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A problem in many of the (collectable/trading) card games is that there is a collective refinement of the various deck builds. Cards entering the pool are quickly evaluated and the results are rapidly communicated across the community through game-devoted forums, or articles on the web from game aficionados. Deck designs are disseminated throughout the community and are analysed, tested, and refined by multiple minds, eliminating weaknesses and moving towards an optimal design.

A classic example might be Turbo-honour in Legend of the Five Rings, where “turbo” simply means fast. Such a deck type is designed to so rapidly accumulate honour in the game that it speeds to the victory without permitting the opponent to assemble sufficient resources in time to counter it. Another especially problematic deck type is often branded “robo”, where the robotic deck performs to its optimal design with little recourse for the player to do more than mechanistically perform the manual functions of the game. In this sense, the player is being played by the deck and player skill, if any, rests solely within the deck design. When that deck is lifted from the net, then there is little skill involved at all, much to the annoyance of its opponents.

This is a result of the (unanticipated at the outset) rise of the internet as the hobby has expanded. Richard Garfield originally envisaged a small community where players might never have encountered specific cards, until someone travelled from one region to another and met with a new play group. Certainly the wild popularity of magic reshaped this envisaged future drastically and the connectedness of the player base was equally unforeseen. The elimination of lag in the proliferation of knowledge of the various deck designs leads to a couple of effects. When a new and potent deck design is discovered, it is either subject to high levels of secrecy – to maximise the (surprise) advantage of the designer (or team thereof) in professional or semi-professional competition – or they quickly become known throughout the player base and hence become ubiquitously environment-deforming.

The objections to such proliferation are that it reduces variety, and or removes much of the fun of the game – some game communities dub this a Negative Player Experience (NPE). Other responses come from the card game publisher or rules team (should they be distinct organisations), in either the production of “silver bullet” counter-cards designed to counteract the degenerate decks, which necessitate their inclusion into non-degenerate decks (forcing a “join ‘em or beat ‘em” dichotomy), or to instantiate a card elimination policy in either banning or restriction of key elements to the degenerate decks.

Are There Weaker or Stronger Netrunner Decks?

It is certainly possible to choose to build weaker Netrunner decks – choosing to include less than optimal breakers over better performers, or not including accelerated “credit-gainers” (cards that generate credits faster than the standard one per action). Extending this idea, some decks will employ cards that work synergistically with one another (e.g. Wyrm or Datasucker in conjunction with Parasite, or more simplistically, Djinn with any non-breaker Virus), whereas a deck including only one of these cards in either combination are perforce weaker than one including both.

The ready recognition of the synergy of multiple cards in the card gaming hobby is why the term “combo” is used almost universally across the hobby community base. Cards that combine or work better in conjunction with one another are naturally sought after in seeking an optimal deck design. Simplistically speaking, decks that have one or more combinations within them will be stronger than those without. The more synergies that can be devised between the cards the better the deck, up to a certain point. Beyond some ineffable point attempting to include too many combos in a deck will cause the synergies to break down and the deck to be dysfunctional. Including sufficient, but not excessive combinations in a deck is one key to the strength of a deck.

Another factor is the actual, individual cards themselves. In a card game with a sufficiently developed and expansive pool of cards available for deck building there will inevitably be cards that are stronger at a particular function than others. The original Netrunner never developed to this stage, although even at the outset with the large pool of cards available there were e.g., sentry breakers that were distinctly better than others and certainly these were more favoured in the deck builds that became popular. Had the game lasted another couple of years and several more expansions we may have seen this become a more marked phenomenon. The ever increasing strength of cards – due to the designer’s / publisher’s self-interested desire to have the player base want to invest in the new cards – is one reason why the more popular and long-lived card games generally have a cycle or arc during which cards are legal for play and then rotate out of legality (cf. the aforementioned policy option in the previous section).

Currently Android: Netrunner is perhaps too immature a game to really show much distinction between cards that perform a function. Certainly there are few, if any, cards that are being described as “broken”, and only certain decks that favour cards of one function over another tend to be driven by Influence deck-building constraints rather than any identified over-powered functionality that cannot be foregone without severely hindering the relative performance of the deck. As such, strength in A:NR decks right now should be more a factor of the synergies in the deck-building rather than of the specific card choices.

Are there Weaker or Stronger Netrunner Players?

Players, too, can be weaker or stronger. Player strengths can include the ability to count cards (a valuable skill inside and outside of the trading card games environment), the ability to read the environment, or the ability to predict and prepare for the opposition in a competitive environment. The latter two deserve more attention.

Reading the environment occurs comes in two modes: reading the broader card environment, and reading the local playing environment. The former case is easily explained; it is the ability to analyse the entire legal card pool to be able to identify the stronger cards (cf. the discussion above). This could be instinctually done, or through careful analysis of pairs of cards to ascertain the one which is generally stronger. Rarely would one card of a pair doing similar things stand out as stronger in every circumstance, unless the designers have completely failed in their work; e.g. in comparing Infiltration vs. Easy Mark, while the latter is clearly superior in its credit-gaining ability, it lacks the flexibility to expose cards that the former has.

Reading a local playing environment is also bi-modal in that it involves both being able to recognise a local mass perception and individual biases. Mass perception is a community consideration, e.g. that Weyland is a stronger Corporation deck type than Jinteki and hence is more likely to see play in a tournament (where the presumed bias will be towards stronger decks being played). An individual bias instead is a personal consideration, e.g. that George is a die-hard NBN player and hence in any event where you have a chance of meeting George (a four-man round robin, or a sixty man event which George and you expect to meet in the finals) you had best be prepared for a deck that employs at least a portion of the NBN capability.

The ability to read the local mass perception, which leads to the aforementioned ability to predict and prepare to counter opposition decks in a competitive environment, is sometimes described as reading the metagame. The term metagaming in card games is far more meritorious than the same term (in a different sense) in roleplaying games. Being able to correctly predict the metagame, such as the above example of Weyland being stronger than Jinteki, allows a player to prepare to face off against the various victories that Weyland decks employ: a high link value serves to make the attempts to trace the Runner harder, thus making the deck’s “tag’n’bag” (Scorched Earth) victory condition harder to pull off. In small environments the metagame can be not only predicted, but also influenced, by demonstrating the power of the deck to the community and hence leading them to seek to build a similarly efficacious deck (or simply lending such a deck in the event).

Another pair of skills that come to the fore uniquely in Netrunner are the ability to bluff one’s opponent and the ability to read the opponent . So much of the game depends on hidden information: e.g. is that agenda, or an ambush that the Corp just installed. A common misapprehension is that the Runner has no room for bluffing in NR, but this is not the case; hiding the true capability of the Runner’s ability to make a run can bluff the Corp into making a mistake by installing “safe” agenda, only to have it stolen by a daring play of a Stimhack that the Corp never saw coming. Given that both players are going to be attempting to deceive their opponent, the one who is best able to see through the bluffing, to spot the opponent’s “tell” will have an advantage. This opens up a meta-level of play in the game, which occurs between the two players over the simple manipulation of cards and tokens: attempting to read when the foe is vulnerable, and further attempting to confound the attempt to make such a reading. This moves Netrunner away from the general card game most of us hobbyists are familiar with and makes it more akin to Poker.

Lastly in a tense competitive situation a player who has the skills to remain calm and unaffected by the tension has a better chance of victory than one who cracks under the pressure and makes a mistake in game play. The calm player can remain analytic and think about the future moves of the opponent, calculate costs and effects and sequences of play without error, and simply not make mistakes due to nervousness – misplaying a card and revealing information, or badly misplaying and being forced to forfeit the game or match. The usual tool to overcome this situation, evinced by many successful players in higher levels of competition, is to play your deck to the degree of familiarity such that the piloting of the deck becomes second nature. What they are in fact alluding to is that the play of the deck is internalised to the degree that it ceases to be a function of the “right” brain – slow, rational and analytic, but instead a function of the “left” brain – instinctual, emotive and rapid.

The more of these skills that a player has, the stronger they are in playing these types of games. I cannot count cards in a standard deck, however I try to be cognisant of the number of cards an opponent has played of specific title. Having identified and located two Archer’s in a non-Weyland deck, I think reduces the chances that I will encounter a third due to the additional rez cost and influence limits. I am less skilled, however, at reading the facial reactions and other “tells” of my opponent than, say, Emma and as such she is a stronger Netrunner player than I am on that basis. Which of us is stronger overall depends upon who can (best) realise the most of the aforementioned (non-exhaustive list of) requisite skills.

Robo-decks Do Not Require a Strong Player

Many (trading) card games suffer from the fact that in the instance of an optimal deck design, there is little requirement for actual player ability to play to the full strength of the deck. Many (many!) years ago in Magic: the Gathering (MtG), red-green weenie/speed decks were indomitable, being unmatched in their ability to produce significant quantities of mana (ably supported by the R-G dual land) and surprisingly fast (i.e. cheap), moderately effective creatures which quickly swarmed the opponent and killed them in a few turns of play. In Legend of the Five Rings (L5R), again early in that game’s history, turbo-honour decks would likewise quickly build towards the victory condition with little an opponent could do to disrupt the steady advance towards its success.

Such “robotic” decks do not reward player skill but only deck design; sometimes governed only by the availability of certain rare cards that constrained the ability to legitimately (vs. proxy-build) the degenerate deck in local environments. The general community despite regarding net-decking for anything other than educational or experimental purposes does not usually militate against their proliferation. It is not uncommon to hear second-hand about the efficacy of a deck design (by title or concept description) and then be able to seek it out and find the deck list on a fan site somewhere. Even in the instance that the actual deck listing is not available, there may be enough of a general understanding of how the deck is supposed to function that asking the right question on a fan-based forum will get an explanation or quick overview enough to set about building a close replica of the degenerate deck.

Android: Netrunner is Different (and How)

More than any other constructible card game in my experience, Netrunner allows a good player with a moderate or passable deck, or a great player with a decidedly weak deck, to perform well. Unlike many card games that are subject to robo-decks, in Netrunner a player plays their deck and not the other way around.

As anecdotal evidence of this – in the old form of the game I ran a significant number of events, some of these would regularly reach upward of twenty participants. I saw some decidedly “weak” decks do very well in these – in the right hands. E.g.in the top 2 final of one event I saw a runner deck being narrowly defeated (finally) which completely lacked a key breaker (for code gates, as I recall), and not because it had other ways around code gates or that they were being ignored by all the Corporate players and not being played. I have seen Iceless Corporation decks come out of six round Swiss draw events with better than 50% win records. Naturally some of this observation is subject to dismissal due to the much greater (at this stage) card pool than the extant state of Android: Netrunner.

Further evidence to support this view is opinion based. Advocates and commentators on Netrunner in the past (such as Frisco, Byron Massey, et al.) would all attest to O:NR being more akin to chess than to, say, Magic (or other contemporary CCGs at the time). The chess comparison is a different matter from Netrunner’s distinction from other card games; like chess, it is a comparatively simple game to learn to play, with a very deep level of strategy that comes with learning to play well. The ability to discern the opponent’s play style, intended victory condition, etc., while likewise masking one’s own (either as Corp or Runner) was more of import than the actual cards in your deck. Claims of this sort are more often made as the complexity of the game increases. Thus while it may be rarely made on the part of a Wyvern or Dragonball Z deck, L5R advocates can and do claim that a good player with a bad deck should beat a bad player with a great deck. To qualify this, a “bad” player is not a complete novice who doesn’t know the rules and cannot play the game competently, but one who is familiar enough with the game to make correct decisions about when to advance through a turn sequence (when these are back and forth trades of opportunity), without mistaking one phase for another, etc.

Setting aside the consideration that such claims will be made on behalf of a game based on partisanship and love of the chosen game, there can be some validity to the claim. Higher complexity in the game design and play means that the learning curve to achieve proficiency is steeper for the more complex games, and results in a greater sense of fulfilment when proficiency is achieved. This fulfilment results in a brand loyalty derived from the pride one feels in being able to play the more challenging game well.

To expand on this point more, a more complex game means that there is more difficulty in: (i) managing and internalising complex play sequences, (ii) comprehending the function and role of numerous keywords and card types, (iii) understanding complex card interactions, (iv) grasping sometimes arcane timing sequences, (v) memorising complicated rulings from the game’s ruling arbiters, and (vi) understanding and balancing the resource development phase against the advancement of a win condition phase, e.g. when to draw cards/gain credits/play lands/buy more attackers/build or develop units vs. when to make a run/install or advance agenda/declare an attack run/cast a spell/block or defend an attack.

Games that have a specific defined turn sequence have less validity in the claim than a game like Netrunner with its uniquely self-determined play sequence. Netrunner eschews a regimented draw/build/attack/discard-style turn sequence in favour of an allotment of actions in a turn which may be expended in any order – and which have considerably distinct consequences when executed in different orders – upon a number of optional action choices. Furthermore, games of sufficient complexity such as Go move through distinct phases throughout the course of a game, and understanding and learning to read when these phases are imminent/extant is critical to good play. Learning when to switch from a strategic to tactical level of play in Go or Chess is important, as is learning to anticipate when an opponent is likely to do so (or has done). Netrunner games have three distinct phases and the approach to playing either side is, to a degree, dictated by recognising what phase the game is in. At a more advanced level of play, the game can become one of controlling the transition between phases as best you are able, to maximally exploit the strength of your side in the phases where it is strongest.

Mechanically too, the very design of the Netrunner game means that skill at play and at reading the game is of prime importance. Rarely might one say that a game of Magic (or other) is decided on a bluff; most of the information relevant to the game is in plain sight on the table, making it easy to determine what might be attacking and what might be in reserve to defend later against your own attack. As such it comes down to an analysis of the numbers on the board and a brute force solution of overpowering the opponent’s defences.

By the very nature of its asymmetric gameplay one is unable to (on a naive reading) state whether one side is closer to achieving victory over the other. E.g. the Runner on six Agenda points over the Corp’s zero Agenda points may appear to be “winning” until the Corp player flatlines the Runner on his next turn. By naive reading, to clarify, I mean to simply evaluate the amount of Agenda points scored by either side. A deeper reading of the “board position” of a game of Netrunner needs to accommodate not only this, but also the degree of set-up of the Runner (usually considered as to whether they have installed breakers capable of efficiently handling Ice of all types: sentry, barrier, and code gate, but not always) versus the Corporation player’s development of their remote & central servers, the quantity (& sometimes quality) of rezzed vs unrezzed Ice, their resources – do they have lots of credits and/or secure ways to quickly regenerate a significant investment of credits? Does the Runner have hidden resources of credits, which the Corporation must bank on them not having to be able to safely score their winning Agenda? Does the Corporation have the winning Agenda in hand and some means of bluffing the Runner in to wasting credits on runs that do not lead to victory, depleting their resources and allowing the Corp time to safely score their Agenda? Is the Runner in a pressure state where they must run everything that could possibly be Agenda in the hopes of stealing it before the Corp can advance it to achieve their own victory?

Why Netrunner Doesn’t Reward Net-decking

To recap, thus far we accept that there are some Netrunner decks that are stronger than others, and that some players are going to be stronger than others as well. Netrunner’s asymmetric game structure and reliance upon discerning hidden information to evaluate the chances of success means that player strength is more important than deck strength. Moreover, we can thus agree that, given the complexity of the game that a good player with a moderately good deck will do better / out perform a good player with a weak deck and that a good player with a moderate deck will do better / out perform a bad player with a strong deck.

It is the last conclusion that is most important here; simply copying another’s deck from the net (whether good / bad) does not automatically result in success (/failure) in game play, pace player skill. As a weaker player, copying a good deck (and learning to play it) does not improve your chances of winning; unless learning to play the deck actually improves your player ability (i.e. makes you a stronger player).

The key factor here is learning how to play the deck. There is no such thing as a robotic Netrunner deck that functions irrespective of the opponent’s activity (in Android: Netrunner, at least). The asymmetric nature of the game, the multiple points of attack and thereby requisite defence, etc. all require that the player accommodate the opponent’s activity into their play style. In copying a deck, you need to learn how to utilise the deck’s capabilities and compensate for these variables. You would need to learn the tempo of the deck, coming to understand how quickly it moves from early to mid-game phase, or from mid- to late. Moreover you need to learn how and where the same deck can respond to the play strategy of your opponent(s multiple) deck(s).

All of this is, of course, assuming that your skills as a player are on par with the skills exhibited or exploited by the deck designer in the course of their game play. A net-deck, publicised as a strong deck, is one that will play into the designer’s strengths and hopefully minimise any weaknesses in their play ability. Copying such a deck will be unlikely to result in the same level of success when the copying player’s strengths and weaknesses are distinct from the designer’s.

Play styles are also widely variable. Some Runner players are highly aggressive and attacking to the point of risking losing outright in the oblivious quest to liberate the Corporation’s precious Agenda. Some Runners are slower and methodical, unwilling to attack unless they have the protection of at least a generic or a sentry breaker installed. Some Corporations are cautious and defensive, unwilling to install even the merest point of Agenda in anything but a “safe” data fort. Others are brazen, almost daring the Runner to steal Agenda that has been installed in the open, or behind unrezzed but ultimately useless Ice (such as Chum as the sole piece of Ice on the fort). Some would rather fill HQ with five Agenda cards, almost guaranteeing the Runner a sure path to victory should they stumble upon the “gold mine”, while others will casually toss Agenda into the Archives while the unwitting Runner has no idea that the final two points that they need it sitting unprotected face down, as they futilely hammer HQ with Sneakdoor Beta.

Unless you know that the play style of the deck designer is equally your own then you are unlikely to make the deck work well for yourself. An Ice-light Corporate deck, designed to be played quick’n’dirty so as to confound the Runner’s ability to predict when and where to run, won’t do well in the hands of a stodgy Corp player. Equally a ballsy Runner deck that expects to win with only one brain cell intact isn’t going to perform well in the hands of a damage-shy Runner.

Deck building in Netrunner is as much about knowing your play style and building to exploit the strengths of that play style as it is about best assembling the synergies that the faction you choose has to offer. Even the faction choice (or identity choice when there are multiples) should be influenced by your play style. As such, lifting a Netrunner deck from the net is, at best, going to give you some insight into what others think that the identity you’re considering might be good at. Net decks are food for thought, and suggestions of the combos that you might like to exploit in your own designs, but that’s all they should be. As such, you should freely ignore any listings that I subsequently post to this blog :-)