Purifying Corruption

Reviews

Contrary to the other reviews here, I do think this card is quite good.

There are maybe ~18 rounds average on the doom clock in Arkham.

If your investigator has soak/healing (Tommy, Carolyn, etc) you can use it to straight cancel 2-3 of the worst treacheries you draw (~1/6th of your total in a game!), and transfer some more into random ones (using the 'remove corruption' option, depending on just how much soak/heal you have)
If your investigator doesn't have soak/healing, you can still use it to cancel 3 bad treacheries and take a random one later (in any fast action window!)
It makes you more resilient to unfortunate game states, and allows you to maximise your chances:
- You pull something and have no skill cards in hand (wait until you have a hand, then draw one & heal)
- You can choose to pull the 'instead' encounter card(s) when grouped up with the team so they can commit if necessary
You can effectively use it to transfer damage/horror between your investigator card and your allies
It can save your life — there'll be a fair few occasions when a treachery you draw will do worse than 1-1 to you
It can buy you extra rounds of the game, in scenarios where Ancient Evils and other 'add doom/can cause agenda to advance' effects are in the encounter deck
Calvin can use it to take damage/horror quickly and then heal a bit for a fast action when necessary (bonus: I believe the treachery you draw will be tested at your higher stats - i.e. before healing - because it's part of the cost)

TL;DR is bad encounter deck pulls at the wrong time is the easiest way to tank a scenario (possibly the only way for a lot of us), and something most investigators don't really have much say over... at least until now (neutral, asset with uses). Straight cancelling is super powerful if you can afford the cost here, and if not then transferring a bad treachery for a random one at a time of your choosing is also strong. It's expensive, but worth a look.

5/3/21

BlankedyBlank · 21

Being expensive is true, but you can play it with Uncage the Soul for 1 or with 2 resources from Antiquary (leaving 2 for you). — Miroque · 25 12/21/21

I'm thinking of using this in Tommy at some point. He has tons of soak and spare resources to fuel it. 4exp is a bit on the high side though. — fates · 53 5/10/22

So first off I don't think this card is very good. 4 cost 4 xp is extremely high and most people would rather not take 1 and 1.

However there are two different decks which may be interested?

Tommy with Spiritual Resolve might be interested in three instances of 1 and 1. Same with anyone who has Peter Sylvestre and Jessica Hyde out -- that turns this card effectively into "skip the next three encounter cards you draw", which is very good.

I personally can't see why you'd ever want to activate the fast ability. Maybe there's something I'm missing here. I guess Tommy or Calvin can use this combo to just take 1 and 1 whenever they want, since nothing exhausts. Not exactly a mind blowing combo but it's something?

4/13/21

KasaiAisu · 41

I was just thinking about this card recently, so I'm glad to see your review asking some questions about it. :-) I think I'm seeing three questions in your review: (1) Is taking 1-and-1 worth it to cancel a treachery for most investigators? (2) Why would you want to use the fast action? (3) Is this card worth 4 resources and 4 XP? I haven’t played with it yet, and here are my answers in this moment… (1) Taking 1-and-1 is likely worth it for some of the worst treacheries, especially those that add doom or make you lose critical assets/cards. Many investigators have allies they are happy to sacrifice to cancel treacheries. (2) The fast action lets you use this card like William T. Maleson if you want to. You can cancel a bad treachery for 1-and-1, then choose to draw a new one to heal 1-and-1. The net result is you traded a known bad treachery for an unknown encounter card that may be easier for you to handle. (3) This is the hard question for me, especially not having played with it myself. — SocialPsientist · 145 4/13/21

The fast ability is also a great way to use the card as an "I'm outta here!" by instantly "resigning" via investigator defeat. — suika · 9406 4/13/21

Using the fast action is better than maleson because its denying a bad treachery now for a random treachery at a moment of your choice, I feel like that may be worth something just on its own, 4r 4xp is a hell of a price though. — Zerogrim · 292 4/13/21

What if you're Roland Banks (or otherwise relying on having enemies to fight), and you use this card both to cancel the treacheries you can't handle and to summon enemies? — Thatwasademo · 58 4/14/21

For Why you want to activate the fast ability, I can think of two reasons. — Hulahoop12 · 1 3/29/22

1. Timing of draw. If we scout the encounter deck and place cards that last the round on top, this would be a great time to activate before round is over. E.g. Furtive Locals from Innsmouth, Or a lot of the hazards from edge of the earth. There is potential synergy with Quick Learning Too (-2 to difficulties during a treachery test? Great. although there is a risk of drawing enemies.. have a plan).. The other case is when you have treachery cancellation cards but need specific window to use (think Patrice). 2. The healing option can be a secondary combo with dmg/heal options similar to spirit of humanity, triggering effects based off heal, e.g. carolyn. Overall, i think most of the time, this will be used for free cancellation of treachery at the cost of 3 health/sanity, and the secondary ability will be ignored. — Hulahoop12 · 1 3/29/22

Someone recently built a deck that uses the zappyboi to draw through the entire encounter deck in order to fail theoretically unlimited skill tests in order to get theoretically unlimited actions from Lifeline, so that's something. You could also use it to draw theoretically unlimited elder signs in Mateo. — Zinjanthropus · 227 11/15/23

As I understand it Diana can snatch it under her before it leaves play with 3 or more corruption (and get it back later with her dagger). — AlderSign · 270 6/20/24

While normally trading one encounter card only allows the ability to swap an especially bad treachery for a random one, another potential use case for this card is when the group has mythos scanning such as Alyssa Graham and wants to be able to give the top encounter card to someone who isn't first player. E.g. the lead investigator is a Guardian or Rogue and the other investigator is a mystic who sees Rotting Remains on top of the deck.

4/14/21

madhatter152 · 8

Or give Roland a foe to bop. — MrGoldbee · 1450 4/14/21

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