Banning Caprice is crazy and defeats the entire purpose of banning rumor mill. The rest of the list seems fine to me.
5 Likes
It is interesting to me how difficult it is to sort out which cards are broken or overpowered from the cards that a particular person just does not like because they are hard to play around.
Is Caprice a problem card, for instance, or a necessary one?
It is also interesting that there is such a strong commitment to the idea that the game needs some sort of Ash-Caprice glacier to be healthy. Is that true or merely an artifact of the period when glacier was a dominant archetype? If we never had RP glacier or Foodcoats would we be so committed to keeping glacier a viable deck?
3 Likes
Caprice with the hate of Councilman/PolOp/Interdiction is pretty fair. It’s pretty crazy that PolOp has disappeared since Rumor Mill came out.
Caprice is fine in the game. At the worst case scenario, she locks you out of one server. Then when we include how many different counters there are to her (Councilman, Pol Open, Interdiction, ICE Destruction, and Credit Denial) that are still in the available, I believe the game would be fine with her left in. The worst case scenario by not banning her is allowing the Corp to have 1 safe server that the runner can’t access. Even then, unless you have her on HQ, you still can’t rely on her completely.
Sandburg on the other hand does need to be banned without Rumor Mill to shut it down. When it came out, I was playing with the fixed strength breakers and it was way to easy to lock the runner out of every server. Even with all the hate, just using Archived Memories or Interns was oppressive since I only had so many copies of counters, and that’s assuming they were already installed. If the Corp gets a Sandburg rezzed, you couldn’t run HQ to get Pol Op down, Councilman and Interdiction are useless, also can be played around easily. In the current Meta, the only other cards that counter Sandburg are Rumor Mill and Sandburg if your playing Fixed Strength Breakers.
1 Like
Power Shutdown /Accelerated Diagnostics Debate
For now i am unwilling to make combo-restriction tables and try to prevent MWL extensions. Even though they would allow much more finetuning here i want to see if we can do a good job without those tools. The reasons are twofold:
- Complexity
- Pandoras box of game-design.
I need some more voices here i feel, for which one is going on here however. One sacrifice will have to be made with my wish above to keep this to a ban-list. As it stands both sides seem equally valid.
Caprice/RM/Sandburg-debate
Many suggestions in the line of not banning Caprice have popped up. I am on the fence here, as she is clearly a bit on the powerful side, but not a clear ban-target. Maybe she would go on some sort MWL-expansion if we were doing that. As for now we aren’t however, so i’ll listen to the crowd here and release Caprice for now from my list.
Also: Several voices for banning Sandburg (except mine defending it). I’ll let this one stew for a bit. Any more support for banning it, or people who think this is too harsh?
Bio-Ethics/Hostile-Infrastructure Debate
Another debate popped up in our facebook-group. Good arguments were made to replace Bio-Ethics with HI, as the card itself is fine in PE for example, but the enabler really is HI (a card no-one is using outside of the archetype anyway. I am inclined to make this change.
Voices for or against?
Runner/Corp Imbalance
If i am doing this, we just added one more card to the list. Is this going in the right direction? What more needs to be done? If this is done it would be another ‘package’ to specifically adress this problem. I’ll try opening the lid a bit on pandoras box here for MWL-adjustments as well as bans, since this is more of a fine-tuning problem. If the MWL-thing gets out of hand we’ll try to move the relevant cards back to the ban-list (and release the rest) and overshoot on the side of caution. These are meant to be implemented as a complete package, also in the environment of the ban-list above, so please have that in mind. Please try to keep it simple =)
Bans
Beth-Kilrain Chang
Faust
Net Mercur
MWL
Temujin Contracts
Mimic
Off MWL
none - (notably no Desperado. I also main criminal so i’m not coming from my biases here. The card is too good.)
Changes implemented in the OP.
Caprice/RM/Sandburg-debate
I think it’s wise to leave Caprice off as she has a fair number of hate cards and one server being boarded up until a solution is found can in most situations be played around.
Sandburg I can’t say anything about as I’ve had very limited experience with the card seeing actual play in an efficient way.
Beth-Kilrain Chain
While she certainly is strong I’ve never experienced her as nearly as bad as many of the other cards mentioned here. In most new decks after the first month she has turned into a one-off from what I’ve seen. Put her on the MWL, that makes it harder to include her.
Net Mercur
Why is this here? It’s one of a few cards that enable an entire archtype of non-destructive decks. It’s powerfull no doubt, but it in itself isn’t the problem with stealth decks at the moment. Temujin in addition to a stealth rig is the problem. It’s also a resource, which is easy to shut down with a tiny bit of resource hate or tags, reliant on atleast two other cards to actualy work(stealth credit and a breaker). At most this card needs an include on the MWL in my opinion.
Temujin Contracts
This card is no doubt above the power level, the same way Beth is. The problem is Temujin synergises way better with both stealth shaper and ice destruction anarch then with standard good stuff criminal. Atleast against corps that try to use ice.
The problem in my opinion is that it’s printed with too low influence cost, it should have been 3 or 4 influence. MWLing it might help, especialy if you put Net-Mercur on MWL aswell, as that will tax the “problematic”-stealth decks of influence.
2 Likes
Hostile Infrastructure is challenging yet a very expensive card that was unplayed for many, many years, to the degree that when I built the first Genomics deck, there were only two other decks in NetrunnerDB that had ever included it. Hostile has proven to not be a bad card for the game, to the point that it saw little play historically banning it because of its interaction with a newer card of a very questionable design cycle (Political assets) seems very wrong to me.
It also bears to note that Hostile Infrastructure was the backbone of Genomics way before Bio-Ethics was printed and it was Bio-Ethics supported through Sensie what pushed it from a tough, but fair deck into a boring, non-scoring monstruosity. Before Genomics was scoring Vanity Project or trying to build Ronins, neither of which is unfair.
Ultimately, banning a card nobody uses over the namesake card in Bio-Ethics lock is something that looks very wrong to me.
As far as the other cards go:
Faust: I think that with the curreny MWL limitations, Faust builds are not more powerful than builds using a more traditional Anarch rig. Hence, I do not share the need to ban it.
Net Mercur: While overly strong, I don’t think it has proven oppresive enough to justify a ban at this point.
Mimic: I don’t think there’s any reason to limit this card. It’s well-costed for its power and limitations.
1 Like
Dusk
Beth is a one-off because she is unique and non-synergistic. She is still very powerful, and not necessary to any particularly interactive deck. This just introduces randomness in the game (did i or did i not draw Beth early?).
Net mercur is there first to start a debate. Second, it will not hamper the archetype to non-viability, since there are several more support cards that stopped being played when it was printed. We even have some more now like the run-event.
Temujin, seems we agree here.
ErikTwice
The reason for putting HI on there is not because of any historic reasons, i’m aware that it is only the synergy with BEA that puts it in the spotlight. My only consideration is where the game would be on the one hand if banning HI, and the other if banning BEA.
If banning BEA: Fixes the problem. Makes HI as useless as it has always been, not seeing much utility even though it is in the game.
If banning HI: Fixes the problem. Leaves BEA, a powerful card that would see play in many decks and is reasonably balanced and adds to the game unless it can be abused.
We want cards to be used, after all. And to be powerful. I would like a less powered version of Bio-Lock to be viable, if possible.
Noting your comments on the other cards, awaiting more comments.
I agree, is she a trouble card in the decks that currently dominate the runner meta though? I’m all for baning cards that are above the power curve, she is potentialy one of them, far from as disruptive as some others though.
Isn’t this the same as arguing for banning Desperado because it wont kill the run-econ based criminal? They have other support cards for the archtype that doesn’t see as much play, so it would survive. Neither are problem cards that upset the balance at the moment.
Not trying to fix the current meta only, trying to leave a game that is interesting with fewer new problems on top of that.
Run based criminal is not a potential killing blow to glacier is my reasoning here. On the contrary it will be balanced by it.
And the new stealth-archtypes are in my experience only a problem for glaciers when temujin is in the picture. Without temujin these decks would be way slower in every stage of the game and easy to tax with decent ice placement.
Real testing, or more voices would be needed to resolve this argument i think. This is a problem with trying to re-balance aside from just banning obvious problem cards. The discussions are much harder.
I made 1 version of Ban list and MWL last week and will going to test about it,right now it looks like this:
Ban(Corp):24/7,Sensie,AD,MCH,MoH,Mumba Temple
Ban(Runner):Rumor Mill,SIFR,Aaron,False Echo
MWL(Corp):Eli,Architect,Breaking News,Sansan,EoI,Sandburg
MWL(Runner):Parasite,Faust,Wyldside,Yog,D4V1D,Lady,Clone Chip,Temujin
Errata:still WNP and Astro limits
Watchlist(keep an eye on these cards):Hostile Infrastructure,Bio-Ethics,Friends in High Place,Desperado,GFI,Blackmail,DDOS,Hard-Hitting News
Looks very interesting. Please come back when you have some experience with it and we could merge lists, or have data for making some more robust changes.
My opinion on cards that need to go (even tho I play these degenerate decks).
BANS:
Diagnostics: As much as I love combodecks, they should go. Both railgun and CI are not healthy for the game. Diagnostics over Power Shutdown because of Hasty CI. If you have seen a good Hasty CI player, you understand how powerfull it is. FA an Effcom turn 6, FA 5 points turn 7 and no way to stop them unless you have good early accesses and a quick rig.
Hostile Infr.: Prison is imo the worst decktype ever. I’m fine with gagarin asset spam, because they still need to pressure the runner somehow. Bio-ethics has a place in various Jinteki decks as a surpirse Neural EMP, so the runner can’t just ignore those servers and has to respect them. Hostile Infr. will bring more oppressive decks if left untouched.
SIFR: Because ppl are shouting this. Haven’t really been hit by it, but it seems oppressive against ‘normal’ decks.
MWL:
Rumour Mill: It is already a rare include. I think if Rumour Mill is placed on the MWL it will give some breathing room to glacier. Looking at some spoilers, I notice that they are using the uniqueness of a card more and more as a balance tool. Also with SIFR gone you need to keep an eye out for sandburg with recursion.
Temujin: Way too strong. Making the runner richer than the corp kills a lot of archetypes. Temujin on MWL should also help Glacier and Trace decks.
Hyperdriver unique: I’m gonna miss Dyper, but it has to go. Hyperdriver is a fine card for a quick setup or a strong powerturn, but only non-interactive decks use multiple Hyperdrivers in the same turn. You could still play Dyper, but it would be jankish and no longer OP.
Not mentionned
Aaron and Breaking News: Let’s wait what MCA Informant does to the game.
DD0S: Is a fine card imo.
Food for thought
What about banning Deja Vu instead of SIFR. SIFR is a fine design if you think about the fixed strength breakers. Removing Deja Vu will hit the recursion of parasites and keep it in balance. Yes you have clone chip and Retrieval Run, but those are less efficient or cost influence. Also hits blackmail recursion (blackmail isn’t the problem, the recursion is). And last but not least it keeps siphon mostly in criminal as intended.
4 Likes
Thanks,but we have only a small group here,I would like to know more about your test on your list to find out how a ban list would affect on game.
Rumor Mill is a must-ban for me,it’s not because the card is widely used so glacier is out,it’s because the idea that “Rumor Mill exists” hugely discourages glacier player.However your concern about Sandburg is right,I would put Sandburg on MWL if Rumor Mill and SIFR is banned.
On the PS/ AD debate, I think getting Diagnostics gone is probably the healthiest option due to how much rules headaches it can also cause. Shutdown without it goes back to being a interesting and incredibly Weyland way to try to clean out some low-cost runner cards. If you have to touch it somehow, maybe make it’s cost X instead of 1 instead? Would mean that you couldn’t burn your deck out with it unless you were rich as hell.
1 Like
Alright, many voices on the side of power shutdown now. That goes off and AccDiag goes on the ban-list.
Also added potential package to counter runner/corp balance to OP with a few changes. Keep it coming guys.
1 Like
I think the list seems reasonable right now, although it is interesting reading this thread, as it is pointing out the major flaw in “silver bullet” game design, you take away one silver bullet and the thing it was designed to stop is now broken, so you put that on the list and so on…
1 Like
Alright, in some discussion on another forum we tried to find a good solution to give anarch a last bump down and fix some more power-level issues. Cards like Paperclip, Medium, Same Old Thing were mentioned.
The suggestion that feels best so far: Deja Vu. It will go on the MWL-list, not cause for a ban outright. Opinions on this?