Mumba Temple

Mumba Temple 1[credit]

Asset: Alliance - Facility
Trash: 3
Influence: 2

This card costs 0 influence if you have 15 or fewer ice in your deck.

2[recurring credit]

Use these credits to rez cards.

Those who are the wisest know the least.
Illustrated by Yog Joshi
Decklists with this card

Kala Ghoda (kg)

#18 • English
Startup Card Pool
Standard Card Pool
Standard Ban List (show history)
Printings
Rulings
  • Updated 2017-04-28

    NAPD Most Wanted List - Level 1: Each copy of this card costs 1 universal influence, which is separate & in addition to the normal printed influence, and counts against all Identities influence limits, even those in the same faction. [MWL v1.2]

  • Updated 2017-05-01

    UFAQ [Damon Stone]

    If the Runner accesses an Alliance card from HQ, is the Corp required to tell the Runner how much influence that card is worth in their deck? What about if the Runner accesses an Alliance card from R&D?

    No. It is assumed that the Corp's deck is legal, and the influence value on the card is irrelevant for the purposes of gameplay.

    What happens if the Corp no longer has enough cards in their deck to satisfy the Alliance requirement for a card due to cards being removed from the game?

    Nothing happens. Just like with Cerebral Static against The Professor, the deck building aspect of a card only matters during deck building and not during the game.

Reviews

When you're measuring the value of economy assets, one of the most important metrics is the break-even time: how many turns does this need to survive to pay off?

Here are some examples. Assuming you rez them at the end of the runner's turn, PAD Campaign and Adonis Campaign both put you one credit down. The next turn, you've recovered the rez cost of the PAD and are 2 up with the Adonis. In contrast, Eve Campaign puts you three credits down, and takes another two turns to over the rez cost. If they don't immediately trash it, Sundew breaks even on the first turn it's out. And so on.

In practice, most economy assets don't pay out unless the runner leaves them alone for at least a turn or two. The cards which do offer positive returns immediately (Mental Health Clinic, Launch Campaign, and Expo Grid) tend to have notable disadvantages: increasing hand size, low trash cost, or an additional trigger requirement.

But then there is Mumba Temple. The very first time you rez it, you're one credit up. No tempo hit, no drawback, no tricky trigger requirement. And then, if it stays rezzed, you effectively get another 2 a turn forever, as you rez ice, assets, and upgrades. You can even use it to reduce the tempo hit on PAD or Adonis Campaigns.

Of course, you have to decide between paying 2 influence for each copy, or capping yourself at 15 ice. Fifteen ice is not quite enough for a heavy glacier build, but for any sort of horizontal deck (Whitetree, NEH, Gagarin) that's more than enough. And honestly, this card is good enough that it's worth 2 influence apiece anyway.

I expect to see this card in most asset-spam decks for the next little bit. Maybe I'll dust off Whizzard again...

(Kala Ghoda era)
Yea this is going to see play in my Gagarin deck, which was only 17 ice to begin with. Might take some tinkering to make it fit properly though, and this isn't an asset you can just play naked and expect to keep. However, with paywall stacked on top of Gagarin's ability, I think we can make it taxing enough for many runners. —