In the “So you wanna…” series we introduce each of the major and minor factions that you can play in Netrunner. These articles survey common themes, flavor, mechanics, and strategies that these factions employ, as well as a brief overview of key cards in the faction. “So you wanna…” will help you find the right faction to play and prepare you to compete against every faction in the game!

Meet the Criminals

Greetings, aspiring Netrunner! Today we will be discussing the Criminal faction on the Runner side. Criminal is one of three core Runner factions. Their cards are bright blue and feature identities such as Andromeda and Gabriel Santiago. Criminals do it for the money, and they aren’t afraid to use their rich assortment of underground connections to get the job done. If that risks getting their hands a bit dirty, well… a proper Criminal will make the run if the money’s good enough. Their strongest icebreakers are the Sentry Killers. The Criminal central server of choice is HQ. Common Criminal themes and mechanics include get-rich-quick burst economy, and high-impact run events, which brings us to some of their signature cards…

Signature Cards

Make a run on HQ. If successful, instead of accessing cards you may force the Corp to lose up to 5 [credits], then you gain 2 [credits] for each credit lost and take 2 tags.

Account Siphon is Criminal’s most iconic card, one of the most-feared Run Events in the game by corporations everywhere, and an automatic 3-of in every competitive Criminal deck (despite the Core set only containing 2 copies). In one single high-impact run, this card swings the money count in the Runner’s favor by a whopping fifteen credits.

To offset the obviously insane power level of this card, the Runner must take 2 tags, meaning that unless the Runner saves a couple of clicks to de-tag, the Corporation may come knocking in… explosive fashion.

Account Siphon is so strong that other factions will occasionally influence this card into their decks, but the cost both in the form of tags and the influence required mean that only specialized non-Criminal decks play this card. But if the ID is blue, it’s a sure gamble that 3x Account Siphon is true.

Make a run. Bypass the first piece of ice encountered during this run.

You thought your server was safe behind that big Tollbooth? Think again! No single-ICE server is safe from a Criminal thanks to this card.

While this card loses part of its insane value later in the game when a wise Corp sticks a single zero-cost ICE in front of a server to mitigate the threat of Inside Job, this card is one of the most valuable anti-rush tools in the Criminal’s arsenal.

+1 [Memory Unit]

Gain 1 [credit] whenever you make a successful run.

Limit 1 console per player.

What if you could turn every run into an extra credit? What if you could make your Account Siphons even more profitable? With Desperado, you can!

Along with Account Siphon, you’re almost guaranteed to see 3 of these Consoles in every Criminal deck. Criminal, as the faction that receives the most “make a run” and “whenever you make a successful run” events and effects, largely bases their economy on making high-impact runs, often at a profit.

Desperado is so powerful that the official tournament rules mandate that each copy of it reduces any Runner’s influence total by 1, a ruling known as the “NAPD’s Most Wanted List.”

The Mind of the Criminal

Criminal is all about an aggressive start. Their ability to take a single credit and multiply it many times through high-impact runs, punish weakly defended servers, and come out the gates swinging with Account Siphon and Inside Job means it’s hard for even a prepared Corp player to defend centrals at the same time as advancing a remote server strategy.

All of this aggression makes Criminal a highly effective anti-rush faction. In addition, Criminal has some of the strongest Sentry breakers in the game, meaning low-strength or lone Sentries do relatively little against a Criminal who has installed a Faerie and a Mongoose.

However, Criminal struggles with a less powerful late-game. Once a Corp has ICEd up servers enough that a single run is taxing enough, run events and the Criminal strategy of profiting off successful runs becomes much less powerful.

Criminal breakers are often tuned to specific servers or one-time use, and this makes reliably and continually making runs more difficult for Criminals without proper out-of-faction breaker support.

In addition, Criminal rarely can afford to influence any cards that interact with the heap, meaning when a Criminal card is trashed, it usually stays that way.

A strong Criminal player must learn to maximize any single, small flaw in the Corp’s defenses, and try to snipe early agendas or successfully make it impossible for the Corp to advance any agendas later with Account Siphon-lock. Those who do master the art of breaking and entering with the Criminal faction, however, will make off like bandits.

Playing Against Criminal

Rule #0: Ice HQ turn 1.

A turn 1 Account Siphon is brutally difficult to bounce back from, unless your starting hand contains three Hedge Funds. Even then, the free money for the Criminal is nothing to be sneezed at.

In general, the next 2-3 pieces of ICE should go to protecting central servers sufficiently before remotes. Once your centrals are safe from early aggression, only then can you hope to successfully advance agendas or make other strong remote plays. Even then, your remotes aren’t safe from an Inside Job until you’ve sufficiently battened down the hatches.

Rule #1: Don’t leave any servers naked longer than you need to.

Unless your plan is to spam the Runner with assets so fast that he or she cannot keep up with trashing them fast enough (you’ll usually know if the Corp deck asset-to-ICE ratio is something like 2 or 3 to 1), naked servers of any kind are huge sources of profit to a Criminal, due to cards such as Temüjin Contract.

Choose a server and place 20 [credits] from the bank on Temüjin Contract when you install it. When there are no credits left on Temüjin Contract, trash it.

Whenever you make a successful run on the chosen server, take 4 [credits] from Temüjin Contract.

Temüjin Contract is the most powerful Criminal resource, and successfully defending against it is vital for all Corps. In addition to being very powerful, Temüjin Contract is easy enough on the influence that seeing 2-3 in any Runner faction is viable, so don’t be caught unawares.

The general strategy is to hit Criminal where it hurts hardest: stacking strong, taxing ICE to prevent profitable runs, and attempting to trash their cards since they have the hardest time retrieving cards from the heap. If your strategy involves rushing and relatively little ICE, you have to build your servers and time scoring right so that you can get by on (most likely) a credit disadvantage. If you can slow a Criminal down enough to the point where running is inefficient or impossible, or implement a strategy where credit count is no object to stopping your plans, you can successfully score your agendas and defend your precious assets.

Is Criminal Right For Me?

Do you like running in your Netrunner? Would you rather act now with a bit of risk and a potentially high reward, rather than slowly build up a board state that lowers your risk and potential reward later? Want cheap, in-faction economy and answer to common Sentries? Does getting your hands dirty and going a little underground for help appeal to you? If you answered yes to any or all of these, you might be a Criminal!

If you’re looking for a strong deck that is competitive and legal to play as of the Flashpoint cycle, check out Criminally Minded by basic.channel and get a taste of running with the Criminals.

We hope you enjoyed this introductory article on the Criminal faction. Here at Levy University, your educational satisfaction is guaranteed, or your credits back!