I wasn't all that interested in getting it, since most reviewers agreed the campaign didn't really play well.

I also kind of dislike that it only has cards for four of the seven factions.

However, it just dawned on me that it appears to have been granted the same status as the deluxe sets, i.e. the cards will always be (tournament) legal.
Is that correct?

That would change things a bit...

Rotation applies to Data Packs, full stop. The rotation schedule is explicitly a mechanism by which Data Packs leave the card pool based on the release of subsequent packs. Anything else that gets retired is done as an ad hoc decision, and thus far the only instance of that is the old Core Set. Everything the developers said indicated such decisions would be strictly case-by-case if at all.

As to whether her or not TD will ever leave the card pool? No one knows. There’s nothing inherently wrong with not having cards for *all* the factions, after all, especially since at the time Anarch and NBN were king of the hill.

If they ever did decide to retire it, I would expect it to cycle out in concert with either the Mumbad/Flashpoint block or the Red Sun/Kitara block. I.E. not for an awfully long time.

Thanks for the clarification.

Of course I know that the number of cards available for a faction don't necessarily indicate an advantage since it's the quality of the cards, that counts. I suppose it's a mild case of OCD; it already slightly irritates me that there isn't an equal number of identities of each faction.

I think, I need to get a couple of plays with the cards I already have under my belt before I decide if I really want or need the cards in TD (but the Corp cards really look tasty!).

I always recommend “try before you buy.” Borrowed cards or paper proxies are fine for casual play. After a few weeks you’ll definitely get an idea of whether a particular set is a good bang for your buck.

I really look at TD as a Deluxe set with a $10 add on campaign. For the equivalent of a DLC side-story in a video game, it’s not great, but not bad. It has some balance issues but it’s a fun deckbuilding exercise, and I have yet to try it with the Revised Core Set.

Best cards for constructed play:

Abagnale/Demara as in-faction breakers for Criminal that suck less, Maxwell James, Deep Data Mining, Ubax, Laguna Velasco District, Dean Lister, Biometric Spoofing, the Shadow Net

Elective Upgrade, Estelle Moon, Marilyn Campaign!, Ultraviolet Clearance, Skorpios, Illegal Arm’s Factory, Colossus, Hortum, Hunter Seeker, IPO!!!