTAIN your momentum. It is not something to LEAD with. This makes the compass very unwieldy and hard to pin down with its use, but if you can hit that stride, playing cards, living your life, and THEN coming back to the compass, I think this card's consistent clue-gathering boost MIGHT be worth the cost for admission. Or you could slap a compass to each wrist and just go nuts.

Personally, I don't see myself including this card anytime soon; I dislike the fact that it demands a decent overhead, and then tells you to get on the ground and lick its boots. Once you hit 0, even if you have ways of gaining more resources, there's only so many times you can go back DOWN to 0 without running out of ways to climb back up. There's a couple of consistent resource replenishers like Drawing Thin or Lone Wolf, but you're still very much limiting your freedom with what you can do with your cards and still get the most out of this. Remember, when you're not using it, it's just burning a hole in your hand (slot).

To each their own, though. If someone told me they found great success with this card, I wouldn't be shocked, but I'd definitely ask to see their deck.

Anyone with big hands need this card. I feel its hard to change anything else after you start your deck building with this so it can be limiting to adapt but no doubt its powerful Really strong enabler for forbidden tome and also very good with characters like Daisy. At dunwich legacy this card... Ughh.... Lets say at dunwich legacy use with caution if you are new :D

So we came across the Abandoned Mine first and we all quickly agreed that "between 3 and 10 resources" is 4 to 9. Then came along this card...

Between 3 and 5 is technically, mathematically, quite literally, just 4... right?... RIGHT?!