It's a good principle of card design that when the effect of one card is objectively, statistically better than that of another, then it should come with a higher cost -- whether in money, actions, or xp. Given that principle, could someone explain to me, please, why this wretchedly inefficient card costs the same as First Aid? They both come with three charges/supplies; they both heal for an action; they both cost two resources; and they both have a single will icon. The only differences are that First Aid can heal sanity as well, and Healing Words takes up a valuable arcane spot -- both of which make the Words worse. This upsets me...
When you put this card up against other healing options, it only looks shabbier. Painkillers get you the same amount of healing for half the cost and 1/4 the actions! (sure, it'll cost you 3 sanity as well...) Thermos, which, for the record, I hate for it's ruinous 4-resource cost, at least has the versatility of First Aid, and is a decent deck addition if you're loaded up with trauma. Or what about humble Emergency Aid? Heal two damage for two resources and an action. Would anyone rather pay three MORE actions for one additional point of healing? That's the deal Healing Words offers you....
Full disclosure: My animosity against this card is personal at the moment. I'm in the middle of a Dunwich run with a beat-up Daisy Walker, and she's in desperate need of additional healing. Out here in nowheresville, she can't get a steady supply of her pills, and the Medical Texts she totes around look like they're from the 17th century... All I have access to by way of deck upgrades is this lousy spell -- or a Thermos of clam chowder... Broods of Yog-Sothoth, here I come...