Tennin institute: FA or taxing?

Netrunner General
25

Couldn’t you just have installed The Future Perfect turn 1, then turn 2 Tennin + Trick + AA to score?

Also I don’t think Unorthodox Predictions guarantees the Runner won’t make a run. I can still pay for Pup. I can still beat Shinobi traces. Komainu is non-lethal. Katana or Tsurugi, I can just hold cards.

Of course, you could just name barrier (and of course, have appropriately placed barriers). And certainly, it’s a good use of the card. But of all the cards in the combo, Unorthodox is the least important and doesn’t really do anything that money + Ice doesn’t already do.

26

Sure. You’re both scoring 1 less point and risking two more points stolen by the runner from the remote, but you could have :wink:

Yes, those are pretty bad for you if you’re aiming for the UP plan. This is why my deck has exactly zero copies of all the mentioned pieces of ICE, combined.

Not all ICE packages can leverage UP properly, but those that can tend to have a good synergy with Tennin - which is why I went with the plan in this ID and not in the others.

  • If you have unlimited money and rezzed ICE, and the runner has unlimited money and ICEbreakers, he gets in.
  • If you have zero credits, rezzed ICE and an Unorthodox you just scored, and the runner has unlimited money and ICEbreakers, he can’t get in.

I’d say that’s definitely “doing something money+ICE doesn’t already do”.

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27

Sure, literally speaking. But most of the time functional equivalence is all that matters.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think what you are suggesting is bad, I just don’t see the argument compelling me away from the more obvious 2 point agenda options. NAPD works installed. Nisei will basically do the same thing. Braintrust is easy to score.

Daisy chaining Predictions into the Future works, but I’m not sold on it.

What Ice do you use btw?

28

Ah, shit… you just got schooled, son! :stuck_out_tongue:

29

Chaining Predictions into the Future isn’t actually my preferred play, it’s just something you pull if you’re already sitting at 3 points and the window opens up. Then it’s “if you let me score this 1-pointer, I just win”. Most of the time, the agenda you want to chain into is Nisei - mostly because one Nisei can easily chain into another Nisei, which makes that initial 1-pointer a 5-point play, ultimately.

Lemme just play it one more time on saturday, and then I’ll post and discuss my list.

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30

heh. not really, given that he doesn’t even like the play that much, he’s just arguing the technicalities of it (which he’s free to have).

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31

I’m not arguing the technicalities, I’m saying your statement is just flat out wrong :stuck_out_tongue:

Also, just because you’re claiming there is functional equivalence doesn’t make it so. Having played with both mega-rich glaciers and Predictions, I’m pretty certain they are two different things. “Money and ICE” stops runs from happening too often over multiple turns, where UP stops them completely for one turn. Completely different use cases.

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32

As promised, here’s my Tennin list.

Play it as a rush deck that transitions into a glacier and see how you like it.

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33

Looks super fun. Really smart deckbuilding.

34

looks pretty mean. no jackson is tough for me though especially when the future perfects start to pile up in the hand.

35

There used to be two of him, until I found that I’d rather have two Successful Demoes. It’s a meta call, really - Jackson would make the Noise / Anarch matchup much better, but Demoes rock vs. Criminal. I’ve been playing around with this thing for over a month now, there have been quite a few versions of it. This is the one I like best, but it’s definitely a matter of playstyle.

@JohnnyCreations Thanks!

36

I like it! Very interesting take on Tennin, I will certainly try it out. I have a revised version of my taxing Tennin build, which I’ll post after the regionals tomorrow.

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37

ive been seeing a decent amount of noise. i think the idea of installing a virus for an “access” is a lot more appealing to runner players than trying to figure out how to efficiently run against the tax decks right now.

38

Here’s my much updated taxing Tennin list.

Identity: Jinteki: Tennin Institute: The Secrets Within

Cards: 49 / 45
Agenda points: undefined / 20
Influence: 15 / 15

Agenda (9)
3x NAPD Contract
3x Nisei MKII
3x The Future Perfect

Asset (5)
3x Jackson Howard ●●●
2x Shock!

Ice (19)
3x Eli 1.0 ●●●
3x Ice Wall ●●●
2x Ichi 1.0 ●●●●
2x Inazuma
2x Komainu
2x Pup
2x Quandary
1x Tollbooth ●●
2x Tsurugi

Operation (11)
3x Celebrity Gift
3x Hedge Fund
3x Medical Research Fundraiser
2x Trick Of Light

Upgrade (5)
3x Caprice Nisei
2x Hokusai Grid

I took this list to a close 9th place at the second Toronto regionals (59 players), missing the top 8 by a razor thin strength-of-schedule margin. I think this build is significantly stronger than my original one. I totally switched up the agenda mix, this one works much better. You try to win with 2 2 pointers and a 3 pointer. The trick of lights let you score an unadvanced future perfect from face down (use your Tennin advancement token, then trick of light and double advance), or sometimes you just double trick of light a Nisei.

I like the Ichi’s, especially behind Inazuma- plus, its nice to have a sentry that’s not so vulnerable to parasite. I’m not a hundred percent sold on the Hokusai grids- they can fake people out since they assume they are Caprice’s, and they are nice on centrals or to fake an agenda, but there might be a better option. I’d love to hear any feedback or suggestions.

39

i like snare over hokusai. with legworks going off all over the place setting up a killing hand isnt hard to do. people are way more likely to use multi access cards against non PE jinteki decks.

40

I took the PeekaySK list (with only one card change) to a small 10-player tournament today in Tacoma. I came in second. The Tenin went 3-2.

The Unorthodox Predictions very rarely came into play; once when stolen, once to cap off a win after scoring two Future Perfects. Compared to my other Tenin tax deck (which is pretty similar to benjaminwald05’s deck) this one seems to have a rough time vs. Atman. I played Katman 3 times (!) which accounted for the two losses. The lack of Tsurugis, Elis and Pups hurt there. Enigmas were actually quite useful. The Grim, Inazuma duo which are normally fearsome, are not quite as comforting vs Atman.

I played a Kit deck once, and noticed that there are a lot of codegates in this deck! But I was able to endure random shots on HQ without serious damage until I could draw some non-codegates to set up first.

The one change I made was to swap out one Wall of Static for a Neo-Tokyo Grid. I thought that could actually help quite a bit when scoring all those Clone Retirements, and when chaining UP’s and Niseis. I think there was one game where I wished the NTG was a WoS (Kit), and one where I played the NTG and it actually paid off well. It is really great when you get a Tenin advance on an agenda, and it pays you too!

Anyway, that’s the feedback from out here. I think I might try to swap in a Swordsman or two after my trying experiences with our Katman-heavy meta. Might be a less expensive way to eat clone chipped sharpshooters than firing off Grim. Maybe -1 NTG/WoS -1 Grim, +2 Swordsman? Maybe a Fast Track? Serious rushing seems like the best medicine vs. Atman.

Edit: (to add tidbit) one game I scored two Future Perfects via the install, no advance method discussed above. That was fun :slight_smile:

41

The Atman matchup can be rough, but it mostly comes down to how you build your servers - against Shapers, I just don’t do Inazuma -> Grim, saving them to lead into other stuff instead.

Overall, I’ve found that it’s really easy to build your servers wrong, and it takes a bit of practice to do it right, depending on the matchup.

The amount of code gates was a huge boon to me in all kit games so far, as eating her ability on all centrals asap is paramount.

Swordsman is pointless in the Atman matchup, in my experience. They tend to have at least one of:

  • Femme
  • Deus X
  • Sharpshooter
  • Insta-parasite

Ask of which make Swordsman a sad puppeh.

42

You are right Swordsman is not a cure-all, but like I wrote at two less cost and 1 less bad pub than a Grim,  it may turn on the Archers and Grims (at least momentarily) by using up one of a finite number of Sharpshooters. Similar statement can be said for Parasite. Femme makes Swordsman sad, but at least versus Atman, Swordsman will be always be a two-sub taxer. But I agree Swordsman is not going to solve all my problems.

Could you (or anyone else) elaborate on your server building statement, specifically with respect to the Atman matchup?

Your statement vis a vis the code gates with Kit does not seem logical. Any one ICE will eat her ability. It is not a specific quality of code gates.

I had an interesting, but briefly held, epiphany when I placed an Ice Wall starting out my second match against an Atman build. I thought that it would be better to actually not advance the Ice Wall in order to spread out the strengths of my ICE, so my first Tenin advancement I placed on a Grim. Then the runner broke out Inti. Oops! False epiphany :open_mouth:

Anyway thanks again for the cool deck idea. It is great fun to crush with Archer again!

43

Sure, but it’s a dead card in all the other matchups. Either way, I wouldn’t run more than one.

Sure. The way I generally use Inazuma against a (presumably) Atman-less runner is a server of

  • Inazuma
  • Grim
  • < some flimsy ETR piece>

Then I usually only rez Grim if they either can’t get out of the Ina they facechecked, or if they’re too short on resources after breaking it to also handle Grim. A very useful trick is rezzing Inazuma and rezzing the flimser, but keeping the ICE in between unrezzed. That way, they still have to keep breaking Inazuma, and they can’t really plan all that well - this makes it possible to catch them miscalculating when they’re overextending, which tends to make it catastrophic enough to hand you the game.

Now, this is something that doesn’t work as well vs. Shapers, because of the insta-installs and Atman. So what you do there is, you spread out Grims and Inazumas over different servers. Inazuma becomes primarily an Archer enabler, as there’s at least a 1-point strength difference (which is possible to capitalize on, after a virus wipe if the Archer is still unrezzed). Grim is the sort of thing you rez maybe one of, depending on what you need to do, how many Clone Retirements you drew and how much it will tax them. Sometimes, you can force a 5-str Atman by rezzing a Grim, then nuking it with an Archer - that’s particularly fun :stuck_out_tongue:

Criminals and Anarchs you can often catch with their pants down, in an Archer/Grim wipeout. With Shapers, you need to play it a bit differently, first rushing agendas while they’re still gated by money (or nuke their MO with a Grim, if that opening happens), then later try to out-tax with sheer number of subroutines. In general, I feel like Shapers require the most premeditated ICE rezzing - it’s easy to dig yourself into a hole without making an appropriate impact.

Sure, but by eating it with a code gate, you’re not giving her any added value. This is especially true of code gates that actually want to be in the front position on a server anyway (like, Inazuma, Chum, and possibly a Quandary) - by having plenty code gates, you’re reducing that aspect of Kit where she messes with your server building process.

Any one ICE will eat it, of course - but an Ice Wall that is just a barrier is better than an Ice Wall that is also a code gate :smile:

44

Still, I’d rather have an Ice Wall against Kit than a Quandary, because presumably Kit’s worse at breaking barriers than code gates and you can put another ice in front. Of course, if you’re planning for it to be the outermost piece of ice on the server, it’s the same, but having lots of code gates is definitely bad against KIt.

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