tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
I'm really okay with the restricted/banned list, especially since it seemed that Shapers really got the lightest hand in rotation/2.0. Everyone was already saying that there was no reason to play anything but lock Shaper decks that built a big rig and moneyed up and locked remotes, and they were probably right. There's a good reason for all of those cards to be on there. I regret Temujin Contract being banned, and would much rather have seen that on restricted (since that lessens incredibly the chance that it gets splashed, and it's priced right for Criminals), but everything else I can kind of nod and go along with.
I think if you're just playing in a pure core 2.0 meta or tournament, you don't worry about the restricted/banned list. Just build the decks and play. If someone wants to play in a regular tournament setting with only core cards, first, more power and luck to them, but second, they should be able to fill in gaps from restricted list cards by splashing from other factions. Like, literally from Core the Shaper player just has to decide if they want to play Aesop or MO, and decks weren't usually running both of those anyway.
I think the core of my problem here is trust. My local meta is pretty much dead, and Core 2 and rotation represent the best opportunity to try to get people back in the game or introduce them. If I have to immediately explain to them though that the new core has multiple cards that are soft banned and multiple cards in the newest cycle have been straight up banned it's going to make that harder, and possibly not worth trying for me. Why bother buying a pack if the cards you but it for might become scrap paper?
There is a definite sense with FFG that the left hand doesn't really know what the right is doing. If this is real, why not announce the whole thing together with core 2.0? And if they do think, say, Magnum or Aesop are a bit over the curve, why not print an errata'd version of them in core 2.0, which would be the perfect opportunity to make changes to existing cards? There's an impression that no one has overall responsibility and so nothing is really joined-up.
All that said, I think I'd be pretty happy to see something like this happen. I never really felt MWL achieved the goal it wanted to (you dropped non-busted influence from your decks and kept playing the busted cards), and a banned/restricted list ought to get rid of degenerate decks much more effectively.
The fact that several of those banned or restricted cards are from the most recent cycle indicates their testing process is pretty poor. Maybe the list is trying to draw a line underneath that, or they've simply decided to carry on the way they are and ban cards that slip through the inadequate QA process.
I'll be really happy if the banned/restricted list thing is real. Less for the cards that are on it, more that they're finally making use of a very powerful tool to balance the meta game.
Unsettled metas are dreadful for me personally because I'm very much not a deck builder and need other people to figure out what's good, but this shake up is great for the game as a whole. Exciting times.
I'm really okay with the restricted/banned list, especially since it seemed that Shapers really got the lightest hand in rotation/2.0. Everyone was already saying that there was no reason to play anything but lock Shaper decks that built a big rig and moneyed up and locked remotes, and they were probably right. There's a good reason for all of those cards to be on there. I regret Temujin Contract being banned, and would much rather have seen that on restricted (since that lessens incredibly the chance that it gets splashed, and it's priced right for Criminals), but everything else I can kind of nod and go along with.
I think if you're just playing in a pure core 2.0 meta or tournament, you don't worry about the restricted/banned list. Just build the decks and play. If someone wants to play in a regular tournament setting with only core cards, first, more power and luck to them, but second, they should be able to fill in gaps from restricted list cards by splashing from other factions. Like, literally from Core the Shaper player just has to decide if they want to play Aesop or MO, and decks weren't usually running both of those anyway.
I'm not looking forward to headbutting a bunch of brain damage. Runs feel binary. You either have the money to complete the run or you don't.
I can’t remember if it was Damon or Boggs saying this, but one of them in a recent interview about Core2 said that actually functionally changing cards that were getting reprinted was off the table. It was part of the deal that let them do Core2 in the first place, and the higher-ups were worried about having multiple different versions of the same card in the wild.
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+1
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admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
I think the core of my problem here is trust. My local meta is pretty much dead, and Core 2 and rotation represent the best opportunity to try to get people back in the game or introduce them. If I have to immediately explain to them though that the new core has multiple cards that are soft banned and multiple cards in the newest cycle have been straight up banned it's going to make that harder, and possibly not worth trying for me. Why bother buying a pack if the cards you but it for might become scrap paper?
There is a definite sense with FFG that the left hand doesn't really know what the right is doing. If this is real, why not announce the whole thing together with core 2.0? And if they do think, say, Magnum or Aesop are a bit over the curve, why not print an errata'd version of them in core 2.0, which would be the perfect opportunity to make changes to existing cards? There's an impression that no one has overall responsibility and so nothing is really joined-up.
I would guess the team that does product announcements literally does not care about the team that does OP announcements.
Magnum Opus restricted seems crazy to me. It has a huge drawback (2 MU is not nothing), and there are two alternatives that do kind of the same thing (Professional Contacts, Laguna Velasco District). Some of the other restrictions are headscratchers, too, but I am not caught up enough on the metagame, so I guess I'll trust that they're OK.
Putting a deckbuilding price on Film Critic seems like a reasonable move, though. There are way too many threats that it disables.
+3
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AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
I think the core of my problem here is trust. My local meta is pretty much dead, and Core 2 and rotation represent the best opportunity to try to get people back in the game or introduce them. If I have to immediately explain to them though that the new core has multiple cards that are soft banned and multiple cards in the newest cycle have been straight up banned it's going to make that harder, and possibly not worth trying for me. Why bother buying a pack if the cards you but it for might become scrap paper?
There is a definite sense with FFG that the left hand doesn't really know what the right is doing. If this is real, why not announce the whole thing together with core 2.0? And if they do think, say, Magnum or Aesop are a bit over the curve, why not print an errata'd version of them in core 2.0, which would be the perfect opportunity to make changes to existing cards? There's an impression that no one has overall responsibility and so nothing is really joined-up.
I would guess the team that does product announcements literally does not care about the team that does OP announcements.
There are three branches. OP, marketing, and development. Sometimes you can tell when they have squabbled.
Shortytouching the meatIntergalactic Cool CourtRegistered Userregular
jinteki is the real winner from rotation
a lot of their hate cards got rotated out or restricted, and generally poor runners means they can't effectively leverage those that are remaining (caldera, feedback filter)
Nothing official, and the attempts I've heard of were weird and kinda janky.
Best one I've heard of was to pair up a runner and a corp together against another pair, you're after 11 combined agenda points (from stealing and scoring) and have a shared credit pool. There's a lot of silly ways you can game that, though, so no idea how practical it is!
Most of the time you're better of doing 1v1s and switching the pairs up.
Magnum Opus restricted seems crazy to me. It has a huge drawback (2 MU is not nothing), and there are two alternatives that do kind of the same thing (Professional Contacts, Laguna Velasco District). Some of the other restrictions are headscratchers, too, but I am not caught up enough on the metagame, so I guess I'll trust that they're OK.
Putting a deckbuilding price on Film Critic seems like a reasonable move, though. There are way too many threats that it disables.
Opus is restricted so it can't be played with inversificator, without defensive upgrades opus/inv/kit annihilates any deck that relies on ice.
This style of restricted list punishes combos not cards, if you wonder why a card is on there look for the other cards on the list it creates npe with.
The more I contemplate it, the more I think I'm okay with Opus being restricted? Like, in every other form of credit generation in it's style they eventually run out or are limited in some way. Opus.. just keeps going. Constantly. Which adds this bit of resigning to... inevitability? on the Corp's side, and actually makes it hard to get scoring windows going.
I mean, to get something like that going credit-wise for the corp, they have to score a Government Takeover.
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
Played some c2+rotation+ban list rumour games on jnet today and it's been great fun. The experimenting period where no one knows what's going on is the best part of any card game.
So, I'm looking at some of the powers I've unlocked over the course of Terminal Directive and I just want to make sure on one of these because it seems... busted.
Ability spoilers for terminal directive:
Whenever one of your cards is trashed, add it to the top of your stack instead of adding it to your heap if there are fewer than 3 remote servers.
This seems bonkers? Like, install bank job, run a remote server, get 8 credits and trash it, and put it back on top of my deck? Does it really fire when my cards trash themselves or only when the corp trashes my stuff?
It's bonkers!
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
So, I'm looking at some of the powers I've unlocked over the course of Terminal Directive and I just want to make sure on one of these because it seems... busted.
Ability spoilers for terminal directive:
Whenever one of your cards is trashed, add it to the top of your stack instead of adding it to your heap if there are fewer than 3 remote servers.
This seems bonkers? Like, install bank job, run a remote server, get 8 credits and trash it, and put it back on top of my deck? Does it really fire when my cards trash themselves or only when the corp trashes my stuff?
It's bonkers!
It's arguably even more busted than your example. You play Sure Gamble. It trashes. It gets added to the top of your stack. Infinite money! Arguably annoying if you actually want to also draw new cards, however.
With the people I played with, we house ruled it that whenever the *corp* trashes one of your cards it gets cycled to the top. Which makes sense with all the killer ice and the existence of Hunter Seeker. But do whatever seems to make sense with you and your opponent.
That ability is probably fair if the campaign is close; for example, the corp gets
Choose whether your mandatory draw each turn is 0, 1, or 2 cards
at a similar point of progression, which is also pretty nuts. But if the campaign is even slighly imbalanced, then acquiring powers like that could make the next few games very one-sided, which sucks. At least the runner ability mentioned is something the corp can try to disable, though it might require a massive overhaul of their deck.
Part of the problem is that I'm 3 wins and 0 losses as the runner right now, and two of those wins were with my condition met to open the next pack, so I am quite well developed compared to my friend who still basically has their starting powers.
I love the idea of a netrunner legacy campaign but they could have definitely implemented some aspects better.
+1
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admanbunionize your workplaceSeattle, WARegistered Userregular
Part of the problem is that I'm 3 wins and 0 losses as the runner right now, and two of those wins were with my condition met to open the next pack, so I am quite well developed compared to my friend who still basically has their starting powers.
I love the idea of a netrunner legacy campaign but they could have definitely implemented some aspects better.
They went extremely win-more with the legacy design. Kinda feels like no one playtested it, which is sort of consistent with that period of Netrunner development.
Part of the problem is that I'm 3 wins and 0 losses as the runner right now, and two of those wins were with my condition met to open the next pack, so I am quite well developed compared to my friend who still basically has their starting powers.
I love the idea of a netrunner legacy campaign but they could have definitely implemented some aspects better.
yeah this is almost exactly what happened in my campaign except it was my friend playing corp who advanced his story state with every win he got
I actually didn't get to open my "lose 4 games" catchup pack til I lost the game lol
We essentially balanced TD ourselves and it became pretty fun. But it does require house-ruling some of the abilities on the basis of "Well, that's just nonsense," and building decks with a focus on whether they'll produce interesting games rather than whether they'll be the strongest. FFG definitely dropped the ball and put all of the responsibility onto the players.
The thing I most enjoyed about the campaign was the deckbuilding bluff and double bluff between games: I started off as murder-Weyland, switched to vegan for precisely as long as it took for my opponent to cotton on that that's what had happened (I think it took a couple of games), then went back to murder again when he tried to adapt to the vegan deck
From a balance point of view, winning games should lead to your opponents getting buffed so there is more chance they win the next game.
I think the big difference between TD and stuff like pandemic legacy or risk legacy is that the rewards and new cards etc belong to one player rather than the entire group. Risk by its nature shakes things up every time you play, and since most of the effects were either to the board or units in general, everyone got to share in the new fun or upgrades. Pandemic is a co-op, so you share all the new stuff and if something happens to one player everyone shares in the excitement or agony.
But TD just gives stuff to the winner, and eventually the loser (if you lose 4 games lol), which basically just snowballs like mad. It also means that you have to start the campaign with your A-game face on, because losing the first game could result in the campaign going downhill for you very quickly (as it did for me, when I built a goofy deck for the first game). So the winner gets more and more story and cool cards and the loser just gets... nothing.
I'm not sure that only giving stuff to the loser is the best option. Honestly I think the campaign would've been better if the story was completely unified, rather than two separate storylines. and the rewards could've been based on the story progressing, for both sides, rather than just based on pure rewards for one side doing one thing or the other.
TD was cool but I honestly think the entire campaign system wasn't very well thought out.
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ArcticLancerBest served chilled.Registered Userregular
No question, the right approach is to give both players something simultaneously, or at least have the ability to do so. The resource/agenda you each start with that does something if you win with it "scored" could have been something to mitigate losing (you still achieved something specific during your game, so have a thing!) instead of the primary thing to push the ... "story" forward. The campaign could have been chunked up a bit with both players racing to a certain milestone - A race to win 3 games, at which point both players open a new pack of cards and the 3-game winner gets an extra bonus/something, then you both have a new core objective for the next part of the arc. There could have been way more of an escalation in the powers coming out instead of how quickly these genuinely crazy fucking things hit the board (people have mentioned bringing your A-game to win, but you actually had to bring your A-game to play around those crazy restrictions [except not, apparently ... I dunno, no spoilers here]).
It's a mess. We all know it. Someone got the go-ahead or the command to produce it with way too little time or support (or they were just genuinely terrible at this kind of design). Maybe we'll get a better one down the road, though after this and the waning state of the game most places, I dunno how well it would do.
*shrug*
Even aside from the snowballing powers of the winner, it also seems problematic that it's so much easier to advance your storyline as the corp than as a runner. Scoring a 3/2 agenda is something that's going to happen incidentally on your way to victory as the corp. Getting a particular resource drawn and installed before stealing the last agenda as a runner isn't something that's necessarily going to happen. And the corp has options for burning the resource before it gets scored. So even if both players are winning similar number of games, the corp is likely to race ahead on campaign progress.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Part of the problem is that I'm 3 wins and 0 losses as the runner right now, and two of those wins were with my condition met to open the next pack, so I am quite well developed compared to my friend who still basically has their starting powers.
I love the idea of a netrunner legacy campaign but they could have definitely implemented some aspects better.
jakobaggerLO THY DREAD EMPIRE CHAOS IS RESTOREDRegistered Userregular
Terminal Directive is such a cool concept, I'm real bummed it sounds like they didn't do it justice.
Especially as someone doesn't quite have the energy for competitive Netrunner (and anyway I think the local scene has died a bit) it seemed like it would have been a nice way to have some evolving fun with a friend. Plus I love storytelling in games.
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I think if you're just playing in a pure core 2.0 meta or tournament, you don't worry about the restricted/banned list. Just build the decks and play. If someone wants to play in a regular tournament setting with only core cards, first, more power and luck to them, but second, they should be able to fill in gaps from restricted list cards by splashing from other factions. Like, literally from Core the Shaper player just has to decide if they want to play Aesop or MO, and decks weren't usually running both of those anyway.
There is a definite sense with FFG that the left hand doesn't really know what the right is doing. If this is real, why not announce the whole thing together with core 2.0? And if they do think, say, Magnum or Aesop are a bit over the curve, why not print an errata'd version of them in core 2.0, which would be the perfect opportunity to make changes to existing cards? There's an impression that no one has overall responsibility and so nothing is really joined-up.
All that said, I think I'd be pretty happy to see something like this happen. I never really felt MWL achieved the goal it wanted to (you dropped non-busted influence from your decks and kept playing the busted cards), and a banned/restricted list ought to get rid of degenerate decks much more effectively.
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
Unsettled metas are dreadful for me personally because I'm very much not a deck builder and need other people to figure out what's good, but this shake up is great for the game as a whole. Exciting times.
Also I'm really frustrated there's been yet another playtester leak.
I'm not looking forward to headbutting a bunch of brain damage. Runs feel binary. You either have the money to complete the run or you don't.
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
I would guess the team that does product announcements literally does not care about the team that does OP announcements.
Putting a deckbuilding price on Film Critic seems like a reasonable move, though. There are way too many threats that it disables.
There are three branches. OP, marketing, and development. Sometimes you can tell when they have squabbled.
a lot of their hate cards got rotated out or restricted, and generally poor runners means they can't effectively leverage those that are remaining (caldera, feedback filter)
Turntable still exists right?
Might be much worse in a world without Breaking News though.
What is the point of being alive if you don't at least try to do something remarkable? ~ Mario Novak
I never fear death or dyin', I only fear never trying.
Best one I've heard of was to pair up a runner and a corp together against another pair, you're after 11 combined agenda points (from stealing and scoring) and have a shared credit pool. There's a lot of silly ways you can game that, though, so no idea how practical it is!
Most of the time you're better of doing 1v1s and switching the pairs up.
Opus is restricted so it can't be played with inversificator, without defensive upgrades opus/inv/kit annihilates any deck that relies on ice.
This style of restricted list punishes combos not cards, if you wonder why a card is on there look for the other cards on the list it creates npe with.
Mopus/inv, pick one etc
I mean, to get something like that going credit-wise for the corp, they have to score a Government Takeover.
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
I hate that part
Ability spoilers for terminal directive:
This seems bonkers? Like, install bank job, run a remote server, get 8 credits and trash it, and put it back on top of my deck? Does it really fire when my cards trash themselves or only when the corp trashes my stuff?
It's bonkers!
With the people I played with, we house ruled it that whenever the *corp* trashes one of your cards it gets cycled to the top. Which makes sense with all the killer ice and the existence of Hunter Seeker. But do whatever seems to make sense with you and your opponent.
I love the idea of a netrunner legacy campaign but they could have definitely implemented some aspects better.
They went extremely win-more with the legacy design. Kinda feels like no one playtested it, which is sort of consistent with that period of Netrunner development.
A lot of people felt this way about Terminal Directive. I sympathize.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
yeah this is almost exactly what happened in my campaign except it was my friend playing corp who advanced his story state with every win he got
I actually didn't get to open my "lose 4 games" catchup pack til I lost the game lol
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
The thing I most enjoyed about the campaign was the deckbuilding bluff and double bluff between games: I started off as murder-Weyland, switched to vegan for precisely as long as it took for my opponent to cotton on that that's what had happened (I think it took a couple of games), then went back to murder again when he tried to adapt to the vegan deck
I think the big difference between TD and stuff like pandemic legacy or risk legacy is that the rewards and new cards etc belong to one player rather than the entire group. Risk by its nature shakes things up every time you play, and since most of the effects were either to the board or units in general, everyone got to share in the new fun or upgrades. Pandemic is a co-op, so you share all the new stuff and if something happens to one player everyone shares in the excitement or agony.
But TD just gives stuff to the winner, and eventually the loser (if you lose 4 games lol), which basically just snowballs like mad. It also means that you have to start the campaign with your A-game face on, because losing the first game could result in the campaign going downhill for you very quickly (as it did for me, when I built a goofy deck for the first game). So the winner gets more and more story and cool cards and the loser just gets... nothing.
I'm not sure that only giving stuff to the loser is the best option. Honestly I think the campaign would've been better if the story was completely unified, rather than two separate storylines. and the rewards could've been based on the story progressing, for both sides, rather than just based on pure rewards for one side doing one thing or the other.
TD was cool but I honestly think the entire campaign system wasn't very well thought out.
It's a mess. We all know it. Someone got the go-ahead or the command to produce it with way too little time or support (or they were just genuinely terrible at this kind of design). Maybe we'll get a better one down the road, though after this and the waning state of the game most places, I dunno how well it would do.
*shrug*
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
I haven't tried it, but https://www.reddit.com/r/Netrunner/comments/6hboxj/watchdog_an_unofficial_narrative_campaign_for/ looks pretty great.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Especially as someone doesn't quite have the energy for competitive Netrunner (and anyway I think the local scene has died a bit) it seemed like it would have been a nice way to have some evolving fun with a friend. Plus I love storytelling in games.
Interested in hearing what has been working for people in the ban list meta.