Hi, everyone,
So, quick question, though I feel like I already know the tactic.
What’s the best way to challenge and beat this deck? I was playing as Andromeda, but other than guarding against net damage, how would you construct to safely face this in tournament, if such a thing is possible.
Advice much appreciated.
Cheers,
DW
go slow, let an agenda or two through. some andy’s run 1 infiltration to recur with SoT for matchups like this
hammer HQ. its seems counter intuitive but you have to limit the jinteki’s players options about what goes in the remotes. often times you will trash an overwriter or ronin before it hits the table and you dont really want these to hit the table. future perfects tend to hang out in HQ too.
Experience is very valuable, test against the deck and learn painful lessons. Feedback Filter is probably the best anti flatline card.
I’ve been having a ton of success with this deck over the last few weeks, maybe losing two or three games out of dozens. A few things I’ve noticed, some even the more skilled players in my meta make mistakes on right now:
Don’t ever trash installed ambushes! This is a bit counter intuitive against most decks, but it should be a no brainer against the shell game, as long as you have the endurance to keep track of the servers.
Trashing them allows recursion with Jackson, and taxes in the case of Psychic Field.
Run archives. I’m running a single shi kyu in my list as protection, but I’m noticing it being cut from others, and it’s the first card on the chopping block when I consider changes. The Corp is going to stash The Future Perfect there sooner or later, and a run at archives will eliminate a shell when Jackson pops off.
Run the unadvanced cards. Especially early. As long as you have a hand of hit points nothing installed with out advancement can kill you. Worst case scenario is a snare, but installing a snare is always a gamble for the corp. The corp player would rather install those 3/1s than leave them in HQ, sniff them out.
Keep very close track of the Overwriters and Ronins. Ronin is the only true proactive flatline method, while overwriter is the bluff card. These two are the main targets for Mushin. In my opinion, it isnt until the late game against Shaper recuring Deus Ex, or where your meta has progressed tactically, that playing Mushin on anything other than Ronin or Overwriter is optimal, so keep this in mind. Flip a coin on the triple advanced card or be prepared for the net damage.
Siphon the shit out of them.
(Hope this helps. Or maybe I don’t. Mind games!)
Side note: by keeping installed ambushes around (especially Overwriters, Junebugs and the like), you’re essentially saying you’re confident they’re not running Trick of Light. This may or may not be a prudent choice, depending on what you’ve seen out of their deck so far.
I only agree about not trashing Psychic Field (for 2 creds). You can trash assets installed in a server when you install a new card there, so it only saves you from Jackson for 1 install. To a lesser extent, keeping the board clean helps reduce the cognitive load, as you can ask your opponent to install new servers on the outside, so it’s easier to keep track of when things were installed.
This has been discussed already over in the Psychic Field thread, but here’s a quick summary:
-Play slow. Keep a full hand, only play essential cards. The pressure is on them to kill you. They are running two Future Perfect and chances of scoring out to 7 agenda points is extremely low.
-Advanced stuff is almost certainly either a Ronin or a trap. Giving up a FetalAI to do 3 net damage and try for a kill isn’t unheard of either.
-Most important → Lock R&D. Destroy the traps before they hit their hand or table. Going two deep each turn is recommended. “Hammer HQ” isn’t as effective.
-The single card that wrecks this deck is Keyhole. Other standouts: Lemuria Codecracker, Deus Ex, Medium, Vamp, Siphon, Infiltration, Indexing, Feedback Filter.
Agreed with @karmaportrait, I’d just add that Indexing (with proper SoT support) is not an “other standout”, it just as deadly as Keyhole is to this deck, maybe even more - after a Keyhole run you don’t know what they’ll be drawing, after an Indexing you do (and can often disarm up to 2-3 traps with a single Indexing).
I haven’t seen Junebug pop up in this deck type, but if you’re running into them or a loaded Overwriter nine times out of ten it’s effectively game over, so Trick of Light is the least of your problems
Agreed. I have been saying this for a while now as well. If you stop them from scoring House of Knives and Gila Hands the game is significantly easier.
Against players familiar with the archetype, Mushin-ing the occasional FP is almost a necessity for exactly the reasons you identify. Unless they have expose. In which case, Mushin a Psychic Field as soon as you have EMP(s) in hand.
QFT. This deck is almost crippled without a scored GHA, especially against Crim.
A lot of the time people will waste energy getting useless money against this sort of deck, or doing some kind of durdley setup moves like clicking kati jones every turn. Sometimes, depending on the build, installing mimic or faerie or datasucker at all can be a crucial mistake. You need your cards as HP, and taking a click to play a card out of your hand is like taking 2 damage.
Running unadvanced things is important: You don’t want to let them score powerful agendas like Gila and HoK if you can help it.
Brain Damage is really bad. If you can avoid coin flipping by Siphoning them it’s really important than you do so and keep a check on Ronins, but just risking it with the coin flip can be deadly. If you’re playing Same Old Thing in your deck, infiltration x1 or x2 can be an all-star. If you take away their ability to make you guess at 3-advanced cards, their deck isn’t particularly powerful.
Many thanks to everyone who replied. Some great advice here for all levels of play.
What are the thoughts on Profiteering instead of GHA in this type of deck?
I think the importance of GHA is that after getting Siphoned/Vamped to zero, the Corp can get back to four credits (Snare!) in one turn.
there’s a variant running around that uses 2x biotic/3x jackson/2x overwriter as its influence to push out the HoK/Gila/Braintrust/Philotic against remote checkers. it adds back in gift over diversified portfolio and trades out the Eli’s for more in house ice like neural katana. i havent played against it yet but the biotics seemed good because that first gila or HoK is massively important for setting the tone of the game.
I’ve been avoiding running advanced remotes but what do people do when they are two triple advanced cards? Without expose seems your damned if you do(overwriter) damned if you don’t (ronin).
You already answered it. You drain them below 3 credits or you expose. Everything* else is a gamble.
I’m so conditioned to newer, inexperienced players playing PE that I try to call all their bluffs.
And it’s even more enraging when I get to match point and get too greedy at the end, even when they’re sitting on less than 4 points themselves.
I don’t like playing against this deck, but it’s still fun, if that makes any sense. I feel like I threw away my 2+ hours of deckbuilding and fiddling around for my weekly Runner builds when someone sits down with PE across the table and we play a different game of drawing cards and checking remotes, bonus points to the Runners with Levy or DeusX.
The ID is big in my meta, and let’s just say this: The first turn blind remote is always a House of Knives.