Whippoorwill

The humble Whippoorwill, a bird whose sole purpose is to annoy you as much as possible. Hunter + lowering all your stats by 1 while it's near you means you want to kill it, but it having aloof (and lowering your combat slightly) motivates you to maybe just ignore it or run from it. And that core conflict this card presents has inevitably lead to many groups being chased around the map before reluctantly taking up a round or two stabbing these birds to death. But the annoyance of this card transcends gameplay. First off, it's kind of a pain to spell it out: W H I P P O O R W I L L. Why two P's, two O's, and two L's? Why do I always seem to forget one of the P's or the O's every single time? Second, it's in the ArkhamDB twice. Here, check this page if you don't believe me: Whippoorwill. See? They couldn't even be contained in one set, let alone one campaign.

Anyway, there are certainly good tools to help deal with these now. Tony Morgan can put a bounty on them, which is hilarious and incredibly satisfying. You can get their attention with a makeshift bird call. Or you can just go full Mystic overkill and Spectral Razor or Storm of Spirits them to death. In one scenario, our Carolyn Fern chose to Dynamite Blast a room full of Whippoorwills, which is probably a triumph for the field of psychology, as it certainly relieved a lot of our anxiety that day.

Side note: Please describe to me exactly the situation in which you would ever evade one of these. Seriously, I doubt anyone has ever evaded a Whippoorwill in the history of this game. Not one person. I really want to know what situation would arise where someone would try to evade it instead of just punch it when they've presumably already purposefully engaged with it.

StyxTBeuford · 13043
I you are Rita with Peter Sylvestre and Track Shoes in play evading is 6 vs 4 while punching is 2 vs 2 and it also kills the Bird. — PowLee · 15
I saw Rita evade and kill 3 whippoorwills with excessive (but satisfying) card shenanigans. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1075
An Im done runnin Rita, fair enough. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
I must admit to considering it (and being frustrated by the high evade value) after taking hits from it when attacks had failed and sanity had suffered. — Yenreb · 15
Did a Caro/Agnes run. These were a funny joke! — MrGoldbee · 1483
Whippoorwill

The humble Whippoorwill, a bird whose sole purpose is to annoy you as much as possible. Hunter + lowering all your stats by 1 while it's near you means you want to kill it, but it having aloof (and lowering your combat slightly) motivates you to maybe just ignore it or run from it. And that core conflict this card presents has inevitably lead to many groups being chased around the map before reluctantly taking up a round or two stabbing these birds to death. But the annoyance of this card transcends gameplay. First off, it's kind of a pain to spell it out: W H I P P O O R W I L L. Why two P's, two O's, and two L's? Why do I always seem to forget one of the P's or the O's every single time? Second, it's in the ArkhamDB twice. Here, check this page if you don't believe me: Whippoorwill. See? They couldn't even be contained in one set, let alone one campaign.

Anyway, there are certainly good tools to help deal with these now. Tony Morgan can put a bounty on them, which is hilarious and incredibly satisfying. You can get their attention with a makeshift bird call. Or you can just go full Mystic overkill and Spectral Razor or Storm of Spirits them to death. In one scenario, our Carolyn Fern chose to Dynamite Blast a room full of Whippoorwills, which is probably a triumph for the field of psychology, as it certainly relieved a lot of our anxiety that day.

Side note: Please describe to me exactly the situation in which you would ever evade one of these. Seriously, I doubt anyone has ever evaded a Whippoorwill in the history of this game. Not one person. I really want to know what situation would arise where someone would try to evade it instead of just punch it when they've presumably already purposefully engaged with it.

StyxTBeuford · 13043
Oh no! I'm seeing double! Does that mean it's a -2 to everything? — LivefromBenefitSt · 1075
Hope you brought your umbrella, because it's time for a Storm. Of Spirits. I'm... I'm gonna play Storm of Spirits to kill the birbs. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
There are worse uses for Storms.... — LivefromBenefitSt · 1075
Here's a situation where you would evade a Whippoorwill: it's nearing the end of the scenario, and you have an Unspeakable Oath (Cowardice) in hand. — suika · 9497
Two more: to intentionally fail a test for Take Heart or something, or to exhaust it to play Sneak Attack (0). — suika · 9497
It's high evasion prevents you from eavesdropping on it for clues! — John Keel · 9
The final part of this comment aged poorly with the introduction of Dirty Fighting — HeroesOfTomorrow · 56
Bury Them Deep

I'm actually very surprised there hasn't been a single review of Yorick's signature card. Well, let me summarize:

A+. 10/10. Literally the best signature event in the game. Quickly searches up all the signature events to confirm. Yeah, I'm right. It's the best one. Honorable mention to Obscure Studies and Dark Insight, but I do believe Bury Them Deep bests them.

Why is this card so good? I'll tell you. First off, ignore the icons. You will never commit this, period. It's too valuable. At the end of the day, you might fail that test you considered committing this, and that test might fail a scenario, but as long as you manage to kill a Swarm of Rats before things end, you've at least got a VP to show for it. You will kill something nasty, Bury it Deep, and it'll just chill in the victory display like a trophy, knowing that, no matter how bad the scenario goes from there, you got something out of it.

And yeah, that's really satisfying. But let's think about that application. Any non-Elite enemy gets added to the Victory Display, as long as you kill it once with this card in hand. That's incredible. You might think "well now, non-Elite is a pretty hefty restriction since all the really annoying things are Elite", and that's where you'd be dead wrong. This game is full of stupidly annoying enemies that, for some reason, are not Elite and don't have victory on them, meaning you can often encounter them multiple times a scenario (especially if you get a reshuffle). Here are a few, spoilers of course at your discretion:

I bet you thought at least some of those were Elite, didn't you? There are plenty more, but I think I've made my point. This card is just amazing. Enjoy the victory, enjoy the slightly safer travels.

StyxTBeuford · 13043
Or a mind blanked Brood of Yog-Sothoth. +2 VP for one damage! — MrGoldbee · 1483
I'm with in that this card is awesome! Any card that gets me that sweet sweet XP is worth a double take for me. However, I don't know if I would consider the best for two reasons. The first is that pinning an annoying enemy to the victory display isn't terrifically useful unless you're playing 3+ players. Also, enemies that return from the victory display (vengeance) still return. You still get the VP (I think), but not everyone gets buried as deep as they could be. Second, while it's great the VP is gifted to the entire party, Survivors have the lowest need for VP. That is changing as the card pool grows, but still. — LaRoix · 1645
I certainly enjoyed Bury them Deep during my recent Chainsaw Yorick rampage, but there were a few times it just didn't fire. If you draw it late, you may not have time to kill an enemy that fits its conditions, and in one case, I drew it early but got hit my a Treachery that I couldn't let fire and had to throw it for the icons. However, it is very good. A lot of recent campaigns have you shuffling the discard pile into the Encounter deck with most Agenda (aned even most Act) flips, so even in 2 player, you risk seeing enemies again. I would put this in the "Among the signitures I am happiest to see" category. — LivefromBenefitSt · 1075
Live said it best there- recurring enemies more recently have become an issue. I will say from my own experience, as someone who plays primarily two handed, that I very much do feel the effects of the enemy being taken out of the deck. "Road less traveled" and all that, but on average you definitely expect this to make your games safer. I also personally disagree that Survivors have no need for XP. Chainsaws are 4 XP a piece! Survivors have exile cards to spend on as well, and those cards- particularly Test of Will and Flare- are still incredibly powerful. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
*has more recently become an issue. I can't grammar good today. — StyxTBeuford · 13043
Huh! Well spotted, I'd never considered the lock-out-of-reshuffle effect this has. As the only restriction is "Non-Elite", it seems that means this would work on Weakness-Enemies, and be a great synergy with recursion decks. Patrice Hathaway is the immediate example; by default she's 1. high recursion, and 2. has a weakness enemy that is 3. non-elite. — HanoverFist · 743
I would like to note. Even if you have to commit this for some reason or you discard it at the start of the game with short supply (which is what I plan to do), It's recoverable with Yorrick — DaveHz · 1
's elder sign effect. (Sorry, accidental enter) — DaveHz · 1
Deep One Bull

So apparently the running theme with Innsmouth's enemies, specifically those with the Deep One trait, is that they do bad stuff when they engage with you. This is not very nice, especially for those of us who enjoy using evasion as a reliable countermeasure. This one compounds that problem by making him creep towards you if there are any Deep Ones you do need to kill. Discarding cards is bad because cards win games, and while it is by choice instead of randomly (thank goodness), this guy will still hit you for a solid 2 damage while you do try to fight him, unless you have the capability to take him out in one round- which is not at all guaranteed, especially in the early scenarios he shows up in. 4 fight is rough. 5 health is a lot- even a full round of attacks with most level 0 weapons, assuming you land every hit, will only just be enough to kill him. And, to top all of that off, this thing DOESN'T HAVE VICTORY. There's only one of him in his set of I believe 6 cards, but still! Having to face this guy more than once is just bad times.

All of that is to say, William Yorick is the perfect countermeasure to Deep One Bull, because of two major reasons. A. Yorick can fight and tank really well. His recursion also makes him hurt less from the discard by engagement (take "Let me handle this!" to make sure it goes to him). But even better than that is B, which stands for Bury Them Deep. Yes, for some reason, Deep One Bull is non-Elite. And sure, that means there's other really strong countermeasures here for the more evade savvy among us. You have Waylay, and Slip Away, and what have you. But honestly? I would just bury this guy as deep as you can.

StyxTBeuford · 13043
Or if you don't have Yorick in your team, put some handcuffs on him. — TheNameWasTaken · 3
Yes, that's the one, I'm sure. Cuff him! — StyxTBeuford · 13043
Usually, the Bulls are not the ones in handcuffs.... — LivefromBenefitSt · 1075
ayyyyyyyy — StyxTBeuford · 13043
Could luke robinson be a counter to this kind of effect? He uses a card as if engaged with enemies but as with zoey's cross and massive enemies there isn't actually a point where he becomes engaged to the enemy — Donel · 13
Luke would work this way. If you’re killing anybody from the dreamlands, this guy is going to stay in place. In very tricky scenarios, you can even move this guy towards you but away from the enemy you killed. — MrGoldbee · 1483
Does the enemy effect trigger when i use an engage action? — Andrej553 · 1
Yes, spending an action to engage an enemy or an enemy engaging you is the same from a rules perspective. — Django · 5142
Cryptographic Cipher

This card feels similar to fingerprint kit though a good bit worse. It slightly accelerates your clue gathering at the expense of a hand slot and a fairly pricey asset. This makes you take more tests and increases the difficulty of one of those tests instead of making it easier. I already don't use fingerprint kit much because of the high cost, though I think it can be good especially if reloaded with Emergency Cache (3). Will be curious to see if this receives any upgraded versions because as is it's quite lackluster. I'm very unsure why the second ability even exists if not for an upgraded version to make it much better (like setting the shroud to 0).

dubcity566 · 111
Fingerprint Kit can also be Contrabanded — Zinjanthropus · 229
This exists because the free action combines with Trish Scarborough's ability, allowing her to evade a monster engaged with her in a free action. If you're looking at this as basically another way to increase your clue-get by 1 each turn, it's cheaper fingerprint kit (side note, there are plenty of ways to reload secrets as well as supplies). If you're getting more value out of a free investigate action, this is probably better. — SGPrometheus · 828
The second ability is there to ensure you can still get clues the sub optimal way if necessary. If you're suffering a debuff or something, you can use it like a flashlight and not have to slow down so hard. The first ability is amazing though! It does make the test harder, but if you succeed, that's a clue and an action you didn't have before. And as people have mentioned, it's great with Trish to get the auto evade, thereby bypassing the AoO. — LaRoix · 1645
First ability would also allow Alice Luxley to do a damage as a free action, which might clear the location for further investigates. — Time4Tiddy · 247
The second ability can also combo nicely with Lola Santiago, as you can buy another extra clue at a 2 resources discount. — jamalix · 1