[Netrunner for Newbs] Binary ICE vs Taxing ICE

This is part of a series of short articles I'll be writing to help beginners understand the finer points of running the nets. I'll be mostly covering some of the basic key concepts and strategies that more experienced players tend to take for granted, and how this understanding can significantly improve your gameplay.

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Ice, Ice, Baby

So, let's talk ice. This article will mostly be drawing upon the excellent points found on Stimhack and Satellite Uplink. However, I'll be simplifying some of the definitions and arguments so that you, gentle reader, won't feel quite so lost.

Ice can largely be categorised as either "taxing", where its role is to make the runner pay lots of cash every time he wants to get through, or "binary", where its role is to keep the runner out. Of course, depending on the runner's breakers, binary ice can sometimes be expensive to break, and taxing ice can sometimes be cheap to break, but those cases should be the exception rather than the norm.

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Binary Solo!

Binary ice are either on or off: there's no midway state. They are very good at keeping the runner out of the server, but they falter and become ridiculously cheap to break the moment the runner gets the right breaker out.

The epitome of binary ice is, of course, Paper Wall. It's a 0 to rez 1 strength barrier that trashes itself the moment the runner breaks through it: which is absolutely perfect for keeping the runner out of your servers until he gets a single Fracter up, at which point it doesn't even exist anymore.

Ice Wall, Quandry and Guard all follow the same pattern, but Chimera is an interesting one. Chimera is the perfect example of midgame binary ice: until the runner gets either a full rig up or an AI breaker running, there's no way in hell he's getting into a server protected by Chimera. However, it costs a shitton of money to continually rez, which in turn taxes the Corp a lot. But it does its job well, and keeps the runner out for a good long time.

Another interesting ice in a similar vein is Mother Goddess, which can only be broken by AI breakers if it's the only ice that's rezzed. However, the moment you start rezzing other pieces of ice, it steadily gets easier and easier to break; although, if you have a deck that's full of sentries (the most taxing ice type, generally speaking), it can straddle the line between binary and taxing due to its 4 strength.

When you have a deck full of binary ice, you're looking to dominate the early to midgame. In fact, the simple fact that you're playing cheap binary ice makes it so that the early game becomes nearly non-existent: you launch the game immediately into the midgame by forcing the runner to start digging for his breakers ASAP.

One last point. If you're building a deck full of binary ice, you'll want to diversify as much as possible. You don't want all of your ice to suddenly roll over the moment the runner gets a single breaker out! You'll want the runner to dig not just for a fracter, but a decoder and eventually a killer as well just so that he can run past your multi-type ice.

Death and Taxes

A great example of taxing ice is Tollbooth which, although it says "end the run" on it, forces the Runner to pay money every time he so much as encounters it. What's more, Tollbooth is also a 5 strength code gate, which means that it usually costs even more money on top of the 3c tax it exacts on the poor runner.

Another less obvious example would be Archer. Why is this taxing ice instead of binary? Well, for starters, it has four subroutines, three of which must be broken each and every time. But wait, that's not all! Archer is also a 6 strength sentry, which is a ridiculously high strength for a sentry. It costs anything from 4c (Faerie) to 11c (Femme Fatale) to break through Archer.

What do we think about Eli 1.0: taxing or binary? I would argue taxing because it's a 4 strength barrier that's leaky as shit. A Corroder would need to spend 4c or two clicks just to break this piece of shit that the Corp rezzed for 3c.

In other words, if you have deck full of taxing ice, the runner is almost always able to get into your servers, but he'll have to bleed for every step he takes through it. When you play a deck that's made up primarily of taxing ice, you're looking to extend the game into the mid- and late game as quickly as you can. Most taxing ice is fairly expensive to rez, which makes it paramount that you spend most of the early game getting your economy up ASAP. However, there are some taxing ice (Eli 1.0, cough cough) that are cheap and effective, and you should probably include a few of those ice to tide you over in the early game.

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Why Not Both?

That's a great question, and one I'm glad you asked. The problem with mixing ice archetypes is that they dilute and muddle your strategy. Do you want to stay strong early on and score Agendas quickly? Well, then your Tollbooths are going to be burning a hole in your hand until you get a strong enough economy going to be able to rez it; and, even then, do you really want it up instead of a rezzed SanSan? OK, say you want to dominate the late game instead. Well, sorry, your binary ice disagree and will gladly roll over to let the runner in at minimal cost. What's more, the mere presence of binary ice on a taxing server is going to cost you extra unless you trash it.

By mixing ice archetypes, you're relying on the luck of the draw. Sure, it'll be perfect if you manage to draw your Paper Walls turn 1 and throw them down, and then draw your Tollbooths midgame right when you need it, but let's be realistic here. What are the odds of the ice not only appearing when you need it, but also in the right order?

But wait. What about Account Siphon? Don't we need some binary ice on HQ to prevent us from being siphoned early game? Well, not really. You see, taxing ice - if it's sufficiently taxing - will do a very good job of keeping a runner out of a server. Plus, I'm a big fan of playing around Siphon instead of trying to counter it. If you suspect the big old Blue Steal, keep your money low, put down some assets - Adonis, Eve, Pad, whatever - and rez it when the siphon inevitably hits. Or just play Sealed Vault if you really need a counter. Mixing binary ice and taxing ice just to keep a Siphon out is not a good idea, IMO.

Some corp players can and do get away with mixing, but that's mostly because they're expert Netrunner players who can roll with the punches, whatever they may be. However, for the majority of mere mortals like ourselves, I strongly suggest that you pick a strategy - i.e. earlygame or midgame - and focus your ice accordingly.

Also remember that your choice of strategy will not only inform your ice choice, but the rest of your deck as well. A deck with binary ice will benefit most from surprise program destruction and other cheap ways to "reset" the board to an earlier state, whereas a deck with taxing ice will benefit most from the threat of winning the game out of hand.

How does that last bit work? Consider the Data Raven. By itself, a tag from a Data Raven doesn't cost the Runner anything. However, the mere presence of the Data Raven in the deck threatens punishment: will it be double Scorched, a Closed Accounts, the loss of my Kati Jones...? This translates the tag into the runner spending a click and 2c, or the runner digging for his Plascretes. But remember, by itself, the tag is nothing more than a threat, and the Corp is relying on that threat to tax the runner.

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NEXT Ice

/u/keylimetart brought up an interesting question in the previous N4N article: where does NEXT ice fall in the spectrum? NEXT ice is really quite interesting because it can be either, depending on which stage of the game you're currently at.

Early game, NEXT ice is simply binary: you just force the runner to dig for his decoder or fracter before moving on. However, once you get a bit of momentum going and more NEXT ice starts getting rezzed, suddenly it becomes more and more taxing for the runner to break your el cheapo binary ice. What do you mean I now have to pay 6c to break through your 3c NEXT Silver? NEXT scales with the game stage, and that's something beautiful.

However. NEXT is also imperfect, and ultimately leans more towards the binary side of things than taxing. Remember that there are very few ways for a corp to rez ice without the runner slamming into it facefirst. If the runner realises that the deck is packing the NEXT suite and steadfastly decides to hammer one and only one server, the odds of the existing NEXT ice on the server growing in strength becomes lower and lower, and the cost of giving all your NEXT ice a +1 strength or +1 subroutine becomes higher and higher as you start to stack.

Eden Fragment may change this, but I doubt it. At the end of the day, I would still argue that NEXT is ultimately more binary than taxing, but it definitely has the potential to grow into taxing ice, which is nice.