http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/ArkhamHorrorTheCardGameInvestigators

The Player Characters of Arkham Horror LCG. Investigators currently available only as promo cards are put separately.

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Introduced in Night of the Zealot (core game)

Roland Banks

Roland Banks, the Fed

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_roland.png

Everything by the book: every "i" dotted, every "t" crossed. It has worked, until now.

Roland had always taken comfort in procedure and rules. As an agent in the Bureau, he was relieved to have guidelines to follow in any given situation. But lately, his Federal Agent's Handbook had been entirely unhelpful given the cases he'd been assigned. Try as he might, Roland could find no mention of what to do when confronted with strange creatures, gates through time and space, or magic spells. If he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he would never have believed it... and there's no way his superiors would understand. Roland knew he would have to handle this one himself.

Both versions

Guardian-class investigator.

Agent Scully: As his backstory explains, Roland didn't believe in the paranormal, and so was completely caught off-guard on how to deal with the otherworldly dangers he found in his investigation.
Boring, but Practical: "Mysteries Remain" replacement signature Event has 2 very simple functions you can choose from: either you discover one clue from your location (acting like a cheaper "Working a Hunch" at no resource cost) or generate an extra clue to discover in your location, reducing the amount of exploration and backtracking needed to reach other locations with clues necessary to advance the Act Deck. It is also fast, so it can be played without spending an action or triggering attacks of opportunity. Not the most interesting signature, but useful in almost every situation.
Cycle of Hurting: His low starting sanity makes him very likely to run out and take mental trauma (something his weakness also dispenses), which in turn makes him more likely to run out next mission until he's rendered permanently insane.
Early-Installment Weirdness: His signature weakness, "Cover Up," is the only card in the whole game that uses clue tokens instead of resource tokens to keep track of your progress towards disabling it.
FBI Agent: Well, BI Agent; they weren't the Federal Bureau until 9 years after Arkham Horror's timeframe.
Giving Up on Logic: Roland's replacement weakness, "Dirge of Reason" (originally provided as the bonus for namesake book), symbolises Roland's Agent Scully mindset cracking, as he no longer can explain what's going even remotely rationally. In gameplay terms, it manifests as him dropping his clues into his location (symbolising his confusion), or taking horror if he can't.
It Only Works Once: Regardless of which of the two effects you pick, "Mysteries Remain" will remove itself from the game once played, limiting its use once per scenario.
Revolvers Are Just Better: His signature card is his .38 revolver. Its main gimmick is providing an additional bonus to Combat when used in a location with at least one clue, which further amplifies the hybrid fighter/searcher playstyle of his default kit. The advanced version has the additional benefit of reloading itself when Roland defeats an enemy in a location without clues.
Secret War: Roland is obsessed with keeping his activities hidden from unrelated people; his signature weakness, "Cover Up", is him realising that he left evidence behind and has to get rid of it. Failure to do so before the scenario ends or Roland resigns/is eliminated will result in mental trauma. In-game, it requires Roland or other Investigator to use clue-finding effects (like Investigating or playing certain cards) to instead discard a total of 3 clues from the weakness to clear it (4 for the advanced version).

Basic version

Has access to Seeker cards (up to level 2).

By-the-Book Cop: According to his backstory, he used to always follow the rules to the letter—until he got involved in the story. He dropped this mentality when he realised that this would not help him with Eldritch Abominations.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed. Roland has slightly more Intellect than other Guardians, and he has access to Seeker cards, making him a versatile investigator able to both fight and search for clues. Also, all his abilities are related to finding clues, including through defeating enemies, and his Elder Sign only gives him bonuses in locations with clues.
Glass Cannon: He's an effective fighter and not bad at getting clues, but his base 5 Sanity is abysmal (a single Rotting Remains encounter can remove up to 3), meaning he desperately needs means of soaking and healing horror to avoid being defeated early in the scenario.
Jack of All Stats: Downplayed, like most Guardians, he has good 4 Combat and below-average 2 Agility, but he also has adequate 3 Willpower and Intellect, so it's easy to make him into an all-rounder, capable of both clue gathering and resisting treacheries if he manages to improve his weaker stats. His access to the Seeker cards gives him the utility unavailable to most other Guardians.
Loot-Making Attack: Roland's main ability allows him to discover a clue in his location whenever he defeats an enemy.

Parallel version

Has access to off-class "Tactics" and "Insight" cards (up to level 3), but can't take the Guardian-class cards above level 3. Receives free exp at the deck creation.

By-the-Book Cop: The "Parallel" version of Roland assumes that he still acts as a proper, rules-abiding detective, making him restricted by countless regulations. The end of his challenge scenario directly questions what would happen when those directives came into conflict with his morality, as a nod to his canon self.
Draw Extra Cards: "Seek the Truth" Directive lets you draw 1 card if you discover a clue in location with an enemy.
Glass Cannon: "Consult Experts" provides Roland with an additional ally slot from the onset, but prevents him from voluntarily assigning incoming damage and horror to his Ally assets, which leaves Roland vulnerable as it drastically reduces the number of assets that can absorb harm in his stead.
Jack of All Trades: "Parallel" Roland lacks access to high-level Guardian cards, being limited only to level 3, but can take any Tactic or Insight cards up to level 3, making him rather versatile, especially if the right Directives are chosen.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: "Parallel" Roland has special cards, unique to him — the "Directives", which provide him both restrictions (like inability to attack more than twice per round) and additional abilities; he has five available, but only three may be chosen, with the other two becoming permanently inaccessible.
Mighty Glacier: "Leave No Doubts" Directive boosts Roland's Sanity to 8 (in addition to him already having 9 Health), but limits how many move actions he can take each round. It doesn't make him any more resistant from being driven insane however, as bonus Max Sanity is ignored by Trauma.
Necessary Drawback: Every Directive provides a powerful ability, but adds some restriction which you have to play around (fortunately, his Elder Sign allows to temporarily disable one of them on his choice):
- "Due Diligence" Directive, once per turn, makes Roland better at evading, parleying or investigating per every enemy at your location, but makes you unable to fight more than twice per round.
- "Red Tape" Directive makes all "Insight" and "Tactic" cards (core cards of parallel Roland's gameplay) "fast" (can play them anytime, do not take actions to play and don't trigger attacks of opportunity), but makes him unable to play more than two cards per turn.
- "Consult Experts" Directive gives Roland an extra Ally slot, but also makes him unable to use his Allies as damage soak (he can't voluntarily assign damage or horror to them, but effects that would cause them to self-inflict damage and horror still work as intended).
- "Seek the Truth" Directive allows Roland to draw a card if he discovers a clue at any enemy's location, but also makes him unable to commit cards to skill tests while at location with at least 1 clue unless he already discovered a clue this round.
- "Leave No Doubt" gives Roland massive +3 Sanity (which he really needs, starting at just 5), but prohibits him from moving more than twice per round — in the game where you're always on a strict time limit.
Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: "Parallel" Roland is forced to obey his directives most of the time... but when he draws Elder Sign, he can disregard one directive of his choice until the end of the round, to finally get the job done. He can also, once per scenario, flip a directive facedown, losing its benefit but also not having to abide to its restriction for the rest of the scenario. That's probably how he came to his canon self's Cowboy Cop mentality.
What If?: The "Parallel" Roland is an alternative version of himself, where he chose not to abandon his directives and still follows the rules.
Weak, but Skilled: When compared to his original counterpart and most Guardians, "Parallel" Roland is hampered by the fact he has no access to any card above level 3, period, and his various directives put many limitations to what he can do... But they also provide him with many useful abilities in return, his deckbuilding options cover fairly common keywords that gives him access to a varied amount of events, and is one of the few Investigators to start with some experience to spend as well.

Daisy Walker

Daisy Walker, the Librarian

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcgdaisy.png

"I know of books so powerful, they can rewrite reality."

As a respected librarian at Miskatonic University, Daisy had always felt that books were the most important thing in her life. She explored in fiction what she abhorred in life: horror, violence, fear. Then, she stumbled across the John Dee translation of the Necronomicon. It was blasphemous, unholy, and too awful to be read. But given her studies in obscure and occult subjects, Daisy knew there was more truth than fiction within the book's pages. She began to wonder what other secrets the restricted collection of the Orne Library held...

Both versions

Seeker-class investigator.

Boring, but Practical: Her signature card, "Daisy's Tote Bag", gives her two additional Hand slots (and doesn't take up any slots itself), which can only be used to hold Tome cards (something she relies upon a great deal); simple, but reliable. She can even dump her weakness, "The Necronomicon", into her bag until she can deal with it. Even its advanced upgrade is Boring, but Practical compared to other advanced signatures: it turns a Tome Daisy play, once per turn, fast, sparing her an action.
Go Mad from the Revelation: Once the "Necronomicon" enters play, it forcibly occupies one of Daisy's hand slots and the only way to get rid of it is to study it, which drains her Sanity.
Item Caddy: Both versions of Daisy are built around actively using tomes, providing a bag to hold more of them, and having extra abilities to improve their effectiveness.
Nightmare Fetishist: She likes reading stories that explore horror, violence and fear (while still abhorring them in real life). But the "Necronomicon" is too much even for her.
Squishy Wizard: She's a skilled occult expert and/or sorceress, but her 5 Health is very low even for a Seeker.
Tome of Eldritch Lore: Her involvement in the plot was kickstarted by her study of The Necronomicon. That same book is also her personal weakness (specifically, the "John Dee" translation of it), turning her Elder Sign into an Auto-Fail token. It becomes even more dangerous if she fails her Loyalty Mission, "Read or Die." as the advanced version of her weakness turns her Elder Sign into 3 negative tokens at once!

Basic version

Has access to Mystic cards (up to level 2).

Boring, but Practical: She has extra action each turn, which she can only spend to interact with Tome assets. Given that those often form the core of her gameplay, it saves her a lot of time, but it's rather simple and generic ability compared to some more flashy ones the other investigators have.
Draw Extra Cards: Her Elder Sign effect lets her draw 1 card per each Tome she controls, if she passes the skill test.
Extra Turn: Her ability gives her an extra action each turn which can be spent on activating her Tomes' abilities, which form the core of her gameplay.
Magic Librarian: Intentionally designed as one, being a sorceress librarian whose power takes its source in her books. She also has access to Mystic cards, most of which are spells or magic artifacts.

Parallel version

Has access to off-class "Tome" cards (of any level), and up to five other level 0 Guardian and/or Mystic cards, but can't take the non-Tome Seeker-class cards above level 3.

Crippling Overspecialisation: "Parallel" Daisy, instead of her usual deckbuilding rules, can access any Tome cards (regardless of level or class)... but only up to level 3 other Seeker cards, and loses her access to Mystic cards. Unfortunately, most Tomes are Seeker-class anyway, so she loses more than she gains. This is slightly compensated by her being allowed to take up to five level 0 Guardian and/or Mystic cards.
Magic Librarian: All her abilities are designed around doing magic through interactions with her books:
- "Parallel" Daisy amplifies her Willpower by putting "Tome" assets into play. When used in combination with her old deckbuilding rules for access to Mystic cards (rules allows to mix front and back sides as the player sees fit), this may greatly increase her effectiveness as a team's sorceress.
- Once per game, she can activate action abilities on all of her Tomes, without actually spending actions, with all the mayhem it can cause.
- Her Elder Sign allows her to regain a Tome from discard pile.
Magikarp Power: "Parallel" Daisy starts with only 1 Willpower and 7 Sanity (her default version starts with 3 and 9, respectively), but amplifies both by one point for each Tome asset she puts into play, potentially exceeding default maximum value.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: "Parallel" Daisy receives +1 Sanity per Tome she controls. Considering that she starts with 7 Sanity, and can have up to 4 Tomes in play thanks to her "Tote Bag", she can end up with 11 Sanity—while the other investigators normally have 9 at most (13 when playing the Read or Die scenario, thanks to Professor Armitage, as he provides two additional slots).

"Skids" O'Toole

"Skids" O'Toole, the Ex-Con

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_skids.png

"I didn't get out of the joint just to watch the world end".

Skids hadn't planned on a life of crime. But sometimes doing the right thing means getting your hands dirty. The cops didn't care that Skids needed the money for his mother's operation. His mother died of her illness during the second year of his sentence. His cellmate, Brad Hollins, told him there were worse fates than death. He ranted and raved in a quiet voice every evening about the "Old Ones" and told Skids about bizarre adventures he'd had while dreaming. Skids didn't give it much thought until the night he woke to the sight of his cellmate bursting into flames. When Skids was finally released, he returned to Arkham, looking for answers.

Both versions

Rogue-class investigator.

The Atoner: Skids' subtitle is the "Ex-Convict" and his desire to discover what happened to his cellmate Brad and avenge him is partially fuelled by his wish to make his late mother proud of him once more.
The Corpse Stops Here: When his cellmate burst into flames one night, the cops accused him of causing it, but couldn't get the charge to stick.
Face of a Thug: He may look like bandit, but he is a good guy—and what banditry he did commit was solely to aid his mother with getting through her illness. His basic version further nails it by giving him access to Guardian-class cards.
Healthcare Motivation: He really was only robbing banks to try to save his mother from her illness; unfortunately, she died while he was in prison — and now, he still has to pay up the bills, which works as his personal weakness, "Hospital Debts"; once they shows up, he has to pay them up until the end of scenario (or his elimination), or suffer penalty to experience earned.
Jack of All Stats: Downplayed, but beside having good Agility (4) and below-average Willpower (2), Skids Fight and intellect are average, making him equally capable of fighting and investigating, with the Rogue cardpool allowing him to do either or both. His base version has access to Guardian cards, which gives him more fighting prowess, options to heal and ways to cover his main weakness and increase his Willpower, while his Parallel version has access to "Gambit" and "Fortune" cards regardless of class, which are universally useful for any playstyle.
Mana Burn: Skids' personal weakness "Hospital Debts", requires him (and potentially other Investigators if they are willing to help him) to spend 6 resources to deal with it (8 for the advanced version). He can choose to ignore it, but if by the end of the scenario the debt isn't paid, he will earn 2 less experience. What makes it tricky to deal with is that each Investigator can only pay up to 2 resources per round, which means you can't just dump all your resource at once even if you have enough in hand.
Never Going Back to Prison: He served ten years in prison once, and won't allow it to happen again—certainly not when the stakes are now much higher than just his life. Fittingly, his signature card, "On the Lam", makes any non-Elite enemies unable to attack him.
"I ain't going to the pen a second time".
Reformed Criminal: His main class is Rogue and he has access to illicit assets and criminal allies, but Skids' motivations to join the invesigation are selfless, wanting to find out why his friend Brad died, make his mother proud beyond the grave and prevent the end of the world; which contrast heavily with many of the later, far more opportunistic and self-serving rogues introduced in later cycles.
Spontaneous Human Combustion: His motivation to come to Arkham was when his cellmate, Brad, spontaneously combusted one night.
Stealth Expert: His signature card, "On the Lam", makes non-Elite enemies unable to attack him. Advanced version let's Skids disengage and move two locations away at the end of the round, preventing him from being immediately pinned down by enemies running after him after the effect ends.

Basic version

Has access to Guardian cards (up to level 2).

Big Guy: Downplayed; his Combat stat is average, but he has access to Guardian-class cards to amplify it. Also, being a Rogue, he can obtain enough resources to fuel his more expensive cards, or use them to buy more actions through his signature ability. All of this makes him a fitting candidate for the role of dedicated fighter.
Boring, but Practical: His Elder Sign just gives him flat stat boost, and few free resources. Given that he has to spend tons of resources to benefit from his ability, as well as to counter his weakness, it's very welcomed bonus, even if it's relatively simple.
Extra Turn: Once per round, he can spend some resources to get an extra action.
Money Multiplier: His Elder Sign effect gives him 2 free resources if he succeeds on a test.

Parallel version.

Has access off-class "Fortune" and "Gambit" cards (up to level 3). He has a reduced decksize of 25 cards.

Ascended Meme: Prior to release of his "parallel" version, there was a popular fan-made version of Skids, which remade him into a Rogue/Survivor gambler. Comes the "parallel" version, and now Skids has gambling-themed abilities, gambling-themed deckbuilding options (many of which just so happen to be Survivor-class), and the challenge scenario set in a casino.
Born Lucky: His "parallel" version trades access to a Guardian class for access to any "Fortune" or "Gambit" cards up to level 3. He also may keep multiple versions of the same card (low- and high-level versions), which is normally forbidden.
Draw Extra Cards: His Elder Sign lets him return one card from discard pile into hand, but it's restricted to cards below level 3.
Gameplay and Story Integration: "Parallel" Skids is essentially a gambler. As result, his new abilities and deckbuilding options were remade to fit the theme:
- Gamblers always rely on risks and various tricks. As result, he has access to "Fortune" and "Gambit" cards (up to level 3).
- "Parallel" Skids trades his usual ability to spend resources to gain more actions for ability to actually gamble on his resources and on success earning much more.
Item Caddy: Parallel Skids can, while upgrading Fortune and Gambit cards, keep both the old and new versions of the cards in his deck, allowing him to sidestep the usual rule of "no more than 2 copies of same-title card in the deck", and thus improving the utility he can get from the cards with those traits.
Low-Level Advantage: His Elder Sign allows him to regain a card of his choice from discard pile and return to hand... but only if it's below level 3, probably to encourage the player to keep the lower level version of upgraded cards.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: The "parallel" version of Skids, while upgrading "Fortune" or "Gambit" cards, may, instead of just replacing them with the higher level versions, buy them at the full cost... and keep both the old and new versions, even if it would put him at more than two copies of the same card in his deck, by title, which is normally forbidden. Any old cards he keeps in the deck this way also don't count towards the deck's size.

Agnes Baker

Agnes Baker, the Waitress

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_agnes.png

"I remember another life, one of sorcery and conquest."

Agnes Baker may be just an unassuming waitress in this life, but in a previous life, in a time and age undreamed of in the modern world, she had been a powerful witch. It began when she found a strange artifact — a key of some kind — in a dusty collection of family belongings in her attic. When she touched it, the memories came flooding back, along with one word: "Hyperborea." The more she delved into the visions and memories of her former life, the stronger her powers grew... and the more frightened she became.

Both versions

Mystic-class investigator.

Action Survivor: Played With. She has strong natural magic power, but otherwise lacks any special training, being a mere waitress in this particular incarnation who only recently started awakening her old personality's memories. Her basic version further nails it, by giving her access to Surivor-class cards.
Cool Key: The Heirloom of Hyperborea, a family artifact Agnes found in her attic, which is the key to unlock the latent powers inside her, and a link to her past self. In-Game, it is Agnes' signature Accessory asset, which allows her to draw cards every time she plays a spell of any kind, while its advanced version has the additional benefit of absorbing damage and horror inflicted by Agnes' own spells and cards.
Draw Extra Cards: The Heirloom of Hyperborea lets her draw 1 card after playing a Spell.
Reincarnation: She was a Hyperborean witch in the past life. All her problems are caused by the past catching up with her.
Visions of Another Self:
- She has dreams of her past incarnation; this is how she learned magic.
- Her personal weakness, "Dark Memory", forces her to relive the worst moments of her Hyperborean past self, either damaging her sanity or increasing the current Doom.
Your Worst Memory: Her personal weakness, "Dark Memory", forces her to relive the worst moments of her past life, where she was a Hyperborean witch, dealing her constant horror every round, unless she plays the card, which will add Doom to the agenda instead. The advanced version is even nastier as it doubles the resource cost of the card (from 2 to 4), leaving Agnes to suffer the horror for longer if she can't pay its prohibitive cost, and worse for wear with less time left and with a huge dent in her resource pool if she can.

Basic version

Has access to Survivor cards (up to level 2).

Armor-Piercing Attack: The moment Agnes takes horror, she deals 1 damage to an enemy to her location: no test required against the enemy's fight or anything, and no chance for them to nullify it.
Counter-Attack: Played With; Agnes has the ability, once per round, to deal damage to an enemy after suffering horror, but said horror doesn't have to come from an enemy attack. Treacheries or even her own cards are eligible to let her cause harm to foes.
Glass Cannon: Invoked, Agnes main ability is to deal damage when she takes horror, meaning that to make the most of it, she must take lots of horror regularly, leaving her vulnerable to be overwhelmed by it and defeated. This is only made worse by the Spells being highly unreliable, potentially damaging her Sanity even further.
Pain & Gain:
- When Agnets takes horror, she can cause 1 damage to an enemy at her location.
- Her Elder Sign effect gives her +1 to the tested skill for each horror she has.

Parallel version

Has access off-class "Spell" and "Occult" cards (up to level 3). She has a reduced decksize of 25 cards.

Blood Magic: The "parallel" version of Agnes can damage herself in order to fuel her magic. It's implied that she achieves this because her blood has magic capabilities.
Cast from Hit Points: "Parallel" version of Agnes, instead of her default ability, gains the ability to sacrifice her own Health to decrease the cost of Spell events she plays (and to keep them in hand instead of discarding them).
Heal Thyself: Her Elder Sign allows her to heal 1 damage on herself. This gives her more liberty in using own signature mechanic.
Item Caddy: Parallel version of Agnes is built around heavy usage of Spells, particularly events:
- She can, while upgrading Spells and Occult cards, keep both the old and new versions of the cards in her deck, allowing her to sidestep the usual rule of "no more than 2 copies of same-title card in the deck", and thus improving the utility she can get from the cards with those traits.
- Agnes can play Spell events cheaper and shufflling them in the deck insted of discarding, at the cost of sacrificing own Health.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: The "parallel" version of Agnes has a reduced deck size (25 instead of normal 30), but she can, while upgrading Spell cards, instead of just replacing them with higher level versions, buy them at the full cost, and keep both old and new versions, even if it would put her at more than two copies of the same card in her deck, by title, which is normally forbidden. Any old cards she keeps in the deck this way also don't count towards the deck's size.
Mythology Gag: The "parallel" version of Agnes basically reuses her abilities from Arkham Horror, adapted to work with the new mechanics. Her challenge scenario also heavily resembles her personal story from the same game, which involved her confrontation with the enemy from her past life.
Squishy Wizard: Played With; "parallel" Agnes gains impressive 8 Health (this is Guardian-level toughness) and the ability to heal herself whenever she draws the Elder Sign, but pays for it with having only 6 Sanity, which is the worst in her class. Whether she would be extremely durable or extremely fragile depends on damage/horror ratio of the specific scenario.

Wendy Adams

Wendy Adams, the Urchin

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_wendy.png

Mama used to let Wendy play with her necklace when she was small. Mama would tell her stories, and Wendy would spin the necklace and watch as it glittered. Then, word came that her father had been lost at sea, and Mama started acting strange, drawing unusual symbols in chalk all over the house. They took Mama to the asylum, and Wendy went to the orphanage. Before they took her away, Mama gave her the necklace, to "protect her." Wendy stayed in the orphanage for several years before running away, deciding that she could take better care of herself on her own.

Both versions

Survivor-class investigator.

Action Survivor: Wendy isn't a war veteran, or trained occultist, or experienced wizard, or grizzled criminal. She's a child who got involved in the horrible adventure which would break most adults... and she still keeps going.
Despair Event Horizon: Her personal weakness, "Abandoned and Alone", causes her direct horror removes all cards from her discard pile from the game, symbolising her losing the will to keep fighting. And the tinnier the deck becomes, the easier it's to draw this card again, not to mention taking some horror each time the deck resets. The advanced version of her weakness is even worse, as it reshuffles itself back in the deck if Wendy's discard pile is empty and inflicts even more horror after removing the cards if it isn't.
Fragile Speedster: Wendy has good Agility and Willpower (both at 4), which help her greatly when dealing with treacheries, but abysmal 1 Combat and moderate Health and Sanity. She's not a fighter and would be quickly overwhelmed if cornered. How exactly she solves this issue ranges from which backside (and thus deckbuilding options) you pick.
Kid Hero: Wendy still being a child doesn't protect her from all the dangers and eldritch horrors, putting her at the same risks of death and insanity (or worse) as her adult colleagues, but she's no less capable to survive against all odds than everyone else.
Obvious Rule Patch: Errata for Wendy's Amulet was released, tweaking the rules specifically to counter its weird interaction with certain Events with non-standard mechanics (like, for example, events that attach themselves to other cards, instead of getting immediately discarded once played), which was easily abusable; prior to this, she was able to reuse them indefinitely.
Orphan's Plot Trinket: Her signature card, "Wendy's Amulet", is an Elder Sign trinket given to her by her parents. It allows her to play events from her discard pile, as long as she keeps it in play. While the base version of the Amulet can only let her play the top most event in her discard pile (which means it can be "blocked" if Wendy discards an asset, skill or weakness), the advanced version let's her play any event in her discard pile.
Parental Abandonment: Her father is Lost at Sea, while her mother went insane and was put into the asylum.
Wise Beyond Their Years: In spite of being just a child, Wendy is as capable of contributing to the investigation as every other adult in the team. She notably has 3 Intellect, which while it is merely average skill value overall, it is above-average for Survivors specifically, making her among the best at finding clues in her class.

Basic version.

Has access to Rogue cards (up to level 2).

No-Sell: She can discard one card from hand to ignore the effects of one chaos token, but she must draw another one instead.
Situational Sword: Wendy's Elder Sign has normally a value of zero and no additional effects, but makes her succeed at any test automatically if she has her amulet in play.
The Sneaky Guy: She can access Rogue-class cards to boost her chances to safely avoid monsters.
Street Urchin: She was put in an orphanage after her mother went insane, but she escaped and has lived on the streets ever since.

Parallel version

Can pick either Blessed and/or Cursed cards, and access any cards with chosen trait(s), regardless of class and level. Picking both increases deck size to 35 cards.

Crippling Overspecialisation: She suffers from the same problem as Father Matteo (another investigator specialising in "Blessed" cards) before her: both Blessed and Cursed cards being very rare (outside of The Innsmouth Conspiracy expansion; though she's unplayable without it anyway). She has no other off-class options.
Luck Manipulation Mechanic: All her abilities are based around chaos pool manipulation.
- Her deckbuilding rules are built around Blessed and Cursed cards, particularly the cards related to Blessed/Cursed tokens introduced in The Innsmouth Conspiracy (in fact, she can't be played without the expansion anyway, due to using those tokens in her core mechanic).
- Her Elder Sign ability allows to get rid of unwanted Blessed/Cursed tokens in the chaos pool, or use with her special ability.
- "Tidal Memento" asset allows Wendy to use the tokens previously sealed on the enemies instead of drawing from the chaos pool, with all the benefits coming with them.
Power Nullifier: "Parallel" Wendy can put blessed/cursed tokens on the enemies while evading them (either those drawn during the test, or from the pool), which, thanks to her special signature asset, "Tidal Memento", allows her to lock them from readying (thus locking them from the battle) or accumulating Doom tokens for as long as they have those tokens on them. As with all such effects, it doesn't work on Elite enemies.

Introduced in The Dunwich Legacy expansion

In general

Crippling Overspecialization: The base version of all ''Dunwich Legacy" investigators have very limited access to cards of other classes besides their own, being limited to only 5 level-0 cards of other class(es).
Jack of All Trades: Downplayed in that their usefulness in certain roles is still dictated by their stats, but the base version of the "Dunwich Investigators" have access to the level-0 cards from all other classes, which makes them capable of covering multiple roles in a pinch. They also have above average endurance, with a total count of 15 total Health and Sanity combined instead of the usual 14 (with the exception of Pete, who has 11).

Zoey Samaras

Zoey Samaras, the Chef

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_zoey.png

"God has spoken. I will do His work without hesitation."

Zoey had known that she was special ever since God spoke to her one night when she was six years old... the night that terrible fire took away her parents. He told her that He had chosen her from among all the people of the world to be His agent. She would protect the innocent and punish the wicked. Since then, He comes to her in times of trouble, offering guidance and comfort. Zoey now travels from city to city, taking work as a chef to support herself. When she isn't working, she stalks the night, guided by the Lord's voice. Wherever she finds wickedness, she strikes it down without remorse or hesitation.

Both versions

Guardian-class investigator.

Armor-Piercing Attack: Zoey's signature asset will deal 1 damage the moment an enemy engages her and she pays 1 resource to trigger the effect, with no skill test required.
Big Guy: All her abilities are related to fighting monsters, encouraging her to take the role of team's main fighter. Also, she has impressive 4 Willpower (above average for most classes, not just Guardians), which also makes her more resistant to Willpower-testing treacheries (and thus better at using the cards which makes her deal with treacheries intended for the other players).
Chef of Iron: Cooks during the day, kicks asses during the night.
Holy Burns Evil: Her signature card, "Zoey's Cross", can damage her enemies when they engage with her.
Hunter of Monsters: She poses as an ordinary chef at a diner, but she's a zealot who believes she hears the voice of God telling her to kill His enemies; ordinarily a prime recipe for a serial killer, if not for the fact that "His enemies" in this case happen to be the cultists and eldritch monsters trying to awaken an ancient horror.
Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The setting is deliberately vague as to whether or not benevolent entities like "God" exist within its setting, and with the Lovecraftian tendencies for insanity taken into account, it's never clear whether Zoey actually is hearing orders from God telling her to kill, or if she's simply mentally ill; either way, it works out, since the ones she's being told to kill in this case happen to be horrible monsters and insane cultists.
Mission from God:
- Her motivation to join the team—because voices in her head (whether they actually belongs to God or not) tell her that she must fight forces of evil.
- Her personal weakness, "Smite the Wicked", spawns an additional monster, to which this card gets attached; if the monster to which this card attached survives until the end of scenario or Zoey's defeat/retreat, she will suffer mental trauma, due to "failing" her "mission". Fortunately, it's not mandatory for her to finish off this monster personally, any investigator may help. The advanced version even makes the enemy stronger.
Religious Bruiser: One of the team's main heavy-hitters is a devout Christian who believes that she's fulfilling a Mission from God.
Status Buff: The advanced version of her personal weakness, on top of spawning an enemy as normal, also raises its health and fight value, making it harder for Zoey and other Investigators to defeat it.

Basic version

Can include up to five level 0 cards of other classes.

Boring, but Practical: She gets +1 resource each time she engages an enemy. It's not much, but it still helps to boost Guardians' starving economy, and it doesn't require any extra steps from her, as she's gonna engage her enemies all the time anyway. It also helps to fuel "Zoey's Cross" signature, which costs exactly 1 resource to use.
Crippling Overspecialization: All her abilities are related to fighting monsters, and thus have limited use when her current task doesn't involve active combat. Like most Guardians, she has only 2 Agility, as well as only 2 Intellect, which makes her poor at searching for clues unless she heavily invests into cards which would amplify her ability to.
Critical Hit: Her Elder Sign effect makes her do more damage if it's drawn as part of a Fight action.

Parallel version

Has limited (up to level 3) access to her own class, but can take Blessed and Charm cards (up to level 4) from any class, and up to 5 other level 0 Mystic cards.

Holy Hand Grenade: Parallel version of Zoey goes a step further with her whole Religious Bruiser with Mission from God schtick, giving her actual holy powers to amplify her offensive capabilities.
- Once per phase, when dealing damage to an enemy, Zoey adds a blessed token into chaos pool. This makes her more likely to succeed at whatever tasks she does next, given that such tokens provides great stat boost.
- Once per round, she can remove 3 blessed tokens before her attack and deal +1 damage, essentially receiving help from whatever force aiding her to fulfil her task.
- The advanced version of "Zoey's Cross" has the additional ability of speding bless tokens from the Chaos Bag to engage an enemy as a free action, which greatly synergises with both the main effect of the cross and the ability of the base version of Zoey.
Situational Sword: Her Elder Sign gives her +1 per blessed token in the pool. The pool is empty? That's unimpressive +0. It's filled to the brim? It's a whopping +10.
Irony: Her entire schtick is built around making Zoey into "holy warrior" on monster-slaying crusade. Yet she can't take a Holy Spear, as it's a level-5 card — something her basic kit can take.
Weak, but Skilled: Downplayed, compared to the other Guardians, Zoey is barred from taking high-level cards of her class (including strongest Weapons), and has 1 less Health than her basic version (8 instead of 9), but compensates for it with all the tools she has at her disposal to quickly generate blessed tokens, and being able to benefit from them in ways unavailable to other investigators. The constant stream of blessed tokens she generates passively by fighting may also help her mitigate issues with below-average Intellect and Agility, something her basic kit struggles with a lot.

Rex Murphy

Rex Murphy, the Reporter

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_rex.png

"This time, nothing will stop me from getting at the truth!"

When disaster strikes, Rex Murphy is usually on hand, suffering the consequences. After spending a day with Rex, even the most hardened skeptic will concede that the man is cursed. Anytime he had a lead on a good story, something would go wrong. That business in Innsmouth with the photographs that had blown out to sea. The tracks in Dunwich that had washed away in the rain just before he'd brought the sheriff. His terrible fortune has more than once exposed him to gruesome beasts and occult conspiracies. To survive, Rex has developed an inquisitive mind, keeping one step ahead of the next disaster.

Both versions

Seeker-class investigator.

Boring, but Practical: His signature (at least, its basic version) doesn't do anything flashy, merely allowing him to draw extra cards (with stackable bonus depending on how many clues he has). It ensures Rex that he would always have some cards to spend, to actually fuel his clue-gathering machine.
Born Unlucky:
- Rex is suffering from Hereditary Curse, which renders him extremely unlucky and prone to suffering random disasters.
- Basic version can't access any "Fortune" cards. Parallel version is also barred from using Blessed cards (though now he is allowed to take either if they also have a Cursed trait).
Chew Toy: The poor guy just can't catch a break. Something always goes wrong for him, especially when he seems to find a good story to write about.
Determinator: It takes a special kind of thickheaded to keep going despite all of his setbacks.
Draw Extra Cards:
- His signature event, "Seeking the Truth", lets him draw 1 card per clue he controls (capping at 5 cards). Advanced version gives him the additional option to instead drop up to 3 clues to get that many cards from the discard pile back.
- His Elder Sign lets him draw cards, but with drawback: basic version only works if he decides to fail the test on purpose, while parallel one lets him draw 1 card per each cursed token revealed during the test.
Hereditary Curse: His personal weakness, "Rex's Curse". Every time he succeeds on a skill check, he must return the chaos token he previously drew, ignoring its modifier, and draw an additional token (or just draw extra token if using advanced version); if this causes the skill check to fail, he shuffles the weakness back into his deck, meaning that you can never quite get rid of it.
Intrepid Reporter: He seeks to get all of the information he can. Of course, his curse just makes it difficult.

Basic version

Can include up to five level 0 cards of other classes. He can't use any "Fortune" cards.

Awesomeness by Analysis: His signature card, "Search for the Truth", allows him to draw as many cards as he has clues, up to five: he not only gathers the info, but comes up with a plan based on it. Advanced version gives alternative option to drop one clue to reclaim one card from discard pile.
Boring, but Practical: Rex's main ability is to discover a clue in his location whenever he succeeds as an Investigation test by 2 (even if he is not using Intellect for said test).
Crippling Overspecialization: The only good stat he has is his 4 Intellect. Only having 3 Willpower and Agility, he suffers from the treacheries (and can sometimes struggle to escape ambushes), while unimpressive 2 Combat leaves him very little chance at open combat; with little access to off-class cards, there's little he can do to improve that, either. He's great clue-searcher, but that's about it.
Failure Gambit: His Elder Sign gives a generic "+2" boost, but also allows him to instead automatically fail a skill test and draw 3 cards.
Gameplay and Story Integration:
- Being a reporter requires knowing how to dig up the truth no matter how deep it's buried. As such, whenever he finds a clue while investigating, he finds an extra one for free if he performed the investigation well enough.
- His extreme misfortune makes him unable to field any Fortune cards.
Nerf: He was the first investigator to receive his own entry at "Taboo rules" list; it limited his signature ability (when he succeed at an investigation test by 2, he discovers a clue in his location, if present) to working once per round. Prior to it, he was considered to be ridiculously overpowered, being able to quickly strip any location of clues.

Parallel version

Has limited (up to level 3) access to his own class, but can include Cursed and Gambit cards (of any class) up to level 4, and up to 5 other level 0 Rogue-class cards. Can't access Fortune or Blessed cards, unless they also have Cursed trait.

Choose a Handicap: When instructed to place his clue into location (whether by an encounter card or his own), he may instead add 2 curse tokens to the Chaos Bag (still fulfilling the condition) and vice versa, he may place a clue instead of adding tokens. Either effects are negative, but he can choose which one would cause him less harm.
Cursed with Awesome: Parallel Rex embraced being cursed, and while he's now barred from fielding any Blessed cards (excluding those that also counts as Cursed), he now has a huge selection of Cursed cards he couldn't use before, opening new opportunities and synergies (particularly because he may now benefit from having cursed tokens in the bag).
Intrepid Reporter: Parallel Rex's put emphasis on how far he is willing to go even when the odds are stacked against him: his deckbuilding trades access for 5 level 0 cards of any class for only those belonging to Rogues, the class about taking risks and rubbing elbows with dangerous criminal for their benefit and can get all Gambit cards below level 5, which are all about either making it out of an hard situation, or tempt fate for various benefits.
Unluckily Lucky: Compared to the basic version, he still suffers from the Hereditary Curse, but now his misfortune can actually work for him. He now has nearly-universal (only missing level 5) access to the Cursed cards, most of which offer great power at an equally great cost. Additionally, his Elder Sign scales its power with the number of Cursed tokens he revealed, though its stat boost now merely cancels the negative modifier of token(s).

Jenny Barnes

Jenny Barnes, the Dilettante

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_jenny.png

"No more 'Miss Barnes' from you. My friends call me Jenny".

Jenny Barnes has spent the majority of her young life in pursuit of creature comforts, fine dining, and the latest fashions. That all changed when she received a letter from her sister, Isabelle. In this letter, Isabelle confessed that mysterious forces were aligning against her and that she feared she may fall victim to some paranormal threat. It was the last letter Jenny received from her beloved sister. Jenny has since returned to the States to track down and investigate all occult occurrences she can find. Hardly a wilting flower, she has proven herself a crack shot as well as a fearless and clever investigator of the unknown. Until Isabelle's disappearance is explained, Jenny will never relent in her search.

Rogue-class investigator. Can include up to five level 0 cards of other classes.

Action Survivor: While she clearly knows how to use her guns, she's not a professional adventurer or fighter, up until recently spending most of her times making fun.
Boring, but Practical: Jenny's only special ability is to gain 2 resources during the upkeep phase instead of 1 as everyone else, otherwise she just plays like any other member of her class, but given how expensive Rogues' cards tend to be, that is unquestionably always useful.
Crimefighting with Cash: Her being rich heiress manifests in her gameplay:
- She receives an additional resource each round. More resources means more tools at her disposal to deal with cultists and monsters.
- Her "Elder Sign" effect scales its effectiveness with amount of resources she has, with no upper threshold.
Discount Card: Jenny's replacement signature asset, the "Green Man Medallion", let's her place up to 3 resources on it once per round, then at the end of the scenario, it reduces the experience cost of the next card she buys by 1 for every 6 resources on it. While it's obviously no longer useful on the final mission of the campaign, you can still just commit it to skill tests for its two "wild" icons.
Gameplay and Story Integration: She is a rich heiress, so of course she has better access to resources than other investigators.
Guns Akimbo: Her signature card is a pair of .45s pistols. Their main gimmick is not having an upper limit how much ammo she can put in them when played.
I Will Find You: She is looking for her sister, Isabelle "Izzie" Barnes, who went missing.
Jack of All Stats: She has 3-3-3-3 statline, which makes her decent at any task (and, accidentally, gives her above-average Willpower for her own class), and makes her able to put her resources supply to good use. But this also makes her a bit slower than the other Rogues, which she would always need to keep in mind.
Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: As always, she is depicted wearing a fabulous dress and jewelry.
More Dakka: Her signature .45s pistols have no upper limit of ammo, as long as she has enough resources to pay for them; and due to receiving free resource each round, she usually has them.
Power Nullifier: "Sacrificial Beast" replacement enemy weakness prevents Jenny from gaining resources from cards effects, her ability to double the payout of her upkeep included. Given how expensive Rogue cards tend to be, it is of vital importance for Jenny or someone else to take it out before she ends up bankrupt, which is not easy because not only it spawns the furthest location away from Jenny, but it also has decently high Fight and Health values on top of that.
Searching for the Lost Relative: Jenny looking for the traces of her missing sister Isabelle is incorporated into her actual mechanics; her personal weakness, "Searching for Izzie", distracts Jenny to try and find the traces of her sister Izzie, who was previously abducted. Dealing with it costs actions, but ignoring it may cause Jenny to suffer mental trauma later due to possibly failing to save her.
Socialite: She has no job other than being an heiress and moving about in high society.

Jim Culver

Jim Culver, the Musician

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_jim.png

"No, not quiet at all. Dead folks get downright rambunctious when I play my horn".

Jazz has been nothing but trouble for Jim since the day he picked up his daddy's trumpet. There was something weird and otherworldly about the writing on the inside of the bell, but the tones from it were smooth and dark, like good coffee. That trumpet landed Jim a lot of gigs until the time it made Widow Jenkins get up and dance, the day he played at her funeral. After that, it was kind of hard to find work. Since then, Jim has learned a lot about jazz — and the things the graveyard ghouls talk about on cold autumn nights. Lately, they've been talking about The End, as in the end of everything that is and could be. The Final Rhapsody. The fact is, Jim isn't too keen on that idea.

Mystic-class investigator.

Both versions

Brown Note: His connection to the dead sometimes results in them answering back; this manifests as his personal weakness, "Final Rhapsody", which makes him draw 5 random tokens and take 1 damage and horror for each Skull and Autofailure drawn. Upgraded version is even worse, as it counts any tokens other than Elder Sign and blessed ones as "bad" ones.
When the dead start talking about what scares them, that's when it's time to listen.
Combat Medic: Can heal horror from himself or from one of his teammates with his trumpet, if he draws a Skull chaos token. Upgraded version also works with cursed tokens.
The "Fun" in "Funeral": He once caused a dead widow to get up and dance...at her own funeral. After that incident, he has had trouble finding work.
Jack of All Stats: Downplayed; outside of his 4 Willpower, Jim has decent 3 Intellect and Combat, but only 2 Agility, albeit it's not that bad thanks to his abilities and deckbuilding options.
Magic Music: He is a Jazz musician who can actually achieve magic through his music. Fittingly, he has the Mystic class.
Must Have Caffeine: Loves his coffee.
Orphan's Plot Trinket: The Golden Trumpet once belonged to his father.
Squishy Wizard: Downplayed, compared to the other Mystics; Jim is slightly more resilient at 7 Health, and a bit stronger at 3 Combat, but without right cards, it wouldn't help him that much: he's more of an all-rounder than a dedicated fighter. He also suffers from only having 2 Agility, which not only hurts him when dealing with enemies, but also makes him more vulnerable to certain treacheries.
Street Musician: He wasn't always one, but ever since he played at Widow Jenkins's funeral, he hasn't been able to get work. Probably because his magic trumpet made the widow get out of the coffin and join in the festivities.

Basic version

Can include up to five level 0 cards of other classes.

Jack of All Trades: Compared to his parallel version, Jim's basic kit lacks access to high level off-class Spell and Cursed cards, but he's also not limited in building his own class, and can pick up to 5 level-0 cards from any non-Mystic classes, which makes him more flexible.
Luck Manipulation Mechanic:
- Jim passively treats Skull Tokens' skill modifier as a 0 (any effects tied to revealing Skull token still triggers, however), which overall tips the odds of skill tets in his favour, especially on harder difficulties, where Skulls can have a very high negative modifier. Many Jim's decks leverage on his ability by including cards that will increase the likelihood of pulling a Skull token, or replacing a much harsher chaos token with it.
- Jim's Elder Sign effect is a generic +1, but he can choose to treat it as Skull token instead if he so desires to trigger effects on certain cards (like his trumpet).

Parallel version

Has limited (up to level 3) access to his own class, but can take Spell and Cursed cards (up to level 4) from any class, and up to 5 other level 0 Survivor cards. Additionally, he can have a Spirit deck which must consist of 9 different Allies from any class (level 0-2), as well as a unique weakness exclusive to it.

Friendly Ghost: The Allies from his spirit deck are no less helpful than their "alive" version.
Item Caddy: Parallel Jim can put charges on his assets whenever he draws Skull or Cursed tokens. Much like his base version, he can choose to treat the Elder Sign as a Skull (or Cursed, for this specific version of him) token as well to benefit from this ability, or just enjoy a generic but useful +2 boost during a skill test.
Ghastly Ghost: Parallel Jim is pursued by the Vengeful Shade, which acts as an additional personal weakness. It's not very strong, but its main gimmick is that it's a part of a small side deck which can occasionally show up instead of helpful ghosts, take up the limited place he has for spiritual Allies, and immediately attack Jim for 2 horror. He can attack or evade it as if it's engaged with him, which allows to temporarily get rid of it, but failing just makes it go into material world.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Parallel Jim has a separate "spirit deck", which is entirely filled with Ally cards, which is used entirely to charge his new signature card. Lore-wise, those are the ghosts who came to his aid.
Necessary Drawback: Because You Can't Kill What's Already Dead, Jim's ghost allies have Nigh-Invulnerability, but they cannot absorb hits any longer for him unlike their alive counterparts, and if damage and/or horror would be assigned to them, Jim would instead be the one suffering it. Additionally, when he gathers too many of them, he risks temporarily losing some of them and/or suffer damage/horror.
You Can't Kill What's Already Dead: When Allies gets summoned through spiritual deck, they retain their functions (only losing their traits, which gets replaced by "Geist"), but can no longer be damaged (so Jim would suffer in their stead).

"Ashcan" Pete

"Ashcan" Pete, the Drifter

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_pete.png

"C'mere, boy. We got work to do".

At night, "Ashcan" Pete sleeps wherever his travels take him: in a field, on a train, or maybe, if he's lucky, in a barn. He bunks with his loyal hound dog, Duke, on one side and his beat-up guitar on the other. And sometimes when Pete sleeps, he dreams. He dreams of haunted, tortured places and of horrible creatures. When he wakes up, he knows that someone needs his help, because his dreams are true. He could not say how long he has been on the road, living by his wits, but he can say for certain no place is too far to go to help someone in need. And as long as Pete can help people, he is not likely to stop wandering any time soon.

Both versions

Survivor-class investigator.

Action Survivor: Pete is just a homeless guy accompanied by his dog. He has to survive in the eldritch nightmare through his luck, savviness and sneakiness.
Homeless Hero: His backstory shows us he lives on the streets, and has done so for a long time. Fittingly, he is a Survivor Investigator, being an underprepared vagrant who got caught in the investigation by chance.

Basic version

Can include up to five level 0 cards of other classes.

Canine Companion: Duke, his faithful dog. Unfortunately, most of Pete's strength is related to Duke, forcing him to keep Duke active at all costs; even his Elder Sign's only effect, besides stat boost, is reading Duke. While it's normally not that bad, in the Dunwich Legacy campaign Duke can be sacrificed to Yog-Sothoth...until the end of campaign.
Crippling Overspecialization: Pete can be a very reliable and versatile fighter and clue gatherer thanks to Duke, but the second he gets discarded, he will struggle to do much without the proper tools to replace him.
Glass Cannon: Duke provides his master with good Combat capabilities, but isn't particularly durable. Pete himself is only slightly less fragile, having only 6 Health and 5 Sanity (11 total, one of the worst in the game).
Item Caddy: Pete can discard his own cards to ready assets he controls, allowing him to use cards that would otherwise only be usable once per round. This ability itself only works once per round, but it gives him the possibility to activate Duke twice per round (or even more than that if he pulls out his Elder Sign) at least as long as he has cards to throw away.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Unlike the other investigators, who treat their "Allies" as more or less expandable, Pete needs to take everything in his power to keep Duke alive, because Duke covers for his weak points; he has some abilities specifically to assist with that. Duke is also the only "Ally" in the game who doesn't take a slot.
Recurring Dreams: He suffers from regular nightmares, and he just knows, from the past experience, that they signify something bad happening, somewhere. These dreams also act as his personal weakness, denying him the ability to ready his assets—including Duke, which makes him quite vulnerable.
Roaring Rampage of Revenge: The Return to the Dunwich Legacy expansion has a special achievement for Ashcan Pete's player: after Duke gets sacrificed to Yog-Sototh, if Pete still manages to survive until the end of campaign and win, he avenges Duke. Made more awesome by the fact that without Duke, Pete is not particularly strong.
Weak, but Skilled: Pete has impressive 4 Willpower and decent 3 Agility, but suffers from low Combat and Intellect (both at 2), which puts him below standard sum of skills (11 instead of normal 12). He has several means of fixing that issue without ever rising the stats themselves: either get a help from Duke to get much-needed boost and fight/investigate with higher base value, or reuse exhausted assets by sacrificing cards from hand.

Parallel version

Limited to level 3 of his own class, but can access "Improvised" and "Tactic" cards (both up to level 4), and up to 5 other level 0 Guardian cards.

Action Survivor: Compared to his basic version, "parallel" Pete is slightly better as a fighter, having higher Health, Sanity and Combat, as well as some Tactic cards to increase his combat capabilities (which can become even better if he takes Duke along). But he's still just a drifter, with no special training, skills or gear, and is unlikely to last for long without support.
Crippling Overspecialisation: Downplayed but compared to his basic version, Parallel Pete cannot use cards above level 3 of his class, however there are very few Survivor cards that are level 4 and 5, so he doesn't lose too much. He is also unable to fully upgrade customisable Survivor cards however because of the level limitation, unlike his base version.
Item Caddy: "Parallel" Pete can return the cards he attached to scenario cards (locations, enemies, etc) to his hand instead of discarding, albeit only once per round. This encourages him to actively using events which works by being attached to locations; it's further helped by him having access to off-class Tactic cards, which makes him rather flexible. Additionally, he can return such cards to hand immediately with his Elder Sign effect.
Magic Music: Whenever Pete uses his guitar to lure an enemy, he either heals 1 Sanity, or gains 1 resource.
Mind-Control Music: "Parallel" Pete can use his guitar (available as "replacement" signature) to force a non-Elite enemy in his or connected location to move once in any direction, either luring it away or luring it into a trap.
Perpetual Poverty: While being a Homeless Hero has always been part of Pete's character, Pete's replacement weakness "Hard Times" explores the negative sides of it, by forcing Pete to discard an equal amount of cards after he draws any, representing how little he owns or can keep in his travels. Notably, it has an unique trait that isn't on any other encounter or weakness card: "Hardship".
Took a Level in Badass: Alternative Pete has a normal statline of 12 skill points and 14 durability sum of Health and Sanity in total, unlike the original, bringing his Combat and Health/Sanity stats to healthy average values (3 and 7/7 respectively). He is far more capable of achieving his goals on his own and far less reliant on Duke, albeit he still can take him along if he wishes so.

Introduced in The Path to Carcosa expansion

Mark Harrigan

Mark Harrigan, the Soldier

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_mark.png

He'd burn the entire town down if necessary, but he wouldn't let those monsters take anyone else.

There were plenty who returned from the war broken in body or spirit. But Mark Harrigan had witnessed horrors he could not explain. His beloved Sophie believed him when he wrote her about the things he saw - not the men killing other men, but the other things. The creatures. When he came home and went to visit her, he found the reasons she believed him: she had one of the creatures inside her, eating her from the inside out. As he watched in helpless horror, she faded away into the air, screaming as thing finished its meal. Now everyone thinks Mark Harrigan is crazy. Maybe he's finally lost it, after all. But he knows the monsters are real, and he will not rest until every last one is dead.

Guardian-class investigator. Can include any level 0 "Tactic" cards, regardless of class.

Big Guy: Most Guardians have around 8 Health and 4 Combat, which makes them good pick for designated fighter. Mark has 9 Health and 5 Combat, as well as extra defensive and offensive abilities. Like other Guardians, he pays for his high Health and Fight by having 5 Sanity and average Willpower, but the photo of his late wife Sophie lets Mark suffer direct damage to increase his odds at succeding a skill test, making him less likely to suffer horror from a treachery's test.
Boring, but Practical: Mark's main ability is to draw a card whenever he suffers damage once per phase. While this trait would be more or less worthless for most other classes that would rather avoid harm in any way possible, because Guardians are meant to be fighting in the frontline and taking hits for the team, he can get a ton of mileage out of it.
Cast from Hit Points:
- Mark can deliberately damage himself to increase his stats during skill checks. However, if he suffers too much damage, this ability gets disabled, causing his stats to decrease instead.
- Inverted with his signature card, "The Home Front", which allows him to move one of his damage tokens to the attacked enemy.
Crippling Overspecialization: His only off-class options are level-0 Tactic events, which primely belongs to Guardian class anyway. Situation did improve over time, as more non-Guardian Tactic cards were introduced, but at the release, he had access to only few cards.
Death Seeker: If he suffers too much damage, his personal weakness, "It Was All My Fault", enters play and reduces all his stats by 1, making it easier to be wounded even further. The only way to snap him out of this is to start treating his wounds.
Draw Extra Cards: Once per phase, Mark can draw 1 card when any card under his control takes damage.
Life Drain: "The Home Front" works similarly to the level 0 version of Vicious Blow (with a very high modifier of +4 Combat instead of +1), only that instead of just dealing an extra point of damage, it moves one damage from Mark onto the enemy; it has however the drawback that if Mark is unhurt, then the skill won't obviously cause any extra damage. Amusingly, if Mark commits this card to the attack of another investigator, he is still the one getting healed.
Lightning Bruiser: Downplayed; on top of having a ton of health and being as combat capable as most members of his class, he's also slightly faster than most Guardians, having 3 Agility instead of the usual for his class 2, which makes him not as vulnerable to Agility-testing treacheries, and increases his chances to evade enemies instead of fighting them directly.
The Lost Lenore: His wife, Sophie, was eaten from the inside out by some unknown monster. This motivated him to join the team, so he may avenge her.
My Girl Back Home: Sophie, who believed him about the monsters he saw in the war. She believed him because one of them was eating her from the inside out.
Pain & Gain:
- When a card under his control takes damage (himself included), he draws extra cards.
- His Elder Sign effect gives him +1 to the tested skill for each point of damage he has.
Returning War Vet: A World War I veteran who was unlucky enough to find his girl back home, Sophie, killed by some monsters, in a rather gruesome way. Now, he would put his military experience to use against whatever Eldritch Abomination stands behind it all.
Roaring Rampage of Revenge: His motivation to join the team is to avenge the death of his wife, Sophie, killed by whatever monsters now threaten the world.
Shell-Shocked Veteran:
- Most people think that Mark didn't take the war very well. Ironically, his story makes it clear that it wasn't the war that got to him, thanks to Sophie believing everything he wrote back to her about the monsters he encountered fighting in the trenches. It was only after he came home, and found Sophie being Eaten Alive by an Eldritch Abomination that he went over the edge...
- His (other) personal weakness, "Shell Shock", which, once triggered, causes him to suffer horror if he has suffered too much damage, basically making him sink into flashbacks to traumatic events during the war.
Tragic Keepsake: His signature card, "Sophie", is the last photo of his late wife, killed by monsters he now fights. It allows him to receive additional resolve (at the cost of his health), but he may become near-suicidal if he uses this effect too much, resulting in the opposite effect.
Unskilled, but Strong: Mark has quite high stats (his stats adds up to 13, instead of usual 12), as well as the ability to bruteforce his way through skill tests at the cost of Health, but pays for it by having extremely limited deckbuilding options, with barely any access to off-class cards, thus making it hard to build him as anything other than a fighter.

Minh Thi Phan

Minh Thi Phan, the Secretary

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_mihn.png

"You can depend on me to guide you through the unknown".

Minh never quite felt like she belonged in America. Things were even harder for her family before they moved, being Vietnamese in Korea under Japanese rule. She worked hard to get her college degree, reminding herself that her parents had sacrificed much to come to the States. Finally, her father became acquainted with a man from Arkham, Mr. Thomas, who offered Minh a job at his office. he was kind to her, at first - but then he started reading The King in Yellow, and his demeanor changed completely. He'd lent it to Minh, but she dared not read past the first act. Three weeks later, Mr. Thomas was found dead, having taken his own life… And The King in Yellow is the key to the truth.

Seeker-class investigator. Has access to Survivor cards (up to level 2).

Action Survivor: She is neither an occult expert nor a part-time wizard, rather she is a secretary who just happens to be involved in this madness. Fittingly, she has access to Survivor-class cards. Gameplay-wise, Minh has great mental stats (both her Intellect her Willpower are a decent 4), but her physical stats are low (her Combat and Agility are a measly 2), but she can make up for them with her access to Survivor cards to help her fight and evade if she ever will need to.
Awesomeness by Analysis: Her signature card, "Analytical Mind", allows her to commit her cards to other investigators' skill checks even when they're not in same location. For Minh herself, it allows her to draw an additional card when she commits exactly one card to any skill check.
Boring, but Practical:
- Minh main ability is to make cards commited to a test in her location give an additional +1 skill value: it's not a big increase, but overall it raises the odds of passing important tests significantly.
- Her signature asset "Analytical Mind" lets Minh commit a card to tests performed by an investigator at any location: while it has the drawback of not triggering Minh main ability, the increase in range at which she can support the team is very valuable. It also had the additional ability of, once per round, let her draw a card when she commits exactly 1 card, letting her replace commited cards quickly.
Brown Note: Her boss was Driven to Suicide by reading The King in Yellow, which motivated her to join the team in order to learn more. Now, this book is her personal weakness, which disrupts her ability to use her cards during skill checks.
Draw Extra Cards: "Analytical Mind" lets her draw 1 card when she commits exactly 1 card to a skill test.
Item Caddy: While all Investigators can commit their cards to their teammates' tests, Minh does that more efficiently: increasing their skill bonus, being able to do that from another location, drawing a card if she commits exactly one card to the test and so on.
It's Personal: One of the reasons for her involvement in the plot was finding out just what caused her boss' insanity and death.
Power Nullifier: Downplayed by her personal weakness, the first act of "The King in Yellow". Minh can commit cards when it is in play, but she is forced to commit more than 2 cards per test, which is on average extremely wasteful for her; it also takes away a precious hand slot, much like Daisy's "Necronomicon". The only way to get rid of it is for a skill test to succeed where she committed 6 matching icons (although, mercifully, "wild" icons count as matching icons for all skill test).
Support Party Member:
- Minh makes the cards she and other Investigators commit at her location passively better, adding one wild icon to them for the test.
- Her signature card, "Analytical Mind", allows her to commit cards to another investigator's checks even if they are in another location, albeit only one card per test.
- Her Elder Sign allows her to return the card of her choice that was committed to a test back to owner's hand once the test ends. This allows her to commit cards to other people's tests more liberally, as well as allow them to do the same.

Sefina Rousseau

Sefina Rousseau, the Painter

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_sefina.png

Even when she was young, Sefina's alluring paintings drew the eyes of many. When an art collector from Paris visited Tahiti and discovered Sefina, he offered to support her work in exchange for her services creating imitations. Her keen eye and steady hand were perfect for the task, and Sefina found the art of forgery to be more engaging and captivating than she'd imagined. Her most recent work came from an anonymous stranger with deep pockets, who'd tasked her with recreating a panorama of a strange, alien city. When she completed the final stroke, she was sent hurtling into the world of the painting. She only barely survived the ordeal, passing out from exhaustion. When she awoke in her gallery, she knew it had been real.

Rogue-class investigator. Has access to Mystic cards (up to level 2). Has an increased decksize of 33 cards.

Anomalous Art: Both her backstory and her abilities are related to her own art, which clearly has some magic in it.
- Her last work turns up to be significantly different from anything she had done before, sucking her into its world, experience she barely survived. Not surprisingly, since it was a painting of Carcosa.
- Her signature card, "Painted World", can be used as an extra copy of any non-Exceptional event under her sheet (she reserves up to five of them at the beginning of scenario). She starts with three copies of it; each copy may be used only once per scenario, before being removed from the game for the scenario's duration.
Boring, but Practical:
- "Painted World" does nothing on its own but copy the effect of another event card. Given how many good events there are in the Mystic and Rogue card pool, being able to "go over" the limit of two copies of a card per deck is a very strong ability to have.
- Sefina's only other ability on her character sheet (beside spending an action to draw a card beneath her sheet), is to start each scenario at the maximum base hand size of 8 cards instead of 5 like all other Investigators, at the cost of being unable to mulligan. It might not sound like much, but starting a game with 3 extra cards in hand is a big boon as it gives Sefina lots of options in the early stage of the scenario and allows her to set up more quickly in a game where you have a limited amount of turns to win. And unlike Seekers, who can achieve similar effect through their cards, she doesn't have to pay experience for that.
- Besides its main effect (which would eventually be disabled when her event stash runs out), her Elder Sign gives her impressive "+3" stat boost (one of the highest stats boosts from Elder Sign in entire game).
Draw Extra Cards: Instead of drawing 5 cards at the start of a scenario like everyone else, Sefina draws 13 when she starts a game, but then her ability also forces her to put 5 events under her, giving her effectively a net gain of 8 (if for any reason she would keep more than 8, in case there are not enough eligible cards to put under her, she would discard the rest).
Fragile Speedster: Like most Rogues, she has 4 Agility, but with only 5 Health (lowest in her class) and 2 Combat, she can't survive a prolonged fight. Her high Agility and Willpower make her relatively resistant to treacheries, but one failed test can destroy her.
Gameplay and Story Integration: She is a forger and and she can forge "illegal" copies of certain cards using her signature events, "Painted World".
Item Caddy: Downplayed; her abilities allow her to make a "stash" of events at the beginning of the game, and either quickly draw them, or copy via her signatures, but she has only 3 copies of "Painted World" (each working once per game) and has no means to put extra cards beneath her sheet, so this advantage would run out eventually, making her no different than other investigators in how she plays the cards.
It Only Works Once: Downplayed, she has three copies of "The Painted World" event that lets her mimic other events, but each copy is only usable once per scenario.
Master Forger: She specialises at creating copies of others' works. Her last work turns out to be...different.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: When drawing opening hand, she picks 13 cards, puts 5 events of her choice beneath her sheet, and uses other 8 cards as starting hand; she's explicitly forbidden to do mulligan. During the course of the game, she can draw those cards by spending actions or by drawing her Elder Sign, and her signature event allows her to mimic those events up to 3 times per game.
Named After Somebody Famous: She is named after Henri Rousseau, a post-impressionist French painter.
Power Copying: "The Painted World" event lacks its own effect, and instead copies one of events beneath Sefina's sheet. She has three copies of it, each can be only used once.
Power Nullifier: "Stars of Hyades" forces Sefina to remove a card beneath her from the game, quickly dimishing the options of cards "Painted World" can imitate. Don't think you can be clever by pulling all cards from beneath Sefina to prevent her personal weakness from targetting them however, because it will start to sap her Health and Sanity instead!
Squishy Wizard: Sefina pays for massive Willpower (4, way above what most Rogues have) and access to tons of Mystic cards with lowest Health in her entire class, and one of the lowest Combat stats in her class. In order to survive, she has to rely on her tricks and on her magic; if neither works, she would perish very quickly.
Star Power: Inverted, stars are her bane. Her personal weakness, "Stars of Hyades" (a constellation strongly associated with Hastur), forces her to remove one card under her character sheet from the game; if she can't, she suffers 1 damage and 1 horror instead. After that, this card gets shuffled back into deck instead of being discarded.
Touched by Vorlons: It's implied Sefina's visit to Carcosa granted her magic powers, hence her access to Mystic cards; and if her personal weakness is anything to go by, what Hastur gave her, he can also take away.

Akachi Onyele

Akachi Onyele, the Shaman

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_akachi.png

"I will journey to the lands beyond. I do not fear them".

As a young girl in Nigeria, Akachi became used to being set apart. Her habits of chattering away at thin air and secluding herself from other children led her village to believe she was mad. Her village Dibia was the first to see her true potential. He believed Akachi was marked by the spirits for greatness, and he taught her how to commune with them to her advantage. Under his tutelage, Akachi grew into a wise young leader, respected not just in her village, but in every community she aided. Now she meets her destiny head on, seeking out unnatural troubles that only her knowledge can stop.

Mystic-class investigator. Has access to any card which uses "charges" (read: most spells) up to level 4, and any level 0 "Occult" cards, both regardless of class.

Black Mage: Puns aside, she is one of the better choices for combat-oriented builds amongst Mystics, due to being able to consistently keep her combat magic ready for use, as her signature card, "Spirit-Speaker", allows to return discharged Spells (and other cards with charges) to her hand, from where she can put them into play again, fully charged.
Boring, but Practical: Akachi's main ability is to passively improve all asset that use "charges" by making them enter play with an additional one. That alone allows her to use powerful spells for longer without needing to replace or recharge them, get more value out of every resource she spends to play these assets and get a leg up with cards that slowly accumulate "charges" to work compared to other Investigators that can use them.
Energy Absorption:
- She can absorb charges from her assets as resources.
- Her personal weakness, "Angered Spirits", requires her to absorb some charges from her assets, and transfer them to this weakness; if she fails to accumulate 4 charges before the scenario ends or she gets defeated/resigns with it in play, she suffers physical trauma.
Ethnic Magician: An explicit version of one, since her dibia powers are the reason for her gifts.
Item Caddy: She's more efficient with assets which relies on charges, compared ot the other investigators:
- All such assets enter play with 1 extra charge.
- Her Elder Sign allows her to add 1 charge to asset she controls.
- When needed, she can either return one of such assets back into hand (to later put it in use fully charged), or discharge it and gain the charges as resources, then discard the asset.
Magic Knight: One of the more combat-capable Mystics (having 3 Combat), and decently fast with 3 Agility. Also, thanks to being able to use almost any assets with "charges", she can use "Enchanted Blade" (from The Circle Undone), both in its Mystic and Guardian versions (and can keep it charged thanks to her abilities).
Mana Burn: "Angered Spirits", Akachi's personal weakness, requires her to exhaust her spells assets (potentially rendering them unusable for the current turn) and spend 1 charge on them to appease the spirits. It is technically not required for her fulfill this task, but if there aren't 4 charges on her weakness by the end of the scenario, she suffers a physical trauma (and as expected from a Mystic she only has 6 health, so every wound you suffer will weight quite heavily).
Religion is Magic: Her shamanistic magic is based on her Igbo religion, Ọ̀dị̀nàlà (she's a dibia in her own right).
Strong and Skilled: Akachi combines above-average stats (adds up to 13 instead of normal 12), flexible selection of the cards for her slots and strong ability which significantly reduces the pain of working with her assets. Her deckbuilding is somewhat limited due to the lack of off-class access to the cards outside of "cards with charges" archetype (as you have finite amount of slots to use them), but it's nowhere as debilitating as with some other investigators.

William Yorick

William Yorick, the Gravedigger

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_william.png

"I am but a simple player in this drama, but if I am lucky, I'll live to see the curtains fall".

William Yorick never wanted to be a gravedigger. He had trained to be an actor and had worked for years in Boston, taking whatever parts were available. Shakespeare was the best stuff, of course, but after many years and hardly any roles, he was forced to admit that the stage was not his destiny. Digging graves was tedious work, but the dead made for an excellent audience, and William always did love a soliloquy. The job took a dark turn when he found degenerate creatures eating the dead in their graves. Ever since that night, Yorick has kept the creatures at bay, using whatever means he can to protect the dead.

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to Guardian cards (up to level 2).

Anti-Frustration Features: Yorick's main ability won't provoke attacks of opportunity even if he is engaged when he triggers the reaction, as it is not considered a play "action", making it safe to use even when engaged with multiple foes.
Beware the Silly Ones: Yorick loves to talk like a Shakespearean actor and act dramatic, but when push comes to shove, he'll put any horror in the dirt.
Big Guy:
- William has access to Guardian-class cards, and has Guardian-grade Combat and Health (4 and 8, respectively).
- His ability only works when he defeats enemies, encouraging him to take an active role in combat.
Creepy Mortician: Subverted. Yorick himself looks fairly average (although plenty scraggly), and is a hero who puts Eldritch Abominations in their graves.
Deader than Dead: Once per scenario he can use his signature card, "Bury Them Deep", to add any defeated non-Elite enemy to the victory display, not only removing it from play for the rest of the scenario, but also earning 1 bonus experience point for the whole team.
Draw Extra Cards: His Elder Sign lets him, if he pass a test, put any card from discard pile into his hand.
Due to the Dead: Yorick was furious when he found the ghouls desecrating the graves and eating the dead, and decided to dedicated his time to stopping them. His personal weakness, "Graveyard Ghouls", represents a pack of ghoul graverobbers and carrions, which disables his ability to retrieve cards from discard pile until he kills them... which would be only a temporary solution, unless he wastes his signature on them.
Experience Booster: "Bury Them Deep" adds a defeated non-elite enemy to the victory display instead of discarding it and gives every investigator 1 Victory.
Hunter of Monsters: His backstory mentions that he was fighting ghouls even before the story started.
Lightning Bruiser: Downplayed, on top of a part of their card pool, Yorick inherits from Guardians their strong Combat value (4) and high Health (8), making him one of the best fighters among Survivors, and he is not hindered by bad agility unlike most Guardians, as he has 3. Instead the weakness he has in common with members of his secondary class is low sanity (6) and middling Willpower (3).
Loot-Making Attack: Yorick can play asset cards from his discard pile whenever he defeats an enemy (paying their cost). His Elder Sign effect also allows him to return a card from his discard pile to his hand, and unlike his main ability, it can even return skills and events, not just assets.
Meaningful Name: He's a grave digger...
Shout-Out: His entire character is one to Hamlet (and its author), both in name and profession.
Starving Artist: He wanted to be a Shakespearean Actor, but as his backstory attests, "dramatic monologues didn't put bread on the table".
Too Awesome to Use: His signature allows to permanently kill one enemy for the duration of the scenario, but as you have just one shot, it's all too easy to wait for "perfect moment" and end up not using it at all, especially if it ends up discarded by some treachery.

Lola Hayes

Lola Hayes, the Actress

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_lola.png

Perhaps this would be her big comeback

Lola has performed to sold-out houses worldwide, but no play has been as haunting or as odd as The King in Yellow. Even during rehearsals, everything about it brought calamity and dread. When her co-star, Miriam, was found floating dead in the Seine, she decided she'd had enough, and penned a letter to the director explaining that her next performance would be her last. Now she heads home to Arkham for one final show, hoping she can finally be rid of this dreadful play.

Neutral-class investigator. Has access to cards of any class (up to level 3). Has an increased deck size of 35 cards.

Action Survivor: Her adaptiveness is a clear case of Gameplay and Story Segregation, as Lola herself is just an actress with no special training or magic abilities, who has to adapt to the eldritch horrors, or perish.
Balance Buff: Unlike other Investigators who recieved Taboo to to lower their effectiveness and strenghts to avoid letting them overshadow most investigators completely, Lola got some improvements to avoid letting her end up as a Master of None:
- First off, she gained the ability to change role by spending an action, without triggering attacks of opportunity, on top of being able to change it as a free action once per turn: this makes less likely for Lola to end up in a "dead" role for a turn after playing all card she could in that role, on top of letting her spend her last action to be in a role she wants to be to play cards outside the investigation phase.
- Second, her personal weakness, "Identity Crisis", got nerfed to only force her to discard 1 asset in play or from her hand matching her current role, instead of every matching asset in play. Originally, her weakness more or less forced Lola to focus mostly on events and skills, as playing too many assets would lead all of her progress being undone in one fell swoop. Now her weakness can make her discard something important, but won't leave her completely butt naked.
Draw Extra Cards: "Improvisation", on top of instantly switching her role and giving her temporal discount for next card she plays, lets Lola to draw 1 extra card.
Glass Cannon: She has below-average Health and Sanity (6), making her rather fragile.
Jack of All Stats: She has all stats set to 3 out of 5, probably done so that she can make reasonable use of every card she has access to.
Jack of All Trades: Can access cards of any class (up to 3 level), making her one of the most versatile investigators in the game. However, it's not recommended to invest in more than 3 classes at once, due to the way her "Roles" system works.
Loss of Identity: Her personal weakness, "Identity Crisis", forces her to discard all cards of her current "role" which she currently has in play, and then discard first card of her deck, switching her to its class's "role" (if weakness was discarded, she switches to "neutral" instead, meaning she can't use non-neutral cards).
"I've played so many roles. Madness is to be expected".
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She's one of the few Neutral investigators, and has access to every class (although only up to level 3). But she needs to change her "role" during the game to actually use them (though assets already put in play will continue working), and each "role" has access to only one class (besides Neutral). To compensate for this, she has a slightly bigger deck size than usual, allowing her more liberty with deck-building. To prevent Crippling Overspecialisation (and actually put her abilities to use), she is forced to use at least three non-Neutral classes.
The Power of Acting: She can change her character class (or, as her ability calls it, "role") in the middle of the game (either through her signature ability, or via her signature card, "Improvisation", which also decreases the cost of the first card of the new "role" by a huge amount), and with it, available cards.
Reduced Mana Cost: Lola's signature event "Improvisation" reduced the cost of the next card she plays by 3, but only if it matches her current role.
Sole Survivor: If present during the first scenario of The Path to Carcosa, she gains a unique prologue, which shows her as the only person involved in the play who survived it, at least with her sanity intact.
Stance System: She can switch between "roles" (changing her class), with only cards matching her current "role" being playable; Neutral cards are always available, and she can keep the assets she's already put in play. She can change her current "role" either manually (once per round), or by drawing Elder Sign. Her signature event card, "Improvisation", allows her to change the role immediately and then puts something from that role into play with massive discount (as well as draw an extra card, so she would have something to pick from).

Introduced in The Forgotten Age expansion

Leo Anderson

Leo Anderson, the Expedition Leader

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_leo2.png

"Keep moving. You can die on your own time".

Leo Anderson has spent his whole life getting into the deadliest and most obscure corners of the globe. Along the way, he's lost good people. He often questions whether such academic pursuits have been worth the lives lost. His most recent expedition, an ill-fated voyage to Nan Madol to recover Olosopha's Almanac, ended in complete disaster. Mitch was the only one of his people to survive, or at the very least, to remain human. Leo is sick of burying people who trusted him. But now he knows these expeditions aren't purely academic in nature - and he won't quit until the job is done.

Guardian-class investigator. Has access to Rogue cards (up to level 2).

Anti-Frustration Features:
- Because of how the ruling of playing asset works, if Leo has already a non-unique (read:generic) ally down, only to play his signature ally, Mitch Brown, he won't have to discard the allies already put down to make "space" for him, as Mitch will provide Leo the extra slots and then make him check if he needs to discard anyone for him.
- Leo's main ability is not considered a play "action" for the porpuses of triggering attacks of opportunity, so he can safely play allies at the start of his turn even if he is engaged with an enemy.
Draw Extra Cards: His Elder Sign lets him search top 3 cards of his deck for an Ally, and draw it.
Gameplay and Story Segregation: Story-wise, Leo suffers from Survivor Guilt and wishes to avoid any more casualties under his watch. Gameplay-wise, he's encouraged to rely on his Allies as meat shield and, and his stock starting deck even encourages him to take Decorated Skull, which accumulates charges when anyone dies near it, friend or foe (though his personal weakness does make him discard his Allies to put them out of danger).
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed; while Leo obviously can't replace actual dedicated Seeker, he doesn't struggle as much as many other Guardians when looking for clues, thanks to having 3 Intellect (above average for his class) and access to some off-class cards which can help him find more clues. Leo's native class and good 8 Health and 4 Combat would protect him while he's busy with his research.
Item Caddy: His playstyle is built around using a large amount of Allies; compared to the other investigators, he can access them more cheaply and, with the help of his signature Ally, Mitch Brown, he can have several Allies in play simultaneously. His Elder Sign effect adds to this playstyle as well, allowing him to look at the top 3 cards of his deck for an Ally card and draw it.
The Leader:
- He was the leader of an ill-fated Yucatan expedition in his backstory.
- If he is a part of the team during The Forgotten Age campaign, the campaign guide enforces him into position of the lead investigator (if they're present, he can be replaced by Ursula Downs or Monterey Jack instead).
- All his abilities are related to Ally cards, motivating you to include many of them in his deck. He can even put in play several non-unique Allies at once, thanks to his signature Ally, Mitch Brown.
The Men First: He won't allow any of his friends to die because of him. His personal weakness, "Bought in Blood", forces him to discard one Ally card from play or all Allies from hand, leaving him vulnerable.
Mighty Glacier: He's slow even by Guardian standards; he has only 1 Agility, worst in his class and one of the worst in general. This not only makes him unable to escape ambushes without cards which can boost his Agility, but also makes him extremely vulnerable to Agility-testing treacheries.
My Greatest Failure: He led seven men into Nan Madol. Only he and Mitch made it back alive. He will protect his new team, no matter the cost.
Spared by the Adaptation: Unlike Leo's original appearance in Arkham Horror, Mitch survived the ill-fated expedition with his sanity intact and is still following Leo.
Survivor Guilt: He suffers from survivor complex ever since the ill-fated Nan Madol expedition, still feeling that he failed his men and let them die, while surviving himself. As result, he developed his "no one gets left behind" mindset, which may doom him instead.
Unscrupulous Hero: Has access to Rogue class cards; as long as he can get the job done and protect his friends, he is willing to fight dirty or deal with shady people.
We Have Reserves: Leo's emphasis on making the most of Allies means he also has plenty of people absorbing damage and horror in his place, making him among one of the most resilient Guardians (on top of already having 8 Health). Mitch Brown amplifies this further, giving him 2 extra Ally slots for non-unique ones, providing him with even more tanking.

Ursula Downs

Ursula Downs, the Explorer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_ursula2.png

"Discovery is easy. Understanding is the hard part".

Not many people can say that they've climbed a mountain on every continent. Fewer still can say they've stolen a golden idol from a tribe of cannibals. Among women in a male-dominated society, Ursula is unique in being able to make these sorts of claims. Ever since she was a small girl, Ursula has broken the rules set down for her, climbing trees, playing in the mud, exploring the woods, and doing plenty of other things that a "proper young lady shouldn't be doing." Since getting a degree in archaeology in Boston, she has been traveling the world searching for forgotten civilizations.

Seeker-class investigator. Has access to "Relic" cards of any class (up to level 4).

Action Girl: It's mentioned in her backstory that she was always the active, exploring type. She also has average Health and Sanity (meaning she is not as vulnerable physically as other Seekers) and 4 Agility (great in general, and certainly best amongst Seekers), making her more able to survive on her own than most of other investigators of her class, as long as she manages to avoid actually engaging monsters head-on.
Adventurer Archaeologist: She has a passion for adventure and archaeology. Perhaps a little too much, because it caused her problems on more than one occasion, and potentially can cause them again, through her personal weakness.
Blue Blood: She's got a hefty inheritance, but she used it to set up her work.
Boring, but Practical: Jake Williams lets Ursula draw 1 card when she reveals a new location or puts location into play; this ability isn't particularly impressive, but it costs her nothing and can come up rather often in some scenarios.
Curiosity Killed the Cast: Her personal weakness, "Call of the Unknown", forces her to explore another location until the end of her turn, even if it is detrimental to the current mission; otherwise she suffers horror.
Draw Extra Cards: Jake Williams lets Ursula draw 1 card when she reveals or puts into play a new location.
Expy: Female Adventurer Archaeologist from rich aristocratic family, who spends her time and money on expeditions in dangerous corners of Earth, in search for long-lost artifacts. Sound familiar?
Extra Turn: Once per round, after moving, she gets a chance to immediately investigate her new location without spending any extra actions. This is a part of her representing mobility-based Seeker archetype.
Fragile Speedster: She's one of the few Seekers to have 4 Agility, which allows her to easily run away from many monsters, as well as deal with many otherwise-dangerous treacheries. She also has the Elder Sign ability which allows her to move to connected location without spending actions. But if she actually tries to engage the enemy head-on, it likely wouldn't end well, as she has only 1 Combat.
The Sneaky Guy: She's meant to always being on the move, avoiding direct engagements like fire, which is definitely made easier thanks to her 4 Agility. Her signature Ally, Jake Williams, lets her first move or investigate actions each turn to not provoke attacks of opportunity, meaning that she can gather clues or run away right under enemy's nose.
The Leader: If she is a part of the team during the Forgotten Age campaign, the campaign guide forces her into the position of lead investigator (if present, she can be replaced by Leo Anderson or Monterey Jack).
Treasure Hunter: While her subtitle is "The Explorer", Ursula main card options outside Seeker and Neutral cards are "Relic" cards (which are mostly powerful asset cards taking up an accessory or hand slot). Given the main way to obtain certain cards is to gather experience on the field to purchase them, it is not unlikely for Ursula to have found them during her investigation.

Finn Edwards

Finn Edwards, the Bootlegger

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_finn2.png

"Never lose track of the exit. Or the merchandise".

Prohibition was the best thing that ever happened to Finn Edwards. Until they banned alcohol, he was just drifting through life, doing odd jobs here and there. But afterward, the demand for alcohol rose to such a fever pitch that he was able to make a living evading the law and giving people what they wanted. His new lifestyle particularly suited his personality, providing him with a taste of danger and plenty of cash. He never got caught and never lost a delivery. Now he's wrapped up in some kind of supernatural conspiracy, but in the end, he adheres to the same principles: Deliver the goods. Don't get caught.

Rogue-class investigator. Has limited (only up to level 3) access to his own class, but unlimited access to any "Illicit" cards, regardless of class, and up to 5 Seeker/Survivor level 0 cards.

Action Survivor: Downplayed; while Bootleggers are hardly defenceless, they do not see as much action as gangsters and other criminals. Fittingly, he has (limited) access to Survivor cards.
Backstab:
- His .38 "Trusty" deals bonus damage when used against enemies not engaged with you — particularly, when he attacks the enemies who attacks someone other than him.
- His Elder Sign effect has the bonus scaling with the number of exhausted enemies. Though it's useful in any task, not just combat.
Crippling Overspecialisation: He can't take high-level cards unless they have the "Illicit" trait, which not only gives him very few off-class cards, but also restricts him from many good cards of his own class.
Damn, It Feels Good to Be a Gangster!: He considers his life as a bootlegger to be best thing that ever happened to him.
Draw Extra Cards: "Smuggled Goods" lets him search either his discard pile, or top 9 cards of his deck, for Illicit card, and draw it; doing the latter isn't guaranteed to work, but lets him shuffle the event back instead of discarding, so he can try that again later.
Extra Turn: Finn has an extra action each turn to evade, which allows him to exhaust an enemy and still have enough actions left to capitalise on that.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed, he has very good Intellect (4), but also decent fight (3), so he can defend himself if his deck is built for combat and/or he needs to stand his ground, but his ability and signature cards encourage him to evade rather than confront enemies head on.
Item Caddy: Finn has unrestricted access to Illicit cards, and has special signature card, "Smuggled Goods", which allows him to quickly find such cards in either his deck or discard pile; as an added bonus, drawing from the deck makes him shuffle "Smuggled Goods" into deck instead of discarding it, making it relatively easily reusable.
Lightning Bruiser: Downplayed. Finn's 3 Combat makes him stronger than most Rogues, but it is still only average in the game overall; instead it would be better for him to avoid unwanted confrontations through his 4 Agility. His Health and Sanity are merely average, but that also means unlike most investigators, he is not more particularly vulnerable to either damage or horror specifically.
The Smart Guy: He has access to some Seeker cards, and has an impressive 4 Intellect to work with.
The Sneaky Guy:
- He is an (in)famous smuggler who never gets caught.
- He is great for stealthy accumulation of clues, due to having good Agility (and a bonus action specifically for Evasion), good Intellect, and access to some Seeker cards. Additionally, his Elder Sign effect allows him, if he succeeds with good enough result, to find an extra clue.
So Much for Stealth: His personal weakness, "Caught Red-Handed", causes all enemies in his location to get ready, and all "Hunter" monsters to move one step closer to him, which, if it happens at the worst moment, can lead to him being hopelessly overwhelmed. Or not only him.
Stealth Expert: He has one bonus action each round specifically to Evade.
Token Evil Teammate: He is trying to save the world (and will do so if he succeeds), but he is still an unrepentant criminal.
Venturous Smuggler:
- His main "job" is to smuggle goods to whoever is willing to pay for them; he's very good at it.
- Him being a smuggler manifests as part of his mechanics. His signature card, "Smuggled Goods", allows him to quickly find "Illicit" cards in either his deck or discard pile, and draw them.

Father Mateo

Father Mateo Castile, the Priest

Mateo Castile's life has not been easy since he became a priest. Recent decades in Mexico have been wracked with instability and conflict. Father Mateo struggled to balance his faith with the pragmatic concerns of preaching when the law told him he must not. But this is not what has assaulted Mateo's faith at its core. The nearby murders and kidnappings were not politically motivated, as he had suspected. A gruesome and horrid cult thrives at the heart of the brewing war. How, Mateo wonders, could a kind and loving God allow what he saw that night to exist?

Mystic-class investigator. Has access to Blessed cards of any class (up to level 3). Receives free exp at the deck creation.

Badass Preacher: He decided to take a more proactive role in fighting the forces of evil, and joined the team in their quest to save humanity.
Crippling Overspecialisation: When he was originally released, he had very few off-class options, due to the "Blessed" trait not being very common. He got a large infusion of new off-class cards with the release of the The Innsmouth Conspiracy Cycle, but this obviously requires buying another expansion besides his own.
Crisis of Faith: Mentioned in the backstory, he wonders how a kind God can allow such a horrible cult as Yig's to do horrific things to people.
Critical Hit: His Elder Sign makes him pass whatever skill test he's doing automatically, and gives one other bonus of his choice.
Draw Extra Cards: His Elder Sign gives him the choice between two options, one of them is to draw 1 card and get 1 resource.
Extra Turn: His Elder Sign gives him the choice between two options, one of them taking an extra action (but only if it's his turn).
It Only Works Once: He has a built-in ability to ignore Auto-failure token (or let the other player to ignore), counting it as Elder Sign instead, but only once per scenario.
No-Sell: Once per scenario he can ignore (or allow other investigators to ignore) the Auto-failure chaos token, and instead treat it as an Elder Sign (which for himself means auto-success).
Religion is Magic: It never gets explicitly confirmed whether there's any connection, but Mateo, a Catholic priest, not only belongs to the Mystic class (the magic class in the game), but also has access to Blessed cards, many of which are dedicated to turning the tides of fate in investigators' favour and/or have religious themes themselves. His backstory also omits where he even learned magic, leaving his faith and devotion as the possible explanation.
Snake People: His personal weakness is "Serpents of Yig", a group of Yig-serving serpent people. They work by "sealing" the Elder Sign token, making it unavailable for anyone until you kill them.
Token Minority: He's native to Mexico, and only his personal mission brought him to Arkham.
Too Awesome to Use: Mateo is one of the few Investigators with an once per game ability, but he allows him to instantly treat an Auto-Fail Token as an Elder Sign Token. Needless to say, most players wait on using it until they really cannot afford to fail a test. Similarly, his "Codex of Ages" allow him to seal the Elder Sign on it (Boosting his Willpower as long as he holds it), and give him the option to discard it to reveal it in place of a random Chaos Token; this is however more abusable if Mateo has ways to recur the Codex from his discard pile.
White Mage: While he doesn't specialise specifically in healing, Mateo's playstyle favours him taking the supporting role, putting his magic to assist other investigators.
- Mateo has access to Blessed cards of any class (up to level 3); most of them are either support-related, or dedicated to changing the stakes in investigators' favour.
- His signature card, "Codex of Ages", allows him to "seal" the Elder Sign token, in order to reveal it at the most crucial moment (discarding "Codex of Ages" in process) instead of revealing a random chaos token.

Calvin Wright

Calvin Wright, the Damned

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_03_calwin_wright.jpg

"If you hurt him, I'll kill you".

Sometimes, life gives you a choice: accept the lot that is given to you or stand up for who you are and what you believe. Calvin chose the latter. On the edge of death, bleeding out on the side of a dirt road, he received a vision - a terrifying vision of the Earth, sundered, and João, the love of his life, turning to ash in the vortex of a blazing inferno. Then, Calvin made another choice. He reached out to the darkness and pulled it within him. He would not die, not today. The world needed him. João needed him.

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to level "Spirit" (up to level 3) cards of any class.

Boring, but Practical: His signature card, "Until the End of Time", has only one function: Calvin may assign damage or horror he receives to it (even direct damage and direct horror, which normally can't be assigned to assets at all). Can be very handy when you have little health or sanity left to spare.
Crippling Overspecialisation: On original release of The Forgotten Age expansion, he had very few off-class options, due to "Spirit" not being very common trait. The amount of Spirit cards has increased since then, with the largest infusion coming with Nathaniel Cho's starter pack.
Gathering Steam: He starts with every skill set to zero. He can increase them by suffering damage and horror (potentially putting himself above other Survivors stat-wise), but his Health and Sanity are amongst the weakest in the game, too, meaning he can't spare much. It's crucial to supply him with the right set of cards if he plans to survive until the end of campaign. This playstyle also often makes him benefit from traumas, as starting already damaged gives him early game stat boost.
Glass Cannon: Enforced, not only does Calvin has below average Health and Sanity (both at 6), but he is encouraged to take damage and horror, as his Combat and Agility raise by 1 for each damage he has and his Willpower and Intellect are also increased by 1 point for each horror on him. With only 1 Health and Sanity remaining, Calvin has an impressive 5 in every stat, but one enemy attack or failed treachery will spell his doom if he cannot nullify it or tank the damage and/or horror on other assets of his. Because of this mechanic, anything that raises Calvin's max Health and Sanity is especially valuable, as that means he can also increase his stats further.
Heal Thyself: His Elder Sign allows him to heal (or take, for associated buffs) some damage or horror.
Heroic Willpower: It takes a great amount of willpower to keep all the darkness Calvin has contained within you. Unfortunately, with most of his strength dedicated to keeping the evil forces inside, Calvin has little left for anything else, thus his abysmal stats.
Heroic Spirit: Beside Survivor and Neutral cards, Calvin has access to Spirit cards, representing his resolve and determination to go on in spite of not having much time left.
Master of All: With enough damage and horror on him, Calvin can have a 5 in every skill, matching every investigator best in a certain field, the problem is that it takes him time to get there.
Master of None: Played With. He is the only investigator to have 0 at any stat, let alone all of them, yet he is also the only investigator who may bring all his stats to 5 even before applying any cards; fully-powered Calvin is actually above average.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: All his skills are set to zero, but every damage or horror he suffers increases them, maxing out when he stays at 1 Stamina and Sanity.
Mysterious Past: His backstory explains very little about him.
Pain & Gain: His stats increase for each damage/horror he has.
Sealed Inside a Person-Shaped Can: Calvin deliberately gets possessed by evil, to imprison it within himself with pure willpower. That same evil also acts as his personal weakness, "Voice of the Messenger", gradually destroying him by giving him physical and mental traumas.
Twofer Token Minority: Black and gay. Especially notable by the lights of 1920s culture.
Your Days Are Numbered: His personal weakness, "Voice of the Messenger", causes him either Physical or Mental trauma (and instantly deals 1 direct damage/horror) whenever it's drawn. Sooner or later, it will kill him, meaning he must fight on while he still has strength left.

Introduced in The Circle Undone expansion

Carolyn Fern

Carolyn Fern, the Psychologist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_carolyne.png

"The mind is fragile, but through understanding, we can protect it".

Visiting psychologist Carolyn Fern's newest patient is Josephine Ruggles, an heiress whose nightmares leave glyph-shaped wounds across her back. Miss Ruggles's case is unusual, even for an institution like Arkham Sanatorium. Her case takes an even stranger turn after she claims to have met Malachi - Carolyn's former patient whose treatment was cut short when he was brutally murdered - in her dreams. When Carolyn uses hypnotherapy to address Josephine's trauma, they find themselves both journeying to a strange place Josephine calls "the Dreamlands".

Guardian-class investigator. Has limited (only up to level 3) access to her own class, and can't use "Weapon" cards higher than level 0, but has unlimited access to any Sanity-healing cards, regardless of class (though restriction about weapons still applies). She also may include up to 15 other Seeker and Mystic cards (up to level 1).

Action Survivor: She has pretty normal profession of a psychologist, and lacks prior experience fighting eldritch horrors (in fact, she doesn't even believe in their magic nature, if her personal weakness "Rational Thought" is any indicator).
Cats Are Magic: Her replacement signature card, Dream Land-born cat Foolishness, provides her with a flat boost to all stats...as long as she keeps it at full Sanity (and it enters play with only 1 Sanity remaining, out of 4); fortunately, any effect which can heal horror on Carolyn herself, can affect Foolishness as well.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- She can't access high-level cards of any class (including her own, where she is restricted to level 3), unless they contain words "heals horror", though she can access some cards of Seeker and Mystic classes (up to level 1). She also can't use Weapon cards above level 0, which restricts her card pool further.
- She is good for horror-healing...and little else. She has good Intellect, but to put it to good use she must include several Seeker cards in her deck.
Draw Extra Cards: When she heals someone with "Hypnotherapy", that investigator draws 1 card.
Early-Bird Cameo: She was originally introduced as a bonus investigator (with a set of replacement signature cards and weaknesses) for anyone who bought the novella about her, before being re-introduced in The Circle Undone Cycle.
Exact Words: As clarified in the FAQ, she can include cards in her deck as long as they contain words "heals horror", even if it means they heal it on themselves (like Peter Sylvestre, a Survivor-class "Ally"), or in very specific circumstances (like "Cheat Death", a Rogue-class card which triggers on defeat via damage or horror, restoring a portion of health and sanity).
Flat-Earth Atheist: Her personal weakness, "Rational Thought" (which even has the "Flaw" trait) disallows her to heal horror from anything else but this card (it enters play with 4 horror, which may be healed as if it belongs to Carolyn herself); you can't help people whose sanity was damaged by eldritch horrors if you can't truly accept them as something beyond the scope of traditional/current science.
The Medic: Her main role in the team is horror healing.
- She may include any horror-healing card in her deck (regardless of class), though the restriction about high-level "Weapons" still applies.
- Her signature card, "Hypnotic Therapy", is a stable and effective way to heal horror on herself or her teammates: it can either heal some horror on its own (albeit with a risk of failure), or boost effect of other horror-healing card instead.
- Her Elder Sign effect allows her to heal 1 horror from investigator or "Ally" card in her location.
Money Multiplier: When Carolyn heals horror from an Investigator or their Allies (herself included), she gives them 1 resource.
Production Foreshadowing: Her backstory features the Dreamlands, and her replacement cards provided along with her novella (which was released before her proper introduction in The Circle Undone expansion) references it as well. The very next expansion after The Circle Undone takes place in the Dreamlands.
The Shrink: Her job. Now, she uses her skills as a psychologist to help her friends survive eldritch horrors.
The Smart Guy: What she lacks in Combat, she makes up for in Intellect (having 4 basic Intellect, highest in her class), so when there's nobody to heal, she can investigate for clues. She can also use some Seeker cards (up to level 1) to better utilise these wits.
Squishy Wizard: While she can't access high-level Weapons (or any non-neutral cards except for those related to horror healing, even from her own class, for that matter), she can partially compensate for this with access to Mystic cards. Unfortunately, none of her stats except for Intellect are particularly good, with Combat and Agility being the worst (both at 2). She also inverts Guardians' typical balance of Health and Sanity, having 6 Health and 9 Sanity (making her weaker physically, but stronger mentally).
Support Party Member: She is great at healing horror and, being a Guardian, has access to many teamwork-related tools (even if she can't access the high-level ones).
This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: Her replacement personal weakness, "To Fight the Black Wind", due to the way it works (it increases Doom on current agenda as long as any investigator suffers horror and isn't healed until the end of the round), can potentially make her normally purely-supportive abilities crucial for team's survival. Of course, it was her weakness which caused this in the first place, but still.
Utility Party Member: Despite being a Guardian, she lacks access to either high-level cards of her class, or any Weapons above level 0, as well as has poor Combat and Health; she has access to some Mystic cards, but it's too limited to make her a good combat mage. Instead, she acts as dedicated healer, with unrestricted access to Sanity-healing cards (excluding high-tier Weapons).
Weak, but Skilled: While Carolyn's endurance is above-average (she has a sum of 15 Health/Sanity total, instead of 14), she has below-average stats (11 stat points total, instead of normal 12), and extremely limited access to her own class' card pool (lacking access to high-level cards, and any Weapons above level 0). But she's the best horror healer, with added benefit of giving her target free resources. Her off-class access to Seeker and Mystic makes her a versatile support investigator, on top of being able to take any card that heals horror, giving her a surprisingly varied deckbuilding option of cards among all classes.

Joe Diamond

Joe Diamond, the Private Eye

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_joe.png

Joe Diamond is a private eye with a reputation for handling cases that everyone else regards as supernatural nonsense. He is thorough in his investigations and not one to be trifled with. His services have been employed by the wealthy as well as those down on their luck. No case is too large, too small, too strange, or too dangerous. In Joe's experience, things start getting nasty right when you start reaching the truth, and that is exactly where he likes to be.

Seeker-class investigator. Has access to Guardian cards (up to level 2). Has an increased deck size of 40 cards.

Anti-Frustration Features:
- Because he's required to always have at least 11 Insight events in his deck, his decksize is bigger at 40 cards (instead of standard 30), so he would still be able to build his deck the way he wants.
- After Joe was released, additional rulings specified that an asset is played before cards that would occupy the same slot as that asset are discarded. While for the most part this doesn't impact other investigators, it is a big relief for Joe as that means if he played tools taking hand slots and then his Detective's Colt 1911s (which take 2 hand slots, but also give 2 additional ones exclusively for Tool assets), he won't have to discard the Tools to "make space" for his weapon.
Big Guy: Unusually for a Seeker, he can be the team's designated fighter, having good Guardian-grade 8 Health and 4 Combat, and being able to use Guardian-class cards. He pays for it with low 6 Sanity and 2 Willpower, which are below average for Seekers.
Expy: Specifically based on Sam Spade from "Maltese Falcon", including his name.
Genius Bruiser: Unlike most Seekers, he can not only investigate for clues, but also kick asses. This is good, since the actual Guardian in this expansion is not exactly fit for combat.
Glass Cannon: As noted by the "Starter Decklist" manual, Joe below-average Willpower and Agility (both are an embarrassing 2) makes him very vulnerable to treacheries that deal damage and horror; the latter is especially concerning given his low Sanity, but even his high Health can get chew through quickly if he is not careful. He can mitigate it with Willpower and Agility boosting and/or healing cards present both in the Guardian and Seeker card pool, but his best bet is to leverage his good Combat and Intellect (both are at 4) to defeat any threat and gather clues quickly and finish scenarios before he gets overwhelmed.
Guns Akimbo: His signature card is a pair of "Colts".
Gut Feeling: He has a second deck specifically for Insight events.
Hardboiled Detective: Joe is tough as nails, and given to taking most risky jobs available. Depending on the team's composition, he can actually take the role of the main fighter.
Item Caddy: Joe has extra deck for Insight events, which he can play at reduced price. He's actually mandated to have at least 11 such cards in his deck.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: He has a second deck specifically for Insight events, which he can play at reduced cost. To make it easier to keep it filled, his Elder Sign can move events from discard pile into "hunch deck".
Mighty Glacier: While Joe is tougher than most Seekers, he's also one of the slower ones, having only 2 Agility.
Path of Most Resistance: Has this approach to his job, thinking that if the danger increases, it means he is on the right track:
"In Joe's experience, things start getting nasty right when you start reaching the truth, and that is exactly where he likes to be".
Private Detective: He's working as private detective; his latest case is what got him involved in this mess.
Reduced Mana Cost: Joe's events played from his "Hunch deck" get a cost reduction of -2 resources.
Revolvers Are Just Better: Uses two Colt revolvers as his signature "Weapon" card. As additional gimmicks, they allow him to use up to 2 "Tool" assets without taking any "Hand" slots, and, if he uses them to defeat a monster, allow him to move one Insight event from discard pile into "Hunch deck".
That One Case: His personal weakness, "Unsolved Case". It is placed in his "Hunch deck" at the start of the game, and once revealed, must be "played" before the end of current round (which would eliminate it from the game), or he will receive two fewer experience points at the end of scenario (symbolising him failing his task and not getting paid).

Preston Fairmont

Preston Fairmont, the Millionaire

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_preston.png

"My money, my legacy, my problem. Let me handle it in my own way".

Preston Fairmont never thought much about where his family's money came from. All he knew was that he had plenty, and he took great advantage of it whenever possible. His father seemed troubled at times, and tried to explain about his grandfather's business and the demands of something called the Hermetic Order of the Silver Twilight, but Preston never paid any mind. Then his father died in a mysterious car accident, and Preston's family fortune has since become his responsibility. Now Carl Sanford, president of the Silver Twilight Lodge, wants to meet with Preston personally. Perhaps for the first time, Preston has begun to really think about where his family's money came from...

Rogue-class investigator. Has access to Survivor cards (up to level 2). He can't use any "Illicit" cards.

Action Survivor: He is not a trained fighter or expert occultist, he's just very, very rich. Fittingly, he has access to Survivor cards.
Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: There's no limit how much money he can acquire through his inheritance.
Coattail-Riding Relative: He's a rich boy who lived off of daddy's money, never bothering to care about little things like the Silver Twilight Lodge.
Crimefighting with Cash:
- He uses his inheritance to fund his operations—and thus has a constant stream of free resources. "Coincidentally", the same expansion introduced several new cards which either directly turns resources into success, or allows him to boost stats.
- His Elder Sign ability allows him to spend some resources to automatically succeed on any skill test.
Dark Secret: Only after his dad's death does he learn how his family became so rich. Now the Lodge wants him to pay his family's "debts". His "debts" are not just part of his backstory; if "Lodge 'Debts'" enters his hand and he doesn't pay them off before the end of the scenario, he suffers mental trauma.
Gameplay and Story Integration:
- Since he is ridiculously rich, he has the best access to resources amongst all investigators.
- His family's "debts" to the Silver Twilight Lodge are not just part of his backstory, and serve as his personal weakness; if they ever enter his hand, he must pay them off (paying 10 resources at once) before scenario ends, or he will suffer mental trauma.
Jack of All Stats: What he is meant to be. He starts with abysmal stats, but, if supplied with the right set of cards, can adapt to any role thanks to being able to afford even the most expensive cards.
Lethal Joke Character: He is a trust fund kid with an awful statline: how effective can he be? Turns out, very much, because he can afford expensive cards that would leave investigators bankrupt every turn.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Instead of gaining resources the normal way, he puts them on his bank account (which acts as a "Permanent" asset), where he can either use them right away, or transfer to his personal supply. Resources in the bank account refreshes each turn.
Magikarp Power: Preston has only 1 at each skill, making it crucial to level him up and get the right set of cards to actually put to good use his never-ending stream of resources.
Master of None: Played With. He has abysmal 1-1-1-1 statline, leaving him no chance to pass any skill tests on his own. But his extremely strong economy makes him able to regularly use expensive cards to either get much-needed stats boosts or directly spend resources for the desired results, which makes his low basic stats into non-issue. Additionally, his secondary class is Survivor, which has tons of cards built for comeback from botched skill tests or to face the impossible odds.
Non-Action Guy: Being forbidden to take Illicit cards, Preston can't access any Rogue-class Weapons (and there are not that many Survivor-class ones), and also many of the combat-oriented events. Besides these gaps, he has abysmal basic Combat and Agility.
Non-Idle Rich: He might be wealthy, but he goes around investigating. He wasn't always like this, though.
Unscrupulous Hero: Played With. He can't use "Illicit" cards (despite being a Rogue), but can access the rest of his class' pool, including their dirty tactics and "Allies" with criminal backgrounds.
Upper-Class Twit: At first. He didn't care about the occult, he just liked the money.
Waistcoat of Style: Matches the time period, after all.
Unskilled, but Strong: Preston has abysmal stats, but has the strong enough economy to just bruteforce his way through the game by spending cash on stronger cards on regular basis. It helps that many Rogue cards, particularly those introduced in same expansion as him, benefit from investigator's resources supply rather than stats, or give strong stat boosts but require regular resources infusions which others can't afford.

Diana Stanley

Diana Stanley, the Redeemed Cultist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_diana.png

As a new business owner in Arkham, Diana Stanley was proud to be inducted into the prestigious Silver Twilight Lodge. Her joy has since turned to dread. Her admittance into the organization was fantastic for business, but the weekly meetings have grown more and more disturbing. After witnessing strange rituals and terrible secrets, Diana has become suspicious of the Lodge's true nature. Now she is convinced that there are terrible forces converging on Arkham, and that the Lodge is somehow involved. Diana has resolved to take it down from the inside, regardless of the cost.

Mystic-class investigator. Has access to Guardian cards (up to level 2). Has an increased deck size of 35 cards.

Anti-Frustration Features: She's meant to put her cards beneath her sheet to get more Willpower. So she has extra decksize to still have enough of her deck left once she dumps the cards she can spare.
The Atoner: She feels so much remorse over what the Silver Twilight Lodge has done that she will undo everything related to them.
Cult Defector: After seeing just how horrifying some rituals of the Silver Twilight Inner Sanctum were, Diana desperately wants to atone for supporting them.
Devious Daggers: As the former cultist, she still carries her old dagger, "Twilight Blade", granted by the Silver Twilight Lodge for her loyalty, as her signature card. It's imbued with magic, and allows to use Willpower instead of Strength when attacking (though she has to find some ways to improve her Willpower first to make it useful), as well as draw the cards from under her sheet as if they're in her hand.
Draw Extra Cards:
- When Diana puts a card beneath her sheet as result of her ability's effect, she draws 1 card to replace it (and gains 1 resource).
- Her Elder Sign effect lets her draw 1 card beneath her sheet.
Gathering Steam: Average at every stat... except Willpower (crucial stat for any self-respecting Mystic), which is set to 1. She can increase it with her special abilities, as long as she has cards to sacrifice (she can return them with her Elder Sign, or play them directly from there via her signature card, "Twilight Blade"), with maximum allowed number of cards giving her 6 basic Willpower, which is above normal maximum.
Heroic BSoD: Her knowledge of the Lodge's dark secrets took a big toll on her sanity and willpower, hence her... not exactly stellar basic stats. What's worse is her personal weakness, appropriately named "Dark Secret", which forces her to either discard the cards under her sheet or suffer horror for each one she chooses to keep.
Jack of All Stats: Beside her unimpressive 1 Willpower (worst in the class), all her other stats are average, which allows her to still be useful in other non-spellcasting tasks. By leveraging her Guardian card-pool she can make use of her Intellect, Combat and Agility to find clues, fighting and evading enemies while she builds her Willpower to be able to cast spells effectively.
Magic Knight: Diana has decent 3 Combat, and can access some Guardian cards to put it to good use, allowing her to stand her ground in non-magic combat as well, particularly while she's still accumulating Willpower to cast magic. The expansion where she appears in also introduced dual-class items, including a Guardian/Mystic magic sword, "Enchanted Blade" (though she can't use the Guardian-only upgrade to it, due to level restrictions).
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Unlike the other Mystics, she starts with only 1 Willpower, and has to increase it to more decent level by putting the cards under her investigator sheet. If she needs them, she may later retrieve them via her Elder Sign.
No-Sell: Her other signature card, the "Dark Insight" event, allows Diana to cancel effects on one treachery or even weakness card drawn in her location by any investigator (including herself) and shuffle them back into deck.
The Mole: She works to destroy the Silver Twilight Lodge from within. During The Circle Undone campaign, she may potentially succeed at this, either getting Carl Sanford arrested or replacing him.
Squishy Wizard: Notably one of the few Mystics to avert this trope: she has well-balanced stats overall, instead of having glaring weakness in either Health, Combat and/or Agility, which makes her less vulnerable, even in comparison to investigators from the other classes. Access to Guardian-class cards also gives her some tools to further increase her survivability.
Unblockable Attack: "Terrible Secret" cannot be cancelled, perhaps to account for Diana's propensity on packing cards with treachery-blocking effects.

Marie Lambeau

Marie Lambeau, the Entertainer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_marie.png

Marie Lambeau always had a voice to die for. People called her "the Smoky Velvet." They said she was born to sing jazz, that she had the magic touch — and maybe they were right. After all, the songs she heard in her dreams ever since her Grand-Mère passed away were like nothing she'd ever heard before. The vocals sounded like no language spoken on Earth, the notes twisted and warped. Why her Grand-Mère had moved from New Orleans to Arkham, Marie would never know. People used to call her Grand-Mère a witch. Maybe there's more than just jazz in Marie's blood, after all...

Mystic-class investigator. Has limited (only up to level 3) access to her own class, but unlimited access to any "Spell" cards, regardless of class. She also can include level 0 "Occult" cards (any class) and up to 5 Seeker/Survivor level 0 cards.

Action Survivor: She is just a singer thrust into a dangerous world by her witch heritage, but she lacks any proper training. Fittingly, she can use a few Survivor cards, while she notably can't access most high-level Mystic cards (excluding Spells).
The Chanteuse: Known as "Smoky Velvet", and has the outfit and personality to match.
Crippling Overspecialization: She can access any Spells in the game, but otherwise is restricted from high-level cards, even of the Mystic class, though she can use some low-level Seeker or Survivor cards.
Damage-Increasing Debuff: The main threat Baron Samedi poses to the Investigators. Every time anyone takes damage in his current location, he causes them an additional damage.
Difficult, but Awesome:
- Baron Samedi is unique among personal weaknesses, which are usually a Power Nullifier, in that it can enable Marie's Doom-related abilities if she gets unlucky and has no asset that can produce Doom in play. Marie still doesn't want him to be in play for too long as it will make the wounds she and other investigators in her location would suffer worse, but it fits for him compelling Marie into tapping in her witch heritage to survive.
- Her Doom-related playstyle is this in general: done right, she can reap enormous benefits beside the extra action she gets; done wrong, it will lead her and her fellow Investigators to meet an unfortunate end.
Early-Bird Cameo: She was first introduced as a promo card all the way back into the core game's release, until being re-introduced properly in The Circle Undone expansion.
Extra Turn: Marie gets an extra action each turn to cast Spells (playing Spell events, putting Spell assets in play, or activating abilities on Spells assets already in-play), but with a catch: at least one of her assets must have Doom on it for her to use this ability.
Hollywood Voodoo: Baron Samedi just keeps pursuing her for an unknown reason; nothing in her backstory explains just why, besides maybe Marie's heritage. While he's active, he takes up the "Ally" slot and increases any health damage anyone suffers near him; the only way to get rid of him is to put at least 3 Doom tokens on him, one by one, which can put the entire mission at risk.
In the Blood: Her magic is in her blood; her Grand-Mère was also an accomplished witch.
Item Caddy: As long as she has at least 1 Doom on any card, she gains extra action to spend on her Spells, either to play them or to use the ones already in play. Her Elder Sign allows to add or remove 1 Doom from any card under her control.
It Only Works Once: Her signature, "Mystifying Song", temporarily prevents agenda from advancing due to matching or exceeding its Doom threshold — but only once per scenario.
Kill and Replace: If Marie draws Baron Samedi and she doesn't have any ally slot available to put him into play, he will forcibly discard an ally of hers to "make space" for himself; ironically that can help her if she had a lot of Doom on an ally and couldn't get rid of them before they advanced the agenda ahead of time.
Music Soothes the Savage Beast: Her signature card, "Mystifying Song", allows her to stop the agenda from advancing for one turn, for any reason, but only once per scenario. Sometimes, this can mean the difference between life and death.
Sadistic Choice: Her personal weakness, Baron Samedi, takes up the "Ally" slot and increases health damage anyone around him suffers. The only way to get rid of him? Put three Doom tokens on him (1 token per round), which can potentially finalize the current agenda, the worst-case scenario being failing the scenario, or even the entire campaign.
The Smart Guy: She's one of the few Mystics to have 4 Intellect, as well as has access to some Seeker cards to utilise it.

Rita Young

Rita Young, the Athlete

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_rita.png

"You got a bone to pick? Fine by me. I don't need your permission to leave you in the dust".

Clocks do not lie. In the past, people have said hurtful things to Rita. They have threatened her, deemed her inferior. But ever since she started running competitively, Rita has only cared about the clock. The clock says that Rita is faster then the rest. It says she is stronger and has trained harder. Now, she may have to fight for her life. Someone is after her. That much she's sure of. She has no idea who it is or why they want her, but there have been several strange men hanging around her dorm. They plan to make an example of her. But they will have to catch her, and the clock says they cannot.

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to "Trick" cards (up to level 3) of any class.

Action Survivor: She's a normal athlete who got involved in this mess because the "racists" she has tried to dealt with turned out to be the cultists looking for another prey. Well, bigots or cultists, they picked the wrong victim...
Affirmative Action Girl: She's faced racism all her life.
Big Guy: One of the few investigators to have 9 Health. While her Combat is average, she can use her great Agility to temporarily neutralise them instead — or even to actually fight them.
Fragile Speedster: Played With; Rita has 9 Health, which Guardian-level of endurance, so she cannot really be called fragile... Physically at least, because she has only 5 Sanity and average Willpower, which leaves her very mentally vulnerable. However, Rita is much faster than most Guardians, having a perfect 5 in Agility, letting her evade and outrun enemies that would inflict lots of Horror at least.
Guile Hero: Rita combines the best aspects of Survivors' ability to improvise and Rogues' Combat Pragmatist tendencies: she has access to Trick cards specifically to run circles around foes.
The Hunter Becomes the Hunted: She's fed up with cultists harassing her; now, it's time for her to fight back.
The Klan: Her personal weakness, the "Hoods" enemy, look suspiciously like group of KKK members in signature hoods. But in truth they are something even worse than just a bunch of cruel racists...
Kung Fu-Proof Mook: Downplayed by her personal weakness; Rita can evade the "Hoods", but they will immediately attack her if she does before becoming exhausted, encouraging her to face them head on and defeat them instead to avoid letting them take cheap shots at her while she is on the run.
Lightning Bruiser:
- She's rather versatile combatant, having 9 Health, 5 Agility and 3 Combat, which allows her to change her tactics depending on the situation.
- Once per round, she can use her high Agility offensively, by damaging the enemies after successfully evading them; this effect becomes even stronger if she draws the Elder Sign, as it allows to utilise this ability multiple times per round instead of just once.
Tired of Running: Her signature card is named "I'm done runnin'"; it keeps her from actually running away from enemies for one round, instead allowing her to deal additional damage whenever she evades them.
Unskilled, but Strong: Downplayed, as expected from a Survivor, Rita has no experience dealing with the supernatural, but she is still a capable athlete that can outrun most threats. In gameplay terms, she has above average stats, with a total count of 13 stat points instead of 12, with her 5 Agility and abilities that reward her for evading enemies enabling Hit-and-Run Tactics well. But she has limited card selection to choose from: beside Survivor cards, she can only take cards with the Trick trait, which are mostly Rogue events, and few asset cards.
Wrong Genre Savvy: She thinks that the hooded thugs harassing her and her friends are part of The Klan. Unfortunately, these guys are way worse than your usual Politically Incorrect Villain...

Introduced in The Dream Eaters expansion

Tommy Maldoon

Tommy Muldoon, the Rookie Cop

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_tommy2.png

"Eyes up, Tommy".

Most members of the Muldoon family are part of the Boston police force in some way or another. Not long ago, the youngest Muldoon brother, Tommy, got his badge. Armed with an eye for detail, fierce courage, and his trusty rifle, Becky, Tommy is dedicated to law enforcement... but when he was loaned out to the Sheriff's Department in Arkham, he found that he was not prepared for the bizarre crimes cropping up in this strange town. Even so, whether the crime scene is a smoky speakeasy or a bloodstained altar, Tommy will not rest until he can bring the culprit to justice.

Guardian-class investigator. Has access to Survivor cards (up to level 2).

Action Survivor: Downplayed. He has combat training, being the cop, but he's a rookie with less actual experience than some civilian investigators. Fittingly, he has access to Survivor-class cards.
Early-Bird Cameo: His dog version was amongst investigators in the Dogwich Legacy fake announcement. All other investigators were just "dogified" versions of pre-existing Arkham TCG investigators, but Tommy had perfectly new (and functional, even if described in the silly way) abilities and stats. Soon enough, he was amongst the first investigators announced for The Dream Eaters Cycle, with all the stats and mechanics being intact.
Family Honor: Many members of Muldoon family serve in the police, and Tommy is not an exception.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed; he has decent 3 Intellect, and can boost his effectiveness in looking for clues with the Survivor-class cards he has access to, while having good survivability thanks to his native Guardian class and strong defensive abilities.
I Call It "Vera": Calls his rifle "Becky".
Item Caddy: While all Guardians rely on using assets to soak up damage, Tommy has some extra abilities specifically to make it easier and more efficient:
- Tommy gains extra resources when his Allies gets defeated, which makes it less punishing to put them under fire; additionally, they don't get discarded, just shuffled back into his deck.
- His Elder Sign effect allows to either dump some damager/horror on his asset, or, when he actually needs some key asset alive and well, reassign damage/horror from asset to Tommy himself.
Jack of All Stats: Tommy has good overall stats, with only Agility being below average. His access to Survivor cards makes him even more versatile, as well as makes it easier to come back if he fails a test or two.
Money Multiplier: When an asset under his control gets defeated, Tommy gains resources, equal to sum of damage and horror on it, compensating the lost card's cost, or even having net profit.
Officer O'Hara: Like the majority of other Boston cops at the time, he is of Irish descent.
We Have Reserves: Unlike the other investigators, he can afford to use his Allies to soak up damage; if they get defeated, he receives additional resources, which he can spend either on even more Allies, or to reload "Becky"; and instead of being discarded, they are shuffled back into his deck (they don't "die", they just retreat). But he must be careful, since his personal weakness, "Rookie Mistake", if drawn, forces him to discard all assets with damage on them.

Mandy Thompson

Mandy Thompson, the Researcher

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_mandy2.png

Ever since she was a child, Mandy would read whenever she could not sleep. Such has been the case on many nights. Her remarkable memory and ability to correlate facts have landed her a highly valued job as a researcher for Miskatonic University. She has spent hours poring over the profane pages of ancient, forbidden texts. In doing so, she has discovered a pattern indicating an impending cataclysm. Has paranoia finally caught up to her? Or is a disaster of truly epic proportions on the horizon?

Seeker-class investigator. Can include up to 10 level 0-1 Rogue, Mystic or Survivor events/skills (she can only choose one extra class) and can choose between having a decksize of 30, 40 or 50 cards.

Draw Extra Cards: Once per round, when investigator at her location searches a deck (theirs, or encounter deck), she can let them either look 3 extra cards (making them more likely to find what they want), or draw 1 extra card that is elegible as the target of their search.
Go Mad from the Revelation: Her personal weakness, "Shocking Discovery". If she finds this card during a search action, not only this action (and all related effects) is cancelled, she is also forced to draw an encounter card.
Item Caddy: Her key ability allows her to quickly search the deck to find some cards she needs, or help her friends to do the same; her Elder Sign does the same, and allows her to either draw the card she finds, or commit to the test.
Jack of All Stats: Mandy has 3 Agility (instead of 2 like most Seekers), which makes her stats relatively balanced, only truly lacking in Combat. Her deckbuilding options allows her to take one of the three paths: take Rogue cards and get more agile, take Mystic cards and get stronger mind, or take Survivor cards and get balanced kit, as well as getting a safety pillow for botched Combat tests.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Before the start of campaign, she may choose her deck size. Apart from the usual 30-card deck, she can also construct 40- or 50-card decks; when playing with increased decks, she receives additional copies of her signature card, "Occult Evidence", which allows her to find clues for free as long as she grabs it during "Search" effects.
Nerf: Unlike Trish and Rex, who got a Taboo to nerf their frontside ability, Mandy's Taboo affected her backside's deckbuilding: she is locked at her maximum decksize of 50 instead of being able to choose her deck's size, which makes her searching abilities less overpowered, as she cannot look through her entire deck for specific cards as easily now, and more of a necessity to get key cards down quickly.
Squishy Wizard: Even by Seekers standards; she has only 5 Health and 1 Combat, making her chances at prolonged combat... slim at best. Fortunately, she also has 3 Agility (most other Seekers have 2), which gives her the chance to escape ambushes, and makes her less vulnerable to treacheries.
Support Party Member: Her ability helps other investigators with searching their decks for specific cards.

Tony Morgan

Tony Morgan, the Bounty Hunter

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_tony.png

"When I find that beast, I'll put it down for good".

Tony's tracked down low-life scum in every lousy corner of the world, but nothing could have prepared him for the thing he killed in Innsmouth. It had the form of a man, more or less, but it was covered in loathsome scales and slime, like some horrid creature of the deep. It stank of salt water, rotten fish, and blood. He should've let it go when it dove into the river, but he'd never let a bounty escape before, and he wasn't about to start then. Ever since, he's found a new kind of dirtbag to hunt. Ordinary mobster or otherworldly monster, Tony will take it down... if someone is willing to pay him for it.

Rogue-class investigator. Can include up to 10 level 0-1 Guardian, Seeker or Survivor events/skills (he can only choose one extra class).

Arch-Enemy: His personal weakness is one particularly sneaky Deep One, which he keeps pursuing, but never manages to kill for good. Main problem with it is that it enters play with 1 Doom on it.
Big Guy: Has 9 Health, and he is one of the few investigators with 5 Combat. He also can use some of the Guardian-class cards to boost his offensive capabilities, while his native class' kit allows him to fuel Rogues' own combat arsenal to go on monster-killing rampage.
Bounty Hunter: The game explicitly calls him bounty hunter. This also works as his signature mechanic, allowing him to receive resources as reward for hunting monsters; Tony has to mark the targets upfront, by putting the bounties on freshly-spawning enemies. The harder the target, the bigger the reward is. Number of bounties available is limited (6 by default), may only be restored either through use of his signature "Weapon" or through his Elder Sign, and he only completes them if he deals the killing blow personally.
Extra Turn: Each turn, Tony gets an extra action which can only be spent on fighting or engaging an enemy; the drawback is that Tony can only spend that extra action on enemies with a bounty on their head (which have to be set when the enemy spawns), but at least he can choose on whom to put those bounties.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed; he has decent 3 in Intellect and can take some Seeker cards, which makes it possible to build him as a "smash in, check out" investigator.
Glass Cannon: Tony has Guardian-like 9 Health and 5 Sanity, making him very vulnerable to horror-based threats, which is only made worse by him being nearly defenceless against treacheries with his 2 Willpower and Agility. He can absolutely slaughter any enemy in his path, but one bad encounter can spell his doom. He also lacks access to as many damage soak options as Guardian-class fighters would, meaning that his best bet is to dispatch the enemy before they dispatch him. He can however take some Survivor cards to tip the odds in his favour or Guardian cards to heal and negate some damage.
Guns Akimbo: Tony is armed with two "Colt" revolvers. Whenever he uses one of them, he can use second copy from his "hand" with no additional cost.
Loot-Making Attack; Whenever Tony defeats an enemy with a bounty, he gains all bounties on it as resources. However, he must deal the killing blow personally, or he would get nothing.
Kill Steal: Tony only gets reward if he kills the bounty target personally; this may come up as a problem if he's no the only fighter in the team: if somebody tries to "help", it would waste (limited) bounties.
Mighty Glacier: He has one of the best Health and Combat stats in the game, let alone amongst Rogues, but compensates for it with unimpressive 2 Agilty, second-worst in the class. This changes his playstyle rather significantly, as many Rogue cards rely on Agility to work efficiently.
Nominal Hero: His main motivation is to get paid, and, maybe, hunt down that Deep One which just keeps running away. The job also involving saving the world is a coincidence.
Punch-Clock Hero: He is Only in It for the Money. And maybe revenge on that elusive Deep One he tries to catch. Otherwise, he couldn't care less about common goals or his teammates.
Revolvers Are Just Better: He is armed with dual "Colt" revolvers; unlike other dual weapons in the game, they are presented as separate cards (meaning they can be used either separately or together. Besides this, they're also integral to his signature ability: using them to kill enemies is the only way to receive additional bounties, besides his Elder Sign effect.
Token Evil Teammate: One of the few outright criminals amongst (mostly heroic) investigators, even if he's usually bringing in more dangerous criminals.

Luke Robinson

Luke Robinson, the Dreamer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_luke2.png

"The key to the Dreamlands lies within us all".

It was many years ago when Luke discovered the entrance to the Dreamlands. Through the gift of an unusual box his uncle had left him, he learned of a way to travel to and from the Gates of Sleep. He has since spent his the majority of his days wandering the land of dreams in search of adventure. From the streets of Celephaïs to the Enchanted Wood with its endless mysteries he wanders, unraveling the secrets of the land and of the myriad dreamers who reside there. Now an ancient chaos threatens to annihilate not only the waking world but the world of his dreams as well. This is something Luke cannot allow.

Mystic-class investigator. Has access to Seeker cards (up to level 2).

Dreamland:
- Being an experienced Dreamer, if Luke is presented during The Dream Quest campaign, intros for several scenarios will change, to reflect that this isn't his first time in the Dreamlands.
- His signature card, "Gate Box", allows him to escape into a secluded part of the Dreamlands, for various purposes. His personal weakness, however, traps him there.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: He can use one event per turn as if he's in a connecting location and engaged with each enemy in it. When combined with the "Gate Box", it means he can interact with any location.
Non-Standard Game Over: As explained by additional rulings: Luke can only access any revealed location from his Dream-Gate and will get expelled out into one of his choice when the gate leaves play. But if there are no revealed locations left when Luke is at his gate and he would be forcibly kicked out, he is immediately Defeated instead.
Pocket Dimension: His signature card, the "Gate Box", forms a portal (called "Dream-Gate") Luke may use to gain shelter from monsters until the end of round, while also being able to interact with the other locations, or even moving there; however, if his weakness, "Detached from Reality", kicks in, the portal becomes malevolent, trapping Luke there and forcing him to quickly investigate a high-shroud location or suffer horror. The box has limited charges, but it can be recharged just like any other charges-based asset, and his Elder Sign allows to put 1 charge immediately.
The Smart Guy: Downplayed; while he has average Intellect, he has access to Seeker cards, and can use some of the Mystic cards to replace Intellect with Willpower during Investigate actions; this makes him a potent choice for the team's clue-searcher — fitting, as the expansion he's introduced in takes place in the Dreamlands, which he knows better than anyone else.
Squishy Wizard: One of the squishiest in the game; he only has 5 Health and an unimpressive 2 Combat, meaning that his first close combat may very well become his last. His best bet for survival when engaged with an enemy is using the Gate Box to retreat in the Dream-Gate, or, if that is unavailable, attempt to run away by relying on his 3 Agility.

Patrice Hathaway

Patrice Hathaway, the Violinist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_patrice2.png

All her life, Patrice has lived for music. The soaring sonatas, the graceful arias, and the booming marches have always been her closest companions. But sometimes when she plays, she can sense some alien intelligence at the edge of her awareness. Something that watches her and waits. Something that hungers. The presence has been growing over the last month and her increasing nervousness is starting to spoil her ability to play the violin. That's not something she can tolerate. After her last concert at the Ward Theatre in Arkham, she finally decided to take action.

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to Mystic cards (up to level 2). Has an increased decksize of 42 cards.

Action Survivor: She's not a trained mage, all her powers are related to her magic violin, and without it, she's just a normal musician. Fittingly, she's classified as a Survivor rather than a Mystic, and her card pool reflects it.
Card Cycling: Patrice can't form stable hand, replacing all her cards each turn instead of just discarding the excessive cards. This may work both for and against her, as while it makes finding key cards easier, it also puts pressure to use them while she has a chance instead of waiting for best moment, while emptying one's deck causes 1 horror to investigator before deck reshuffles, and can trigger other negative effects, depending on scenario.
Cursed with Awesome: Her violin is connected to a certain hostile Eldritch Abomination, which can (and will) attack her if given a chance, but its magic also allows her to help her teammates in their world-saving quest.
Difficult, but Awesome: Her unique gimmick means that she can't form a stable hand and plan around it, but also that she can rotate her deck very quickly (even more quickly if she puts assets in play, since they're now removed from the card rotation), accessing certain cards much more often than she would have otherwise. However, fast rotation also means more issues with managing horror (as each time the deck resets, investigator takes 1 horror).
Draw Extra Cards: "Patrice's Violin" lets Patrice to pick investigator (herself included) and discard 1 card from her hand to let the chosen investigator draw 1 card, or gain 1 resource.
Eldritch Abomination: Her backstory references... Something that has been observing Patrice her whole life, especially whenever she plays music. Said entity is her personal weakness, the "Watcher from Another Dimension", whose unique nature is also underlined by unusual mechanics compared to other enemy weaknesses: instead of immediately spawning engaged with Patrice, it would stay in her hand, taking one of the precious limited slot she has for her handsize, and if it remains in her hand when her deck reshuffles, it would immediately attack her (and it deals 3 damage per attack). Patrice can immediately discard it by succesfully attacking or evading it, but if she fails to do so, it would spawn engaged with her instead, acting like a "normal" enemy (on the bright side, in this state other Investigators will be able to attack and deal damage to it, as it is impervious from all attacks and evasions attempts from anyone else but Patrice as long as it stays in her hand),
Glass Cannon: Patrice's personal weakness "Watcher from Another Dimension", hits extremely hard and has high Fight and Evade value of 5, but only 2 health, meaning the second anyone can get a good hit on it, it's toast. In fact, if Patrice managed to attack or evade it while still in her hand, it would get automatically discarded, regardless how much damage it would take, if any.
Magic Music: Patrice's music and/or the violin she plays are the source of all magic surrounding her, both good and bad:
- This music is how Patrice's magic manifests. Because of that, she has access to Mystic-class cards, and the violin itself serves as her signature asset, "Patrice's Violin", that gives her ability to discard cards from hand to let herself or other player draw 1 card or get 1 resource.
- The music seems to attract otherworldly attention, as it's all but explicitly stated that it's due to it, the "Watcher from Another Dimension" put an eye on her.
Master of None: Downplayed. She has 4 Willpower, but only 2 in every other stat (which is below average); since most Willpower-based cards belong to the Mystic class, from which she can't use high-level ones, the usefulness of having high Willpower stat gets somewhat limited.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She has a lower maximum hand size (5 instead of the normal 8), and during the Upkeep phase, she discards all non-weakness cards from her hand, drawing a new set of 5. Given that she's likely to discard most of her deck in just few turns, her Elder Sign allows her to shuffle almost the entire discard pile (minus 1 card) back into the deck. To make this gimmick easier to manage, she has boosted deck size of 42 cards, instead of normal 30.
Squishy Wizard: Has access to Mystic cards and has a high Willpower stat, but she is neither durable (having average Health and Sanity) nor powerful nor fast, meaning that it's not in her best interest to fight monsters directly.
Support Party Member: She can allow any investigator to draw additional cards or resources by discarding her own cards.
Touched by Vorlons: Patrice's musical abilities are what attracted the attention of beings from beyond, and awakened her magical powers.
Weak, but Skilled: Patrice has below-average stats (her total sum adds to 10, which his lower than the 12 of most Investigators), and suffers from her gimmick which makes her hand getting wiped out and reset every turn (so no way to "preserve" good cards for later occasion), but she never stays with empty hand for long, so she can freely commit her cards to skill tests to compensate for her low base stats. On top of that, her Violin allows to get rid of useless cards in her hand and then either draw a new one or get a resource, or let her teammate do that.

Introduced in The Innsmouth Conspiracy expansion

Sister Mary

Sister Mary, The Nun

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_mary.jpg

"The Lord watches over my path. I am armored in faith".

The more Sister Mary learns of the strange and arcane forces that sometimes manifest in this world, the more certain she is that she has been set upon a path to ward off these forces and protect the innocent wherever possible. Armed only with the trappings of her church and an unshakable faith, Sister Mary seeks out every supernatural threat she hears of through her fellow priests and nuns. Other members of her church may dismiss such things as medieval nonsense, but Sister Mary knows the real evils that exist in the shadows - and she knows that if such evils are left unchecked, they will bring ruin and horror to all of creation.

Guardian-class investigators. Has access to Mystic cards (up to level 2).

Crisis of Faith: At times, her faith takes heavy blows; when her personal weakness, "Crisis of Faith", enters play, she must either replace all Blessed tokens with Cursed ones (putting her whole team's work at risk), or suffer (potentially fatal) horror.
Fragile Speedster: Downplayed; compared to the other Guardians, Sister Mary has lower Combat, but also higher Agility (both at 3, instead of usual 4 and 2, respectively), making her more vulnerable in open combat, but also more likely to just escape ambush.
Glass Cannon: Played With. She has very low Health (only 5). While, being a Guardian, she has some good options to soak up damage, putting those in play requires time and resources. But on the bright side, she massive 9 Sanity, so against the enemies prioritising horror over damage, she would be more resilient than the average Guardians. While she has worse Combat than most of her colleagues, her class has many ways to minimise this problem, or she can just utilise the Mystic-class Spells.
Hoist by His Own Petard: She can add additional Blessed tokens into chaos pool each round (and adds 2 token on setup). If she then draws her personal weakness, all these tokens will revert to Cursed ones, potentially making the situation worse than if she never bothered.
Luck Manipulation Mechanic: She can directly add Blessed tokens without the use of other cards; she adds 2 tokens at the start of the game, and can add 1 more each round, as well as 1 extra whenever she draws an Elder Sign. Her signature asset, "Guardian Angel", generates extra blessed tokens whenever it gets damaged.
Magic Knight: She is a Guardian who can use Mystic cards (read: magic), and combines great Willpower with decent Combat (both of which can be improved further with the cards she has access to).
Pain & Gain: Mary's signature, "Guardian Angel", can be used to soak damage on not just her, but any other investigator in same location. And when it receives any damage, it adds equal number of blessed tokens into pool, helping the entire team.
Religion is Magic: Implied, same deal as Father Mateo: it's unknown if benevolent entities like the God that Sister Mary worships exist in the Arkham Files universe, but despite being just an humble nun, Mary is able to generate bless tokens passively, her signature "Guardian Angel" protects her from some (physical) harm while generating even more blessings and she has access to Mystic-class cards (read: magic). No explanation is given why is the case, beside her being a nun.
Sadistic Choice: Her personal weakness, "Crisis of Faith", forces her to either revert Blessed tokens in the pool to Cursed ones (endangering her and her friends), or suffer massive, potentially fatal, horror to preserve them. The more such tokens in the pool, the worse this effect becomes.
Squishy Wizard: Stats-wise, she's closer to a Mystic than a Guardian, having only 5 Health and 3 Combat and Agility. But she comes with impressive 4 Willpower and access to Mystic-class cards, allowing her to compensate for weak points with magic.
Support Party Member: Her abilities are related to supplying team with a constant stream of Blessed tokens to increase their chances at success.
White Mage: Besides her chaos pool-manipulating abilities, she has access to Mystic cards. Due to already having adequate combat capabilities thanks to Guardian cards, she may instead concentrate on support-oriented magic.

Amanda Sharpe

Amanda Sharpe, The Student

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_amanda.jpg

Amanda Sharpe was on track to become one of Miskatonic University's most accomplished graduates. However, ever since she saw a strange painting of an enormous creature's emergence from the depths of the ocean, her classwork has suffered. Her dreams are overwhelmed by images of a vast submerged city and whispers in a language she does not understand. She remains dedicated to her studies, but her goal is no longer to graduate at the top of her class; rather, she seeks to discover the meaning behind the occult secrets concealed between the lines of reality.

Seeker-class investigator. Has access to "Practiced" skills of any class (up to level 3).

Critical Hit: Her Elder Sign doubles skill icons on the card beneath her sheet, and thus, the power of her ability (which only triggers during skill tests).
Draw Extra Cards: Amanda draws one additional card when the Investigation phase starts.
Early-Bird Cameo: She was originally portrayed on the "Encyclopedia" card from core game, long before her introduction in The Innsmouth Conspiracy.
Item Caddy: Amanda is built around heavy use of Skill cards, not only having wider selection of them from across multiple classes, but also having extra functionality to make them more useful. Amanda always keeps a skill beneath her sheet, that can be committed to tests like anything in her hand, and, most importantly, doesn't get discarded afterwards (though she discards and replaces those cards at the beginning for each round, whether used or not). Her signature event, "Obscure Studies", can be played to be put under her and give a massive skill boost for the round, on top of returning the card currently under her sheet back to her hand to be reused later.
Jack of All Stats: When supplied with the right set of skills, she can become an all-rounder, who can adapt to any role.
Master of None: Played With. Stats-wise, she is one of the worst investigators (only 2 at every stat, which is below average), and certainly has the worst Intellect amongst Seekers (all of whom have 4-5). However, her abilities allows her to quickly rotate through all her available cards, nearly always having something useful at her disposal. Also, any cards she has under her sheet can be committed to tests multiple times.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Each round, she picks and puts a card beneath her investigator sheet; to make that ability easier to use, she draws 1 extra card at the start of the Investigation phase. Cards under her sheet can be committed to skill tests as usual, but won't be discarded until the time comes to draw the next card. This works particularly well with skill cards (which must be applied to a skill test in order to work anyway), though she can do this only once per test. Her personal weakness is also built around this mechanic: "Whispers from the Deep" is a skill card with negative stats modifiers, which she has no choice but to commit to tests.
Recurring Dreams: She keeps seeing weird dreams about some submerged city (i.e. Y'ha-nthlei). They actually bother her so much, she can't concentrate on her studies any more. Besides being her main motivation to join the team (she wants to learn more about that city and why she keeps seeing it), these dreams also act as her personal weakness, "Whispers from the Deep".
Weak, but Skilled: Amanda has 2 in every stat, bringing her to a total of 8 skill points (most investigators have 12), but her free extra draw she gets at the start of her turn and ability to commit one card to every skill test (including skill cards with powerful secondary effect beside the stat boost) until her next turn greatly compensate for her weak statline.

Trish Scarborough

Trish Scarborough, The Spy

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_trish.jpg

Trish had always excelled in both body and mind, her unwavering focus on excellence and her fearless disposition a winning combination. Given her stellar academic and athletic records, everyone expected to see her become something great. Instead, Trish took a job at a commercial code company. The initial shock of her humble work eventually wore off, and the exceptional Trish Scarborough faded into obscurity. This suited Trish just fine, as it made it harder for anyone to realize the truth: her job was a cover for her true work as a spy with the Black Chamber, the Bureau's code-breaking agency.

Rogue-class investigator. Has access to Seeker cards (up to level 2).

Early-Bird Cameo: She was originally portrayed on the "Manual Dexterity" skill card from core game, but wasn't actually introduced until The Innsmouth Conspiracy.
Fragile Speedster: Downplayed. While she has 8 Health, with only 2 Combat, she'll have a hard time actually fighting anyone. Instead, she prefers to rely on her 4 Agility to just evade her enemies, and discover clues right under their noses. Her main concern is her low 6 Sanity, coupled with typical for Rogues 2 Willpower (making her vulnerable to treacheries), but unlike most of them, she has access to many Seeker cards that can compensate for said vulnerability.
The Men in Black: Her personal weakness, "Shadow Agents", is represented by the group of shadowy guys (working for the dark cult related to the current Big Bad) who keep pursuing her and prevent her from discovering clues by any means except by investigating. Fortunately, they can be dealt with by successfully evading them...which won't be easy, considering their high Evade rating.
Nerf: With the Taboo rules, Trish's ability to automatically evade an enemy when she discovers a clue in location with said enemy can no longer affect Elite enemies, to avoid letting her get around Contractual Boss Immunity. The alternative effect of same ability, to find an extra clue, wasn't affected.
The Smart Guy: She has impressive 4 Intellect, and can access Seeker cards, making her a good clue-gatherer. This is fortunate, since the actual Seeker from same expansion is more of an all-rounder. To further motivate her into acting like team's searcher, her Elder Sign allows her to investigate remote locations without physically going there.
The Sneaky Guy: She combines the best traits of both Rogues and Seekers, resulting in an agile, hard-to-catch clue gatherer who can steal clues right under her enemies' noses. As additional bonus, once per round, when she finds a clue in a location occupied by an enemy, she can discover an additional one for free.
Stealth Expert:
- After discovering a clue in a location occupied by enemies, she can automatically evade one of those enemies.
- Her signature event, "In the Shadows", allows her to sneakily disengage from all enemies and avoid engaging with anyone until the end of round. As a downside, she can't deal damage to them, either.

Dexter Drake

Dexter Drake, The Magician

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_dexter.jpg

"Do you want to see true magic?"

For Dexter Drake, the magic of fairy tales and myths has been a lifelong fascination. The chance discovery of an old book page during the Great War opened Drake's eyes to the possibility that magic might truly exist. Years later, the promise of arcane tomes locked away in Miskatonic University's special collection draws the successful stage magician to the quiet town of Arkham. Lured to an auction of occult items, "Drake the Great" and his assistant, Molly Maxwell, find themselves targeted by the depraved servants of an otherworldly force of disease and corruption. To save Molly, Arkham and perhaps the world from a horrific transformation, Drake needs more than his wits and quick hands. He must turn to real magic, even if it risks his mind, body and spirit.

Mystic-class investigator. Has access to Rogue cards (up to level 2).

Draw Extra Cards: His Elder Sign effect lets him return an asset he has in play back into hand, then draw 1 extra card.
Early-Bird Cameo:
- He was first introduced as a bonus investigator (with a set of replacement signature cards and weaknesses) for anyone who bought the novella about him, before being re-introduced in the The Innsmouth Conspiracy.
- Dexter was pictured on the "Haste" Asset from The Dream Eaters expansion, which directly preceded The Innsmouth Conspiracy. It also foreshadowed him having access to Rogue cards.
Expy: Dexter is based on Mandrake the Magician, down to the name.
Fatal Flaw: His obsession with learning "real" magic is quite possibly the main reason behind all his problems.
Gameplay and Story Integration:
- His magician background is reflected by his signature ability: he can quickly exchange assets in play with different ones, just like magicians would do during their performances. And his signature asset is outright named "Showmanship"; it gives bonuses to whatever cards he recently put into play.
- His obsession with learning "real magic" manifests as his personal weakness, "Occult Scraps", which is whatever fragments of occult books he managed to get his hands on; it drains his Willpower until he manages to get rid of it, which, ironically, reduces his effectiveness as an actual mage.
- He's only starting to learn the world of magic, with no-nonsence "do-it-right" attitude; he has only 2 Intellect and can't search for signs of occult and eldritch as efficiently as his more experienced (or savvy) colleagues.
Item Caddy: He's all about quickly shuffling his assets, replacing ones he no longer needs with the others. His Elder Sign further helps with it.
Lovely Assistant: His promo-card provides his assistant, Molly Maxwell, as an alternative signature card. Her main role is providing an opportunity to quickly find and draw assets with a specific trait. To discourage abusing her ability, she takes horror each time she uses it, and has only 4 Sanity.
Mage Marksman: He is a a magician that can cast actual magic and his main choices in weaponry come from his Rogue card pool, most of which are firearms. His backstory also states that, like Mark, he is a war veteran.
Magicians Are Wizards:
- Used to be normal Stage Magician until he learned real magic.
- He is a Mystic-class investigator, who uses his magician skills to actually amplify his performance as a wizard.
Magic Knight: Downplayed. While Dexter only has 3 Combat (compared to his 5 Willpower), he has access to some guns from Rogue-class arsenal, making it less of an issue, while his abilities makes it easier to quickly replace discharged guns with fresh ones.
Pick a Card: Molly Maxwell, his assistant (and alternative signature card) allows him to pick one trait and then search his deck for cards with this trait, until he finds the first one with it; all other cards must be shuffled back; the fewer cards with the chosen trait his deck has, the better chance of finding a specific card (if you know what to search for).
Power Nullifier: Dexter's replacement personal weakness, "Yaztaroth", prevents him from putting assets into play, be it through his abilities or by just playing them. This is especially nasty if he is using both of his signature cards, as Yaztaroth will prevent Dexter from getting rid of Occult Scraps until he discards the former weakness.
Reduced Mana Cost: Once per round, Dexter can play an asset as a free action (so without the risk of provoking attacks of opportunity) with a discount in resources too, but only if he discards another asset from play first.
Squishy Wizard: Played With. Dexter has adequate Combat (and some guns to put it to use), but he still has relatively low 6 Health and unimpressive 2 Agility, making going onto offensive risky as he wouldn't be able to easily escape, as well as making him vulnerable to Agility-testing treacheries (which are likely to target his Health).
Stage Magician: He was a stage magician before he learned real magic. He still dresses like one.

Silas Marsh

Silas Marsh, the Sailor

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_silas.jpg

"Leave your fears on the docks, lads".

Silas Marsh has always felt called to the sea. As a young lad, he left his family in fear-shadowed Innsmouth and made a name for himself sailing the seven seas. But after the death of his parents, the sea's call has only grown stronger. Silas has dreams - nightmares - of pointed teeth grinning, webbed hands reaching, and eyes glowing in the darkness of the ocean deeps. No one in his family is able to offer an explanation for his dreams, or at least, no one is willing. So when desperate librarian Abigail Foreman comes to Silas with questions of her own, he cannot turn her away. Her ancient and mysterious tome, the Profesiae Profana, points to a stellar event foretelling the end of the world, and painted in its margins are the very same creatures that haunt Silas's nightmares...

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to "Innate" skills of any class (up to level 2).

Big Guy: Silas has 9 Health and 4 Combat. These stats are impressive on their own, but this also makes him the most durable investigator in The Innsmouth Conspiracy expansion, allowing him to act as potent backup fighter. Predictable downside is only having 5 Sanity.
Boring, but Practical: His replacement signature card, "Nautical Prowess" skill, does nothing flashy, but instead just provides rather stable, albeit minor, bonuses: when applied to a skill test with a negative chaos token modifier, it provides two "wild" (fit for any type) skill icons, which somewhat offsets the negative effect of the chaos token. Alternatively, it has the rather standard effect of allowing him to draw a card.
Crippling Overspecialization: Granted that he specializes in having more cards to pass tests with than normal, but skills cards are typically only usable for skill tests. Assets and events are still restricted to the Survivor pool for him.
Early-Bird Cameo:
- He firstly appeared on the "Overpower" skill from the core game, long before actually becoming playable.
- He was originally introduced as a bonus investigator (with a set of replacement signature cards and weaknesses) for anyone who bought the novella about him, before being re-introduced in the The Innsmouth Conspiracy.
Glass Cannon: Silas has tons of Health, as well as high Combat and Agility, but pays for it with only having 5 Sanity and 2 Willpower, making him vulnerable to certain treacheries and horror-dealing enemies if he fails to take care of them in time. It's in his interests to quickly find a way to soak up horror and boost his Willpower, or he will be quickly driven to insanity.
Half-Human Hybrid: Like all members of the Marsh family, he has the Innsmouth Look, marking him as half-human, half-Deep One. This doesn't make him any less heroic though, but it does leave him vulnerable to the "call of the sea". His main weakness, "Siren Call", represents this and forces him to pay resources when he commits card for each icon matching the skill tested, quickly leaving him without resources and unable to commit cards anymore if he cannot pay unless he can discard it.
In the Blood: As a member of the Marsh family, he has the Innsmouth Look.
Irony: He's one of the few investigators who has a card portraying him (upgraded "Overpower", Guardian-class skill), which he can't take as it's off-class for him.
Item Caddy: His playstyle relies on using skills (he can access a large amount of the off-class ones), and him easily regaining the skills spent on skill tests (or adding new ones).
- Both "Sea Change Harpoon" and "Silas' Net" gains stronger effects if he commits skills to the tests where he uses them, and both can be returned to hand to get the committed skills back.
- His Elder Sign allows to commit to the test a skill card from discard pile, which he then returns to hand instead of discarding.
Lightning Bruiser: He's the only investigators to simultaneously having 4 Combat and 4 Agility, on top of being very tough, which makes him very flexible combatant.
Mana Burn: "Siren Call" makes Silas pay 1 resource for each matching skill icon on a card he commits to a skill test: if he cannot pay the full price, he cannot commit them.
Power Nullifier: "Siren Call" forces Silas to pay resources to commit cards, and if he cannot, prevents him from committing cards at all. "Dream Of The Deep" subtract 2 points from his skill value to a test Silas commits this weakness to (making most skill cards near useless) until he passes a test with this penalty to discard it, and forces Silas to commit this card to every test under the threat of sapping his health every turn if he can't get rid of it.
Recurring Dreams:
- He keeps seeing dreams about the depths of the ocean; this is a bad sign, indicating that his Innsmouth heritage is beginning to force him into becoming a full Deep One.
- His (replacement) personal weakness, "Dreams of the Deep", acts as a skill card which subtracts from his total skill value, and returns to his hand if the skill check is failed, instead of being discarded. If he ends the turn with it still in his hand, he suffers 2 damage.
White Sheep: Unlike most members of the Marsh family, he is a good guy.

Introduced in Edge of the Earth expansion

In general

Magikarp Power: Since Edge of the Earth investigators start out with very limited access to cards of their "de facto" class, they get badly outperformed in their intended roles by full members of those classes. But once they get the experience to buy upgraded cards, their powerful built-in abilities start to shine.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: All Edge of the Earth investigators only have access to level 0 cards of their own class, but can also use any level 1-5 cards and up to 5 level 0 cards of another class. This causes them to effectively change class over the course of a campaign as they replace their level 0 cards with upgraded cards of their secondary class.

Daniella Rayes

Daniela Reyes, the Mechanic

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/daniela.JPG

"Relax, tough guy. I'll handle this. You stand over there and look pretty".

Daniela always figured she had a good life. She had a loving, boisterous family. She had a steady job that used her brains and her hands. She had enough money to spend on fast cars, pretty girls, and her motorcycle, Gabriel. Then her brother, Ramon, got caught up in some trouble. Her mother warned her to be careful, that darkness lay ahead. Daniela set a glass of water behind the door for her mother's sake, to catch evil spirits - just as she's been taught as a child. When Daniela awoke to find it shattered, she was determined to figure out what happened and fix it. Just like she always did.

Guardian-class investigator, who can only access level 0 cards of her own class, but can include unlimited number of level 1-5 and up to 5 level 0 Survivor cards.

Action Survivor: Tough as nails she might be, Daniela is just a mechanic that found herself tangled with the supernatural by chance, and the horrors she faces are way out of the league of what she is accustomed dealing with. This is probably why she "starts" as a Guardian only to "turn" into a Survivor later.
Armour Piercing Attack:
- Daniela's ability allows her to deal damage to an attacking enemy without bothering with any skill tests, which can help a lot against enemies with high Combat rating.
- Daniella's personal weakness, "Mob Goons", is a couple of, well, mob goons, whose attacks can't be cancelled by any means, and whose damage and horror are always treated as direct (so they can't be assigned to assets).
Big Guy:
- Like all Guardians, she's very tough and strong, and remains so even after dual-classing to Survivor. She's also encouraged to stay on the frontline, as all her abilities trigger only when she gets attacked (regardless of whether she actually gets hit or not). This does not work on attacks of opportunity, however.
- She's the only investigator to actually benefit from being attacked, which encourages her to go into offensive rather than hide behind:
  - She can either immediately retaliate and deal 1 damage to attacking enemy, or automatically evade them (which either exhausts them, or triggers other effects).
  - Her signature card, "Mechanic's Wrench", can force the enemies into attacking her when she needs it for specific effect.
- She has only 6 Sanity, but compensates for it with impressive 4 Willpower (above average for Guardians, and good stat in general), making her less likely to get hit by treacheries. This also makes her better with actually using certain Guardian cards to tank treacheries intended for the other investigators.
Book Dumb: Representing her unawareness of the eldritch horrors she's facing, she has one of the lowest Intellect stat in the game, only having 1 point in it, making her completely reliant on Survivor cards for finding clues (all of which involve some unorthodox search methods, or even dumb luck). However, where she really shines is thinking on her feet and finding non-standard solutions to seemingly impossible problems... Just like a true Survivor.
Butch Lesbian: Her backstory mentions that she loves to spend her money on "fast cars, pretty girls, and her motorcycle, Gabriel". Daniella herself is a tough-looking mechanic with "let's go into fight, would figure the rest out on the go" approach to problems.
Counter-Attack: All of Daniela's abilities are focused around punishing the enemy for attacking her, whether by reflecting back some damage, automatically evading them (stunning them for a turn and leaving them helpless) or powering up her wrench to hit harder for a round.
Gameplay and Story Segregation: Daniela is a mechanic, a job that requires not not just brawns for heavy lifting, but also smarts to know how an engine works, what material to use, how to place pieces toghether and so on, yet she only has an Intellect of 1. While this is not too noticeable in most cases, in The Innsmouth Cospiracy there is a treachery called "Malfuction" which targets vehicles you are using and disables some of their abilities: it can be removed with an Intellect test, but that means, paradoxically, Daniela is one of the worst characters at actually repairing stuff.
Early-Bird Cameo: Daniela was portrayed on several cards released prior to her announcement.
Mighty Glacier: Even after she "becomes" a Survivor, Daniela remains a force to reckon with in battle, with an impressive Combat stat of 5 and 8 Health. She's unlikely to escape any ambushes, however, only having 2 Agility, though she can try to tank damage and then use her ability to just evade an enemy automatically.
Pain & Gain: Her Elder Sign gives her automatic success if she was attacked this round... or a simple "+1" otherwise.
Revenge by Proxy: Daniella's personal weakness, "Mob Goons", is literally a couple of bandits sent after her by some loan sharks after her brother got into troubles. The card's flavour text even states that "debt is a family affair".
Twofer Token Minority: Being both Hispanic and lesbian makes her stand out in the 1920s setting.
Wrench Wench: A strong, sturdy woman who's very good with a wrench, both for fixing cars and clobbering monsters.
Wrench Whack: Her signature card, "Mechanic's Wrench", is not only a useful tool which reinforces her mechanics, but can also be used as a weapon against enemies who previously hit Daniela.

Norman Withers

Norman Withers, the Astronomer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/norman.JPG

Nobody believes him, and why should they? How could six stars vanish from sight all at once, never to reappear? Astronomer and Miskatonic University professor Norman Withers had all but given up on regaining his colleagues' esteem when a protege of the renowned Albert Einstein comes to speak on campus. The visiting physicist, with unsettling theories about the curvature of space-time, may hold the key to helping Norman explain the phenomenon of the vanishing stars...

Seeker-class investigator, who can only access level 0 cards of his own class. Instead, he can include unlimited number of level 1-5 and up to 5 level 0 Mystic cards.

Badass Bookworm: Despite being an astronomer (and not a physically strong one at that), Norman is willing to stand up against the Eldritch Abominations as much as the other heroes.
The Cassandra: No one believed him when he claimed that six stars suddenly disappeared from the sky, all at once.
Clock Roaches: Whatever he did, he attracted the attention of Hounds of Tindalos, who now hunt for him for meddling with the space-time continuum. His (replacement) personal weakness, "The Vengeful Hound", hunts for him (and him specifically), and as long as it's engaged with him, he can't use any player cards to reveal or draw cards, effectively disabling his signature asset, "Split the Angle".
Early-Bird Cameo: Like several investigators before him, he was originally released as a promotional character alongside a novella before becoming part of a full expansion. He later served as template for other investigators with similar deckbuilding rules.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: The top card of his deck is always revealed, and he can play cards from there, at reduced cost. However, if it's a weakness, he must immediately draw it. Both his signature card, "Livre d'Eibon", and his personal weakness, "The Harbinger", also interact with this ability, providing him with more benefits, or disabling any interactions with the deck, respectively.
Obvious Rule Patch: Errata was released for Norman's promo card, which slightly tweaked the rulings for his deckbuilding to match his campaign version, specifically to address an issue with him interacting with low-level multiclass cards, which otherwise would consume limited slots for level 0 Mystic cards in his deck.
Omniscient Hero:
- Norman always plays with top card of his deck revealed (allowing him to know what he may expect). His Elder Sign effect synergises with this ability, as its effect scales with the cost of top-most card of the deck, with him being allowed to swap it with one of the cards in his hand, either to get stronger effect or to get better cards earlier.
- Livre d'Eibon, Norman's signature tome asset, lets him swap a card in his hand for a card on top of his deck, on top of allowing him to commit the top card of his deck to skill test (which is especially useful when the card on top of his deck is a skill card, which Norman can't play even when revealed).
- His replacement signature card, "Split the Angle", allows him to spend an action to reveal the top card of the encounter deck. He then may exhaust Split the Angle (and sacrifice the top card of his deck) to discard the top card of the encounter deck, potentially avoiding something nasty, like "Ancient Evils".
Power Nullifier: "The Harbinger" prevents Norman from interacting with his deck (be through his main ability or just drawing, searching or even his upkeep) until he takes 2 actions to discard it. "Vengeful Hound" replacement enemy weakness has a weaker effect of merely preventing Norman from drawing or revealing cards until it is defeated.
Reduced Mana Cost: Norman can play the card at the top of his deck for 1 less resources than he would by playing cards from his hand instead.
Space Is Magic: Norman is an astronomer who through his studies, learns about the eldritch nature of space and how to exploit it to cast magic. In-game, he starts as a Seeker, but later "becomes" a Mystic.
Squishy Wizard: Norman combines Seeker-grade 5 Intellect with Mystic-grade 4 Willpower, on top of 8 Sanity, and eventually learns how to use powerful magic spells, but he's physically frail, so he has only 6 Health, 2 Combat and 1 Agility, making him one of the most fragile investigators in the game.
The Stars Are Going Out: Being an astronomer, he was first to notice that stars were starting to disappear en masse; none of his colleagues believed him, leading Norman to try and find help elsewhere, resulting in him joining the team.

Monterey Jack

Monterey Jack, the Archaeologist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jack_3.JPG

Young Jack traveled the world with his father's archaeological expeditions. Now a globe-trotting treasure hunter and an accomplished archaeologist in his own right, "Monterey" follows in his father's footsteps, securing the treasures of ancient civilizations and lost cultures. But after discovering a silver pendant with a familiar symbol on it, Monterey must explore his own past. Years ago, his father was found murdered with the very same sigil carved in his forehead. The image has haunted Monterey's dreams ever since. But he's getting close. He won't stop until he solves the mystery of his father's murder... no matter what it takes.

Rogue-class investigator.

Both versions

Adventurer Archaeologist: Monterey was never one of those archaeologists who work from the office; he's the man of action, who goes on the dangerous expeditions personally, ready to face—and survive—any dangers life can throw at him. His basic version makes him remember that he's a scholar first and foremost, making him "evolve" into a Seeker, while parallel version puts emphasis on the "adventurer" part.
Early-Bird Cameo: In a bit of futureproofing, he was mentioned several cycles back in the campaign guide for The Forgotten Age as one of the investigators who must take the role of the lead investigator if present at the start of the campaign.
Expy: He's based on Indiana Jones, complete with a hat and a bullwhip.
Fragile Speedster: Monterey has very high Agility of 5 in both versions, but suffers from pitiful 6 Sanity and 1 Willpower, combined with only 2 Combat. His unique card, "Trusty Bullwhip", somewhat compensates for it, allowing to fight using his Agility instead, and either deal extra damage or evade the enemy after a successful attack by exhausting the card (or do both at once with the advanced version). However, his weakness, "Buried Secrets", exacerbate the issue by making him unable to move (outside of scenario cards' effects) until he investigates his location (if he can investigate it, otherwise he is free to move), leaving him as a sitting duck for "Hunter" enemies chasing after him.
The Leader: If he is the part of the team during the Forgotten Age campaign, the campaign guide forces him into the position of lead investigator (if present, the other possible candidates are Leo Anderson or Ursula Downs).
Power Nullifier: "Buried Secrets" weakness makes Monterey unable to move unless instructed by scenario cards, which not only pins him to the ground, but also shuts down his abilities, as they rely on him being always on the move. He may try to investigate his location to either discard it (if he succeeds) or shuffle into deck at the cost of 2 horror (if he fails). The advanced version is even more punishing as it forces Monterey to pass the Investigation test to leave, and even requires him to spend an additional action to Investigate in the first place.

Basic version

Can only access level 0 cards of his own class, but can include unlimited number of level 1-5 and up to 5 level 0 Seeker cards.

Draw Extra Cards: If Monterey ends his turn at least 1 connection away from location where he started it, he can draw 1 card or gain 1 resource; if he ends up 2 more more connections away, he can do both.
Fragile Speedster: The combination of his high Agility and Intellect, and access to both Rogue and Seeker-class cards (primely the latter), as well as an ability that rewards him staying on the move, he's got the means and incentive to zip around the map collecting clues and evading enemies. But he's not well-fit for combat or dealing with treacheries, lacking Rogue-class arsenal of offensive and defensive cards to compensate for his 2 Combat, yet still having typical for them low Willpower, that would make him struggle against treacheries.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed; he's more on the "genius" side, due to having access to primely Seeker-class cards, as well as suffer from only having 2 Combat, but he still stands out amongst actual Seekers, who tend to have even fewer combat options than him on average.
Money Multiplier: Monterey can gain extra resources at the end of his turn (or, alternatively, draw extra cards), but only if he ends the turn in different location than where he started in. His Elder Sign has similar effect.

Parallel version.

Has limited (up to level 3) access to his own class, but can access Charm and Relic cards (both up to level 4) of any class, and up to 5 other level 0 Seeker cards.

Crippling Overspecialisation: While he can access cards above level 0 of his class unlike his base version, parallel Monterey cannot get level 4 or 5 rogue cards, but makes up for it by having access to both Relic and Charm cards below level 5.
Item Caddy: He can access off-class Relics and Charm class (save for level 5 ones), and can "unbury" them by performing research at various locations, quickly finding them in his deck and playing them at reduced price; the higher location's shroud, the stronger the effect is.
Money Multiplier: His Elder Sign gives him 1 resource per each Relic and Charm asset he controls.
Mythology Gag: His parallel version strongly resembles Monterey from Arkham Horror, being less about researching and more about quickly accumulating lots of relics with all sorts of weird effects, as well as makes him more combat-oriented than his basic version (though still not as much as his version from original Arkham Horror, where he was more of a bruiser than speedster), by softening the restriction on Rogue cards he can take.
Reduced Mana Cost: Parallel Monterey gets a discount playing Relic assets from his main ability equal to the shroud value of the location where he discovered the last clue.
Treasure Hunter: His parallel version revisits his routes, by turning him into relics specialist. His challenge scenario is also all about treasure hunting, and reuses locations and encounter cards from The Forgotten Age campaign.
- Parallel Monterey's main ability is to "discover" a relic when he finds the last clue in a location. What means in gameplay terms is that he searches a number of cards for a Relic asset and gets a cost reduction to play it both equal to the shroud value of the location.

Lily Chen

Lily Chen, the Martial Artist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lily_8.JPG

"I have been preparing to confront this evil for my entire life. My focus must be absolute".

Chen Li speaks rarely. When she does, her words are measured and wise. After a lifetime of disciplined training, every gesture is graceful, uncluttered by hesitation. The monks who raised her said that she was born for a special purpose, to face a great evil. Now, they believe that evil is at hand, and she is the only one who can stop it.

Mystic-class investigator, who can only access level 0 cards of her own class, but can include unlimited number of level 1-5 and up to 5 level 0 Guardian cards. She can't access any "Firearms" cards.

All Asians Know Martial Arts: Not only is she one of the few investigators of an Asian ethnicity, she was also raised by kung-fu monks. Given that the Mythos is derived from 1920s pulps, this isn't much of a surprise.
Big Guy: She has better Health than most Mystics, and has access to Guardian-class cards (gradually shifting over completely) to increase her survivability and combat effectiveness even further.
Charged Attack: The "Prescience of Fate" Discipline raises Lily's Combat value by 1, but also lets her take one action to flip the card to the "broken" side and get a massive +5 skill value bonus to the next test she performs. Taking said action does not provoke attacks of opportunity, meaning it can also be useful in combat to overcome a foe with high Fight or Evade value. It can be restored to the "unbroken" side by not taking a test for a whole round, so hope the next encounter card you draw won't require a test.
The Chosen One: As per her backstory, she was raised by monks who thought her destiny was to fight against whatever horror the investigators oppose in a given campaign.
Death of a Thousand Cuts: Lily's personal weakness "Burden of Destiny" is unique in that the effect is fairly weak on its own (either flip a discipline to its broken side, which can be restored next round, or take 1 damage and horror), but has the property of adding another copy of itself to the deck every time she obtains a new discipline, up to a maximum of 4. Needless to say, drawing 1 isn't much of an issue, but drawing 2 or 3 in succession can overwhelm her.
Desperation Attack: Her "Quiescence of Thought" Discipline improves Lily's Intellect by 1, but can also be flipped when Lily has less than 5 cards in hand by taking an action to draw cards until she has 5. Given being this low on cards isn't an ideal position to be in the first place, it shouldn't be used so willy-nilly. Doesn't help that (beside revealing her Elder Sign) it can only be restored by having 2 cards or less at the end of the round, putting you back in the situation that made you use the discipline in the first place.
Does Not Like Guns: Even as she dual-classes into Guardian, she can't use "Firearm" cards, possibly due to her training as a martial artist. Bows and grenades are still valid, however, as they have "Ranged" trait instead.
Draw Extra Cards: "Quiescence of Thought" Discipline lets her draw cards until she reaches exactly 5, but that counts as breaking it, thus disabling its bonuses.
Extra Turn: Her "Balance of Body" Discipline allows her to do up to 3 different fight and/or evade actions at the cost of one; doing so, however, breaks the Discipline, disabling its effects until she manages to spend a turn with no enemies nearby at any point.
It Sucks to Be the Chosen One: Her unique weakness, which forces her to either take damage and horror or flip her Discipline assets to their "broken" side, is titled "Burden of Destiny". The number of copies of this card increases as she learns more Disciplines, thus making it harder to keep them active. The Disciplines can be restored back, but it requires ending the turn with specific conditions fulfilled, or draw an Elder Sign.
Lightning Bruiser: If Lily manages to obtain all of her disciplines, she will enjoy an above average statline compared to other Investigators, which includes a fantastic Combat skill of 5 and very good Agility of 4.
Kung-Fu Wizard: Literally; she was raised by monks, and is adept in both martial arts and magic, though she's better at the former rather than the latter: Lily has below average Willpower for a Mystic base (3, though she can raise to 4 with a discipline), but has the best Combat stat among them (4, which can go to 5 with a discipline). She has also lower Sanity than other Mystics (7, while most have 8-9), but better Health (7 as well, while most have 5-6), meaning that she is not squishy either.
Magic Knight: She can access both Mystic and Guardian cards, and has good enough stats to succeed in both roles, though eventually she's likely to drop a large chunk of her magic completely, due to all her high-level cards belonging to the Guardian class. Neither class helps much to mitigate her 2 Intellect, however.
Magikarp Power: Downplayed; if she manages to get all four disciplines, she gets 4-3-5-4 statline, which while isn't broken, puts her significantly above average (it's 16 skill points total, versus standard 12) and leaves out all glaring weaknesses... assuming that she manages to keep those disciplines intact, which gets more difficult as she gets higher number of them.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: When creating her deck, she gets to choose from four different unique Discipline assets which boost one of her stats and provide her with a powerful ability, which has the cost of forcing her to flip the card over to its "broken" side, disabling it until specific conditions are met to turn it back (or she draws an Elder Sign). She can pick only one Discipline right away, but will gain another for every 15 experience points earned in total across the campaign.
Mythology Gag: Lily's "Aligment on Spirit" discipline, on top of providing her with 1 additional point in willpower, allows her to flip it and take 1 direct damage to heal 3 horror or 1 direct horror to heal 3 damage, which is very similiar to her ability in various Arkham Files games to trade health to heal sanity and vice versa. It can be restored by not taking damage or horror in one round.
Power Nullifier: "Burden of Destiny" gives a choice to Lily: either it breaks one discipline she has and prevent her from restoring it this round, or saps her Health and Sanity.
Spam Attack: Her "Balance of Body" Discipline improves her agility by 1 and allows her to take an action to flip it to perform 3 more Fight or Evade actions. The catch is that they must all be "different", so you cannot attack 3 times with the same weapon in a row, but you are free to use more than one asset or play events. To restore it, Lily must have not been in a location with an enemy for a whole round, which hopefully won't be a hard condition to fulfill after taking care of every foe using this discipline.

Bob Jenkins

Bob Jenkins, the Salesman

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bob_0.JPG

According to Bob, the secret to success as a salesman is persistence. People just need to be told what it is that they want. Repeatedly. Recently, Bob came into possession of a handful of "cursed" golden coins, and he hopes the same persistence he so famously advocates will help him to uncover their origin and purpose. If he plays his cards right, maybe this will be his big score. Maybe he'll finally be able to retire and buy that boat he's had his eye on and spend the rest of his days fishing in a tropical paradise. Or maybe Bob will finally come to see all that glitters is not gold.

Survivor-class investigator, who can only access level 0 cards of his own class, but can include unlimited number of level 1-5 and up to 5 level 0 Rogue cards.

Action Survivor: Subverted; Bob appears to be one, as he is a saleman finding himself to deal with much, much more than just selling goods, but as his backstory describes, he has chosen to dwell into the unknown for his own personal gain. Notably, while he starts out having access to mostly level 0 Survivor cards, all of his level 1 and above cards are from the Rogue faction, meaning that Bob at some point is no longer attempting to survive, but exploiting the situation to become rich.
Extra Turn: Bob gets an extra action each turn to play an "Item" asset of his or of another Investigator; if it belogns to another investigator, then both of them can pay the resources for it together.
Gameplay and Story Integration: He's a salesman; all his abilities are related to his career in one way or another:
- Bob has a bonus action specifically to play "Item" assets.
- Bob can ask another investigator in his location to reveal an "Item" asset in their hand, and pay the price for them, fully or partially. His signature asset, "Shrewd Dealings", further reinforces this mechanic, by allowing him to play "Items" more cheaply, and playing his own assets under control of the other investigators.
Greed: His appropriate-named unique weakness, "Greed", cause Bob variable amount of horror depending on how many resources he is holding when he draws it, with the effect worsening the less he has. At best it will cause him 1 horror, at worst, if he has zero resources, 4, half his max sanity!
Item Caddy: He's all about quickly and easily putting tons of Items in play, thanks to having extra action just to play Items, and having means to reduce their cost. His Elder Sign further motivates it, giving him the bonus which scales with the number of Items he controls.
Only in It for the Money: Most Investigators might be putting their lives and sanity on the line to save humanity, but for Bob it's all about making profit. This may also be why he has only 2 Willpower; he lacks resolve his more heroic companions have.
You say the 'end of the world.' I hear 'business opportunity.'
Reduced Mana Cost: "Shrewd Dealings" reduces the cost of item cards Bob's plays (whether in his hand or the hand of another investigator) by one resource.
The Sneaky Guy: Bob has an impressive 4 Intellect, which, if he puts his Rogue-class cards to good use to boost his 3 Agility, makes him good pick for covert clue gathering in the danger zones.
Support Party Member: His abilities let him pay for his teammates' Item cards or even gift other investigators cards from his own deck. Guardians who rely on expensive Item assets to do their job are particularly happy to have him around.

Introduced in The Scarlet Keys expansion

Carson Sinclair

Carson Sinclair, the Butler

Carson Sinclair has served three generations of the Webb family in Arkham. Always proper, Carson watched with disapproval as his most recent employer, Hercule Webb, began bringing bizarre artifacts and profane tomes into the house, aided in these endeavors by Webb's business manager, Dupuis. When Mr. Webb was swallowed by a dimensional rift, no one believed Carson's description of the harrowing event. Carson has devoted himself to proving Dupuis's guilt, and to restoring the children as the rightful heirs to the Webb fortune.

Guardian-class investigator. Can include up to 10 level 0-1 Seeker, Mystic or Survivor events/skills (he can only choose one extra class).

Action Survivor: In spite of being a Guardian, Carson isn't a police officer, a soldier, mercenary or anyone that had previous ties with the supernatural, which partially explains his not so great skills.
Battle Butler: Downplayed. While he's not very strong on his own, due to low stats, he can compensate for it with the tools the Guardians have access to, being able to stand his ground and protect his friends.
Draw Extra Cards:
- "As you wish" skill can only be committed to tests performed by the other players, letting either performing investigator (if they succeed) or Carson himself (if they fail) to draw 1 card once it concludes.
- His Elder Sign lets Carson draw 1 card. Main gimmick is that it can trigger when anyone draws an Elder Sign, not just Carson.
Extra Turn: His special ability allows him to trade his actions to the other players. He has an extra action specifically dedicated to this ability, allowing him to freely use it every turn at least once.
Master of None: He has no stat above 2, so he has to either rely on the other players, or stockpile cards which can boost his stats, and he's unlikely to be very strong in any particular field. He can take some off-class cards, but they wouldn't let him catch up with stronger teammates; of those, Survivor-class cards provide least amount of help to his teammates, but also makes him less of a deadweight thanks to many of them giving beneficial effects on a failure.
No Self-Buffs: Neither Carson's abilities, nor his signature card, work on Carson himself, rendering them useless when playing in singleplayer.
The Power of Friendship: Friendship and loyalty are the core of his design, including his gameplay:
- He has powerful supportive abilities, but nothing of this works for Carson himself.
- His Elder Sign allows him to draw 1 card... and this ability triggers each time any investigator draws their Elder Sign, not just Carson himself.
Support Party Member: All his abilities are related to supporting his team, while Carson himself isn't very strong, having no stats above 2.
- He can spend actions to give extra actions to the other investigators; he has an extra action himself each turn specifically for that purpose.
- His signature card, "As you wish" skill, can only be assigned to the tests performed by the other investigators, giving them huge stat boost, and allowing to draw 1 card on success (on a failure, Carson draws it instead).
- His personal weakness, "Selfless to a Fault", actually punishes him for not committing cards to other players' tests, causing him horror if he ends the turn without helping anyone.
- Carson can take some cards from either Seeker, Mystic or Survivor class; given his stats, the best Seeker or Mystic-class cards he can pick are those which don't make him pass skill tests — meaning mostly utilitarian or protective cards.
Undying Loyalty: His motivation to join the adventure is to help the children of his master, and prove his murderer's fault. Nothing would stop him at that.
Weak, but Skilled: Downplayed, Carson has a below average total statline of 8 (4 less points than the average 12) and is also frail with 6 health and sanity, and while none of his abilities compensate for his weakness, nor make him self-sufficent, he still can be very useful as a Support Party Member team player, enabling stronger Investigators than him do their job even better.

Vincent Lee

Vincent Lee, the Doctor

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahtcg_vincent.png

"I will find the answers, even if it kills me."

After the third or fourth mutilated body showed up during his time at St. Mary's Hospital in Arkham, Vincent Lee begun to suspect that these were not mere wild animal attacks. When a young man died screaming in his sleep from a burst heart, Vincent knew for a fact that dark times were ahead. Taking a leave of absence from his position at the hospital, he has set out to ease the suffering of those afflicted by the spreading chaos, hoping that the trail of bodies will lead him to the answers he craves.

Seeker-class investigator. Has limited (only up to level 3) access to his own class, but has unlimited access to any Health-healing cards, regardless of class. He also may include up to 15 other Guardian and Survivor cards (up to level 1).

Cast From Hitpoints: When Vincent uses "Bonesaw" as a weapon, he can deal extra damage at the cost of hurting himself.
Chronic Hero Syndrome: Vincent just can't stand aside when innocent is in danger; as such, he occasionally gets distracted to help a bleeding bystander (as part of his personal weakness effect), at the cost of actually performing his mission (and risking the world to end); he can ignore the bystander and let them die, but every time it costs Vincent a mental trauma.
Combat Medic: He's the team's designated medic, who also can stand his ground in a fight (and has some Guardian-class tools to do so), though he wouldn't replace actual Guardians. He can even use his "Bonesaw" as a Weapon, gaining much-needed bonus to Combat (and can sacrifice a point of health for extra damage). Additionally, his Elder Sign effect allows him to immediately heal 1 damage from investigator or Ally card in his location.
Crippling Overspecialisation: He can't access high-level cards of any class (including his own, where he is restricted to level 3), unless they contain words "heals damage", though he can access some cards of Guardian and Survivor classes (up to level 1).
Exact Words: As clarified in the FAQ, he can include cards in his deck as long as they contain words "heals damage", even if it means they heal it on themselves.
Genius Bruiser: Besides access to both Seeker and Guardian cards, Vincent has Guardian-grade 9 Health, decent 3 Combat (one of the best in his class), and retains great 4 Intellect. However, he faces the typical problem the Guardians tend to have (high Health, low Sanity), making him highly vulnerable to horror-based attacks which can quickly chew through his 6 Sanity, and he can't even hit hard enough to qualify as Glass Cannon.
Harmful Healing: Once per game, he can use his "Bonesaw" to heal up to 5 damage at once from any investigator, but must then pass hard Intellect test, or cause that investigator a physical trauma (which causes permanent damage and can kill the investigator if too many traumas gets accumulated).
Heroic BSoD: Vincent's personal weakness, "Innocent Bystander", acts like a (slotless) Ally card which enters play with most of its health missing, and receives further damage whenever Vincent suffers some (excluding direct damage). It can be cured, and leaves play if Vincent does so, but if it actually runs out of health, Vincent suffers a mental trauma, for letting his patient die.
Mighty Glacier: Vincent is one of the toughest Seekers in the game, having highest Health and second-highest Combat in his class. He's also one of the slowest, having only 1 Agility.
Support Party Member: Whenever he heals damage from any investigator, he also provides them with a copy of "On the Mend" skill, which acts as a free stats boost. The amount of such cards is equal to the number of players.
Weak, but Skilled: In a similiar way to Carolyn: Vincent is overall more resilient than the average investigator, as his Health and Sanity sum is 15 instead of the usual 14, but his total amount of stat points is slightly below average, having 11 instead of 12. He also has limited access to cards of his own class, as he can take only Seeker cards up to level 3, severely limiting his ability to gather clues fast and locking him out of many "researchable" Seeker cards upgrades. But he is the best character at healing damage, and when he does so, he gives an "On The Mend" to investigator just healed (himself included), which acts like a free stat-boosting skill card, aiding Investigators in their tests. His access to Guardian and Survivor cards from level 0 to 1 can also let him put his decent Combat (for a Seeker) to use and the fact he can also take any cards that heals damage regardless of their level or class give him a surprising amount of versatility.

Kymani Jones

Kymani Jones, the Security Consultant

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahtcg_kymani.png

"This doesn't belong to you."

When the Talno artifacts went missing from the Miskatonic Museum, Kymani was hired to assess the museum's liability. Of course, Kymani already knew who the thief was — it had been their own heist, all along. But Kymani had no interest in selling the relics. As far as Kymani was concerned, they weren't the one who really stole them. No; Kymani had sent the historical artifacts back home, where they truly belonged. The museum and the insurance company see only a villain to catch, but Kymani is faster, smarter, and better.

Rogue-class investigator. Can access Tool cards of any class (up to level 4). Receives free exp at the deck creation.

Backstab:
- Normally Kymani's Elder Sign is just the same as a +1 token, but if they draw it while there's at least one exhausted enemy in their location, it counts as an instant success.
- Kymani can immediately engage exhausted enemy as a free action, and if they then try to evade them, they add their Intellect to their Agility during the test; on success, if result is equal or higher than enemy's remaining health, the enemy gets discarded. It doesn't count as defeating the enemy, so no victory points, nor does it work on Elite foes.
Fragile Speedster: Downplayed. While Kymani has high Health, they lack Combat to actually fight without proper preparations (basic Combat is only 2); not to mention that some enemies target Sanity instead. Instead, they have great Agility (one of the few characters to have basic 5 Agility) and have an additional ability which allows them to discard exhausted enemies when evading them again.
Grappling-Hook Pistol: Fitting for a thief, Kymani uses a Grappling Hook as their signature asset, which allows (without risks of attacks of opportunity) to engage, move, evade or investigate; when performing the latter, they also uses their Agility instead of Intellect, which is much higher by default, and much easier to boost given that they're Rogue.
Ironic Name: Their family name is Jones, but instead of looking to bring artifacts to foreign museums, they instead extricate artifacts from there.
Justified Criminal: Kymani is a thief, but the reason why they steal relics isn't for profit; they return them to the original lands where they belong, seeing the ones who originally put them into museums as "thieves" instead.
Kung Fu-Proof Mook: Agent Fletcher prevents Kymani (and only Kymani) from adding their Intellect to their Agility while attempting to evade him, not just when using their main ability, but also when playing certain Rogue cards, like "Slip Away".
Martial Pacifist: Implied. Enemies taken care of with Kymani's main ability are not considered to be defeated, just "discarded", with the implication that Kymani gave them the good ol' slip or sent them on a wild goose chase after them, neutralising their foes non-violently. While that means they cannot gain Victory through evasion, that also means they can avoid negative effects that would come from defeating certain enemies (the Horror from the Goat Spawns, the Vengenance from Serpents, harming "Innocents" in Murder at the Excelsior Hotel, etc.). Kymani can still benefit from fighting and dealing damage to enemies however (or someone else doing so for them), as the less health they have left, the easier they are to be discarded when exhausted.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Kymani gains a bonus (based on their Intellect) when evading exhausted enemies; if they succeed, they automatically discard those enemies (but not defeat, so no free victory points, for example). They have free action ability specifically to engage such enemies. This ability has much less chance to work on their personal weakness, Agent Fletcher, as he prevents Kymani from gaining Intellect-based bonuses during Evasion.
Twofer Token Minority: Jamaican and non-binary.
Weak, but Skilled: Kymani has low offensive stats, but has extra abilities to neutralise enemies through the other means. On top of that, Kymani is way less vulnerable to treacheries which usually torment Rogues, being one of the few Rogues to have 3 Willpower (instead of standard 1-2), on top of 5 Agility. However, few games can be won through evasion alone, so one of the top priorities is to look for ways to boost their 2 Combat and Intellect, as most victory points comes from defeating strong foes and clearing important locations from clues; to help with that, Kymani starts with some free experience points.

Amina Zidane

Amina Zidane, the Operator

"What is it trying to tell me?"

A refugee from French-occupied Algeria, Amina arrived in Arkham with nothing more than she could carry. Six years later, Amina's sharp mind and technical skill placed her at the switchboard for the Miskatonic Valley Telephone Company. Soon after, she began to catch snippets of something strange while at work - distorted words in an unrecognizable language, out-of-place noises, calls that connected to nowhere at all and dropped almost immediately. As the phantom calls grew in frequency, Amina sought answers. She found the right extension, connected to the line, and listened in. Despite not understanding a word of the alien language on the other side, she could tell the eldritch words held real power.

Mystic-class investigator. Can access Charm cards of any class (up to level 4).

Action Survivor: She was a normal phone operator, until she accidentally noticed something weird and eldritch going on. She still doesn't fully understand those, and heavily relies on various "charms", not all of which are even magic. Notably, she's one of the few Mystics to have less than 4 Willpower.
Item Caddy: She's the only investigator, even amongst Mystics, who can put Doom on her assets directly (and not as effect of the other cards or Elder Sign draw). In addition, her Elder Sign allows her to move Doom from any card in her location (including location itself) and drop on any other card in that location, where it would be easier to manage.
- Amina's signature cards are two fast events which improves asset usage at the cost of requiring Doom to be either placed or already present on them to work: "Word of Woe" and "Word of Weal". '"Word of Woe" let's Amina activate an asset without spending an action by spending 2 resources and placing 1 Doom on it, "Word of Weal'" let's her instead add her Willpower to a test using an asset with Doom on it for free. On top of that, playing either card will shuffle the other in the deck if it is in the discard pile.
Jack of All Stats: All her stats are average (3, including Willpower). She has to rely on her Doom-manipulating mechanics to make things done. Justified as she has neither prior training nor knowledge of the arcane; she got involved with the occult essentially by accident.
Magikarp Power: Amina becomes less awkward to play once she starts gaining high-level cards (particularly, to get the ways to actually remove excessive Doom), but that requires actually making it past first few scenarios with her weak starting kit.
Master of None: Generally, Mystics start with high Willpower (4 or 5 for most of them), which they can use to compensate for their weaker stats with Spells that lets them do basic tasks through Willpower. Amina starts with all stats at 3, Willpower included, which makes her struggle to do anything, with or without magic. She becomes better with higher level cards, but it would only let her catch up, not outshine anyone.
Power at a Price: To even greater degree than other Mystics. All her abilities are built upon accumulating Doom on her cards for various boons, like playing them "for free". Fortunately, her Elder Sign ability allows to move all Doom from any of her cards to another card at her location, even if it's not hers (like the enemies). As with any Doom, it takes away the time the team has to finish their goal, and her personal weakness, "Deafening Silence", may move some Doom from her cards straight to the current Agenda, making it permanent.
Squishy Wizard: While she lacks the Willpower of other members of her class, Amina still fits this trope to a T with her fantastic Sanity value (9) and abysmal Health (5)
Token Minority: She's an Algerian refugee.
Touched by Vorlons: Her contact with the "Phantom Calls" and the eldritch powers their words carried is what is implied to have granted Amina magical abilities. Unfortunately, the complete accidental nature of how she gained said abilities means she has no training nor experience on how to use them, unlike other Mystics, which explains why her Willpower value is passable at best.

Darrel Simmons

Darrell Simmons, the Photographer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahtcg_darrell.png

The truth is darker than any of us know.

Even while growing up in Arkham, Darrell always knew that there something not quite right about the strange little town. After graduating from high school, he went to work for the Arkham Advertiser as a photographer, and in the years since, he's scoured every inch of the city. But on one fateful night, he saw something truly indescribable — a horror that shook his world to the core. His editor says he was just seeing things, but he knows the truth. With his trusty camera in tow, he would not rest until he has captured photographic evidence of the horrors that dwell in the shadows of his hometown and beyond. Just one good shot is all he needs.

Survivor-class investigator. Has access to Seeker cards (up to level 2).

Action Survivor: He's relatively normal photographer, going for investigation which would be anything but normal, with cults, monsters, dark magic and Eldritch Abominations at every step.
Early-Bird Cameo: He was portrayed on several cards long before becoming playable.
Going for the Big Scoop: He actively risks his life to gather information. Fittingly, his main class is Survivor, with access to Seeker cards.
Intrepid Reporter: Darrel knows that something strange is going on, and believes that it's up to him to uncover the truth. Armed with his trusty camera, he goes on the quest to reveal it — or die trying.
Loophole Abuse: Darrell's main ability can be triggered by spending evidences on assets he controls, any assets, not just his Kodak. By bringing other cards that generate evidence (which are somewhat rare however), he can get far more uses from his main ability of reducing skill tests' difficulty and get a bigger safety cushion against his personal weakness.
Power Nullifier: "Ruined Film" removes 4 evidences from assets Darrell controls, and inflicts him horror for every piece evidence he cannot discard.
The Smart Guy: He's the only Survivor to have 5 Intellect, and has access to some Seeker cards to put it to good use. He pays for it with only having 3 Agility, and 2 Willpower and Combat, making him rather vulnerable to both enemies and treacheries.
Support Party Member: Darrell can spend the evidence he gathers with his Kodak (or other assets) to make tests he or other investigators at his location take easier, by reducing their difficulty by 2.
We Need to Get Proof: Presented in both his backstory and actual gameplay:
- Finding some evidences of the supernatural activities is his motivation to join the quest.
- His signature card, "Darrell's Kodak", allows to put some resources on enemies and treacheries, as "evidences", and then gather them when he finds clues in their location and puts on his assets. He can then spend them to decrease the difficulty of his tests (compensating for weak stats). He should take care to keep at least some in reserve, though: his personal weakness, "Ruined Film", forces him to remove 4 evidences from his cards, and punishes with Horror for inability to do so, taking up to half of his Sanity supply in one hit at max power: failing to bring back proof may as well spell doom on him and his career. To make his life a little bit easier, his Elder Sign effect allows him to put 1 evidence on either his camera, or other asset he controls which also uses them.

Charlie Kane

Charlie Kane, the Politician

"It can be arranged. It's just a matter of acceptable terms."

Charlie Kane promised the people of Arkham a safer future. He made a lot of promises—lower taxes, better schools, less crime. It was part of the job, after all. And although he sometimes had to do things he wasn't proud of, Charlie always did work for the greater good. So when he started hearing the reports, he put the people first. Of course, he couldn't tell anyone. Widespread panic would not serve the public good. Besides, who'd believe him? Still, Charlie has always had connections in town. So he made a few calls, put a task force together, and went to work.

Neutral-class investigator who can take level 0-5 Ally cards from any class, any Neutral cards and cards level 0-2 from any two classes chosen at deck creation.

Action Politician: Downplayed. While he does put himself in harm's way for the sake of Arkham, he is almost helpless without his Allies. His backstory also implies that he only chooses to involve himself personally in the investigation because going public with his findings would either cause mass panic or have him thrown into the loony bin.
Boring, but Practical:
- Bonnie Walsh, his signature Ally, doesn't do anything on her own, merely giving Charlie flexible stat boost for his own ability, and allowing to ready another Ally when he uses it.
- Other than reading Allies in his location (which is good, but situational), his Elder Sign also gives him an impressive "+3" stat boost... which merely compensates for his poor basic stats.
The Chains of Commanding: Referenced by his personal weakness, "Burden of Leadership"; as the leader, Charlie has to put his Allies under risk; and this weakness forces him to choose between going on with the mission (hurting and potentially killing them, as they take direct damage), or ensuring their safety at the cost of completing objective (they gets exhausted, making Charlie unable to use them).
Crippling Overspecialisation: Charlie is entirely dependant on his Allies (and has all his abilities associated with them), and becomes extremely weak and vulnerable if he loses them. Naturally, his personal weakness, "Burden of Leadership", targets them, by forcing him either exhaust them (losing access to their benefits for a turn) or deal direct damage and horror to them.
Early-Bird Cameo: Charlie was originally portrayed on the "Charisma" asset, introduced in The Dunwich Legacy expansion (and later copied into the second edition of the Core); as with other cards portraying investigator on their art, "Charisma" hinted at Charlie's class, being a Neutral card which adds extra "Ally" slots.
Gameplay and Story Integration: As a portly elderly politician, Charlie isn't well-suited to combat the eldritch forces on his own, but he is able to call on his connections to get things done, represented by the skill boosts he gets from his Ally cards.
Glass Cannon: Zig-zagged, Charlie has below average Health and Sanity (both 6) and his abysmal stats (He only has 1 point on each skill) makes it easy to fail most skill checks and take loads of damage and horror, but the fact he start with 4 allies slot instead of 1 allows him to absorb significantly more punishment on them than other Investigators could on their own. Direct damage and horror will be a huge issue for him though.
Item Caddy: His playstyle is entirely built around amassing large number of Allies, gaining stat bonuses from them. For that, he's given unrestricted access to any such cards, three additional "Ally" slots, as well as a set of abilities dedicated to always keeping them ready, including his Elder Sign effect.
Jack of All Stats: Charlie Kane has poor stats on his own (all at flat "1"), but can easily boost them by exhausting his Allies with matching skill icons. As he has highly increased limit on how many Allies he can field at once (up to 4 by default, up to 6 with both "Charisma" cards), he can easily amass the little army which would cover for his weak points. But he's unlikely to surpass the more specialised investigators, who have high stats and can use high-level cards.
Magikarp Power: Charlie only starts shining when he gathers up his team, and puts all those Allies in play; before then, he has to somehow stay afloat with his abysmal basic stats.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: In addition to being a Neutral investigator who essentially gets to choose his class when creating his deck, he's a got a flat "1" in every single stat and a special ability that lets him boost his skill values during tests by exhausting Ally cards (for which he has 4 slots by default) with icons matching the skill being tested. His massive card pool and his unique approach to passing skill tests mean he needs to be built in a way that's entirely different from any other investigator.
Power Nullifier: "Burden of Leadership" makes Charlie choose between causing direct Damage and Horror to his ally cards (potentially causing them to be defeated) or exhaust them (disabling Charlie's core ability and potentially the abilities of allies that require exhausting themselves to activate them in the first place, for the round)
Shout-Out: He's named after Charles Foster Kane from Citizen Kane, who's also a politician.
Sleazy Politician: Subverted. He looks like the very image of a fat, cigar-chomping career politician and he isn't above employing underhanded methods to get ahead, but his ultimate aim is to serve and protect Arkham's residents.
Weak, but Skilled: Lore-wise, he is not much of an investigator, fighter or spellcaster, but he is definetly a good leader. Gameplay-wise, Charlie has 1 in every stat and is pretty much unable to do anything on its own, and can only take up to level 2 cards of any class, but at deck creation he can choose which two classes he can access cards from and he can get essentially any Ally in the game without any level or class restriction, which he can make very good use of given he starts with 4 allies slot, when most investigators only start with 1. On top of that he has the ability to exahust allies to increase his skills temporaly during a test by 1 for every ally exahusted that way plus every icon on them that matches the type of test: the more icons on them the better they get for Charlie. If you can put enough allies in play fast enough Charlie can perform as well as any other Investigator in spite of his weak stats.

Introduced in A Feast of Hemlock Vale expansion

Wilson Richards

Wilson Richards, The Handyman

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_wilson.png

Wilson takes pride in always having the right tool for the job. Leaky plumbing? Pipe wrench. Fallen tree? Hand saw. Interior remodeling? Sledgehammer. But recently his jobs in and around Arkham have taken on a certain strangeness. Creaky floorboards give away to labyrinthine tunnels. A broken roof shows signs of bursting outward instead of collapsing inward. It's Wilson's job to fix problems, and when those problems involve bizarre and horrifying creatures and unexplained phenomena, well, then it's time to get creative with what he got.

Guardian-class investigator. Has limited (up to level 4) access to his own class, but can take any Tool cards (regardless of class or level), and up to 5 level 0-1 Improvised and/or Upgrade cards of any other class.

Doom It Yourself: Wilson may be a handyman, but he's not failure-proof. This manifests as his personal weakness, "Hasty Repairs", which sets his basic skills when using his assets to 0, justifying it as him botching repair process. Solution? Do a proper repair, by spending two actions to discard the weakness.
Item Caddy: Wilson's abilities are all focused on making the most out of Tool assets.
- First Tool card he plays each round costs 1 resource less.
- He gets +1 skill boost when resolving effects of Tool cards, making them more likely to succeed at their function.
- His Elder Sign effect lets him quickly swap one Tool with another, on condition that new card costs the same, or less than old one.
- His signature, "Ad Hoc", is an Upgrade card for your Item or Weapon cards; once attached, it lets you to discard a Weapon or Tool asset from hand, only to then trigger their action ability for free.
Jack of All Stats: Wilson has 3-3-3-3 statline, being average at everything. While he lacks some offensive capabilities, compared to the other Guardians, he has better Agility and Intellect than many of his colleagues, making him more flexible.
Jack of All Trades: Wilson has no stat below 3 (or above, for that matter), making him not as locked in the same role as some other Guardians, while access to off-class Tools (and built-in boost to their effectiveness) makes him able to quickly switch to other tasks when situation changes. His deckbuilding options amplify his versatility: while he cannnot take level 5 cards of his class, he can include level 0 and 1 Upgrade (mostly Rogue) and Improvised (mostly Survivor) cards, on top of Tools of any other class regardless of levels (many of which belong to every other class but Mystic).
Power Nullifier: "Hasty Repairs" makes all the assets Wilson controls virtually useless, as triggering any abilities on them (be they actions, free actions or reactions) will set his basic skill value to 0, which makes it extremely unlikely for him to pass any kind of test using them.

Kate Winthrop

Kate Winthrop, The Scientist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_kate.png

Kate Winthrop has spent years researching in the basement of Miskatonic University's science building, passing up funding and academic prestige in pursuit of progress. Her single-minded focus finally paid off with the invention of the Flux Stabilizer: a powerful device capable of channelling a new form of energy. However, the price of progress is steep. The first successful test of this groundbreaking invention took the life of her friend and mentor Professor Young. Since then, Kate has worked tirelessly to understand these alien currents, in hopes that she might find a way to reverse their effects.

Seeker-class investigator. Can access Science (up to level 4) and Insight (up to level 1) cards of any class.

Cast from Money: Flux Stabilizer only works if Kate puts at least one clue on it, but it gives her access to powerful offensive events and, once active, gives her one-time boost for next test for each clue she puts on it.
Crippling Overspecialisation: While she does get some nice cards through access to Insight events, her other deckbuilding option (and the only one which lets her access off-class high-level cards), to Science cards, gives her very few extra cards, as overwhelming majority of Science cards is of Seeker cards, and, unlike the other investigator with similar quirk (Finn Edwards), she's not restricted in her own class, meaning that she can get them anyway.
Determinator: In backstory, she spent years in pursuit of her study in very humble conditions before they gave any results, sacrificing the prestige and money she could've obtained had she dedicated to something more mundane and traditional. Then one of experiments backfired, killing her friend and mentor, Professor Young, which not only didn't made her quit, but strengthened her resolve to master those powers.
Draw Extra Cards: Both versions of "Aetheric Current" lets Kate draw 1 card, in addition to their prime effects.
Early-Bird Cameo:
- She was depicted on several Seeker-class cards long before appearing as a playable investigator.
- Barkham Horror featured Kate Wintrhop-based investigator long before actual Kate was introduced.
Fragile Speedster: Kate has an impressive 4 in Agility, but only 2 Combat, as well as rather low Health of 6. This generally means that while she can easily disable enemies by evading them, actually fighting them can be problematic. She also has an uncharacteristically low Willpower of 2 for a Seeker, but she has a good sanity of 8 to make up for it.
Hoist by His Own Petard: "Failed Experiment", Kate's personal weakness, forces her to pass a Willpower test, the difficulty of which starts at 3 (she has only 2 by default) and quickly scales with the number of clues on her assets (which, given her abilities, she's likely to have quite a few). Fail it, and she would be forced to drop 1 clue into her location for each point of failure... or, if she can't, take horror.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She can put her clues on her assets, which gives her various benefits. Such clues still counts as hers, but will be dropped in her location if an asset with a clue gets discarded. Fortunately she can return them to her main pool either through her signature events or her Elder Sign effect.
Science Hero: Kate aims to defeat the eldritch abominations with the power of science and her own inventions.
Speedrun Reward: Kate can place clues on certain type of asset to gain a Status Buff, but she is hard-capped by how many times she can do that by the number of assets she control (and each can only hold 1 clue each). There are 4 ways to clear clues from assets: dropping the clues on her assets back in her lcoation (which means she has to pick them up again), discarding the assets with clues on them (which means she needs to find a replacement or replay a copy), using either "Aetheric Current" (and she needs to find an enemies to target with the event) or advance the act and/or spend clues specifically on her assets first. In other words, Kate is encouraged to make progress quickly to gain more uses of her main ability.
Status Buff: After placing a clue to activate her signature, each time Kate puts a clue on another Tool or Science asset, she gets a bonus to her skill value for the next test she is going to perform.
Weaponized Teleportation: "Flux Stabilizer" gives her access to her signature events, both of which, on top of their normal effects, helps her to get rid of her enemies by teleporting them elsewhere; as may be expected, neither work on Elite enemies.
- "Aetheric Current (Yuggoth)", on top of enhancing Kate's offensive capabilities, allows to also exhaust attacked enemy and teleport it into any location on Kate's choice.
- "Aetheric Current (Yoth)", on top of helping Kate to evade an enemy, allows to get rid of it altogether, by shuffling it back into encounter deck, implication being that they were put on a trip to some very remote location. It doesn't count as actually defeating them, though, so you wouldn't receive any associated rewards (or penalties, for that matter).

Alessandra Zorzi

Alessandra Zorzi, The Countess

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_alessandra.png

"I love a good party."

Alessandra's life of careless luxury enabled her to hop from a stately gala in New York City to a banquet with the Maharaja of India with ease. The Countess has sampled every dish, drink, and dame from Marrakesh to Chicago. The regal title is just an act, however: behind the scenes, Alessandra uses her cover to pilfer from art galleries banks, and the hearts and pocketbooks of the rich and frivolous. Her silver tongue has gotten her into and out of plenty of trouble. A new job with the shadowy Zamacona brought Alessandra to Arkham, Massachusetts, where the Countess learned the that more lurks beyond the suggestible rich and frivolous excess than she previously thought.

Rogue-class investigator. Has unlimited access to the cards that allow her to parley (regardless of class).

Canon Foreigner: Alessandra originally appeared in tie-in novels before being introduced as a playable investigator.
Crippling Overspecialization: Beside Rogue and Neutral cards, Zorzi can only take cards that allow her to parley (albeit of any level); however, such cards aren't very common, with some of them being Rogue or Neutral anyway.
Exact Words: Much like Carolyn and Vincent before her, the FAQ specifies Zorzi can take any card that mentions "parley" in its text, even if the card doesn't allow her to parley per se.
Extra Turn: She has an extra action dedicated to parleying, which gives her more freedom with how to spend her other actions.
Fragile Speedster: She has good Agility (4), but pretty low Combat (only 2), which makes dealing with enemies by evading them preferable to open fights.
"Get Back Here!" Boss: Want to get rid of Zamacona? Too bad, he's "Elusive", so when you catch up and attack him, he escapes to another location. Potentially with tons of Doom on him.
Heroic Seductress: Alessandra specialises in seducing people for fun and profit, both in backstory and in her actual gameplay. Aside from arsenal of cards giving her various bonuses if she parleys with someone, her own signature, "Beguile", allows to parley with enemy and either make it move away, or make her investigate or evade at its current location.
Kung Fu-Proof Mook: Zamacona (Alessandra's personal weakness) can't be parleyed with; this also disables many cards which otherwise would've been useful to dispatch him.
Lipstick Lesbian: Her backstory mentions that she "sampled every dish, drink and dame from Marrakesh to Chicago". Alessandra dresses in feminine drink outfits and uses her charm as a main tool of hers.
Power Nullifier: Downplayed with Zamacona; if he enters play, Alessandra still can parley, but at the cost of adding extra Doom on Zamacona for the first parley action she does each round, which makes it too risky, as the Doom measures your time limit for scenario.
The Social Expert: Alessandra specialises in using her charm as the key to success, hence why she has access to any cards involving parley in one way or another. Her good 4 Intellect and decent (for her class) 3 Willpower makes her use those cards more efficiently.
The Sneaky Guy: Alessandra can use her signature, "Beguile", to trick an enemy into leaving her location. Then she can either clear out its location without even going there, or evade the enemy to keep it pacified.
Stealth Expert: Her Elder Sign allows to automatically evade any non-Elite enemy in her or (revealed) connected location.
Token Minority: The only Italian in the cast, and one of the two known lesbians.
Twofer Token Minority: Italian and lesbian, in a mostly all-American cast.
Unskilled, but Strong: Zorzi has above average stats (her total sum of skill point is 13, instead of the usual 12 other Investigators have) and has superior action economy thanks to being able to parley once per turn without spending one of her 3 actions, but she has extremely limited deckbuilding and access to off-class card, which severly limits her versatility and the player's ability to cover the weakspots in her statline. She can talk her way out of most situations, but when diplomacy isn't an option, she will struggle.

Kohaku Narukami

Kohaku Narukami, The Folklorist

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_kohaku.png

"Why not greet the unknown with wonder rather than fear?"

Everyone in the Arkham Historical Society recognizes Kohaku's booming laughter, and the haunting tales he tells of both the yokai from his childhood home outside Tokyo and the strange creatures that haunt the Arkham Woods. The eccentric folklorist tells everyone that the chronicling and publication of these phenomena's existence will be his greatest work. It is only when he is home with his partner Gabriel that he hears the cries of the same spirit who haunted his father, and fears that his "greatest work" will never allow him a night's sleep.

Mystic-class investigator. Has restricted access to the cards of his own class (up to level 3), but unlimited access to Blessed and Cursed cards, of any class. Can also access level 0 Occult cards of any class.

Extra Turn: When he uses his ability to remove two blessed and cursed tokens from the pool, he gets an extra action.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed; Kohaku's is the only Mystic who combines high Intellect with decent fighting capabilities (most dump either one or another), having them at 4 and 3, respectively, though he wouldn't be particularly strong fighter unless he somehow boosts his Combat further.
Luck Manipulation Mechanic: All Kohaku's abilities are related to blessed and cursed tokens in one way or another:
- When his turn starts, he can add 1 blessed or cursed token into a pool, whichever there are fewer (on a tie, he can pick what to add). Alternatively, he can remove two of each, and get an extra action.
- His Elder Sign effect adds 1 blessed and 1 cursed token into pool.
- When a chaos token gets revealed at his location, he can exhaust his signature asset, "Book of Living Myth", to instead find and resolve a blessed or cursed token from the pool (whichever there are more; on a tie, he can pick what to use).
Squishy Wizard: While Kohaku has decent (for Mystic) 3 Combat, he pays for it with only having 1 Agility, which not only makes his chances to escape ambushes much lower, but also leaves him vulnerable to many treacheries.
Stalker without a Crush: Kohaku is pursued by a ghost, "Weeping Yurai" which acts as his personal weakness and prefers to keep in a shadow (being both "aloof" and "elusive", so it's you who have to hunt for it) and silently follow Kohaku, so it can attack whomever reveals blessed or cursed tokens at its location (given Kohaku's abilities, it's gonna happen a lot).
Token Minority: Japanese and gay.

Hank Samson

Hank Samson, The Farmhand

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_hank.png

Growing up on a farm, Hank Samson did all the chores Ma and Pa told him to do, including taking care of his brothers and sisters. When Pa showed him the strange animals in the city stockyard, Hank felt uneasy, but he did as he was told. When Pa told him to wait, he waited. And when Pa didn't come back, Hank went to find him. Pa taught him that family is everything, and you don't just leave family behind.

Survivor-class investigator. Can take up to 10 Innate and/or Spirit off-class cards (up to level 2). Has an increased decksize of 35 cards.

Armor-Piercing Attack: Hank's signature event, "Stouthearted", dumps damage and/or horror on an enemy the moment he engages them, with no test required; it can't target Elites, however.
Auto-Revive: Once per scenario, if Hank would get defeated by damage or horror, he can instead choose to become Resolute, which allows him to keep playing, albeit with different stats and no longer being able to heal by normal means.
The Big Guy: Played With.
- Hank stats with an extremely low 5 Health and Sanity, but, upon defeat, he (once per scenario) transforms into one of the two versions geared towards either tanking damage or tanking horror.
- Both his Elder Sign effect and signature card, "Stouthearted", allows him to move some of his damage/horror to the other cards (in "Stouthearted" case, even to the other investigators or enemies), further prolonging his survival. This works even for "Resolute" versions, which can't be healed by conventional means.
- Hank can take damage and horror intended for the Ally cards or other investigators.
Cast From Hitpoints: Inverted; "Stouthearted" event allows him to dump some of his damage/horror onto enemies (as damage).
Critical Status Buff: Unlike the other investigators, once per scenario, Hank can shrug off the fatal damage/horror and become "Resolute" (one of the two flavours), gaining extra stats in several fields (at expense of others) which makes him stronger overall than basic Hank was. The downside is that he no longer can be healed by normal means, with either Health or Sanity being now reduced by 1 (depending on which version you chose).
Draw Extra Cards: The "Assistant" version of "Resolute" Hank draws a card whenever he suffers horror.
Glass Cannon: Played With.
- By default, Hank has only 5 Health and Sanity; however, if he gets defeated by damage or horror, he can get back up and become "Resolute", which gives him a second chance and readjusts his Health and Sanity to better tank either damage or horror, at expense of other stat; if counting both "lives", he becomes the most durable investigator in the game.
- Out of two "Resolute" versions, "Warden" is the most combat-oriented, gaining extra basic Combat (bringing him to 6, highest in the game) and Health, but his Sanity gets decreased even further, making horror-based attacks even more dangerous; at least, he gains some extra Will to not get eliminated by the single failed treachery.
Jack of All Trades:
- On top of already being a Survivor (geared towards generalist gameplay), he can access various Spirit and Innate cards (mostly events and skills, respectively), which further amplifies his effectiveness within certain fields.
- Changing to the "Assistant" form boosts Intellect (from 1 to 3) and Agility (from 3 to 4), at expense of small loss in Combat (from 5 to 4). This makes him more versatile.
Heal Thyself: Played With regarding "Resolute" Hank; while he no longer can be healed by conventional means, his Elder Sign gains the ability to dump some damage/horror (depending on which version is used) on his assets, which can be healed or at least replaced with new ones.
Heroic Second Wind: If he runs out of either Health or Sanity, once per game, he can fully heal and adjust his stats to continue the struggle, turning into one of the two "Resolute" versions; the second defeat would eliminate him, however.
Heroic Spirit: Many aspects of Hank's design Invoke this: he is the only Investigator who can shrug off being defeated on his own, without the aid of other cards, and he has access to Spirit cards, which are generally all about surviving the impossible odds and drawing from one's inner strength.
Life Drain: "Stouthearted" lets Hank move up to 2 damage/horror total from himself to an enemy he engages, healing himself and damaging them. It works even if he's "Resolute", and thus can't heal normally.
Lightning Bruiser: Hank is primely combat-oriented, but has decent 3 Agility, letting him evade his enemies if needed. "Assistant" variant of him, which is geared towards versatility, further reinforces it by boosting the Agility to 4 (at expense of lowering Combat), making him into fairly balanced fighter/evader investigator.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Once per game, he can "resurrect" instead of being defeated, gaining different stats and abilities.
Money Multiplier: The "Warden" version of Resolute Hank gains 2 resources each time he takes damage.
Searching for the Lost Relative: Like in other Arkham Files games, Hank's motivation is to find his lost Pa. This quest manifests as his personal weakness, "Where's Pa?", which spawns an enemy in connected location, and makes it "Elusive" (actively tries to avoid being engaged with), forcing Hank to abandon everything and go on a hunt, as each turn he fails to kill it, he takes 1 direct horror: who knows what these monsters would do to Pa if not rescued in time?
Wound That Will Not Heal: After becoming "Resolute", Hank can no longer be healed by conventional means. Effects which moves damage/horror elsewhere still work, however, like his Elder Sign (which gains new effect specifically to keep him alive), or his signature card.

Novella investigators

Gloria Goldberg

Gloria Goldberg, the Writer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_gloria.jpg

Nightmares and apocalyptic visions have plagued novelist Gloria Goldberg her entire life. Although she learned to exorcise her terrors onto the page, she has never revealed the inspiration for her weird tales, not even to fellow author Jamie Galbraith. One day, she is struck by a vision of Jamie begging her to help finish what he started. Moments later, she receives word of his sudden death. As Gloria reads Jamie's unfinished book, the story takes hold of her, and the words on the page begin to bleed into reality.

Mystic-class investigator. Can include up to 10 level 0-1 Guardian, Seeker or Rogue events and/or skills (she can only choose one extra class)

Gratuitous Latin: Her replacement weakness' title is in Latin. "Liber Omnium Finium" roughly translates to "A Book about the End of Everything".
Hoist by Her Own Petard: Her replacement personal weakness, "Liber Omnium Finium", when drawn, forces Gloria to take a random encounter card from beneath her sheet—one of those she put there herself in attempt to disable something dangerous—adds the "Peril" keyword to it (which means no help from teammates) and forces her to deal with it immediately, unable to cancel it by any means and with a -2 skill penalty. If it's an enemy, it will also make an immediate attack.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: When looking into encounter deck in any way, she can look two cards instead, and either put one drawn card back on top, discard it or put it beneath her sheet, effectively removing it from the game for the time being (she can only trap up to three cards this way, however). As Gloria is also able to decide the order in which investigators would draw cards, she can arrange for nasty cards being removed, or dumped on someone who can handle them. She has no means to affect Elite enemies, however.
Seers: Gloria's Elder Sign allows her to look top-most encounter card in the deck.
Support Party Member: She'll struggle to survive on her own, but she's a great addition to the team anyway, due to her ability to interact with the encounter deck and discarding or even temporarily trapping cards from it. She can also choose the order in which players interact with the encounter deck during the Mythos phase, which synergizes well with her other abilities related to controlling the encounter deck.
- She also has access to few Guardian cards, and while she cannot make use of most of them given her terrible combat skill, there are few support cards that she and her team can benefit from.
- Beside providing Gloria with (admittedly much needed) extra tanking, "Ruth Westmacott" replacement signature Ally asset reduces the difficulty of a fight or evade action against an enemy or the test on a treachery by 2 if Gloria is willing to discard a card beneath her matching one of the traits of said encounter card.
The Smart Guy: Gloria has an impressive 4 in Intellect (one of the highest in the class), and can try to put it to use by taking some Seeker-class cards.
Squishy Wizard: Not only does she have extremely low Health of 5, she has very low 2 Combat and just 1 Agility, which makes her very vulnerable. She can try to compensate for it by taking some Guardian or Rogue cards, but it would only help her to a degree.

Standalone investigators

In general

Crutch Character: Beside 5U-21, all standalone investigators have above average total health and sanity value (15 in total instead of the usual 14; 16 for Stella), and excel at the assigned role of their class, but sacrifice the versatily of many other investigators sharing their class. Downplayed in that they are still considered viable later in the campaign, they just need teammates to cover their blind spots.
Fatal Flaw: Beside their personal weakness, Starter Packs Investigator come with a basic weakness that closely relates to their character and backstory.
Skill Gate Characters: Standalone Investigators sold in their own packs are designed to be easy to understand, build a deck for and play, with simple but strong abilities and a statline optimised to do one task, on top of being slightly more durable than many other investigators. But they have zero access to cards outside their class beside Neutral ones, meaning they lose on many cards synergies other investigators of their same class enjoy with their off-class deckbuilding options.

Nathaniel Cho

Nathaniel Cho, the Boxer

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_nathaniel.JPG

"I must fight on".

When up-and-coming boxer Nathaniel Cho was offered lots of dough for a title fight, he thoughts he'd finally hit the big time. But his promoter turned out to be part of the notorious O'Bannion gang, and Nathaniel was pressured to fix fights by taking a dive every now and then. His refusal led to his brother Randall's "accident." Nathaniel is rightly fed up with the mobsters endangering Arkham's citizens on a nightly basis. Now he puts his fists to better use, patrolling the streets and defending others from harm. But he's about to find out there are much more dangerous things that lurk in the shadows of Arkham than simple gangsters...

Guardian-class investigator. Has no access to cards of other classes.

Boxing Battler: Before joining the team, he was a professional boxer. The card-pack he comes with also includes actual boxing gloves to further improve his combat skills.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- Can't use non-Neutral cards outside of his class.
- Stats-wise he's a very good fighter (5 Combat)—and that's it. He has poor Intellect and Agility (both at 2) and average Willpower, making him unfit for anything other than combat, where he actually excels, even by Guardian standards.
- Using his boxing gloves (which synergise extremely well with his investigator ability) will fill both his hand slots, preventing him equipping any conventional weapons or investigation tools (e.g. a torch).
Draw Extra Cards:
- His Elder Sign lets him put event cards from discard pile into his hand.
- Randall Cho lets him find and play a Weapon asset either from discard pile or his deck, but only when he enters play.
Heroes Fight Barehanded: Nathaniel is a heroic vigilante that left his career as boxer behind to clean the streets of Arkham from the gangsters, mobster and other assorted scumbags plaguing them, and while he can use weapons as well as any other Guardians, he specialises in dealing additional damage with events, many of which showcase him or other people engaging in Good Old Fisticuffs.
Implacable Man: His personal weakness, Tommy Malloy, is a big and intimidating O'Bannion thug who keeps pursuing him and his brother Randall. He has no flashy special abilities, he is just very hard to put down, due to decreasing any damage he receives to 1, and always returning some time later. On the bright side, Tommy isn't immune to damage from other investigators, has a surprisingly low fight of 2 and is particularly vulnerable to cards that hit multiple times in one action, like "One-Two Punch" or "Butterfly Swords".
Item Caddy: Most fighters equip weapons to boost their damage. Nathaniel in contrast is designed around using damage-dealing event cards, such as combination attacks and counters, whose damage he can boost once per turn with his investigator ability. By equipping boxing gloves he can search out one of these cards every time he knocks out an enemy allowing him to continue his assault, but the gloves take up both hand slots preventing him equipping other weapons. His Elder Sign further amplifies this playstyle, as it allows him to regain events from discard pile.
The Medic: Not Nathaniel himself (though he can be a Combat Medic as much as any other Guardian if the player builds him to be so), but his brother Randall, who acts as his signature Ally; when he enters play, he can heal up to 3 damage from Nathaniel.
Necessary Drawback: Even if he equips a weapon (by eschewing his boxing gloves or gaining more hand slots to use both) his combat events typically use his base stats and not any bonus accuracy or damage granted by the weapon.
One-Man Army: Besides having one of the best Combat stats in the game, his abilities also allow him to quickly deal with most monsters by chewing through their health.
Revenge by Proxy: His brother Randall's disability is the "punishment" for Nathaniel refusing to throw the fight.
Throwing the Fight: His backstory mentions that his promoter tried to convince him to throw some fights when everyone bet against Nathaniel. When he refused, the "promoter" (actually an O'Bannion gangster) didn't take it well, leading to his brother Randall suffering an "accident" that left him wheelchair-bound. After this, he cut all ties with them and became a vigilante.
Vigilante Man: After the O'Bannion gang ruined his brother's life, he became a vigilante in order to protect those who can't protect themselves.

Harvey Walters

Harvey Walters, the Professor

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_harvey.JPG

"I have experience dealing with these sorts of horrors".

Professor Walters began as a devotee of the archaic and obscure, but over the years he has discovered that his knowledge of ancient languages, profane relics, and strange rituals is vital to addressing dangers in the modern day. He is both an avid collector of prehistoric ephemera and a fount of knowledge regarding the bizarre primordial religions that worshipped nightmarish gods eons ago. There is perhaps no sane person alive who knows more about the occult than Harvey. When a supernatural event occurs, Professor Walters brings his considerable resources and experience to bear.

Seeker-class investigator. Has no access to cards of other classes.

Cap Raiser: His signature card, "Vault of Knowledge", boosts his hand size by 2 for as long as he keeps it in play.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- Can't use non-Neutral cards outside of his class.
- Besides Harvey's 5 Intellect, his only other decent stat is his 4 Willpower, which, without Mystic cards, generally only helps with treacheries. Otherwise, he has neither combat capabilities (1 Combat) nor speed to escape the monsters once they start hunting for him (2 Agility). While this is not uncommon for Seekers, his colleagues normally have access to some off-class cards to offset this.
Curiosity Killed the Cast: His personal weakness, "Thrice-Damned Curiosity" (which fittingly has the "Flaw" trait), punishes him for delving too deep into the world of occult, by dealing him 1 damage for every three cards in his hand. Considering all the ways he may increase his hand's size, this can potentially accumulate into a One-Hit Kill.
Draw Extra Cards: Most Harvey's abilities are related to drawing more cards than it's normally possible, and letting other players do the same.
- Harvey can let any investigator at his location (himself included) draw 1 extra card when they draw a card during Investigation phase (but only once per round).
- After successfully investigating a location, Harvey can exhaust "Vaule of Knowledge" to let any investigator at his location to draw 1 card.
- His Elder Sign effect allows him to draw 1 card.
Item Caddy: Harvey represents the archetype of Seeker who want to maintain massive hand. Not only he has several abilities that let him consistently draw more and more cards, but his signature, "Vault of Knowledge", boosts his hand size by 2, which lets him go above normal possible maximum handsize achievable by any other investigator.
Occult Detective: He specialised in researching occultism and the activities of Eldritch Abominations even before he joined the team. Now, he can actually put all those skills and knowledge to stop the world's ruin.
The Professor: Professor at the Miskatonic University, and one of the team's greatest occult experts.
Support Party Member: His abilities allows him or his teammates to draw additional cards during the Investigators phase, quickly resupplying themselves with fresh cards.

Winifred Habbamock

Winifred Habbamock, the Aviatrix

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_winifred.JPG

"I can top that".

Winifred - Weethao as her parents know her, Wini to her friends - was one of the smartest kids in her reservation school. However, her reckless attitude and lack of respect for authority meant she often got herself into trouble. The course of her life changed forever when she found an old biplane in a farmer's garage and decided to "take it out for a spin." The owner, a former pilot in the Great War, was awestruck by her natural talent and offered to teach her what he knew. Now Wini is know as the "woman without fear," showing off her skills in barnstormers all across the country. That nickname would be tested when, during one of her shows, she spotted a creature she could scarcely describe: a thing with leathery wings and a single, mutated, pus-filled eye.

Rogue-class investigator. Has no access to cards of other classes.

The Ace:
- She's the best at anything she does, and she knows it. Sometimes this self-confidence bites her in the ass.
- Her being not just great, but the best manifests in her gameplay; she represents the "overachiever" archetype of Rogues, who goes above established goal to get extra benefits.
  - Her signature card, "Anything You Can Do, Better", provides a whopping six "Wild" icons, which in most cases all but ensures any skill check's success, and only truly needed for either really hard checks... or to go above the goal and reap extra rewards.
  - She has easier time to recover from committing multiple cards to the skill tests, as she can draw extra card once per test if she commits at least 2 different non-weakness cards to same test, and her Elder Sign allows her to return committed cards back to hand if she surpasses the goal enough (1 card per 2 successes).
Ace Pilot: Natural-born pilot, who showed great skills even before being properly trained.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- Can't use non-Neutral cards outside of her class.
- She's one of the few investigators to have 5 Agility, even amongst Rogues, which makes her great at neutralising enemies by evading them, but having only 3 Intellect and Combat, she would often need to rely on committing cards to either search or fight, while pathetic 1 Willpower would leave her at the mercy of treacheries unless she stockpiles cards to boost it somehow.
Draw Extra Cards:
- Once per test, when she commits 2 different (non-weakness) cards to that test, she can draw 1 card.
- Her Elder Sign effect lets her return one card she committed to a test for each 2 points she exceeded the difficulty by.
Early-Bird Cameo: The Dream Eaters Cycle introduced the "Daredevil" skill card, which portrayed Winifred's plane, and called her by name in its flavour text. Soon after, several starter packs were released, including Winifred's.
Fatal Flaw: Pride; she's great and knows it, which sometimes may lead to her overestimating her chances. Her personal weakness, "Arrogance", plays into that, being a skill card that reduces her stats by 1 at every skill test she perform, and she is forced to commit it to EVERY test she takes, on top of the card returning to her hand if she passes the tests anyway. The only way to discard it is by failing once, making her realise she is not invincible and to be more careful.
In Harm's Way: She is an Aviatrix that enjoys taking dangerous flights, two of the cards included in her pack are the skills "Daredevil" and "Reckless".
Pride Before a Fall: She's very skilled, but also arrogant, which can spell her doom. It manifests as her personal weakness, "Arrogance", which works as a "skill" card which deduces one point from any skill she checks; she must appoint it to every eligible skill check as long as she has it in her hand, and only gets rid of it for the time being when it actually causes her to fail something.
Red Baron: Known amongst other pilots as the "woman without fear".
Token Minority: The only Native American amongst the cast, specifically a Wampanoag.

Jacqueline Fine

Jacqueline Fine, the Psychic

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_jacqueline.JPG

"The future can be rewritten".

Blood. Fire. Destruction. Every night, Jacqueline's dreams are filled with things that have not yet come to pass. At first, she thought of these dreams as a terrible curse. However, as she began to control her visions and observe the events within in greater detail, she now understands they are no curse, but a calling. The world is about to be plunged into a thousand years of indescribable chaos, and only she knows the warning signs. Her dreams have never been wrong, but she cannot let the nightmares that haunt them become a reality.

Mystic-class investigator. Has no access to cards of other classes.

Attack Backfire: Her prediction ability triples the odds of pulling the autofail token and if this happens she'll have to either let it resolve or cancel it and let the two other (statistically likely to be negative) tokens resolve instead, which may leave the player worse off than if they'd just drawn a single token normally.
The Anti-Nihilist: In spite of being aware of the terrible things that will come to pass, Jacqueline still resolves to fight for a better future than the ones her visions show.
Boring, but Practical: Her signature card, "Arbiter of Fates", has only one effect: it allows her to use her special ability twice per round. Considering that this kind of effect can easily save her and her fellows, it's really all she needs.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- Can't use non-Neutral cards outside of her class.
- Has impressive 5 Willpower , which is good for many Mystic cards' effects (and often used to bypass treacheries)... and that's it; she has only 3 Intellect, and 2 Combat and Agility, making her struggle to do anything without her magic to boost her stats or manipulate tokens to get better outcome.
Draw Extra Cards: She can draw 1 card when she reveals an Elder Sign, if she ignores or cancels it by any means.
Dreaming of Things to Come: In her dreams, she can see visions of future yet to come...and they aren't pretty. Her main motivation for joining the team was to prevent these visions from becoming reality.
Luck Manipulation Mechanic: Once per turn, she can make any investigator to draw 3 chaos token instead of 1, and choose which one to play; in some cases, it may even be beneficial to cancel otherwise-benevolent tokens, including her Elder Sign (which allows her to draw 1 card if she doesn't let it trigger). Her suggested starter deck is built around this mechanic, with cards which either makes it easier to use (e.g. "Scrying Mirror", which "predicts" next token draw), benefits from "bad" tokens (e.g. "Voice of Ra" goes stronger if you draw symbol tokens instead of numerical ones) or have drawbacks on "good" tokens (e.g. "Azure Flame" and "Clairvoyance" deals damage/horror when revealing an Elder Sign or otherwise positive token like +1 or 0).
No-Sell: Once per round she (or another investigator at her location) can draw three tokens for a test and ignore two of them or one auto-failure. Her signature card, "Arbiter of Fates", allows her to do this twice per round.
Screw Destiny: She knows that her visions always become reality, but she can't just sit and wait until world burns; if there's even smallest chance to prevent it, she must try.
Straw Nihilist: Her investigator pack came with the "Nihilism" basic weakness, which causes investigators damage and horror every time they draw an Auto-Fail token. Given how she has been plagued for who knows how long by visions of the world falling into chaos and destruction, it's no wonder she might be worn down so much to believe nothing she and her companions do will matter or change the future
Support Party Member: Her signature ability is great for protecting her teammates, but by herself, Jacqueline has no good stats other than high Willpower, which at least lets her fight with spells.
Winds of Destiny, Change!: In story terms, her abilities are essentially attempt to manipulate the future she predicted... and sometimes succeeding.
You Can't Fight Fate: Her personal weakness, "Dark Future", disables her ability (and any other similar effect she may have), denying her her greatest ability to help her teammates (or herself). At the end of her turn she must reveal 5 chaos tokens; if one of them was the Elder Sign, she may discard "Dark Future", otherwise it remains in effect.

Stella Clark

Stella Clark, the Letter Carrier

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_stella.JPG

"I can hear it. Can it hear me?"

"Before Stella began working for the postal service in Arkham, she knew two things with certainty. First, her parents made a mistake when they called her their son and gave her a boy's name. Second, the house on the cliff in Kingsport whispered her true name - the name she chose for herself - late at night: "Stella." Delivering the mail six days a week in all kinds of weather wasn't an easy job, but Stella loved knowing that she was helping people connect with one another. Then she started finding the letters. At the end of her route, there was always one extra envelope in her bag. It was always addressed to her. It was always postmarked from Kingsport. And it always contained a letter with one typed word: Stella".

Survivor-class investigator. Has no access to cards of other classes.

Big Guy: She is the most durable investigator, simultaneously having 8 Health and 8 Sanity. However, she's not as good on offense as she's in defence.
Boring, but Practical: Her signature card, when applied to a skill check, provides three "Wild" (suitable for any check) icons to the test, and protects her from consequences of failing tests for particularly nasty treacheries (and she has 3 copies of it); nothing flashy, but depending on the situation it may be life-saving.
Crippling Overspecialisation:
- Can't use non-Neutral cards outside of her class.
- She represents the "prevail against all odds" archetype of Survivors; as result, all her abilities provide their benefits only when she fails skill checks. While good for making a comeback, they provide no help when she can't afford losing the skill test even once.
Determinator: To an even bigger extent than other survivors: Stella's abilities and cards included in her pack either give her benefits when failing a skill test or diminish or nullify the negative consequences of doing so. She will complete her mission, no matter the setbacks.
Extra Turn: Stella gets an additional action when she fail a skill test, but only once per round. Not only does this ability allows her to bounce back easily from wasting an action, but she can also abuse this to lengthen her turn by taking tests that do not take actions to do and intentionally fail them.
Failure Gambit: Her "Elder Sign" effect allows her to intentionally fail any skill-check, which also heals a little damage and horror from her. She also gets an action refunded once per turn when she fails a skill test.
Fog of Doom: "Called by the Mists", Stella's personal weakness, causes her 1 damage every time she takes a skill test with a difficulty of 4 or higher, until she discards it.
Jack of All Stats: She's fairly balanced compared to the other standalone investigators (who tend to boost one stat to the sky and dump the rest to oblivion), fitting into Survivors as a class being meant as Jack of All Trades. The only truly poor stat she has is her 2 Intellect, but it's not as much of an issue given her abilities and her class' tendency to just bruteforce through troubles.
Lightning Bruiser: Downplayed; she's not very strong offensively, having only 3 Combat, but has good 4 Agility on top of massive 8/8 Health/Sanity, meaning that she's less of a killer, and more of a safety shield which stuns the foes, so the rest can finish them off.
No-Sell: Her signature card, the "Neither Rain Nor Snow" skill, allows her to cancel all effects caused by a skill check's failure (both positive and negative) as long as it was appointed to this check. In some cases it may be life-saving.
The Perfectionist: In spite of most of Stella's unique abilities focus on turning failure into benefits, her pack came with the "Atychiphobia" basic weakness, which causes investigators horror every time they fail a skill check, implying she doesn't like to fail or make mistakes. This could be attributed to her role as an Unstoppable Mailwoman: Stella cannot accept the fact that she failed at her job or task.
Stone Wall: Downplayed. She's the only investigator to have both 8 Health and 8 Sanity, making her very durable. But she has only average Combat, and, being Survivor with no off-class options, has limited fighting capabilities. She has good 4 Agility, but it only helps to stall the monsters, not defeat them; at 3 Combat, actually killing foes after neutralising them may take some time.
Twofer Token Minority: Black and a trans woman. Definitely not someone Lovecraft would have come up with for a protagonist.
Unstoppable Mailman: She works as a mailwoman, and she is the biggest Determinator among Survivor investigators, barring maybe Calvin.

"Suzi"

Subject 5U-21, the Anomaly

Bonus investigator introduced for enhanced version of The Blob That Ate Everything scenario. She's a Neutral investigator who normally can't access non-Neutral cards above level 0, but gains access to specific classes' high-level cards via her unique mechanic. She has a massive decksize of 50 cards.

Arbitrary Equipment Restriction: She's forbidden from taking any "Permanent" cards, excluding story assets and her own signatures.
Draw Extra Cards:
- "Regurgitation" event lets her to return up to 3 previously-devoured cards into owner's hand, also healing 1 damage and horror for each card she returns. She has multiple copies of it, and she needs them, given how often she devours stuff.
- Her Elder Sign effect lets her to return a previously-devoured card back into owner's hand.
Extreme Omnivore: As may be expected from Blob-themed investigator, all her mechanics are built around her "devouring" cards, regardless of what they represent. She can't devour story cards, but almost anything else is a free game (albeit most frequently, she targets player cards), with her personal weakness, "Reality Acid", specifically existing to make her actively devour her and teammates' cards, with a table of possible results. There's a very small chance that she would devour some enemies instead, but enemies killed that way don't award victory points.
Gameplay and Story Integration: Investigator based on the Blob, as may be expected, has all her mechanics built around hunger and her being Extreme Omnivore.
Gathering Steam: She starts with all stats at 1, but whenever she "devours" cards, they gets put beneath her signature card, "Ravenous: Controlled Hunger", which gives her +1 to all stats per card "devoured". However, actually reaching the maximum can be risky, as it turns her signature into "Ravenous: Uncontrolled Hunger", which starts actively devouring either cards under control of investigators, or those beneath it, now putting them aside.
Glass Cannon: Suzi has below average Health and Sanity (both at 6) and unlike other investigators with similar endurance, like Lola and Calvin, she can't just make up for it by buying Charisma to get more Allies in play to use as a meat shield, as she is forbidden from buying any non-story permanents. Her fragility will always be a problem no matter what.
In-Series Nickname: "Subject 5U-21" is also known as Suzi.
Jack of All Stats: She starts with abysmal stats, but quickly rises them to average or above, making her rather universal. It's keeping her at adequate stats which is the challenge.
Jack of All Trades: She can access every class, and can potentially gain high-level cards from multiple classes, allowing her to be quite universal and adapt to any role... as long as she manages to avoid being screwed by her own eternal hunger.
Lethal Joke Character: Suzi has absurd design, very low stats, and strange and confusing deckbuilding rules which makes her build extremely huge deck of low-level cards without easy ways to upgrade them to anything. But her concept isn't just for making another Blob-related joke (even if it is a Blob-related joke); in truth, she's meant to grow stronger as she keeps "eating" cards: during scenario, she can accumulate extremely high stats, even if it's hard to maintain them for long; and across campaign, devouring cards also unlocks ability to actually upgrading or replacing them, with no regards for level, which ultimately makes her only investigator who can access any cards period, only passing on non-story "Permanent" ones.
Magikarp Power: She's normally restricted to level 0 cards (excluding Neutral ones). However, as she keeps playing and "devouring" cards, she gains ability to purchase cards of higher levels, albeit from just one class at a time (depending on what class had higher count of devoured cards in a last scenario). This allows her to potentially stockpile end-game gear from multiple classes and become quite universal.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter:
- Suzi's deck's size is 50 cards, instead of standard 30; as she has to include at least 7 cards from every non-Neutral class (to make her mechanic work), it leaves her 15 cards she can take from any class she wants, including Neutral. She also includes 2 basic weaknesses, instead of standard 1. Having a deck so big significantly alters her gameplay, sometimes to her boon, sometimes to her bane.
- Each turn, she "devours" one card from her hand, and her free action ability allows her to devour one card under her or other investigator's control, which then gets put beneath her signature card. Reaching the maximum of 5+ cards makes it putting devoured cards aside, and devouring one card either beneath or under players' control until it empties, at which point it reverts. Fortunately, her signature event "Regurgitation" allows to forcibly revert it (and return up to 3 "devoured" cards), while her Elder Sign returns any 1 "devoured" card of her choice to its owner's hand.
- By default, she can only access level 0 non-Neutral cards, but when the game ends, she gains access to upgrading or purchasing cards from the class which has the largest amount of devoured cards (eg, if she devoured mostly Guardian cards, she can upgrade Guardian cards), of any level.
Token Non-Human: All the other investigators are humans. Suzi is a sapient human-shaped blob. Backstory behind her birth is so long, it didn't fit on investigator card (not that there was much place left; instructions how to play her consumed all the space), so it was instead put into a separate section of the The Blob That Ate Everything Else manual (with extra blurb if you also recovered a Pet Oozling).

Barkham Horror investigators

In general

Heroic Dog: Every Investigator from Barkham Horror is an anthropomorphic dog trying to stop an evil cult of cats from summoning their master.
Purposely Overpowered: All Barkham Investigators have insanely strong abilities and signature cards, balanced out by the fact players are only allowed to use them in this standalone
Self-Parody: Each Investigator is more or less a satirical take of the role of each class, with overpowered abilities and signature cards and extremely narrow deckbuilding options that makes them good at only one specific task: Bark Barrigan the Guardian is an insane killing machine that can wield an absurd amount of weapons at once and tear apart any enemy with his BFG, Kate Winthpup is a non-combatant Seeker who can trivialise any skill check with her ability to sniff and has never to worry about enemies thanks to her signature instantly stunning them, "Skids" O'Drool is a Rogue with ludicrous mobility who can go run circle around the entire map without even worrying about enemies engaging him and can even deal damage to them by just running into them, Jacqueline Canine is a Mystic with supreme control on her deck through her ability to "burry" unwanted cards and Duke is a Survivor who is extremely hard to put down in spite of his low Health and Sanity thanks to Pete continiously healing him with treats.

Bark Harrigan

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_barkham_mark.jpg

Bark Harrigan is the best of the best, trained in paw-to-paw combat and barkmanship, he takes pride in being the protector of humanity. A shield agaisnst the feline forces that threaten to invade the world But will his weapons and skills be enough? Or is he all bark and no bite?

Guardian-class investigator. Has access to any level 0 "Weapon" cards.

Boisterous Weakling: His backstory implies that in spite of all his training, his bark is worse than his bite. This is referenced by his weakness "More Bark Than Bite", that gives Harrigan a massive reduction to his Combat skill (-3 in total, bringing his base Fight to a measly 2). The only way he can get rid of it is by succesfully landing an attack to regain his courage, proving he can "bite back".
BFG: His signature card isn't just another kind of revolver, or even a riffle. It's freaking gatling gun!
Crippling Overspecialisation: He is ridiculously overpowered in open combat, but his Intellect and Agility have a lot to desire for. He also traded his prototype's access to "Tactic" cards for off-class "Weapons", leaving him out of many cards which were useful to amplify his prototype's weak points.
Gatling Good: His signature card is a huge "Catling Gun". It's very strong and has tons of ammo, but has one major downside — it requires two actions to use (and investigators normally have three per turn).
Mighty Glacier: Has the exact same stats, health and sanity as his prototype with the exception of lower agility, putting him more in line with the usual archetype of a Guardian.
More Dakka: His "Catling Gun" starts with 12 ammo, and can spend up to three per shot, increasing in damage output with each ammo spent this way. With just one "shot".
One-Man Army: Just like his prototype, Mark Harrigan, Bark has huge Health and Fight stats. While he can't amplify his strength by taking damage, he trades it for ridiculous access to "Weapon" cards. His Elder Sign further encourages him into focusing on Weapon-based builds, as it reduces the cost of the next weapon he plays.
Punny Name:
- His name is an obvious dog-related pun on his prototype's name, Mark Harrigan.
- His gun is called "Catling Gun".
Walking Armory: He has two additional "Hand" slots specifically for "Weapon" cards, and can include level 0 "Weapons" of other classes in his deck. This may be increased to whopping six "Weapons" equipped at once through "Bandolier" asset. Armed to the teeth, indeed.

Kate Winthpup

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_barkham_kate.jpg

One of the brightest in Muttskatonic University Obedience School, Kate is an expert in theoretical physics, chemistry and zoology. Thanks to her keen mind and attention to detail, she has concocted a way to defend herself and the others from the machination of cats everywhere. Using her newly constructed Feline Discombulator- and her keen sense of smell- Kate will sniff out evil and defend Barkham from the forces that dwell in the shadows

Seeker-class investigator. She can access up to five level 0 cards of other classes which she thinks "would smell weird".

Brown Note: Her personal weakness, "Foul Odor", is the smell so awful, the mere memory of it causes her to take horror if she tries to sniff anything while it's in play; fittingly, it has "Madness" trait.
Early-Bird Cameo: She's based on Kate Winthrop, recurring Arkham Files investigator, who was only formally introduced to the game several Cycles later after release of Barkham Horror.
Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Her "Feline Discombobulator" states in its subtitle that it discombobulates felines.
Fragile Speedster: Shares the same statline as Ursula (Good Agility and Intellect but awful Combat) but has far worse Health compared to her (5 instead of 7) in favour of more Sanity (9 instead of 7). Kate can get clues easily, and do so quickly, but the second an enemy shows up she needs to get away (which is fairly easy to do with her signature card and ability to "sniff").
The Nose Knows: All her abilities are related to her super sense of smell.
- She can "sniff" her current location, which would reduce the difficulty of any further skill tests she would take there, by taking an action to do so without provoking attacks of opportunity: after all, sniffing things is fast and easy. Her Elder Sign does the same (or even target a connecting location instead), only without costing an action.
- Her personal weakness, "Foul Odor", deals her horror whenever she tries to smell things. The only way to get rid of it is by taking an action to "unsmell" all locations, which will undo all actions you spent smelling around to make skill tests easier.
- Her Deckbuilding Options include five level 0 cards that would "smell weird". What that means is up to the player's discretion, but for simplicity's sake it can be treated as working in the same way as the card access for Investigators introduced in Dunwich Legacy (five level 0 cards of any other class).
Punny Name: Obvious dog-related pun on her prototype's name, Kate Winthrop.
Trap Master: Her signature "Feline Discombobulator" (It Discombobulates Felines), allows her to automatically evade any enemy "that is a cat, looks like a cat or is a weird cat-person hybrid" spawning in her location. Given the name and that her signature is portrayed as an electrified mouse toy, it's not hard to imagine how it works...

"Skids" O'Drool

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_barkham_skids.jpg

"Skids" O'Drool always wanted to be a good boy. But his nose for trouble kept landing him in the pound, where the "bad dogs" go. Usually this was because of his favourite pastime: begging to go for a car ride, then fervently wrenching the wheel away from the hapless human. How this obsession with cars began, we may never know. All we know is that other drivers should be careful when "Skids" is on the loose.

Rogue-class investigator. Can access up to five level 0 cards of other classes which may move him in one way or another.

Adaptational Villainy: Played for Laughs, the original O'Tool only robbed banks to aid his ailing mother and when she died he became The Atoner. O'Drool is a crazed hijacker that likes to board cars and wrestle control from the driver for its own sake.
Back Stab: His Elder Sign allows him to ambush the next enemy into whose location he would enter, dealing 1 damage before the fight even starts.
Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: According to his backstory, he begs humans for a car ride, only to steal the wheel. This is even his printed ability on his investigator card!
Car Fu: His signature card, "Take the Wheel", allows him to damage enemies whenever he enters locations.
What? No. Stop. That's bad. Bad dog.
Crippling Overspecialisation: His deck-building options provide him with best mobility in the game... and little else, outside of standard Rogue card pool.
Diabolical Dog Catcher: "Skids" O'Drool's nemesis (and personal weakness) are a pair of dogcathers trying to bring him back to the pound.
Drives Like Crazy: The reason he landed in the pound in the first place is because of his past time of hijacking cars. This even referenced by his signature event "Take the Wheel"
Heroic Comedic Sociopath: Unlike his prototype, his backstory as a criminal is completely Played for Laughs
Lightning Bruiser: Downplayed. He has ridiculous mobility, having access to off-class movement-related cards and having an ability to, once per round, move up to 3 times at the cost of 1 action 1 resource (while ignoring enemies). He's also just as tough as his prototype, O'Tool. But unlike O'Tool, he lacks access to Guardian cards, and his own offensive capabilities aren't that great, with him only having 3 Combat like the original.
Punny Name: Obvious dog-related pun on his prototype's name, "Skids" O'Tool.
Stealth Expert: His ability allows him to quickly sneak past the enemies without them noticing him.
Token Human: His weakness are the only human enemies fought in the scenario.
You Will Not Evade Me: Once the Dogcatchers enter O'Drool's location (or he enter theirs) he cannot move for the rest of the round, shutting down his high mobility. Downplayed in that "Skids" can evade them, he just can't leave their location until next round (and they are "hunters" so they will keep chasing him regardless).

Jacqueline Canine

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ahlcg_barkham_jacqueline.jpg

As a psychic, Jacqueline Canine can always foretell what is buried beneath the earth in any given spot. She knows where to go to find the bones, where to rummage to find the tastiest scraps of food, and where to beg for the best treats. But what will Jacqueline do when these premonitions lead her to real danger?

Mystic-class investigator. Can access any even remotely cat-related cards (blasphemy!).

Bad Powers, Good People: In this verse, cats are Always Chaotic Evil... yet Jacqueline specialises in using them to fight the forces of evil. This mirrors how "normal" Mystics deal with forbidden magic to fight back Eldritch Abominations.
Draw Extra Cards: Downplayed:she can draw an extra card as a free action each turn, but it requires her to "bury" one from her hand first. She can recover up to 2 buried cards by taking an action to dig 'em up.
Crippling Overspecialisation: There are not that many cats in the game, so she can't access all that many non-Mystic cards anyway.
Forgetful Jones: She's so prone to forget where she buried her stuff, even her personal weakness, "No Sense of Space and Time", is built around it, making her either discard buried cards, or take some mental damage in attempt to remember (taking 1 horror for each card she keeps).
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She can put cards from her hand beneath her sheet,"burrying" them, and take an action to draw 1 or 2 cards that were "burried". This solves the common issue with cards being drawn faster than the player can use them, resulting in some cards being discarded during upkeep phase. Her signature asset: "Chew Toy of Nightmares", is a relic that takes a handslot but allows her to commit cards beneath her without needing to draw them first, while her Elder Sign allows her to instantly unbury a card and add it to her hand too.
Punny Name: Obvious dog-related pun on her prototype, Jacqueline Fine.

Duke

Arf. Arf arf arf. BARK! Grrrrrrrr. Woof. Arf arf arf arf arf arf arf. Bark bark. Mrr?... Bark. Bark bark. Arf arf arf arf arf. Borf borf. Woof woof woof! AROOOOOOO—

Survivor-class investigator. Can access up to five level 0 off-class "Allies", assuming they are either dogs or humans. Only investigator to being specifically forbidden to include anything cat-related.

Cat/Dog Dichotomy: Taken a step further than with other investigators. While for others, taking cats into your deck isn't forbidden, just frowned upon from narrative standpoint, Duke is the only one for whom it's explicitly forbidden.
ABSOLUTELY NO CATS UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES!
Crippling Overspecialisation: The only off-class cards he can take are level 0 Allies. The problem is that any investigator has only 1 Ally slot by default, and the card which gives more, "Charisma", requires spending experience to obtain.
Draw Extra Cards: One of the potential effects of Pete's dog treats (beside healing or giving resources) is drawing cards.
Genius Bruiser: Shares the same statline as Joe Diamond, of all people, having 4 Intellect and Combat but 2 Willpower and Agility, with all the strenghts and weaknesses that come with it.
Glass Cannon: Much like his owner, Duke is pretty fragile even as an investigator, having below average Health and Sanity. This is less pronounced than when Pete is in the lead though, thanks to his role as The Medic here (though Pete himself can still hardly take any punishment even as an ally). His low Agility and Willpower leaves him more vulnerable to treacheries too.
The Medic: Pretty much Pete's role as Duke's ally; instead of just amplifying his stats, this time he acts as the easy way to heal damage and horror, and to gain free resources and cards.
Mythology Gag: In all games where he ever appeared, Ashcan Pete was accompanied by his faithful dog, Duke, and in Arkham TCG Duke was the core part of his gameplay, allowing him to amplify his most weak stats (Fight and Intellect). Since this time around, it's Duke who is playable, his ally is the "friendly human", Ashcan Pete. They also have their stats reversed, with Duke now having good Intellect and Fight, but low Willpower and Agility; and Duke's ability and Elder Sign effects are both related to keeping "friendly human" ready for action by supplying him with resources. The original Pete has 6 Health and 5 Sanity, while Duke as an ally has 2 Health and 3 Sanity. As an Investigator of Barkham Horror Duke has 5 Health and 6 Sanity, while Pete as an ally has 3 Health and 2 Sanity.
Support Party Member: While Duke was vital to Pete because it covered the weakspot in his statline, here Pete is vital to Duke for offering him healing, resource generation and card draw every time he succeeds at a skill check by feeding him dog treats. However he only starts with 5 and the only way for Duke to add more on Pete is by either taking 2 actions to put 3 of them on him or revealing his Elder Sign to add 1 (which also readies Pete). Stockpiling on them is unadvised though, because drawing Duke's personal weakness, "Out of Doggie Treats", will immediately remove all dog treats from Pete.
Token Human: While other human allies can be added to any investigator's deck, Duke's "Friendly Human" is specifically the only human ally introduced in Barkham Horror.

Characters / Arkham Horror The Card Game Investigators

Edit Locked

Introduced in Night of the Zealot (core game)

Roland Banks, the Fed

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

Daisy Walker, the Librarian

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

"Skids" O'Toole, the Ex-Con

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version.

Agnes Baker, the Waitress

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

Wendy Adams, the Urchin

Both versions

Basic version.

Parallel version

Introduced in The Dunwich Legacy expansion

Zoey Samaras, the Chef

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

Rex Murphy, the Reporter

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

Jenny Barnes, the Dilettante

Jim Culver, the Musician

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

"Ashcan" Pete, the Drifter

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version

Introduced in The Path to Carcosa expansion

Mark Harrigan, the Soldier

Minh Thi Phan, the Secretary

Sefina Rousseau, the Painter

Akachi Onyele, the Shaman

William Yorick, the Gravedigger

Lola Hayes, the Actress

Introduced in The Forgotten Age expansion

Leo Anderson, the Expedition Leader

Ursula Downs, the Explorer

Finn Edwards, the Bootlegger

Father Mateo Castile, the Priest

Calvin Wright, the Damned

Introduced in The Circle Undone expansion

Carolyn Fern, the Psychologist

Joe Diamond, the Private Eye

Preston Fairmont, the Millionaire

Diana Stanley, the Redeemed Cultist

Marie Lambeau, the Entertainer

Rita Young, the Athlete

Introduced in The Dream Eaters expansion

Tommy Muldoon, the Rookie Cop

Mandy Thompson, the Researcher

Tony Morgan, the Bounty Hunter

Luke Robinson, the Dreamer

Patrice Hathaway, the Violinist

Introduced in The Innsmouth Conspiracy expansion

Sister Mary, The Nun

Amanda Sharpe, The Student

Trish Scarborough, The Spy

Dexter Drake, The Magician

Silas Marsh, the Sailor

Introduced in Edge of the Earth expansion

Daniela Reyes, the Mechanic

Norman Withers, the Astronomer

Monterey Jack, the Archaeologist

Both versions

Basic version

Parallel version.