by tonksey
Introduction
Firstly, let me make it absolutely clear that when CCG’s first started flooding out in the 90’s I never got involved in them; not even M:TG, although I had heard of it at the time. I was still at school & just going onto University. Even once I finished & began earning a steady income, I still not get involved due to hearing of the gigantic amounts of money some people were spending on CCG’s. I simply refused the lure. So the golden age of CCG’s passed me by happily.
Once we began to see Race For The Galaxy & Dominion (plus the expansions) published, I fell in love with those as each new set came out; seeing as I earn more now than I did as a fresh-face graduate & being more involved with the gaming hobby, my mind occasionally drifted back to temptation in CCG’s. Cue Fantasy Flight’s LCG format – I am really enjoying Warhammer:Invasion & I also like Call Of Cthulhu to a lesser degree. This pretty much ended any lingering interest I may have had in dipping my toes in CCG’s.
Until a regular gaming buddy of mine who used to play several CCG’s a lot in their heyday started mentioning Netrunner. I didn’t see any harm in giving it a go & so borrowed a starter set. I have since played it 2 or 3 times, both times switching sides.
Components & theme
Unsurprisingly, 99% of the components are cards. These could be bought in 60-card starter packs & 15-card boosters, but unfortunately Netrunner is now OOP so the only way of getting these are either buying off someone else who already has the cards and/or via specialist sellers. You also need beads or some kind of tokens to track various things happening via the cards & perhaps a couple of die.
I’ll be honest here; when I first looked at the artwork, my first thought was ‘These sure are ugly cards!’ & from that point on prior to playing, my expectations dropped dramatically. For some reason, I didn’t like the majority of the illustrations – particularly the 3D rendered graphics – at first, but they seem to have grown on me & I realise they really do add to the theme of a futuristic, seedy world of hackers & large corporations doing their damned best to keep the hackers out of their data. You only have to go to the gallery on BGG just to see some examples.
A bit of trivial opinion – I particularly like the artwork on Japanese Water Torture
anyone else got any particular favourites?Rules & game-play
There are 9 types of cards; the Corporation player will use Agendas, Operations, Ice, Upgrades & Nodes. The Runner player will use Programs, Resources, Hardware & Prep.
I won’t go into the full rules, but the aim for both players is to score Agendas; usually 7 points of Agendas will win you the game, plus a bonus 10 for the win. Then both players switch sides for another game & an aggregate score is made to determine the overall winner. Both players begin with 5 cards & 5 bits (money).
Game-play is very simple; the Corporation player always begins the game & his turns begin by drawing a card from his stack (also known as R&D) before taking 3 actions. These can involve drawing a card, taking a bit, installing a card face-down on or in one of their data forts (on – Ice, in – Nodes, Upgrades & Agendas), adding an activation marker to a card installed inside a data fort or using an action on a card they have in play (usually activated Agendas/Nodes or Operations). By installing Ice in various places such as Archives (trash piles), HQ (the Corp’s hand), R&D (the Corp’s stack) & other subsidiary data forts, the Corp can place defences against the Runner attempting to break into their systems to find Agendas in any of those 4 locations to score (know as a Run) as each Agenda has a certain number of points on the card. Ice cards have a strength that the Runner need to match/equal to pass & may also have subroutine to be bypassed before the Runner can move onto the next piece of Ice. If no Ice remains to be bypassed in the data fort, the Runner has succeeded & gets any Agendas from the card(s) he is allowed to reveal. Generally, Operations, Upgrades & Nodes all serve to give the Corp more bits, cards & other benefits such as doing damage in some form to the Runner.
On the Runner’s turn, he does not get a card to draw but instead gets 4 actions. These include; taking a bit or a card, using a card’s action (Resource, Prep, Hardware) or making a run. Runs are perhaps the most crucial element of the game; this is where the Runner nominates one of the Corp’s data forts to attempt accessing to potentially getting an Agenda – or several in some cases! If the first Ice in that data fort is face-down, it gets revealed to show what kind of Ice it is; such as Wall, Code Gate, Sentry or a more obscure type like AP & Hellhound. If it’s face-up, it just means either it has been revealed by an action or a previous run. Usually the Corp will try to ‘rezz’ (pay the cost to activate it) the Ice so as to force the Runner to have to bypass & beat it. The Runner should have several programs at his disposal with various strengths to beat the Ice & abilities to bypass the subrountines. Usually, this will involve the Runner paying bits to do so.
The Runner may also have other type of programs in play that do not enable him to break Ice, but they do other useful stuff such as revealing the first piece of Ice. The Runner is limited to 4 MIU for these programs (most of them are 1 MIU, some are 2 MIU) but there are certain Hardware cards that allows you to increase your MIU capacity & thus install more programs. Prep cards are like the equivalence of the Corporation’s Operations cards & involve mostly a one-off benefit before the card is discarded.
There are other little rules involved such as certain cards that use special tokens & also damage that can be inflicted on the Runner by certain Ice cards, but these have not really come up enough for me to feel confident of commenting on them, so I will leave these out for now.
Impressions
In case you haven’t already guessed, I absolutely love Netrunner already & am hooked. There are a ton of strategies that derive from the cards can be pursued by both players; some of them will be quite specific & others quite general. There is so much interaction going on as the Corp does everything he can to prevent the Runner gaining access to any Agendas & the Runner trying to do so. Despite so much complexity, the game is very simple to play & this is where the beauty of the cards lies. The rules are also very clear in aspect.
I bought a barely-used start set from someone else in my weekly group & was also lucky enough to get the chance to buy a massive set from an old Netrunner player in the UK. This means I pretty much have more than I need to play Netrunner on a regular basis. In some ways, Netrunner being OOP is both a blessing & a curse with anyone trying to buy the cards; it’s a blessing because it’s no longer being produced so there are no more cards being produced (unlike Magic) so you don’t have the same feeling of having to keep up. If you’re unlucky, buying starter sets & other cards could be hard to find & expensive at the same time.
In summary:-
A fantastic game from the same designer of M:TG & one that I’m glad to have given a chance. Even though it’s over 10 years since Netrunner first came out, it beats the living daylights out of many of today’s best games!
An easy 9 out of 10 in my book – who needs M:TG, huh?!
Pros
Amazing game-play with tonnes of interaction
Completely assymetrical feel due to the different aims, cards & actions of both sides
Complex game, yet very streamlined to play
Some very nice artwork
Cons
OOP & hard to find so could be expensive
Perhaps a lack of players still involved or would be willing to play
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