Netrunner

So you want to play one of the most interesting and unique trading card games that ever saw the light? Well, you certainly found the right page! 1996 was the year Richard Garfield and Wizards of the Coast brought us Netrunner, a trading card game for two players. The most interesting part about it is probably that it's an asymmetric game, meaning that both player fulfill a different role within the match. One player will be the Runner and the other player will incarnate the Corp. The game is long since inactive and WotC has stopped printing cards for it.

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Goal of the Game

In the near future everything is digitalized. Big corporations rule the world and guide the people through their life. Or maybe they oppress the population into doing their shady business. No one knows for sure. But the Runners, internet jockeys that use their brain as a computer are all about unveiling the truth. The corporations don't take lightly on this behaviour and try to wring these data-terrorists out of exsitence.

The game is won by collecting agenda-points or lost by matching a few conditions. Agendas are projects the corp works on and each has a value displayed in the lower right corner of the card. The Corp has to install agendas and advance on them until the conditions on the card are met. It then scores the agenda, sets it aside and has as many points as depicted on the card. The Runner has to uncover/steal the agendas from the corp. You can make runs on everything the Corp has: Their hand (aka HQ), their deck (aka R&D), their discard pile (aka Archives) or data forts. When a runner finds an agenda somewhere he just scores it and scores the points on depicted on the card. Effects on the cards generaly don't affect the runner.

Whoever amasses 7 points or more in a game, wins.

Ways to lose

You can however also lose the game, in which case your opponent wins by default. The Corp can run out of cards to draw from R&D. If you are forced to draw a card from R&D, but can't because the stack is empty, you lose. The Runner has to look out to not get his brain fried. If the runner sustains enough brain damage to reduce his maximum hand size from 5 to 0 he is braindead and loses the game. If he has at any point no cards in his hand he is flatlined and loses the game.

Match Preparations

For a full game you will need at least one Runner deck and one Corporate deck. Those decks can contain up to 60 cards each. Also get a ton of tokens. 40 tokens for both player are generally enough. Also, some cards may need a die so set one aside. You'll need table space for each player to have about a dozen cards, maybe a little more.

Beginning of the Game

Now this shit gets interesting. Decide who plays their Corp deck and who plays their Runner deck. Shuffle each deck and draw 5 cards each. Five is also the maximum hand size for both players. Both players also get 5 Bits, which represent the currency in this game, but more on that later. Each player's turn is measured in Actions. Both players get 4 Actions, but the Corp must always use their first action to draw a card. Corp always gets the first turn.

What "Actions" can be used for

When it's your turn you can spend your four Actions however you want (except for Corp's first action, which is forced to be "Draw a card"). The options are as follows:

Both players use an action to:

• Draw a Card: take a card from their face-down deck and add it to their hand.
• Get a Bit: add a token to a pool in front of the player, used to represent money or liquid assets. Each bit of money for the Corporate player is obviously orders of magnitude larger than Hacker bits, but Corporations need to move oil-tankers and fund rock stars, while the Hacker can live on ramen and coffee.

The Corporate player may use an action to:

• Install an Agenda or Node in a subsidiary Datafort: Start a new pile in front of the player by placing an agenda card face-down on the table. Leaving an sole Agenda in a Datafort is ill-advised.
• Install an ICE on a Datafort: Add an ICE card face-down and "tapped" to one of the Datafort piles on the table. ICE can only be placed on top of a Datafort, never in the middle. Runners always encounter ICE from top-to-bottom, so the Agenda is always last. The first ICE on a Datafort comes at no cost to install. For another ICE on a Datafort that already has one you have to pay a Bit. The next one costs 2 Bits and so on.
• Install Upgrades: Upgrades are put face-down behind a Datafort and generally support something inside the Datafort when rezzed. There are also Regions which are Upgrades that have to be rezzed as soon as they are installed. An Upgrade is accessed by a runner when he reaches the last part of a Datafort, for example an Agenda.
• Do Operations: Operation cards are non permanent cards. Play them, follow their effect, store them in the archives.
• Advance a project: Agendas, some Nodes and even some Upgrades can be advanced. For each advancement you use an Action, pay a bit and put a token on the card in question. If the card is face down and the cards says nothing about revealing it upon advancement it stays face down.
• Make the Runner pay for keeping Tags: Tags, if we can give them to the Runner, are good for us. We can taken an action, pay 2 Bits and trash one of the Runners Resources at will.

The Runner may use an action to:

• Make a run on the Corp: explained later.
• Install Cards: If you have any programs, hardware or resources in your hand you can install these by paying their cost in bits and setting them down in front of you face up (or face down if it's something hidden).
• Use Preparations: Preparation cards are non permanent cards. Play them, follow their effect, put them in your trashpile.
• Lose a Tag: Tags are trouble! If you have one a desperate Corp can steer you into a world of hurt. For an Action and 2 Bits you can lose a Tag.

What all that stuff means

Will be continued - --Kajotex 14:50, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

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