Why does Wyrm have an ability to increase its own strength? It can only break subroutines on ICE that has a strength of 0, right?

I always play Wyrm as though you use the ability that gives a piece of ICE -1 Strength as often as you need to get a piece of ICE to 0 strength and then you break the subroutines on that 0 strength ICE with Wyrm. Or, sometimes I use Wyrm to lower the strength of a piece of ICE and then use something like Aurora to break the ICE's subroutines now that it is low enough strength for Aurora to break them, etc.

But am I playing Wyrm wrong? I can't see a reason to increase its strength.

Rules, pag. 16:

An icebreaker can only interact with ice that has equal or lower strength than the icebreaker.

So BEFORE Wyrm can lower Ice's strength, it MUST first equal its strength.

AH, very important to note…thank you sir!

Then why would you use the card. If you have to increase the strength of Wyrm that means that the rest of the card is a waist. Lets say I go against Archer the strength is 6, I have to pay 5 credits to get it up to 6 just to match the strength. Now I have to deal with the subroutines, btw there is 4 of them. I have to to pay 5 more credits to bring Archer's strength to 0 and then I have to pay 3 credits because I just got his strength to zero I can now break the subrotines. That to me sounds like a waist of credits, why would you use this card? I have been asking this question all day. LOL! Can you answer me it and give a good example of how you would use this card?

Wyrm is an AI and works with every type of ICE.

Yo can start the work with Wyrm lowering the strenght of an ice and then breake the subs with another ice that can't be pumped.

I did not think to use it in conjunction with another card, now it the light just went on and the wheels are now turning in my head. Thank you so much for the help.

It also works well with Data Sucker and Parasite to trash rezzed ice.

Sportacus said:

So I thought you had to meat the or beat the strength of the card you are incountering? If I use wyrm with Mimic I have to meat the strength of the card first before I go to the subroutines. Yes I bring the strength down with Wyrm, does it stay that way when I use Mimic or does it go back to its orginal strength when I encounter it with mimic. I can't find any where in the rules that state I can use 2 different cards or that if you bring the strength down it stays the same through out. Because there are cards out there that say when you increase the strength it stays that way for the run. ie. Battering Ram " +1 strength for the remainder of this run" you would think it would say that on wyrm if that is that case.

Decker1613 said:

You have misunderstood how a run works. You, the runner, make the run. So you, the runner, encounter a piece of ice. Then you can use all the tools at your disposal to deal with that piece of ice. You can use multiple cards to interact with the piece of ice you are encountering. But you must follow the rule that an icebreaker can only directly interact with ice if the icebreaker's strength matches the strength of the ice. The strength requirement must be met for each icebreaker individually.

So if you were encountering Archer and had both Wyrm and Mimic, you would:

1. Raise Wyrm's strength to 6 (5 credits)
2. Lower Archer's strength to 3 (3 credits)
3. Break Archer's subroutines with Mimic

Archer's strength would not reset until you have finished encountering it.

Khudzlin said:

This makes sense to me now. Thank you, I need to see it this way, I also see there is no real difference between using Wyrm and Crypis out side of the fact that crypis takes 5 bits to bring out and 1 MU where Wyrm takes 1 bit to bring him out and it takes up 1 MU.