Ok, IT department. Ran into it today with someone testing it as well, and the question was in the end:
Can you save an ice from parasite with a counter at the start of the turn? I don’t have a clue how the timings there are supposed to work.
Er, it depends a bit.
Case 1: You have an ice that is about to die to Parasite on the runner’s turn – say Eli, with 3 counters on it. There is a paid window before “turn begins” triggers, so you should be able to use ITD to save it for that one turn.
Case 2: You have an ice that already has Parasite counters equal to or greater than its unmodified strength, but it was surviving through some other means (e.g. an ITD counter last turn, Corporate Troubleshooter, etc.). In this case, it should die immediately at the “turn end” trigger, when ITD counters and other effects are removed, before you have a chance to re-up ITD next turn.
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I was about to refute your #1, but this is actually accurate! weird that there’s a window in the “limbo” between turns…
If you’re running ITD already, this could be a nice extra trick to surprise a runner who’s really counting on a particular ICE dying in a particular turn…
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Doesn’t IT Dept only last until end of turn? Wouldn’t the added parasite counter at start of runners turn kill the ice?
You can use IT Department to boost an ice’s strength before start of turn triggers happen.
There’s a window after end of corp turn but before Runner’s start-of-turn effects? O_o
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Yes. Step 1.1 of the runner’s turn.
Yeah, paid windows before “turn begins” on both sides. That “rez Adonis at the end of your turn” play can actually be during the first window of your own turn.
Eh, sort of. It’s a pretty edge case, because the ice will die at the end of the runner’s turn* and you have to use the counter before they invest any clicks in the turn.
*Barring that new asset that can wipe virus counters as a paid ability, but… if you’ve already got that out, you might as well just use it and save the ITD counter.
Hoping they hit an orion/destroyer during their turn to blow up the parasite is about the only use case I can think of aside from just buying another turn of safety.
how is “keeping someone out of a server for one turn” an edge case for ITD? if you’re running an ITD deck (not saying you should) this is a scenario that could very well be relevant in a lot of games, given the popularity of parasite
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ITD is certainly about the incremental wins, but if parasite has been ticking down on a piece of ice for a while such that this play is an option, you’ve as a corp probably had the opportunity to replace the ice as well. If you’re really in the situation that you need that ice for one more turn it’s probably a solid play or may aggravate the runner, but in my experience parasite tends to go on centrals where repeated accesses really gain from the cost reduction. Remotes tend to be dealt with by building up cash reserves and then just making that run once. It’s less likely that you’ll see a slow parasite on a remote (in my experience) than on a central. (Although a slow-roll parasite on an ice protecting ITD may be a special case)
ITD decks should run a suitable number of ice, so you ought to have a replacement on hand if anything gets nuked and not be in the situation where you need to keep a piece of ice alive using ITD. Basically, with the right deck it’s a convenient move to help stretch your resources a little farther, but it’s impact on the game is probably relatively low. Not really a high-impact move.
Thanks for the answer. That’s one unnatural looking way of card interaction.
It for upcoming cards, but nevertheless:
How does the interaction between hivemind and viruses that spend virus counters works?
Hivemind
Program: Virus
Cost 3
2 MU
Place 1 virus counter on Hivemind when it is installed. Virus counters on Hivemind are considered to be hosted on all other virus programs (and can be spent as if on them).
A(5)
So, if I use Imp or even Datasucker ability, do I remove the counter from Hivemind?
[Sorry if this is a stupid question, I’ve seen some comments on how hivemind will give you permanent Imps and that striked me as odd]
Yes, spending a token from Hivemind as if on Datasucker or Imp means that a token is removed from Hivemind (i.e. spent tokens are spent!).
Yes, spending it to activate the “hosted virus counter” ability on them spends the token on Hivemind. Just because it’s not physically located on the Imp doesn’t mean you don’t spend it the exact same way - think of it as Hivemind just holding tokens for Imp.
Because that never goes wrong…http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=5833.
For all us non-magic vets… how did it go wrong? I assume there’s some card that removes the ‘end of turn’ part to trigger that card?
Wall of boom seems more approrpiate, scroll down a bit here,
http://www.recoculous.com/2012/03/30/the-three-best-combos-that-no-longer-work/
But 1.1 is not that timing window. 1.1 is part of the turn.
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It was intended purely as a defensive card. But you could play it in a timing window before the start of your turn but after the end of the opponent’s turn which meant the creatures did not have summoning sickness on your turn (creatures cannot attack the turn they come into play) and could attack.
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