Originally published at: Teaching Netrunner on the Fly - StimHack
Discuss the latest article by @Trypios here.
Originally published at: Teaching Netrunner on the Fly - StimHack
Discuss the latest article by @Trypios here.
I think itâs probably worth mentioning all the left-out features at the end of the demo. One of Netrunnerâs attractions for gamers is that itâs got a lot going on in terms of decision points, and saying at the end that the full game has even more to offer in terms of mechanics is probably a good selling point, depending on how beleaguered the demo-ee appeared to be.
Very good point and an absolute must to explain that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Otherwise the game would be boring.
Glad to see you filling a gap in teaching Netrunner
I was surprised to see the SUSD picture for the article, I assume you got permission?
excellent teaching resource! i intend to use it, this situation crops up fairly frequently for me as well. the only thing i would change at all is that the corp page in particular refers to players as âhe.â itâs a small thing, but using more inclusive language like singular they is an easy win
I asked permission from everyone I credited at the bottom of the text. SUSD is the only one that didnât respondâŚ
Iâll change it tomorrow! English is not my native language, hence a few mistakes here and there
Iâm sorry, but it looks like the link to the Power Point presentation is down.
http://www.koutelis.com/netrunner/presentation.ppsx
Can you provide a working link, Iâd like to get the PPT.
thanks,
N
Donât know why, but there are some problems with the domain, hopefully temporarily. Try this alt. domain: www.trypios.com/netrunner/presentation.ppsx
thanks, that worked.
This is a great resource and certainly will be using it in the future. Similar to yourself Iâm in a smaller location (Hong Kong) where we have a small group of English speaking friends who are learning together. Itâs been tough to find any group outside of ourselves and To avoid pure meta incest this may be a valuable tool to help include more.
Also, my ear pricked up at the mention of Cyprus as my mother lives there and I visit every year. Would love to visit game stores and maybe join a night next time Iâm in town! Anywhere I can head for info?
I taught Netrunner to three people at a small local convention recently, using the FFG-recommended deck lists, and about halfway through the second game many of their weird deckbuilding choices started to make some sense to me. Iâm going to try to explain them by responding to the articleâs criticisms. Sorry about the resulting wall of text.
Before I get into it, I would like to say that Iâd love an update from @Trypios on how teaching with the articleâs decks went at Cyprus Comic Con.
Caveats:
First, the Corp deck. A lot of the criticism is about how this deck would cause problems to someone playing it in their first-ever game. But usually someone will be playing against it in their first game, which is different. If they did stay for a second game, I think having just seen this deck in action would help them with it.
I do think the FFG deck might cause problems if you were trying to teach two players at once by having them play each other, but my limited experience has been that thatâs a less common situation. If I did end up doing a double demo, I would probably sit beside the Corp player and give them a bit more advice than the Runner. I donât know if that would be sufficient to avoid problems. Itâs quite possible that if Iâd been giving double demos, I wouldnât like the FFG decks as much.
The other main point of criticism seems to be that the deck is not great for winning games. Iâm sure this is true, but I worry that making it better at winning games might make it worse at teaching Netrunner. Again, this might well be different when giving a double demo, since youâd want the new Corp player to at least have a chance.
Jinteki is quite poor to be able to utilize itâs traps and beginners wonât be able to bluff remotes effectively.
I had very few money problems. The new players were often reluctant to run, though I did try to encourage them to run more. This meant that I had more time than usual to click for credits or wait for economy cards. And I usually got at least one turn out of Melange in the middle of the game.
New Jinteki players wonât play the shell game. They wonât take risks bluffing an agenda as trap and they end up losing. Iâm a big fan of the Jinteki church, but itâs a terrible choice for a complete beginner.
I donât think this is a big problem, because the new player is the Runner. I probably didnât bluff as much as I would have if Iâd had more experience playing Jinteki and Iâd been playing to win. I treated the traps as being there to teach the Runner that traps exist, rather than to really hurt them.
I will admit that I ended up losing a lot. Iâm not sure if itâs because I wasnât bluffing enough, or if I was too distracted by having to watch my opponents extra closely for things I might have to explain, or if I was too easy on them early in the game, or if the decks arenât that well balanced, or if Iâm just much worse than I thought at Netrunner.
The benefit of Jinteki here is all the net damage. The amount of net damage in this deck seemed pretty well suited to teaching the Runner to worry about damage while being unlikely to kill them unexpectedly. In the HB deck in the article, Iâm not sure thereâs enough damage cards to really instill a sense of caution.
As I said before, I want to avoid combo cards like Trick of Light and Chum, in case the player sees it early and doesnât know what to do with it.
I didnât end up using Trick of Light ever, but I did use Chum later in one game. I think it worked well for providing a glimpse of Netrunnerâs complexity without being completely incomprehensible to a new player. Also, the complexity of these is offset by their being in the Corp deck. In a typical demo where youâre playing Corp, you can explain them when you use them, rather than hoping the new player will figure them out or ask about them when they see them in their hand. And you can decide not to use them at all if you really think theyâd be too much for someone youâre teaching.
Priority Requisition and Nisei MK II are liabilities. HB has better agendas, in case they get locked. Playtesting showed that Kate easily locks the remote.
Iâm not sure how much of a difference this change would actually make. Thereâs no fast advance cards, so all of the agendas under consideration will have to be installed for one Runner turn. And as I said above, I think the amount of net damage in the FFG deck is about right, so Iâd be reluctant to trade that away even if HBâs agendas are substantially better.
New players use Neural EMP just as soon as they draw it, they donât know how to set up a kill. Better go for a big remote and scoring.
I donât think I ever actually used Neural EMP, so you may be right that it should go. On the other hand, if a new player did this, it might help teach them that actually flatlining the Runner requires a plan.
Jinteki PE & Restructure? Who are we kidding?
Just hold on to it until after youâve used Melange!
Melange Mining Corp. is a difficult card to understand right away and slows the tempo of the corp. The extra credit that HB provides, makes a huge difference.
It might be confusing to a new player who was playing Corp, but my opponents didnât have much difficulty understanding it once they saw me use it. It does slow the Corpâs tempo, but thatâs ok because the new player is the Runner and theyâre generally already going slowly.
More importantly, Melange is a great tool for getting the Runner to start actually running things. By the middle of the game, theyâve often seen a trap or two, so theyâre reluctant to run. Watching me get rich while I pointed out that they could stop me by trashing Melange turned out to be a reliable cure for this.
In the article decks, I suppose that the smaller number of damage cards might reduce the need to give the Runner a really obvious reason to run.
HB is richer, cards are simplerâŚjust make sure to skip the NAPD Contract bad publicity text and the Snare tag. They may ask about Guard wording, thatâs nothing.
The complexity wasnât enough to upset anyone or drive them away, so Iâd worry that simplifying things further might mean underselling the game.
On the other hand, if you tell me that your demos went faster than mine, then Iâm willing to consider the benefits of simplification!
Now on to the Runner deck, about which I have less to say:
Freelance Coding Contract â They might sell important breakers and be locked out. Also, the most they can get out of this card is 8cr, late-game and IF they wonât trash the spare programs.
I mostly agree. I think it does help to teach that cards can have multiple uses, but itâs not that useful. I did have a player sell both Pipelines, which was bad. If I were going to use these exact decks again, I would definitely have to pay more attention when the new player uses FCC and stop them from making this mistake.
Public Sympathy. What? How is that going to be of any use? Kate wants to run, not hold as many cards as possible.
It gives the Runner something they can do to protect themselves against all the net damage in the Corp deck. It does make sense to take it out when using the articleâs Corp deck.
Aesopâs Pawnshop. Again, avoid âwhen your turn beginsâ cards. There are no good cards to sell anyways. Probably just the completely useless aforementioned Public Sympathy.
They could sell Ice Analyzer! No, I agree, this seems like a bad choice. Iâm not sure the âwhen your turn beginsâ trigger is actually a problem, but new players donât seem to be inclined to sell anything even if they have stuff they could sell.
Ice Analyzer is questionable, just like Professional Contacts. The first is difficult for a beginner to keep track of, the latter is a tempo-loss, since Kate has solid economy already with Magnum Opus. Theyâre both 1ofs, so I excluded them.
Ice Analyzerâs not that hard to keep track of, but new players are reluctant to run without all their icebreakers, so by the time it starts getting credits they have little use for it. Plus they have Modded. I agree that this should likely go.
Professional Contacts is useful because theyâll be doing a fair bit of drawing, due to all the net damage and also Public Sympathy. Diesel might be a better choice in some ways, but as mentioned in the Reddit comment I linked way up at the top of this, leaving out draw cards like Diesel means that the new player is âalways seeing only one card at a time, which helps keep the game moving and avoids information overload.â
Modded is a great card, but Kate is too rich already in a very small 30-sized deck.
Clicking Magnum Opus for credits is boring. Making it easy to get and keep money keeps the focus on the non-boring bits of the game. The new player will still need to pause and get money sometimes, which is sufficient to teach them that they need money.
Net Shield is out, becauseâŚHB, no Jinteki.
Agreed. With the articleâs Corp deck, removing this totally makes sense. Of course, with FFGâs Corp deck, this should stay in.
With all of that said, this article was very helpful to me when I was preparing to give demos, even if I didnât end up using the recommended decks. Thank you for writing it!
Hey Absotively, youâre rightâŚI should post an update.
Comic Con was great in general, lots of ANR attendants, more than a dozen but I canât say I enjoyed it to the fullest as I had a gig the previous night, only slept 4-5 hours and was at the tables from 10:00 to 19:00 with only a single meal / 20â break around noon There was also a lot of noise (not the hacker extraordinaire), loud music and a super loud announcer shouting at the microphone every 5 minutes. All these made the teaching process very hard.
All complains aside, I consider the whole teaching process a success. There are some things I would change in the order of presenting the material, but not the decks to be honest. The decks went almost 50-50% and I played only 2 games myself. The rest of the games, I was sitting on the side, impartially advising the newcomers without giving away spoilers about each other hands/hidden cards. I will comment on the presentation after âdefendingâ my deckbuilding choices.
First of, I agree with the legal decks you were using for teaching (Weyland vs. Kate) as they are both balanced and logical. That is for when you have time for complete explanation and a full length game. I considered Weyland at first, but decided to leave traces, tags and bad publicity out of it. I stand by my statement that Jinteki is poor and needs to bluff a lot in order to win. Takes much more experience than playing HB and scoring out. From my experience, new corp players donât think about killing as much as setting up a fort and scoring behind it. I always advise the runner to have 4 cards at his/her hand, hence it becomes quite difficult for the corp to kill.
Your experienced is based on you being the stronger player and if thatâs the case, Jinteki is fine. You can set up a kill and lure them into it, with Neural Katana and snare or Junebug, holding your ready to fire EMPs at hand etc. Newbie corps waste those cards since they donât really know the combos and IF they kill, itâs by mistake or a reckless runner, hence why I give the advice to always hold 3-4 cards on the grip. Still, you admit you were losing a lot and thatâs why I believe a noob runner is stronger against Jinteki.
Youâre right about the limited net damage in my decks, but thatâs only about teaching the damage mechanics. HB is not about killing, unless youâre Cerebral Imaging or Cybernetics Division.
About the liability of agendas. Indeed, there are no FA tools or 2/1 agendas in the deck, but the runner might take an installed non-advanced card in the remote as an asset instead of agenda and let the corporation have it. An advanced card like any 4/2 and 5/3 will signal the runner into running it.
Melange, itâs a great card in general but thereâs no time for it in an HB deck. I didnât say it doesnât work in general but in my decks.
Restructure is still a bad choice. I push the runners to run often and pressure the corp, especially in the beginning. This keeps the corp low in funds and left clicking for credits. IF they melanged, next turn they need to set up another ice and lose their cash again, no time for restructure usually.
Public Sympathy is bad even for damage protection. If the runner gets hurt, just redraw, no need for PS.
As for ProCo, itâs a good card and IF Iâd include it, Iâd remove a diesel and the Magnum Opus completely. I chose MO as it restricts their memory units (yet another mechanic). You donât want the runner being TOO rich to balance it out.
Lastly, the most important thing in the article: TIME
I prepared a lot before the event, practicing at home pretending I was teaching the game to an imaginary person. Having all my materials down, the visuals and the limited mechanics; the explanation/teaching took 10 minutes at MOST. I have to add that work as a music teacher and explaining stuff comes somehow natural to me when I have my material down. Playtime was about 25 minutes in most cases, but I was quite pushy with both players to rush with their decisions. I also took care of Kateâs discounts, HB credits paying attention at what is going on and astro fast advising (see what I did there ). There were some slow players that took their time and the game went up to even 40 minutes! These are the ones that have lower attention spam, missed a few bits of the rules and kept asking questions all the time.
One last comment, I chose HB because I strongly believe itâs easier for a new player to understand the glacier strategy. Itâs the first thing that comes to mind: Runner = attacker, Corp = defender. Protect the servers and score. Jinteki is ok, but needs the shell approach, bold moves and setting up a kill. Beginners wonât thing that way unless already involved in other card games.
Hey Joe, sorry for the late response, I didnât get a notification for your msg. You can PM me or Facebook me if you need anything in Cyprus: Redirecting...
Iâm glad to hear the Comic Con went mostly well!
Iâm now a lot surer that FFGâs decks are meant to be used with an experienced Corp player for the first game. I do still think they work very well in that situation, but I will agree that yours are likely better for two new players. I will have to try them out when I get a chance.
Youâre probably right about why I was losing. Though part of it may also be that I didnât particularly want to flatline them, because I worried it would give them a bad experience. Which means youâre probably right that less damage would be better, but I still think they should see damage cards early and often, so I still probably wouldnât go as low as your decks.
Also, I did usually only have one or two remote servers. This was partly because I didnât want to give them too many to choose from - it took them long enough to make decisions already! - but also Iâm not sure this particular deck is meant to have a lot of servers. Compared to most of the PE decks I see online, it has a fairly low ratio of ambushes to agendas, and thereâs quite a lot of ice. But I donât have much experience playing Jinteki, so I may be wrong about this.
Your point about the agendas also makes sense, and also fits with my belief that their decks are meant to generally have an experienced Corp player - the new player might need the hint that a card might be an agenda to push them to run, and I think pushing the new player to run is more important here than giving the experienced player good odds. The agendas are also balanced out a bit by the Junebugs, of course.
Sure, Public Sympathy is bad for damage protection. What it was good for was making the runner feel less helpless with regards to damage protection. The one player who used it was much more willing to run after he had it on the table.
For time, I donât think I spent more than ten minutes on the initial explanation, but I didnât have the foresight to time it separately, so I may need to tighten it up a bit. I suspect that being unable to see the new playerâs cards and give them specific advice slowed things down a fair bit. I wonder if a small tip sheet would help.
You have the notion that a newcomer has to be the runner, but the decks were designed to be fair for both players as beginners. I believe a new player can start learning either side, not necessarily the runner. I started as corp and refused to play as a runner for a lot of games actually. A tip sheet (sounds like dip-shit btw :P) is a good idea, Iâll make one; face-check often, hold enough cards on your grip, try to keep the corp poor trashing assets or forcing them to rez ice - rush agendas behind ice that no icebreaker is presented yet, defend centrals first, keep the runner poor bluffing an asset as agenda forcing them to run and spend money for nothing etcâŚ
I will work some more on the subject during the xmas holidays and maybe publish a 2nd version. The plan is to:
Itâs not that the newcomer has to be the runner, only that FFGâs decks are designed for the newcomer to be the runner.
I look forward to seeing the changes!
Hm, youâre absotively rightâŚat the very beginning of the book it does suggest; the beginner starts with runner, but I never noticed. I donât completely agree with that but their choices make more sense now. Although, 2nd game sides will switch and the noob will have to play a hard-to-pilot corporationâŚ
You are not supposed to switch sides, you are supposed to have an exiting matchup where the newbie have a fair shot at winning.
âWe have written this guide with you, the demonstrator, playing as the Corporation. Have your new player use the
Runner deck for his or her first game. If you and your new player have time for more than one game, we recommend
he or she play the second game as the Corporation.â.
It does recommend to switch sides. I donât agree with this approach though, I started as corp and played more than 10 games before trying out the runner. Even if itâs all about the runner though, check out how weird the card list is