TLDR: This card in a Leo Anderson deck is an absolute tank. Include it if you want to have an easy time on hard/expert mode.

I should mention this isn't much different than the review done by MiskatonicFrosh but I just felt the need to include my review of this specifically with Leo Anderson.

First off, this card on its own provides you with a heal for damage and horror and then soaks one damage and horror for 1 action and 2 resources. Compare this to First Aid, liquid courage, etc. All that can be for action costly healing assets. The big benefit of those compared to this card is they dont take up a valuable ally slot.

In walks Leo Anderson and his armada of ally's. I should say even with Mitch Brown, I upgraded to Charisma to have an extra slot and I'm only half way through my campaign, but Medical Student is just a must add for Leo's deck. I have had this situation occur in two straight situations:

Have already taken some damage/horror from encounter deck/enemies. Play the Medical Student and heal myself 1/1 as an actionless cost. Play calling in favors to pick up another ally (guard dog or even one time I picked up ANOTHER medical student) and then play that card at reduced cost. Then with Survival Knife armed and ready, I felt comfortable going into fighting a big boss. I used my Cyclopean Hammer for one swing. Then on the enemy phase, I absorb the hit with guard dog/medical student and fight back with my knife. Next turn begins and I still have the Medical Student I picked up from the previous round and play it again as an actionless cost to heal myself. I should note that in order to play calling in favors, i didn't let the medical student absorb any hits, I only sacrificed them the second time around when I played them, but got the bonus healing of 1/1.

What did this all cost? 1 action and 4 resources (to play calling in favors is the action and one extra resource to pay for guard dog) to heal/soak up a total of 6 damage and 4 horror. Not to mention with survival knife and guard dog, you have a solid tempo of attacking/doing damage during your phase and enemy phase. In terms of cost benefit this card is just broken for Leo.

This is the most effective and fun way to heal. I didn't really need Mitch Brown, but Leos special effect is what makes this work so well. I can't imagine a deck of his without this card. I should also mention I try to avoid running the same ally's. So for example I wont run Leo De Luca with Leo even though they are perfect for each other because I just like the variety.

The last thing we need to consider though is a moral or philosophical one that the game developers might not have considered. Should the investigators of Arkham be using Medical Students of Miskatonic University as cannon fodder for the monsters of the world? I'll let the comments decide.

As I understand (corect me if I'm wrong). Case study

Start of investigation phase. Sefina Rousseau plays Black Market. There are Pilfer and Backstab among those cards.

It is the turn of Rita Young. She can play this card and she does! Every time she does it, she hits the target and finds the clue, she even passes by 2 or more every time.

In accordance with the "pass by effect", the played cards return to... Sefina Rousseau's hand in the end of Sefina's turn (which may take place next round if this round Sefina had her turn before Rita)? As I understand, they do.

As per my interpretation of rules, in this case the word "you/your" refers to the one who controls the card. Even though Rita can play it as if it is in her hand, the cards are still considered to be controlled by Sefina.

Alright, here is my ~200 characters review of Charlie Kane.

31/01/23 - Here is the long-time overdue changelog to this review!

• Burden of Leadership has been clarified by the design team.
• New allies/synergies are available.

For the sake of readability, the updates, including the new Scarlet Key cards and the latest taboo, will be written in red.

05/04/2024 - New update with the latest taboo and the FHV cards!

This time around, the updates will be in Green to spot them easily!

T L ; D R :

Go with and for a dedicated clue-getter, and / for a fighter build and and for Flex.

If you want an example of a deck, here is my "Forget the A-Team, here's the S-Team" Deck Guide, with an upgrade path for 0 to 50xp, and all the explanations you need to start playing with Charlie.

Character breakdown:

Let's try to understand better what makes Charlie Kane fundamentally different from any other investigator so far.

Stats:

1 | 1 | 1 | 1

With Preston Fairmont and Calvin Wright, Charlie Kane is part of the selective club of investigators that rely entirely on their Ability and Card Pool to achieve anything.

At this point, we can already guess that cards that "Add" a different stat the test being performed, such as Lockpicks or Spectral Razor, will most likely be weak with Charlie Kane. As this is an important part of the mechanic, a significant fraction of their card pool will be of little use to Charlie Kane.

Ability:

We have 3 additional Ally slots, making it possible to have 4 Allies on the table simultaneously without counting cards, increasing the number of Ally slots.

To compensate for the ugly stat line, we needed a strong ability. This one may not read that strong, but trust me. It is.

It basically reads: Exhaust one or more Allies you control: Add the matching icons to your skill value for this test, +1 for each Ally exhausted.

This Ability also means that you:

1. Need multiple Allies in play since you can only exhaust an Ally once (unless you un-exhaust them, which we will discuss later), which means that you cannot do much before you play your Allies. It is interesting to load your Deck with more than enough or with Ally searching tools like Flare or Calling in Favors.
2. Once you exhaust an Ally for their icons, you will not be able to use the Abilities that require them to exhaust. This concerns most Allies in the game.

Note 1: There is no limit expressed in the Passive Ability of Charlie Kane. You can use this Ability as many times as you want throughout a single skill test.

Note 2: You can exhaust an ally with no matching skills, like David Renfield during an investigation test. This will only give you +1 for your test.

Note 3: If you want to use the Lockpicks and you exhaust Gené Beauregard, you will only gain +2, (+1 for the Ally and +1 for the icon) since it says "that matches this test's type." at the end of the Ability.

Example: If during a basic investigate action, you exhaust 2 Allies with 1 each like Leo De Luca and Art Student, you get +4 (+2 each).

Implications:

• A consequence of this is that you have a limited chance to boost your skills each turn, and therefore Charlie Kane will rely on increasing the impact of his test more than trying to gain actions that would result in more tests.

• You still may choose to increase your number of Ally slots with Charisma or Rod of Animalism since the more Allies you control, the more you can commit to tests.

• Alternatively, you may want to look for Allies with 2 of the same icons or with a even though committing 2 Allies with only 1 icon is more interesting. icons are particularly good since they also help with tests during the mythos phase.

• Allies that bring a static boost on top of an icon of the same skill or increase your base value for a test will be very interesting.

Elder Sign:

Average strength: brings your base stat to 4 on the skill tested, which should very often lead to succeeding, and readies an Ally at your location.

This means that you can either use the Ally you just committed to that test another time or that you can use the Ally's exhaust ability.

Note: It refers to an Ally at your location and therefore can be used on someone else's Ally, which could be interesting if someone else has an Ally with a trigger that can be used outside of their turn, like Beat Cop (2).

Deckbuilding Restrictions:

Since we rely so heavily on Allies, it is evident that we would get good access, but wow, "Allies 0-5" is huge! That means every Ally in the game. Forever. This is already big with the current card pool and will age like wine. But not your supermarket wine. This is already a Saint Emilion Grand Cru and can only improve with time. I'm looking for the time of future releases in years when with every Ally revealed, everyone will be thinking: Is it good in Charlie Kane?

On the side of the Ally access, we can choose 2 classes and have 0-2 access in each of these classes. Of course, 0-3 access like Lola would have been sick since most cards that start to shine in each class are 3+, but that's only fair and already gives a lot of choice.

In my personal opinion, Charlie Kane is the Neutral investigator I had been waiting for. The perfect sandbox that can be built in 100 different ways, all roughly as good as the other. Some fantastic community members around this game will probably find ways to break the game with him, but until now, it also feels like there is no one-way to build him that would make the others look silly. That's a demonstration of mastering the arts of game balancing from the Game Designers!

Signature:

Bonnie Walsh is pure potency. The icons mean that you have a chance, once a turn to be 4 in any skill that you want.

Exhausting her will also ready another Ally, making it possible to exhaust one Ally twice in the same turn or exhaust an Ally and their exhaust ability on the same turn or even use the exhaust ability of an ally twice in a turn.

Example: A full turn with Lola Santiago, Dr. Milan Christopher and Bonnie Walsh on the table could look like this. Your base value is 3, since both Milan and Lola bring a static boost.

1: Exhaust Lola Santiago to investigate with 6 .

2: Exhaust Bonnie Walsh to investigate again with 6 . Ready Lola Santiago.

3: Exhaust Lola Santiago to investigate with 6 . Use Dr. Milan Christopher's tabooed exhaust ability to gain 1 resource.

Note 1: Nothing prevents you from using Bonnie Walsh to ready an Ally you committed to the same test. If you use Charlie's ability to first exhaust Lola Santiago, then his ability a second time to exhaust Bonnie Walsh and choose to ready Lola Santiago, you could then use his ability again on Lola Santiago! You are now testing with no less than 11 !! Add Gregory Gry to the mix and get easy 3 resources.

Note 2: The "(Limit once per round.)" clause prevents you from using cards like Inspiring Presence to be able to use Bonnie Walsh's Ability more than once a turn.

Price-wise and in terms of soak, she's just average; nothing much to say here.

Weakness:

Burden of Leadership ranges from mild to just a dead draw. What's the worst it can do? Exhaust some of your Allies during the Upkeep Phase, making them useless for the next turn. At best? You draw it at the end of your turn when all your Allies are already exhausted and choose to exhaust them.

This has been since then clarified by FFG:
"Though there exists a rule under “Exhausted” stating that an exhausted card cannot be exhausted again until it is ready, this rule doesn’t have much bearing when there is also a rule for “Must” stating that its absence when choosing between multiple options allows the player to choose “an option that does not change the game state.” Thus, the rules of “Must” conflict with the intention of Burden of Leadership. For that reason, Burden of Leadership will be receiving an errata, where “must” will be included in the presented choice: “For each Ally asset you control, you must either exhaust it or deal it 1 direct damage and 1 direct horror.”

TL;DR: The rules as intended of Burden of Leadership have the word must, which in other terms, means that you need to exhaust your allies or decide to give them 1 damage and 1 horror. If your allies are already exhausted, you must give them the damage and the horror.

To decrease the impact of Burden of Leadership on your team, make sure that you draw cards as early as possible during your turn and that you first exhaust your allies that can handle a damage and a horror.

Interesting Allies:

Now that we know how Charlie Kane works, let's look at what cards he can use.

For the rest of the Review, I will write the Ally name in bold to indicate the best Allies for Charlie Kane.

Allies that give 2 of the same icon:

To have good chances to pass skill tests, it can be a winning strategy to look for Allies that can give you 2 of the same icons, which provides you with a base of 4 of that skill during the test when you exhaust them.

• 3xp:
  Lola Santiago
  Dayana Esperence
  Grete Wagner
  Nkosi Mabati
  Professor William Webb

• 4xp:
  Nephthys
  Girish Kadakia

• 5xp:
  The Black Cat
  Michael Leigh
  Chuck Fergus

Of all of these, only The Black Cat does not exhaust for any of its abilities, and Michael Leigh does not exhaust to collect evidence while investigating.

Allies with interesting abilities:

Another category of interesting Allies to Charlie Kane is those with exciting abilities. It's impossible to name them all, but I will name some that I've heard being named regularly or that I could see being used:

The Allies that only bring you something only once (either when played or when leaving play):

These are interesting since you can pack many of them in your Deck, increasing the set-up pace since Charlie Kane is useless before he has 2-3 Allies on the board.

• The Red-Gloved Man that boosts 2 of your stats to 6 while giving you a icon to commit for a +2 at any test using your Ability.

• Jeremiah Kirby of course, if you manage to get around 20 cards of either odd or even in your Deck.

• Mysterious Raven that is a cheap 1 icon and can be discarded for an auto-clue before you replace it.

• Art Student that gives you a clue when played and an icon to use during a skill test without sacrificing any exhaust ability.

• Laboratory Assistant for an ok draw and an icon to use with your ability on a test without any downside.

• Medical Student can be nice to heal one of your Allies (Bonnie Walsh if possible) after you had the Burden of Leadership. It also gives you a welcome defensive icon.

• Stray Cat can be good as it is improbable that you give any evade abilities to Charlie Kane.

• Brother Xavier that is more a one-off ability, and also helps you both with a static +1 and a similar icon. He could fit as an early upgrade in a oriented build even though his price is hard to justify.

• Tetsuo Mori that helps you investigating with an icon, and helps you finding your Items when leaving the game.

• Priest of Two Faiths for a blurse build, that offers the best soak/resource ratio, but coming with a disappointing icon.

• Anna Kaslow if you try to boost your stats with Tarot cards, that comes with a icon.

The Allies that do not exhaust to give you something:

• Miss Doyle gives you a icon to use at any time, along with 3 little kitties that do not have health/sanity and therefore are not affected by Burden of Leadership since you can still choose to deal them 1 Damage/Horror. Zeal, Hope, and Augur do not take the Ally slot yet have the Ally trait, so you can still use them for your Ability. It's a one-slot two Allies pack. There are 3 main uses for the cat crew. 1) Use Augur's ability to boost your to 5 during one of your investigation. 2) Use Augur's and Miss Doyle's icons during a treachery test to get to 5 . 3) Use Hope as a defensive card in case you draw an enemy during the upkeep phase. I think our Politician will be a cat lover.

• Speaking of furry balls, the Black Cat decreases the threat of Symbol tokens and helps you take advantage of the if you draw it when there is no Ally to ready. Also, it doesn't have any reason to exhaust, so it can be fully dedicated to your Ability. It is also a great soak to compensate for your 6 Health, 6 Sanity.

• Gregory Gry can be really interesting here. He exhausts for an icon and you do not need to exhaust him to bet the 3 resources. So if you exhaust him, Lola Santiago and Bonnie Walsh to the same test, you are investigating at 10 which should be enough to collect the 3 resources out of him reliably. Another trick to secure the +3 resources is to use the auto-succeed feature of Miss Doyle's cats.

• Leo De Luca, our good ol' friend. The lion gives 1 additional action without exhausting and a nice icon! This one never stops being a good boy.

• The traditional power couple Jessica Hyde and Peter Sylvestre (2) do not exhaust to soak. They offer a lot of Static boosts (unfortunately no though) and / icons.

• Guard Dog does not require exhaust and can help fight. He could see play in a Fighter/Flex build using the Rod of Animalism to increase the Allies to use with Charlie Kane's Ability.

• Tristan Botley gives you +1 to two of your skills without exhausting and gives a icon. That could be good if you're going for a statball build or down the road.

• Familiar Spirit gives you an additional Arcane Slot while allowing you to use it for a test. The only reason to slot this little creature is if you go full in your build.

• Dr. Elli Horowitz that could hold a Relic while giving you a icon to use. Could see play in builds.

• Dario El-Amin for big money builds, also has 1 icon. I doubt that he'll see much play here. Maybe alongside Gregory Gry?

• Joey "The Rat" Vigil (0) and (3) does not require exhaust for its shenanigans, while allowing you to use both an and an icon. I also doubt he'll see play here.

• Gabriel Carillo gives a static boost and does not exhaust to give a card, so his icon can be used with Charlie Kane's ability. If Kōhaku and Bonnie allow it, we may have a love affair going on here.

Allies not mentioned above that are just good for Charlie Kane:

• David Renfield is perfect with Charlie. You can use his ability since you most likely do not care for the icon. The best is when you use Bonnie Walsh to ready him and use it a second time to collect resources during the same turn. That can bring ridiculous amounts. To get rid of him, you can use Calling in Favors, replace him with one of your many Allies, provoke an attack of opportunity or even choose not to boost yourself during an Encounter Test since your stats are all 1s.

  • Now that we have had the latest taboo, David Renfield has been a victim of Amina Zidane, and the 4xp are absolutely redhibitory...
  • With the latest taboo, as of April 2024, our friend Eschatologist is back! Just remember that you can't get more than 3 resources each time you use his ability, but if you manage to ready him with Bonnie Walsh, then he's good to go for another 3 resources.

• Dr. Milan Christopher for the Static boost, the icon and the reward if you didn't need to exhaust him earlier.

• Lola Santiago will be a staple for the Cluever Decks. Her 2 icons and Static boost are the best to him right now. There are multiple ways of abusing her ability by reducing the shroud of the location and using her ability during the skill test. Flashlight, Old Keyring, Lantern, Cryptographic Cipher and The Skeleton Key are some of the available options available to Charlie Kane. The BETA version of Alice Luxley (2) also offers a shroud reduction until the end of the turn.

• Grete Wagner (3) for her static boosts and the flexibility of the icons. She is a tremendous help both with fighting and investigating; her ability is more of a side effect.

• Summoned Hound is one of the obvious choices. You can play it ignoring the Unbound Beast by using A Chance Encounter (2) though it makes the combo heavier in XP and Deck space. It gives you an extra fight/investigate each turn with a base of 5, which is good. Also using Bonnie Walsh's ability to ready it gives you a 2nd action.

• Trigger Man works fantastically with a fighty Charlie Kane. Attach a weapon with no ammo to him like a Switchblade (3) (allowed in Charlie Kane because of how the Taboo list - Chained/Unchained works) and enjoy the ride! This could also work with the Lockpicks but to a lesser extent. Another good option for a weapon is the Mauser C96 (2) with its many ammo.

  • Ready him with Bonnie Walsh to have 2 attacks per turn, with a base skill value of 4! You need to sustain this expense with for instance, a Lone Wolf.

  • Don't forget that you need to have both the Trigger Man and the weapon you want to attach to it in your hand simultaneously for you to attach it to him. There are many ways to help putting the Trigger Man into play, but you need your weapon in your hand. Backpack or Black Market won't help in that case.

Recommended Allies for a cluever role:

Here are Allies that I would recommend starting your Deck with if you are trying to throw your first Clue-getter Deck together.

0xp Allies:

• Dr. Milan Christopher for the static boost, the icon and the bonus resource if you didn't exhaust him.

• Gregory Gry for the icon and the money that he can bring on turns when you only need to investigate once, giving you the tools to pay for better allies to replace him with.

• Jeremiah Kirby, Leo De Luca, Art Student and Laboratory Assistant for the icon with no reason to exhaust them.

1-5 Allies:

• Miss Doyle for Augur and the icon.

• Lola Santiago for the 2 icons and the static boost, probably one of the first purchases with XP. Either use her icons for a high score or if you have money, simply buy the clue during an investigation with the Flashlight.

• Gabriel Carillo is extremely good but comes with a hidden tax of 2xp most likely, for a Blasphemous Covenant, though since Charlie can so easily overshoot a skill value, he most likely won't mind the so much.

• Granny Orne (3) brings both an and a static boost, with a built-in mini Lucky!.

• The newly revealed Field Agent offers a test-less clue and an icon. When you are ready to replace her, you can also finish her with a last clue before playing a new Ally.

Recommended Allies for a fighter role:

0xp Allies:

• Beat Cop is a neat level 0 Ally since it gives a passive +1 and doesn't provide anything that would exhaust them, so you can use it for your ability.

• Grete Wagner is a bit like the Beat Cop except that her Ability can be helpful for just 1 more resource.

• Lonnie Ritter gives you a static and a icon when you do not need her passive for healing purposes. Recommendations on what to bring with her further down the Review.

• Guard Dog for the icon and the defensive damage that doesn't require exhaustion.

• A pack of Sled Dogs, since you don't need to spend any XP to play them all. As a side note, Charlie Kane could actually run the 16-Sled Dog dream with 2 Charisma and Rod of Animalism and a team full of Teamworkers.

1-5xp Allies:

• Upgrading to Beat Cop (2) is logic to access the test less damage. Add Bandages, Trusted and Inspiring Presence to your Deck and you have a reliable damage engine.

• Grete Wagner (3) with her static and her 2 icons available is fantastic. Plus her exhaust ability is not always needed, making her an ideal target for your ability, that Bonnie Walsh can ready if need be to collect the clue.

• Nephthys brings some solid icons, and justifies by herself a combat build.

• Aquinnah (3) could see play in a fighter build. I doubt that anyone would build this, but you never know!

• The Jessica Hyde/Peter Sylvestre (2) that gives you nearly unlimited soak, Jessica's static an a similar icon for the passive ability, and Peter Sylvestre's defensive stats.

• Trigger Man with a weapon attached boosts your base skill value and gives you a action. He is a bit of a struggle to set up but worth it.

  • Note that he is not unique, so you can have 2 in play at the same time!

Recommended Allies for a flex role:

0xp Allies:

• Madame Labranche for dark horse builds.

• Grete Wagner offers a static but more importantly both a and an icon for your ability.

1-5xp Allies:

• Miss Doyle for the flexibility that it offers.

• Summoned Hound for the free action that can be used to fight or investigate with a base 5.

• Michael Leigh boosts both and and rewards you for doing both.

• The Red-Gloved Man for the +5 to 2 of your stats during one turn and the icon. Pack 2 Daredevil as the only skill in your Deck to unlock the fast Deck cycling to see The Man more often.

• Girish Kadakia gives a +2 and a icon, as long as you can provide a steady flow of damage/horror to him, with a Meat Cleaver or Spirit of Humanity for instance.

• Jacob Morrison has the particularity of readying by himself if you draw a token, and brings a to the table. I guess it's hard to generate enough to make him reliable, but it's also good to know that he's the only card that Tommy Muldoon cannot access in a solid build. Bring 2 Favor of the Sun to ready him at will.

• Alongside Jacob, Tristan Botley can find a spot, bringing +1 to 2 stats that you choose based on your needs, while also coming with a icon.

• Anna Kaslow to use, for example, Ace of Swords and Death • XIII (they are not unique so that you can have 2 copies of one of them online at the same time).

• Abigail Foreman would hold an Encyclopedia could also be a lead to explore. Maybe with Leo De Luca to compensate the needed?

Interesting 0-2 cards from each faction:

Let's now explore cool potential cards and synergies for Charlie Kane in each class. This is a non-exhaustive list, and if you have any other ideas, feel free to let me know in the comments!

Cards :

Overall good Cards:

• Motivational Speech was tailored for Charlie Kane to the extent that he appears on it. This card single handedly makes a significant better choice for him as when I initially wrote this review.

• Well Prepared was one of my first thought when seeing Charlie Kane. Get another boost based on the icons of your Assets (including your Allies). This helps boost one test much higher or pass more tests during the same turn, especially before Bonnie Walsh shows up.

• Ever Vigilant is probably going to see play in a lot of Charlie Kane Decks since he is rather Asset heavy, and Allies tend to be an expensive type of allies. Also, he does not only need it during turn 1 since he will most likely replace a certain number of Allies throughout a scenario.

• Glory if you decide to kill enemies.

• Vicious Blow as usual

Cards for specific builds:

• Cards that heal give you more uses of your Allies that require damages like Grete Wagner, Beat Cop (2), Guard Dog, the new Field Agent, Aquinnah (3). These cards are Emergency Aid, Kerosene, Inspiring Presence, Trusted (not really, but almost the same), Soothing Melody (bonded to Hallowed Mirror) and Medical Student.

• Rite of Sanctification, .35 Winchester and Radiant Smite if you go with Nephthys down the road.

• Testless cards to overcome the 1-1-1-1 statline, such as Evidence!, Scene of the Crime, Mano a Mano (1) & (2), Lesson Learned or why not Dynamite Blast.

Cards

Overall good Cards:

• Dr. Milan Christopher of course, as usual, even with the taboo. His Static +1 is just too good. Either get a resource or use his icon to investigate.

• Jeremiah Kirby as a one-off draw, static boost and that you can use without sacrificing anything else.

• Art Student/Laboratory Assistant are a good examples of simple cards that bring a bonus when played and then can be exhausted each turn to help with , and later replaced by a stronger Ally.

• Burning the Midnight Oil and Crack the Case as good economy cards that are fast. Good to pay for clues with Lola Santiago.

• Deep Knowledge or the newly revealed Captivating Discovery for card draw.

• Inquiring Mind is always good when you have low stats and plan on investigating. Especially as it also covers defensive stats like or .

• Magnifying Glass, Pathfinder, Shortcut, Eureka! and Deduction as usual. Deduction is excellent here since you are trying to pass little tests since you only have a few chances to boost them. Increasing their impact is the way to compensate and gain tempo over the Mythos.

• Pendant of the Queen of course, doing things without a test is always good with Charlie Kane. If you are going there, you can think of adding Whitton Greene/Whitton Greene (2) to your Deck, and Astounding Revelation.

More situational cards:

• Encyclopedia can be good to overcome the 1 at every stat, though it's a bit slow when you're not Daisy Walker. Add Abigail Foreman, and you can get a case for it.

• Fieldwork is not necessarily the best when you do not need to move like Ursula Downs or Monterey Jack, but it can still help every time you move to a new location.

• Shrewd Analysis if you are going with Synergy cards since it doesn't have any downside.

• Mind over Matter for scenario tests like Locked Door.

• Occult Invocation for fighting with the 2nd copy of your Allies.

• Working a Hunch is an excellent way to get a clue without taking a test.

Cards

Overall good Cards:

• Lola Santiago for the reasons explained earlier.

• Lonnie Ritter gives both a static and a icon for Charlie's ability. You can pair her with Leather Coat if you run a Dark Horse or Scavenging Deck, Leather Jacket if you run a big money Deck, or Heavy Furs if you play with Spells like Shrivelling and Rite of Seeking, or if you want to use the Baseball Bat. The newly revealed Improvised Shield could also be healed by Lonnie Ritter though we do not have enough info yet to know how it can be any useful.

• Gregory Gry as explained extensively earlier.

• Faustian Bargain is the best resource-maker if you choose

• Lucky Cigarette Case is a classic staple, doubling your drawing rate if you succeed by 2 or more at least once a turn, which should happen regularly in this Deck.

• Quick Thinking, "Watch this!" are always good for tempo and resources.

• Eye of the Djinn is perfect here, especially in a heavy generating Deck since it can bring your base stat to 5 multiple times per turn!

• Leo De Luca since he doesn't exhaust to provide the extra action. The price is rough, so maybe take Flare with him.

• Switchblade (2) is one of my favourite weapons if you can reliably boost your . Even if you use the Taboo, they cost 3xp but are still considered level 2, so accessible by Charlie Kane. After all, what's more like politicians than stabbing one another in the back?

• The Skeleton Key is one of the best ways to bring down the shroud to an accessible level. It is action-heavy, though. I would only consider this with Leo De Luca, Lola Santiago, Eon Chart (1) and Scavenging (2).

• Black Market is one of the best draw engines today while it ignores your weakness, which is quite wicked!

• "You owe me one!" is good to compensate for your base of 1 in defensive stats.

• Hit and Run is also very interesting in many Charlie Kane decks, just because of the large number of allies. It becomes better with the allies mentioned earlier that give you something when you play them.

More situational Cards:

• Geas are good in this type of Deck if it is built around them, by including 0 skill cards, for example (which is also favourable for Jeremiah Kirby).

• Crystalliser of Dreams can be good like in any other Deck, but I don't see it shining here.

• Lone Wolf is an easy way to increase your income.

• Well Connected and Well Connected (3) can be reliable ways to increase your stats if you go big money. High Roller works well in the same type of Deck.

• Sneak Attack, Decoy, Intel Report, Small Favor and Counterespionage are good ways to leverage the money for testless actions, though Charlie Kane is probably not going to be nearly as good as Preston at doing this.

• Three Aces if you have enough draw to be sure to see the 3 of them. An automatic success is nothing to sneeze at when your highest base stat is 1.

• Chuck Fergus can be good with his icons if you go full Tactic/Trick. But probably not his best home either.

• The Red Clock is not necessarily that optimised here, but still lovely for the +3 at a test when it has only 1 charge, the rest being the icing on the cake.

• Priest of Two Faiths as a cheap soak and generator.

• Easy Mark is always good to thin a Deck.

Cards

Mystic seems to be the least considered class for Charlie Kane. The reason is most likely the lack of 2 that can also have a good use or the fact that it's hard to match the power of a pure mystic.

• David Renfield and Summoned Hound as explained earlier.

• Living Ink could be a good option to bring static boosts to Charlie Kane.

• Summoned Servitor is also interesting with the additional action with a base skill of 4. It is not an Ally though, so you are limited to 4 boxes.

• Ghastly Possession could be interesting in Charlie to refill half of any given asset.

• Your suite of spells like Clairvoyance, Shrivelling, Sixth Sense, Rite of Seeking. Rite of Seeking is actually the only upgrade of the basic suite that he can take, providing a built-in +2 .

• Ward of Protection/Deny Existence, no need to explain.

• Holy Rosary for the boost and to absorb the horror from the Spells mentioned above.

• Uncage the Soul if you go this way.

• Arcane Initiate for the tutoring and the icon.

• Familiar Spirit, as mentioned earlier, is good because it gives an extra slot and doesn't exhaust, so it is easy to use.

• Enraptured can be good to add charges on your Clairvoyance. Use it on investigate actions with Summoned Hound or Augur.

• Scrying Mirror is interesting to decide which Ally to exhaust according to the Chaos Token you revealed.

• Promise of Power and Prophesy for the big amount of that they provide fit especially well in Charlie Kane's Decks.

• Recall the Future is an easy way to prevent yourself from failing while pulling the token with the worst modifier (let's admit it, it's much less stressful to draw a Chaos Token when there is only the that can make you fail, and not a rogue -5).

• Ikiaq could see uses in some enemy-management builds since you can use them to store the weaknesses of you and your party, without impacting your and . Doing so will prevent you from passing any and tests, which can be challenging for your survival.

Cards

Overall good Cards:

• Flare seems to be a must-have for Charlie Kane. Pay only 2 for your expensive Allies and search for them in your Deck! Good to know that Flare doesn't exile if it doesn't find any Ally while searching.

• Unrelenting as a good draw accelerator or a way to exclude the nastiest tokens from the bag.

• Dark Horse with Madame Labranche, Mariner's Compass and Fire Axe can be terrific!

• Rise to the Occasion will see a lot of play here since it gives +3 to any test that is 3 or more which happens frequently.

• Take Heart is easy money and cards since you can fail a test at more or less any time, and it will happen during an encounter test whether you want it or not.

• Pocket Multi Tool could be interesting for its versatility.

• Grizzled could be interesting with both traits Monster and Humanoid to cover most enemies in the game.

• Bandages to heal your Allies.

• "Look what I found!" and upgrades to empty low-shroud locations. Sames goes with Old Keyring.

• Jury-Rig to use on 1 test to get +6 or multiple tests to get 3 Unexpected Courage. Helpful when your stat line is so poor.

• Grit Your Teeth, Fight or Flight and Trial by Fire are good ways to boost your skills for 1 turn.

• Lucky!, Granny Orne (3), Live and Learn and all the suite of anti-fail cards. Live and Learn offers the advantage that you can commit Take Heart, then try the test again with +2 and exhaust an Ally. Other than for that use, Lucky! is better since you exhausted Allies for that test, and you'd rather succeed that test than take another one.

More situational Cards:

• A Chance Encounter (0) if you plan on using some "when played" Allies like Jeremiah Kirby.

• A Chance Encounter (2) can also be used to play Summoned Hound from your discard pile without having to deal with the Unbound Beast. It is also great if you are using Short Supply.

• Signum Crucis is really good here for a Deck. Get advantage of it with Practice Makes Perfect and Resourceful. With Keep Faith, Jacob Morrison and Ancient Covenant, it is the pack. Maybe add Spirit of Humanity if you have Peter Sylvestre and Jessica Hyde for a shower of tokens.

• Unexpected Courage (2) could be decent here, even though I personally don't really like it since I try to pass every test that I start, and if I succeed, it's just a 2xp Unexpected Courage.

• Resourceful is also always good to increase the use of one of your best cards.

• Newspaper (2) offers a good boost when you do not have a clue. I am a big fan of this card, and it surely has a place here.

• There is definitely space for a sick Scavenging (2) build, recycling Old Keyring and Flashlight to reduce the cost of buying clues with Lola Santiago, and Schoffner's Catalogue to pay for the items.

• In the vein of the previous point, we can think of Short Supply to speed up the set-up pace. A Chance Encounter (2) can bring back Allies, including Bonnie Walsh from the discard pile. Resourceful finds back Miss Doyle, A Chance Encounter (2) and Scavenging (2) that itself gets you back Old Keyring, Flashlight and Schoffner's Catalogue. It is a bit of a risky approach and is really challenging at 0xp, but it can be really worth it! It also decreases the number of cards in which Flare and Calling in Favors have to dig, increasing your chances of finding.

Neutral and Multi-Class Cards:

• Calling in Favors. This feels like a second signature card. Charlie Kane has a 28 card Deck since 2 of them are Calling in Favors. Good targets for Calling in Favors are any single-use Allies like Jeremiah Kirby, Art Student, or David Renfield when he has too many Doom on him, or even Miss Doyle if you are not happy with the cat that you pulled (meaning if the random process didn't give you Augur).

• Rod of Animalism can find a nice spot in Charlie Kane. Don't you already have 4 Ally slots, you'd ask? Well, having 2 more slots is neat because it allows you to exhaust multiple Allies on the same test. Sled Dog, Miss Doyle, Guard Dog, Familiar Spirit, Stray Cat and Mysterious Raven are all Creatures. This is the cheapest way to increase your Ally slots though it is not permanent.

• Charisma of course, since it displays Charlie Kane. The more Allies you get, the more you can boost your Skills.

• Protecting the Anirniq is excellent since you have a lot of Allies. It is as many reasons to lose a few, throughout a scenario, especially with Burden of Leadership.

• The Red-Gloved Man looks like the best way to spend your extra experience when you are done with your priority upgrades.

• Divination and Brand of Cthugha are quite good because you can use or the normal skill for the test, so you can exhaust a wider range of Allies, let's say David Renfield first and Beat Cop for the second fight action with Brand of Cthugha.

• Taboo Scroll of Secrets is worth considering for Synergy purposes and is a 1 cost, 1 action, draw 3. You can also discard a weakness if you find one at the bottom of your Deck. It's rare but joyful when it happens.

• Flashlight is always excellent, perfect here since Lola Santiago likes the decreased shroud. You can use Emergency Cache (3) to add Supplies to your Flashlight, turning every supply into 2 resources saved when using Lola Santiago, so effectively making Emergency Cache (3) saving 8 resources!

• Sled Dog can benefit from the extra Ally slots. And as 2 of them use 1 Ally slot, it makes +4 with a single Ally slot.

• Favor of the Sun is important in any Deck, so why not.

• Moon Pendant allow you to 2 Tarot cards for each of your primary skills. It requires a lot of Deck space, though.

• The Fool • 0 (0) is fine since you play a lot of expensive Assets. It is relatively slow, and you'd need to play 6 cards to break even with Emergency Cache (0). It could work, but it is hard to slot in.

• Hyperphysical Shotcaster could be a decent option because of its versatility.

Build ideas:

I will leave some space for your imagination, but I think it's always nice to have some inspiration for where to start with your Deck.

Cluever Deck:

For a Cluever Deck, I would recommend and . Both card pools have amazing cards that both help with getting more clues and compensate the 1-1-1-1 stat line.

• A Dark Horse Deck, which I personally used did fantastic, with only 9xp. Upgrade to Emergency Cache (3), Deduction (2), Perception (2), Flare instead of Calling in Favors and you have a solid off-the-shelf Deck to start playing with Charlie Kane.

• A Deck using Summoned Hound including some resource generation and scavenging of Old Keyring and Flashlight to take the best out of Lola Santiago's Ability.

Fighter Deck:

For a Fighter Deck, I would opt for and since these are the 2 most fighty card pools, or and for the same reason as above, is great at leveraging low skill values and includes a high amount of great level 0-2 cards.

• Here is an example of a Deck that uses the Eye of the Djinn to bring you base value to 5 at least once a turn, with a clear target of at least twice or 3 times if needed.

Flex Deck:

and is an obvious choice for this category. could also work but it's hard to compete with dedicated Mystics. is also terrific as a flex faction.

• A Joe Diamond kind of Deck with a weapon in one hand, Magnifying Glass in the other, Grete Wagner (3), Michael Leigh and Well Prepared. Here is what it could look like.

• Use his capacity to bring Allies of any colour to build a synergy deck. For the classes, I would probably choose and to access Gang Up and Cheat the System, or for Close the Circle.

• Here is a more flex Deck using and .

Conclusion:

You will have fun, Charlie Kane feels good to play, not too hard once you get the trick, yet still engaging.

But you are going to LOVE Charlie Kane if you are into Deck building. He is unlimited fun, bringing tons of combinations, and the length of this Review says enough.

"At any time, an investigator at your location may reveal to you the Item assets in their hand." This is not just the first step to use the 2nd paragraph's ability, but a flavorful play with the "Table Talk" guideline stated in the Revised Core Set booklet that the hand (and the deck) is hidden information. And I recommended trying this out to get the most fun out of this character. I opt-in to "Table Talk" for the first time recently and it makes the game really interesting. (e.g. Cannot say "Perception" or an amount of icons you can contribute. You have to believe in friendship and go for it if someone says "I can help!".)

It means player cannot just outright say, "I just draw .45 Automatic, let's group up and you play it for me." while being remote. You may hint that you needs Bob's help to buy an item, before finally revealing it once you grouped up.

Cards on hand are not necessarily telling the story that the investigator suddenly found a gun, it maybe that he brought a gun all along but need "resources" to use it, which is an abstract value, in this case it might take some time putting bullets into it, or finding it from deep in the bag, or gathering courage to use it. But when playing with Bob, the story changed to that when you reveal your .45 Automatic from hand, you are asking Bob to order this specific gun (maybe you forgot bringing it) and then pay for it together. This is a win for flavor for your table.

Bob's resource count is an open information, so you may hint that Bob has enough or not enough resources to pay, without saying "4" cost of .45 Automatic before you group up. (However with more talks/probing, it maybe easy to deduce the cost of the hidden information card.) This affects Bob's decision if Bob also need to use resources for his own and adds to the fun of declining or accepting the group up.

On the other hand, Bob with Shrewd Dealings make this more complex to ask for stuff that might be useful for him from all players. e.g. Even if Bob knows someone put Painkillers in the deck and wants it, since deck is also a hidden information, Bob cannot ask for a specific card. No one can answer that they have Painkillers on hand without breaking the character, either.

Instead, the other players need to give a hint to Bob once they see Shrewd Dealings in play (now an open information), and Bob needs to give a hint that he is in trouble. Even when Bob is not in trouble, Bob don't know what could make him even better with cards of other player's hand. So the table needs to speak up (intentionally vaguely). The secret to success as a salesman is persistence, after all!

The game’s areas of hidden information (the cards in a player’s hand and deck) exist to maintain the feeling that each investigator is a unique individual in the game world, and makes their decisions without complete and perfect knowledge of what everyone else knows or is thinking. A good means of maintaining this illusion is to not name, read off, or allude to individual cards that are hidden information (i.e., in a player’s hand or deck)

For example: Wendy wants her partner, Roland, to take an investigate action, and she desires to communicate that she can help. Instead of saying something like, “Take an investigate action; I can commit Perception” or, “Investigate our location; I can contribute two icons,” Wendy stays in character by saying, “You should investigate. I can help!”

I recently wrote a review of the butterfly knifes, and I mentioned this weapon, I really liked using this spear with sister Mary and Tommy, but I wrote in that review that you could make a blessish build with lily, but then I thought can you really build for bless with cards she takes?

Let's talk about the cards she can take.

Tempt Fate - this is an excellent card that not only helps fill the bag up with bless tokens, but it is also an automatic cantrip. The down side is that is also fills the bag with curse tokens as well. This card really shines in paradox build where using both benefits you. But with lily, it really doesn't benefit her at all.

Guardian cards-.there is not many options that she has, but their is a few.

1 - Book of Psalms- this is actually a really good bless generator, especially in horror heavy campaigns like tcu and ptc. But in this case, unless you have bandolier, it gets in the way of using the spear.

2- Blessed Blade, this is definitely not a weapon I recommend, but if you are stuffing the bag with tokens, you have a good chance of doing the +1 damage. It does only put 1 token in the bag per round. It still interferes with the spear.

3-Hand of Fate.- expensive in terms of resources, but a bless version of dodge, depending on the attack, it will yield 1-4 bless tokens. There can be times where this is more, but you usually want to use this when the bless payback is good. Which also decreases it's value somewhat, compared to dodge.

4- Holy Rosary(2) starting the lvl cards that generates bless token, this card is pretty good in terms of providing not only soak and a bonus Stat, but a somewhat reliable means to add tokens. The drawback is that it's not any will test, but only treachery cards. You can do this with any will treachery(weather it being you or your friends.)

5- Righteous Hunt(1). This so a good zone clearer. And depending on the horror it does, can provide a decent 1-2 blesses, you can easily fit this into a deck.

These are all the guardian cards I can see that generates bless, the rest of the bless token cards they have requires the token be already in the bag to actually do anything. So unless you Sister Mary, you don't have a reliable means of adding bundles of tokens to the bag. She also has lvl 0 mystic access, and there seems to be 2 cards that add bless tokens, but she may only use 1 of them(Tides of Fate). As Rite of Equilibrium is a lvl 5.  Tides of Fate is very tricky to use, especially if you don't have ways of putting curse in the bag.

So, with the cards she can take, she is very hard pressed to fill the bag with bless tokens. BUT... thank God this is a co op game, where you can play with more investigators. I built a preston deck along side her that try to lean a little on getting clues, and adding some bless generation. There is no better feeling then playing Keep Faith(0) twice with Double,double(4) "8 bless tokens at once?! Yes please!!!"

So, if you have the means of generating bless, the spear will carry you. But I would not just take the spear as the only card that uses blesses, cards like Hallow(3) or Ward of Radiance(0) are stand out cards that provide decent support. But having cards like this as well as the spear makes taking bless tokens alot more worth the trouble putting them in,another example is in this preston deck, he utilize Ancient Covenant (2) so he can skate pass some test.

So the long and short of it is, this is a good meh weapon when you only meet the requirements and only use the bless tokens with the spear, but this weapon becomes extraordinary with additional bless tech. While lily doesn't build bless well by herself, with team work, she can be just as good!