Shapers have The Maker's Eye, Criminals have Legwork, Anarchs now have both. Sort of.

Climactic Showdown is a potentially powerful resource with a ton of versatility. It stacks with other forms of multi access, like The Turning Wheel, eXer or the aforementioned run events. It works on either central, thus you can pick the optimal server at the time. You also get to choose which server the corp has to trash ice for to dodge the access effect, so if the corp only has a rezzed Tollbooth or a Chiyashi on the remote, this is one of the cheapest ways to trash an expensive piece of ice.

Unfortunately, CS comes with a fair share of downsides as well. First off, the corp has a whole turn to prepare for your shenanigans. This makes it a lot worse than multi access run events, which benefit a lot from the surprise factor. Not only that, the corp has a choice in the matter. If they just installed a mediocre piece of ice on the server of your choice, they can just opt to trash that. And if they'd rather take their chances on your run, that is up to them. Also, this WILL trigger at the start of your turn, as the effect is mandatory. If something came up that makes you not want to use it yet, too bad. You could play Dr. Lovegood to blank this card so you can keep the timing a surprise, but that might be going into jank territory. Last but not least, it removes itself from game, so you have no way to recycle this.

I think this card is good enough to see play, but it won't be an anarch staple.

Tiered Subscription is one of 3 new advertisements in Downfall and at first glance, it looks quite attractive (even outside of Spark) with its strong rez/trash numbers. It’s definitely the strongest of the 0 instant-rez advertisements and that’s quite a big deal as Spark when you can drain credits turn 1 without ever losing initial tempo. Its 3 trash cost isn’t too bad either and is on-par with the other commonly played advertisements/campaigns.

However, in testing I found Tiered Sub alone does not always do enough for you. Tiered Sub’s true use is being an additional supplement to other must-trash assets. Without the latter on the board, the Runner can often ignore runs altogether until they are fully set up, leaving you creditless turn-after-turn while you were wishing you had an installed PAD Campaign instead. In that regard though, Tiered Sub can really find a home in horizontal decks who constantly require the Runner to run and interact with the must-trash assets. At 1 influence, it could be widely splashable anywhere.

What about the alternatives like Paywall Implementation or Sundew? Paywall is in most cases likely to make you more money but is 1 more influence and takes up your current slot while Tiered Sub could combo with ELP or Service Outage. Sundew is a stronger way to force the Runner’s decision-making and is the superior option in RP but is pricier in influence and isn’t in-the-black 99% of the times that Tiered Sub is.

In conclusion, you want to use Tiered Sub to put the Runner into a lose-lose situation. If they run and trash/steal your stuff, Tiered Sub makes you money; if they don’t, you steamroll them with your other tempo assets.

First off, lovely art, love me some foxes, so A+ there.

"Infinite" drip cards are strong. More so if they come with few conditions like Data Folding and Rezeki, but Trickster taka is still a strong card. Nearly every runner ( side-eyes breakerless Leela ) wants to break ice, and for that you need to pay for your ice breakers. This helps with that, similar to Cyberfeeder. Every turn this fox spawns a credit into a neat little pool. Unlike Cyberfeeder, which is 1 recurring credit, this means you don't have to run every turn to get full value out of it. But in a stroke of design brilliance on Nisei's part, you can't just lean back and twiddle your thumbs forever while this keeps ticking. After 3 turns you have to run (since it doesn't work outside of one) and use some of these credits, or you will either take a tag or have to say goodbye to the fox. You can use Taka for all programs tho, not just ice breakers, so it works with SMC, Surfer, etc.

The most exciting part for me however, is Taka's subtype: Stealth. Many stealth cards have long since rotated and it is very exciting to get a new one. Unfortunately the archetype never took off in anarch, as they have to import too many cards to make it work and I don't think this will change that. Same probay goes for criminals, although I think Switchblade is probably a lot better than BlacKat.

But I think this card will truly shine in Smoke. While Net Mercur is still the star of the show, having an secondary (infinite) source of stealth credits is really good. Especially since Smoke likes to run often and is usually not shy for influence. Taka allows you to go to the aforementioned Switchblade over Dagger, which absolutely hoses ice like Surveyor, Trebuchet and Tour Guide, and in testing i found you are able to use Net Mercur credits more freely if you have your stealth needs covered.

So in short, will definitely see play as a breaker drip card and probably also as a 1 off in Smoke.

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.