@warpchy@Saan Tour Guide is great. In my particular case it never gets more than 4 subs. Bounces around 2-4. Usually on the higher end when it matters. If you suspect parasite, I usually use it as a distraction (HQ), or over a marginal asset that I vaguely want to defend if I also suspect Imp. I never really recur it, but its always a welcome sight. Somethings gotta eat the Parasites! Great thing is that Criminals are sometimes tempted to Faerie it, and Ichi can blow them up later.
I think running three copies is a mistake, because then it really incentivizes them to go for your assets. While not always a bad thing, its just too much reliance. I also think its not a very good ICE outside of Gagarin. Worth exploring maybe as a Sentry ETR in other factions like IG/NEH maybe, if they have a way to recur it.
@steve_houston Loving the DBS and Blacklist, how’s 3x Expo working out for you? The Corporate Town + SEA Source seems like a nasty control punishment. Make them broke and desperate, finish em off. Only problem I see here is getting around Plascrete.
@linuxmaier Between Paywall and assuming they don’t trash my assets (most don’t and I’ve exploited scoring windows before) I can usually keep up. If it gets out of control and they run Kati, broken record Corporate Town can swing in and close it out. But yea, early Sec Testing is rough and you really gotta dig for those ETRs and secure a PAD/Capital.
I need way more games with this to know for sure. As @kiv said, it’s possible that good runners can just make money and not die, but I think the plan has to be to aggressively spam assets (including some Atlases every once in a while) to keep them off balance–Public Support is good at putting on pressure and creating credit disparities. Imp is imp, just deal with it. I’m also trying to figure out what to do when they drop the Plascrete, because the ice is binary and there’s not much to do against a fully set up runner.
I had a Contract Killer in my deck originally but I found myself never needing it with Corporate Town, especially if you have two and are slamming down Assets as red herrings. Either it wasn’t worth the 4 credits to fire Killer or it was just better to rez Corp Town and ice it up for a much bigger threat/tax. With your 3x Public Support it shouldn’t be hard forfeiting odd points.
Another question, one which I find myself wondering a lot. How’s Wendigo doing for you? It’s one of those ice that I try and include in almost every Weyland deck I build, but end up taking it out because more often than not it proves too situational to be that useful.
I’ve been making Pad Campaign servers with a single ice in front for a bit of extra tax and putting in Expo Grid after the fact. The ice in front is great to tax them, but what really helps keep it in play is forcing them to keep trashing your Public Supports. If they’re behind an Ice, even more time and money wasted.
I like it a lot. Since I don’t have Meru Mati or Eli my 4 str ICE is quite low, so with 2x Ichi and 1x Wendigo I have enough 4 str uncomfortables to Atman while not being very weak to it. Plus Wendigo is great against d4v1d, and Fire Wall really needs some d4v1d help. Never hated seeing it yet. 1x is enough.
Tested the deck I posted earlier again last night, and I think that a better use of influence would be -2 Crick, -3 Errand Boy, +3 Architect, and then +2 ice to help a scoring remote. Architect on R&D is a no brainer, and if it fires I could be getting a huge kick start with the number of installable cards I have.
I’m not totally satisfied with the economy either. If they spend the early money trashing PAD Campaigns and Expo Grids I can end up poor pretty fast. The only time that isn’t true is when I have an Oaktown Renovations to score right after they trash them. Also Private Contacts is good enough because I’ve literally never had someone trash one (so it’s like guaranteed money) but at the same time it’s pretty slow…
Private Contracts aren’t terrible on the World’s Plaza.
I have had some luck with World’s Plaza out of Gagarin. Its pretty nice to be able to have the option of shoring up your assets in match ups where you are confident the runner will be trashing stuff.
Here’s the deck I played at our Nats yesterday. I ended up losing a lot - I’d say the ratio of just ridiculously bad luck (the only two agendas remaining in 30-ish cards being stolen in one 2-card access, to name just one) to design flaws was about 60/40 in my estimation. There’s a couple of concepts at work here that actually did seem to work, but it definitely needs more tweaking. Also, Universe of Tomorrow wasn’t legal yet, which led to a problem with the scoring pattern (more on this later).
15 influence spent (max 15)
20 agenda points (between 20 and 21)
49 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Old Hollywood
###List of things I was testing:
Negotiator: it’s cheap enough to be viable early, annoying enough to be worth rezzing, and its porosity actually ends up being a plus - noone ever bothers parasiting it, which means its trash sub ends up sticking around for Wormhole to copy (this was actually my primary reason for including it)
Hollywood Renovation + Space ICE: building up a server while going for a score is very good on paper, I wanted to see how it’d do in practice
Oaktown Renovation + Root: scoring while clicking Opus/Investors definitely sounded intriguing enough to try
BARRIERS EVERYWHERE: I really like Spiderweb and the Walls are a natural complement to Space ICE (i.e. they’re a decent place to Constellation tokens to), so, yeah.
###What Worked
Negotiators work well, I feel. Most of the time, I was actually wishing tha singleton Swarm would have been a third copy - when Swarm works it’s a blowout, but I don’t want the BP, and by the time it’s ready to go, the way it beefs up one server and weakens the other is undesirable. Also, the 8 to rez is just brutal for a deck that can reasonably work from 2-4 credits a lot of time. Negotiator is fine in that slot, as it’s annoying, expensive, and has good subs to copy as needed.
Oaktown is awesome, 'nuff said
I also liked Hollywoods, enough to think that running all three copies is the right call. The synergy with Space ICE is very nice, because the swing in board position between “before” and “after” is really notable.
###What Didn’t
Melange clashes with Root way more than I expected - I was assuming people would actually go and trash The Root due to how powerful it is, but it seems noone gave a fuck… I must have made at least 10-12 credits on average off of it (per game, after accounting for the rez cost). The Melanges should probably be some combination of PADs (nod to @clercqie)
The scoring pattern ended up being really horrible. For some reason, two 3-pointers always got stolen in the first 3 turns, which usually left me with 6 points and having to score a 3-pointer in order to win. The seventh point is a pain with this setup, and I’m really excited for Public Support because it’s the ideal thing to slap into your future scoring server as you’re building it up.
###Thinking About
With Space ICE, I can’t shake the feeling that Shipment from SanSan might be a cool addition - in an opening hand it can enable rez without dipping down to zero (unlike Hedge Fund). The idea probably wants a slightly different deck, though - there’s obvious anti-synergy with the whole “Root all the advances” plan, and in order to be justifiable use of influence one would need another use for the thing. Clot-dodging for Hostiles seems decent, if nothing else - maybe I’ll try Space Titan with FA potential and public agendas eventually.
What does the Universe of Tomorrow version look like?
Shipment from Kaguya doesn’t work with the renovations. But it’s influence free, and pretty nice for installing advancing two different space ice. Anything there?
Three Pad Campaigns seems mandatory in Gagarin, as does Paywall - the latter even synergises with a lot agenda density, which is where I’ve been pondering Gagarin.
First and foremost, Public Support. Tour Guide doesn’t strike me as worth it in my version (or rather, I would have to cut less conditional ice to fit it in). Beyond that, maybe The Future Is Now could be interesting in place of the Atlases.
I want the Shipment as Space ICE enabler, for when you need to get your stuff up but aren’t in the position to push through Hollywood just yet. For that, SfSS is highly superior to SfK, as you don’t need a second advanceable thing.
been playing some of @whatisthistreachery’s list; the future is now and tour guide both do great work.
tour guide on a non-scoring remote pretty much ensure safety for one of your not-important-enough-but actually-very-good-to-have-out assests like the root, corporate town, or even just a pad or Jackson. For 2 rez, it’s a must-parasite against most Gagarin decks, and especially in the remote that feels like a bad deal for most runners.
TFIN is just so, so much better than it looks. With 3 atlases and 2 TFIN I find that I am almost always able to tutor something in the first few turns, which makes it very easy to run powerful one-of cards.
I like the Hollywood/space ice idea; even with just walls I’ve been having a really good time with Hollywood, it’s very similar to oaktown in that you can do a lot while scoring out.
I’ve been doing pretty well on OCTGN with this over the last couple weeks (for me that’s a lot of games ). My takeaways:
I think too much drip econ is a trap. Weyland’s lategame is fundamentally too weak to use it well. 3 Pads and 1 Root (rezzed situationally) has been plenty.
This is a Weyland deck. Scoring windows must be seized and we can’t worry about "what if"s. You want to make the runner feel like they have to bust your Ash remote to stop you, which should create another scoring window or, even better, Sea Source opportunity. Any less than 3 Ash feels like a mistake. The card is crazy in this ID.
Sea Source → Trash Kati has won me several games. Having 2 Sea in the deck makes this play easier to make.
Posted Bounty is a wonderful comeback card. Last night I started a game down 6-0 off a really unlucky R&D and pulled it out because of this card. No one expects this thing. They treat you scoring as a chance to assault centrals and then you kill them.
Hunter is Super-Pup that wrecks Parasite. It’s been awesome every single game. I don’t always ICE The Root, but when I do, it’s with a Hunter
Lotus Field is Weyland’s best friend. Gear Checkz Yo!
I’m pretty wary of Traces with Sunny around the corner. Even without her, there are a lot of weird T 1.5/2 decks that end up with a fair amount of link, and Hunter’s base is only 3.
This is a pre-D&D list. I’ll be exploring Global Food once D&D comes out. Link really hurts Caduceus, but hunter only costs 1. Even if they blank it eventually it usually hits them once first and then buys you some time. If they are 0-link all game it is absolutely nuts.
To be honest I’ve been blanked by link a few times, but decks that build link tend to be pretty slow and the Ash-Rush plan usually puts them away before they get set up.
You need Face-check punishment in Weyland or people just play a Datasucker and run all over you.
Definitely. I like 2 Architect in Gagarin, but they do eat 4 influence. I am bringing my own Gagarin list to the LGS tonight; will report back. It’s been doing pretty well on OCTGN.
). My takeaways: