This is powerful, but won't be as crazy-strong as its early gameplay looks. Yes, Ob can rez an Envelopment for $5, cause the Runner to pay $4 to break/trash it, and then tutor/install/rez a Border Control for free. Later on, they can trash the Border Control to end a run and tutor/install/rez a $3 ice for free. Their $5 ended up paying for 3 ice (2 installed from R+D clicklessly), BUT in a funky series of pawnings where only one was ever on the table and in the exact opposite order I'd usually want to play these cards. This is an unusual economic flow with lots of on-paper income but I think runners might find reasonable counterplay over time. It might not be much harder to deal with than Blue Sun turning each Oversight AI or Building Blocks into a quick $7-14. But... Blue Sun made $7-14 by playing a bunch of inefficient cards that are not by themselves very good. Few, if any, of Ob's cards are inherently bad and the value they get from the Ob ability is not the easiest to play around.
It may be too much ID value.
- Any time you detonate a Urban Renewal, you can clicklessly install Drago Ivanov. If you already have End of the Line, this will probably be fatal unless they have counterplay. UPDATE: This was strong enough that Drago got banned.
- I suspect this card will eventually get removed not because it's overwhelmingly powerful (although it certainly is quite strong), but because it adds more complications to designing/balancing cards than any other identity I can think of. Ob has to be checked on basically every self-trashing card (particularly those that can trash during a run), any cheap cards which can uninteractively cause damage, and any cards which would cause unanticipated problems if a major identity could readily install them during a run, and any cards which would benefit unusually much from early tutoring (Urban Renewal). Hell, at this point, I'd check for Ob problems on any installable card printed at $0 or $3.
- Border Control is already one of the strongest ices ever printed and giving it the ability to also find/install/rez a $3 card pushes it into the stratosphere. Envelopment was one of the only ices good against Endurance and nobody but Ob could feasibly play it. (Endurance has since been banned, but before March 2023, Endurance was absolutely everywhere).
- Even average assets jump a tier or two when they gain 2-3 basic clicks worth of value. Even a mere Marilyn Campaign or Launch Campaign becomes a well-compensated tutor card. Ob has an unusually wide array of assets that have much more upside than normal if not killed. (Regolith Mining License, Marilyn Campaign, Nico Campaign, Launch Campaign, MCA Austerity Policy, etc). It's a Weyland ID with an unusually strong pool of $3-5 ice and much stronger-than-normal $1-2 assets, and a life-changing amount of tutoring flexibility/consistency. This looks like more ID value than most top IDs get, and its card pool is surprisingly flexible. Update: Ob got restricted in Eternal. It's pretty good.
- Even with Drago banned, you have the ability to reach kill/pain cards so quickly and reliably that negligible cards like Urban Renewal are probably harder to respond to than they were intended/meant to be.
Obstacles:
- Your Ob chains run from most expensive to least expensive. A couple of problems with this. A lot of your funds could be tied up for up to 4 turns in an Envelopment which the runner doesn't HAVE to trash. Ob chains will probably delay your cheaper ice, which usually would have been most cost-effective in the early game. Maskirovka looks like a good ice! But when you're trashing a Border Control on like turn 5 it's probably not the ice you'd love to have then.
- You're building around an ID ability which can only be triggered once per turn. Runners can easily force a trash on Envelopment and it is only good at all while your ID ability is still available and a liability otherwise.
- Pre-rezzed ice make it much easier for runners to budget and aim Boomerangs/etc.
- Besides Border Control and (far less so) Stavka, most of Weyland's "trash a card" cards are not inherently great, and very few self-trashing cards are printed at $3, so Ob chains will probably mostly be limited to $5-4-3 (Envelopment -> Border Control -> any $3 card) or 2-1-0 (economic asset -> Urban Renewal -> Gaslighting or Rashida).
- The runner has a lot of influence over when the self-trashing ice are allowed to fire (or forced to fire). Architects of Tomorrow would be a really good ID if runners triggered it every turn, but they don't and it sucks. Svyatogor Excavator and self-trashing economic assets are harder to work around, however.
- In timed play, the amount of shuffling and deck-searching will probably be ridiculous. Tutoring is not a fast process. Thinking through which card to tutor takes some time too.
Card reference (*asterisk on cards which prematurely end the Ob chain unless you have some other effect to trash them).
- $0 -
Drago, Gaslight, Rashida, Spin Doctor, Svyatogor Excavator, Sandburg, Angelique, Snare
- $1 - Urban Renewal, Reconstruction Campaign, Launch Campaign, MCA Austerity Policy, Wall to Wall*, Bladderwort*
- $2 - Regolith, Marilyn Campaign, Drudge Work, Nico Campaign
- $3 - Mavirus, Bass Chiriyoga, Reaper Function, Crisium Grid*, Afshar*, Akhet*
- $4 - Border Control, Mausolus*
- $5 - Envelopment
Reconstruction Contract may be the card you're looking for instead of Alexa Belsky. You can trash to move 0 counters and trigger Ob. Saves influence if nothing else, and spare meat damage from, for example, a random Azef Protocol could potentially power it up.
— tzeentchling