There are a bunch of times when I want to put an asset behind an ICE but one that's not, like, important. Protecting a Vera Ivanovna Shuyskaya or whatever with a whole-ass Tollbooth never really feels good, especially if I have to actually rez the damn thing. Scatter Field is an ICe designed for protecting non-scoring remotes (or maybe Archives) - taxing runners who actually do care about trashing your assets without breaking the bank. Designed for Poétrï Luxury Brands: All the Rage for sure, but I could see it in wide Synapse Global: Faster than Thought decks to protect Idiosyncresis or Public Access Plaza before threat 2, but maybe the 2 influence is a bit of a stretch.

The design of this card is so egregious that it made me log into an account I haven't accessed in years. I was fairly intrigued looking at some of the reworked Core Set cards in the Elevation set, as they often seemed to grok the ways in which the original cards were either too efficient or overbalanced. This card, on the other hand, abuses a disruptive technique that ANR made prohibitively expensive with good reason. It's almost difficult to describe the magnitude of how game breaking this ice is, because designing it requires a fundamental lack of knowledge of how the runner functions in regards to accessing agendas. This attacks multiple programs, often times in a single run, at the control of the corp, and is triggered by either a credit OR agenda lead. The amount of time and resources it will take the runner to mitigate the damage done by this subroutine text is potentially insurmountable. I'm in genuine awe that any amount of play-testing would allow this ice to survive with the text it currently has. At best, this card is an abberation of design philosophy that somehow escaped correction in testing. At worst it is a warning against once again getting emotionally invested in a game that remains dead.

This isn't a nice card...or is it? The fact that this nearprint of one of the oldest FFG cards gives the Corp more options to rez it, means that you lose your fracter and then your decoder if you have no killer installed and makes it even more clear that NSG has zero knowledge about Netrunner. You "steal" beloved cards and "make a similar one" like this and think people will be happy that it has a cool ass reptile on it, yet in the background your ANTI PEOPLE BEING UNABLE TO BUY THE CARDS THEY NEED Agenda proofes otherwoose. Players are not allowed to have hair trigger tantrums that stink to high heaven of unexplored confirmation bias and if you are bad at corp you need to look elsewhere for excuses. The outlaws of society aka the longest-running publishers of the game are the good guys in the world not just Netrunner.

This card is Archer but marginally more flexible and without the credit gain. I really hope someone stops me from ruin this game by thinking before I speak.

Flyswatter (🪰) is “Ping for purge’ing” (IE. gearchcecks with hostile rez-triggers).

Design-wise, ice as dynamic interaction is more fun (IMHO) than ice as just arithmetic breakpoints.

For example, if the Runner doesn't have any viruses installed yet (or only a few virus counters hosted), then even if you would want to end the run, you may let them pass an unrezzed Flyswatter to purge them out later. “Dynamic” non-subroutine abilities include:

• On-Rez (When you rez this ice during a run against this server, …): like Ping, Ablative Barrier, Anemone, even Stavka.

• Trashcans ([trash]: … Use this ability only during a run on this server.): like M.I.C..

For example, how many counters/purgeables in play do you want, to rez it? (Should you just purge two counters off a single Fermenter? How much do you want to keep the Runner out? How likely is it for the Runner to let it cook, install another virus, and re-run that server? It depends.)

Blank Flyswatter (against no Viruses) is much worse than blank Magnet (against no Trojans); you really need the purging to be worth enough credits (given the current metagame / average boardstate). But exactly how many/good Viruses do you need to expect in a Runner's deck, to slot it in? (Out of Jitneki?) IDK. LMK what you think.

While this card does drain credits, and so invites comparisons with Diversion of Funds and Account Siphon, credit drain gets stronger the more you're capable of removing. Losing one or two credits may have no meaningful impact on the board state unless it can be repeated across future turns (PAN-Weave, Fransofia Ward), but larger chunks are more likely to push the corp into the position where they can't rez an ice or asset at the appropriate moment, leaving you free to do what you like while they recover. Three credits sits at an uncomfortable point where it's not nothing, but unlikely to have an impact as a one off effect unless it's part of a larger package of credit denial cards.

Instead, maybe treat it as Hot Pursuit, a card where the primary benefit is actually the credits you're gaining from it, alongside other cards which can leverage the tag such as Manuel Lattes de Moura. The corp could still do the same sort of counterplay as with siphon/DoF to deny you the credits, but is it actually worth doing for only three credits?