Can I wait until just before I would collect the credits to rez Adonis Campaign? Like at the end of a runner's turn or something?

If so, that really changes whether or not you need to protect it with ICE…

You can rez it at the end of a Runner's turn, but they can still make a run and spend 3 creds to trash it, so you'd still want to put ice in front of it to protect your investment until it's done…

EDIT: It occurs to me I might not understand what you're getting at. Give me an example of what you're thinking?

pwnguin said:

According to the timing diagram at the end of the book, you can rez non-ICE cards during the Corp draw phase, which would still qualify as the beginning of the turn, so you would still get the first 3-credit payment from the campaign.

However, Adonis Campaign still takes 2 turns to make up the rez cost, and 4 turns to fully pay out. With no protection, a runner can access the remote host at any point during the next 3 turns and pay the bits to trash the asset.

If you're playing in faction as HB, Adonis Campaign pays for itself during the first pay out. If it pays out fully, you net 8 credits for 1 click/1 card, an incredibly good click/credit ratio. If the Runner trashes it, it'll cost them a click (for the run) and 3 credits for the privilege of denying you credits.

No matter what happens, you always come out ahead.

To answer the question:

Yes, you can install (but not rez) Adonis Campaign on turn 'X'.

Then at the beginning of any later turn, during step 1 of the Corp's turn, there is a time period where you may rez existing cards and doing so counts as 'before your turn begins', so Adonis would immediately pay out.

hooliganj said:

That's ok. You net lose 1 while the runner loses 3. If you really want it to pay out in full, just install one or two ICE in front of it to let the runner know it's a waste of time. Then later on, when Adonis is finished, you can throw an agenda or some other useful asset behind your new line of defense. It's a win-win.

TheRealLeo said:

On an un-ICE'd campaign, there's four possibilities:

1. The runner trashes it before you've rezzed it. Net advantage: 3 credits
2. The runner trashes it after you it triggers once. Net advantage: 2 credits
3. The runner trashes it after it triggers twice. Net Advantage: 5
4. The runner never trashes it. Net advantage: 8

From the runner's perspective, they clearly need to trash it. and the only question is when. Second one is most lucrative, fewer bits lost and you get to "float" an action for a turn. Realistically, the Corp should count this as earning two or three bits, and any ICE you install (and rez) on it worth 5 or 6. More if you don't can reuse the remote server you just ICE'd.

Anyways, what's also interesting is how this has changed. I thought this was a renamed copy of an existing card from the original NR, but it's not. Many simliar cards, but they were slower and the trash cost were so high the runner would probably leave them alone. It leaves room for a bit more analysis, as 3 bits 3 turns from now isn't as good as 3 bits this turn, and I have no idea yet how to estimate discount rates.

Similarly, PAD Campaign gives 1 bit forever. Comparative analysis:

- The runner trashes it before you've rezzed it. Net advantage: 4 credits
- The runner trashes it after you it triggers once. Net advantage: 3 credits
- The runner trashes it after it triggers twice. Net Advantage: 4
- The runner trashes it after it triggers thrice. Net advantage: 5 and so on…

So this card actually has a higher payout in the short term than Adonis, loses for a while, then turns around again on turn 8 and never looks back. We should also probably look at a discount rate analysis, and figure out where the breakpoint is where you'd prefer Adonis over PAD. Maybe once the game arrives I'll think harder about that.

This may seem obvious to people who actually get math, but can you break down how that income pattern works? Why does the net gain fluctuate from 4 to 3 then back to 4? Any help is appreciated.

I assume its because you have to pay to actually rez the card.

gokubb said:

Ah! So it's just factoring in the cost to rez the card. Thanks for the clarification!

It's Income + Trash cost - Cost to rez.

This formulation does assume that denying your opponents is equally favorable to earning your own. It might be interesting to test that by introducing a new event card along the lines of "gain 4 bits, and your opponent gains 1" and see whether favor one or the other.

I'm generally of the belief that one credit is worth more to a Runner than a corp. So far, the corp has stronger money cards and the economics of runs work in the corp's favor (pay to rez ice once vs pay over and over to break). So spending a click (in the worst case) to cost the runner 3-4 credits and a click is worth it for the corp.

An operation that gave the Runner 1 credit and the Corp 4 credits would be an auto include for whatever faction had it and if it was a transaction, probably be an auto include for Weyland too. And it'd probably replace Beanstalk Royalties for OOF money cards.

An event that gave the Runner 4 credits and the Corp 1 credit would probably probably be an auto include if it was a Criminal card. Anyone else would have to think hard about it.