My first thought when reading her ability was, "Wow, that seems fun". And my second thought was, "That's way too powerful". But on examining the list of cards that use power counters, I realized that there is nothing game breaking (with the possible exception of her console). But my first thought holds true, there are some fun and interesting ideas to try.

First things first: her ability can trigger only once per turn and runs almost never occur on the Corps turn, so you'll only be generating a set amount of power counters. Interestingly, her ability occurs at the start of an R&D run, not on success. Spending a click to simply run into an Ice Wall may be worth it occasionally, but the real value comes from getting a power counter while doing something you need to do anyway. Successfully running and accessing R&D and/or putting on a brave face for instance. One important note about power counters: unlike virus counters, the Corp has no way to influence them, at least not yet.

Back to the list. Some of the cards are anti-synergetic, power counters are bad for these cards. But usually more is better. In my mind only about half the cards there are worth considering. I'll highlight a few of them below. (I may add more once more cards are revealed from Midnight Sun). You'll probably want to pick only one to focus her ability on.

Chatterjee University - I tried using this card years ago, but it just took too long to charge. And it's unfortunate that it can only target programs. While still janky, I think the extra power counters from the Captain could make this worth trying again. You'll need to get it out really early though which probably means it'd be a 3x.

District 99 - Any kind of recursion is welcome. You get your favorite tools back and it can save you from running out of cards vs Jinteki. However, this card has always been super clunky outside of MaxX and the influence is prohibitive. You could try it with the Captain but you'd need to include other ways of charging it up too.

Earthrise Hotel - This is one of the strongest options in the current pool. It's already a good card especially with support. But if you are running R&D anyway, you can keep this charged indefinitely, netting you a free two cards every turn!

Endurance - She's called Captain for a reason and this is it. Her console is a friggin' boat! And it's a super strong console at that. The install cost is high (though new Rigging Up helps a lot), but it's power rivals that of Sunny's Security Nexus (a console I despise). Once it's installed, you can face-check any ICE confident you probably will be fine. It's like a rechargeable Boomerang that you only have to install once and can be used on any ICE. I'm confident I won't like this console either when playing as the Corp.

Kasi String - Who doesn't want free game winning points? Charge this up in as little as two turns.

Mind's Eye - This is the interaction I'm most excited about. While probably not as good as her own console mentioned above, it's ability is not to be ignored and it's install cost is much lower. In Captain decks, for every three successful R&D runs on separate turns, you get two free R&D accesses! These accesses can be augmented by cards such as eXer or Nyashia or both.

Nyashia - Mentioned above, this card couples nicely with Mind's Eye. You're only going to be able to keep one of them charged with any efficiency. I'd tend to charge Mind's Eye and keep this as a three-time use R&D Interface. But you could try focusing on this.

The Turning Wheel - This is already a good card, helping you get those multi-accesses on both R&D and HQ. Getting it charged faster is always welcome.

Temple of the Liberated Mind - Once installed and used once, you could keep this charged with Padma's ability, getting one extra click each turn. This is definitely a better option than Upya.

Some lesser choices (in my mind) include Revolver, Takobi and Puffer. I think Captain Endurance is going to be a force to be reckoned with going forward. I actually hope they add a counter. Something akin to Macrophage, which counters viruses while not being worthless without them in play. Or maybe an agenda that clears power counters on scoring.

So, I'll preface this review by saying that I've always had a problem with the trash costs in this game. I truly believe that when Whizzard was released in the very first data pack, he created a problem for the game designers, one that they recognized. He basically got an auto-win versus asset-spam decks and so to compensate for this, I believe the designers started increasing trash costs. This didn't fix the issue. Whizzard still had an easy time against asset-spam but every other runner had an incredibly hard time. (I think a similar problem, that of tag-n-bag existing alongside tag-me, has been termed rock/paper/scissors. You've already either won or lost as the match begins [with only a little exaggeration].) I remember playing many nightmare games against NEH and Gagarin, but even recently I watched a game where a René with a Scrubber out couldn't keep up with a CtM and I thought that was very sad. Now Whizzard is no more and that's a good thing, but many cards with trash costs above what they should be still exist and will until they rotate out. I sincerely hope that those taking on the role of designers now will start to lower trash costs on new releases if only by a little bit.

Enough about that.

Arella Salvatore is quite a powerful upgrade. At the basic level, once she is rezzed, she will save you 2s and 1 each time you score an agenda from her server. Nice indeed! While somewhat different, her effect makes me think of the Astro-train of yesteryear. Let's discuss her pros and cons while also comparing her to a similar upgrade, SanSan City Grid.

Pros

• High trash cost. As you may have guessed from my introduction, I think it is too high. I think a good rule of thumb to follow going forward is: if it is super powerful, it should have a lower trash cost (like Oberth Protocol).

• Compared to SanSan, the rez cost is quite low, at only 2s.

• She is very versatile.

  • Her obvious use is that of facilitating the scoring of agendas. Score a 2/1 or anything else in her server and you can get a 4/2 locked and loaded for next turn. And then do it again and again.

    • You might actually score two agendas in one turn! If you loaded a Project Beale last turn, you could score it along with a 2/1 and then get another 2 pointer ready! That's right, her ability is a "whenever, not a "once per turn". But what if you don't have the next agenda in hand?

  • She can install anything! You might install a piece of ICE saving a and several s if you've got a deep server thanks to the "ignoring all costs" clause. You'll get an advancement token on it to boot. This will benefit advanceable ICE but could also potentially be used to work your way towards a job on Mars.

  • You could install an asset or an upgrade and advance it, even if it is not advanceable. The runner will have no idea what is going on. He or she will need to try and run the server anyway to trash Arella. If you don't have the agenda in hand or if you are confident that they'll breach the server, install a Prisec or Urtica Cipher or NGO Front or something fun.

• Political Operative will trash her but not before you get the one use out of her.

Cons

• While not a region, she is unique, so you can only have one of her rezzed. I think we're all glad that this is the case.

• Unlike with SanSan you won't typically score agendas the turn you install them unless you add other cards to the mix. This is good and bad. Good because Clot doesn't hamper your game plan but bad because the runner has a turn to react.

• The influence cost is pretty high at 3 pips. I think this is where it should be.

• Councilman can stop her, though it'll be expensive since the runner still needs to trash her later.

And I'm certain there are other notable interactions worth mentioning but I'm not as familiar with the card pool as I used to be. In conclusion, this is an amazing upgrade. Because of her versatility, I consider her to be better than SanSan, which is a rather significant statement. I wish it had a trash cost of 3 or 4 so that she would be easier to snipe out of R&D or her remote server.

A fun card with a potentially powerful effect. I've been playing a few games on jnet and trying to get this to work in conjunction with Wari. With Wari installed I can do the following:

-Use Silhouette, 419 or other expose to learn the subtype of a piece of ICE not guarding HQ.

-Spend 1 to play Embezzle and make a run on HQ, paying my way through any defenses.

-Use Wari to add the above referenced ICE to HQ.

-Name ICE and hope to reveal two ICE. Trash them and gain 8s.

In practice, it is difficult to pull of and probably not worth it. The few times I made the successful Embezzle run, I revealed just one ICE, netting me just 3s, an uninstalled ICE, and a trashed ICE. However, the play just felt good, and I'm going to try it a few more times in hopes to reveal 2 ICE.

Realistically though:

Using Embezzle with Wari gives you a bit more information and a bit higher chance of success. But in general you don't have a lot of knowlege of what is in HQ. So just throwing Embezzle out there is probably not worth it unless HQ is unguarded. And with the now balanced Account Siphon released, you probably won't find HQ unguarded anymore (especially versus Criminals where the restrictive influence cost will keep this card).

So I'm throwing Embezzle in the jank pile; where I happen to live.

Six years ago I was surfing Amazon looking for games. I've always loved board/card games and was looking to start a collection of "real" games. Games that the developers had actually put thought into. Games that were focused on more than just the roll of the dice. I ended up buying Ticket to Ride - India: Map Collection Volume 2, Thurn and Taxis and one other game. The game had cool looking artwork, a fun theme and looked to be amazing amounts of fun. It reminded me of old trading card games I had tried to get into in the past. This game of course was Android Netrunner.

I was not disappointed. Everything about the game was excellent. The asymmetrical game play, high-stake gambles, and exciting card combinations. Sadly, I didn't get to play it very much. I've never had the time or even real desire to play competitively. Not too many of my friends were into that kind of game. I purchased cards up to Honor and Profit before stopping. It sat sadly on my shelf while I looked longingly at it. Then a friend of mine found something. OCTGN; a way to play Android Netrunner online against other players. My love was revived and I spent a ton of time playing Netrunner again. OCTGN worked pretty well, but it was far from perfect. Eventually I found netrunnerdb.com, a place where I could read and write reviews of my favorite cards, along with finding cool ideas for deck building. The site continues to be one of my most frequented. I saw mention of another site, here on netrunnerdb; the site was jinteki.net. For months I just assumed it was another site similar to this one. When i finally actually visited it, and was sad it had taken me so long. Jinteki.net is so great. A strong player base, dedicated coders, and a perfect place to play Netrunner anytime.

Today 6/8/18, I stumbled upon a sad article in my Google news. FFG's license on Android Netrunner is expiring and the game is coming to an end later this year. Reign and Reverie will be the last content added to the game. Why can't this license be renewed? I don't know. I wish that the game would continue forever. I have taken breaks from the game over the years. I currently haven't played in a few months (curse you, Rocket League). I've definitely done my share of complaining. But really I've always loved the game. I hope to continue playing on jnet for years to come.

Thanks to the developers and artists and all others who made the game possible. Thanks to the people behind jnet, netrunnerdb and other fan sites. And thanks to the Netrunner community.

I've always like Silhouette. As @Kikai mentioned, the 40 card deck size is rather rare and quite valuable, allowing you to get your essential pieces in play quickly. But I also really like her ID ability.

Expose is an underutilized mechanic. Deck slots are tight and there is often little or no room to include an expose mechanism. And many times that is fine. You may not need it every game. But often it is crucial. I've long had an issue with Mushin. The gamble this forces on the runner has tremendously high stakes. The corporation could score a Vanity Project next turn, or do four brain damage, or eight net damage. If any of these things happen, the corp has likely just won. High stakes are fine; that is often what Netrunner is about. But Mushin does this for free, while saving 2 s, and most importantly, can be done on turn one. Anyway, Mushin is mostly a dead draw versus Silhouette. A few corp decks revolve around Mushin as their sole win condition, so you may get an easy win in such cases.

Recent additions to the card pool have made her ability even more relevant. The biggest example is NGO Front. Glacier has become popular again thanks to cards like NGO Front and Jinja City Grid. Whether the runner takes the bait and wastes 15 s or not, the corp still profits. Knowing whether or not to commit to running at that huge server may end up saving you the game.

Everyone's favorite turtle is at home in most decks, but gets a nice boost in Silhouette. You will often end up scoring two counters on a successful HQ run. I'm not sure if she is holding Blackguard or Zamba or something else in her hands, but either synergizes nicely with her ability (with Zamba being far less janky). Both cards make her ability useful even if you don't find you need the extra info in a given game. I like to use a Sneakdoor to make those HQ runs easier.

Try her out. I think you'll find she does well in the current meta.