HB:EtF variants in the SanSan Cycle

Spoilers

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If you guys havent tried Media Blitz Mandatory Upgrades on OCTGN yet, get on that shit. I dont know how good it is ultimately, but holy hell is it fun.

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It’s interesting you mention you have problems with Noise, where @mediohxcore swears that this very same deck (with non-next ice) is awesome vs noise.

2 Archived 3 Jackson, Popup windows, and an ice suite with generally very high strength helps a lot. Next ice is crap vs every deck with Parasite aka every deck. I’m not surprised this list does a lot worse vs Noise. Also, BBG but no Eve Campaign? You know that BBG and SanSan are both regions, right?

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How did you fit the second Archived? Down to 16 ice?

Yeah I play this deck like ICE is a luxury. Icing HQ in particular is whatever these days, and icing R&D is usually secondary to icing an Adonis/Eve remote, and sometimes secondary to icing 2nd remote. DBS/Jackson will find you sufficient ICE by the time it becomes strong for the runner to start pressuring centrals. Also 2 of my 16 ICE are Popup windows. #livingontheedge

Pretty much every corp lives or dies on early remote pressure these days. If the legions of durdle runners want to forego setup to take potshots at HQ I welcome it. Points are easy to come by, tempo is not.

Obviously it’s a different story if you’re facing down Siphon Maxx or Leela, but that’s where the inherent flexibility of this deck shines. The fact that Andy starts with a tempo lead, can win the long game, and pressures all your central servers out of the gate is what makes her such a dismal matchup.

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yeah after seeing some streams i try to keep this in mind when i play a close version of the same FA hybrid…
instinct to hedge ice centrals still too strong, trying to up my game

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Yep, seems like this kind of deck will thrive in a Criminal-starved meta. Who shall take the reigns of Blue to rebalance the forces?

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Nope.jpg
90% of players I beat with HB NEXT suite have Parasites.

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@mediohxcore what’s your list right now?

@mediohxcore, I’m having trouble forming a constructive response to your comment due to a few statements.

It’s difficult to respond to an absolute statement like that, and it reads to me like “This deck should lose to every deck with Parasite (aka every deck).”

After reading this multiple times, I still can’t help but interpret this as “since I believe NEXT ICE is bad against every deck, I have to assume your success is due to a fundamental misunderstanding of the rules.” That or maybe “since our experiences so greatly differ, the most reasonable answer is that you’re making an error I’ve seen others make in the past.” Either way, there is no constructive answer to this question.

If you are genuinely interested as to why I don’t play Eve; I found that I rarely wanted to rez Eve without BBG and often couldn’t find them together. I would rather spend ICE and a new remote protecting DBS and the extra slots for other utility cards.

I’m not saying you’ll lose to every deck with Parasite, I’m saying that if you were playing a similar deck with a different ICE suite, it would be better against non-criminals, (decks with Parasite). I actually believe this. To fit the NEXT suite, you’re foregoing Ichi 1.0, which I believe to be the single best ICE in the game right now. I honestly believe it’s just a bad choice. Obviously, if you play well or get lucky or both, you can beat any deck with your list, but that doesn’t mean it’s justified.

I’m sorry, I didn’t think that what I believe to be a suboptimal ICE choice means you misunderstand the rules. The list just looks mediocre for BBG to me (unless you could rez SanSan off it). You have 7 reasonable rez “targets” for BBG in your deck, two of which are Ash and CVS, which are far off full value for BBG. I could be wrong; rezzing Adonis off it and then having them turn around and trash both is better value than hedge fund, so when it’s good, it’s definitely good. It’s not a bad card when you rez a CVS off it, but it doesn’t seem all that great to me. Furthermore, when I play HB, my main server usually is housing a SanSan, making it unable to house a BBG. Basically, it’s great if you’re rezzing Adonis, and lackluster if you aren’t, which seems kind of inconsistent.

I understand a lot of people don’t want to be playing Eve in HBFA. I think it’s sort of a style thing. Some people want to get rushy with agendas more often than not, or prefer to protect R&D early to an Eve Campaign, or don’t necessarily want to protect it, all of which definitely makes it a lot worse. I personally believe one card netting $12 is way too good to pass up, and is almost always worth going out of your way to play and protect, especially early. By no means is this the only way to do things.

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Thanks for the response. I think I understand your view much better now. I may have to go back and re-examine Eve and how I play her. I’ve also had vastly different results with Ichi 1.0, but a lot of this may be differences in opposition and our play styles. We still have a good amount of Criminal in my area, and as a Criminal player I tend to avoid decks that have poor Crim matchups instinctively. It also may be time to re-examine that.

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It’s really just Andy. Eve Campaign plus Jackson Howard beats Leela; I have never lost the matchup. Gabe is fine for you too.

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No need to get full value every time with BBG. The card just gives you a disgusting amount of tempo gain. Just using it on Ash is fine, it makes every agenda at least as expensive to steal as NAPD. Other uses are baiting runs (neveradvance bs, yay), just getting 3 free creds with Adonis, instant purging when Anarchs are appproaching your Ichi,… The list goes on. If you look at it as a conditional econ card, yeah it’s not all that fantastic. The reason it’s amazing is the huge amount of edge plays it enables in an already very flexible deck.

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Breaker Bay does have a number of things going for it, in the sense you’re laying out to @mediohxcore, but it might just be better to play one over the other in regards to regions . Though, if you’re getting fortunate draws often, the deck may indeed just work.

I learned today, in a mini tournament, that HBFA really does not have a shot against Andy.

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I brought a standard good ice HB FA Hybrid to ANRPC today, met 3 Noise, went 2-1.
The match up feels way different when the Noise player is good.

The one lose really convinces me that it’s not a good match up. Not saying you can’t win, but it is not as great as people thought. (and I don’t think it matters that I only have 1 CVS and 1 Achieved)

Without Lotus Field spam, you can’t really force out a heavy Faust usage. They will just install EVERY SINGLE virus in their deck and find ways to deal with your code gate without the need to use Faust. Feels like they still have more answers than you can challenge.

If a starting hand with Cache Wyldside turn1, aesops turn 2 and later on Chronotype is just unbeatable for every corp other than NEH. Maybe I should just stop being bothered. I somehow have an illusion that good Noise player always manage to find them faster. :worried:

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Noise stinks. Sorry to hear you had some trouble with the slot machine. Actually, you went 2-1 so not too terrible! Any win vs Noise is a win for truth and justice in the world.

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I switched my popups and wall of static for a spiderweb, Turing, and IQ for that reason. Money is a little bit tighter, but I’m feeling a little better about Anarch.

Also, 2 cvs is almost non-negotiable if you intend to close with FA. 2 archived helps a lot too.

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What if Criminal comes back for Worlds?

It seems like aggressive remote and FA are really strong now because Crims have faded.

Once you have to worry about Siphon again HB will have a tougher time.

Something to consider going into Worlds training.