Order and Chaos (Now FFG Confirmed w Spoilers)

New Cards and Spoilers
21

So excited for this one! Even from just these cards, it looks like there are a lot of fun combo’s you can do.

  1. Darwin + Ice Carver + Hive Mind + Virus Breeding Ground = Str 3 Darwin, minimum, even after a wipe (for 1C and a click).
  2. Stim Dealer + Aesops
  3. The new ID that gives bad pub + Investigative Journalism + Personal Workshop = Effectively an Opus.
  4. The new ID that gives bad pub + Investigative Journalism + Itinerant Protesters
  5. Hive Mind + Virus Breeding Ground + Medium + Nerve Agent. Add in Demo Run for extra Spice.
  6. Hive Mind + Virus Breeding Ground + Parasite, supplement with datasuckers or Wyrm
  7. Edward Kim + Imp in general for awesome trashing power
  8. Gagarin Deep Space + Encryption Protocols for super taxing assets. Pairs well High Risk Investment when the runner knows he will need lots of cash on hand to access/trash things.
  9. Hive mind makes Chakana/Deep Thought/Pheromones more useful if you can power it up with Surge or Virus Breeding Ground. Pheromones + Virus Breeding Ground + Personal Workshop would be similar to the bad pub + personal workshop idea as well. New econ?
2 Likes
22
  1. The new ID that gives bad pub + Blackmail (plus one/both of the other things)
  2. Human First + Chakana + The Source
  3. Incubator + Hivemind (likely to be very brief, admittedly)
  4. Kim + Scrubbers

EDIT: Looking elsewhere, it looks like “BP Runner” is Valencia Estevez, a journalist. I’m really happy that at least two of the three Anarch IDs in O&C are PoC. Kind of hoping for 3/3.

EDIT 2: Holy hell, Wormhole can ruin Nasir’s day if it’s advanced enough first. Eeek.

EDIT 3: And makes for a good ToL battery, seeing as the counters stop mattering once you rez it (unless it gets de-rezzed).

23

Wanton Destruction is amazing. Like doing a bunch of Imp runs on HQ in a single turn, except you only need to break the ICE once, and you can’t hit any traps. Blow up some biotics, scorch pieces, or agendas. Becomes extra silly if you can get extra clicks.

2 Likes
24

Wormhole seems excellent against Shutdown, since it keeps its advancement counters and you can just keep rezzing it for nothing. That is, assuming the rez cost is reduced by at least 2 for each counter (otherwise I don’t know why that effect is even there).

1 Like
25

Well, if it’s only 1 per, it lets you pretend for it to be something else, it lets you build up to rezzing it with drip econ (other factions likely care more about that), and/or it gets real benefit in BWBI alone (but is still good even without its advanceability, honestly).

@fluffdasheep Yeah, it could be nice. You can definitely hit 6 click turns (Stimb Dealer + Joshua B./Rachel Beckmann), which would make a click one Wanton pretty painful for the Corp.

EDIT: Rereading Virus Breeding Grounds, uh… shoot. It has to put a virus onto something with a virus already. Still good for Darwin/other things, less good for eternal Imps/Hiveminds. At least, without using Incubator (which’ll also be up to 1 that turn).

26

Still forces a purge from the corp, or you just keep adding that Imp token back every turn…

27

I hope Wormhole is the start of BWBI being worth playing :D! I’m pretty stoked for a bunch of these Anarch cards too, to be honest.

Valencia’s ability to start any corp with Bad Pub is downright nasty. BLACKMAIL ALL THE SERVERS.

28

More spoilers! More or less.

Three new things:

  • The Twins, a 2 cost sysop
  • Uninstall, an event that returns a program (Imp, Hivemind) or piece of hardware (Plascrete?) to your grip
  • Orion, a 15 cost, 8 strength Ice. Estimates on the rest: It’s a Code Gate - Barrier - Sentry, and the subroutines are: Trash 1 Program, Do the Wormhole, ETR. Can be advanced, each advancement… maybe lowering the cost by 3, or something?

I do hope that Weyland isn’t getting the Criminal/HB treatment here. Anarch won more H&P Tournaments than they did (admittedly as 1/3 the pie, not 1/4). Have seen things that’ll invigorate dead archetypes (Advance Ice, Glacier) and maybe make some new ones, but nothing much for the current Weyland rush decks. Fingers are crossed, 'cause they need the help, too.

EDIT: For clarity’s sake, “do the Wormhole” is just the Wormhole “fire a subroutine of another rezzed ice” thing.

4 Likes
29

Can Satellite Grid make all the terrible Advance ICE playable? I’ll definitely be revisiting BWBI to find out.
(prediction: no, it cannot)

30

The space program theme is wonderful. Crazy to see a card as earnestly touching as Space Camp out of the Corp that brought us Vulcan Coverup, but that’s the thematic complexity we’ve come to expect from the Netrunner universe.

Here are some preliminary card ratings, in an X out of 5 format. Edward Kim, Wanton Destruction, High Risk Investment, Hivemind and Sub Boost are my favourites.

Edward Kim [4/5] is an excellent ID and very scary for many powerful Corp archetypes. He also comes off as mean person, hating Androids. The genius of this card from a theme perspective is how often he will probably be smashing Biotic Labor with his big hammer.

Gagarin Deep Space [2/5] looks a little mediocre compared to the economic powerhouses of BaBW, GRNDL and Blue Sun, but at least it points to a different way to play Weyland. Thematically the idea of everything being up in space and more expensive to reach is solid.

Traffic Accident [2/5] is going to help soften up Plascretes in Tag-Me builds but landing that second tag could be problematic so it feels very situational. What a grim card this is. Dripping with flavour and black humour.

Human First [2/5] looks ok with the potential to net 5 credits over the course of the game, but its potential as a dead draw means it won’t see much play I think.

High Risk Investment [4/5] could be Siphon defence, but really what it wants to do is guarantee the corp can win a trace. Kinda useful in Tag and Bag. 3/5s are tough to score but rushing one of these out early enough opens up a ton of flexibility while still maintaining a constant flatline threat.

Satellite Grid [3/5] is a solid tax on the runner between its trash cost and the extra cost to break in to get it, depending on the breakers they are using and if they are Whizzard. Whizzard running Morningstar probably laughs at this though.

Itinerant Protesters [3/5] could singlehandedly win a game against GRNDL with a couple Hostile Takeovers scored, but then again it only takes a single HT to pop it. With enough runner based BP generation though, this could win games or at least force a corp to hold their Currents in reserve.

Wormhole [2/5] seems fated to see play primarily in BWBI, which should have better targets for advancement than this. If it was strength 8 or had more than one sub it would be a lot better, and there are probably combos I’m not considering but as it stands it feels like yet another excellent target for Knight.

Space Camp [3/5] is an adorable and useful taxing ambush, and a great Datasucker counter. I think this guy is primarily meant to sit in Archives, punishing repeated Datasucker runs by inflating the advance-able ice on your other centrals. Otherwise it can sit in HQ to similar taxing effect.

Glenn Station [2/5] aims to solve Weyland’s agenda flood issues but if you are able to score the Glenn, then you can probably handle the agenda flood already. Weird card with awesome flavour. I hope it is better than I think it is because the mechanic seems like it would be very fun to play.

Wanton Destruction [4/5] looks incredibly dangerous, on the level of Legwork. It is significantly more click intensive than Legwork, and you can’t score Agendas immediately, but the chances of knocking a Biotic Labor or Scorched Earth out of hand are excellent. This could be right up there in Imp territory in terms of dangerousness

Hivemind [4/5] is a solid option to play in reaction to being purged, to restart the engine. In the late game with Grimoire out, Djinn search/Hivemind/Surge or trash Incubator/Run seems like a potentially very nasty turn. I like what this card does for Djinn and Surge, but it will really sing with Incubator.

Investigative Journalism [3/5] ought to really stir up those Itinerant Protestors. Does Valencia Esteves really start the Corp off with a BP? That sounds a little OP to me but if true this card becomes an incredible economic engine and would get a better rating from me.

Sub Boost [4/5] should see a lot of play, and be a staple in many decks. It helps neuter Knight and Overmind, and stengthens things like Hunter. Really like the idea of playing Hunter more, and think we will see x3 Sub Boost and x3 Hunter in a lot of deck lists. Would also look good on Dräco. It also helps neuter Darwin, which will probably be seeing more play with all the virus boosting going around.

Stim Dealer [3/5] makes me want to put in a deck with Public Sympathy, Borrowed Satellite and Duggar’s. Maybe Aesop’s too. maybe, if I’m feeling wussy.

Virus Breeding Ground [2/5] will draw obvious comparisons with Incubator, which I think is a better card. VBG isn’t as good for Purge recovery since it need to find a card with a Virus counter on it to work. It will also be also very click intensive to move virus counters one at a time.

5 Likes
31

Sub boost also tacks on the barrier type. It’s… pretty niche.

32

So… what happens when you Wormhole a Data Raven?

Also, here’s hoping that all the ‘reduce rez cost’ cards in the set reduce it by 3. Anything less and you’re only just breaking even on click efficiency, which isn’t actually better than clicking for credits (and who wants to do that?)

It also has to be noted that all the ice spoilered so far works really really well with The Root. God I want to play that card so bad…

33

traffic accident costing 0 to play and 1 influence is a big deal. probably going to be the default siphon punish out of jinteki/hb (shutdown for car crashes maybe?)

2 Likes
34

Probably not far off the mark provisionally, but the contents of the rest of the set could change that - especially Wormhole I think. Sure, he’s in Knight zone but that’s all he’s in and not everyone runs it; plus there are plenty of options to boost that strength by a point to make him very difficult to beat. He’s not dying to Parasite any time soon and he’s very versatile because he brings ICE from other servers into the game (which works with Amazon Industrial Zone). In concert with a variety of cheaper utility ICE he can be a hard ETR, do net damage, trash programs or land tags). His usefulness might depend on what the discount turns out to be based on advancement counters, but he is useful as a battery for Trick of Light once he’s rezzed. I wonder whether he could be useful as a splash in Jinteki - they have some devastating ICE, ToL in faction and an agenda that boosts Code Gates.

35

I guess Sub Boost is alright in Weyland, after that one agenda comes out that gives all Barriers +1 STR and a cred for each rezzed barrier.

But definately niche for now. Might have some weird synergy a few years down the road.

36

Also, have has it been confirmed that this definitely comes at the end of the current cycle or will they simply release it when they want to? I believe the AGoT deluxe sets just released whenever they were ready, they didn’t fit into any particular release cycle structure.

37

The only recent instance of a deluxe expansion coming in the middle of an on-going cycle was with the Star Wars LCG, and I believe that was because the force packs were delayed and the deluxe expansion still released on time. Admittedly, that was after I stopped playing the Star Wars LCG and paying close attention to it, so I could be wrong about that.

38

So? It doesn’t make something impenetrable, it makes it a bloody nuisance. Tack an ETR on your Ichi 1.0 – good luck clicking through, and paying through either Icebreaker is going to be 6~ credits. Pop it on Wotan to make it absolutely impervious. Pop it on Janus to make it even more frustrating. Put it on Curtain Wall to increase the tax, or on something they’re using Knight to get through to increase the cost. (Wraparound takes 4 now, say.) Tacking on a barrier type means you have to be careful about handling it, and can turn big ice (like Wormhole, or Orion) into more taxing things to deal with if they can break them either way.

For 0 I make this thing cost you 1+ more/turn, and remove the ability to soar through unimpeded (on, say, Pup or Ichi or Komainu or something else that they’ll likely still have to pay through). It’ll make Morning Star better, but that’s been happening for a long while.

39

Re: Wormhole

While it is difficult to Parasite/Datasucker Wormhole, it is also the most vulnerable high strength ICE in the game to Datasucker/Parasite because you just have to destroy whatever ICE it is borrowing the sub from.

While it is high strength, it is also very high cost.

It isn’t as taxing as it looks, because Code Gate breakers are very efficient. Gordian Blade is 6 to get through. Torch is only 4. Yog on Dinosaurus is 2 Datasucker Tokens. Knight is 2 credits. Compare to Tollbooth at 7, 5, 3 and 5 respectivly. Tollbooth is more taxing for less upfront cost and has fewer Icebreakers that can unlock it.

It fits in Tennin as a ToL battery and GRNDL as an influence saver over Tollbooth, but elsewhere if I really wanted a high strength Code Gate I’d splash Tollbooth because of Wormhole’s essential uselessness to most Anarch builds that run Knight as well as everyone who splashes it, and not being as good as Tollbooth against any of Shaper’s Code Gate breakers. Being weak relative to its rez cost against 2/3 factions - and extremely weak versus 1 of those - is very problematic for me.

1 Like
40

I can’t think of a better big in-faction code gate. Weyland FA looks like it’ll be wanting some ToL shenanigans of its own, and in-faction it seems pretty helpful. Or alongside Flare, which has one of the single best subroutines in the game.

It really comes down to how much each advancement helps, I think. If each is 2c, eh. If each is 3c and you’re doing ToL, the cost stops being a big issue in a hurry because you’ve got the other uses for 'em.

And Yog off of Dinosaurus takes 4 Datasucker tokens, which is pretty prohibitive, at which point they need to parasite it or parasite everything else. So it also will serve as another kick in the teeth of Yog on its lonesome.

I agree though that it’s not Tollbooth and that the relative costs should most definitely be weighed there because Tollbooth is amazing, but I do think it can manage to fill a number of jobs depending on the other ice you’ve got in your deck, especially in a situation where the advancement counters are helpful.