Once again Weyland prove themselves to be comically evil. Poor Darwin! Let our boy free!

Secure and Protect is similar to Priority Construction. Both are double operations that allow you to install ice at a substantially reduced cost. Pri Con is a pretty reasonable card, but it doesn't see that much play. Is Secure and Protect better?

Well, Secure and Protect can only install ice protecting your centrals, meaning you can't get a discount on building your deep glacier remote like you could with Pri Con. On top of that, you don't get any advancement counters on your ice, meaning you don't get to turn on the nasty Hortum or Mausolus subroutines. Looking bad for Secure and Protect.

The fact that Secure and Protect tutors for the discounted ice is both a blessing and a curse. On the upside, you can find the perfect piece of ice to match your opponent's breakers - or lack thereof if you're rigshooting. Weyland happens to have the exceptionally taxing and cheap Meru Mati and Afshar in-faction, so good news if you want to secure HQ! Downside is you reveal the ice, so you won't surprise the runner.

On the whole, this card is not particularly exciting for any existing Weyland archetypes. Perhaps Blue Sun will want to save influence on buying in multiple Chiyashi and will use this to tutor for an Oversight AI target? Or maybe the yet to be revealed Weyland ID due in Uprising - presumably SecTech - will reward you for defending your centrals?

Well. It's happened. Netrunner has added Lootboxes. Time to ragequit like everyone else does when Lootboxes are added to a game.

Seriously though, this card looks pretty sweet. As a trap, it forces the Runner to pay credits to keep running, and gives ME credits (though I do have to make the tough choice of giving them a good card for those credits). Probably the best choice will be something that is a situational card that doesn't really hurt me in this matchup, but it will probably still be a tough choice. Loving it.

(system core 2019 perspective) Ever wanted to bang a piece of ice with a stick of toblerone until it shattered? Well now is your chance!

Synergies

I would like to think that this card and Femme Fatale are the best of buds. Femme takes care of ice that have high cost, high power and low number of subroutinrs, while toblerone takes care of the high cost, low power ice. Glacier decks beware! (Huh. Who was that? Probably just the wind

With enough deck recurrence such as Test Run and Retrieval Run, this card can be used to get rid of pesky low cost ice such as Afshar, Rime and Congratulations!. Heck, with enough deck recurrence, this card can be used to blast through low impact gear check cards such as Wall of Static and Enigma. You thought that one ice could protect your r&d for a few more turns? NOPE, your server is naked and I just played The Maker's Eye

Considerations

I feel like this card creates a really interesting set of questions to answer: Is this ice worth chiseling? Should the Corp spend his turn clearing virus counters if chisel is installed on an expensive piece of ice?

With this in mind, one of the keys of this card would be placing the Corp in a situation where cleaning the virus counters or leaving the counters be will both result in a situation that is pretty annoying for them the corp. How this can be achieved, well, I am a bit of a noobie so I don't know a good answer to that. Maybe threatening multiple servers, one with chisel and one with other resources, will be the best way for using this card.

Final thoughts

I would like to take a second to appreciate how well the art, name, flavor text and mechanic of this card go together. Kudos to NISEI for such a thought provoking and nicely designed card

Lore review:

So...this is the great problem you get when you have a game that alludes to so many fandoms at once: you never know when the things you pick up on are things only you see, or things most people see. Anyway, here goes.

The NCC-1701 on the hopper's license plate is the ship's number of Star Trek's Starship Enterprise. The hopper looks nothing like the starship...it's the wrong color, wrong shape, wrong size, you get the picture.

The quote at the bottom is from two different Star Trek episodes: the Original Series' "The Trouble with Tribbles," and Deep Space Nine's "Trials and Tribble-ations." In the former, the crew of the Enterprise finds itself at a starbase which serves as a sort of safe haven to both members of the Federation (AKA "The Good Guys") and the Klingons (AKA "The Bad Guys"). One of the Klingons, seeking to make trouble, makes the mistake of describing the Enterprise using the above quote, which prompts chief engineer Montgomery Scott to defend the honor of his vessel by starting a bar-fight.

In "Trials and Tribble-ations" the Federation and the Klingons have made peace, but somebody goes rogue, and goes back in time to install an explosive device in one of the "tribbles" (harmless self-fertilizing fuzzballs that breed like crazy) in order to kill Captain Kirk. The Deep Space Nine crew goes back in time to try to stop the killing, and encounters a lot of the same scenes that appeared in the original.

I'm not a Star Trek expert, so some of you out there can probably catch all kinds of little mistakes in there. I just remember watching "The Trouble with Tribbles" over, and over, and over again with my dad. He's a purist and he'd "kill" me if he knew I was even talking about anything other than the original series with y'all. Thanks for the nostalgia, Nisei!

NISEI rarely prints strict upgrades to previously-printed cards but that’s what Bukhgalter feels like to the now-rotated Garrote… wait a minute, haven’t I published this review before?

Jokes aside, the two criminal Killers have the exact same paid abilities that are so rare and elusive: "1: Break 1 sub" and 1: +1 strength". But that’s where the similarities end as Bukhgalter is 4 cheaper, 1 less , and pays you money for using it while Garrote gets 1 additional strength. I think the winner between the two is obvious.

Now I can already hear you saying, “Cherries, this card is OP!” Let’s take a look:

MKUltra is better vs:

• Architect*, Caduceus *

Mongoose is better vs:

• Rototurret*, Komainu (2+ subs * or 6+ subs), Tour Guide (2+ subs* or 6+ subs), Architect*, Caduceus*, Anansi*, Enforcer 1.0, Assassin

Na'Not'K (3 str) is better vs:

• Surveyor (2 str*), Nebula *, Assassin *, Anansi *, all 3 str ice, all 2 str ice *

Na’Not’K (4 str) is better vs:

• Surveyor (2 str*, 4 str, 6 str, 8 str*), Orion *, Archer, Trebuchet, Nebula *, Assassin *, Anansi *, all 3 and 4 str ice, all 2 str ice *

*Bukhgalter is better vs. these ice if it is the first piece of ice that it breaks all subs on

Ignoring the obvious offender Na’Not’K, that is not a lot of ice. Most of the ice listed above are also asterisk-marked. Does this comparison even matter though? At 4 influence, Shapers will gladly stick to their star pupil and Anarchs to theirs. But you best believe, Criminals now have their own Killer worthy of the icebreaker spotlight. If you’re running in blue, there is little reason to run anything else.

P.S. Thank you NISEI for a powerful blue card that is not under-influenced. I look forward to future sets!