Shapers and (more often) Criminals run Same Old Thing. I suspect Criminal Currents will stick more than Anarchs.
I think they’re trying to be fairly conservative with the power level of Currents. It will only take one really good one to create a cascade in the meta. ELP in RP might even be it. If it becomes a 3-of that is hard to deal with, all of a sudden Net Celebrity is providing a value of say +6 instead of +2 for its ELP killing power. Then maybe Weyland takes another look at Paywall Implementation. It’ll have to be something you can’t ignore though. I’ve had about a dozen currents played against me so far, a Scrubbed that @SamRs played was the only one that affected the gamestate, the rest just dissipated a turn or two later. If NEH gets their hands on a current, that might trigger the cascade too.
They’re a tricky thing to balance because of how much control of game tempo the Corp has with their deck design. RP and CI are hard to score against after the early game, you could expect their currents to last 5 or 6 turns instead of 1 or 2. To make a current balanced for RP/CI but good enough for decks with 11+ agendas you’ll have to frontload the value. Runners need this immediate payoff too as they’ll be playing against some decks with fast advance and 2/1s. A good way to accomplish this is surprise or trick value, Scrubbed is a good example, we’ll see if it’s powerful enough. Cerebral Static on Chaos Theory is the closest the corp gets to a frontloaded current, unplayable for the foreseeable future but it would have been interesting as -1MU.
Anyway, good review mediohxcore. I don’t know if it’s a pack full of weak cards, more like niche cards. I think Ghost Runner is 4+ in Nasir (a 1 elsewhere until we get more stealth), Cache is 4+ in Noise, Heinlein Grid is 4+ in the right deck. It’s a pack you want to own for the one card your deck needs, not a bad strategy from FFG. I’d agree with a few people in this thread that the card I think you underrated is Heinlein grid. Briarfox’s review has same negative opinion of False Lead and Strongbox combos. Well I’d agree with both of you, those aren’t strong enough, but I do see a few roles for it:
- An ambush with Ichi 1.0 or Enigma and to a lesser extent brain damage bioroids. You should be able to see this opportunity coming with a look at their setup. If they don’t run you’ve got the start of a nice server. If the situation changes and it wouldn’t be effective, don’t rez it and let them pay the trash cost. Like most ambushes I think the fear of this will be just as useful.
- To score with end the run bioroids like Eli 1.0 and Victor 2.0. Forcing them to bounce off is probably not worth it unless the run was important, but sometimes they are. This can even work to protect an agenda with a single piece of ice with NAPD or Ash.
- To dramatically crank up the tax with larger bioroids like Heimdall or a mix of bioroid ice types. Requiring them to have a breaker for each piece of ice and break everything creates a scoring window you could drive a truck through, especially with Ash.
So it can set up situations where they can’t run early and amazing tax late. Upgrades are also fantastic bluff cards and 3 trash is just enough that you’re generally happy if they do so in most situations. It doesn’t work in the top 3 decks but is still very strong and might be just what a tweaked Red Coats or CI needs.
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I just saw a game with the Cambridge PE deck that got an early Paywall Implementation out. The runner didn’t get a current and failed to steal an agenda easily, partly because of the difficulty in checking 6 servers and keeping the corp sufficiently broke when each run made the corp money. Not an impossible thing to beat, but… it seemed like a damn bloody nuisance.
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What Crim: currents? Unscheduled Maintenance? Card is useless.
Sure, in the future. And at the moment its hard to see a crim using an SOT instead of Account Siphon etc.
I’ve played a fair bit with foundry - I like it quite a lot. Whirlpool, howler, janis, on 2 credits. Plus a recycle whirlpool. Yes, please. Take something like 3xpop up, 3x howler, 3x whirpool.
Then 3x janis, helm2, and a few other biotics.
The trick is to take 3 x BER and 3x OAI. This allows you to draw ice on your turn.
Additionally, keep your hand near 5 - and when you rez an ice runner will be drawing on your hand of 6. Nice side benefit.
And yes, Heinlein places well in this deck.
Direct H. Project Agenda is a good. As is false lead, of course. All in all lovely deck.
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After playing a tournament yesterday in which I used Enhanced Login Protocol in my RP deck I have to say that currents are pretty mean. Nearly everyone who was on the receiving end of ELP shed even more tears during the game, then normally. 
Net Celebrity worked really well in my Kate deck, too. Most of the time I was able to trash annoying currents like Targeted Marketing and recursion with SoT works really well.
That said, I don’t think playing more then one current as corp will really help, since it may be dealt with quite quickly. However, ELP is a really nice way to set up a scoring window by playing it and installing and advancing Nisei afterwards.
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I don’t know about this being the only viable deck. There was a pretty reasonable deck that took a Regional in, I think, Australia that was using Paintbrush with Dagger - search for “killing me softly” on Netrunner DB. It’s the most efficient breaker that’s not one-shot and can safely break destroyers on the turn they rez.
Switchblade is likely to be very playable when we get deeper into this cycle, especially if RP continues to see a lot of play.
The decoder stealth is pretty much = dagger except it goes miles for Kit with parasite plus it starts with 2 str already so no need to ALWAYS use stealth cr, and you still have lots of influence for parasite and other stuff
Yeah that’s true, but the advantage with Dagger is that you can beat destroyers the turn they rez without needing another card to make them a Code Gate - in particular Roto doesn’t even need a stealth credit to overcome. Kit’s ability is nice, but the Corp can play around it on their key servers with additional ICE and her ability is only valid for the first run (unless your Kit is French lol) which means she’s terrible at getting into remotes against Replicating Perfection. Kit plays a little more like a criminal I think and needs to make individual runs with a high payoff, focussing on centrals.
I do like the stealth breakers though: very cheap and very credit effiicient, but less card efficient which makes their reliability a little higher variance.
Drawing a card is indeed better than a credit (Near Earth Hub says Hi), and this is the best kindof draw (ICE!) Medio’s point is that you don’t have control over it. Savvy runners aren’t going to just poke you once a turn so you can rez your ice and get your bonus. They are going to save up and pound the crap out of you in one turn.
I’m going to try it out tonight. So far my expected ice mix is:
- Popup Window
- Next Bronze
- Next Silver
- Eli
- Ichi 1
- Rototurret?
- Minelayer??
Otherwise I expect to play it more or less exactly like I play ETF. The question in my mind is whether you try to play Amazon Grid.
I think the ID will be stronger with the full grail suite - Merlin is going to be a home wrecker.
Not sure what you’re responding to exactly (I talked about Scrubbed and ELP, not the Foundry), but, yeah, I agree that the lack of control is a potential problem. But making face-checking riskier is a good thing, and, yeah, it won’t be at full strength until we have all the Grail Ice, since those give a major benefit to the ability, since having another in-hand at the very least gives you another subroutine they need to break.
Oops, responded to wrong poster. Oh well!
I agree for now, but I think in the future the Corp will probably get some more interesting options for rezzing ICE out of the regular sequence - you already have Oversight AI, Bioroid Efficiency Research, Amazon Industrial Zone, Priority Requisition and Accelerated Beta Test.
The Foundry is probably garbage at the moment but I think its long-term potential is good, especially once the suites of ICE that work better in multiples are fully released (Grail and NEXT for now, others to follow?)
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Why is it that people that think NEH (which spawns a card draw) is very strong, while Foundry, which spawns an ICE is garbage?
NEH pulls a card when desired. Strong.
Foundry, pulls an ICE : Strong. But does it at the timing of the runner. Disadvantage.
Except that 6-9 times in the game you will pull an additional ice out on YOUR schedule. So you get pulls on runners schedule AND yours.
However, on top of that foundry lets you get ice out fast - which is an advantage. It lets you get EARLY ice out early, and late ice out when you want it as well. So it tailors your ice to the phase of the game where you need it.
Finally, Foundry lets you get out ice combinations. Have an mine layer in hand but no other ice? Not an issue. Drop the minelayer - you now have another ice to drop. There are a lot of ice that benefit from rapid duplication - from data mine, to NEXT ice, to chum, to data matrix, to ice wall to caduceus.
Well, first NEH is a NBN-ID that has previously had quite weak IDs while HB already has a very strong ID.
Second drawing a random card is arguably better than drawing ICE (still this is pretty close).
Third, in NEH you are in control of your draws and not the runner.
Fourth, drawing cards as a benefit of spending credits (foundry) is not that great while drawing cards advancing you gameplan is.
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You’re dead wrong about what makes people/me think NEH is great and Foundry isn’t. NEH isn’t strong because of the draw. The draw is actually just okay. What makes NEH great is that it allows you to play 2-3 Biotic Labor in an Astro deck and have influence to spare. The draw is particularly good in this ID not because drawing in general is so good for the corp, but because you’re playing what is essentially a combo (Biotic/Astro) deck, and drawing helps you find that combo.
The Foundry doesn’t help you get to a combo unless the combo is with an ICE and itself, (Grails, NEXT are examples of these). The fact that the timing is up to the runner is actually not of huge importance. The runner is going to have to let you rez ICE over the course of the game, and if the only way that they can stop you is by not running, you’re mostly fine with that. The biggest reason that I rate the Foundry low is that it doesn’t compare well with EtF. A credit is always going to be good, but a second copy of a piece of ICE isn’t. EtF has what is probably the strongest corp ability in the game. Chum, Ice wall, and Caduceus in multiples can be pretty good, but they don’t make each other much better. For the Foundrys ability to work super well, we just need more Grails and NEXTs. Those cards are significantly better in multiples, (and in the case of Grails, you don’t need to play or pay money for the second one to be helpful, which is super important since you’re paying money to turn your ability on and also losing economy as an opportunity cost of not playing EtF).
So in the end, it’s really about those opportunity costs: playing AstroBiotics in NEH vs MN or TWIY is a good idea because you can make good use of the draw, (less true with MN’s ability, as you spend a lot of influence on Biotic and then can’t afford to splash 3 Caduceus, the #1 reason to play MN), and the influence, (compare to TWIY, whose 40-card min helps you in a similar way to the NEH draw at finding your combo, but is lacking by comparison in the influence department and therefore has to play a lot of mediocre ICE). The Foundry’s ability, on the other hand, just isn’t quite as good in a conventional FA/Glacier build than EtFs, and it’s ability won’t help a radically different deck become tier one until you get more cards that synergize with it.
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Good Comments Medio.
But you’re wrong. =)
You are right that the Foundry is not as good at a conventional FA/Glacier build as EtF. But neither is CB and that doesn’t make CB weak. Trying to play Foundry as a Glacier is not using the card as it should be played. EtF credit means that ice can be played deeper.
Foundry gives you more ice, (and generally cheap ice faster) and calls for a style of build that is completely different.
As Foundry, you are going to be looking to have 1-2 remotes up fast - either as traps or somethign to put melange behind. Its a MUCH more aggressive style than a glacier build.
You’re going to try to put up something like:
Whirlpool, howler, Agenda; Whirlpool, victor, heinlein. Enigma, ichi, heinlein. Quandry, paperwall, False Lead.
Or popup popup on r & d.
Or you’re going to go: Encrption protocol, then drop eli, eli melange. And you’re going to be able to play these servers much much faster than usual.
Or you’re going to play a Janus on R & D. Play a Howler on HQ. Rez the Janus on R & D with OAI - and you now have another janus for HQ defence when the runner runs HQ.
Playing in this way forces the runner to respond to you.
I don’t feel qualified to say whats a toptier deck and whats not. But I will say that I’ve played more than a couple dozen matches with Foundry decks and found them fun, and exciting and competitive. Way more fun than a glacier deck, to my mind, and they are not weak. And they don’t need new ice to be competive at a casual level of play now.
Finally, the foundry has some other edge cases that make for interesting deck design. More or less the foundry is
built in immune to index,(and red dress) and you can also build entire decks around the shuffle r & d concept.
putting shino (paperwall) on r & d. Rez paperwall if shino tells you you need to change the top 3 cards.
put shino cell portal on r & d. At the cost of a cell portal rez you can constantly change the draw to ensure a favorable draw.
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The runner is not in control of your draws. Between Amazon, OAI, BER, Priority Requisition you have the ability to create a deck design that will force 6-9 deck draws on your turn.
On top of that, you are in a position to manipulate the runner. Drop a melange. Whatever ice you put in front of it you are going to end up with a duplicate in your hand. So instead of a melange triple click being 7 credits its now 7 credits, a free slot behind ice to drop another asset into, and another piece of ice in your hand to use. You are forcing the runner to respond to you.
Your fourth rebuttal was that drawing cards as a benefit of spending credits isn’t strong as advancing your game plan.
My answer to your rebuttal is this is one of the reasons I don’t advocate (so much) next ice etc. Ideal candidates in the early game are: Howler, quandry, whirlpool, popup.
Pulling these cards forward into your early game means that you will have fewer dead draws: fewer hands where you are stuck with only expensive ice in the early game, and useless enigmas in the end game.
And doing this is advancing your strategy for the foundry.
I’d argue that CB sure isn’t particularly strong just yet either, but moreover…
How often do you use the Foundry’s ability? Every time you can? Makes sense, otherwise why have it. But, if you do… well, shucks. Looks like R&D access just got a whole lot more dangerous.
HQ is a bit safer, sure, but R&D lock is painful, and the Foundry does little/nothing to deal with that. Once it has Architect or even Eliza’s, maybe that’ll be different. Scoring an Eden Shard could help – though in ETF it’s even more powerful. Unless you put all that Ice down on R&D to protect the more easily trashable/stolen things remaining within, in which case, uh, you’re spending a lot of money to do that. Might work, HB Ice is decent, but it’ll be much stronger with Grail/NEXT complete sets.
On the topic of D4V1D… what do people think, so far? I’m trying to fit it in, but if I do I pretty much need to take out Ice Carver – but Ice Carver works excellently with Datasuckers to keep me having/building them without wasting them on all the non-Lotus 4-strength stuff. Buuut D4V1D seems rather nicely positioned in comparison. But then, Scrubbed might be a tragic necessity to deal with ELP, at which point the synergy with Ice Carver and Datasucker seems desirable. What’re other people doing with D4V1D?
Not at all greedy.
So an opening hand for the Foundry is going to have two preferred choices. Either you draw a cheap taxing ice (popup) which will lead to another popup the next turn. (pop up, eli…)
Or an enigma Heinlein.
Or you’re looking for an OAI / BER to drop on a janus.
Here are a couple of decks I’ve played around with. They are drafts. Which means I can critique them as well as you can = ).
http://netrunner.meteor.com/decks/YfBYqTPf7Hbr2h9iP/
In this deck I question the Blue/Green Level clearances… you don’t really need draw.
http://netrunner.meteor.com/decks/r3fqqvzBqvhzeCh34/
This deck recurs OAI and ice - to ridiculous extents.
As for d4V1d.. I'm not a fan. Scrubbed. Parasite/Ice Carver, Knight.
E3 or cache. And they won't recycle big ice just to get rid of a pesky Knight.