Retribution

Retribution 1[credit]

Operation: Gray Ops
Influence: 1

Play only if the Runner is tagged.

Trash 1 installed program or piece of hardware.

Did you really think youʼd get away with it?
Illustrated by David Lei
Decklists with this card

System Gateway (sg)

#65 • English
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Reviews

Probably the best tag punishment that is not a kill card (like High-Profile Target and BOOM!).

This combo very well with Public Trail. One tag is all it take to take out that expensive program or console. At midgame, taking out the console usually mean the runner must also trash a program, due to the lack of .

Retribution will be seen often in NBN deck, which usually have plenty of tags to give. At a cost of one influence and only 1 to use, it is very easy to splash it outside of Weyland.

Retribution is so easy to use that runner should always pack a backup of their breaker and console, or have the risk of being lock out of runner certain ices after having just one tag. Unlike the NBN equivalent, Self-Growth Program, Retribution actually trash the card, instead of putting it back in hand.

The art and quote is the coolest thing ever for Weyland. Amazing card.

(System Update 2021 era)
4247

Going to see new life against all those Endurance big boat decks. Nothing like killing the entire crew and sinking the ship (thematically) purely from a single tag. Especially combined with the new tag power of Drago Ivanov.

(Midnight Sun era)
35

Like many green cards that need a tag, this card will probably see play almost exclusively in Weyland and NBN. However, it serves largely different purposes for the two factions.

In Weyland, while this can provide tempo, the easy access to a more direct tag-based win condition. nasty Destroyers, and solid ICE with EtR subroutines makes this more likely to show up in a rigshooter deck. Thanks to the rotation of the bin breakers, this is a viable way to win the game, either by totally locking the runner out, or by slowing them down enough as to create a scoring window as they dig through their deck looking for a lifeline. (Just watch out for Shapers who are happy to just pop a Simulchip and keep your remote locked down.)

In NBN, this card fills the same role as Self-Growth Program: it directly taxes the runner's time and money by removing something they had to draw and pay for, keeping them too poor to make runs, clear tags, trash assets, and steal Bellona or pay other taxes NBN may present to them. As a rule of thumb, Retribution will generally slow criminals the most and shapers the least, outside of the most gimmicky criminal decks that barely install anything, at any rate; Self-Growth Program may be a better option if you're specifically trying to target Shapers. It is still competing with a few other tag punishment options that exist in-faction, but for single tag punishment, it's one of the better options in slot.

In other factions, Retribution has yet to make a splash, but The Automata Initiative did just add the most compelling reasons yet as to why this could be worth a one-influence splash by adding Jaguarundi and Phoneutria as solid ICE that makes avoiding tags uncomfortable for the runner, but giving neither faction a particularly great way to capitalize on a single tag (outside of Hypoxia which needs a very specific deck to generate enough value for the corp). That said, Retribution is still a bit at odds with the normal gameplan for these factions, which makes it hard to earn its slot.

(The Automata Initiative era)

And while the new Mindscaping can punish multiple tags in red, a single net damage is much less punishing than (as you say) program/hardware destruction or a double bounce.