This review is made from the viewpoint of someone who is playing only with cards released from 2026 and onwards.

This card just usually feels great to play. It is always nice to be able to thin out your deck a little bit or draw into things like Joe Diamond's weakness early so you can prep around it. The real advantage I have found when playing it is just how versital it is. I would say almost every scenario I have played with it has at some point put me in a weird situation. I would have some of my equipment out, usually prepped for what was on the board, but then a new twist had been thrown out that was really slowing me down. My duo partner was going to be even worse at handling the issue than I was, and I wasn't BAD, but an extra point to a skill test or an extra damage to an attack would REALLY seal it. Enter this card, cheap and handy. It is simple, but you will always be happy to see one in your opening hand and will usually find good use for it if you draw it later down the line.

Of course, I say this for those who have plenty of items they may want to find. It sucks to draw this if you only have a few targets that you have already drawn or used. For those who need plenty of tools and weapons for fighting and investigating, plus a little utility here and there? Heck yeah.

Magnifying Glass, M1911, Machete, Fingerprint Kit; the list goes on.

Just a fun fact, that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere: the guy on the artwork is either Danny Schaefer, lead designer for Star Wars: Unlimited; or Grubby (Manuel Schenkhuizen), a Dutch pro player; or, even worse: a triple of them, still UNAWARE of all this, whose identity is yet to be uncovered in a cosmic-horror paradox.

EDIT: Disproven (see comments)

Another philosophical one. If you are not into pointless discussions, skip it.

While it is surely not intended I wonder if RAW (rules as written) this allows Hidden Pocket to be attached to a gun. But wait, also other "non-Firearm" Upgrade events exist:

• Fine Tuning
• The Raven Quill
• Tinker
• Trusted

Explanation: The line "Attach to a Clothing or Armor asset you control." on Hidden Pocket is an effect of the card, not a play restriction. Without it (and ignoring the "needs to change the game state" rule) the card would simply do nothing and go straight to discard, but could still be played. RAW, Primed for Action circumvents the whiffing by specifying an attachment target.

The "if able" on Primed for Action is a bit of a vague phrase in my point of view, since it does not specify what qualifies that event to be "able" to be attached - and again, "Attach to a Clothing or Armor asset you control." is not a restriction.

To conclude: While I do not see much sense in playing this "combo", they could have simply added the word "only" to the sentence on Hidden Pocket to prevent brainfuckers like me from posting reviews like this. I dare to assume they omitted it mainly for layout reasons, as the effect would then have used up another line.

Its quite easy to design the deck around this with a few XP and i cant help but feel that some of the reviews are basically saying "if you design your deck without thinking about your signature weakness, then it will shaft you".

I've got Underworld Market so i just have about 6 or 7 illicit guns in my underworld deck, along with Fence. its just 5XP entry point into a deck that doesn't need all the cards out.

It means i can reliably guarantee to have Fence out after a maximum of 5 rounds, (average 3), and then every firearm in my deck becomes fast at no extra cost. sure you need some economy, but with fence Bank Job is a no-brainer, also in the underworld deck. A few more XP and you have Bruiser and you can reliably play and pay for your many guns easily, and fast.

The min-maxing approach of having 3 or 4 loaded guns out all the time is high risk, just keep the resources till you need to play a fast, illicit gun, and fence will do the rest. I'm tending to also leave the guns out where possible, and mid game i get 2 or 3 empty guns shuffled back into my deck for reuse.

The major added advantage of Underworld Market is also that getting a gun is effectively guaranteed, at the very worst you will get a gun by round 2. So you don't need to mulligan heavily for weapons; you can mulligan heavily for action (Leo De Luca and Haste); and/or resource generation (Lone Wolf, Bruiser or Stylish Coat).

Talking just from a chapter 2 perspective, this is an exceptionally good card in new Joe Diamond (Hope I linked the right Joe...) His ability and card pool allow him to keep his hand up so he can fuel it, and a 3 dmg attack for 2r at level 0 is nothing to scoff at, especially since you can use this on Elite enemies. Even in Chapter 1 or in 'Legacy' lvl0 3 dmg fights (like Spectral Razor) were premium, and Razor only hit elites for 2!

That said, it's not a 1:1 as Razor doesn't require you to discard any cards and there are times where you just can't afford to drop 2 cards. I don't think it's that hard to keep your hand up in situations where it matters (Detective's Intuition and Intel Report )

So, for Chapter 2? I would call this a staple for Dexter, but Trish and Carolyn prooobably have better things to do. For Legacy? Use this with a Vicious Blow tucked under Amanda, or even in Roland Banks, and it can go a long way, especially because chapter 1 has much, much, much stronger card-draw options to just keep your hand perpetually full.

A neat card that I think gets around "Seekers are good at Everything!" (Unlike Occult Invocation) because it demands they use their fists to fight instead of BOOKS like NERDS. Except in Joe where its "Fight at 6/8 and do 2/3 dmg tee-hee." Which is pretty good for a level 0 card imo.