A very card-heavy approach to trade attrition in the hand for attrition in the stack. The Corp player who knows how to use net damage is still going to win this match-up.

A very card-heavy approach to trade attrition in the hand for attrition in the stack. The Corp player who knows how to use net damage is still going to win this match-up.

Well, with 6 cornflakes installed you can avoid up to 4 Snare!s that would have otherwise flatlined you. Or Ronin. Or Philotic Entanglement.

It's definitely a flatline-prevention card.

Or just run Replicator and clear about 9 cards out of your deck while at it.

Sure. I get it. The Runner trades burning down the stack for flatline prevention. From the Corp side, where I'm often not actually trying to flatline, but just trying to burn the Runner down, I like that a whole lot.

Replicator is fine, but I've run my share of Replicator as a Runner. It plays a good game of NetBuilder ™, so again, doesn't make me too sad from the Corp side.

I think this card is worth a shot, especially if you're MaxX or if you run Trope. The Corp side of me isn't sad to see this one coming out, however. It's going to be heavier, slower, and jankier in practice than most Runners might like.

I do not like this card at all. Too many card slots for too random of an effect...and it burns down my stack in the process? No thank you. 

The way I see it, this card doesn't actually prevent damage, it just transfers the location of the damage from your grip to your stack. Yes, you won't get flatlined, but against any aggressive kill deck where the runner's cards are their HP, to borrow a videogame analogy, you've just lost a whole tonne of 1UPs. I really can't see myself using this.

The way I see it, this card doesn't actually prevent damage, it just transfers the location of the damage from your grip to your stack. Yes, you won't get flatlined, but against any aggressive kill deck where the runner's cards are their HP, to borrow a videogame analogy, you've just lost a whole tonne of 1UPs. I really can't see myself using this.

Exactly. 

Works great in Kate with clone chips and levy and same old thing. Its also great Aesop's food when combined with Replicator, if you don't fear damage (and a bunch of other cheap hardware to replicate)

Also technical writer fits in nice.

To say that all this card does is transfer the location of the damage sells the effect short. There are no flatlines in R+D. -and as we know from Maxx things in the trash arent a problem if the deck is set up for that play- Which shaper is...

I do genuinely appreciate attempts to find uses for cards that have generally been dismissed as bad. Put it in a deck, see how it fares, and maybe it turns out that it's alright. The fact that Chairman Hiro, once regarded as an enormous liability, is now a key part of many Jinteki kill decks is testament to this.

With that said, while I would like to share your optimism, I still think this card falls short, and that's mostly because the ability to get any value out of it is entirely dependent on the choices your opponent has made in their deck construction. As you've correctly identified, its considerable downside is best mitigated by playing it out of faction. Therefore, the question that must be asked is - are you going to devote several points of influence and deck slots to a card which, in many match ups, will do absolutely nothing whatsoever? Will this improve or weaken your deck's overall power and consistency? I realise the same point about uselessness could be made regarding Plascrete, but it offers four points of protection in a single card, and even then most of the time it's a very begrudging include.

Does Aesop's go some way toward redeeming it if your opponent is not playing a damage deck? A little, I guess, but you'd have got more money and spent half the card slots and influence by slotting Cache or Harbinger.