Nero is a bit strange. In a way he undermines his faction’s affinity for Killers. He’s comparable to Quetzal in this regard, but almost certainly worse. Quetzal is a fracter; Nero is a Snitch. Now that I’m thinking this through, the only ways to currently leverage Nero all venture into hank territory. His best tool will probably end up being Turning Wheel, allowing you to farm a sentry to build up for one giant access.
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This might be stronger than we’re all thinking, remember how killer Leela turned out to be? Though, I think the counter play to this style will invariably make the Corp game faster, or more robust against this late game. Who knows?
I can’t wait for Nero! However, I’ve tried to make some theorical builds for him but I’m uncertain about leveraging his ability. Whether that’s his text ability or link or both. I’m thinking standard criminal build with Snitch. F@$* Au Revoir! That’s too much Mu and moving parts. I’d rather get to see what’s in HQ then run Au Revoir with the B&E programs.
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I think you keep Faeries in Nero. Faerie is an all-around powerful killer, and Nero’s ability will help you save them for inexpensive runs rather than blowing them on facechecking. I think the effect will be subtle but profound: there are plenty of instances where sentries go unrezzed until they can have maximum impact, even against criminals when that might just mean forcing them to use their Faeries. Nero uses no resources when avoiding the worst of surprise sentries, which can have a pretty meaningful effect on when and how those ice are installed and rezzed. Mongoose is a great killer for Nero, potentially replacing Mimic, because not only does the Corp have to double stack sentries for the chance to make them fire, but the penalty to Nero is even smaller.
He’s still susceptible to Marcus Batty shenanigans, but that’s no better or worse than any other runner. I don’t think he’ll single handedly pull Criminals out of the dumps, but I’m excited to see how he turns out.
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Sort of. There are differences: Nero triggers on encounter, Snitch on approach. Nero makes corps rez their sentries, so he has an econ denial edge. He’s more like a reusable Recon for sentries.
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A lot of us knew Leelas ability was awesome. Most of us know Neros ability is underwhelming.
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I feel Nero will have good potential, very similar to Security Nexus. He will allow us to play a little riskier from turn one. Plus who doesn’t love making somebody rez an Archer just to jack out and do something bad to it. Or they don’t rez it and you can get in easier. It reminds me of Andromeda but with a slightly more long term usefulness.
Awesome and good are different things. Leela is splashy and does something cool - the question was never ‘is this ability kickass’ it was ‘should I be playing Andy?’
Nero is a very utility focused ID. He’s all about allowing you to be more aggressive with little risk. That opens different doors.
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Does anyone else feel like Full Immersion RecStudio is a slap in the face for Weyland? It feels like this is how World Plaza should have been printed. The mechanics also feels more like Weyland, the builder faction.
Another card I dislike is corporate scandal. It just feels like a bad idea to dish out a bad pub like this. Not only does it enable blackmail to everyone, but it is dangerously close to power creep when compared to net celebrity. And give Val 2 creds per run seems insane.
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Yeah, just about everyone who’s seen the card. It’s a sad thing.
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I agree about Nero being a snitch.
That’s why I still think Parasite is a must have card with him, new MWL inf prices aside.
Scandal does cost everyone inf though. Also it costs 3c to play. Doesn’t seem like power creep to me at all, even if it usually is a better card.
Also Val has other means to get 2c per run and they don’t even cost inf or credits…
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I did think, like Leela, Nero’s ability is one that needs to be experienced on the table too see how it is. I was unsure about her on paper, then loved her when I finally played! That said… Leela’s ability will fire in a vast majority of games. Unless the corp manages to rez everything, or they kill you in the first few turns, someone will be stealing/scoring agendas.
Nero has one of those abilities which may never fire, but may affect both the corp’s and the runner’s behaviour to give you an advantage. More of a Quetzal than a Kit?
I feel Nero wants to be running very aggressively from the first turn. As such, you want maybe a Gabe-style deck that can now get going without the need for Fairies/Knight/whatever. Either that, or they go full niche with Reflection (his console), Au Revoir, and The Turning Wheel (which will get tokens on a run where you jack out).
With Reflection, Zu.13, and Sunny’s good cloudbreakers (i.e. not Striker), Nero has the ability to support the Au Revoir engine without the memory/cost issue that’s plagued playing it in criminal in the past. The cloud breakers being expensive to use doesn’t matter so much when you can click for 3 credits.
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Yep. But Nero will probably hate Grail ice for that, probably even more than other criminals.
Plus if you’re hyper-charging Turning Wheel, you need fewer successful runs. Hopefully some more stuff that just procs off a ‘run’ will come out (I’m sure I’ve seen some in the spoilers, but I can’t remember which ones… Run Amok maybe?). That said… Between Sunny Breakers, zu.13 and the Turning Wheel, plus SMC or similar to find your Au Revoirs, we’re looking pretty heavy on inf? That’s probably 10+ right there.
It is a tactic at odds with a lot of other crim (or neutral) cards like Desperado, Bank Job, John Masanori, Data Sucker… Interesting to see if it sticks.
That’s always been an issue for crim, though, you could face check with a Faerie and still hit a Galahad/Merlin with net damage subs. I don’t think Nero suffers MORE than other crims, and we’re maybe just a bit lucky that Grail really isn’t played too much!
A criminal spending 10 inf on breakers and multi access sounds pretty run of the mill to me 
1x Shrike, Zu, and Sherman = 6 inf
2x Wheel = 2 inf (since you’re probably playing express delivery/draw to dig)
2x SMC = 6 inf
Spend the last inf on some meta thing like Sac Construct/Film Critic/Feedback Filter
Seems alright?
Turning Wheel really helps as it can probably largely take care of centrals multiaccess by itself, taking over from multiple RDIs. Mr Li? That said, lack of breaker back-ups seems scary… Maybe some spikes alongside faeries/mongeese, rex and femmes?
Maybe we need to start up a Nero thread with a test deck list 
It’s pack 3 he’s coming in, right? Everyone is going to be all over PoOp and Councilman at that point!
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Is anyone else thinking of running early bird with him? Getting your au revoir credits, wheel counter and hq reveal then getting your click back seems strong.
Probably too many moving parts in that engine to start with and it’ll probably end up cut but thinking it might be worth trying.
This isn’t necessarily true. Turning Wheel will still help on normal successful runs where you don’t steal and agenda as well as Security Testing runs, possibly combined with Sneakdoor.