Psychic Field: Fair?

Especially when it also incidentally plays around Sweeps Week.

If the runner also sees Psychic Field in HQ or R&D then this helps in two ways, (1) it's slightly taxing for the runner to trash it, and (2) the runner is now very afraid of running any unadvanced assets or upgrades, which is great for the never advance strategy.

If they hit a snare you have the option to deal 3 net damage and give them a tag, which is significantly better than just potentially costing them 2cr and will leave them more afraid than they would be of just Psychic Field (which is not very scary since it can’t kill you on its own ever and requires you to win a psi game). Additionally, never advance out of Jinteki is not even that scary to begin with. Jinteki gets scary when they have multiple over advanced cards on the table and you have to guess if they are Ronins or Overwriters.

Snare! is more universally useful

Which makes it the better card. Psychic Field is more situational and therefore the weaker card.

Generally you are correct. I’m thinking Psychic Field is a killer splash (especially in NBN).

In NBN I’d be way more scared of the Astroscript but it could be because everytime I’ve tried NBN for the flatline I’ve felt it was more difficult than building a deck that just tries to win off agenda points. What do you play to get the flatline?

That’s always been the standard play against any shell game deck. Not even the best Runners can completely lock the Corp out of econ, especially against PE running next to no ICE.

Siphoning the Corp to 0c isn’t so difficult, and if it is, that’s where Deja Vu to recur it or the Vamp comes in. Obviously you’re either holding 4+ cards in hand or have Plascrete out in most scenarios where you are floating tags.

Plus, technically you don’t need to get the Corp to 0c. Technically you only need to get them to 2c.

The threat of Psychic Field is that it is an agenda. If the Corp is at 2c, they won’t be able to pay to score it the next turn anyway so you don’t need to run it. If you don’t run it, it can’t hurt you. If the Corp is at 0c, then you just run it in hopes of scoring, knowing that you’ve neutered the bulk of the available traps.

Point is, Econ denial is an answer to traps. Still is. Plus, the Siphon/Vamp aspect of Econ denial has rarely been so viable as it is with the most recent pair of AI breakers.

PE running next to no Ice is the easiest Corp to knock down to 0 credits.

If you siphon/deja vu/siphon the corp to 0c you have 1 click to run a single remote. Deja vu is also pretty rare in criminals.

It feels like you contradict yourself if you say that you only need to get them to 2c. On the one hand youre saying you dont run unadvanced remotes at 2c, but on the other hand an advanced remote (junebug/aggsec) will still trigger at 2c.

Same Old Thing then.

I am not contradicting myself at all. An advanced remote - Junebug, Agg Sec still doesn’t need to be run if it is sitting at one advancement counter with 2c in the bank because if it was a 2/3 it likely wouldn’t be sitting advanced on the Runner’s turn and if it was a 2/4 then 2c isn’t going to be enough to score it.

The points that getting the Corp down under 3c prevents the ability to bluff traps as being agendas, and in effect shuts off the trap - getting down to 0 shuts it off for good since you can run and trash it but shutting it down for a turn opens up a window for the Runner to assault the corp on Centrals.

I thought the bigger difficulty was distinguishing a 3 or 4 advanced trap from a ronin. Those are the ones you want to defuse.

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I was splashing Psychic Field in my Regionals Deck (NBN). It got some scared looks when it was encountered in R&D, but no one ever paid to trash it. It only fired twice in two tournaments and both times I lost the Psi game and caused no damage.

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Well, you clearly aren’t playing the card right. :stuck_out_tongue:

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Cerebral Overwriter is colossally more painful in Jinteki decks. Psychic Field is a card you need to be aware of, but is it busted? It’s no worse than the other Jinteki traps. If anything it’s easier to avoid.

now you aren’t talking about Psychic Field at all.

still, doesn’t matter, corp needs a couple Ronins to guarantee flatline the runner, not just one, and dropping the corp to between 0 and 2 credits means a long crawl back to charge even a single Ronin.

I’ve never witness Ronins charged with anything except Mushin, which costs the Corp exactly 0 credits. They need 1c to get the final fourth, which they can do at any point in the game (generally on the turn they’re going to win).

Anyway, you guys have swayed my mind a bit. I was never saying Psychic Field was broken though, only that it seemed a bit under-costed.

True, but they also need 3 creds to threaten Overwriter. Otherwise Ronin will get checked and trashed.

A 3/4-advanced Junebug is plenty scary. It doesnt always have to be an Overwriter.

You’re just getting back to the original point which is that low econ neuters traps. Ok, you Mushin the Ronin. Normally Ronin is protected by the fact that it could be an advanced trap. If you Mushin the Ronin with 2c, it isn’t an Overwriter. 1c it isn’t an Aggressive Secretary. 0c it isn’t even a Junebug. Either way the corp has to hold onto the 1c or 2c to threaten Junebug which means no rezzing most Ice. No rezzing Ice represents a legitimate window for the runner to exploit R&D or HQ in potentially game winning ways.

Junebug is way cooler than Overwriter, too :smile:
Denying the Corp credits is a way to keep it from doing anything, not just activate Traps, but I understand your points @striatic

…except kill you with a House token and a Fetal AI :stuck_out_tongue: