Elizabeth Vaughn EVENT: Reporter. Your opponent is hounded by a reporter. You may discard up to 6 cards and replace them from your Endurance. (errata'd text) An interesting card. This was initially somewhat overlooked, but seems to be coming back into vogue big time. First, the game mechanic questions. Elizabeth Vaughn is both an Ally and a Reporter. "Duel is delayed." is flavor text and has no impact on play. You discard, then immediately draw the same number. So that's how she works - what does she do and how useful is it to you? Card cycling is _critical_ in Highlander, and becoming more so every day. Patience lets you draw quickly. Master's Stratagem lets you dump cards. Quality Blade/ME essentially lets you have an Ability one higher, as well as letting you draw the card at the beginning of your turn. Elizabeth Vaughn lets you dump a big chunk of cards and redraw them immediately. Using her does use up your one Special for the turn. However, you can still play defenses and attacks. That suggests one use for Elizabeth Vaughn. Don't have the defense you need? If so, discard those defenses that aren't helping you, or that attack you don't need at the moment, and draw up to six more cards. Hopefully the defense will be there. Are you faced with an unblockable/undodgeable attack and don't have that Alertness in your hand? Play Elizabeth Vaughn. You may not be able to play another Special . . . but you can play any number of Edge cards. If you draw a few Patience, you can play those as well. Not only can you draw to replace Patience, but to replace EV as well. If you're trapped with a useless, diminishing hand of cards due to Factory or a multi-play Encounter, Elizabeth Vaughn can give you a boost there as well. If you've been hit with a Charm/Kastagir or a Cat & Mouse/Defense, EV can give you an emergency draw of cards there as well. As noted above, Elizabeth Vaughn is a card cycler. Did you put Alertness/Block in your deck, and you find yourself up against Luther or Annie Devlin? You're probably not going to be facing an unblockable attack, and you can dump those Alertness cards at will. In other words, Elizabeth Vaughn can help you dump those cards you don't need. Unlike, Master's Stratagem, it lets you dump them in bulk. Is Elizabeth Vaughn better or worse than the Movie Edition Flashback? As an Ally and a Reporter, Elizabeth is more vulnerable. However, currently there isn't much for her to be vulnerable _to_. The only card that affects Reporters is Sovereign Media, a promo card that you typically don't find in many tournament decks. Sovereign Media _is_ a powerful card, removing all Reporters in the target's Endurance from the game. Even Selective Memory is no proof against it. However, at least one of the other two Reporters, Linda Plager, is pretty inconsequential. If you think you'll be up against opponents paranoid about Reporter itself and/or Elizabeth, then don't use them. There are not currently any cards that detrimentally affect Event Allies such as Elizabeth, so she's in no danger there. Balanced against this are the facts that A) Elizabeth Vaughn is a Common (compared to Flashback's Rare status); B) not all Personas have Flashback; and C) she allows the discard of one additional card. Taking this all into account, EV is currently the better of the two cards. Of course, in Renaissance-style play, Flashback is usable and Elizabeth Vaughn is not, making it much more useful as a card-cycler. Another issue that arises is: is Holy Ground/SE better than Elizabeth Vaughn? If you are expecting a lot of attacks that can't be dodged or blocked, then Holy Ground is definitely better. However, it also lets your opponent cycle cards . . . and he doesn't have to play a Special to do so! If you have other means of avoiding attacks (Disappear, Alertness/Block & Dodge), EV is once again the better card. Also, Carl won't counter Elizabeth Vaughn. Above we note the power of card-cycling. Using Holy Ground/SE to let your opponent ditch cards is doing his work for him. If you are going for a lock deck, using Holy Ground is probably not a good idea: why give them a chance to draw those lock-breakers? Elizabeth Vaughn seems like a better bet for combat and non-combat decks. Use Alertness/Block to avoid those unavoidable attacks, and EV to cycle rapidly and get what you need while they have to spend their turn playing Specials to get their vital cards. So which Personas benefit from Elizabeth Vaughn? Probably all of them. The ones without Flashback/discard have no other choice but to use her for large- scale card cycling. Nefertiri gets no huge benefit from Elizabeth Vaughn. She can draw to replace EV itself, giving her an extra card in addition to the other cards she cycled/discarded. In fact, she can play EV, draw to replace, and then toss the replacement card as one of the six allowed. This is not a huge benefit for her. No other Persona gains specific advantages from Elizabeth Vaughn. The dumping of useless cards is a benefit to anyone. So overall, Steve gives Elizabeth Vaughn a _7_ at the current time. If future cards have a greater impact on Reporters and Event-Allies, then this rating could be lower. But right now, her ready availability to any Persona, and her ability to move mass numbers of cards, make her a force to be reckoned with. What Our Other Raters Say: Ben - Abstain Jeff - Lizzie Vaughn is essentially a Holy Ground without the "Holy" part. Useful only if you don't want your opponent to cycle as well. Usually, though, I'd rather have a Holy Ground: 4 Cards. Rick - It's one of the best card cyclers in the game so it's good in an emergency. Hank - Elizabeth Vaughn is a good card for throughput, if you're somehow intent on keeping your opponent from drawing cards. Otherwise, I use Holy Ground/SE for the same effect. Still, it's a card with a use. Alan - Abstain Jim - Abstain Wayne - This is probably the best generic event card for card cycling. This card allows you to play a larger deck and still dump the "trash" without it piling up in your hand. This card is probably second only to Master Stratagem as far as card cycling. Ratings Overall: Steve 7 Ben N/A Jeff 6 Rick 7 Hank 6 Alan N/A Jim N/A Wayne 8 Average: 6.80