Sixth Sense

Sixth Sense

A comparison to using Rite of Seeking (4), assuming no support for either and you always have a location available for an additional investigate, at discovering 18 clues:

  • Rite would take 10 resources, 2 cards, 2 plays, 6 investigate actions at 3 clues per actions
  • Sixth sense would take 3 resources, 1 play, ~13 investigate actions, at 1.35 clue per action

Rite of Seeking saves 7 actions, but costs 7 resources, 1 card, and a play more. A naive analysis liquidating every resource and card would into actions put Sixth Sense squarely ahead. Even a slightly less naive analysis — say you spend a play on Emergency Cache and put a copy of Rite of Seeking in play with an Uncage the Soul — still works out to +1 resource +3 cards and +2 plays vs +7 actions, putting Sixth Sense only 1 investigate action behind (assuming you can use the resources and cards to save actions in other ways).

This comparison purely theoretical — there's almost no scenario where you'll need to get 18 clues alone as a mystic. But it's quite common to need to need to get more than the 9 clues that a single copy of Rite of Seeking would get you; which gives Sixth Sense a even larger lead in such a situation...

...at least, until support is factored in. Sixth Sense's support options are just worse:

When compared with Recharge or Twila, no amount of support Sixth Sense can get will keep up with Rite of Seeking's action compression. The caveat is that recharge support costs XP.

Other considerations:

  • Rite's downside is easily mitigated most of the time, the real downside is that a failed Rite of Seeking test is much worse than a failed Sixth Sense test and it's terribly inefficient when there's one clue remaining (Seekers, do your job!)
  • Potential shroud reduction is occasionally useful, but offset by the fact that it needs to make more tests at a high shroud location, to the point where Grotesque Statue is more useful for Rite of Seeking than for Sixth Sense.
  • Playing Grotesque Statue to speed up Sixth Sense investigation is usually a wash on clues/action compared to just taking an extra Sixth Sense investigate
  • Sixth sense is worse on scenarios which require you to clear clues off a single location to advance, and on VP locations
  • Jacqueline Fine can use Sixth Sense better than any other investigator

So in conclusion:

  • If you're going to get recharge tech for your other spells anyway, go for Rite of Seeking
  • If your team has a competent seeker and you don't need to get much more than 9 clues a scenario, go Rite of Seeking (Sixth Sense/Drawn to the Flame can pick up a few more if needed).
  • If you're in a low XP campaign (read: Dunwich) without Arcane Research, or have other priorities, Sixth Sense becomes much more attractive because of how little XP it takes to get going.
  • Sixth Sense is far cheaper to run and allows you to run a Mystic deck with much fewer economy cards.
suika · 9497
I think you haven’t taken map design into account. A lot of scenarios, especially in TIC, move you around the map at a rapid pace. Being able to use sixth, especially if you can support with eldritch or Jaqueline’s power, can support grabbing victory points off locations without taking the two moves to go there and the two to come back. In TCU, this can be used to reduce painful haunting effects. But if you’re running a deck where you have a lot of blesses and can choose which token you yet, sixth becomes less useful. — MrGoldbee · 1483
I don't see that as a huge advantage — the counterpoint being that the the first time you were at that location, you could have used Rite of Seeking and gotten 3 clues there, and have another gater pick up the last one, instead of having to go back for it/remote clue with Sixth Sense. — suika · 9497
Same with Haunted effects — making fewer tests is also a very good defense against Haunted. — suika · 9497
I think the player count is also important. In 1-2 players, you'll often have 1-2 clues on most locations so you'll never get 3 clues. Or in 4 player you'll often have 1 clue left, so rite is best in 3 player. — Django · 5142
Regarding map design, Sixth gets better when other players reveal locations and you ever move there. It's also great to avoid high shroud locations and it doesn't end your turn with the wrong symbol (or make you waste actoins for the same reason). — Django · 5142
Can I ask a timing question with the new errata? I get that "as if" cards now consider you at that location from start to finish off the event/test. This card only considers you at that other location once you pull a token, at which point you have already taken you're AoO, paid the extra investigate cost, etc. Do you [A] undo those costs and pay the new ones? It feels more correct to [B] keep those locked in and only use the shroud value & clue removal of the new location. Besides, if you want to get really janky [C] it says you're at both locations - paying both costs? I think [B] makes the most sense. — Taevus · 782
You don't retroactively take any new costs. You're only considered at both locations after the symbol is revealed, not when costs were being paid. — suika · 9497
I wouldn`t assume that a seeker is always around when you play a mystic. — Chiungalla · 2

Gilded Volto

Gilded Volto

For a long time I have sat and theories why you would take this card, the only clear solution is "you are playing a character with really high agility", and yea maybe you pick this mask for the alone but its coming into play ability as far as I can tell is worthless, it is even worse than if the mask itself had fast (given then you could fast play it to be able to clear a tricky test).

Perhaps there is some potential here but everything I think of would be better served by switchblade level 0.

Save for one lone soul, one light in the darkness who sees a non fast asset that plays an asset and smiles, who sees the icons on this card as being more valuable than the discard effect.

The man men love, Dexter Drake.

You can put Volto into play fast with his ability (and for free) then immediately get another asset into play without spending an action, then the turn afterwards you can feed his ability with the mask that remains in play.

The only other option for Dexter realistically is the willpower mask and I've never really needed healing as Dexter, and swapping tests out for willpower is pretty easy to do without the mask anyway.

Zerogrim · 295
Another person who might like it is Yorick, who can play it from discard pile on a kill to get a fast play of a card in hand. Though admittedly, he would much rather have bauta — NarkasisBroon · 10
Yea I think I personally would always take Bauta as yorick but if someone else wanted it I could see geting use out of Volto. — Zerogrim · 295
Wendy with Lockpicks and Scanvenging (2) seems like a good combo for me. But given, that the later is from "Weaver of the Cosmos", that was a long way from Venice to make this card working. — Susumu · 381

Sea Change Harpoon

Sea Change Harpoon

In my Silas deck, this was usually a back up weapon. But then I realized the power of using this with Opportunist(2). That way, this becomes a pretty nice alternative to machete. The same technique can power your net. There aren’t a lot of great weapons in survivor if you can’t get chainsaw going for you consistently, this will do you well.

MrGoldbee · 1483
Better than Opportunist (2) (that you should get back after the test, there is Quick thinking, expecially if you don't us the taboo list: commit, succed, get an action, get it back in hand, commit again, gain an action again. — AlexP · 265
How exactly are you getting Quick Thinking back in hand? If you are using Silas ability then you won't get the extra action benefit. If you are using the Harpoon ability, then you'll need to spend an action to play it again, which render the action gain from Quick Thinking meaningless, plus you even need to pay 3 resources. — Killbray · 12322

One-Two Punch

One-Two Punch

I note that this card does not use the word "Fast" nor use the Fast/Reaction symbols regarding the 2nd fight action. This suggests that this event generates a full 2nd Fight action. Therefore, a couple questions:

  • Would playing this count as 2 Fight actions for the purposes of activating Haste?
  • Does playing this count and fighting a 2nd time count as 2 actions towards Pay Day?

Asking for a friend.

HanoverFist · 744
Nope. The literal presence of "Fast" or one of the two non-action triggered ability symbols isn't the reason events and abilities that invoke an action designator without actually costing an action don't count as an action, it's the fact that they didn't cost an action. When you play One-Two Punch, you're doing a single Fight/Play action that just happens to repeat the steps of fighting an enemy twice (conditional on succeeding the first time and choosing to repeat it, of course). — Thatwasademo · 58
Though, a strict reading of Nested Skill Tests (FAQ 1.17) would suggest that the second fight isn't part of the same action "If the first skill test was part of an action, the second skill test does not initiate until that action has finished resolving." (note that "if you succeed" suggests that One-Two Punch tries to start the second fight during ST.7) so you kind of get the worst of both worlds here -- the second fight isn't, say, "an additional action which can only be used to Fight" and so doesn't count towards Haste or Pay Day, but it also isn't part of the same action and so doesn't count toward Ace of Rods. — Thatwasademo · 58
Excellent breakdown, thank you. — HanoverFist · 744
There is no nested skill test here, so that rule doesn't apply; the first fight test fully resolves before the second fight test begins. Both are part of the same action, and Ace of Rods applies to both tests. — Hylianpuffball · 29
What makes you say that there is no nested skill test? "If you succeed" is the wording used to add extra results to a skill test, and those results resolve during ST.7, which would make it a nested test and make those rules applicable. I think it's unlikely that the second fight was intended to be resolved *after* the action, not during it, but that is what a strict reading of the text and rules gives you. — TheNameWasTaken · 3
It's all in one action, but the second test happens after the first one resolves. Both tests are in the same single action, but they occur in sequence. This card applies only once for Haste. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
Fighting, Playing (a card), Investigating, Evading and so on are not inherently actions. They are only actions if you need to spend an action to perform them. For example if you Fight an enemy using the reaction ability of Survival Knife, you are not peforming a Fight action you are just fighting. So there is no doubt that that One-two punch only allows you to fight again, it does not grant you any extra action. The only time when an effect grants you an extra action is if the text says "take a [...] action". For example Ursula's ability. — Killbray · 12322
I have a related question for this card. Would it count as two times doing damage to Primordial Evil in the Edge of the Earth campaign ? I guess it does but would like to be sure. — Putzibram · 20

"Eat lead!"

"Eat lead!"

Leo, non-parallel-back Skids, and Tony are probably the best users of this. It can easily guarantees a Double or Nothing shot, and they can spend the ammo from a Sleight of Hand'd gun and have ammo to spare too.

With taboos, the payoff isn't that good anymore, but at least you can still get an additional action or 3 resources.

suika · 9497