Ichi is strictly better, might be passable in second identity way way down the line with more bioroids.

Ichi is not strictly better. Putting the cards on top of the deck slows the runner down. They have to redraw, play, and pay install cost. This essentially costs them a whole turn (or more).

If you just trash their programs, they'll keep going through their deck, pulling out more tricks and econ cards.

This card also circumvents sacrificial construct (core). That makes it worth a second glance in my opinion.

One of the strongest Sentries out there, but with the HB Achilles heal. Works really well targeting Djinn, which might have to trash its hosted programs. Or any expensive ICE really. Nice!

Still dont like him, he's the right mentality, wrong practice. Ill be gin my dissection, Sentry bioroid, costs one more then ichi for one more strength and one less [Subroutine], next issue, is that his ability only slows not turns kills programs, and yes you can use whatever justification you want for why that is not strictly worse, but i would rather break my opponents attack avenues then disarm them. The third and biggest nail in sherlock's coffin is his [Subroutine]'s themselves. They are not regular abilities. They are traces. A trace should be on something that is game changing and terrifying because they are so easy to ignore... Given that Kate is the current strongest runner who actively ignores almost all attempts at tracing her and with the new mem chip all runners should have some link. sherlock is rendered almost a complacently moot point and useless, until further notice.

I'm honestly not sure how you could think that, unless you are misunderstanding something. First trace 4 are some of the strongest base traces, but that's really not the issue here. Lets look at a situation where the runner has copies of the two cards you get rid of in their hand. You trash both programs and then next turn they just spend the two clicks to install them, and however much money, done, and all is back as normal. On the other hand, you use this card. Now that same thing happens, BUT they have to spend an additional two clicks to draw the exact same two cards, to get through them. So you have cost them two additional clicks overall. Now couple that with the fact that information is power in this game, knowing the cards your opponent will draw is ALWAYS beneficial. Now, I think that NBN is the best place for Sherlock, but he is still a great card.

That the runner has the exact programs I choose to trash in hand is quite an assumption and a pretty unlikely scenario, and if they don't Ichi is a lot better. Is this really going to be a point of contention?

That's just a nitpick. The point is that no matter what you are forcing the corp to draw through two known cards already. If you can't find the benefit in that, then, sucks I guess.

Sherlock's function is not to kill the runner's programs as Ichi, Sherlock is a completely different beast. His role is to drain as much of the runner's economy as he can. if the runner has clicks he will spend them definitely. if he hasn't he will spend money to break him and if he cannot he will spend as much money as he can to beat the trace. you don't want the runner to lose the trace, you actually want him to succeed but remain as moneyless as possible in doing so

It's just a nitpick that Ichi is better except in one very specific scenario? I'm not sure we're using the same dictionary here. If the Runner doesn't have a Code Gate breaker in hand, then I'm probably making them draw more than 2 cards before they can reliably start running again. Do you really think that knowing the runner's next two draws is better than denying them cards that they need to win the game?

Sherlock is no better at draining economy as Ichi, he's less expensive (credit wise) to break with Ninja, and not more for other killers, and if the Runner can really not afford to allow Sherlock's ability, then it stands to reason that Ichi's ability would hit him even harder. You can't assume people are going to overpay to break traces, he's definitely not going to pay much more than it'll cost him to get the program back into play, which he'll have to spend anyway if you destroy a crucial program with Ichi.

Those two Trace4 are quite intriguing when you have ChiLo City Grid installed on a server... I'm gonna try it out in my NBN deck.

NDBurns, it's that you can't seem to understand the benefit of knowledge in this game. All the statistics in the world won't help you when you've been outhinked.

I'm not even using statistics, it's simply obvious that Ichi's effect is better in almost all circumstances. Knowing the top cards of the runner's deck is hardly fantastic knowledge anyway as there are no ways currently to look at the runner's hand, so it's hardly like you can be certain they won't have an inside job or similar. How do you suspect you'd play different knowing the top 2 cards of the runners deck?

If I destroy a Fracter with Ichi when I have a bunch of barriers out, and the runner has no way of getting another, that often wins the game by itself. Do you really believe that knowing the top 2 cards of the runner's deck comes anywhere near that level of power?

The only REAL, tangible, benefit that Sherlock has is that single point of STR that puts him out of Icecarver + Mimic range. For ichi to have that, you have to be running Stronger Together.

I think that it's a hate card more focused against anarch. As long as you don't bounce back noise's viruses. (mediums are still acceptable targets tough)

It bypasses trash prevents, has one more strength, and hi-value traces for stuff like Chilo City Grid. Maybe new cards that focus on trace and trash prevention will make this one better, currently Ichi is definitely better. Still you can have only 3x of Ichi so this card might still be usefull, but it can be broken by clicks, click + E3, paying those traces if you dont like your money, or having high link and some money, pretty expensive for icebreakers, but too many holes IMO, if it was cheaper, but it costs 6... not the biggest fan of.

The only few cases when putting card on top of deck is worse than trashing the card is when the card was useless in the first place or runner has another copy of this card in hand. In both cases it only wastes him one click... and one real threat is playing against anarch who can force you bounce his viruses becouse thats all he has and card doesnt say may so you have to do it... how stupid is that...

@Zephyr, the point of pushing a program to the top of the Runner's stack is that it reduces the efficiency of the Runner's draw, and lets you know exactly what the Runner will be drawing. Yes, it's potentially a card the Runner needs, but it lengthens the time the Runner may need to get to other critical cards in the stack.

Also, note that it's the Corp, not the Runner, that picks the program to be put to the top of the stack - and if it's hosting anything, those obviously go away (the FAQ does not clarify the specific case of a program being sent to the top of the stack, but I believe that any hosted cards would be trashed). Against an Anarch using Djinn, that could be devastating.

This ice is very much a late-game ice that goes as one of the outermost ice on a heavily protected server. The later the game goes, the more valuable clicks are, so just clicking through it will not be an easy choice late game. This effectively forces either an expensive use of a breaker, or running the risk of a high strength trace that could potentially end the run by taking out the one program the Runner really needed to get into the server.

Still, if even a single trace of sherlock manages to be successful, it means at least a single scored agenda for the corp

With all the program recursion effects in the game now, this might be worth another look. Normal program destruction is counterable by things like Clone Chip, but this isn't, the runner will have to reinstall it at full price.

With clone chip, they'd have to reinstall it at full price anyway, and then they used up their clone chip.

However, Clone Chip can be used to get the program back in the same run it was destroyed. With Sherlock, you know it's gone for at least this run.

You know that Morningstar or Femme that came into play cheap on a Personal Workshop or via Test Run/Scavenge, or how about that Virus with a pile of tokens on it, or maybe that breaker with a copy of The Personal Touch or three? That'd be the one you stick back on top of the deck.

 

It's a strength 5 sentry with a pair of trace-4 subroutines, and it can ruin the runner's day.