Card Analysis - Core NBN

From Jinteki we now turn to the next corporation, NBN.  The world's largest media conglomerate, which has been known as Network Broadcast News, Net Broadcast Network, and Near-Earth Broadcast Network.  Today, it headquarters itself in Broadcast Square, New Angeles, as well as maintaining facilities along the length of the New Angeles Space Elevator, particularly in Midway Station and the Castle.  If it has to do with entertainment, advertising, or marketing, odds are good that NBN is behind it.  With this massive presence, it is no wonder that almost all data passes through NBN at some point.  So let us take a look at the core cards behind NBN.

NBN: Making News

NBN is the news.  With numerous subsidiaries across the Earth, Moon, and Mars, practically any event can be covered from any perspective.  I'm not exactly sure how to tie that into the ability, though.  Having two recurring credits to use during trace attempts means that you'll want to make at least one trace every turn, either on your turn or the runner's turn.  There are plenty of ways to do so, and these credits mean your credit pool can be saved for other costs, such as rezzing ice or playing operations.  Still, it is not exactly the strongest identity NBN has.

Pair cards: Manhunt, Door to Door, Broadcast Square, anything that traces

AstroScript Pilot Program

A card so good, it had to be changed through errata.  You'll get two of these in your core, but now can only have one in a deck.  The was because the card was used so frequently in NBN decks, and because its ability is so powerful.  Scoring one means you could install another copy, advance the new copy twice, then use the token to score out the second copy.  You could do that again with the third copy, and then finish off with another 3 for 2.  Even with the new restriction, there's very little reason to not run a copy of this in your NBN deck.

Pair cards: Biotic Labor, 24/7 News Cycle

Breaking News

A 2 for 1 is pretty good on its own, as it can be used to score out if you only need one more point.  But the effect on it is really good as well.  If you wait to score this, you can land two tags on the runner, provided they have no way to remove or avoid those tags.  Even if they can dodge one of the tags, there's still a lot of cards that can be activated off of that.  Still, thanks to the Most Wanted List, each copy of this card reduces your maximum influence by 1 point, so slotting in 3 of these means that with Making News, you will only have 12 of influence to work with.

Pair cards: Closed Accounts, Scorched Earth, Freelancer, Bad Times, Traffic Accident, 24/7 News Cycle, The All-Seeing I, BOOM!

Anonymous Tip

This card is pretty much as it looks.  If you need 3 cards, then getting them in exchange for one click is really good deal.  Granted, I tend not to see this card played often, but that might just be my meta at work.  If you find you need more cards in hand, whether you are playing them or the runner is hitting your hand hard, this could be a decent way to get those cards.

Trivia: It is a reprint.  The original card from the CCG was called Annual Reviews.

Pair cards: Shipment from MirrorMorph

Closed Accounts

A major problem for the corporation is when the runner has massive piles of credits.  With lots of credits, the runner is able to do pretty much anything: install and play cards, make runs, trash cards, and so on.  This card is the answer to that.  For 1 credit, you can force the runner to lose all their money, potentially opening a scoring window for you in the time it takes them to rebuild their credit pool.  Of course, you do need to tag them first, but that should be easy for NBN.

Trivia: Another reprint, even down to the name Closed Accounts.

Pair cards: Breaking News, SEA Source, TGTBT, Prisec, City Surveillance

Psychographics

According to Wikipedia, psychographics is the study of personality, values, opinions, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles.  Considering that each tag on the runner represents a piece of information you have about them, you can kind of understand where this card is going.  The more you know about the runner, the more you can get out of them, translating into being able to place multiple advancement tokens on a card.  Of course, to get maximum benefit out of this, it would be ideal to place a large number of tags on the runner at once.

Pair cards: Midseason Replacements, Hard-Hitting News

SEA Source

Being able to land a tag on the runner is a big thing.  Even more so if you can do it on your turn.  At the cost of 2 credits, you can initiate a trace against the runner.  If that trace is successful, you give them one tag.  Of course, in order to play this card, the runner must have made a successful run on the previous turn.  So if they got stopped by some ice, or voluntarily jacked out, you won't be able to use this.  Of course, if they can not make successful runs, then you are probably going to win the game.

Trivia: SEA is an acronym for Space Elevator Authority, the organization that oversees the operation and security of the New Angeles Space Elevator.  Security officers of the SEA are sometimes called 'yellow coats,' a reference to their yellow uniforms.  Although, you'll sometimes hear NAPD officers refer to them as 'elevator mercs,' or 'rent-a-cops.'

Pair cards: Closed Accounts, Scorched Earth, Freelancer, Bad Times, 24/7 News Cycle, The All-Seeing I

Ghost Branch

The ambush card for NBN, and it's a really good one.  Each advancement counter on it becomes a tag you give to the runner.  Even better, it activates without having to pay anything for it.  So you install and advance this twice behind a piece of ice.  The runner may be forced to spend significant resource to reach it, with the result being needing to spend more resources to remove the tags.  Or say they hit you with an Account Siphon before running on this.  Unlike other traps, you can still use this on them, even with your credit pool drained.

Pair cards: Trick of Light, Mushin no Shin, Back Channels

Data Raven

A porous ice, but still one that could stop a run.  If the runner is unable to deal with this ice or the tag it gives, they can choose to end the run on encountering it, possibly buying you the time you need.  Even with that tag, the runner will still need to break it, or risk giving it a counter, allowing you to tag the runner at practically any time.  A very good piece of ice.

Trivia: A reprint, sort of.  There is a card from the Netrunner CCG called Data Raven, but it functions differently.  It has a rez cost and a strength of five, does not automatically give the runner a tag, and its subroutine instead can give the runner a counter which does give a tag at the start of their turn, but the counter can be removed at the cost of an action and a credit.

Pair cards: Improved Tracers

Matrix Analyzer

Another porous piece of ice, but a potentially useful one.  On encounter, you can spend a credit to place an advancement token on a card that can be advanced.  So, you could advance a trap the runner is heading toward, or an agenda you have in play, or even a piece of ice that can be advanced.  Aside from that ability, there's not much to this card.  It has a low cost and low strength, and the one subroutine has a fairly low strength trace.  Granted, it could still be fairly useful.

Pair cards: Improved Tracers

Tollbooth

The largest piece of ice NBN has in the core, and it is an exceptional one.  An 8 credit rez cost for a strength 5 piece of ice makes this similar to the Wall of Thorns from Jinteki.  However, instead of doing damage, this card drains the runner's credits.  Plus, if they do not have enough credits to pay the toll, then the run automatically ends.  So this card will either tax the runner significantly, or will stop them cold.  Just watch out for Femme Fatale, as once you bring this card online, it becomes a very tempting target for the bypass ability, since it means they get past this card for just 1 credit.

Pair cards: Akitaro Watanabe

Red Herrings

Again, not a card that commonly sees play, but one that could have some decent application.  With this installed, if the runner accesses an agenda, they will have to pay 5 extra credits in order to steal it, even if they trash the Red Herrings on that run.  The low trash cost makes that easy to do, so you want to place this somewhere it will be expensive for the runner to reach.  This will probably be best in a subsidiary fortress, as you can place your agendas in there, and the runner will probably have to make 2 runs in order to steal the agenda.  Placing this on R&D or HQ feels less useful, due to the random nature of accesses off of R&D and HQ.  This maybe could be good on Archives, if a lot of agendas end up in there, but would still probably be of more use elsewhere.

Trivia: It is another reprint.  The original Red Herrings is pretty much exactly the same as this one, although it does have some nice artwork of fish on it.

Pair cards: TGTBT, Explode-a-palooza, Award Bait

SanSan City Grid

NBN's one-off in the core is so good, you will likely want to purchase at least one more core to get another copy of it.  Or maybe not, as the 2016 world championship deck uses 2 copies of this card, so it may be better to wait until that is released.  But you can easily see why.  Lowering the advancement requirement of agendas in the same server means you could install a 3 for 2 and score it on the same turn, or you could install an agenda with an advancement requirement of 4 and still score it on the same turn with a Biotic Labor or an AstroScript Pilot Program counter.  The investment on the rez cost is pretty high, but the high trash cost means that the runner has to invest significant resources to get rid of this, and they may have to make a hard choice in that regard.  But be aware, this card is also on the Most Wanted List, so each copy will lower your maximum influence by 1.

Trivia: This one is pretty close to a reprint.  Washington, D.C., City Grid from the Netrunner CCG has the same effect, but has a rez cost of 7 and a trash cost of 6 instead.

Pair cards: Interns, License Acquisition, Team Sponsorship, Friends in High Places

And that is all for the NBN core set.  In the next analysis article, we move on to Weyland Consortium.  Prepare to blow stuff up.