It is worth noting that Lola's weakness, "Crisis of Identity," can effectively negate this card (and certainly whatever strategy you'd cooked up, forcing you to discard the very card you'd hoped to play), if picked up during the forced draw. If there's still two CoDs lurking around in your deck, make sure you don't burn your Investigator ability to fast switch roles before playing this in crisis situations.

The obvious comparison to this card is Backstab. "It's the Survivor backstab", I hear you say. And Backstab is a kinda-average card: OK but a little clumsy and quite expensive, so the temptation is to think that Waylay fits into that category, but it's a far superior card for many reasons.

Firstly it can do more than 3 damage. Frequently you will do four, five, or even six damage with it. That's great.

Secondly it's "attacking" on the evade value rather than the fight value. There are lots and lots and lots of creatures that have a weaker evade than fight. The above two-cases provide a ton of monsters of which Waylay is a great target for. Almost every scenario has some, many of which provide XP. You'd be surprised what isn't actually elite.

Next is the fact that it's not technically an attack action, nor is it technically doing any damage. This might seem strange, but it gets around certain edge-cases, some of which are niche, but some of which are significant, or common. (You do also need to be aware that as it isn't a "fight", it will provoke if there are other enemies engaged with you. Stay safe heroes).

Lastly it has better icons. Double-anything is usually good, and here we're getting something that matches with our Agility (presumably we like Agility, as we're chosing this). Obvious heroes are Wendy, but it is excellent in Finn also, who can set it up with his free evades.

So, here we are in the Forgotten Age cycle, nobody has yet reviewed Cat Burglar. He must be useless, right? I mean, look at his abilities - adds to your Agility, but then lets you avoid having to make Evade actions. That is contradictory. 4 Resources seems expensive. And, worst - if you can take Cat Burglar, you could also take Leo De Luca, one of the finest allies in the game.

And yet - he is fantastic. Testless disengage and move, against multiple enemies. Yes, Leo Anderson can runaway like a little girl despite his appalling agility. Even agile investigators like "Skids" O'Toole or Wendy Adams can benefit. Surrounded by lots of enemies? Can't evade them all? Hit Cat Burglar and get the hell outta there.

Consider the card Elusive, which is generally considered as pretty strong. Elusive has advantages in being fast, cheaper, and can take you to any revealed location with no enemies. However, Cat Burglar can do any connecting location - even unrevealed and and occupied - and you get this every turn.

On top of this, you get an agility bonus. Wendy can beef up her for those funny events. Backstab, with added criminality. And a 2/2 damage soak. Suddenly, it doesn't seem so expensive.

So, why don't we see more Cat Burglar in play? Well, I think this is 'cos he's in the same faction as Leo De Luca. More actions is very powerful, and against Leo De Luca, I just don't think the Cat Burglar stacks up, even in an evasion-heavy (so far) cycle like Forgotten Age. If you're trying to just move, or investigate, or play a card, Cat Burglar doesn't do anything for you, while Leo De Luca does.

However ... Charisma is a thing. You can play them both, and enjoy being able to just move away from any enemies, and still have 3 actions. I've done this in a few decks - "Skids" O'Toole and Jenny Barnes - and it just allows you to slip past enemies. It's very powerful against Brood of Yog-Sothoth in Undimensioned and Unseen, and in my opinion, pretty much breaks The Organist.

And for Leo Anderson, Cat Burglar seems a strong pick - giving him alternatives to just killing things. Moreover, Cat Burglar is non-unique; he could have 2. Need to run away from the Harbinger of Valusia? Cat Burglar is your friend.

So not, perhaps, your first-choice ally - but an excellent secondary one with some awesome uses when enemies start to mount up and it's time to bravely run away.

This is an cheap (if clunky) option for horror healing that gains new life as a combo piece for "by-two" Rogues. The ability to trigger an easy test at will provides fodder for "Watch this!" and Lucky Cigarette Case - in combination with Double or Nothing and a willpower talent, a rogue can potentially win six cash in a single test of whiskey-shooting ability.

On a separate note, I absolutely love that the cards for drinking, smoking, and gambling all work together to promote a play style based on risk-taking - what a resonant design!

I did the entire Dunwich cycle with Minh Thi Phan. In eight scenarios, I drew this weakness nine times.

This is my favorite weakness in the game to date, as an amazing combination of theme and mechanics. It interacts beautifully with Minh Thi Phan's flow.

Minh Thi Phan is practically powered by card-draws. Literally any competitive deck of hers will have two copies of Guts and Perception, and probably Manual Dexterity and Overpower as well - to say nothing Resourceful, upgraded Lucky! and Cryptic Research once she's powered up a bit, and of course her very own Analytical Mind.

Two consequences ensue:

• drawing lots of cards is what makes her pick up The King in Yellow; and
• drawing lots of cards is what allows her to discard The King in Yellow.

Which is beautiful, because it means the King in Yellow is the reason Minh Thi Phan needs a lot of card-draw, but the high card-draw also means she's nearly guaranteed to draw it every scenario.

This means that The King has similar impact to other high-octane unique weaknesses like Rex's Curse, but where the Curse places a lot of tedious small roadblocks in your way, The King places one interesting giant roadblock. Really, it's like getting your own private miniboss to fight.

The other interesting thing about this is that you're obviously better off dispatching the King while also tackling a skill-test that somehow warrants six points of commitment. Upgraded Deduction is the most obvious candidate, but whatever you do you just know it's going to be impressive. Get ready to shout "ZHU LI! DO THE THING!"

(My alternative theory is that Min Thi Phan is secretly Batman and she's doing paranormal investigation to relax.)

That's assuming you don't autofail, of course, which can be so disastrous that it's practically a drinking story waiting to happen.

Obviously, this weakness is why Minh Thi Phan must have two copies of Unexpected Courage and Inquiring Mind, because how else is she supposed to reliably have six symbols to commit to a single skill-test? Rise to the Occasion is a dodgier proposition, because 6-difficulty Willpower and Intelligence tests are rare, and 4-difficulty Combat and Agility tests tend to involve doing things she should generally avoid, Batman-ness notwithstanding.

(For extra-fun thematically-appropriate headaches, get Drawing the Sign as your basic weakness, like I did! Hastur-obsessed much, Thi?)