Red Sand Cycle: We're finally going to Mars!

i agree with you for the most part, but i think Transparency Initiative is in the running for worst card of the pack (yes, even giving O2 Shortage a run for its money)

Transparency Initiative doesn’t install the agenda, so it uses up a click for the FA equation, and Dedication Ceremony means you can’t score it that turn anyway.

also i just want to highlight how all the Anarch programs have been ‘really interesting, but ultimately unusable’ this whole cycle. Berserker, Persephone, and now God of War. they all have really interesting mechanics that make you pause and look at them beyond just an icebreaker that you pump and break. that’s really good for the game imo, but Berserker’s inability to break anything above IP Block or Eli 1.0, Persephone’s… everything, and now God of War’s terrible boost/base str make them all fall way too short of being playable

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Isn’t that what the people wanted? No more usable Anarch goodies for a while? :slight_smile:

i suspect that you’re joking, but i’ll unpack and respond to this anyway

when the competitive meta has one faction that clearly dominates, people understandably want to change that.

but the solution is to just release terrible cards for the faction that no one will want to play? sure, this means that strong cards in the other factions will see play, but it also encourages players to use what was already strong for those dominant factions, which causes further stagnation for the competitive metagame. but if that’s the preferred plan, why even release cards at all for those factions?

what any faction needs, regardless of dominance, is new and interesting cards that either encourage lesser-played archetypes or encourage new archetypes altogether. strong cards that replace and/or crappy filler cards that encourage new archetypes but are completely unplayable is not at all what anyone really wants.
these new programs are new and interesting, but unfortunately completely unplayable, meaning Anarch is still dominant but isn’t really using anything new

Sorry, that’s definitely Rover. :smiley: I did miss that text on Dedication Ceremony. :frowning:


I think outside of that weird DLR+Citadel case, God of War won’t see play. (Which, that DLR+Citadel use case is… ADORABLE.)

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I’m not reading that you can’t install Transparency Initiative on existing public agendas. Turning it face up is part of the total effect. In this case you would simply ignore that part, because it’s already face up.

Consider the difference if it had said ‘choose existing face down agenda.’

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Something I saw brought up elsewhere, but I thought was interesting…

Open Forum actually refers to the “[1.5] Draw 1 card from the top of R&D into HQ.” as the “mandatory draw.”

Which I think it’s the first time it’s been referred to as in the rules or cards?

Core 2.0 confirmed?

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If Transparency Initiative can be installed on Oaktown, it might be playable - you could click Oaktown forever for 3c per turn, daring the runner to steal it and get midseasoned (until they install film critic and you cry). Otherwise, it’s awful. It’s only better than a hedge fund on GFI, Vanity Projects, and Government Takeover, but it would make GFI take THREE turns to score. It should at least install the agenda when you play the card so it was click neutral.

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Transparency might be usable in a Mumbad Construction Co type deck where you actually care about the agenda abilities rather than just wanting face-up agendas. God knows I’d almost always rather score a High-Risk Investment than a Hollywood Reno.

I had an old deck that I haven’t run in a while that actually could use this to save a couple influence. As I said, that deck is super old and probably needs more tuning than just this card (look at that! Interns is in the deck on purpose!), but that two influence makes it super easy to chuck a couple Friends in.

I honestly think there might be something to the card. I’m not sure what that something is yet, aside from MCC decks and mitigating money loss through scoring larger agendas, though. The 3 credit click to threaten Midseason is kinda cool, if it’ll work.[quote=“StephenE, post:591, topic:8189”]
It should at least install the agenda when you play the card so it was click neutral.
[/quote]

Totally.

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Templating changes constantly on these cards. Inconsistency is the only constant. I wouldn’t put too much weight into that.

In editing Damon and I agreed to update this in the FAQ so that mandatory draw could be referenced on cards. I just have to remind Boogies about it.

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I haven’t heard any talk about Rover Algorithm. My first thought was there are some good low strength code gates that you do not include because of Yog. If you put a Rover Algorithm on them then they will become good after a run or two.

My thoughts then turned to Sentries. If you put this on a sentry (Architect is ideal), it will get to strength 4 eventually. Strength 4 sentries are a pain for pretty much all runners. Mimic will need Datasucker/Ice Carver/NRE support. Mongoose is 5 to break strength 4 sentries and MK Ultra is 6.

Also…Atman.

I know Patch could’ve done this same job but I think the ICE you want to put it on are not Weyland so it being influence free makes it more likely to be used. I think this card can be quite oppressive if the runner does not have support for their breakers.

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Those all sound like reasonable conclusions, but they add up to the card being conditionally useful and therefore in tight competition for deck slots.

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Yeah. The thing about ice upgrades is that you have to think of them in the context that they could just be an extra piece of ice instead - so they’d need to be really good to be playable. None of those printed so far have quite got there, even though their abilities aren’t unreasonable.

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I have no idea how it would need to be worded to function properly, but I wonder if a clause where you could install the ICE upgrades on the fly when you rez a piece of ICE would work. Maybe with a extra couple of credits cost, so it’d be cheaper if you installed it normally on your turn.

ICE upgrades have three fundamental problems.

  1. As others have said, they could just be another piece of ICE, which doesn’t need to depend on having an ICE out, and rezzed (usually), to put the upgrade on.

  2. It makes ICE even more vulnerable to ICE Destruction plans. If you thought losing one card and the credits you paid for it was bad, losing two cards is even worse.

  3. They are never a surprise. You’ll never ‘gotcha’ or ‘catch’ the runner in them, so at best they are things to increase the amount of tax that ICE provides. And usually, a simple strength boost just isn’t enough tax to justify it. (Sub Boost on Macrophage is one of the only exceptions I’m aware of.)

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Relating to point 1 above. When you already have an ice in the server, then the value between an upgrade or another piece of ice is similar. However if you have no ice protecting a crucial server and you instead draw the upgrade, then you are incredibly sad.

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Right; I think the upshot of all these points is that ice upgrades can certainly make ice better, but only in a sufficiently ice-rich environment.
So it’s kind of a weird way of adjusting the balance in favor of ice, since (at best) it only helps decks at the far end of the spectrum.

Ice Upgrades do benefit from having low play costs, which can tip the favor rather than spending 1 or more to install a new ICE, in addition to the rez costs. That being said, all conditions suffer from that card you Want to include, but just can’t. I think 2 reasonable conditions that could be some play would be one that adds a “Cannot be Trashed When Installed Clause and a +1 str” and a “Cannot be broken by AI”.

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When we evaluate cards, there are a few questions we should ask ourselves:

  1. is this card good whenever I draw it?
  2. Does this card clutter up my hand?
  3. Is this card effective?

The problem with ICE enhancers is that:

  1. They are only good when:
    1.1 You have ICE in play
    1.2 That ICE is rezzed
    1.3 That ICE is a good target for this particular enhancer
  2. Looking at (1) it looks like this will get stuck in HQ for a long time, and be a top discard when HQ is jammed.
  3. In a dream scenario, they can be great (e.g. sub boost on a Data Ward), but much like positional ICE, they pay off too late if ever in most games.

Even if you pull everything together and make a really great fort with your ICE + enhancer, the runner can just win out of a different server (otherwise Wotan and Fairchild would be amazing).

Oh, and all this assumes that there is no ICE destruction. ICE destruction is bad, but far from the only problem with enhancing ICE.

I’d theorically agree but this particular enhancement have excellent strengh against your usual “I can spam that central” runner deck.

That is what gives Quicksand its strenghts, and weaknesses, if you compare this to your Rainbow / Static.

This is a card you want in synergistic conditions. Other than that, wait for phase 1.5-2, bet it on the central that most can read to be spammed and slow down the phase transition 2 to 3.

Quicksand put on the appropriate central won me games. Now, I’d perfectly agree this card is not one of the big 3 (agenda, ice, money) but this is one card that allow new decks (Quicksand, Sandburg, this one, Lag time, etc).

Great card in a “my main job is etr” RP as it provides a punition on bumping one central.