The first and obvious benefit of this card is in making Yog.0 strong enough to break Lotus Field, but that's not all there is to Net-Ready Eyes.

In general, Anarchs do benefit a great deal from splashing this card, since it makes both Mimic, Yog.0, Knight and Morning Star much better.

The +1 to the strength is also quite useful for cards like Femme Fatale, Sage or Creeper, which pay 2 to raise their strength, or with all Icebreakers in general if you wanna save some money. Taking 2 meat damage for that might be quite annoying, though, but you can always Chrome Parlor to prevent that and freely install other cybernetics as well, without damaging yourself.

Introduced in the SanSan Cycle, however, there's an interesting trio of new Icebreakers that could benefit a lot from this card. I'm talking about criminal programs revealed thanks to the System Crash draft set:

Given how their strength depends on the presence of other installed Icebreakers, you would need a lot of them to break stuff like Wormhole or Asteroid Belt. With this card they can always have at least strength 2, which allows to break quite a number of ice.

Last but not least, this card might make the Atman based rigs more popular once more, and less dependent on the number of virus counters on your Datasuckers.

All in all, Net-Ready Eyes is a simple way to save a lot of money, especially if you're an aggressive runner. Since you chose which Icebreaker will get the bonus strength when initiating the run, you can assign it to different targets each time, adjusting it to your needs. Even if it might make you discard two cards, I'd say it's a pretty good card to have... it will probably see plenty of use.

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I think this is my favorite card art. —

This is an extremely powerful card, but one that doesn't really do much on its own.

To exploit Hivemind's ability, you should use those viruses that won't consume the virus counters on it. The following is a list of those that will benefit the most from this card's presence:

  • Chakana becomes a very good fast advance counter;
  • Darwin, which usually suffers a lot from purges, won't fear 'em anymore;
  • Deep Thought... well, admittedly this one isn't such a good card;
  • Gorman Drip v1 can make you gain money with no counters on it, and you'll feel like cheating;
  • Medium to go deep down the R&D's hole;
  • Nerve Agent if what you search is not in R&D;
  • Parasite becomes an instantaneous ice killer;
  • Pheromones can have some recurring credits with no effort;

Now, Hivemind comes with one virus counter on it, free of charge, but you need a way to keep at least that single one on it, because this card does not offer a way to gain more of them. You just need a Progenitor to host it, and it will be somewhat safe from a purge.

You also should make use of Incubators and Virus Breeding Ground. The latter will work just fine, since there will always be at least 1 virus counter on your Hivemind hosted on the Progenitor.

Incubator, on the other hand, is your main source of virus counters, and once you have a few, you'll be able to do insane stuff. Let's say you have 5 virus counters on Incubator: you trash it to move all of them on Hivemind, which now will have 6. Suddenly, your Medium (which was void of any counters) is worth 6 extra cards from R&D (keep in mind you'll add another virus counter before accessing). Your Parasites will kill any piece of ice with strength 6 or lower on install.

If that's not enough, keep in mind that all the virus counters on Hivemind will are considered hosted on all other virus programs. Why is that important? Well, just imagine installing another Medium... voilà: accessing to 12 extra cards from R&D. How about that?

Not enough to satisfy your need for wanton destruction?

Well then, why don't you make a Demolition Run instead.

Of course, you could always use the counters on Hivemind with other viruses, that will consume them... like Gravedigger, for example. Yes, this Hivemind will let you do some crazy stuff, just take a look at this awesome deck: Can o' Whupass... even if just for the description!

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"If that's not enough, keep in mind that all the virus counters on Hivemind will are considered hosted on all other virus programs. Why is that important? Well, just imagine installing another Medium... voilà: accessing to 12 extra cards from R&D. How about that?" —
You would still only be able to access 6 extra cards with Medium in this scenario, because you still have to spend the virus counters on Hivemind. —
Haha nvm, I'm an idiot. You don't spend virus counters with Medium. Sorry! —
Here's a question that I just though of: how does Hivemind interact with Incubator? Incubator doesn't spend tokens for its effect... but you wouldn't get to duplicate all your tokens on Hivemind by using Incubator's ability... confusing. —
I don't think it duplicates them, because the counters aren't actually there. You use them for counting effects or can spend from Hivemind, but if you are moving them elsewhere it takes the literal ones on the card (by the way it is worded). —
Hmmm... does that mean that when you trash Incubator you also are moving all the counters on Hivemind back onto itself? What if there are multiple Hiveminds? Do the rest get drained and moved as well? —
@Zakalwe No multiple Hiveminds. The card is unique —

Just like Utopia Shard could be the strongest of all the "Shards", Utopia Fragment might as well be the strongest when it comes to "Fragments".

Adding an additional cost before the runner can steal an agenda has been proved as a very powerful mechanic by the NAPD Contract, hated by many runners and loved by many corps (ok, NBN first and foremost!).

If you install an agenda and the advance it twice, you're basically making it a clone of NAPD, telling the runner he'll have to pay 4 credits more (in addition to actually reaching it, that is). Not to mention, it works on NAPD Contract as well, and 8 credits is definitely a lot to pay for just 2 points.

You have some bad publicity? No big deal, keep advancing that NAPD, it'll just make it increasingly expensive to steal, after all.

Mushin No Shin rejoyces too, you can just use it on an agenda and place a single ice in front of it. The price to reach & steal that agenda might already be too much for the runner.

I would say it's a pretty nice ability for a 5/3 Agenda, easily worth a place in my decks. Not that you can have more than one anyway, unfortunately: Limit 1 per deck.!

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If you do happen to score it, most runners will simply give up on your scoring attempts. Bane or boon, a scored Utopia Fragment makes any advanced card a lose/lose for the Runner. —
Unfortunatly, you're reading it wrong (as I did) : it needs to be scored so that its text benefits OTHER agendas later on. —

Another excellent card in an overall very good Data Pack for the Corps, this All That Remains!

There was alread Levy University, so this Executive Boot Camp is not exactly the first corp tutor ever, but it surely is the first good one.

  • First of all, it works through a paid ability, so it doesn't take you a Click to fetch the Asset you want or need.
  • Second, it's free to rez (Levy costs 3 creds).
  • Third, it also allows you to rez a card at the beginning of your turn and lower its rez cost by 1 credit.

This means it's very good with Blue Sun: Powering the Future, especially if you also have The Root on the table, since it can become a pretty decent source of extra income.

It also works perfectly with the good old Tyrant or Woodcutter (ok, I'm being ironic here, they're not so good on their own, at all). You can basically rez them without having to wait the damn runner passing by, and start pumping them with advancement tokens. Tyrant thus becomes a quite good ice, and with strength 4 is the least susceptible to Parasites.

Given this Asset also costs 3 to trash, it can be rather annoying for the runner, and with just 1 influence point it's easily splashable.

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The key to this card is its type.

By virtue of being an Upgrade, and not your usual economy Asset, Shell Corporation allows near-infinite options. You can install it in the root of a Central server, for example the Archives full of Shock! or Shi.Kyū, or maybe in a Remote server, together with an Ambush-type Asset.

It can become almost permanent, if such a thing is even possible for Corp cards, because a Runner will hardly go on a server with an unknown card advanced a few times, especially if he has reasons to believe it could lead to a flatline or to other dangers.

In tag n bag you might wanna install it with Ghost Branch. If they wanna trash Shell Corporation they will have to take a few Tags. In an Haas-Bioroid you might go for Cerebral Overwriter or Aggressive Secretary. The first works anytime, the latter might be more useful in late game.

Shell Corporation is not a card that's useful absolutely, but it's a wonderful card because it's the first of its kind and offers an entirely new kind of mind game. In Jinteki it obviously shines, given how they have most of the dangerous cards and can make even Archives a nightmarish server to thread upon.

In the other Corps it might take some working around it, but it can be a valid economic option. It can also become sort of a protection from the all-time-dreaded Account Siphon. It works exactly like Kati Jones after all, so if you charge some credits on it, you can take them back after a Siphon.

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