Aaron is huge vs any NBN or Jinteki deck as well as all kill Weylands, and he also has value elsewhere. If the list is true, then at the very least he should be restricted.
That’s what I’m saying. I can buy Restricted without batting an eye, especially with Gang Sign being the only Restricted card from Criminal. It’s odd that he’s Banned, but not completely implausible.
This. Besides merely being good and invalidating entire IDs, Aaron has the same issue as ETF and Kate. He provides a costless benefit for something that is going to happen just because you play the game. Seems like the powers that be are wanting to get rid of those.
I’m going to agree with this. While Aaron let’s you draw a lot of cards, it’s not entirely unconditional - agendas have to be scored or stolen. There is still a fixed number. Further, while it’s good against net damage decks, those decks frequently win when there’s nothing left in the stack anyway, which means that Aaron is only letting you speed up the game and stay, temporarily, safe. With meat, the only scary card is Boom, which isn’t the most feasible right now. MCA Informant still hits a decent number of relevant connections, and anything going after Boom or heavy tags might still want to run one or two. It’s unfortunate he basically invalidates SEA Source combos, but those aren’t game winning anymore.
Ultimately, I include him in my criminal decks because he’s the best card for drawing cards in faction. The tag removal is secondary, and a nice benefit at times (much less so now, when Siphon is gone). Perhaps he should be restricted, but the post-rotation card pool doesn’t really have me thinking that he’s so much of a problem that I’d be upset if he stayed unrestricted.
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I love Aaron, but he is far superior to any other draw engine in faction (not to mention hoses certain matchups). He did however fix a severe draw problem that crims had with efficient and consistent draw and losing Andy & John Mas is yet another blow for the faction in this regard.
What options are left?
- Career fair/Earthrise will be ever popular, but its much less likely you will see both in an opening hand now
- Fisk Investment Seminar has a major drawback but is slightly better in a no Jackson world
- Drug dealer / lovegood has some merit but is a 2 card combo that delivers only half a pancakes
- The baby has been so long forgotten that he actually grew up and is now called Bryan Stinson but could well see a resurgence
- Deuces and to a lesser extent Build script are reasonable
- Blockade runner may see some play but is very click intensive
- Hopper is expensive and at least multi purpose (kill/link) but not great outside of Geist, who isn’t really a criminal anyway
- Exclusive party is deckslots intensive and doesn’t help accelerate the early game at all
Whilst criminals can still obtain some form of draw engine they are a long way behind shaper in this regard and with reg crims already being completely gutted (siphon, desperado, andy, moose, mas/kati, medium, hostage) I don’t agree with either being banned but for me both Aaron & Temujin should be on a restricted list. i.e. you can have premium draw or premium econ – but not both. I suspect most would opt for Temujin given the choice making Aaron a meta call.
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I had the exact same reaction when I saw the banned/restricted list! If Aaron and Temujin were restricted along side crucial cards for other factions, it should help to keep Temujin in Criminal where it belongs and not in Smoke decks and the like where it just totally breaks the cost curve of installing their rig. Or at the very least if you want that economy in another faction you’re giving up Film Critic, E. Strike, etc.
I’m fine with the runner having some cash if they have to give up all the ridiculous silver bullet cards that hose entire strategies.
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Apologies if this has already been covered, but I’ve heard talk (-CodeMarvelous- stream) that Damon kind-of confirmed the ban list, but I haven’t seen the comment myself. Any additional info?
Asking for a friend. 
If this happens, I’m just bummed that I won’t be able to put Mopus and GFI in the same deck.
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Re: Aaron, he’s way too swingy as a tech card. Sure it’s reasonable for crim to have a draw engine but in the process he entirely wipes out Argus, Personal Evolution (to be clear: I’m biased because I love those 2 IDs & despise A-a-ron), and much of NBN in the process. That’s just not a healthy impact for a card to have.
And then the Account Siphon interaction always felt preposterous—corp scoring turns siphon into a huge credit, cards, and clicks swing, how is that fair?!? While that combo isn’t in the game anymore maybe it’s a hint that a siphon replacement or similar Criminal taggy card is on the way which has great synergy with Aaron. Really just as soon as any “tag as an additional cost” card is printed Aaron immediately becomes Too Good.
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Not true. He overstated. Damon stated why he went the MWL route, and why he could see them going the B/R route. This would be a Boggs/FFG decision. He likely knows just as much as us.
Yeah, Damon “confirmed” this in the same way he “denied” Core 2. He said a bunch of things that make sense if it’s true, but doesn’t actually say that it’s true.
Full Damon Quote, first one in response to “A combo of MWL and BAN list seems like a good tradeoff of both: Tier 1-? for strong cards, BAN for broken cards”:
I agree and that was what my plan had been, but there were some recognized problems with that form or addressing the metagame, just as there are problems with a Restricted and Banned list. Ultimately it is the lead designer’s job to implement these sorts of decisions and do what they feel is best for the future fo the game. All the people worrying that it is going to somehow break the game or ruin it should probably wait and actually play with it for a while before passing judgment on it. All the people who feel it is the salvation they’ve been waiting for, well I like the positivity, but generally, even that should probably be kept in check. No one gets it all right the very first time they try something. This list is certainly going to need revision, some things moving from banned to restricted, restricted to banned, and things on neither list getting placed on one or the other should be everyone’s expectation.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it is near perfect, but experience on both sides of the gaming world has taught me to be pretty forgiving and keeping my expectations in check–so I am pleased with the concerted effort to make improvements but expect there to be some fine-tuning.
Second one, in response to people saying they took pride in Netrunner not having a banlist:
Not having a restricted list, or banned list or MWL is pretty much never something anyone should be proud of after a few years of releases. It is for all practical purposes impossible to make perfectly balanced cards that create a perfectly balanced metagame unless every single card in the game follows a specific and rigid mathematical formula and has no non-quantifiable elements.
This would lead to a stale and unimaginative design and play.
The other side is that the game does not follow those parameters and the games company simply is ignoring problems.
I think it was time to ban some cards, when I had designed the reised core that was a large motivator to my selection. With it’s implementation I would have also created a banned list, so this comes as no real surprise to me.
I thought a statement or an update to the MWL needed to come out about every other month as ideal, but no less than every three months. But the design and development cycle and the workload of OP makes something like that very difficult, and once you commit to it you need to stick to it or get crucified on the internet.
I’m interested in seeing how the players react to the restricted list and how it shapes the metagame. There are some genuine “logistical problems” with both the MWL and the standard LCG restricted list as they apply to Netrunner. I chose the MWL as the easier one to sort out, but I’m hopeful that Michael has figured out how to thread that particular needle.
Certainly strongly implies it’s real.
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Thanks!
While the implication is there that it’s real, we still don’t know if the one we’ve seen is the one we’re going to get. I’m hoping the restricted list gets a bit more refined before it comes out, but honestly, I kinda want the ban list asap.
I do think it says something that Damon never said “If this is true, then…” He really seems to have taken the spoiler list at face value. This could possibly be because he knows about the person spoiling them, and knows that he spoils real info. I really doubt that after all this time Spoilerken is actually on a testing team, seeing as he hasn’t actually spoiled any cards in roughly forever, and kinda got caught out on the whole Stealskin thing, but he apparently knows someone who is who occasionally drops him some info.
Everyone has taken it at face value, due to the specifics of the leak. The last leak from this source had the correct MWL down to the card and included the big reveal of tier 3.
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Has spoiler-ken ever been wrong, other than the name of Steelskin?
Also:
The community has been asking for consistently timed MWL updates & more frequent MWL updates since the MWL was created, and I’ve seen a lot of speculation that it’s really Organized Play that’s the problem. This seems to confirm that line of thinking – OP is understaffed.
That’s evident by any exposure to anything from OP at all in the last year. They’re late with every announcement, things are misspelled when they are announced, and things are generally just a big shit show.
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To clarify, this was an earlier spoilerer (heh) who got his wrong, under the handle ‘snow-jax’.
Yeeeap. My thinking entirely. And the effects are being felt pretty hard.
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Oh, that’s right! Forgot they were different people. It’s all so long ago…
Soooo if we assume for a moment that the ban/restriction list becomes a reality and doesn’t change from this iteration…
What are some of the various options for runner economy packages that others have been considering? I’m particularly interested in Shaper. I feel like MOpus might be a great foundational choice, and have seen in action how effective it can be. But what other options are people trying?
Also, is anyone else feeling like they have a ton of influence again? I’m finding myself awkwardly trying to burn like 10+ influence in some of my builds that no longer use Temujin. I’m having to reassess all of my assumptions about the importance of influence and how to use it most effectively.
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