[Kate] Redefining Shaper Control Decks

Deck Archetypes
2346

You’re using game day to draw maybe 4 cards, if you start your turn with 1? 2 clicks and 1 credit for 4 cards isn’t so great, even if it’s powering power nap. I’ve been down this road, it leads to a dark place friend.

5 Likes
2347

I agree with @x3r0h0ur, Game Day is pretty lame on its own. But paired up with Beach Party, it can draw a lot of cards. Add Adjusted Chronotype and you can keep your click. Double down with Gene Conditioning Shoppe and you can even use Starlight Crusade funding (or a second Beach Party).

Now toss Faust into the mix and you can really set your deck on fire! (warning 2-3 LARLA recommended assuming the corp doesn’t just score out while you set this jank up)

I don’t know if this is the dark place @x3r0h0ur was talking about, but it’s the one I went to. Just say No to Game Day

1 Like
2348

Thanks for feedback. So far I have felt OK to play Game Day for 4 cards. I view it like playing I’ve Had Worse to draw 3 and then clicking for 1 more card, which seems decent to me.
But yes, it is the weakest card in the deck and is usually the first to discard when overdrawing with Quality time…

2349

Has anyone messed around with sticking to blitz Kate after adapting to the MWL changes? Here’s my shot.

Kate “Mac” McCaffrey: Digital Tinker

Event (23)
3x Diesel
3x Dirty Laundry
1x Escher
1x Levy AR Lab Access
2x Lucky Find ••••
2x Modded
3x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
3x Test Run
2x The Maker’s Eye

Hardware (9)
2x Astrolabe
2x Clone Chip
1x Plascrete Carapace
3x Prepaid VoicePAD
1x R&D Interface

Resource (3)
1x Film Critic
1x Same Old Thing
1x Symmetrical Visage

Icebreaker (6)
1x Atman
1x Cerberus “Lady” H1
1x Deus X
1x Femme Fatale •
1x Gordian Blade
1x Sharpshooter

Program (4)
1x Datasucker •
1x Parasite ••
2x Self-modifying Code

8 influence spent (max 15)
45 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Old Hollywood

Deck built on http://netrunnerdb.com.

2350

Playing no Clot and no legwork feels like basically conceding the Astrobiotics matchup. Beyond that, I’m not sure there’s enough targets for Modded to really make it worth it, since a lot of the time you’re installing from SMC and the Test Run/Scavenge combo. No Quality Time slows down the deck as well, since with this archetype you usually want to be drawing your pants off.

I guess my initial feeling about it is that it has almost no chance vs Astrobiotics, and probably a worse glacier matchup than Nexus Kate, so it’s not really a good contender against either opponent.

5 Likes
2351

I won an SC with @tomdidiot 's Cheeky Notoriety list, not dropping a single runner game. Three games I won with Notoriety, one of which I had no business at all winning. As a last hurrah for PPVP Kate, I couldn’t have asked for anything better. May she now rest in prepaids.

5 Likes
2352

Yes. I think reports of Prepaid VoicePAD’s demise are somewhat exaggerated. The Prepaid econ engine is still insane in Kate, it’s just a matter of whether we can get more done with less peripheral support now that Corps have also lost some ground.

This is my current testing list:

Digital Tinker (v6.2)

Kate “Mac” McCaffrey: Digital Tinker (Core Set)

Event (22)

Hardware (7)

Resource (4)

Icebreaker (8)

Program (4)

9 influence spent (max 15-6=9)
45 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Data and Destiny

Decklist published on NetrunnerDB.

  • I’m not sure 2x Atman is needed.
  • I’m not sure Snowball is needed.
  • I’m not sure Mimic is better than the third Clone Chip or second Lady. Especially if I have 2x Atman and Datasucker.
  • There’s just no way to keep Parasite, so we need more economy cards than we had before. That’s even more true since I had to cut a Lucky Find to keep the Legwork.
  • I’m not sure two Scavenges are needed, but they’ve definitely been nice so far.
  • The third Tech Writer would be nice to have, just to help get it early on.
  • A Film Critic or Plascrete would be pretty easy to fit in, I think.

So far in my testing I feel like the major Corps lost more than Kate did, but I’m still working on a suitable Fastro list to test against this, so we’ll see how it holds up. That said, with this list I’m not afraid of anything glaciery – if you even get close to Levy 'o clock, you should do nearly as well as the pre-MWL list.

5 Likes
2353

The problem with “Oh, well, the corps lost stuff too.” is that Fastro cut Eli and kept APP, while you’ve cut Clot and kept lady.

5 Likes
2354

I kept Legwork, which is even more important than Clot. But you could fit a Clot in there even with the Legwork if it’s still important.

2355

They’re both important, I didn’t say to cut the Legwork. I suspect you’ll need the Clot though. Legwork is 1 copy that becomes 4 once you see the real copy, through SOT. Clot is just 4 copies of hate through SMC.

2356

This works. Not sure if Nexus Kate is better or not, though.

Kate “Mac” McCaffrey: Digital Tinker

Event (21)
3x Diesel
3x Dirty Laundry
1x Legwork ••
1x Levy AR Lab Access
2x Lucky Find ••••
1x Notoriety
3x Quality Time
1x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
3x The Maker’s Eye

Hardware (9)
2x Astrolabe
2x Clone Chip ☆☆
1x Plascrete Carapace
3x Prepaid VoicePAD ☆☆☆
1x R&D Interface

Resource (5)
1x Film Critic
1x Sacrificial Construct
3x Technical Writer

Icebreaker (6)
1x Atman
1x Cerberus “Lady” H1 ☆
1x Cyber-Cypher
1x Mimic •
1x Sharpshooter
1x ZU.13 Key Master

Program (4)
1x Clot ••
3x Self-modifying Code

2357

Your list looks very solid, and should be great against NBN.

My concern is however, that it might have problems with more glacier decks, which can have nasty sentries with 4, 5 and sometimes also 6 and higher strength.
So single Atman won’t solve this, and the Sharpshooter is also insufficient with reduced recursion.
I also tested Kate with 2 Atmans, but I was still not happy about it.
In this case I feel that D4v1d is what is really needed.

So this is my current D4v1d build:

Kate “Mac” McCaffrey Digital Tinker
11 influence spent (max 15-4=11) •••••••••••
45 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Old Hollywood

Event (23)
3x Diesel
3x Dirty Laundry
1x Legwork ••
1x Levy AR Lab Access
2x Lucky Find ••••
3x Quality Time
3x Scavenge
3x Sure Gamble
1x Test Run
3x The Maker’s Eye

Hardware (7)
2x Astrolabe
1x Plascrete Carapace
3x Prepaid VoicePAD ☆☆☆
1x R&D Interface

Resource (7)
3x Daily Casts
1x Film Critic
1x Kati Jones
2x Same Old Thing

Icebreaker (4)
1x Atman
1x Cerberus “Lady” H1 ☆
1x Gordian Blade
1x Mimic •

Program (4)
1x D4v1d ••••
3x Self-modifying Code

No Clone chips, but Scavenges are better for Lady and David.
Test Run (and two SOTs) are primarily to recover from destroyed program, but is also great as a tutor for David.

So the matchup against NBN FA is likely to be worse with the D4v1d build (compared to your “classic” build), but glaciers are better for sure.

And Nexus Kate will be likely positioned even further in the glacier part of the spectrum.

So it seems that the “right” Kate build might be a question of Meta call post MWL. Not enough influence to have one deck which is great against everything…

1 Like
2358

I’ve tried to get the ppvp engine post MWL and it’s nowhere as successful as the proco / cast build.
You lose way too much of your toolkit box to reliably compete vs q diverse field and losing some speed doesn’t matter as much since every corp deck slowed down as well.
Basically by playing proco instead of voicepad you are 2 turns slower than before but since the corp setup speed also slowed down by that much if not more, it doesn’t really matters.

4 Likes
2359

Do you believe that or are you trying to hide your NEH FA deck? :smiley:

3 Likes
2360

with that many scavenge i’d think about femme.

1 Like
2361

I found that playing Kati Jones instead of Lucky Find is less of a hit then I expected. I still profit a lot from the pads for all the other events. Swapping one Clone Chip for another Scavenge and Legwork for Utopia Shard left the rest of the deck unchanged and it is still a powerhouse.

2 Likes
2362

@pj1 Tested it against FoodCoats and it worked reasonably. RP may be more difficult. Atman is actually a pretty poor breaker because the install cost is so large that you lose immense pressure by playing it. Under most situations, it just sits in the discard with “Break glass in case of emergency”. Sharpshooter, 2x Clone Chip, Levy is generally sufficient since 3 x Diesel, 3 x Quality Time moves through the deck very quickly. Ichi 1.0 and 2.0 have alternative breaks so it’s only when servers become 3 deep that this becomes a problem. 3 deep takes sufficiently long that there is ample time to win.

With only 1 Legwork, you need Clot. It’s very likely a number of better players will revert to NEH in an MWL world so I’m afraid you’ll very likely be left behind at the station without #SlotTheClot.

1 Like
2363

I’m not.
Before that, you could put Architect somewhere and the runner won’t run until they find their SMC. Now, the runner could blind index/TME you and don’t really care much. You basically need to install and rez more ice for the same effect, which is effectively slowing down your deck.

Also, not having NAPD anymore means the centrals are easier target. You won’t create scoring window because the runner is too poor to react after stealing a NAPD.

6 Likes
2364

@IirionClaus Been playing a post-MW 'pocalypse Kate based on your pre-MW list, and finding it quite good still. Have you done any work on that deck lately?

1 Like
2365

NEH is still fine but like you said,it lost some consistency and really depends on what you have drawn.There are simply too many things you can achieve easily in the past now cost you more clicks and money.NEH is strong,but not dominant like it once was before.