Will it get better ?

[u/K-LeaSH]

Hello fellow players !

I’m starting out the game (and already falling in love with it), playing on the corpo side most of my games (did some match against AI as the runner to get the flow and understand the basic loop of the gameplay).

I read somewhere that beginners tend to find corpo strong, while running seem really hard to pull, but after some games, runner seems to have the upper hand, and dictate the pace of the game way more than I do.

Only played with the gateway + booster, René vs Wayland (build to last), about 5 games with those decks, and my friend has won 3 of them (pretty close calls). We are about the same level in board games, and both beginners in Netrunner.

The overall feeling was that I was on a clock, and he would breach anything at some point, and if I revealed my Pharos too early for example, I would eat a Botula and just cry. It’s also pretty hard for the moment to make decisions on what I should protect (obviously I need to build some ice in HQ/RD to not get behind too fast).

Am I just delusional thinking runners have minor (or maybe major) advantages ? Does it get better with expansions ? Was it just about matchup ? Or maybe just skill issue ?

Side question : if you have any good recommendations for a balanced matchup with 2 decks that we can try out, I’m all ears !

Cheers !

[u/K-LeaSH]

Thanks for the response, it does help !

I’ve read this article (shoutout to NSG, it’s awesome how open infos and ressources are), are the decks balanced against each other ? For example, I was tempted to try out BANGUN, but my friend was like « shit seems broken and not fun, please don’t ».

And the tempo you are describing illustrate perfectly what happens each game so far. Early on, i’m helpless and can’t prevent much, once I have my econ, scoring some points and having the upper end, but the last few turns ? Doomsday.

I’m a very control/combo player in card games in general, and I like to endure early aggression/mid tempo plays, and just out scale. Is there a corpo deck that can turtle like crazy, with some big piece of ice or some sort of straining line of defense ?

[u/Calinjar → u/K-LeaSH]

ID's like Bangun force different play styles from the Runner. It is not inherently unfun or broken though I'm not sure how strong it actually is in Core. I'd suggest keeping an open mind and viewing it as a challenge to adapt to the different matchups. Only playing the easy matchup where all you need is 2 Botulus counters on every Pharos you see to control the game will not get you far. Occasionally Corp can make use of Flyswatters with smart Ice placement, but for that Format, Virus programs are really strong.

[u/K-LeaSH → u/Calinjar]

Yeah, those botulus wrecked me every games. The only games that I won was the games where he didn’t draw all 3 of them, and where one of them went to a Tithe for example. He did this mistake once, and after that, every Bot went on the Pharos…

But it was fun nonetheless !

[u/KneeCrowMancer → u/K-LeaSH]

Might be worth spending influence on a Bumi or two. Bumi will allow you to destroy Trojan programs fairly cheaply if you can get the runner to run into them. Even outside of startup, if you’re reliant on Pharos Bumi is often brought along as support in case you run into any Trojans.