Howdy, folks!

So I am new to Netrunner, but pretty long in the tooth as far as card games go. I've played MTG on and off for more than a decade, and competed in VS and Legend of the Five Things when those were around (regardless of the rumours that L5R is sort of back to life). I consider myself a relatively savvy card player, having won sizeable tournaments in each of those.

With Netrunner I find myself really intrigued at the notion of a tournament being played as both the evil runner, trying to bring down the virtuous corporation, as it tries to complete agendas for the betterment of humanity, and the poor corporation itself, desperately trying to stave off the runner's onslaught before it can actually take its newest offering public. So between that and wanting more opportunities to play (initially got the core set for myself and a friend to have a game to play now that we share weekends) I am thinking of swinging up for a tournament in the capital on the 19th.

So I was wondering how brutally merciless tournaments are in Netrunner, whether everything is obsessively fine-tuned like an MTG Pro Tour, or whether a tournament is more of just a celebration of the game, and might actually be an appropriate place to essentially learn to play the game, with a bit of a makeshift deck from whatever data packs I can pick up between now and then, likely playing with cards I wouldn't have necessarily used all together before the day.

Would y'all think it's a bad idea, and would I be detracting from the tournament experience for others by jumping in the deep end so soon?

Also, on a complete aside. There is a lot of mention of LCGs being a much more financially responsible alternative to CCGs, but there seems to be an issue with an escalating barrier to entry, where every month it's a little bit harder for a new player to jump in, unless they are jumping in with other newbies, who are ok with slowly catching up to the current time, like people watching a TV series on DVD. Is there any plans for something like set rotation (generally unpopular outside of established CCGs) or perhaps pre-constructed decks, where a person could get relatively current with a given runner/corporation, and then catch up backwards, as desired, instead of going forwards though 2 years of releases?

So to answer your first question: I don't know what the meta is like where you play but every A:NR tournament I have ever been to has been 100 to 1000 times more friendly layed-back and enjoyable then anything I have ever expirienced playing magic (even when I was playing so called "casual" Magic tournaments). So I would recommend that you would absolutely go and play at a tournament. As far as not having optimized decks I wouldn't worry about it that much. There are a number of reasons for this but in general decks aren't as important as the player in netrunner. Since it's an LCG there are far far fewer "bad" cards in netrunner then there are in Magic so as long as you have a general idea of what you want your deck to do and have some cards in your deck to support that you should be fine.

As far as the cost I just did the math the other day and if you want to have the entire collection today (3 of every card) and you could only buy it at MSRP prices it would cost you $325 to have three of every card ($285 if you chose to only go with 2 core sets). Most likely if you search on-line you can find deals that are much cheaper then that and can probably own everything for around $200. Now granted that is not just chump change to get into the game but at the same time I'm sure you know that at that price in Magic this would get you an entry level deck that you woudl have to spend a couple of hundred dollars on every couple of months if ou wanted to even be anywhere close to be able to play in any sort of competitive enviornment. And of course the real beauty of the game is knowing that once you do make the initial buy-in you will never have to spend more then $10-$20 a month to keep up with everyone else. Plus the truth is that now that the card pool is large enough you really don't need to own every datapack unless the collector in you absolutely needs it. Nowadays you can buy 2 core sets the deluxe expansion and a couple of specific datapacks (so no more then ~$150 worth of cards) and you'll be able to build a deck that is as strong and competitive as anyone with 3 of everything can build.

I personally feel like the lack of set rotation is a strength, not a weakness. I can be assured that when I drop $15 for a given stack of cards, they're going to be there for me year in and year out. The notion of spending a couple hundred on a block of M:TG cards that will be of limited use in less than two years makes me shudder.

I find that the tournament scene is also much more collegial. There's the sense that everyone there has access to the same cards, so it's much more about your creativity and player skill than who has too much free time and too much disposable income. (Also, a lot less theft: there's nothing in that guy's deck that you can't buy retail, except for the occasional promo version of an existing card with alternate artwork.)

My comment for the lack of set rotation was mostly in relation to the escalating barrier to entry into the game. It works out contrasted with CCGs for now, but the comparison with other board and card games gets tougher the further it goes.

For me it makes little difference: I'm in. But a general musing.

With monthly releases the tournament scene is likely more fluid, since a specific meta would have trouble fully developing with new options every month.

From what I understand, tournaments will have very highly skilled players, but you're not gonna ruin anyone's day by turning up and doing your best. Also, you'll learn a lot, and quickly, from the experience. My first tourney, I thought myself a reasonable player in the local group, and I was slaughtered XD but I still had a good time.

The idea of a 'set rotation' is a little inimical to the LCG format. However, I 100% support the idea as an ALTERNATIVE format. If my LGS decided to do some un-supported events where decks could only be built from a narrowed-down card pool, I'd be up for giving it a try

Also, on a complete aside. There is a lot of mention of LCGs being a much more financially responsible alternative to CCGs, but there seems to be an issue with an escalating barrier to entry, where every month it's a little bit harder for a new player to jump in, unless they are jumping in with other newbies, who are ok with slowly catching up to the current time, like people watching a TV series on DVD. Is there any plans for something like set rotation (generally unpopular outside of established CCGs) or perhaps pre-constructed decks, where a person could get relatively current with a given runner/corporation, and then catch up backwards, as desired, instead of going forwards though 2 years of releases?

Set Rotation is generally unpopular outside of Magic: The Gathering . I've only heard of one other CCG trying it, and that game was in its death throes at the time. Neither of the CCGs I was seriously into even considered the idea except for niche theme events.

Meanwhile, over on boardgamegeek.com, we keep a thorough list of which Data Packs have which cards that are critical to each mainline strategy, meaning that if you are just starting out and don't know anybody, you can buy exactly the Data Packs you need to make your deck viable.

I've played over 20 tournaments and there have been new players at most of them. You wouldn't be detracting at all.

As for the escalating barrier to entry issue for LCGs. I do think that's real. It's one of the reasons I never got into AGOT although if I'd known someone who was up for getting into it at the same time it would have been fine. For Netrunner and the Star Wars LCG it was no problem. We were all getting into them at the same.

Ok. Sold.

Will head out there on the 19th. Any tips and hints on tournament play? Looking at videos it seems important to be prepared with clear click counters both for yourself, and probably the opponent to keep track of the turn flow. I already got the whole staying hydrated and some non-sugary, non-messy snacks thing down from tournaments in other games.

Stimhack or netrunnerdb seem the places to go for some foundation for deck lists, but with the broad range of options and the power of bluffing it seems there are a lot of valid options out there and it would be more valuable for me to swap in cards I am sure I understand than copying a list outright. Reminds me a bit of a guy who won or top 3ed a Magic tournament by playing as though he had mana leak (which is like an op you can play at any time to counter a card the opponent plays unless he pays 3), without having it in his deck. Because of everyone assuming that deck would have it, he got mad value on the act as opponents would try to play around it.

One thing actually. Jackson and Hedge Fund seem tragically ubiquitous to a point where I can't build test decks from a set of everything without proxying or buying multiple core sets (already have my second in the post). Is there some concern that corp decks are basically 43 cards with the first 6 being universal, regardless of gameplan or faction?

Jackson and Hedge certainly do feature in a lot of decks, its true, but like any card you should be sure it fits the plan. I had a recent iteration of an NBN deck that only ran 2x Hedge, but it also had 3x Sweeps Week. Sweeps has wonderful synergy with Scorched Earth, because they either keep a full grip and I can get a Hedge Fund from only a single credit, or they keep a low grip to neuter Sweeps and I can Scorch more easily. Some decks also prefer Anonymous Tip to Jackson.

tl;dr: They will be in a lot of decks, certainly more than half, but not all. Don't assume any card is auto-include.

Just got back from the tournament, which all-in-all turned out to be a pretty fantastic day.

Our tournament prep was a bit lacking. After 2 afternoons playing with the core decks the rest of my cards arrived, so I put together two sets of decks for myself and my accomplice and we had a go of playing with for real-real decks, trying to figure out the rules to a functional level and get used to the flow of the game, and what it would take to actually keep track of all the things in the tournament.

I didn't like the feeling of the Gabriel Santiago deck, so with <48hrs to the tournament I went hunting for a new decklist to work off.

So we roll out for the tournament, I explain to people that this is my fourth day playing Netrunner, and people were incredibly accommodating.

My first game was a bit of a blur and I was pretty jittery settling into a new competitive environment. I played my HaasBroid against Kate, and won 7-3 by having uncomfortably large ice. Switched to the runner I never played before against NBN fast advance, and it was 7-4 to my opponent before I figured out what was happening. 1-1

Round 2 my opponent was actually sitting next to us and offered me one of those play cards with all the actions listed on it, and was incredibly nice answering questions as we went along. The game with me playing Corp was hella interesting, losing the first 2 agendas (which ended up a bit of a theme for the day), then stabilizing with a bunch of ice, scoring 2 of my own before my opponent build up a big meaty rig powered with all the moneys off Magnum Opus. I ended up rather burnt out of money with a 3-ice remote, in which I installed my only advanceable cards, and scrounged credits to get it up a couple of advancement tokens. My opponent did the calculations, had just enough credits to make it through everything, burned all their credits to access, only to find out it was an Aggressive Secretary, torching their icebreakers. Took me a couple of turns to track down an agenda from there, but basically the runner never recovered. With them playing corp (Weyland who poof and hoof and blow your house down) I got a relentless stream of Account Siphons (with 2 actual Siphons, Same Old Thing, and Deja Vu), and ran rampant across servers behind layers of ice that could not be afforded to rez, until eventually Nerve Agenting my way through all of their hand to chase down the last agenda. Felt a bit bad to completely lock out a nice person from the game but... it's a remorseless Android world. 3-1

Round 3 started with a bit of a disaster. Shuffling my runner deck I discover I am down to 44 cards, so I double checked, got my opponent to check, went back to where I was playing, checked with my opponent, eventually had to check the decklist to discover that a Knight was missing, which I then managed to borrow, and play the games. My opponent was incredibly understanding, which I am immensely appreciative of, and a very methodical player who offered me a solid educational experience. As runner I got hit by two cards that destroyed programs killing my Corroder (or maybe Knight, don't remember) and a Djinn with a Medium on it, and basically never recovered, with Archives not getting filled with Agendas from it, losing 7-3. As Corp I again lost the first two agendas, then built up large stacks of ice. My opponent deftly avoided my ploy to Aggressive Secretary them, but then I scored an Accelerated Beta Test (following up my agenda which raised a Tollbooth for free) hitting 3 ice off the top, and that basically sealed the game. Opponent played Andromeda and Weyland. 4-2

Round 4 build massive ice, my opponent gets an R&D interface for his Kat deck I think, desperately digs for my 8 agendas, through back-breaking ice payments, while I slowly churn out scores in a large remote. As runner against his Weyland I get no economy in opening hand, mulligan into no economy, try a bit of running, and a bit of search and rescue for the economy, never really get any going, and lose through Scorched Earth after getting Snared and some brain damage trapped to basically put me out of my mysery. Opponent was again very helpful in the post-mortem, pointing out that I needed to either be a bit more desperate in the running, or more committed to economy, to focus with the deck more. 5-3 - Still undefeated as corp, starting to wonder what kind of nasty punishment it is to be forced to play as runner.

Round 5 play against an incredibly fun guy from my town, which was great at this point with my brain filling up with cards data, and general weariness of a long day settling in. I played runner against NBN first. Kicked down the HQ door hard, killed any puny ice he tried to throw up there with parasites, escalated Nerve Agent, and basically torched his hand down for agendas, winning 7-0. He then got to play his own Whizzer against me, running around single-accessing stuff from hand and R&D while I pushed towards a critical mass of ice. Had some minor economy issues, especially with him burning down an Adonis Campaign, lost the first two agendas, but was basically a turn away from locking down all servers with a large remote to score agendas from. Get a choice on my turn to drop a second ice I could rez (going broke in the process) in front of R&D or getting the money to do whatever I want by building up to and playing Hedge fund. I am sitting with 1 agenda in a relatively safe HQ, 2 agendas he already scored, so 5 agendas remaining in >35 cards in R&D. Take the risk, especially with him having to click through Ichi to get in for just 1 card, doesn't pay out. Was a cool Indiana Jones-style moment with him rolling out with the final treasure before absolute walls came down. 6-4

So 6-4 for the day, which I felt was rather respectable. Turned out I missed out on Top 8 and a mat on strength of schedule, or whatever the second tie breaker was.

From my day overall it seems the runner is really the one that benefits the most from people getting better at the game. There were plenty of times during the runner game when I felt I was just randomly darting between tasks I wasn't grounded enough to prioritize.

The tournament structure seems a bit whacky. They registered people by nicknames, which folks invented just to register and quickly forgot, leading to mass confusion at the pairings. The tie breaker system also seems odd. With a lot of games going 1-1 seemed strange that the total number of wins effectively determined your standing, potentially allowing a couple early blowouts to put you in a dominant position, whereas in other card games the results of later game are more important as you climb the rankings. The tie breakers were also rather odd where it seems it mattered how close you were in your losses, but made little difference how dominant you may have been in your wins.

All in all though I had an absolute blast, am incredibly happy I got into this game, and look forward to a lot more of it in the future.

In terms of tournament for swiss pairings, 5 rounds generally sorts out the players pretty well. Hell all of the tournaments where I am are usually only 4 rounds. The top 3 or 4 can be pretty close, but there is usually 1 that ecks out a prestige or two above the pack.

I actually like weak-side-wins as a tie breaker as it encourages the better overall player rather than one that rofl stomps with their best deck and washes with their weak deck. You have to do well with both decks rather than do really well with one deck.

The weird thing there is that the early wins are as valuable as later ones, once you get paired with other super-winning people. With our 5 rounds some 6-4 players made Top 8 for mats and such, which means that in theory you can stomp your first three opponents 2-0, and then lose both of the next two matches 0-2 and still get prizes for your achievements in the early inaccuracy of Swiss pairings.

I believe under the new Tournament rules that WSW is the tiebreaker over SOS, which is good since it derives from player skill. Were you playing under 4/15/14 tournament rules?

I was about to start a thread regarding some of the same tourney questions brought up here, so I figure I'll ask here and hope I'm not hijacking. I'd like to get a feel for how super-serious you, personally, play. My local tourney scene has some pretty good people, no one I would call out as being unsportsmanlike so this is just curiosity.

At what level of competitiveness, with what frequency, or it what situation would you do the following?
1. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent before play begins.
2. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent after a round concludes. After a tournament concludes?
3. Advise your opponent that they have unspent Bad Publicity or Recurring Credits?
4. Object if, when accessing R&D (normally), a runner declares they are trashing a card that cannot normally be trashed, resulting in it being revealed?
5. Advise a player that they have, or do not have an option that would otherwise cause a notable misplay. For example, a runner has had their Corroder trashed by Power Shutdown, but this turn declares they will use Indexing to make a run against a server protected by a barrier.

I'm curious, and in the interests of openness, I'll offer my answers if there are a couple of replies, so as not to unduly influence the zeitgeist. Of course, I'm looking for your honest, reasonable case answers, certainly we've all missed BP credits. I once chose to let a Sworsdman trash my Atman despite having the credits and the Femme Fatale to do otherwise, and my opponent won the game as a result. More often-than-not, I find Netrunner players to be a higher class of nerds. Or something.

1. Definitely not.

2. After the tournament, perhaps.

3. Not my place.

4. Really can't imagine this is a problem. I'll see it at my start of turn anyway, and as above, it's not my job to correct his errors in judgment.

5. Depends. I might. There's a convention in chess where you haven't committed to a move unless you've either touched an opponent's piece or taken your hand off the piece. The sooner they realize their error the more likely I am to let them back out.

I'd certainly try to be helpful and supportive if someone came to a tournament with an imperfect grasp of the rules. But their decisions and their errors are their own.

At what level of competitiveness, with what frequency, or it what situation would you do the following?

1. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent before play begins.

1. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent before play begins.

I come from a background of competitive Policy debate, as well as hobby gaming. It's considered normal, and even rude to pretend your strategy is secret there. It's not a norm in hobby gaming, but I think it should be. I'll offer to disclose my deck list before a round if my opponent does so, ***-for-tat. There's no points for surprising a player.

2. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent after a round concludes. After a tournament concludes?

As above, there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent, and only negative sportsmanship in pretending you're deck is super secret and, when not in play, will be kept in a locked case handcuffed to your wrist like a Yu-Gi-Oh villain. If after a couple rounds you don't know what to expect from a reasonably sized play group, you're missing out.

3. Advise your opponent that they have unspent Bad Publicity or Recurring Credits?

I'll just come right out and say it. I won a game because a player didn't spend the recurring credits on her Toolbox. I don't have a good answer for this. Not only are there so few reasons to spend credit pool credits over other options, but also because its so easy to overlook, this gaffe could practically be automatic. It's the sort of thing that an AI opponent, even with rudimentary strategy would likely never miss.

4. Object if, when accessing R&D (normally), a runner declares they are trashing a card that cannot normally be trashed, resulting in it being revealed?

I wouldn't, this happens. But it is a rules violation and it seems hypocritical to be permissive of violations that benefit only yourself.

5. Advise a player that they have, or do not have an option that would otherwise cause a notable misplay. For example, a runner has had their Corroder trashed by Power Shutdown, but this turn declares they will use Indexing to make a run against a server protected by a barrier.

Again, this is an actual case that came up. And the player was visibly unnerved when I look across the table dully and said "You bounce off Hive." I let the player take back the Indexing and the move (in truth, I let the player take back the first two Magnum Opus clicks made that turn too, although these were immediately remade anyway.) I won the game anyway, the damage was already done by my Power Shutdown, not my opponent's overlooking of its results.

1. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent before play begins.

I come from a background of competitive Policy debate, as well as hobby gaming. It's considered normal, and even rude to pretend your strategy is secret there. It's not a norm in hobby gaming, but I think it should be. I'll offer to disclose my deck list before a round if my opponent does so, ***-for-tat. There's no points for surprising a player.

2. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent after a round concludes. After a tournament concludes?

As above, there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent, and only negative sportsmanship in pretending you're deck is super secret and, when not in play, will be kept in a locked case handcuffed to your wrist like a Yu-Gi-Oh villain. If after a couple rounds you don't know what to expect from a reasonably sized play group, you're missing out.

allow me to be more blunt: ABSOLUTELY NOT on either of these. Scouting of deck contents and deck lists is expressly forbidden by the tournament rules. You may not share or ask for deck details until the tournament is over.

The reason for this is simple: anyone who says "there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent" hasn't been playing this game for very long. Hidden knowledge and unexpected card choices are absolutely at the center of this game. If you disclose to your opponent that your Weyland deck doesn't actually have Scorched Earth in it, or that your The World Is Yours deck spent all its influence on biotic labors, you are giving up a tremendous advantage.

1. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent before play begins.

I come from a background of competitive Policy debate, as well as hobby gaming. It's considered normal, and even rude to pretend your strategy is secret there. It's not a norm in hobby gaming, but I think it should be. I'll offer to disclose my deck list before a round if my opponent does so, ***-for-tat. There's no points for surprising a player.

2. Offer to disclose your deck lists to your opponent after a round concludes. After a tournament concludes?

As above, there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent, and only negative sportsmanship in pretending you're deck is super secret and, when not in play, will be kept in a locked case handcuffed to your wrist like a Yu-Gi-Oh villain. If after a couple rounds you don't know what to expect from a reasonably sized play group, you're missing out.

allow me to be more blunt: ABSOLUTELY NOT on either of these. Scouting of deck contents and deck lists is expressly forbidden by the tournament rules. You may not share or ask for deck details until the tournament is over.

The reason for this is simple: anyone who says "there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent" hasn't been playing this game for very long. Hidden knowledge and unexpected card choices are absolutely at the center of this game. If you disclose to your opponent that your Weyland deck doesn't actually have Scorched Earth in it, or that your The World Is Yours deck spent all it's influence on biotic labors, you are giving up a tremendous advantage.

While I very much agree with you that I would never give out any decklist before a game, I do think decklists should be public after a tournament has ended and tournament winners shouldn't have a choice in the matter.

allow me to be more blunt: ABSOLUTELY NOT on either of these. Scouting of deck contents and deck lists is expressly forbidden by the tournament rules. You may not share or ask for deck details until the tournament is over.

The reason for this is simple: anyone who says "there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent" hasn't been playing this game for very long. Hidden knowledge and unexpected card choices are absolutely at the center of this game. If you disclose to your opponent that your Weyland deck doesn't actually have Scorched Earth in it, or that your The World Is Yours deck spent all its influence on biotic labors, you are giving up a tremendous advantage.

OTOH, that is true. Scouting is very much illegal and surprise can win you games. OTOH, if you are relying on that sort of luck to win, you'll be at a disadvantage. You shouldn't hand out your decklist to your opponent before you play, but if your deck can't win against an opponent with your decklist, it isn't a good deck. Indexing/Maker's Eye or just plain clever opponents can quite often ruin these sorts of surprises.

allow me to be more blunt: ABSOLUTELY NOT on either of these. Scouting of deck contents and deck lists is expressly forbidden by the tournament rules. You may not share or ask for deck details until the tournament is over.

The reason for this is simple: anyone who says "there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent" hasn't been playing this game for very long. Hidden knowledge and unexpected card choices are absolutely at the center of this game. If you disclose to your opponent that your Weyland deck doesn't actually have Scorched Earth in it, or that your The World Is Yours deck spent all its influence on biotic labors, you are giving up a tremendous advantage.

OTOH, that is true. Scouting is very much illegal and surprise can win you games. OTOH, if you are relying on that sort of luck to win, you'll be at a disadvantage. You shouldn't hand out your decklist to your opponent before you play, but if your deck can't win against an opponent with your decklist, it isn't a good deck. Indexing/Maker's Eye or just plain clever opponents can quite often ruin these sorts of surprises.

I disagree. The game of netrunner is a game of hidden information. A Weyland deck that doesn't run scorches (but pretends it does) and uses the deck slots for something else is a very powerful deck. But it can also rely on the fact that a runner will slow down in order to find the plascretes. I actually think that's a valid strategy to bluff having scorches in your deck. However if a runner knows for certain that you don't have scorches then they are at an unfair advantage. And the same thing applies for the runner. Knowing what breakers and tricks the runner has can give the corp a huge advantage and actually change the way they would play vs a deck they knew nothing about. So I highly disagree that a deck is supposed to win even if your opponent knows exactly what's in it. vs what's possible to be in it.

allow me to be more blunt: ABSOLUTELY NOT on either of these. Scouting of deck contents and deck lists is expressly forbidden by the tournament rules. You may not share or ask for deck details until the tournament is over.

The reason for this is simple: anyone who says "there's nothing to be gained in surprising an opponent" hasn't been playing this game for very long. Hidden knowledge and unexpected card choices are absolutely at the center of this game. If you disclose to your opponent that your Weyland deck doesn't actually have Scorched Earth in it, or that your The World Is Yours deck spent all its influence on biotic labors, you are giving up a tremendous advantage.

OTOH, that is true. Scouting is very much illegal and surprise can win you games. OTOH, if you are relying on that sort of luck to win, you'll be at a disadvantage. You shouldn't hand out your decklist to your opponent before you play, but if your deck can't win against an opponent with your decklist, it isn't a good deck. Indexing/Maker's Eye or just plain clever opponents can quite often ruin these sorts of surprises.

I disagree. The game of netrunner is a game of hidden information. A Weyland deck that doesn't run scorches (but pretends it does) and uses the deck slots for something else is a very powerful deck. But it can also rely on the fact that a runner will slow down in order to find the plascretes. I actually think that's a valid strategy to bluff having scorches in your deck. However if a runner knows for certain that you don't have scorches then they are at an unfair advantage. And the same thing applies for the runner. Knowing what breakers and tricks the runner has can give the corp a huge advantage and actually change the way they would play vs a deck they knew nothing about. So I highly disagree that a deck is supposed to win even if your opponent knows exactly what's in it. vs what's possible to be in it.

And furthermore, one of the most valuable skills you can have in this game is the metaknowledge to try and suss out exactly what the other player's game is.

For example, I ran a CI deck with a single copy each of Minelayer and Sensei (since I tend to stack up ice on centrals, both of those seemed worth trying). In one game against a Shaper, I put the Minelayer on HQ, and when he ran it I only had the Sensei in hand, so out it went. He ran it again, saw the Sensei, and jacked out, and didn't run again. I thought I had HQ taken care of for the time being, until he had the cards in hand to install Gordian Blade, Account Siphon me and then Same Old Account Siphon me, all in one turn. I didn't see it coming, which some might say is a rookie mistake, particularly since Gordian Blade is a potent breaker against a server guarded by two Code Gates. But nowadays I've very wary and counting influence to see whether that Account Siphon is one of their splashes.

Another example is the one I used: TWIY* is generally a fast deck that doesn't have the luxury of having different paths to victory between the deck size and Influence restriction, so when I sit down and I see that ID, I'm generally trying to figure out as early as I can exactly what kind of game they're running. If you just hand me the information that you've spent 12 influence on 3 Scorched Earth versus 3 Biotic Labor, you are giving me exactly what I need to attack your deck in a certain way.

Even just a small giveaway is potentially game-changing. Shinobi has shown up in a couple of NBN decks. Some Weyland decks are running Edge of World. If I'm walking around having finished my matches and I see an RP deck with an Encryption Protocol in his hand, I can make educated guesses. If I see a Snowball or a Morningstar in a Kit deck, that's very valuable.

The hidden information and bluffing in this game is so important that I'm really at a loss as to how someone could be so naive as to cut their own throat in such a way, even if it weren't against the letter and spirit of the rules