Welcome to Card Game DB
Register now to gain access to all of our features. Once registered and logged in, you will be able to create topics, post replies to existing threads, give reputation to your fellow members, get your own private messenger, post status updates, manage your profile and so much more. If you already have an account, login here - otherwise create an account for free today!
Register now to gain access to all of our features. Once registered and logged in, you will be able to create topics, post replies to existing threads, give reputation to your fellow members, get your own private messenger, post status updates, manage your profile and so much more. If you already have an account, login here - otherwise create an account for free today!
Film Critic
Submitted
Guest
, -- | Last updated --
![]() |
Film CriticType: Resource: Connection Cost: 1 Faction: Runner Shaper Faction Cost: 1 Film Critic can host a single agenda. Whenever you access an agenda, you may host that agenda on Film Critic (the agenda is no longer being accessed and is uninstalled). [Click] , [Click] : Add an agenda hosted on Film Critic to your score area. “My gerbil could write a better screenplay.” Set: Old Hollywood Number: 86 Quantity: Illustrator: Georgi Georgiev |
Recent Decks Using This Card: Peacemaker Hayley katie cheap v2 PanTheory Sunny's Army So Far So Good Valencia v1.3 |
|
Want to build a deck using this card? Check out the Android: Netrunner deckbuilder! |
Netrunner is a TM of R. Talsorian Games, Inc. Android is TM & ©2012 Fantasy Flight Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. Netrunner is licensed by Wizards of the Coast LLC. ©2012 Wizards.
28 Comments
Wait.. what? Why would you want to do that?
Is it because of these new ambush-agendas or am i missing something?
Quantum Predictive Model (Data and Destiny), Award Bait, Explode-a-palooza, Fetal AI, etc. It also circumvents "stealing an Agenda" effects, like Argus Security, NAPD Contract, Red Herrings, Midseason Replacements, Punitive Counterstrike, and so on. Because with Film Critic, you don't steal agendas anymore - you are adding them to your score area.
But if the Film Critic is trashed, the hosted card is also trashed to it's place of origin. So, do not waste too much time reviewing that next movie hit or it might escape your grip.
Exactly. Very strong, a little slow and situational, but it's a hard counter to a lot of Agenda steal-taxing. Poor synergy with Turntable; puts Jinteki PE on the Boulevard of Broken Dreams.
Busts Strongbox.
This is a wait and see card for me. It's an obviously useful effect, but it is entirely meta dependent and it does charge a significant tempo tax. Very toolboxy.
From a game design standpoint I do not like it. This is a very rules-y sort of effect, and the fluff just doesn't jive with my head canon of the A:NR setting. Feels very forced to me. Not a fan.
Beats Future Perfect and NAPD contract so it'll be very strong against RP which has been a/the top deck for a while. Seems like a direct response. Though now Butchershop is possibly better better anyway?
Let's not forget that if Iain Stirling hosts agendas on this then his ability is active throughout a good majority of the game. Personally I think anything that turns off all the cards AP mentioned, in addition to the wretched Future Perfect, is worth it for that alone. Meta dependent, yes, but at present the meta relevant to this card is located at: everywhere.
Yeah, but we've seen this before in A:NR. A new meta fixer enters the pool, there is much hype, people stress about how it wrecks a particular deck or card, in response people stop playing that deck or card, subsequently no one plays the meta fixer anymore, eventually the wrecked deck or card creeps back in to the meta, things reach a sort of equilibrium.
So, yeah, it's good. If it doesn't come in and go out of fashion I'll react accordingly, but in the meantime I'll wait and see how the meta fluxes before rebuilding my decks.
One thing I wonder is, if Film Critic gets trashed, does its hosted agenda go to archives, or is it removed from the game? My assumption is that it goes to archives but some clarification would be good.
My call would be for Archives, since game-removal conditions are usually explicit. The Agenda is hosted and not installed, so it should bounce to Archives, and Jackson Howard can have his own private war with the film critics . . .
Speaking of which, it is not unique, so you can handle multiple accesses with multiple critics.
FAQ, Page 3: Non-Resolvable Abilities - Conditional abilities resolve after meeting their trigger condition. However, if the game state advances past the trigger condition due to simultaneous effects or a chain reaction, then the triggered ability cannot be resolved.
Example: The Runner hits a Tollbooth that she can bypass with Femme Fatale. Both cards have the same trigger condition, but because it is the Runner's turn the Femme Fatale resolves first. The ice is bypassed, and since the game state has progressed to a new step of the run, the trigger condition for Tollbooth is no longer valid and the ability to force the Runner to pay credits does not resolve.
What that means for Film Critic: The runner accesses a Fetal AI. The trigger conditions for both, Fetal AI's damage and Film Critic's "host it on FC, and it's no longer accessed", are met. However, due to the fact it's the Runner's turn, his ability (Film Critic) resolves first. Therefore, the trigger condition for Fetal AI is no longer valid (as it is no longer accessed) and the ability to do 2 net damage does not resolve.
Nothing official. But after reading that passage, it seems finally clear to me.
That is my reading of it too, as I have written on the Casting Call page. Just keep in mind that it will wok the other way round if you access it due to An Offer You Can't Refuse.
So, I'll just put this here:
Film Critic protects New Angeles City Hall from getting self-trashed by stealing an Agenda, (which has always been the bad thing about NACH -- sure, you can use Fall Guy, but Film Critic does more).
New Angeles City Hall protects Film Critic (and itself, and every other Resource) from being trashed by tags. It also saves clicks for clearing tags, (which, you know, might be important to Runners who use Vamp or Account Siphon).
So, I guess, bring it, tag storm. I am ready.
I'm not saying you're wrong, because the ruling could go either way, although the text you're quoting is specific to non-access situations. And I understand that you're talking about a card effect, so let's have a look at other card effects:
Can the Runner trash an accessed card with Demolition Run before any ‘when accessed’ conditional abilities resolve?
No. The card must be accessed before Imp, Demolition Run, or any other similar effect can be used to trash it, just as if the Runner was paying its trash cost (FAQ, pg. 12).
That looks an awful lot like you don't have to resolve the Runner's card-effect fully when the condition trigger of an accessed card is met. Read the text on Imp and Demo Run: you access the card and then trash it, but the Access triggers of the accessed card still fire. The process of the card text is "interrupted." Timing priority seems to have little to do with Access, which, here, always occurs prior to the Runner's card effect. The text you quoted is correct, but it is directed at non-access situations.
The text on Demo Run is particularly direct: "You may trash, at no cost, any cards you access (even if the cards cannot normally be trashed)." Yet Fetal AI appears to break that chain, because accessing an Agenda isn't encountering a piece of ICE, or any other phase of the game.
I'm not saying FFG will be consistent here, but both Imp and Demo Run have card effects that cannot be fully resolved until they are "interrupted" by Access triggers. Otherwise, how would Fetal AI harm you? You've already trashed it, according to Imp/Demo Run, and its damage callout is inactive in Archives. Access is a special situation, and Access triggers always fire, even if the Runner has a card with a series of events listed on it. The Runner needs an "instead of accessing" callout to avoid access triggers.
All of this is hinted at the organization of step 4.5 of the run:
4.5 Access cards, then go to [5].
• If an AGENDA is accessed, the Runner STEALS it. If a card with a TRASH COST is accessed, the Runner may pay its trash cost to TRASH it.
First you Access, then you find out if what you accessed is an Agenda. 4.5 is when the conditional triggers of the Agenda fire. 4.5+ is when the Runner's card "discovers" that it's an Agenda. Notice that it's on the same line as the trash cost information; ergo Imp and Demo Run get hit by conditional triggers at 4.5, then activate their trash option at 4.5+.
Film Critic says "Whenever you access an Agenda." It doesn't "know" that an Agenda is being accessed until 4.5+, which is a subsequent "situation" to the access at 4.5. That is, drilling down into this, just like Imp or Demo Run, The Runner accesses "a card," which may fire its access-conditional triggers. Then, just like Demo Run and Imp, Film Critic "discovers" that what it has accessed is (or is not) an Agenda at step 4.5+, and may now do its thing. Imp and Demo Run may trash (even an Agenda); Film Critic may host.
Now, some will wonder why Film Critic has the text "turning off" Access: well, what would happen at Step 4.5 of any subsequent run if the Runner were still accessing the card hosted on Film Critic? The conditional triggers would fire, that's what, so Film Critic would be rather a considerably more restrictive bottleneck than it already is with the double-click to add. At the same time, whether there were conditional triggers or not, the Runner would be forced to "Steal" the Agenda off of Film Critic or, perhaps, host it on another copy of Film Critic at 4.5+: the rabbit hole goes deep, so the card turns Access off.
TL;DR: Film Critic works like all other cards vis-a-vis conditional triggers on Access.
I always thought that was the intent behind Film Critic as well. I hope the ruling aligns with your analysis Meadbeard, as I believe the card is meant to avoid stealing triggers, not stealing and access triggers.
Whether it does or not, hey, thanks for reading
I agree that AP's argument is perfectly rational.
Step 4.5 of the Run is, however, very poorly parsed for Timing Priority, and that's why this one will need an answer in the next FAQ. Agendas appear on line 2, along with trashing, and that's a problem.
What constitutes "advancing the game state" is also a bit nebulous: In the example AP gives, the Run is involved in another step (i.e., it has advanced from 3 to 3.2), and the quote says "since the game state has progressed to a new step of the run." Here, we're still hanging around in Step 4.5, so how are we defining "advancing the game state?" That's an issue. Instead of bullet-points, the rules easily could have called those 4.6, 4.7, etc. Step 4.5 is poorly parsed.
Film Critic is currently in all of my Runner decks, irrespective of the answer, but I'd rather the Corp player know how this is supposed to work. (If it does indeed avoid access triggers, it is one of most powerful Runner cards in existence and will be in every single competitive deck for some time to come, which is a little sad).
You make an interesting read Meadbeard, but the FAQ excerpt is specific for trash effects, which are handled by the standard game workflow - a card is accessed, any abilities resolve and only then a trash condition is checked. The way I see it Imp and Demolition Run are meant to do "give the card being accessed a Trash 0 icon, replacing an already existing one"(there is no "when accessed" on them, just a pointer that the event occurs at a step during 4.5). This means that the game state must advance to the trashing step for those two cards to do their job.
Regarding Film Critic, I still support Python's reading. Also there are only 6 agendas with the "when accessed" trigger - 4 NBN and 2 Jinteki and also one additional NBN card - Franchise City. I will skip the NBN analysis - anyway the Corp will be more annoyed that the "stolen agenda" conditions will be evaded which we all agree is the intent of FC. It is the two Jinteki agendas - Fetal AI and Future Perfect, that the "avoid access" effect of FC makes me even more convinced that this is the way it should work.
These two agendas are the usual choice for most Replicating Perfection decks, which seems to be (after the recent card releases) the hardest deck to play against currently and are without a doubt considered 5-star agendas from their release to this day. It makes perfect sense - slightly reduce the value of two powerful cards, providing the meta a tool to shift itself.
So the question about whether Film Critic turns off "when accessed" conditions is a question should Fetal and Future Perfect have a hard counter.
Good responses: I'm happy to have made the counter-case, even if it ultimately fails.
Agreed that they should have a hard counter but I think that FC does that even without turning off the "when accessed" conditions of those two agendas. For Fetal AI, it shuts down the 2 credits to steal which fires from anywhere. Fetal would only have the 2 net damage if FC is ruled as meadbeard states. For Future Perfect, FC completely shuts it down because even if it allowed the "when accessed" trigger, the runner could always bet 0 and then still host the agenda on FC since the bet only prevents a steal.
"We'll see". This one will just all come down to a ruling, so no point worrying about it until then.
Hey guys! I got a response from Lukas on this (I simply referred him to the thread):
That moves against my reading and for AP's. Always great to get these things fully worked out.
That fits, thank you for taking time to contact Lukas on clarifying this. I am still a bit bothered about the interaction with An Offer You Can't Refuse and Fetal AI (for FP still does nothing in that case) - any word about that?
EDIT: After reading through the rulebook on Optional and Required Conditional abilities, it seems that player priority matters, so the AOYCR case means that upon accessing Fetal AI the Runner takes 2 damage, then Film Critic activates and finishes the job. The Future Perfect is basically a blank card in this case (except for Nisei Division ID, which may gain 1 credit from the Psi game).
Since the agenda is consindered not stolen, it shuts down cards like Punitive Counterstrike, Midseason Replacement, and the like, correct? And, sadly, it allows a corporate current to stay in play...