Install Parasite only on an active Netrunner player. Host player has −1 enjoyment for each troll counter on Parasite and is trashed if its enjoyment is 0 or less. At the beginning of each game, place 1 troll counter on Parasite.

Two weeks ago I walked into my friendly local game store with a deck box, a playmat, some Team Covenant tokens, and a stomach full of butterflies.

For three weeks I prepared for this Saturday afternoon–a blur of practice games, careful consideration of deck archetypes, and hours of articles and forum posts on strategy, mindset, and execution. After checking in with the tournament organizer I spent a few minutes thumbing through my decks and collecting myself ahead of only the second tournament of my nascent Netrunner career.

I then spent the next four, nervous hours losing game, after game, after game–none of which were particularly close.

And I can’t wait to do it again.

Looking back through text messages to my wife, there was never a point during my 9-loss streak (I won the last game!) that my convivial mood diminished. Even as defeats mounted and I slipped further and further away from a playmat, I continued to describe the experience as “fun” and “rewarding.”

The reason for that, in retrospect, is obvious. As the Astro Train ran over my ill-equipped Reina Roja deck, my opponents extended friendly invitations to Thursday-night Netrunner at another local game shop. As Noise carved up my FoodCoats deck, my adversaries commiserated with words of encouragement and stories of equally painful ass kickings.

My opponents weren’t roadblocks to some abstract glory, but living, breathing, smiling human beings who love Netrunner as much as I do.

As I type this, I’m certain that I’m not alone in this experience–that thousands of Runners and Corps have felt the same way I did, whether by the fluorescent lights of a comic book store or the dim lights of a pub. It’s the human connection that makes tabletop gaming in general–not just Netrunner–a rewarding and enriching pastime.

In an ideal world, this kind of feel-goodery would cross all barriers, code gates, and sentries. Unfortunately, as our small but passionate community continues to grow, we’ve discovered the one place where the camaraderie of our favorite card game does not translate: the Internet.

Lately it seems that the gathering places of online Netrunner fans are filling with stories all-too-familiar to online gaming. Our current favorite platform for playing Netrunner, Jinteki.net, is apparently not immune to the jerks, assholes, and rage-mongers that fans of Dota 2 and Counter-Strike will recognize in an instant. Lately, nary a week has passed without some screen-captured exchange of words over rules, etiquette, and the apparently emasculating act of deploying someone else’s deck.

Jinteki.net is a great tool. It exists because of a mutual desire to 1) share our game with others and 2) play as much Netrunner as humanly possible. But the environment is intrinsically different from the table-side gatherings we’re used to. Believe it or not, 12 Medium counters and an Archives full of agendas looks very different on the computer monitor than it does on the gnarled wood of a beer-soaked bar table surrounded by friends.

John Gabriel’s Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory states that a human being, when given an audience and complete anonymity will occasionally turn into a “total fuckwad.” As we’re all quickly learning, three stolen agendas is a pretty effective catalyst for the human-to-fuckwad transformation. And while we worry that this pattern of Internet anger is indicative of a larger transformation in the milieu of our community, it only takes a couple games at the local game night to realize that actual Netrunner–played on tables with people–is as engaging and rewarding as it has ever been.

The key to playing on Jinteki.net (or playing any other online game for that matter) is remembering that the Internet is a megaphone for the worst of our human predilections–not always, but often. Tomorrow, the sun will rise, flowers will bloom, and someone on Jnet will rage quit when their swanky new jank loses to the Astro Train, again.

Rage quits and name-calling may not be standard Netrunner behavior, but they ultimately do little to detract from the game we know and love. Even in their own twisted way, rage quits are just further proof that our cozy community has a game worth caring about.