Ok so there’s a point in resurrecting this subject from the grave. Rather, three points that I was interested in views on.
First up, my experience with this deck (and I played it my main runner for months) was that it ate up pretty much anything that had to install and advance its agendas to win, but struggled against NEH and to a lesser extent other forms of FA. In a world in which Clot will at least stop NEH being absolutely everywhere it follows that this deck becomes a much better choice. Not having to tech so hard for the NEH match-up also frees up some space (can lose a legwork for example, Dirty Laundry can become Infiltration and it might be right to go back to Battering Ram over Lady).
Secondly though, is Oracle May still worth the deck space restrictions and influence? Symmetrical Visage does two thirds of the job of Oracle May without the associated costs and risks. Much as I love May, she comes with an awful lot of baggage - the inability to use SOT in such an event heavy deck for example.
Thirdly, whilst May’s place looks in doubt, Power Nap decks ought to go from strength to strength. I’m still not yet sold on Game Day, but Comet is clearly going to be insane in this build and actually, Comet allows you to burn through events quicker and might make Game Day less bad. And if you go with Visage over May you get the option of some hand size boosting cards.
The current meta is currently in a state of shift because people just aren’t sure of what to play (other than RP). Astro/biotics is what really caused the issues to gear toward speed. It’s still going to be a problem. If we go away from Oracle may, the restrictions on what’s added are lifted but we still want to overdraw and feed archives doubles if we want to keep with the theme of the deck. If we add non-events we’d want them to be crucial. For example, 1-2 same old thing would be huge, 3 seems like overkill as we are probably going to recur the deck at least once if we’re doing it right. Plus the more non-events you draw the less likely Comet is to be useful.
Game day is an auto include. With comet, you can play lucky find and sure gamble, then game day last 2 clicks to draw 3. 10 credits and 3 cards. That’s a good turn in my book, and it put 2 doubles in the trash. Sure it’s not a guarantee but it will happen occasionally and that’s huge. Otherwise if you can’t play it you can dump it. The point is, this deck plays 2+ events a turn without comet and will play 3 easily with it. This means your hand will be low and you can draw a bit more efficiently.
I’m not 100% on symmetrical yet. It could be a good replacement for may and would allow to shift influence over to something else (planned assualt?) instead of hostage. It’s worth trying out, for sure. Hand size boost is appealing (especially considering the lack of damage prevention). The need to balance the events and other things is still important so we can’t add too much and losing clicks via beach party is out of the question.
I agree, but that makes me a bit sad. Oracle May is really cool! I guess the logical extension is why not play Kate and PPVP in 3 of the 5 of the extra cards you need. I’m sure that deck already exists…
The thing that reluctantly is pushing me that way is Comet. It’s so good that you probably want two to see it early and you definitely don’t want May sticking your one copy in the trash.
Sadly this is the position find myself gravitating towards(although there are good reasons to stick at 40 cards). Although it would be a totally different deck to the usual PVP builds.
So I played the String Theory Doubles deck a lot back when it was a thing and I loved it, but also had to give it up when NEH became so prominent, and when Blue Sun came out (being unable to run Plascrete or Utopia sucked). When I saw Comet and Game Day spoiled I got really excited at the prospect of building a similar, more stable deck again. The list I came up with was this:
Comet Theory
Chaos Theory: Wünderkind
Event (28)
3x Diesel
3x Game Day
2x Indexing
2x Legwork ••••
2x Levy AR Lab Access
3x Lucky Find ••••• •
3x Power Nap
2x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
3x Test Run
2x The Maker’s Eye
Hardware (4)
3x Comet
1x Plascrete Carapace
Resource (3)
1x Rachel Beckman •
2x Same Old Thing
I hadn’t thought of Symmetrical Visage for it before now, but I really like that idea and I think it would be possible to fit it in to this list somewhere.
I also went through the same thought process of ‘why not run it in Kate with Voicepads’ but I came to the conclusion that a 40 card deck lets you see your Comet earlier and kickstart that crazy event engine asap, and that Comet and PPVP might not actually be the best combo. I play PPVP Kate at the moment and I don’t think I’d put Comet into it; to make the most out of the Voicepads you don’t really want to be playing more than 1 event per turn, whereas a Comet/Doubles deck spams them. I guess the PPVP&Comet combo is still being debated but I’m not sold on it.
I assembled, but haven’t had a chance to test, a variant with SCF and adjusted chronotype. It was only 1 of each, but 3 qt and 3 diesel, you either get it or you don’t, missing 2 slots and 1 inf isn’t so bad, especially in a slower world. If you do hit it, its awesome, being able to play 2 doubles and have 2 clicks left, but I started to think that in testing it might flop so I back-burnered it. I’ll break it out and try it soon I suppose.
Anyone ever actually gotten SCF to work fairly well?
Sort of off tangent, but if they go with neutral runners in the next big box, I wonder if one will be “Reverend such and such of the Starlight Crusade” with a professor ability for doubles.
Event (30)
3x Diesel
3x Game Day
1x Indexing
2x Legwork (4)
2x Levy AR Lab Access
3x Lucky Find (6)
3x Power Nap
2x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
3x Test Run
2x The Maker’s Eye
1x Stimhack (1)
2x Eureka!
Hardware (3)
2x Comet
1x Feedback Filter
Resource (4)
2x Symmetrical Visage
1x Utopia Shard (1)
1x Same Old Thing
3x Comet seems a bit overkill. We still want to be drawing a lot and hopefully it’s not clumped up. Same Old Thing is not important, but a 1-of can mean a tactical strike on HQ with legwork or a post Jackson Howard R&D hit with Makers Eye.
Added Eureka because of the double synergy.
Utopia shard is probably enough against Blue Sun, and if not consider adding a plascrete. Feedback Filter is the best new add as PE can really be a problem but money isn’t. Can’t outplay PE? Just throw money at it!
Battering ram is fine in this deck and is more efficient against Eli, which is the most common barrier out right now. Wall of static is making a comeback which it breaks the same as corroder.
I don’t like double killers personally and femme is too expensive as a main breaker. I have always felt garrote is best fit for this deck but the influence was the issue. NO LONGER!
Hmm. I really like the programs in my version because then you can run Magnum Opus which I think will really shine paired with the click compression of Comet. I have a soft spot for Beckman (she also superpowers Opus), but she could be dropped for a Stimhack no problem! I think Mimic & Femme as paired killers is generally fine, I think as long as you’re running Test Run and Scavenge Femme’s bypass ability is extremely valuable. You can use her to walk through problem ice, or Test Run her at a crucial moment to get past whatever ice is in your way. I personally don’t like Eureka! and only included it in the old String Theory deck because of the double synergy. Now that Game Day is out I’m very happy to drop it. I’d swap a Legwork for a Planned Assault for an extra double and a bit of versatility (especially now that NEH is less popular). I think my list would look a bit like this now:
Event (27)
3x Diesel
3x Game Day
2x Indexing
1x Legwork ••
1x Levy AR Lab Access
3x Lucky Find ••••• •
1x Planned Assault ••
3x Power Nap
2x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
3x Test Run
2x The Maker’s Eye
Two games tonight with a pre-Breaker Bay version. I think you might be understating SOT. It means one Test Run is two Test Runs in the early game (or one Scavenge is two Scavenge or … you get the idea). Plus Power Naps are rarely bad value even at three clicks (and you can go down to one Levy).
I’ve wanted to try this deck for awhile now, but I fear is crisium grid (prevalent in my meta at least) and the fact that the only form of multi-access is subject to successful run. Sure you can always run in and trash but when they see any shaper across the table the corp does there best to make those R&D runs as expensive as possible. With the symmetric visage idea over oracle may, may be worth trying to swap out RDIs (and maybe 1 HQI/Legwork) with extra influence?
Those are some good points, and probably right on the money. Increase to 2 and see if you still feel the same way.
RDI Isn’t a bad choice, and may end up supplementing the makers eye instead of replacing it. Agendas pool up in HQ only every so often, which is why legwork is so prevalent. Maybe stick with legwork there but just do RDI to work around the Crisium? With no other HQ pressure they would surely not waste a crisium there…
Crisium is annoying alright but not the end of the world. PPVP Blitz Kate doesn’t run RDI and it’s never been a major problem for me playing that deck…you’ll usually have enough money to trash it comfortably, and if not running centrals as often you should be making enough to lock down the scoring remote…therefore agendas are either in the remote or piling up in HQ for you to steal from there.
Also I think crisium is slowly dropping in popularity, at least in my meta. It went into most decks out of fear of Keyhole Maxx, but now that that trend is dying down a lot of decks are cutting it again.
I took it to a few tournaments over the last couple of months, always found myself wishing I could fit an Imp into the deck, especially given we’re already running Scavenge.
I did have Net Celebrity in the deck but found myself nearly ways just discarding it, but I wanted a current to combat ELP out of RP. So when Traffic Jam turned up I was looking at trying that out instead as I’m not sure NEH is as dead as people thought, clot was hardly used in the Stimhack Invitational…
Also with more new stuff coming out that people will want (runner current forcing to corp to trash a card in HQ upon rezzing non-ICE, Yellow asset that prevents cards being installed out of the heap), clot may well be forgotten soon enough and NEH could continue to be a thing that wins games.
It’s almost got me thinking Stimhack is unintentionally in the business of self-fulfilling prophecies. I mean, most of the top players come here to talk serious about Netrunner. Like, Clot came out. Everyone talked about how NEH Astrobiotics is dead, and also how no-one will want to actually put Clot in their deck, because it’s a dud card against everyone who’s not NEH. Everyone then also agreed that glacier and Blitz Kate were the new “go-to” archetypes for serious competition. Come the SSCI tournament, what do you know? No-one has Clot, most people have Glacier, and Kate is everywhere.
An an outsider (IE non-tournament player) looking in, it almost feels like a conspiracy (and I am the antithesis of a conspiracy theorist). All the top players get together on this one board, and collectively decide what the new “meta” is. Then, unless you’re one of those top players, your decks aren’t built to handle the new meta properly. You can also easily identify “outsiders” come tournament time - they won’t be using the same “meta” cards as the rest. This sounds completely far-fetched, I realize, but it’s kinda what happened in the SSCI, no?
I mean…everyone says PE is dead now. Why is PE dead? What happened between Worlds (when Dan himself said Cambridge PE was something you had to look out for), and now? No new deck archetypes have really hit the scene. More people are playing Kate, and everyone just kind of “decided” that Clot killed NEH and apparently PE too even though Cambridge PE is much more never-advance than fast advance. Blitz Kate can recur Deus X, but that still burns cards, even if it’s not as many as you like (either a Clone Chip or SMC or Scavenge or what-have-you). Get into the long game and a Philotic Entanglement will still get you the win. Maker’s Eyes are dangerous as hell since you could go something like Snare!-Neural EMP-House of Knives.
I dunno…it’s just weird to me.
EDIT: Sorry, went off-topic there.
EDIT2: Modified my post slightly.
