Red Tree - the Mti Mwekundu thread

Decklists
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I like these ID threads and Mti has such an interesting ability I’m curious where other people want to take it. I don’t have any lists to share yet, in fact I’m starting this because I can’t find anything I’m happy with, but I can start a high level discussion on what the ID does. I see basically three routes to take with Mti: asset spam, mushin/traps, and rush. No matter what you do, there’s already a Jinteki ID that’s viable in the archetype (Industrial Genomics, Personal Evolution, Palana Foods) so Mti needs to justify itself.

asset spam

A lot of the initial discussion around Mti has focused on asset spam because the ID ability allows you to pseudo “protect” all your remote servers at once with ICE in hand. Runners are disincentivized from checking facedown remotes and you have more flexibility in choosing which ones to protect since it doesn’t have to happen ahead of time but rather during a run.

Asset spam decks tend to win by either fast advance or kill. Fast advance is a bit tricky because the best option in faction is Political Dealings which I’ve played with quite a bit and find to be lesser than other factions’ options, but kill is suitable given the faction’s strengths. The most powerful assets tend to be the political ones and Mti has some cool ways of protecting them: you can still ICE them to force an encounter (the runner doesn’t have to trash the political anymore but that might be worth a DNA Tracker encounter) or you can use Himitsu-Bako to gear check (using its paid ability to return to hand before your turn begins).

The tension with asset spam is that you don’t have deck slots for a lot of ICE, so your ID doesn’t fire consistently, and even the nastiest Jinteki face checks (Komainu, Cortex Lock) don’t necessarily advance your game plan. Runners, particularly Anarchs with I’ve Had Worse, can risk net damage if it means suppressing your board state at a critical juncture.

mushin/traps

These decks will look similar to the asset spam ones to some extent, relying on damage assets like Ronin and/or Bioethics as win conditions. My rationale on why this is a compelling choice is that runners are doubly dissuaded from checking your remotes since there are two unknowns: will Mti ICE it? and is it a trap? This indecision makes it easier to develop kill components onto the board. These decks have the same slot problems as asset spam; with all the traps, Mushins, kill cards, etc. you have little room for ICE.

rush

Mti can theoretically score a 5/3 turn 2: IAA turn one, if the runner contests use Vanilla to ETR, finish scoring turn two. That’s an unlikely scenario but the ID is set up to score very early. IAA shenanigans with NGO Front, Bio Vault, Nisei Mark II, etc. is easier with the ability to drop a gear check in front of them if contested. In rush games, clicks are the limiting factor more than credits so Mti’s ability to save a click on install becomes more valuable. The “ghost ICE” protecting all your remotes also makes never advance more potent and lets you sneak Rashidas onto the board where they might not be checked for fear of a nasty ICE. Lastly, Shipment from Tennin is particularly difficult for some runners to turn off since they may not have Strike or be ready to run and risk an ICE encounter, whereas against most other corps hitting a safe server is trivial in the early to mid game.

cool Mti things

Just some observations:

  • you can trigger Mti on your turn with every rules lawyer’s favorite card An Offer You Can’t Refuse
  • Sadaka (and trap ICE generally) are awesome in Mti
  • the install cost savings is helpful for rush or glacier builds
  • you’re a little better at using positional ICE because you can install to the base of a server, e.g. Trypano trashing the Komainu behind an Inazuma is less of a concern
  • you have to have a plan for Employee Strike
  • SMC and the conspiracy breakers let runners play around your ability to some extent but Criminals don’t have tools for on-demand access to breakers (RIP Savoir-faire)
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I think MTI is going to be the best Rashida and NGO deck in the format, which is a huge deal for me, seeing as how they’re the best cards in the game right now. T1 IAA or Rashida, Ice a Central, play something else.

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You rang?

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One of the more interesting things I’ve seen Mti used to do is protecting Bio-Ethics Association with Himitsu Bako, then picking it up for 1c before your turn starts so that BEA still fires.

I’m not sure that a simple gear check that costs you 3 credits each time you do it is really the best thing you can do with Mti, but it is something cool that other asset spam decks can’t really do.

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Nero new meta.

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i was thinking trap ice could be good here too (protecting politicals but just in general too). Jinteki has a lot of options.
Special Offer is probably a waste of influence, but 4 clickless credits seems ok?

you get boned if the runner can break it, but you just don’t install/rez it in the first place then

but i think Mti will be like the CTM of Jinteki. it doesn’t need a metric ton of assets, but it can definitely punish runners who contest them

i was also thinking the Jua > Wraparound combo could work here since you could just hold onto your wraparounds to install on the innermost position once you get jua out. it would still need Navi, and then @miek pointed out wanting to use Blacklist, and i realised it just does the same thing but with few cards dedicated to it and way less influence

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If you install a political and then protect it with a Trap or something, they can choose to jack out, so that might not be the best use of time and resources.

I do like the idea of using traps and upgrades. Install, Improve, then if they don’t continue you have a 2 Ice remote with an Upgrade built the previous turn for just one click, so now you can IAA whatever you want.

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I don’t think so. Mti Mwekundu’s text:

Once per turn, when the Runner approaches a server, you may install a piece of ice protecting that server in the innermost position, ignoring all costs. The Runner is now approaching that ice.

If you have a naked asset, at step 5 of the run (“approach server”), corp can install an ICE and the runner will go to step 2 (“approach ICE”). Step 2.2 says “If this is not the first piece of ice approached this run, the Runner can choose whether or not to jack out.” Since this is, in fact, the first ICE approached this run, the runner may not choose to jack out, and the corp is free to rez it and make them eat it.

It’s a good ID ability!

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I hope this doesn’t end in one of those classic FFG rulings like “when the runner approached the server, there were zero ice protecting the server. The runner passed all zero ice so the ice installed by Mti is not the first piece of ice.”

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I agree that FFG’s templating has been a little dodgy, but this seems pretty cut and dry as the timing rules are written. The timing rules specify that you cannot jack out if its the first ICE you encountered that run. Even if there was some malarky about “passing 0 ICE means you have passed some ICE on this run,” they would have to justify it as “they encountered an ICE even though there was no ICE to encounter,” which would be really weird, even for FFG.

At any rate, probably a good idea to have the timing of a run printed out before you take this ID to your first tournament :stuck_out_tongue:

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I was being kind of silly :innocent:

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The fact that you get to install the ice for free makes me feel extra excited about using Red Tree for a deck that wants to build vertically… in that context, the ID ability is similar to Jinja City Grid, except you don’t have to draw it and they can’t trash it. Instead, you have to bait runs.

It’s competing with Palana and AgInfusion there, but that what gets me excited.

In practice, you really need to be careful about Employee Strike if you are rushing early as that has wrecked me pretty good.

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Nasir players are already used to this :slight_smile:

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You are absolutely right. My mind was still in the “Multiple Jack Out Windows” place, but now its your first piece of Ice. That’s quite interesting.

And yeah, it being a Jinja with a slightly more punishing timing makes it really impressive.

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When installing with the ID, can you over(under?)write ICE?

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That’s a good question and I guess we need an FAQ. I looked at the rules reference which says this in the section on installing ICE:

When installing ice, the Corp may first trash any other ice already installed protecting the destination server in order to reduce the install cost.

Emphasis mine. This makes it sound like one can only trash pre-existing ICE in order to lower costs; since Mti’s ability ignores cost, perhaps you can’t overwrite? We would’ve already had this issue with Team Sponsorship or Jinja (where the ICE install doesn’t cost any extra) but I’ve never seen it come up in play.

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Strike is going to become even more prevalent, I guess. The worst part is that you’ll just have to plan around not being able to use your ID ability, since the Runner can just Strike -> run.

Maybe this ID wants Obokata after all. I’d been leaning toward a rushier style with 4/2s and GFI, but if a Runner can’t have both Strike and Critic, then you can lean on Obo to beat Runners with Strike and lean on your ID to beat Runners with Critic.

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That last comment is quite interesting. I’ve been going with Fairchild, because I think people might try to poke you into an install elsewhere before running your remote, so they won’t be able to click through it. We’ve been trying different things, and if you run R&D or HQ first and they don’t install, you can then read them on “Protect my Rashida” or if they’re going for no trigger this turn, and make the call from there. You can get your run in without them installing from the ID this way.

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I still think they meant this ID to work the way it was described in the news post that spoiled it: That you have to put the ICE down at the innermost position just after the runner started the run, and then the runner jumps inward to the new ICE. They probably just messed up the wording.
That being said, it sounds like a complete mess to errata it, so I assume it’ll be left as it is and we’ll never know.

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I dunno, I figure by now they probably have a pretty good handle on the difference between “approaches a server” and “initiates a run on a server”

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