I inevitably include ABT in my decks and often fire the ability. Experience has taught me that ABT does not work on the principles of probability. It works on the principle of maximisation.

Maximisation of human suffering to be specific.

When you are winning it will give you a 5 deep scoring server or R&D with Turing, NEXT Gold and Eli 1.0 on top (to maximise your opponent's suffering). When you have 3 agendas in hand and only 4 agendas left in a deck of 29 it will flip Sales Team, Jackson and Vitruvius to maximise your suffering.

Over advancing Project Vitruvius can be an answer to safely firing ABT, but after scoring a Vitruvius with two agenda counters, ABT will usually maximise your suffering by only turning up when your opponent accesses R&D.

Like an abusive partner, ABT hurts and betrays us, then turns around and does something amazing, promising us it will be good to us in the future.

I'm not sure why this agenda was included in the Core Set when there is an entire expansion dedicated to Fear and Loathing.

(Core Set only perspective here, so relevance may vary)

What you'll think this shows: "Forget the risks, full power to all the ICE!" "Yes sir. Right away sir..."

What it really shows: "Are you kidding me?!" "Oh shit. Boss drew a handful of agendas again..."

Every. Damn. Time. My precious points...right in the bin...and no easy way to get them back. If you're going to play this you really should do one or all of the following:

1. Don't do a 3-click, full-turn score on this unless you're just after the points. If things blow up in your face you'll need some clicks to salvage the mess.
2. Have at least one Archived Memories or your preferred recursion card in hand to rescue you from complete disaster.
3. ICE up archives (if you haven't already) to not make it quite so easy for the runner. Careful though, since suddenly icing up archives will clue in a lot of people to what you're about to do.

Basically, if you want to be safe with this card, you have to take a deep breath, slow things and turn it into 'Kind-of-fast-but-let's-not-be-stupid-now Beta Test'. Do I ever do any of this? Oh my, no.

What's more, I know that even if I don't have some (or even any) of these safety nets, I'll still fire the ability every time, because the chance for that free Archer and/or Tollbooth is way too tempting to pass up.

For players just using just the Core Set, this card is risky, infuriating but potentially amazing; a lot of fun. For everyone else, use one of your three Jackson Howards and enjoy your 2 points.

One of the few “Three for Two” agendas, Accelerated Beta Test was, and still is, a staple among HB Decks. While its ability may not always be used (‘Fired’ as the lingo states) the fact that it is a 3/2 Agenda is strong for all decks. The ability to put it down and advance it out entirely in either one turn with tricks like Biotic Labor or SanSan City Grid or two turns without giving away that it is an agenda (because you don’t have to advance it the first turn to score) is very powerful.

Certainly this agenda found some more consistent use after Jackson Howard came onto the scene, giving a very common and useful way to protect the corporation against a bad activation of its ‘when scored’ ability. NEXT Design: Guarding the Net so gave it some life, with the math that 22-26 pieces of ICE is the way to ensure a full effect of NEXT’s first turn. That much ICE in a deck made firing an ABT much more reliable.

As the design space moved on to exclude further 3/2’s from the new card pool, ABT remains strong even with a less than always desirable ability. It will continue to be played in HB for all time, just because of its very cost effective to point value and ability to be scored out in one turn.

(Written during the meta of The Valley, part of the SanSan Cycle. For more reviews like it, visit wyldside.blogspot.com)

This card's strength has been significantly increased with the release of Team Sponsorship. Being able to add another 3 cards to your deck besides Jackson Howard that essentially nullify the downside of firing ABT is really incredible. This card's power level has always depended largely on the available card pool (Jackson Howard makes it safe to fire) and board state (knowing your ICE to agenda ratio in R&D is crucial), and the addition of Team Sponsorship to the card pool has really pumped up the effectiveness of ABT.

An automatic 3-of in any HB deck that isn't built around a specific agenda structure. Accelerated Beta Test provides what everyone wants in a game of mixed skill and luck: variance control.

In a game where you're winning or keeping pace with the runner, ABT is a blank 3/2 agenda, which is great. You always want to be able to fast-advance or never-advance out 2 points. In other words, it adds consistency to the game.

In a game where you're losing, you can fire an ABT to increase the effect of randomness on the outcome. You might hand the runner points and lose anyway, or you might drop a Heimdall 2.0 and a Tollbooth and suddenly make your scoring remote unbreakable.

That's only the value of the card on its own. Other reviewers have touched on combos with Biotic Labor, The Foundry: Refining the Process, Team Sponsorship, and NEXT Design: Guarding the Net.

If you're building your first corp deck, start with Haas-Bioroid: Engineering the Future and 3x Accelerated Beta Test. You won't be disappointed.