This ruling doesn't make any sense.

blackguard: "the corp must rez by paying its rez cost, if able"

archer: "as an additional cost to rez Archer, the corp must forfeit an agenda"

Both texts contain "must", where does the choice of not forfeiting an agenda come from? What would even happen with the archer card?

This ruling doesn't make any sense.

 

blackguard: "the corp must rez by paying its rez cost, if able"

archer: "as an additional cost to rez Archer, the corp must forfeit an agenda"

 

Both texts contain "must", where does the choice of not forfeiting an agenda come from? What would even happen with the archer card?

It's the same as with the Fetal AI. The runner doesn't have to steal it even if has enough credits in the pool. Which is usually some marginal situations or when the net damage that will follow-up the stealing kills the runner.

I'm not sure I can find it in the rulling but all 'additional' costs are always subject to the payer's choice, one does not have to pay them in case they don't want to, but should one refuse, the result doesn't trigger either.

So whenever you force something that has an additional cost, your opponent may end up not having to pay any costs at all.

In this case the Archer can stay unrezzed where it was if the corp doesn't rez unlike with the FAO where if not rezzed the ice has to be trashed.

So this console is expensive and highly situational. Why is it rated 4 stars?

Perhaps with Lemuria Codecracker for a reusable expose trigger... but it makes The Toolbox look like a bargain.

So this console is expensive and highly situational. Why is it rated 4 stars?

 

Perhaps with Lemuria Codecracker for a reusable expose trigger... but it makes The Toolbox look like a bargain.

The situation, however, is that the Corp has cards in play and that the Runner is hitting HQ with this and Lemuria, not exactly a difficult combination.

Forcing the Corp to rez repeatedly can wreck its plans and its economy. It's also a great setup for things like Emergency Shutdown, Crescentus, Parasites, and Silverware suites, and it ruins any element of surprise -- Komainu? Here comes a Parasite, and the Runner doesn't even have to burn a Clone Chip mid run to do it.

Exposing and rezzing the Corp completely broke on a server that the Runner plans to ignore, then running for free elsewhere, is a viable strategy, and for a few clicks the Runner can put the Corp massively behind in tempo, as well as open up other opportunities.

Multiple uniques face-down on the table for the Corp? Not any more.

It is definitely a "build-around me" card, so it's quite different from Toolbox, which will benefit almost any Runner who plays it. The Toolbox is awesome, but all of its effects (+MU, +Link, recurring credits) can be achieved quite easily via other cards. Not so with Blackguard (Forged Activation Orders and False Echo come close, but both are single use only and give the Corp options). It's effect is unique and repeatable.

Try it in a deck with Escher: ridiculous

Parasite the Swordsman your Eater would have hit, every time

Is 11 credits expensive? You bet. If it weren't, this thing would be everywhere, hosing Corps left and right

It does work pretty well with Snitch, once you manage to get the damn thing on the board. But it is such a giant tempo hit that you give up early game pressure.

Also, if your deck is built around it (which it pretty much has to be), and if you struggle to find it and install it, the rest of the deck sits idle waiting for it to hit the board. Typical combo deck problem, but exacerbated by the very high install cost.

To really leverage it you want at least Snitch, probably Crescentus and / or Emergency Shutdown, and there's an array of other secondary cards such as Rook or Xanadu, the odd Criminal Run Event that increases the cost to rez ice by "X", Lemuria, Satellite Uplink, Infiltration, etc...most of which are second tier enabler cards and not first tier bomb cards. While many of them are reasonably powerful or irritating for the corp, none of them are straight up game winners...so having a pile of them ends up being pretty toothless unless paired with some kind of a solid win condition like multi-access.

You'll also need a big bursty econ package or a "cheat it out on the cheap" package to enable the install. You also need enough econ to sustain runs; to properly pull off the forced rez then de-rez and then force rez again trick you'll need to be able to compress a lot of busy work into a single turn, and you can't do that without sufficient credits.

The other kooky thing is, the card is thematically supposed to be Silhouette's console, but one of her main advantages is a 40 card minimum deck, and this console requires a pile of other cards to be useful which is anti-synergistic.  

So, high install cost, and needs not just one or two other cards to work but basically almost the entire deck dedicated to the strategy, isn't really a good fit for the runner it was supposed to be primarily intended for, and an ability that is powerful but doesn't directly win the game.

Having said that, when it does work, Blackguard can bankrupt the corp in two to three turns and completely disrupt their strategy. The combo does work, if you can get it to trigger and also trigger early enough in the game to matter. But it's very high variance. Further, some corp decks are robust enough to play around it, and fast advance isn't impacted much as long as they can protect HQ & RD long enough to squeeze out the win. Glacier can be vulnerable to it, but if Blackguard comes out too late it generally wont matter.

It is a very powerful effect IN THEORY, but IN PRACTICE it is difficult to realize its potential. Like a lot of cards though, a future printed card that synergizes with it could make it competitive. 

Agreed. I've managed to get it to work a few times, and it's very difficult for the Corp when it does, but the whole deck is built around it, and you have, quite literally, no other options -- no fallback position.

It's way too slow to be competitive, but, as KS says, a future card or two might change that . . . something like Test Run / Scavenge for Hardware . . .

Given that we just got Tyson Observatory, and it's not exactly the quickest tutor ever, we probably shouldn't hold our respective breath.

I think that's a good thing. Blackguard is immensely powerful. If it were easy to set up, it'd wreck the meta. Silhouette wins tournaments with Desperado and Doppelganger, not Blackguard.

Would we want Blackguard to be easy? I think not.

I have a question for those wiser than me. If I expose an agenda with Blackguard, does the agenda rez? Is it even possible to agendas to rez?

I ask this ahead of time for my "Blackguard and Hacktivist Meeting" -deck I've been planning.

No, Agendas cannot be rezzed, so you would only get to look at it. They do not have a Rez cost, only an advancement requirement, and that's where the other side of the "if able" comes into play. If they cannot rez it because they don't have enough credits, or if the rules disallow it, then the card is not rezzed. Hope that helps.

Yes, thank you. This helps me a lot.