So it seems pretty obvious that if your opponent actually has Lotus Field then you’d rather be playing Knight than Peacock. But how many decks are actually playing Lotus Field? If it’s sufficiently few then you’re going to be better off freeing up the influence for something else (and if you still want to be able to handle Lotus Field you just run Peacock) because the trade of being better off in general but worse off when your opponent is actually playing Lotus Field will be worth it. I think it’s a no-brainer at the moment; Upstalk has been out on OCTGN for a while now and I’ve seen exactly one Lotus Field ever rezzed against me.
Isn’t that bound to change? Due to my holiday I played a lot of games these weeks. Each week I’ve seen the number of H&P decks drop and more Upstalk decks appear. NEH is everywhere and Lotus Field too.
I feel like you’d be better off with Knight than Peacock either way, but there’s likely to be a proliferation of 'em as Upstalk continues to exist. I expect a few decks’ll skimp, and some’ll run two, but many’ll just end up running one, and wait for Yog to rez it.
Mostly, I think Knight is a better card all-around than Peacock, and I’d rather stick to good cards. Might hurt a bit losing the influence, but I’ll be happier seeing Knight in other match-ups than Peacock ever.
Then again, I’m not likely to be playing much Andy right now, despite her being the best, so… take that as you will.
2 Likes
This list is really strong mediohxcore, It is definitely the best andy list until spaces between at least. From there we will see. I think Andy will still be strong, but we do have some more targeted hate coming out, and I don’t know how that will impact the meta. Really nice job changing it for the evolving meta, I did really well with Andy at the North West regionals and this feels like it’s natural evolution, saved me a lot of testing finding it :).
I played this list at a local GNK in Vancouver, WA on Saturday. I think I had 1-2 changes in total(I chose not to play any plascrete and I didn’t play infiltration, I don’t know if that is correct though. I did play 1 weyland player. NBN Scorch is very lethal if you choose to play without. 1 Plascrete actually might be good enough considering the use of Mr. Li now that I have used Mr. Li)
With the change to more 1 ofs like 1 knight, 1 RDI, etc, I found Mr. Li to be very strong addition, where I really disliked him in the past(I had always used contacts, or no draw at all) I was always using him to find specific answers during the tournament. He actually was surprisingly powerful at finding me the 1 or 2 of in my deck that I was digging for. I needed RDI, I went and got one. I needed parasite, I went and got one. Etc.
If I had played a little bit better it would have finished 5-0 with andy I feel, but I lost to a strong player piloting RP, it was a close game, and I was at fault, not the deck or the luck of the draw.
2 Likes
I’ve been playing with @mediohxcore’s list too and have really liked it. I agree that a knight is probably the best lotus field solution overall. However, I think people are starting to realize that adding one knight is how these Andy decks are dealing with Lotus Field and are taking advantage of it. I had an RP player just drop 2 Lotus Fields on HQ, effectively blocking me out. I know the deck has plenty of other tricks to get around a situation like this and the double Lotus Field HQ wasn’t the reason I lost the game, I’d made some earlier mistakes, however, I feel like the one knight solution can be weak to this line of play. It’d probably normally happen against RP but it isn’t too extreme of a scenario for the RP player to rez a Lotus Field, discard it after Knight comes out, then install another Lotus Field with something else cheap in front of it to guard against inside job/shutdown. I realize you can still use Femme but putting the Femme token on a Lotus Field instead of something like a Tollbooth is far from optimal. Maybe this is an edge case from a slightly less experienced Andy player but I feel like a single Knight solution can be played around, especially by RP. I’m thinking about trying to find a slot for one passport in addition to the Knight just as some added insurance for Lotus Field and in case something were to happen to my Yog, I’m not sure what would be good to cut though and inevitably the change would probably reduce some of the power for a little added insurance. Has anyone else had this problem?
1 Like
Will be interesting to see what the GenCon meta looks like, with so much RP and NBN:NEH I’m not sure I favor Andy anymore for tournament play. I like the NBN match-up but even with Parasites RP is pretty annoying to play against.
I haven’t had this “problem” but I’ve beaten Knight handily this way as Corp. I don’t like 1xKnight very much as a solution to Lotus Field, because it only works one time. Granted, it works very well that one time. You can’t bring it out against other ICE either, because they might trash it just to make their Lotus Fields invincible, and any End-The-Fun decks should be playing at least 2.
What do you favor versus RP and NBN:NEH?
I lost a JRP matchup when they managed to get all three Lotus Fields rezzed on centrals… took too long to powerdraw the Knight and keep moving it around. I’m definitely pro-real-decoder.
Why has no one suggested peacock? Sure it isn’t very efficient but breaks lotus for 4 which is fine. Its the only option without influence and or a exploitable weakness i.e. passport/knight.
1 Like
Somebody has (in 5th post) 
2 Likes
I haven’t had much time playtesting with Upstalk yet (it arrived here recently), but in general I think the RP-matchup really wants Parasite recursion and the NBN-matchup wants early multiaccess on RnD. Andromeda probably has the best match-up against NBN out there if you tweak your deck for it, but that comes at the cost of a pretty bad RP match-up.
My few games with Upstalk included a smaller tournament for the summer kit yesterday where I was running Whizzard (assuming I’d run into alot of asets/upgrades) and while his ability is great, any kind of early window to these decks without the right breaker is really bad.
At this point I would probably favor Shaper of some kind since they have recursion, Indexing and good answers to Lotus Field in-faction. That said I’ve been mostly playing Andy through Spin cycle and don’t have a good enough grasp on the shaper decks at the moment.
Parasite really handles Next Silver and RP quite well.
1 Like
Can we discus the pros and cons of “2 parasites” vs “1 parasite 1 clone chip”?
I’m considering these instead of dropping RDI.
1 parasite might be difficult to find but no clone chip would mean zero recursion.
Well i would run 2 para and one clone, but that’s not what you asked. If you are running the standard crim one of each suite clone chip is a big help. Clone chip is much more flexible can be that 2nd para or your only trashed corroder.
Side note i have switched to Wizzard as I feel the parasite is king in this current meta. I have access to 9 parasites with recursion.
Knight is the answer to Lotus Field. Having Knight/Femme/Inside Job/Same Old Thing are enough ways to get around a Lotus Field. Yog.0 is WAY too good to stop using because of one new ice that’s not even played in every deck.
I am wondering if people are overvaluing Parasite though. I’ve been running a typical Andy deck, but I have 3 RDI and 0 Parasite and it’s been very strong. My goal isn’t to play all 3 RDI but to consistently draw one in the early game and start pounding R&D. The multi access makes runs so much more efficient. By mid/late game I try to have 2 RDI if it’s still economically feasible to run R&D and not take the tempo hit from installing a second one. Every corp fears HQ access so much in the early game. The amount of times R&D gets left open for your first turn is higher than you’d think. Especially with NEH, they like to install an econ asset first click to see more options. Maybe they draw Hedge Fund, want to play that, then ice HQ. I’ve had openings where I Sure Gamble/Desperado/RDI/run open R&D. Another thing that having multi access R&D threat opens up is your ability to get into HQ. Forcing the corp to commit more ice than they’d like on R&D helps to weaken HQ or remotes. Maybe I’m crazy, but I’ve had solid results so far. Can someone make an argument as to why 2 Parasite 1 RDI is better than 3 RDI? The only games where I wish I had Parasite are vs RP, but even then I don’t really see having 2 Parasite with no recursion being that much of an advantage over RDIs.
1 Like
Parasite = possible tempo gain and extends your early game advantage (1 click & 2 creds to the corps 2 clicks and x creds).
RDI = tempo transferred into long term benefit (1 click & 4 creds for increased accesses).
I think these 3 slots are the ones that are the most flexible. In the current meta parasite has the added benefit of dealing with the ice that taxes the criminal run economy. This with the increase of RP is why I believe you are seeing a lot more parasites in Andy.
1 Like
I wouldn’t want to go up against NEXT Silver without parasite(s) for example
Easy - pack a Morning Star 
While I think Morning Star in Andy is somewhat viable (or at least was pre-Upstalk), the influence and memory is harsh now when you want Parasites as well as Knight.
If you think you can get by without Parasites this list worked well for me in the Finnish nationals (2nd place, H&P-meta):
Andromeda: Dispossessed Ristie (Humanity’s Shadow)
Event (20)
3x Account Siphon (Core Set)
3x Dirty Laundry (Creation and Control)
2x Emergency Shutdown (Cyber Exodus)
2x Indexing (Future Proof) ••••• •
2x Legwork (Honor and Profit)
2x Planned Assault (Honor and Profit)
3x Special Order (Core Set)
3x Sure Gamble (Core Set)
Hardware (5)
3x Desperado (Core Set)
2x e3 Feedback Implants (Trace Amount)
Resource (10)
2x Daily Casts (Creation and Control)
1x Data Dealer (Core Set)
2x Kati Jones (Humanity’s Shadow)
3x Same Old Thing (Creation and Control)
2x Security Testing (Honor and Profit)
Icebreaker (7)
1x Alias (Honor and Profit)
1x Breach (Honor and Profit)
1x Femme Fatale (Core Set)
1x Mimic (Core Set) •
1x Morning Star (What Lies Ahead) ••••
1x Passport (Honor and Profit)
1x Yog.0 (Core Set) •
Program (3)
3x Datasucker (Core Set) •••
15 influence spent (max 15)
45 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Honor and Profit