I’ve still got 2 Mr Li. I wouldn’t drop him to 1 or less by any means; he seems so powerful in Leela, especially the desperado aggression version. Being able to draw very quickly for the card you need when you’re on the off foot is super nice. I could also go from -1 sec testing +1 mr li to get me 2x sec testing and 3x mr li; what do you think?
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I play 2x sec test and 3x Mr. I so very rarely have multiple security testings online and making money, that 3 feels like a wasted card slot, whereas Mr. Li, while somewhat of an intangible benefit, I still notice a substantial trend towards consistency, and consistently being able to maintain aggression once he hits the table.
I turned Mr Li into 2 Quality Times and was very happy with it. (Using the influence Aaron spent on Stimhack and Utopia Shard). It’s slightly quicker when you need to dig right now, and has the big benefit that you can use it when going TagMe.
You definitely need some draw in Leela though: I used not to run any and my most common losing condition vs NEH was not drawing one of my breakers types quickly enough. QT has fixed that right up, and Li ought to as well; he seems reasonable if you really want to use the influence elsewhere.
Yeah, my build runs ice destruction tools as well, so influence is tight. Given the redundancy in the deck, Mr Li feels like the right call although I can totally see how quality time would work faster.
Utopia seems like a must include for me. Combined with Legwork and the right timing, you can have a super-destructive turn. This will only get more powerful when Clot hits.
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Are you going to put clot in your leela deck? If so, how will you play it? My thinking was that Leela already does pretty well against FA and doesn’t have the tools to make the clot splash hurt like Shaper does.
Leela is very good against FA, you’re right, clot isn’t necessarily a tech against that, but its a way of “clotting” agendas into HQ, to make those runs more profitable between legworks.
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No, not at all. Clot’s appearance should foster more of a glacier environment. That can be both a boon and a bane for a Leela. If it leads to more IAA plays, she will have more opportunities to make a Power run to attempt to bounce the advanced car in via remote. Utopia shard is a great tool to help facilitate those power turns.
But Criminal has so few ways of making that Clot come out reliably, and it seems like as soon as they install it from hand the corp will purge. Maybe that’s worth it on its own, but I figure the inf is better spent on things like Utopia Shard.
Gotcha, that makes sense.
I’m not saying its an auto-include, but I can think of plenty of corner cases that might make them worth including, depending on which match-ups you tend to find challenging.
My knee jerk reaction is Clot is a card primarily used in Shaper and Anarch (in that order). Since Leela can handle FA and doesn’t care about Cyberdex I’m inclined to say Clot is not going in. I’ll be moving up to 3x Kati once clot hits though, getting her out will be even more vital at that time. Depending on the builds that start to come out another option would be adding Tri-maf or a 3rd Security Testing to make sure you have solid sources of income to start stockpiling the cash. Another thought would be to get that Garrote back into the deck for those annoying sentry heavy glaciers that will be more in vogue.
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I just sleeved Garrote back in, as I have lost (admittedly, only a couple) games that could have been won with a Garrote in the deck, and there were cards in the deck I couldn’t say that for. I agree, clot probably doesn’t make the cut in a Leela Patel deck, though it helps normalize matches where NEH takes off before you’ve gotten any strong punishment, or HB late game if they have a bunch of ICE rezzed and you don’t have much punishing power.
I’ve always wondered why Tri-Maf would ever be played over Armitage. The potential downside may only be a factor in 1/50 games, but it costs 1 more to install and you can only click it once. The only upside of TMC is that it lasts forever, but assuming you click AC only once/turn (as if it were TMC), that’s still 6 turns which is a pretty significant chunk of a game. Glacier games obviously go longer, but I’m always baffled when I see TMC slotted and not AC.
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True, you’ll need to hit the Tri-Maf at least 7+ times to start compensating for the inherit value and relative safety of Armitage. That being said ina glacier game you’re going to have a lot of turns building, if it came early it’d work and you can always Hostage for it (if you have your better pieces of economy running). I’m definetly not a huge fan of the Tri-Maf, but if not here, where (nowhere I guess)?
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I have to admit that @aandries has bigger balls than me, I was trying to figure out how he fit in cards I wanted to include but didn’t make the cut. Then I noticed he wasn’t running Plascrete or Garrote! Maybe it’s a different meta but BS kill decks are everywhere here, and I couldn’t rely on Utopia to keep me safe. I also don’t like not having an answer to a problem, that’s why I play Garrote.
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im curious what garrote is allowing you to do that the combination of mimic and faerie is not ? the range of 4 + sentries not named archer that see regular play is narrow.
i cut down to one plascrete but then i run the logos version so i can fish it out. if i weren’t running logos i might run 2 cuz thats a lot of pressure on mr. li to find all the 1-ofs on his own.
Stacked sentries will become an issue. If you read your Fairie run wrong Garrote at least can get you through sooner than a Femme and can survive a purge.
I’m surprised by this, but Saggitarius gave me more trouble yesterday than I thought possible. Lost a combined total of 23 credits’ worth* of programs to it, if memory serves 
Fortunately, it’s Str 4, so 4tman handled it in the end, like it usually does.
*two Morning Stars, a Yog and an Imp, for those interested.
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Taurus sees a lot of play in Blue Sun, I’m also seeing more decks with Space Ice, such as NEH with ToL and they are troublesome as Emergency Shutdown doesn’t do anything. Information Overload is also common in tagstorm decks. It’s definitely not every game you need it, but if I install Garrote one or two games a tournament, then it’s solved a problem I was having. As I said, you can play without it, I just prefer the security of having it available.
The Plascrete is a priority over the Garrote (IMO). I have never been unable to play around a sentry or two, you have answers in the deck, you have to be crafty about it. But the Plascrete can save a game. It’s only tournament loss was to Rob Wiley in Chicago in the finals of a 30 person event to flat line. I put most of that loss on myself, I hit a 3 pointer out of hand that actually gave me pause. I didn’t know if he had the Punitives and I knew there was at least an agenda in archives. I should have just gone hell for leather and ran everywhere. My big problem was I got all my tech cards and none of my breakers so by mid-game I had a ton of money and 1 of 3 breakers out, so I couldn’t stop the Posted Bounty in a double iced server from getting pushed through to my demise with the double scorched biotic turn.
I can not overstate how powerful Utopia Shard is, if you build a runner deck you need to consider it always. It’s a power card that everyone just hasn’t realized yet. Paired with legwork and it’s a savage, destructive turn. There is no place to hide those agendas when you decide to go. I find it even more disgusting in the re-set decks with AR Lab or heavy Deja Vu, firing it multiple times in a game is insane.
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