To those who have not looked at Carson closely yet, his ability has 1 free quota each turn, but you can use your actual action to do it too as long as it is not to the same investigator. Therefore if you play 4 players, you can use your free , then 2 actual for the remaining 2 players, then you still have 1 action for yourself.

Even if you have just 1 action left per turn, others using 4 actions per round is liberating. Even when I use my remaining action to just Move or play Obsidian Bracelet / Emergency Cache I still feel that Carson makes the team successful. He still has Skill cards to "help" in other's turn, as incentivized by Selfless to a Fault. (Though to actually get through this card, it has to be other's action inside your turn. Regardless, your deck will likely have some Skill cards.)

I have played limited Core + TSK Carson once choosing , while initially looked like suicide since he has nothing new other than Guidance (1) (which is good) and old Working a Hunch, just being a "2x Vicious Blow + 2x Deduction guy" hasten the team's tempo greatly when combined with his giving ability. (And it also save other's deck space to include more non-Skill cards.) You can basically order someone to deal 2~3 damages or pick 2 clues.

Therefore, in high player count there is no need to try hard and boost 2/2/2/2 to usable range (such as trying to build around Runic Axe / Sledgehammer / Lightning Gun) as you have many different players to give actions and they can cover fighting and clue gathering. It is possible to focus on a card that is immediately effective in one action and share benefit to others instead, like Obsidian Bracelet / Dynamite Blast. You can fill in support role with these cards that actual fighter has no time / resource / equipment slot / deck space to waste. TSK gave a lot of cards like this : Guard Dog (2) to fix engagement and deal auto damage, Girish Kadakia to tank and give boost, Motivational Speech for other's Ally, or Ever Vigilant (4) / Prepared for the Worst (2) for quick setup even while they are engaging. You skill cards and soaks should cover your own protection to / tests, or fix it without involving tests like Second Wind / "I've had worse…".

Perhaps more worrying to those who have not played him yet is that, is this any fun? It is!

• You have to be tactical with your ending location the previous round if you want to to many different teammates without moving. You can also rally the team to come to your location to prepare for your command. A card like Fighting Lessons or Bestow Resolve that allows remote commit makes movement planning even more fun.
• You will always be in the conversation when Mythos Phase is over regardless of cards in your hand. Either they will explicitly request your actions before/after they play because they have good solutions on hand but not enough actions, or you be the commander and volunteer to go first and order/push others around if you have some sort of solution on your hand. (Both ways, there is a sort of "trust me" energy that is addictive!)
• If you get an enemy engagement, there is an incentive for others to go first and kill / take engagement because they could get an action back from you. Or you can go first and do it yourself (using boosts, some test-less cards, or 0 difficulty techs) or even take some AoO to still have others help you in one action.
• Have fun eyeing all of your team's token draw at the same location, because you get to copy any pulls. (This one is easy to forget sometimes, maybe have other players remind you too so they can get more skill commits if you can draw a lot.)

Hi if you forgot to bring torches and this location comes up, congratulations you're dead.

No idea who thought this location was a good idea. There are a lot of bogus supply checkpoints in TFA, and this is one.

Bring torches or die.

This card does wonders with Akachi Onyele. Not only you get an extra charge, being able to take it back to your hand and play it again makes your party immortal. Suddenly you prefer to take damage yourself rather than your allies :D

Disclaimer: Weird and probably insignificant meta ramblings ahead.

I used the card in Norman Withers for the obvious implication: You see it on the top of your deck and draw it, instead of, say, doing something else and and cursing RNGsus for drawing it in the upkeep phase. Great. Best case scenario. Maximum outcome. Here comes the first "weird" part: For Norman, depending on what else he does in his turn, it might make no difference if he draws it or plays it using his ability - in both cases he gains 2 resources. Like I said, he might need the use of his ability for another card on top of his deck in the same turn, but it is likely enough that the player can choose which action to use for the effect. Why could this be important? I don't know, maybe for Stupor or Panic? Otherwise not so much probably.

But what even more puzzled me is that seemingly for Norman Withers, Burning the Midnight Oil performs better than this card in their best (i.e. playing it from the top of your deck using Norman's ability) and "worst" cases (i.e. playing it from your hand) and as well in its "worst" case as Cryptic Writings in its best case.

Best case vs. best case: So what the hell am I talking about? Playing (or drawing, see rambling above, hehe) Cryptic Writings from the top of your deck costs you an action to gain 2 resources. Neat. Playing Burning the Midnight Oil from the top of your deck costs you an action to gain 2 resources AND take an investigate action. That's one for the midnight oil!

Worst case vs. worst case: On the other hand, playing Cryptic Writings from your hand costs you two actions to gain 2 resources (unlucky you). Playing Burning the Midnight Oil from your hand also costs you two actions, but nets you 2 resources AND an investigate action. Better again.

As you can see above, since Burning the Midnight Oil is always one action ahead of Cryptic Writings, playing it from your hand is just as good as playing Cryptic Writings from your deck. That's a huge burn from the midnight oil, poor crippling writing!

Conclusion/TLDR: If you are playing Norman Withers and have enough space to take both, just do so, but in the case of lacking card slots I would almost always pick Burning the Midnight Oil over Cryptic Writings as it saves you one action in most cases.

Side note: Yes, I did not include the eventualities of not needing or wanting to investigate, in which case that benefit of the card would be rendered meaningless.

Since this review is a comparison between two cards, I postet it on both pages (yes, of course I want to maximize my steet cred).

Disclaimer: Weird and probably insignificant meta ramblings ahead.

I used the card in Norman Withers for the obvious implication: You see it on the top of your deck and draw it, instead of, say, doing something else and and cursing RNGsus for drawing it in the upkeep phase. Great. Best case scenario. Maximum outcome. Here comes the first "weird" part: For Norman, depending on what else he does in his turn, it might make no difference if he draws it or plays it using his ability - in both cases he gains 2 resources. Like I said, he might need the use of his ability for another card on top of his deck in the same turn, but it is likely enough that the player can choose which action to use for the effect. Why could this be important? I don't know, maybe for Stupor or Panic? Otherwise not so much probably.

But what even more puzzled me is that seemingly for Norman Withers, Burning the Midnight Oil performs better than this card in their best (i.e. playing it from the top of your deck using Norman's ability) and "worst" cases (i.e. playing it from your hand) and as well in its "worst" case as Cryptic Writings in its best case.

Best case vs. best case: So what the hell am I talking about? Playing (or drawing, see rambling above, hehe) Cryptic Writings from the top of your deck costs you an action to gain 2 resources. Neat. Playing Burning the Midnight Oil from the top of your deck costs you an action to gain 2 resources AND take an investigate action. That's one for the midnight oil!

Worst case vs. worst case: On the other hand, playing Cryptic Writings from your hand costs you two actions to gain 2 resources (unlucky you). Playing Burning the Midnight Oil from your hand also costs you two actions, but nets you 2 resources AND an investigate action. Better again.

As you can see above, since Burning the Midnight Oil is always one action ahead of Cryptic Writings, playing it from your hand is just as good as playing Cryptic Writings from your deck. That's a huge burn from the midnight oil, poor crippling writing!

Conclusion/TLDR: If you are playing Norman Withers and have enough space to take both, just do so, but in the case of lacking card slots I would almost always pick Burning the Midnight Oil over Cryptic Writings as it saves you one action in most cases.

Side note: Yes, I did not include the eventualities of not needing or wanting to investigate, in which case that benefit of the card would be rendered meaningless.

Since this review is a comparison between two cards, I postet it on both pages (yes, of course I want to maximize my steet cred).