It makes a tonne of cash, and can spiral quite quickly unless the runner goes full trash.
When they do, it really open’s the sea scorch combo (which is the cheapest route to murder) and makes other important assets come alive, like expo grids. You can be so patient with this list while you build up kill combo’s in hand, so you are often able to just go, install, click cred, click cred. Couple of bucks off Expos or Pads. I often am sitting around 30+ creds, and pretty much always above 15. Precisely because I can sit back and watch the runner desperately hunt for points while often growing my own pool by 5-6 creds per turn. Or watch them full trash and open other kill windows. Pretty versatile. It’s the total opposite of modernism ideas because you can be so patient and just spam out assets and click for creds. (Cap Investors something to srsly consider). Gagarin also adds so much here for creating that swing between the credit pools.
Another thing I’ve noted is that it is always good to ice your remotes with the spare ice as it turns up. Even an Ice Wall makes the PAD’s a 6 cred trash which tbh, totally sucks to have to do.
So far I’ve done such random killing too. Like Punitive, Sea, Single Scorch. Or Midseasons, Traffic, Contract Killer. Heh.
The other thing I’m loving about it over previous Punitive ideas is that getting assets out and useful is so much stronger than combing your hand for just the right set of events and hoping the stars align. It feels like there’s so much more control here.
Wish I had more to play against. I’ve won both so far. Leela and Geist. Got a night tonight with local meta and have asked my dudes to bring their bestest crims. If you guys do get a chance to test it, I would love to hear your experiences. Just play super patient is the advice I have so far, and often clicking for 3 is a fine call. Stuff that has created the most pressure is Imp and Hacktivist Meeting (those can be scary, thinking it might do great with a current or two of it’s own) and I assume Whizzard. Will be interesting to face up against him.
Geist played 2 bank jobs, but I managed to sneak a high risk and then I was really quite happy to let him have them XD
this is actually one of the most convincing GT lists I’ve seen yet (one full cycle later, no less). Glad to see you came around on jackson - for some reason right now people have gotten the idea that it’s “edgy” or “a meta call” to not slot jackson, and imo it’s just never the right call (for reasons that are numerous but I’ll TLDR and simply say he’s the most popular card in the game for a reason).
I’m curious about your ICE setup - 7 ice until you score a public sympathy seems rough (especially when all the other ice is quite parasiteable). while I always hate to be the “dies to doomblade” guy, it seems like a fair number of anarchs (and some Kates) might be able to get an iceless RnD and a medium or two online before you’re ready to blow up properly. do you have any particular strategy against someone who tries the “total ice blowout” tactic against you? Or is it just not as much of an issue as I’m imagining?
In a few situations so far I’ve had to double ice RnD or put effort into limiting Sucker tokens and their ensuing Parasites. Once even had to ice all centrals, wait a turn, then purge. With the ice strengths as they are (like enigma vs quandary), sucker tokens are pretty important (and Grimoire, but that seems like quite a tempo hit to the runner).
Even then I’ve found enough of the time, the Public Supports are just another must-trash that will either credit swing to provide some sort of kill manoeuvre or give me points win pressure while enabling archer/corp town.
With the enigmas I think it’s 9 binary ETR so you can get central’s somewhat under control, but I’m using Public Support’s to tax, rather than score. Having said that, once you have reasonable economic advantage or fairly safe centrals, you do score them. Esp when the runner has to be so careful of sea/scorch. Then IMO the extra’s go on your remotes to tax attempted trash’s.
I’m really liking -1 Traffic Accident -1 Meru Mati into 2x Tour Guide. You have the assets to support it. The entire ICE suite is parasite bait so there’s no reason not to add more.
I’ll try it later because playing Gov Takeover is too fun.
So I gotta ask: how’s World’s Plaza doing for you, and what do you generally do with it? It’s probably nice for baiting a successful run, so I can see that. Generally I kind of think the card is pretty mediocre, but maybe you’re doing something with it that I haven’t thought of yet.
I think if you have to glacier up, like a lack of ice and it’s a Val/Whizzard that has no problems getting in and trashing junk having all your assets under a single roof has it’s benefits.
Hey, I want my Pads, all I have is this Enigma, but they got Imps and no Yog, Lets World’s Plaza the lot of them under it first before long gaming with my Public Supports.
I guess I can see that line of play, but it seems like kinda a long shot to include a 1-of card and hoping you see it in the very specific circumstances where it would be useful.
Well it’s also a certain kind of edge case. It probably is likely a card worth swapping for another piece of cheap etr, but asset heavy it seems like it should help.
People pretty much never trash the Expo Grids, so it operates mainly as a 4th Pad Campaign in an Expo Grid server. It has some added economic benefit by providing a cost reduction on Contract Killers, DBS in the original list (now Jacksons though) and Public Supports. I generally only ever install 1 asset onto it. Having said that, it is probably the weakest of the slots right now, but it does have some interesting use cases (like the ones you guys listed) and EBC provides consistency when you have an opportunity for those.
I went 3-1 against the Crims last night. All I have to say is Geist Maths. He pipped me once on 9 point maker’s eye (good for him), but I managed to find a kill maneuver eventually with midseasons, into double scorch, traffic accident in the other game.
This is my experience as well. Although it also is nice for Corp Town which will force a run and will almost always open up a scoring window.
In many ways it is like a slightly more click and card intensive Adonis. Also if you load three assets on it, it might be worth protecting with an Ash. Especially if those assets are IT department or Corp Town, which fundamentally alter the game.
Some updates to the original list I feel are pretty strict improvements:
-3 DBS, +3 Jacksons (pretty straightforward, just a better card all round for the same purposes)
-1 World’s Plaza, +1 Capital Investors (World’s plaza wasn’t as ‘must trash’ as I hoped, but cap investors certainly is. It shores up the economy even further, and is another solid expo grid companion. It also allows oaktown grid style ideas where you can rush into economy, which is excellent)
-1 Traffic Accident, +1 Tour Guide (the traffic accident kill only really comes into play with midseasons, so 2 was overkill, exchanging for a cheap sentry ETR that forces more parasite installations while increasing tax on asset accesses is helping, and the extra ice provides more protection in the early-mid game)
Like the Capital Investors, they are a great 1-of in a deck running Ash and Midseasons. They can also win you games against hard econ denial decks, which do occasionally happen (3x SoT Geist, Reina, and other jank variants). Surprised you didn’t have Tour Guides before - I think they are way, way better than Meru Mati or Ice Wall. The ‘parasite’ excuse doesn’t even work with Meru (half the time it doesn’t go on HQ) and Ice Wall.
Well it’s not just pad’s that support it. I’ll often lay it in front of a Jackson, and in very very rare occasions (I’ve only done it once so far), a snare/expo server. Then rez the snare XD. (Then you chuckle under your breath, trash that)