Does Femme Fatale still need to have strength equal to the ICE designated using the card's special ability to break sub-routines? Per the rules it seems like Femme Fatale's strength still needs to equal the ICE making it a pretty crappy icebreaker at a 9 credit install cost, base strength 2, and 2 credits to pump 1 strength.

ironchefzod said:

If you mean the ice declared on install, no. Every other ice, yes.

The rules on Femme Fatale's card supersede the more general strength matching rule.

Ok, but why?

It's an effect that triggers when an ice is encountered and it "bypasses" ice which isn't actually a term discussed in the rulebook. So I'm assuming the icebreaker never actually interacts with the ice because it would need a strength equal to the ice in order to do so.

This has been discussed already -

My take is this:

Because Femme's text states that the runner may pay a bit… therefore the Runner is interacting with the ice and not the ice itself. Much like when the Runner may spend a click to break a subroutine, the Runner does not need a piece of ice to match the strength of the ice.

Note, that this is still speculation, and hasn't been confirmed by any FFG employee or rules dude.

See http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=299&efcid=4&efidt=706050

I'm thinking that the term "interact" is just as much in need of clarification as the term "bypass".

My theory (and this is just a theory that hasn't been confirmed) is that the term "interact" means affecting the ICE in some way, i.e. breaking a subroutine, or reducing its strength. An effect that "bypasses" ICE does not actually affect the ICE itself, but rather simply allows you to avoid it. Thus there is no need to match strength because you aren't actually doing anything to the ICE.

In other words, its not the ICE cards that say "the runner encounters this piece of ICE during a run". The rules say that, so "bypassing" a piece of ICE is circumventing a rule, not an ability on the ICE.

The official word from FFG (Lukas) regarding strength boosting Femme Fatale for bypassing suboutines:

"Femme Fatale can bypass any piece of ice regardless of strength. Bypassing is not considered to be interacting with the ice."

Treguard said:

Where are you getting this official word from?

Paul Grogan said:

The "Rules Questions" link at the bottom of the page, maybe?