Arkham Horror Base Set: Mystics

Next up, our reincarnated Hyberborean sorcerer, now serving corned hash with a side of Joe. Hello Agnes Baker! You are now a Mystic. Deal with it.

Her Trait is meaningless. 5/2/2/3 is... extreme. It's great having that high of Willpower, but all those 2s means she will have to discard cards or find other boosts to have even a small chance of pulling off even basic checks in Intellect and Combat. That means she's nearly useless in investigating without help, and cannot fight until she gets a weapon (or, more likely, spell) to do so. As the most common tests in the game are fighting off monsters or investigating for clues, that means Agnes actively hampers your team until she gets enough card draw to find her gear so she can deal with that stuff. But, if you look at it another way, her evasion is average, and her durability is actually better than Roland to off-tank a monster or two (5 Sanity is punishing if Roland misses a few attacks; Roland is NOT a tank, he's a durable attacker). If an important location is guarded by a reasonable monster, Agnes, with no development, can spend one action to basically "stun" it for a turn through evasion, freeing up the room for the better investigators to ransack it and Skids or Roland to defeat the foe. Plus, while Willpower is not regularly called for (unlike Intellect or Combat), character skills are currently 1 through 5, and there ain't nothing wrong with being the best you can be in a stat.

So Agnes is obviously a support character based on stats, which is totally fine. She will help smooth out the bumps so the fighters can get the monsters under control, and the investigators can vacuum up the clues. But it's her powers that up the ante considerably. Her main ability is simply awesome, and helps turn her Sanity into an offensive pool even while it's protecting her. It's consistent in that it's pretty easy to trigger when you want it (unlike Roland's), as worse comes to worse she can find ways to make herself lose Sanity to toss out free damage on foes. Elder Sign abilities are more flavor text than rules, but it does mean that a late-game Agnes with an Elder Sign can basically crush any test that is required.

Her back side shows that's she's off-Survivor, which is awesome, because that's the faction of support characters even more. This is one durable, surprisingly helpful lady whose only weakness is that she cannot easily do the two most common actions in the game (fighting and investigating). But that's fine, she'll handle the rest of the adventure while the more boring characters hit monsters or slum for clues.



Another neutral signature item -- and since Agnes has access to Survivor, Item trait actually *matters* (not much, but it does). As with all signature cards, it has great icons to discard it. But will you want to?

Currently, Agnes could start an adventure with about 30% of her deck, more or less, as spells, and the Heirloom does stone nothing if you're not playing said spells. Obviously spell density can increase as new cards are released, and the Heirloom can trigger unlimited times in a turn, which is sweet, but a $3 investment for only a 30% return isn't all that great. I'd say if there's already a spell in your hand, if you can afford the time and money to get the Heirloom out, do that first; a free card is nice, and you'll probably draw more. And it helps you mitigate your Dark Memory quite nicely. But don't be afraid to toss this for icons if you need to.



Another wonderful flavor Weakness! This one means that any game with Agnes, the Agenda basically starts with 1 turn up on you. To cast this, as additional insult, Agnes has to actually *pay hard-earned money*. To advance the Doom. Or she could keep it in hand and take a brutal 2 Sanity loss per turn. Which actually isn't completely all bad, as its a controllable, reliable way to trigger Agnes' ability, but at 2 Sanity loss to 1 outgoing damage that's not an exchange you're happy to keep making forever. Finally, unlike Roland's Treachery Cover Up, Dark Memory doesn't have to be instantly played, plus Agnes will have no lingering bad effects heading into the next adventure from this. It's flavorful, but unlike Roland's Cover Up, it can actually be almost useful (heck, the Heirloom lets you draw a card off of it). It also doesn't have the weird rules interactions Cover Up had. I like it.

****

Mystic cards! Cards about magic and spells and pizza! How delightful!

There are currently two Mystics in the game right now: Agnes main, and Daisy secondary. Let's run them down, shall we? (Er, the cards, not the ladies). Just how many of these magical mystical lovelies will Daisy want, as she's currently bogged down by only being THE BEST DAMN INVESTIGATOR FOR CLUES in the game? Nothing major there.



OK, so the more Doom out there, the faster the Agenda deck advances, which is bad for the players, right?

Which is one reason the Arcane Initiate is so damn cheap. You're shaving a turn off your clock by playing her! On the other hand... you're getting insanely good stats for just 1 resource. You're getting reusable spell search as well, which is great for Agnes, and maybe useful for Daisy in some builds. And her Forced ability doesn't include the magic words "This may make the Agenda deck advance." Which means the Agenda still only advances in the Mythos Phase, which means you have a whole half turn to get rid of the Initiate if you need to. Agnes can play her, look for a spell, and feed her to a monster, and the Doom track will not even notice. Also, a little rules-fu here: when the Agenda advances, *all* Doom on cards in play vanish. So if you play the Initiate on the turn the Agenda would have advanced anyway, you're losing nothing Doom-wise, and no matter when you play her, once the Agenda advances, she's completely safe and Doom-free.

But really, 1 dollar for those stats is just golden and awesome, and she should be played just for that. That Agnes can use her to set up a card-drawing machine is just gravy. Willpower icon is arguably the worst icon (it's the only stat characters usually cannot force a test on in any given turn), so that's a negative, but this is still a great card.

So have we figured out that Mystics deal in Dark Magic that advances the Doom yet? Yes? OK.



The Mystic Skill-boosting Talent boosts Willpower (meh) and Intellect (yay!). With this out, Agnes can actually start investigating like a big girl! All my comments earlier on the Skill-boosting Talents apply; these are great cards that can turn a late-game resource glut into a crushing advantage, and even a 1-2 dollar spend on a key test will pretty-near guarantee success with the average CHAOS BAG!!! in the starting campaign. That being said, Willpower is still the least-used Skill in the game currently, so having it as an icon and a boost is whatever (although that does help Agnes sling spells, she's already got a 5 Willpower base). Would Daisy want it? My odds say no, unless she's going hard into spellcasting; she already has access to Hyperawareness, and Intellect/Agility are better things to boost than Willpower/Intellect on average.



And now we have our first Spell that Agnes actually wants to cast. This is an evasion-attack spell, really, and once you start messing around with the game you'll realize all the crazy fun stuff that high-evasion characters can pull off to manipulate the board state. It also lets Agnes use her 5 Willpower. Now, remember, on average in the base campaign, a +1 to a skill effectively negates the effects of the CHAOS BAG!!!. This lets Agnes evade +2 higher than her Agility, which is stupid, and throws in extra damage as well. If she uses this and then finds a way to get some Sanity loss on her, this can kill an average monster easily. This also effectively gives Daisy a +1 to evade nasties, which is good for her as well. The icon-based disadvantages are annoying, but not a reason not to play Blinding Light.

And, yes, while you could play this last to get around the potential disadvantage completely, most evasion-based shenanigans require you to evade enemies first in the turn, and then do silly stuff while they stare in mute wonder, so playing Blinding Light as your last action isn't usually the strongest tactic for the card. It has an icon to discard for as well (and a Willpower icon, which is cute and can be framed for showing to your guests over tea).



An amazing way to invest 2 XP. You lower the resource cost of the card, do more damage, and Agnes is actually happy that a bad draw causes her Sanity loss, because that's more outgoing damage she's doing! Daisy will not be as happy with that, but whatever -- this "evasion" spell at Level 2 can kill most average monsters. So good, so nasty, so dead.



Roland gets a Shotgun, Agnes gets this beautiful Item (which she could Scavenge very poorly for, should she feel the urge) that only she can use. It does take up a hand slot, but she's probably not using weapons, and it gives you another arcane slot to hold more spells and other arcane nonsense. The cost of an action to recharge a spell is a real cost, don't neglect that, but it keeps her spells loaded and ready, and it's also a safe thing to pass the time with if current Agenda/Story interaction requires the party to bide their time a bit and build up.

Obviously not useful in a Spell-less Agnes build, but why are you doing that? I guess when there's enough cards and you can just build an all "eat my Sanity and die!" deck, but that's not here yet, and perhaps never will be.



What an utterly adorable card. I just love it. First off, the art is striking, even for an FFG game. Then all you need to drain 2 tasty clues off an innocent location is just take a bad draw from the encounter deck to your face! Which, quite frankly, with her awesome Willpower and various evasion-based shenanigans, Agnes is more than equipped to typically do. As Agnes is typically a lackluster investigator, this not only lets her snarf up clues for once, it also is a great way for her to go for the high-Shroud locations and quickly get clues that even Daisy or Roland might have trouble unearthing.

The card is much less useful for Daisy unless you're trying for the TURBO-Clue 9000 build for her, as she's Seeker primary, and thus usually doesn't need help gaining clues. Clues flee from her, trod beneath her nail-shod pumps.

Oh, and it has 2 icons! (Kinda).



The Mystic Skill is just so perfect for Agnes, not insofar as she needs the Willpower boost, but because it lets her further abuse her rather exploitable ability (really, Agnes' power is so much more useful than Roland's, it's rather scary). I'm sure Daisy wouldn't mind handing out some free Sanity heals as well.

The trouble comes that, alas, this is a Willpower Skill card. Which is the toughest card in the game to play unless you're going Spell heavy. Roland or Wendy can go entire games and never test Willpower. I think it's just wonderful and awesome in Agnes, but if your Daisy isn't planning on making spellcasting a major theme, this can be left out of her deck.



And here's another card that just combos with Agnes' power! Like I said, her ability is so abusable, even in the starting card pool. It's a Talent, so it doesn't take up a slot. It's FREE. It has an INTELLECT icon. It makes money for Agnes AND lets her kill a monster. Without taking an action. Or resources. Just stupid good.

Daisy can certainly use the free resources, but this is a lot less appealing to her in that she generally doesn't WANT to lose Sanity.



Another card that only Agnes can play. This one is a sizable chunk of XP to invest in, but at least it is cheap, and then lets her pretend she's the best character in the game (Wendy) for four draws. It also has the amazing wild icon.

Anything that gives you control over the CHOAS BAG!!! is pretty sweet. This is probably best played later in an adventure, because doubling the odds that Agnes can rip out a killer Elder Sign when needed can crush any imaginable opposition. And it's good insurance to help control any vitally important test.

It's a great card, and it allows you to aspire to be Wendy-esque for a few turns, which is the goal of all good people and societies. Going all-in for 8 XP for two is quite the investment, though, especially when (nearly) all higher-level cards in this game are worthy of purchasing.



The Holy Rosary is...slightly cross purposes. Agnes doesn't need the +1 Willpower. Having a place to dump Sanity losses (like when she's not using her power to snipe a monster) is her main attraction.

A spell-cating Daisy is more interested in the +1 Willpower. Like all characters, +2 Sanity is also useful to her. And it might make her want Forbidden Knowledge a bit more.

In general, a very meh card. I wouldn't be surprised if this is the first one cut from future Agnes decks.

There appears to be an icon symbol on this card, but I can't make it out clearly, so we won't talk about it.



Ah, at last, another Spell for the Heirloom to trigger off of! Which is about all we can say about Mind Wipe in polite company.

This one is...maybe the worst Leveled up card in the game so far? It's not worthless, but it's highly situational, and it doesn't let you actually *resolve* a monster any faster.

For most critters, the most dangerous thing about them is the fact they eat you. Mind Wipe does not protect against that. Mind Wipe does not make a monster easier to kill or evade. Mind Wipe does not do much of anything against most monsters in the game, actually, because for most of them, the "they're eating me!" is the only rules text that matters, and this doesn't stop the munching and crunching.

Mind Wipe *does* get rid of really nasty keywords (like Retaliate), and certainly will erase very-annoying-to-highly-dangerous rules text from some boss monsters or other featured foes who have lots of rules interactions with the Agenda, location, or whatever, but it's only for one phase (one PHASE? Not the entire turn?).

It also doesn't work on Elite monsters, which makes a very situational card even more limited, as most boss monsters or other featured enemies will probably be Elite.

Both Agnes and Daisy can use this spell just fine, but the fact it costs 1 XP per copy really drags this down. At least it has a Combat icon, which both characters appreciate. I guess at least Agnes can chain more card draws off this from her Heirloom makes it slightly more useful to her?

Easily the worst spell in the game, and maybe the worst player card. Again, it's not unplayable or useless, but it's very, very situational, AND it costs XP to put in your deck, AND it costs a resource to play, AND it only lasts until the end of the current phase (!!!) AND it doesn't work on Elites... geez, maybe it is just good for the Combat icon.



Ah, now here's a bread and butter spell worth talking about. Setting up a character's deck is of middling use; players can always draw more cards for an action, so the party is down one action for you to just rearrange (and not improve) the next three draws from a given player deck. That's...meh, at best, but if you're digging for a key card, it does help slightly. It's a lot better to set up the encounter deck, as that happens in a set order every turn, and not only are you warned about what's coming up from the Deck of Pain, you can arrange the cards so that the right investigator gets the right threats.

In short, this is a card that gives Agnes something useful to do while the investigators are investigating and the fighters are fightenating. This is much less useful for Daisy, as she's the best investigator in the game, and thus usually has something else to do besides muck around with the encounter deck.

It bears a wonderful Intellect icon for Agnes to gaze longingly at.



The default *resuable* attack spell in the game. Agnes adores it, because even if she draws iconography that means she's doing MORE DAMAGE. Daisy doesn't mind it, as it's probably her best attack option, but it's less useful for her to combo off with. *This* is the spell you'll be Book of Shadowing onto. Oh, and it has a Combat icon! So nice.



This is Lord of the Ring's "A Test of Will", only with a wonderful 1 Sanity loss that makes Agnes happy and Daisy sad. And it has a wild icon? Wow.

A wonderful spell for both of our Mystics (Daisy can just shut up and take the Sanity like a trooper). Random Treachery Revelations can really mess up investigator tempos. Note that it only counters your OWN Treachery Revelations, but if you're Scrying, that's something you can even set up. And then Drawn to the Flame for more mad synergy bonuses!

So have we seen how many cards in her own faction line up with Agnes' ability? See how wonderful that is compared to Roland's rather plodding power? Good cards here, good cards (except Mind Blank, which we will discuss in amused tones at the next club meeting).

Next up, Skids.