Grip, not Hand: Yes We Khan!

but will it be better than Aurora?

Secretarybird Secretarybird - Wikipedia

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Osprey

Watch out for those Aggressive Secretarybirds! :joy:

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at the risk of Damon seeing this as a personal challenge, how could it be any worse?

We know it will be 5 to install vs. Auroraā€™s 3. So if it costs 2 to break whatever number of subroutines, then itā€™s automatically worse against Vanilla which is one of the most commonly played barriers.

Yeahā€¦ Vanillaā€™s the main motivation behind trying to find a way to fit Parasite into the build. If Iā€™m playing a cred denial strategy, I really donā€™t want to let them have a free ETRā€¦

Oh hey, this might actually be a deck that imports Xanadu/Rook. Hm. Hadnā€™t thought of that before.

After messing around, I donā€™t really think Khan is going to have a hope for some time - the birds are far, far too expensive and inefficient to work even when ice is the main expense of the corp. It seems seriously hopeless when the strategy is something else (assets, tags). And then there are the secondary issues: TarMar, Salem, net damage, all of which make holding breakers in the grip a serious liability.

Something truly astonishing in power would need to drop for Khan and her birds to see serious play. And I say this as someone who spent a lot of time on another fairly hopeless Criminal ID (Geist) and actually got it into a decent place. Khan seems a level below even Geist with just the B&E pieces out.

But: [quote=ā€œCrushU, post:149, topic:7504ā€]
Oh hey, this might actually be a deck that imports Xanadu/Rook.
[/quote]

Iā€™d look to Hernando Cortez first.

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I agree. I wish they would release a Crim identity that would work well with the Crim card pool we already have instead of ones that require a lot of new cards, just to be on a decent level. With the added result of having cards in the pool that are strong in one identity, and useless in any other - I was never even tempted to use Tech Trader in any Crim deck that is not a Geist deck ā€¦
That said, I still have some slight hope for her console. I hope it does something meaningful with derezed/unrezed ICE. That would make with whole process somehow more relevant.

Geist actually at least had a pretty generic trigger - Fall Guy, Crescentus, Grappling Hook, and a ton of out of faction cards along with some new ones all work with that ID, for a given level of ā€˜workā€™.

Khan has less influence and an incredibly specific ability that works with arguably only the B&E cards (which seem a poor choice in a 40-card, 0-link deck) and the birds. Compared to Smoke, Khan is rather laughable.

I do feel that they are expensive. I donā€™t feel theyā€™re inefficient, if you can mitigate the install cost. For example, Peregrine is perfectly fine against Enigma and Quandary, and at least compares favorably to Gordian Blade on anything else, costing only one more credit to break odd-strengthā€™d code gates. (In particular I like it vs Archangel. 5 cred to break is just about as good as you get without Yog shenanigans or Cy-Cy.)

And Peregrineā€™s the ā€˜worseā€™ one. Golden absolutely crushes Str 5 Sentries. 4 credits to go through an Assassin is no joke. Honestly the only Sentry breaker that beats Golden is actually Mongoose. (Ok, and Faerie, Iā€™ll give you that.)

You really just have to mitigate the install cost. You can ignore that last ability on them and theyā€™re actually passable breakers.

He has a severe flaw for a credit denial deck: He only does something if your gameplan isnā€™t working.
Iā€™m not sure what kind of deck Cortez is supposed to go in. And even then, his ability isā€¦ Odd. When Rook does your job better 60% of the time, without needing a credit thresholdā€¦ You need to go home, and rethink your life.

I agree Peregrine is fine against Quandary and Enigma. As it should be - itā€™s a 5 cost decoder. It would truly be hopeless otherwise!

But for a 5 cost breaker you need something more than ā€˜fineā€™ against very cheap code gates. It doesnā€™t have that - itā€™s not efficient enough for its install cost by a long way.

Unfortunately it costs 7 to break Archangel!

Agreed! But when did you last break a Grim or Assassin? The sentries you need to break are Turnpikes, Cobraā€™s, Ichi 1.0, Architect, Cortex Lock, News Hound. Much of the same criticisms against Peregrine apply to Golden, and installing it early to deal with these seems hopeless.

Iā€™m not sure this is true. It doesnā€™t take much for a corp to get up to 10 credits, and spend them again. EtF in particular, but also things like Celebrity Gift. Cortez is a big deal for the most efficient ice (in terms of tax to rez ratio) - bioroids, DNA Tracker, and multi-sub barriers.

I derped and for some reason thought it was 2cr:+2str, not 3 for 3.
Well hey, itā€™s better against Tollbooth at least. :wink:

Golden is a weird Sentry breaker, in that most Sentries will take 2 or 4. Ichi does stand out as taking 6 to break because of the third sub, though. 2 for Cobra is good, 4 for Turnpike is bad, 4 for Cortex Lock/News Hound is Fine, 4 for Architect isnā€™t great. Also realize that Mongoose pays: 1 for Cobra, 3 for Turnpike, 5 for Cortex Lock/News Hound, 3 for Architect.

The problem for the birds, 100%, is the install cost. If they cost nothing to install, they would be nothing short of amazing. So, I feel, the answer lies in getting them to cost nothing to install. That said, Khan doesnā€™t necessarily need to be played with the birdsā€¦ Sheā€™s just the most able to get them reinstalled the fastest.

Thatā€™s more a flaw with Credit Denial decks in the current meta than support for Hernandoā€¦ Also ā€˜big deal for the most efficient iceā€™ā€¦ Except for Tollbooth, Archangel and Turnpike.

Heh. In a fashion, I feel that if Hernando Cortez becomes playable, then his style of deck becomes unplayable. :slight_smile: (It does mean that I may need to shelve that Khan build until the meta shifts.)

I think thatā€™s fair. As they are, they provide a ā€˜big rigā€™ foundation for a faction with no support for it, in a meta that doesnā€™t want them. They are the best ā€˜honestā€™ solution to those strength five ice, but I fear that is both too niche and damning with faint praise.

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Keros McIntyre from the new cycle will help considerably. He will balance the cost of bringing the bird back to your grip. But thatā€™s a long way off.

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I would look at Pheromones and Desperado/Temujin for now. They probably, sadly are simply too expensive for play without something crazy.

But I would love to make them work with Pheromones. Helps the money problem and the install cost in Khan.

Now that I mention it, anyone try perfumeshop in Khan?

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The first time I tried, my opponent but a Quicksand on HQ.

Pheromones can be very strong, but itā€™s hard to pull off without an AI breaker.

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First deck I posted (link). Thereā€™s some change to do there but the main problem of the deck, like @Dragar said, is Khanā€™s inner tempo, and a little but not much the deck :confused:

In lots of game in midgame you need to keep some breakers in hand during the corp turn, resulting in more fear for net dmg than your usual criminal and / or moves any corp can do like changing outermost ices.

I think Khan is Criminalā€™s Nasir right now (imo).

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This is why Iā€™m looking hard at Ankusa includeā€¦

When your plan is to derez all their stuff, and they play barriers like Ice Wall, Vanilla, and Quicksand, returning the barrier to their hand is waaaaaaaay better.

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