I recently play a rogue with some XP devoted for treachery defense. He can simply not trying at all to boost and tank horror from willpower tests with Elder Sign Amulet (skips about 1-2 tests), or make it go away with cards like "You handle this one!" or Counterespionage. But there is a hole in this defense, if Frozen in Fear already lands there is not much I can do.

Frozen in Fear is an example that this card is a good answer. Like Lucky!, you get to keep this card intact on hand while you try the recurring test again and again, until you see an appropriate chaos tokens, then like its name you surely pass with 2 resources. Much better than going for a big willpower boost (e.g. Moxie pump / Say Your Prayers / Savant) only for the chaos bag to laugh at you with a bigger minus and lose all your investments. You just wait and not waste anything with Sure Gamble. For the sake of variety and same XP budget, rather than doubling up 2x Elder Sign Amulet for consistency only for it to be powerless against Frozen in Fear, 1x Elder Sign Amulet + 1x Sure Gamble maybe better.

The "Striking Fear" set is special that it is somehow used in most FINAL scenario of the campaign. I say this card is not so situational if there is this prominent pattern in campaign design. In the final scenario you either win or lose the campaign and many things in Striking Fear set are BS against Rogue, and it will be sad if your character is on their knee unable to play after such a long journey. I think even 3 XP for one of this card added last minute before the final showdown is a good investment. It is a core set card for good reason.

To make good use of XP, an over-success card with situational benefit like .41 Derringer (2) which now comes together in Revised Core Set can give it an another duty. Unlike Lucky! which only works when you fail, this card sometimes let you choose between regular success or over-success. (In the case if this gun it has 3 kinds of success.) Breaking and Entering (2), Slip Away (2), etc. also has multiple kinds of success.

Wait people actually think this card is good? Its terrible.

Lets look at all the negatives.
-Costs 3, a card and an action.
-Have to do a test with no bonus.
-No refund if you fail the test.
-Non-elite only.
-Your location only.
-Enemy must be exhausted.

Just kill the enemy normally or evade an move away. This thing needs to do like 10 damage for it to be worthwhile (and again only affects non-elites).

Am I crazy or is this the coterie agent? Were they planned from the start?

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I completely disagree with Caius take on this card, Keen Eye is, without a doubt, the worst "Permanent: spend resources for stat boost" talent in the game by FAR. Not only it doesn't hold a candle against Scrapper, Streetwise and Higher Education (and the fact it's the only card out of these 4 not to get taboo should tell you a lot), but it's absolute ineffective on its own even without considering its class alternatives.

"Now why is that?" You may ask "Why is this card so bad? It gives a stat boost of +1 for and , two of the main game winning skills, for the rest of the turn for 2 resources, and you can even stack it if you have the cash"

And the end of that sentence is exactly the issue: Guardians do not have the cash for this kind of luxury, with possibly the exception of Zoey Samaras, Leo Anderson and Tommy Muldoon, they are constantly paying for assets, put allies in play, play events, they simply cannot afford the economy to leverage on the stat boost reliably. Nathaniel Cho can, given his playstyle is less asset heavy, but his is too low for the boost to matter, and his is high enough he doesn't need it

Second, +1 for 2 resources for all your skill checks in a round is a very bad deal in anything above easy, and very questionable on easy itself. By the time you can afford the exp for this permanent, the stat boost will probably not suffice for most skill checks you will have difficulties to complete. Sure you can spend 4 resources for a +2, but where you are gonna get enough money to do so?!

Third, and this is the reason what leaves Keen Eye completely dead in the water: boosting all of your skill checks in one turn by little is massively inneficent compared to boosting one skill check by a lot, because that means you are committing the rest of the round fighting and/or investigating. Most guardians aren't just gonna spend all of their actions investigating one location, even in multiplayer, they are very likely to want to take other actions in between, before or at the end of their turn, like moving to another location to investigate there. And even the most combat heavy guardian will struggle to do nothing but fight the whole round (unless you are playing a full 4 player game with heavy enemy spawning and high boss health), their turn will probably also be interspaced by moving and engaging. You sacrifice massive action flexibility to make use of this Permanent, which makes it very difficult to justify using. Sure the times it works (in location with lots of clues and enemies) can be pretty good, but remember you are spending 3 exp for a highly situational permanent and possibly adding to your deck and buying various economy cards just to make use of this

I cannot understate, for a 3 exp card, how bad Keen Eye is, it's almost worthless on its own and ridicolously situational if you have the economy for it. Ironically, if this was the Rogue permanent talent instead of Streetwise... It would still be absolute rubbish, but at least would fit a niche because rogues have various ways to grant themselves additional actions to make the most of the buff

Unless you have some kind of huge rube goldberg combo costing a million XP, this thing is a giant trap.

On one hand, a 3 cost weapon that can get you +4 to hit is great. Where the problem starts is that it only deals 2 damage and exhausts itself. 2 damage is not enough. There are somewhere around 100 enemies in the game with 2 or fewer health, and that number includes swarms and bosses that get +X per investigator health that I can't be bothered to count, because there are around 250 enemies in the game with 3 or more health.

An investigator dedicated to fighting needs to be able to deal at least 3 damage per round, full stop.

The best case scenario for the sickle is to deal 2 damage, evade the enemy, then finish it off next round with the secondary ability to clear the doom. For four xp you're doing in three actions, with three tests, across two rounds, what any other weapon/spell could do in 2 or less. All that 4xp gets you is an unnecessarily huge bonus on the first of your three tests, and it still requires outside boosts to seal the deal.

There are two cards that make the sickle work, and they're both expensive. The first is Elle Rubash, who makes sitting on the doom while you wait for the second attack less dangerous, and gives a small but appreciated bonus to make the secondary attack actually connect. If you dual-wield them you even have a relatively stable combo... for a bank-breaking 10xp minimum. The elephant in the room is that, if you're running Elle, Abyssal Tome does what the sickle does at half the cost. It lacks the extra boost for the first attack, but makes up for it with the ability to boost the damage output when you really need to. Unlike the sickle, it is appropriately costed for the limitations involved.

The second option is to spend a whopping six more xp on Sin-Eater. Sin Eater lets you double tap the sickle in a given turn, and gives an option to clear doom that doesn't involve using the terrible secondary ability. It's pretty good, as should be expected for a 10xp combo... ignoring the caveat that you can't use it at all in the last three rounds of any agenda. I wouldn't spend 10xp on a combo that still regularly requires a Moonlight Ritual, but you do you I guess.

The sickle is just worse in every way that matters compared to the Enchanted Blade, a card which already doesn't get much play because it's not a spell. It is laughably worse than every other 4xp weapon or spell. The only investigator in the game that would want to take the sickle over something else can't, because it's 4xp. You could argue it's less useful than a Kukri, a level 0 weapon which is cheaper, more flexible, and doesn't add doom to the field, and kukri is the worst card in the game.