Jinteki have lost ‘Clone Retirement’ though, which is a fantastic little agenda for fast advancing and saving your tool cards to score 3/2s or 3/1s with meaningful effects, especially if you don’t care how many credits the Runner has because you’re taxing them cards instead. It might take a few crucial turns longer to get the stage where you have quickly scored several agenda points and start to force the Runner into risky plays.
It’s possible that killy, classically Jinteki-style FA decks where you have ‘Philotic Entanglement’ and one-pointers like ‘House of Knives’ and ‘Chronos Project’ may lose a surprising amount of rush pressure from losing ‘Clone Retirement’, but HB-style mainly two-pointer fast advance decks in Jinteki (so with things like ‘Braintrust’, ‘Medical Research Program’, ‘Nisei Mk. II’ and maybe a couple of three-pointers) might be a better prospect now with the other changes in the game.
My initial observations are games are longer and grindier since neither side can throw knockout punches. The lack of parasite, medium and siphon are noticeable and embolden the corps to throw more resources into remote play which I suppose was the idea.
the biggest imbalance to me is runners despite losing their bombs still have their tutors, draw and high powered silver bullets like Aaron, film critic, employee strike while corps are left with pieces of Jackson Howard spread across mediocre cards.
Im enjoying it so far but the next cycle is going to decide the game for me.
As far as I can see the loss of Jackson has tremendously taken speed out of the corp’s game. With “draw 2” and “shuffle back in agendas”, the corp had a tool to quickly set up his board state.
Other observations as a loyal Jinteki employee: Our Komainus and Kakugos might be better these days (although rezzing them is getting more expensive since Reina has re-appeared and so we have the same money problems like in 2013), but Film Critic and Employee Strikes are everywhere. Both blank our strong damage IDs PE and PU (I hear the same from our colleagues at Argus). Film Critic laughs at Obokata and Future Perfect. All Shapers run Indexing and Equivocation and so our beloved traps get worthless.
I don’t understand the reasoning behind printing cards like SVA, Clan Vengeance, Counter-Surveillance, etc. where you take an effect that was previously strictly negative (getting tagged, taking damage) and turn it into something positive. How can you expect that to not end up creating solitaire decks or other unbalanced play experiences?
It would be different if:
The triggers were “owned” by the corp (cards for self-tagging/self-damage rare or non-existent)
The resulting effects were non-negative, but didn’t directly fuel a win condition (e.g. Obelus lets you get tagged without worrying about flatline after a certain point and it’s fine vs. Counter-Surveillance where the runner gets to access every card in R & D).
They hadn’t printed all of these stupid cards at the same time
As it is, none of these 3 conditions hold.
Taken in the larger context of the competitive scene right now-- if the meta is in flux going into worlds (and the associated prep period where even “casual” games are likely to skew towards the strongest decks possible), why would you play a deck that depended on the other side of the table? Why NOT play solitaire when you don’t know what you’re likely to get matched up against?
And that’s what I have to say on the topic of these decks, thank you for tuning in I still like this game.
The other option would be for the triggers not necessarily to be “owned” by the other side in the card pool, but for the good effect to only trigger off of actions by the other side.
So if ‘Salvaged Vanadis Armoury’ was instead worded:
“The Corp trashes the top X cards of R&D. X is the amount of damage you have suffered from Corp card effects this turn. Use this ability immediately after having taken damage.”
Then it would be a really interesting card, with things like tactical decisions and counterplays that make it an interactive game.
Play PE and disrupt it all. Vanadis is probably still a good card though. An early scarcity should probably help a lot too. I dunno, the deck is definitely fast. Perhaps packing Salems (or the man himself) would be good for snipping peices.
69 card decks?
Haarpsichord (or Old Hollywood Grid) with Museum of History? (getting desperate here)
Best Defense on the single pre-installed SVA probably doesn’t get it done.
Aside from only being 1/3 of the combo and having 2/3rds of your deck milled still probably kills you, they also play Trope and just Trope it back.
You might be able to disrupt them a little with Salem’s.
Museum of History/scored Hades Fragment won’t help if the Sneaky Pete is playing Eden Shard.
@Damien_Stark: The Best defense was to try to exhaust their clicks. Having to install SVA on the combo turn hurts. They have to spend three clicks on Amped and at least two on installing Dadiana (to get maximum effect). Having to spend two (install + trash) on SVA hurts.* I forgot they could pre-install Titanium Ribs, though.
*You are also correct that 2/3 of the combo is also enough to win.
Hot Tub Time Machine (the traditional one with Mumbad City Hall) has:
A way to tutor events
Salem’s Hospitality
A way to play multiple Salem’s Hospitality in one turn (Salem’s, Whampoa, Consulting Visit for Salem’s)
It seems like Hot Tubs can slot a token amount of hate (Best Defense, maybe Ark Lockdown), and rush agendas behind Tour Guide fora pretty reasonable game-plan. What, if anything, am I missing?
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