A Look Back at the Netrunner Core Set - Criminal

[@MaNU7908]

These videos are gold. 2020 and still revisiting them every now and then. RIP Netrunner

[@KrystianMajewski]

I really like the hypothetical cards you come up with. Especially some good thoughts on Gabe! - Gabe: One thing that I like about Gabe is that because his ability is so narrow, he is a really great runner for new players. He basically has a built-in tutorial. Sadly, I've never seen a lot of demo decks with him. - Ninja: I laughed out how you basically dropped it. One thing perhaps to add here is that it would be a good breaker for high-strength Sentries. But we never really got any of those. - Crash Space: I've been successfully using Crash Space instead of Plascrete. Generally, a lot of top-tier decks will often drop Plascrete because it's a deckspace hog. You can play around tag and bag by making enough money. So putting in economy instead of Plascrete is often more useful. Especially since Butcher Shop has so much meat damage, Plascrete often won't help anyway. In this context, I really like Crash Space as a good middle-ground. One Crash Space is almost as good at protecting against "SEA Source, 2x Scorch" as a Plascrete is. It's cheaper and if you play Account Siphon you can always get the economy out of it. The only downside is that you can't go tag-me, which was a popular style during the first two cycles. Looking forward to the next video!

[@Willingdone]

Krystian Majewski Gabe: Yeah, that's a nice thing about him, though I think Noise does that even better since the "tutorial" you're talking about includes deckbuilding with Noise :) Ninja: This Icebreaker makes me very sad, and I couldn't bring myself to deconstruct why it's not very good. Crash Space: The biggest problem I'm seeing with Crash Space currently is that most players are tagging with Midseason, not SEA Source. I agree with your comment about it being a decent middle ground against SEA + 2x Scorched.

[@KrystianMajewski]

Willingdone "most players are tagging with Midseasons": That's what I'm saying. Against Butcher Shop I'd rather have Crash Space. With that, Dataravens are no longer taxing and the Account Siphons (which I can expect to pull off) result in larger swings. So I have better chances to keep up the economy game. Once the Midseasons lands, I'm a dead runner anyway. The Plascretes would just give me an additional turn or two.

[@Willingdone]

Krystian Majewski Ah I see. I didn't think about Data Raven, but that alone seems worth it. Data Raven is such a big part of Butchershop's defense. Agreed that Plascrete isn't good enough vs Midseason to do much more than buy a couple turns. I'll have to play a bit with Crash Space over Plascrete. It's been a little while since I've had Crash Space in a deck.

[@PhuKhan]

The Special Order idea is great!

[@paulryanclark]

Removing the click requirement to Data Dealer could have made it similar to Stimhack for Anarch. It would allow the player to potentially have access to 9 credits if they have an agenda to sacrifice. Potentially cool ramifications.

[@Willingdone]

Paul Clark It would certainly make us think about Data Dealer a lot more. As it is, unless you have some gimmick, it's a useless card.

[@DefiasBrotherhood]

Also wanted to comment on what you mentioned about the design of the core set. As someone who has tried out most of FFG’s LCG’s, I think this is hands down the best experience you will get out of a single core set for a LCG. I haven’t tried Warhammer Conquest or Cthulhu, but with games like LOTR you HAVE to invest in more. It’s definitely not a complete game with just a single core set. In spite of the undercosted Anarch influence cards, it doesn’t break the game. This is a rewarding experience straight out of the box. Just my two cents for whatever that’s worth!

[@Willingdone]

Seth Dortch I haven't played all of the FFG LCG's, but I do have a lot of experience with card games. I totally agree that the Netrunner Core Set is a fantastic card pool. You get a lot of value just with that single box. We hear a lot of whining about the 1-of's and 2-of's in the Core Set, but we don't hear enough about how good the card pool is. While I've been critical of a lot of things in these videos - especially the Anarch breakers - these opinions are from the perspective of someone who's played the game a ton, owns all the stuff, and wants these changes for the purposes of the tournament scene. For someone thinking about getting into Netrunner in 2015, the Core Set is a great deal. It accurately represents all the factions and gives you a lot of the game's best cards for about $30. There's a lot of fun to be had with just the Core Set.

[@stephenmills4392]

Hi, first as a new player I find your videos really helpful and I'm slowly making my way through them. I'm watching your review of the core box at the moment and one thing where I get a little lost is when you are referencing other cards from outside the core box. This is because you suggest there are now better cards available but if I wanted to get them I don't know which packs to buy. I guess this might have added too much information to include in your videos but would have been very helpful to new players.

[@Willingdone]

Keep in mind that my Core Set Retrospective is from the perspective of someone who has played the game extensively. I definitely intend the series for experienced players. That's why I suggest changes to the cards and bring up a lot of history. If I had included the information you suggest, the series would've been much, much longer. Sacrifices were made and since the target audience of the series is experienced players, new player stuff had to go. I'd recommend my Archetype Overview series that I just started for Data Pack recommendations. I include that sort of information at the end of the videos.

[@stephenmills4392]

Thanks I'll take a look, your videos are really interesting and make me want to delve into AN

[@DefiasBrotherhood]

Excellent video. As usual! I agree that people went overboard in condemning Account Siphon. Yes it’s strong. But not broken. The only card I think the corp really had in the core set to combat it was Beanstalk Royalties. One click for three credits is pretty helpful in recovery from the Siphon. Not to wax poetic on Account Siphon, but to me it actually feels like more of an Anarch card. Yes flavor wise it fits Criminal’s stealing credits. But the two tags? Seems more risk/reward/Anarch to me. Oh well, like I said, great video!

[@thrazznos1]

Seth Dortch What if Account Siphon was steal 3 creds from the corp, gain 6, and take 1 tag?

[@DefiasBrotherhood]

thrazznos1 It would be less powerful obviously.

[@Willingdone]

Seth Dortch Agreed about the Siphon condemning. I don't think people were wrong about Siphon being too good at the time, but most wanted to blame it and not think about the context of the rest of the card pool. Siphon is a perfect example of a card that the designers adjusted the card pool to correct. More options with early game ICE, more tag punishment, and dedicated solutions have pretty successfully nerfed Siphon while expanding the overall breadth of the "playable" card pool. The early card pool had such limited options for defense that the impact of errors like the Anarch Icebreakers was much greater, and Corps have gotten much better against Siphon now that there are a larger variety of ICE to choose from. I could see Siphon being an Anarch card. Maybe Vamp and Siphon should switch factions?

[@Marinealver]

I don't think you can forfeit an asset or card in place of an agenda in score area. However with cards like HB domestic sleepers It allows you to make use of a 0 point agenda,

[@KoenigNord]

Pre-Thanks Willingdone! Your videos mean a lot to me :)

[@Willingdone]

KoenigNord Aww shucks! Thanks for the kind words!

[@Eggers2007]

Another great video, thanks

[@Willingdone]

Eggers2007 Thanks for watching!

[@Quincy_Morris]

New player here. Real helpful vid. Sounds like I should run a criminal deck and import the anarch rig. Though that will be tricky with the Most Wanted List.

[@CRAZY6256]

You get everything (almost) if you get 2 core sets

[@dizasterdoes8663]

I can't believe how much you can talk about one card. You obviously know a lot about this game. It makes me very intimidated to get into it. If I go to the game store and end up playing against someone like you there is no hope.

[@Willingdone]

+Dizaster Kid Haha! Don't be intimidated! We were all beginners once. There's a lot of stuff going on with Netrunner, but you don't have to learn it all at once. I'd recommend going to local game store and playing a few games. I'm sure if you tell your opponents that you're learning the game, they'll help you a ton. Keep in mind that this video is looking back at the original release from the perspective of someone who has played a ton of games. While there's probably some good information for new players in these videos, this series is mainly targeted at players who are familiar with the tournament scene. That's why I spend so much time on Account Siphon. It was a huge deal in the early tournaments. I hope you enjoy Netrunner! It's a great game!

[@magikot]

+Dizaster Kid Definitely don't be intimidated! There are several play groups all over the world that are always willing to teach and welcome new players. The learning of the cards to the level that Willingdone knows them will come in time. I went to my first store championship after playing the game for only a month and it was one of the most fun I've ever had playing a competitive card game. Telling people that I'm new and it was my first tournament, they were willing to point out when I missed a trigger and would let me go back and take it, such as Desperado giving you the 1 credit before accessing a card. I didn't have enough money to trash the Pad Campaign before hand, but when my opponent said, "Don't forget that you get a credit," it gave me enough to trash it. I have never been to a Magic tournament or any other card game where people were that willing to play competitively while still teaching a new player the rules of the game.

[@funkzentrale]

Honestly, I think the numbers on aurora are just wrong, same with ninja. I would like to see these as meta options,but there is just no situation where these breakers are better.

[@Willingdone]

***** There's an argument to be made that most of the Icebreakers have bad numeration, though some of them like the Anarch suite are too good rather than too bad as a result. It sucks that Aurora and Ninja never see much play, but I'd rather have cards be underpowered than overpowered. Fortunately, this game hasn't had a whole lot of trouble with that. It seems to me that ICE have far more metagame options than Icebreakers. The most used Icebreakers are so good at what they do that there isn't really a reason to play metagame choices. That isn't the case with ICE, so sometimes we play, for example, a variety of strength in our end the run barriers so that we don't get beat as easily by Atman.