On my private list of "Horrible things that Cthulhu did to mankind" there's Black Plague in the number one spot, but then there's this card in close second place.

Encounter cards are like Twinkies: sure it might be thrilling to have one once in a while, but eat too many at once and boy, you know you're in trouble. Having to draw one encounter card per round is the norm. If you are a mystic at heart you have cards like Drawn to the Flame that gives you 2 clues for your trouble, or Delve Too Deep to gain that precious XP. Basic Weaknesses obviously lie in different category than regular player cards, but I want to sketch out the idea of how much enounter cards are worth in terms of gain, so that, by analogy, we can try to understand how much you lose if you draw a bunch of them - which will happen at some point, if you find yourself mildly Overzealous.

All Basic Weaknesses (excluding obvious Indebted) deny you draw of one card and additionally put on you some kind of penalty: some of these penalties are immediate (like Amnesia) other give you time to deal with them, before they start to become the problem (for example Psychosis or Chronophobia). (Additionally, that shows the standard of how much inconvinience average Basic Weakess should provide: aproximately loss of two actions - assuming you don't want to suffer consequences.) Obviously the immediate ones tend to be worse, mainly because you have no control over them, they don't offer you any substantial choices. Overzealous, sadly, belongs to the first group, but the worst part is yet to come.

Now, let's see what happens, when you draw Overzealous during your upkeep:

• denied card draw;
• you draw at least two encounter cards, PLUS one more in mythos phase: effectively, you draw at least 3 encounter cards before you can do anything again;
• your prognosis of the start of your next action phase might be extremely different.

One might say: "Bah, of course it's gonna be different! Tis the Arkham, you fool!" - and on that note I agree, but it's all about the scope. You expect to get hit by something, or to be engaged with one enemy at the start of your next turn... But what about having three enemies on you, or having just one, but being severely damaged due to failed skill checks? Or pulling a bunch of Acolytes and learing that whoops! - agenda is going to advance two rounds earlier...? That's a different beast entirely. Additionally, this card, unlike other Basic Weaknesses, scales with the scenario you're playing, meaning that the harder the scenario is (or the later in the campaign you are), the worse Overzealous gets. Drawing this one card, like no other Basic Weakness, might be the end of the road for you, just by the fact of how little control you have over it and how far it can set you back, compared to other Basic Weaknesses.

Are there any good news? There are! In multiplayer it's much easier to deal with the encounter cards with staying effects (mainly enemies), as your friends can always help and taunt them off you. Another good news is that if the first encounter card drawn from the revelation effect already has surge, that card cannot gain additional surge! Hooray...? Bad news is that if the second card drawn from the surge of first card, has surge, you will chain even more encounter cards. So there's that.

This encounter card is probably the worst weakness for true solo decks, as it will thoroughly test your luck stat - which sadly, you can't boost. However, even in group play there will be times, when you'll draw perfect storm from the encouter deck, and in your powerlessness, you will weep: "Cthulhu, deliver us!" But in return, thou shall only hear chaos tokens, shuffling in the bag of tentacle wonder. And you will repent for not believing this review.

This is a really powerful card. Compared to Preposterous Sketches,its 4xp more. So you can easily consider these two cards are upgraded version to another. For 4xps you get: Fast Two cost lower No need to be in a place with clues Can be another one

How can you complain this card? For 4xps, it’s a fair trade.

Especially in Minh Thi Phan,you can effectively draw more icons to help others.

This guy is weird. He costs too much money to effectively generate the money and bonuses that he might seem like he is supposed to be granting. There are too many disadvantages. The highly competitive slot, the high cost, the high bonus threshhold.

But then when you add in a powerful resource generation framework for him to inhabit, some Hot Streaks, a few Burglaryes, a little Lone Wolfing, Jenny Barnes's natural ability, Dario will take off and fly you to the finish line like a magic carpet ride.

That really is the gist of it. If you can generate the kind of $$$ that Dario needs, he's really really good, but getting there takes a lot of cards and quite a bit of time, you better have some powerful resource dumps ready for the late game to make all this setup worth it.

Baffled and disappointed when you saw this card?

Lets put things in perspective:

-This card is an arcane item, it no longer occupies the hand slot.

-This card lets you investigate without provoking attacks of opportunity.

-If you succeed on your investigation check while using this item, an enemy is automatically evaded.

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It is really easy to misunderstand the purpose of this card:

-This is not the card that lets you evade with your .

-This is the card that lets you totally ignore an enemy at your location while you investigate.

The scenario you need this card for: You're the clue-hoover, you pick up nearly every clue on the map while somebody else clears the way. An enemy spawns on you, it's some small fry with a half decent fight value and 2-3 hitpoints. What now? The fighter has to come running and deal with it right? Not with this card in play! You can just keep investigating, totally ignoring the threat, and if you happen to succeed in acquiring the clues you're there for (which is highly likely) you'll have evaded the enemy as well! Now if the location hasn't been cleared yet you can keep doing this for a couple more rounds if you need to.

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By far the most powerful part is the fact that this card lets you investigate opportunity attack-free. If you find yourself hard pressed by a monster (multiple monsters even) at a difficult and important location (Difficulty 4 or 5), you can use this card to get the breathing room you need to throw multiple attempts at the clues you need to close out the game.

An enormously strong card that encourages Seekers to build around it in multiplayer games. By itself, it will probably only net you one, maybe two extra clues at best, and that is assuming the chaos bag doesn't entirely hose you.

Enter Higher Education.

Every resources invested in Higher Education while using Guiding Stones essentially picks you up an extra clue (assuming you don't auto-fail) which is immensely strong in multiplayer. Rex especially, who has access to Burglary, can generate up to 4 resources and 1 clue with a single action (Burglary + Dr. Milan Christopher) and then follow it up by picking up 4 to 8 clues with Guiding Stones depending on shroud and chaos token drawn. Other Seekers can't generate resources quite as quickly as Rex can, but anyone with access to Dr. Milan should be able to have powerful turns with Guiding Stones.

Minh Thi Phan is runner up for using Guiding Stones well, as she gains +4 Intellect from Inquiring Mind and potentially +5 from Desperate Search. Playing at 3 or less Sanity is pretty dangerous, but a little more manageable for Seekers now that they have access to Logical Reasoning. And a Minh deck filled with skill cards will probably have more free resources to spend on Higher Education than a Daisy deck will.

Just don't bother playing it in solo games, as locations simply won't have enough clues at them to take advantage of the power of Guiding Stones.