From Fallen London Wiki

Personally i enjoy the previous seasons of HG, and i'm eager to try the new challenges, but counterplay is just mind-bogglingly bad. I get it if a card is activated when the counterplay bar reaches level 7 or something, but as for now the only viable stats is if we ignore the non stat-check poisonous progress options at all. And so what's the point of having those as options then?

And i've seen some players manage to get winnings this season, and good for them, but not all players have enough money or have spend enough years in the game to accumulate enough FATE/festival equipments that would help with succeeding the stats checks.