I am leaning Glory Hound, to let my Kyra and her 8 blessings go exploring. I plan to defend her. But definitely a tough call.
I wonder what Hawkmoon thinks...
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I think both are very tempting. Lancer has a lot of deck efficiency and 'healing' built in. But having double duty diplomacy rocks in Glory Hound.
Ultimately, I'm making the call based on party size. With 5-6 players and a lot of locations, movement is going to be key so I'm off to Lancertown.
Lancer definitely makes Alain better at combat, but I'm going to go with... Glory Hound.
1) Alain doesn't fail many combats. See other threads for stats.
2) The ability to take a combat away from someone else makes him the ultimate bodyguard, and could make things altogether too easy for any group.
3) Hand size 7.
4) Average +11 melee bonus when using an ally to explore. Alain will have Diplomacy fully upgraded in Wrath.
I could be wrong, but I don't believe Alain needs to discard or recharge his lance very often.
I could be wrong, but I don't believe Alain needs to discard or recharge his lance very often.
I think it's less about needing to discard for a high check and more about being able to recharge a weapon card when you end up with two in your hand.
If you're concerned about exploring speed (and in 5-6 player, you probably should be), I'm a fan of the Lancer combo of 'discard a mount to move-scout-and-encounter-if-monster' and 'recharge any card to get a mount from your discard/deck'. Having the option of full-scout-mode (like Alhazra & Adowyn) is a nice perk, and being able to convert extra weapons/armors into explores some of the time seems very appealing.
Glory Hound mostly seems appealing if you have one or more full support characters who are going to stick with Alain all the time, and you want to be able to run them without attack spells while still exploring.
If you're only worried about them taking their one free explore, Lancer's scouting power leaves the non-monsters behind, so you can also use that to find safe spots for Kyra to walk into.
Lancer's power to recharge a card to pull a mount card out of your discard pile or deck into your hand, is very strong.
Mount cards (apart from Donahan) can be used as an explore-again. So play a mount to explore again, then recharge the worst card in your hand to get it back and play it to explore yet again. You can get up to 3 additional explores doing this with a 6 card hand (weapon, armor, Donahan, +3 cards). If you acquire any boons on your turn, that's even more explores. You only actually need a single explore-again mount in your deck to keep doing this.
If you take damage (e.g. before/after you act), discard mounts. You can self-heal them with this ability.
Before you reset your hand, discard any mounts remaining in your hand. After you draw up to full, recharge the worst cards in your hand to get the mounts back (you can do the latter part when it's your turn again, when you actually want to explore again with those mounts; until then, the other cards might be more useful). This cycles you through your deck faster, as you get to draw an additional X cards and just keep the best ones in your hand.
Alain is already good at combat, and Glory Hound's +even more combat that happens only when you used an ally to explore again can be situational. At most you'll have 5 allies in your deck, not all of those explore-agains will end up being combat, some things are mental immune, and you might not have needed the extra bonus on some of those fights anyway because he's just that good. Glory Hound's strength is mainly in taking other people's combats, in my opinion.
I just really want to hear from the legend, HAWKMOON, him/herself. I defeat the scenario with my group tonight at 9 CST. Please bless me with your wisdom for decision time.
Lancer's power to recharge a card to pull a mount card out of your discard pile or deck into your hand, is very strong.
Mount cards (apart from Donahan) can be used as an explore-again. So play a mount to explore again, then recharge the worst card in your hand to get it back and play it to explore yet again. You can get up to 3 additional explores doing this with a 6 card hand (weapon, armor, Donahan, +3 cards). If you acquire any boons on your turn, that's even more explores. You only actually need a single explore-again mount in your deck to keep doing this.
Team just completed and took lancer.. just got fun re-ran 3-5 to see his ability... One word : insane!... With warhorse every card is an explore. Pretty much burns through at least half a scenario deck in his turn. The rest of us feel we were like playing another game...
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I just really want to hear from the legend, HAWKMOON, him/herself. I defeat the scenario with my group tonight at 9 CST. Please bless me with your wisdom for decision time.
Sorry. The timing of my daughter's birth interfered with that possibility. However, if my belated advice will have any value still, here it is:
I think the answer is going to depend on who else is in your group. If you are teaming with a character that is weak in combat, Glory Hound is almost a no-brainer since you can take care of their combat checks for them.
That being said, in a vacuum, I think I might like Lancer. I've been playing through S&S with a group where one guy is Lini and has Droogami. The number of times he's beaten a henchman, closed a location, then moved and explored with Droogami is uncanny. Lancer lets you do the same thing. Plus, Lancer Alain isn't really exploring with is power. You could do it at the start of your turn, then whether you found a monster or not, still take your regular move. I hate when I'm past my move step and could explore, but know what is coming and that I can't handle it but I can't do anything else either. I'd love to be able to do something like that. And if you've got a teammate that can examine the deck to let you know what's coming, you can get great use out of that power to knock off some monsters.
I've not logged any serious Alain time, so I might not be the best one to advise on this. So take all that with a grain of salt.
But really, you can't go wrong with either. They are both solid. Let us know which you chose!
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Sorry. The timing of my daughter's birth interfered with that possibility.
Congratz!
Thanks. And, despite sharing a birthrate with the date of the article linked in this thread, the two occurrences are not related.
Congratulations. Love my 1 and 4 year old daughters so much, even if they've killed my gaming time.
Also I agree, Droogami is powerful.
I studied how often Kyra and Alain were at the same location and found it to be too low. Also, our Kyra has no combat issues. So just for the sake of fun, I went Lancer! Haven't taken it for a spin yet, but I've got my Warhorse ready.
Kyra will have to find her own path, Donahan is the only friend I need anyway.
Try not to bore the other members of your team too much when you take your turn buddy... :D
Try not to bore the other members of your team too much when you take your turn buddy... :D
Can't wait for AD4!
Also...thanks for the response and congrats on the daughter!
Try not to bore the other members of your team too much when you take your turn buddy... :DCan't wait for AD4!
Just rerun a scenario and give it a try. It seems game-breaking. 100% can draw up the war horse/pegasus, then every card in hand or acquired behaves like a self-recharging blessing. At least half a location deck blown through each turn, +5 or so cards to deck each time. Try it on the marketplace and may just be +7 or +8 cards to deck literally free.
Not to say it isn't suspiciously too much fun.. but no other char even comes close. So if the AD4 banes are scaled up to account for this, the rest of us will be hanging on for dear life..!! :D
We also just realized that in extreme situations with warhorse + Pegasus the lancer could potentially end the game in *one* turn.
Each explore if it's a boon that could be successfully acquired is an additional explore. Do that enough times on a location to encounter the villian/henchmen.. (warhorse makes lance as strong as first combat each time) Close... recharge card to search for Pegasus.. Use Pegasus.. move to next location and wash/rinse/repeat...
Now my group is wondering if this was intended this way. Or are we playing it wrong? It seems the apparent problem stems from the power pick :
Recharge a card (□ or put it on top of your deck) to search your deck or discard pile for a card that has the Mount trait and add it to your hand.
That "recharge a card" & "add mount to hand" seems to be what keeps the recursive explore engine going. All other characters/cards have a drawback to additional explores, which is prob one of the most powerful abilities. We've been debating should it have been "discard" or "put mount on top of deck" instead... (with all due respect to designers of course!).
Any opinions folks or did we just totally miss something and doing it all wrong?
We also just realized that in extreme situations with warhorse + Pegasus the lancer could potentially end the game in *one* turn.
Each explore if it's a boon that could be successfully acquired is an additional explore. Do that enough times on a location to encounter the villian/henchmen.. (warhorse makes lance as strong as first combat each time) Close... recharge card to search for Pegasus.. Use Pegasus.. move to next location and wash/rinse/repeat...
Now my group is wondering if this was intended this way. Or are we playing it wrong? It seems the apparent problem stems from the power pick :
Recharge a card (□ or put it on top of your deck) to search your deck or discard pile for a card that has the Mount trait and add it to your hand.
That "recharge a card" & "add mount to hand" seems to be what keeps the recursive explore engine going. All other characters/cards have a drawback to additional explores, which is prob one of the most powerful abilities. We've been debating should it have been "discard" or "put mount on top of deck" instead... (with all due respect to designers of course!).
Any opinions folks or did we just totally miss something and doing it all wrong?
I think this is a similar sort of question to the 'is Damiel too strong' threads that arose when S&S came out. That is: how powerful is it ok for characters to be? Both Damiel and Alain are cases where straightforward play leads to great results, regardless of party composition. The question is: is this (a) out of line with other characters such that (b) it poses a problem. (B) is a rather deep game design/social contract question, so I'll just consider (a).
Alain's Lancer power is a better version of the 'recharge ally/blessing type X to explore' powers that some characters get as a base (pre-role) power (as it applies to all cards, rather than just 1/3 or so of a deck). It does two things: reliably lets him explore lots, and acts as self-healing after doing do . Given max hand size (6), and keeping a weapon and armor (this *is* still WotR, and you probably want to ensure you don't lose your weapon to pre-combat damage; if considering in other paths, add 1 explore), Alain can explore 4 times + 1x for each boon he acquires while exploring.
While that last part (all acquired boons ---> explores) seems exciting, bear in mind that allies & blessings already have that function for everyone, and that with his stat spread, he's going to (without additional resource expenditure from somewhere!) miss some blessings, most items and spells, wis-allies, and depending on mythic path, some or most ranged weapons/armor. So, one can't really look at an Alain turn and assume that he's going to net that many boons overall (someone in the party is probably recharging/discarding for each non-trivial acquisition outside of str-weapons and cha-allies). Let's be generous, though, and say Alain acquires half the boons he encounters. If he doesn't use any cards for non-exploring purposes, he can explore on an average turn, then, 5 + (#boons encounter/2).
Compare with Ranzak. At the same stage (AD4), every boon he acquires has a 2/3s chance of granting an extra explore, and he has an extra d4+3 to acquire boons. This doesn't use up the acquired card, so blessings/allies are worth 1.67 explores each. With card feats in blessing/ally, he'll average just over 3 (3.1) blessings/allies per 8-card hand. Let's say he acquires 90% of boons he encounters, and allies/blessings make up 1/3 of boons. 90% * .67 (non-ally/blessings) * 2/3 (power chance) + 90% * 1/3 (ally/blessing * 5/3 (power chance + guaranteed explore) = 1.1
On an average turn, then, Ranzak can explore 4.1 + (#Boons encountered * 1.1) times.
So, on a turn where two boons are encountered, Ranzak is a slightly faster explorer on average than Alain. When encountering more than two, or if buffs are around to help Ranzak acquire better (my usual tactic is Potion of Heroism/Divine Fortune whenever possible), Ranzak's edge only increases. In a location that is half boons, Ranzak averages 7+ explores, while Alain gets 6+. My experience with Ranzak (that he often can run through a location a turn) supports this.
I take as given that Ranzak is awesome and must never be nerfed, so this rate of exploring is clearly an acceptable power level :).
Of course, Alain's power also has a healing component. On a turn when Alain explores 6 times, he effectively gets 5 points of healing (as usually explores involve discards). So, he's effectively 1.5 cures (or one feat-boosted healing power) ahead of the game. But he's a little behind Ranzak in exploring speed, so they're about on par.
So, if Ranzak isn't too good of an explorer (in a party with enough Cures/heal powers to keep him going), then Alain probably isn't either.
(Note: RotR Kyra with the Sarenrae-to-top-of-deck could also reliably explore for zero cost like this once she drew into the blessings, albeit without the additional potential of turning boons into extra explores.)
So, is Alain top-tier? Yes. Is he clearly better than other top-tier characters? Doesn't look like it.
Good points, thanks. We never played s&s so that's enlightening. Imrijka also has the explore power with the 2/3 chance after defeating a monster. I guess we're not too worried about which char is top tier or not - some clearly are stronger in some areas while others play differently/take more time to develop. it's just that this seems excessive with boons/card in hand becoming guaranteed explore and heal in one package. Also alain's combo is different in that he can effectively close a location and use Pegasus to hit another location potentially closing that as well on the same turn (barriers/etc not withstanding :) )
But if that's the way its designed to be then so be it. I guess if our group feels its too overpowering/upsets the team balance we may just swap him to another role.
Good points, thanks. We never played s&s so that's enlightening. Imrijka also has the explore power with the 2/3 chance after defeating a monster. I guess we're not too worried about which char is top tier or not - some clearly are stronger in some areas while others play differently/take more time to develop. it's just that this seems excessive with boons/card in hand becoming guaranteed explore and heal in one package. Also alain's combo is different in that he can effectively close a location and use Pegasus to hit another location potentially closing that as well on the same turn (barriers/etc not withstanding :) )
But if that's the way its designed to be then so be it. I guess if our group feels its too overpowering/upsets the team balance we may just swap him to another role.
It's true that Alain has an easier time splitting his turn between multiple locations, giving him an edge when you aren't starting on a fresh location (which I usually do with Ranzak ;), or if you are going for quick closes and hit a henchman/villain early (with Ranzak, the temptation to fully-loot locations is high, though!). And with his move-explore power, you can also choose to play him more slowly with considerably more safety :).
But yeah, in PACG there are a variety of ways to build a character/party that significantly drop the difficulty of the game and/or make certain characters outshine others/take up the majority of the game-time, which your group may want to avoid. I've found Ranzak to be very unpopular in large games for this very reason (the whole game feels like Ranzak taking his turns), and so mostly play him in 1-2 player games where he's not diminishing player fun. Lancer-Alain may need to go in that same pile of characters (top-tier but not broken power-level, but with fun-destroying spotlight-hogging for many groups).
Just curious: Is anyone capable of doing this recursion trick by recharging/topdecking cards that do *not* have the Mount trait, or does it require all cards to have the Mount trait to pull it off?
Just curious: Is anyone capable of doing this recursion trick by recharging/topdecking cards that do *not* have the Mount trait, or does it require all cards to have the Mount trait to pull it off?
Alain's power: "Recharge a card ([]or put it on top of your deck) to search your deck or discard pile for a card that has the Mount trait and add it to your hand."
So yes, we're talking about recharging any old card to search our discard pile for a single mount card that we've already found (and are continually discarding to explore). Then doing so again and again.
Of course it is limited by the number of cards in your hand. Could you pull it off and play an entire scenario in one turn? Sure, if you can pull that off without encountering more than 6 banes our failing to acquire more than 6 boons. It seems incredibly unlikely.
Seems really powerful to have a martial melee character where every card in his hand could potentially be recharged and used as an exploration.
We thought of another way (which we probably won't do - cheesy). Everyone start at the same location, pass one card to lancer. Then move to location that can be closed by that char, explore normally. 4p game he can have 10 cards in hand by the time his turn comes round, all are effectively blessing to explore. Throw in mastiff for additional 2 cards (doggy literally is like a mtg ancestral recall..).
So that's 10-12 explores.. more if acquire cheap boons. Maybe 15 on average.. On his first turn.
We thought of another way (which we probably won't do - cheesy). Everyone start at the same location, pass one card to lancer. Then move to location that can be closed by that char, explore normally. 4p game he can have 10 cards in hand by the time his turn comes round, all are effectively blessing to explore. Throw in mastiff for additional 2 cards (doggy literally is like a mtg ancestral recall..).
So that's 10-12 explores.. more if acquire cheap boons. Maybe 15 on average.. On his first turn.
That's only 9 cards (3 *other* characters), with +1 for mastiff (it's discarded to draw 2). And are you really recharging your last weapon and armor? There are some punishing banes out there if you do that.
Also, shifting resources from one character to another is different from the chosen recipient being too strong on his own. If the concern is that overlong exploring turns are unfun for other players, then we don't have to worry about situations like this, as they'll be unlikely to happen for such groups :).
(And my Imrijka will never give up her trusty mastiff! Mastiffs forever!)
Named Ally. Must Acquire.
Haha ok ok slightly less. it's just theory really.. but you get the point right? True giving cards could be done with any char but in this case all card are recharged, any card becomes an explore for literally no cost to the team, and u get enough explores to blow through one or two locations in one turn. Any acquired boons are free explores. Nothing else can do this.
(yea mastiffs rule! Btw why can't the mastiff also be recharged to explore for net 3 explores? The discard only happens at end of turn, reveal means put back in hand. It can also be recharged to explore, then discard end of turn, no? )
I seem like a sweet summer child thinking Glory Hound would net the team more explores than Lancer. I was so innocent and naive a week ago...
Just curious: Is anyone capable of doing this recursion trick by recharging/topdecking cards that do *not* have the Mount trait, or does it require all cards to have the Mount trait to pull it off?
So... vic/mike.. with the answer being *any/all* card(s) becomes an explore with this one lancer power pick, I guess my group would just like to ask if this really was the design intent for lancer?
Bear in mind that Adowyn has a similar ability as a basic (pre-role), to get an animal out of her discard pile into her hand. However, hers she can use only once per turn. On the other hand, Adowyn's other utility and abilities (and Leryn) are pretty amazing, while Alain's aren't as exciting. Was a tough choice picking between the two. Overall I think they are the top two characters.
Adowyn is awesome. Nice balance skills and abilities. Good choices between the two roles too.
Group just tried again w the lancer recently and he ended up closing 3 locations in one turn. But after that almost died (zero cards in deck) to a righteousness barrier.. (Lol) Hopefully that's a rare occurrence and we're putting our faith in that the ad4 onwards maintains the teamwork and challenge.
Before our weekly gaming sesh tomorrow night, we are adding the text "At the start of your turn" to the Lancer ability in question. Didn't want to break the game.
Also...with Alain and the Gunslinger, who at Paizo is the Dark Tower fan?
This discussion should not be over. The fact that someone has to implement a house rule on this ability in order to keep the game cooperative and entertaining is sad. As Path 4 becomes widely distributed and Alain filled parties begin realizing the absurdity of this power feat, they'll come to these forums for guidance. I hope by then, or preferably sooner, the Devs are kind enough to offer an official ruling or FAQ to correct this egregious oversight.
Yes, I'm referring to the recursion thing. Thank you very much for your response.
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It's a co-op game. If you think something's too powerful, don't do it.
There's enough stupidly difficult stuff for characters to deal with, without people complaining every time we get some useful tools to fight it, and asking the devs to nerf it.
I guess the only question here is if this was the design intent?
If so then it's no problem - The game would have accounted for it and we can just enjoy the ride.
That being said if it isn't then there's the potential to break the intended experience. Can hardly ask designers to change scenario now; the play tests and printing should already be done months ago.
Alainplus2's idea to house rule to a one off start of turn is intriguing. Means the lancer can always have a mount at the start. Makes it similar to adowyn's one off ability to pull out a animal.
The Lancer path is incredibly strong, but in practice (I use both of them in a party), its not as powerful as pack Leader Andowyn craziness.
Looking at the game design question now (when is a character/feat too good), there are a couple different parameters to lay out:
1) What's the problem we're worried about? Are we concerned (a) about the game becoming too easy, (b) just having too large a power differential between characters in the abstract, or (c) players having less fun, perhaps because the character becomes a turn-hog?
2) How frequently/easily does this need to crop up to warrant a change? If a character only becomes OP given a specific (and uncommon) deck(/party) composition and playstyle, is that a problem? Or is it only when straightforward play leads to OP-ness?
For instance, pre-errata Radillo fell afoul of everything, casting infinite auguries/detect magics to loot the entire scenario and stack the villain to the top without needing to face a bane, pre-role-card, no setup needed. We can safely say that that is stronger than is good for the game.
It's not all that hard, however, for someone like Transmogrifier Ezren to hold in hand/bury/give away all his non-spell cards on his first couple turns, then draw up to a 10-card hand, and loop through his deck the exact same way, drawing a new spell for each one he plays, as long as his deck is built with enough low-recharge-check play-anytime spells. He can do something just as powerful as pre-errata Radillo, but only easily post-role, with some deck finagling. If someone isn't specifically shooting for this, it won't happen.
Lancer Alain falls under the 'gets strong through standard play' heading, so he gets the high (Radillo) scrutiny, rather than the lax (yeah yeah, you can work really hard to make the game too easy through setting up infinite Ezren tricks). So, where does he fall on the power-curve? If Damiel, Adowyn, Restoration-looping Lini, and Ranzak are still better, does that make it fine? Or is this a combination of power-level & fun-killing-spotlight-hogging that makes it objectionable?
(For my money, the exploration-speed isn't the problem, as no one's been filling the boards with nerf-Ranzak posts. Infinite self-healing at-will seems like the thing to look at. If it were 'recharge to pull from deck/discard to pull from discard pile', it'd let him keep the explore engine without making him entirely self-sufficient, which is a bit odd at the moment.)
Vic and the dev team: thanks for considering the fix.
To pitch in another voice, this feels like a game-breaking oversight. Everyone can modify the game as they see fit to correct it, but that's not what we're talking about. The community loves the game as written by the creators of the game, and I don't think a lot of us want to author the game ourselves.
I feel bad for the people that looked at the Lancer role card and said, "This is going to be awesome when I take infinite turns," because that just can't be intent for a co-op game. If you didn't expect to take infinite turns, this doesn't affect you anyway. Even if you somehow limited the number of locations closed to one per, that's still too powerful because there are still too many blessings in the blessings deck for exhaustion to be a threat and everyone is basically holding their d until Alain comes to the rescue in one orbit.
There are 5 scenarios per AD. My group's time is limited so we don't replay scenarios. Can we please get a ruling or at least comment on whether this is what you guys want? Picture that each scenario played is $4.00 thrown out the window because that one ability completely breaks the game for everyone else.
This isn't a social contract issue or abuse issue. The text as written leaves very little to the imagination and subsequent room for interpretation. Also, please don't let the Ranzak conversation distract from this one because Ranzak is a separate character created in a separate game. Ranzak can be addressed if need be in a different thread, but for the people that bought WotR and play with only WotR characters, this is what matters now.
The fact that people are laying out passionate debate and calculations on this matter is a testament to the quality of your game, but the fact of the matter is that the game is dead right now.
We bought Mike Selinker's and Vic Wertz's and the entire dev team's game. We really enjoy the game, but we can't play the game anymore. Our Alain wants to play Lancer for every reason except that ability, but if it's there, he can't be asked to not use it. He's considering altering to Glory Hound just to avoid the issue, and that's a tragedy. I might trump his wishes by pulling the "decisions have to matter" card, because decisions do need to matter for the game to be fun.
Help us out, Devs, and please expedite the process so my group can continue to enjoy your game during our weekly gatherings.
Are you talking about the recursion thing? It's still under consideration.
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Assuming for a second that they do want to change it (which is an assumption), then they have to figure out how they want to change it, because there are multiple possible ways to do so. They could make the mount retrieval only happen at the start of your turn (i.e. recharge 1 card to get 1 mount). They could make it at the start of your turn, but allow you to do it for multiple mount cards (i.e. recharge as many cards as you want to get that same number of mounts). They could increase the cost to a discard. They could have you put the mount on top of your deck. They could have it happen at the end of your turn. They could have you put the used card where the mount came from (recharge if you got it from your deck, discard if you got it from your discard pile).
So, even if they want to change it, they need to figure out the best way to change it so that it remains fun and viable after the change.
If you're group has an Alain and Alain is finding it too easy to pick the low hanging fruit and spam the power, which results in all of your not having fun, then I suggest you houserule it for now (besides, if they don't change it you are going to want to do something about it anyway). Personally, I'd go with "At the start of your turn, recharge any number of cards to get the same number of cards with the Mount trait from your deck or discard pile" version. Or perhaps the version where the used card goes where the mount was. Those both let the Alain collect all his mounts for his turn if he wants, but doesn't let him recycle them during the turn. Or they don't let him heal by collecting mounts. He still gets lots of explorations still, but not forever. Seems like a good compromise between Alain and the rest of the players.
A bit hyperbolic. I don't think it's possible for Lancer Alain to have infinite explores.
He won't acquire every boon he encounters. He won't want to recharge his weapon to get his mount back to explore. He shouldn't recharge his armor due to the high occurrences of before/after you act damage. That leaves a had with 4 explores +1 free explore, if he maxes out his hand size and takes no damage. Add on to that whatever cards he acquires, noting that he has a d4 Dex, so he's not getting any dex based items. He has a d6 Int and d6 Wis, with no divine or arcane so he's not getting many spells.
It's powerful, but it's only game breaking with a lot of luck in boon distribution in the decks. I'd probably end up using the ability to move and scout more than burn through a whole deck, so that all my fellow players can know what they will hit, and I can use my strength to kill a couple monsters for them on the way.
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It doesn't need to be infinite to be overpowered. It's overpowered at one location close per turn. It's overpowered at half a location explored per turn. Nothing should make the blessings deck inconsequential, which this ability does due to the exploration rate and Alain's combat prowess. If your group knows what it is doing, it can get Alain past the hiccups. There are also mythic charges to do that as well.
I think the hyperbole is present only in the company of ignorance, pardon the harsh reality. Our Alain waxes every encounter, barring a bad beat, with room to spare.
A bit hyperbolic. I don't think it's possible for Lancer Alain to have infinite explores.
He won't acquire every boon he encounters. He won't want to recharge his weapon to get his mount back to explore. He shouldn't recharge his armor due to the high occurrences of before/after you act damage. That leaves a had with 4 explores +1 free explore, if he maxes out his hand size and takes no damage. Add on to that whatever cards he acquires, noting that he has a d4 Dex, so he's not getting any dex based items. He has a d6 Int and d6 Wis, with no divine or arcane so he's not getting many spells.
It's powerful, but it's only game breaking with a lot of luck in boon distribution in the decks. I'd probably end up using the ability to move and scout more than burn through a whole deck, so that all my fellow players can know what they will hit, and I can use my strength to kill a couple monsters for them on the way.