Hackers

## Overview

*Shrouded in a deep hood and working from…well, who knows where (probably their mothers’ basements), Hackers steal valuable information right from under the noses of those who guard it the most carefully. These guys would rather use the stuff they steal to gain power themselves than ransom it back to the people they stole, but the feeling of pwning someone has still never felt better.*

### Details

#### General

* Name: Hackers
* Author: Berryl
* Complexity: 3/5
* Version: 1.4
* Last updated: July 15th, 2023

#### Special details

Do some of these cards feel like junk data? Don't worry! This faction was made using the Hello World! template. The templated cards have been underlined below.

### Breakdown

This faction has the standard 10 minions and 10 actions, and the standard 30 total minion power or average minion power of 3. Among their actions, they have:

* 2 play-on-minion actions: 2x R.A.T.
* 2 play-on-base actions: Rootkit, Decryptor
* 6 standard actions, all of which directly affect one or minions (in **bold**): **2x Trojan, D.D.O.S., Malware, Backdoor, Payload**

### Minions (10)

* **1x Zero Day (5):** Special: Before any base scores, you may reduce a minion’s power there to its printed power until the end of the turn to give a minion on a different base power until the end of the turn equal to the amount of power lost.
* **2x Spoofer (4):** Talent: If the power of one of your minions here has increased this turn, give that minion +2 power until the end of the turn.
* **3x Black Hat (3):** Ongoing: After this minion loses power at the end of a turn, place +1 power counters on it equal to the power lost.
* **4x Worm (2):** Special: Before a base scores, you may place a +1 power counter on this minion. Talent: Destroy this minion to give another minion here this minion’s power until the end of the turn.

### Actions (10)

* **2x RAT:** Play on a minion. Talent: This minion gains +2 power until the end of the turn.
* **2x Trojan:** Special: Play after another player's minion increases in power on a base where you have a minion. Until the end of the turn, that minion has -2 power and one of your minions there has +4 power.
* **1x DDOS:** Play an extra minion of power 3 or less. Give it +1 power until the end of the turn.
* **1x Malware:** Choose one of your minions. Destroy a minion of power 3 or less at its base to give it +3 power until the end of the turn.
* **1x Rootkit:** Play on a base. Talent: If one of your minions here has power greater than its printed power, draw a card.
* **1x Decryptor:** Play on a base. Ongoing: After a minion here gains power, place Energy on this card equal to the power gained. Once per turn, after this card gains Energy, you may choose an option below, removing the indicated amount of Energy:
	+ 2: Shuffle an action you own from your discard pile or in play into your deck.
	+ 5: Play an action that directly affects a minion.
* **1x Backdoor:** Choose a base. All players’ minions there gain +1 power until the end of the turn. Special: Play before a base scores to choose every base.
* **1x Payload:** Another player’s minion gains +4 power until the end of the turn.

### Bases

* **(23) Dark Web (4 2 1):** Before this base scores, destroy the minion(s) here with the most power.
* **(15) Botnet (2 4 1):** When a minion's power here would increase, its controller must choose another player's minion here to gain the power instead, if able.

## Clarifications

**Trojan, Decryptor:** If these reactions happen during another player's turn, they resolve after the active player finishes resolving their own reactions to the trigger.

**Botnet:** If a minion there gains power counters or constant power (such as from Full Moon), that power does not add to the original minion's power until the end of the current turn. Temporary power changes remain on the new minion for their entire duration.

## Strategy

### General

Hackers are built around giving other players power, which they can then steal and use themselves. The main way they can steal power is with the double feature Trojan. Although Trojan can interrupt another player's turn, it never takes progress away from a base; in fact, it actively pushes that base closer to breaking. Its real value is the 6-power swing it generates, which can frequently be quite massive, turning what would otherwise be a somewhat efficient victory for the opponent into a very efficient, out-of-turn win for you. Other methods to steal are Zero Day, who forces opponents to spread their power increases out or else lose a lot of it when it matters the most; and Decryptor, which can pull the rug out in any number of ways with its five-Energy ability (again, none of the internal options for which set a base further from breaking). If you can line it up correctly, Black Hats are an excellent target to receive the power, as any temporary power they receive is conserved from turn to turn.

Although Hackers are primarily driven by their actions, the recruit Worm plays a very important role as well. Their self-destructing Talents serve as important enablers for cards such as Spoofer, Decryptor, and Trojan, and also help build a singularly powerful minion for Zero Day. Even their Special abilities pull a lot of weight, adding a bit of extra oomph to the talent and giving an opportunity to trigger Decryptor before a base scores.

The overarching goal of any Hackers game is to break multiple bases in a single turn, usually with Zero Day and sometimes in tandem with Trojans and Backdoor. This is done by building a singularly powerful minion with cards like Payload, Spoofer, Trojan, Worm, and Malware, then "beaming" that power away with ZD to another base, giving it to another player's minion and then siphoning them with Trojan if needed. Given the importance of Zero Day here, cards like Rootkit are imperative to seeing him, which is easily enabled by R.A.T. or a Worm with a counter granted by its Special ability.

On first glance it might appear that the Hello World half of Hackers doesn't cleanly integrate with their other half; HW cares about boosting your own power, and the other 10 cards in Hackers mostly focus on manipulating power of other players' minions, or even outright giving it to them. However, the internal HW package plays very naturally into Hackers' specials package. Many maneuvers involving HW cards don't make sense in a vacuum but are greatly augmented by Hackers' specials package. A simple HW turn is playing D.D.O.S. for Black Hat and Spoofer (or their equivalents), an easy drop of 10 permanent power. Ordinarily, this is a dangerous amount of power to leave out, as any decent burst from an opponent will lead to a very efficient victory for them. However, with the threat of Trojans always a possibility, opponents must try to overtake you without power increases, or else run the risk of needing to lay down 17 power instead of just 11, with all of the positive power you receive being conserved by Black Hat if opopnents abandon the attack. Couple this with the possible presence of Decryptor or Zero Day as well and this becomes truly frightening, and if opponents don't take the bait you have any number of ways to follow this up to convert into a break on your own turn. Even an opponent playing one minion for presence presents a dilemma: If they leave too small a defender, Malware can dispose of it, enabling Spoofer and more than likely getting a solo; if they leave a large one, Payload converts that defender into an efficient win (note that Payload is the largest power increase from a single card in the faction). Hackers' abilities were very intentionally chosen to work with Hello World in an unorthodox but effective way, and scenarios like these should hopefully help demonstrate this.

### Partner Suggestions

A very intentional weakness of Hackers is their lack of movement; any sort of movement, especially that from an action play, allows cards like Worm and Decryptor to become much more effective and disruptive...thus, factions with those sorts of cards make excellent partners! Additionally, partners with more ways to increase power, either yours or your opponent's, will be able to make more liberal use of cards like Black Hat, Trojan, and Decryptor.

#### Published

* **Mulan:** Mulan offers plenty of good actions to play with Decryptor, and plenty of power increases. There's potential to remove many defenders from a base and get it solo with proper setup between Malware, Dragon Cannon, and Shan Yu.
* **Anansi Tales:** Hackers have plenty of valuable standard actions to sling that are difficult for opponents to use, notably Payload. Pot of Beans can distribute counters on other players' minions to trip Trojan on your own terms, and Hornets offer even more potent traps that opponents have to be wary of.
* **Polynesian Voyagers:** Wayfinders are perfectly Singularly Powerful Minions for Hackers to work with; after one receives a Sun Tattoo to go to a double score, Zero Day can beam the augmented power to a third base, potentially putting you far enough ahead to ride fumes to victory.

#### Custom

* **Iconoclasts (ludichrisness and Onassi):** Iconoclasts offer some of the movement Hackers so covet. Additionally, Colossi provide ample opportunity for Worms to build power, and in turn Worms are helpful with scoring some of the trickier Colossi. Zero Day can help make Colossi scores more efficient by beaming power you use to score them over to Black Hats on regular bases.

## Author Notes

Attempting to make a Hello World faction distinct from the base strategy was an extremely fun challenge. Although I did help put together the Hello World template, the flash of inspiration came when I noticed something peculiar about it - R.A.T. could be played on *any* minion, not just your own. From there, the mechanic of siphoning other players' power almost wrote itself, although the actual Hackers theme came slightly later. The first draft of the faction sat in my vault for a while before I dusted it off and made art, and by that time Energy had become integrated into the custom system - perfect for what I already had written down for Decryptor, which at the time just used +1 power counters. The final product ended up being extremely fun to play, and (I hope, at least) an extremely novel take on the Hello World template.