What are the best ways to beat the post-rotation CtM? That deck seems super strong right now.
I would say CTM feels pretty fair right now. This is based pretty much entirely on my perspective playing Shaper, since I’ve barely played anything else in the new meta.
Misdirection is useful in the matchup, but can still leave you vulnerable to SEA Source if you let the corp run bankers the entire game. I like On the Lam as a tech slot for Smoke, providing a good HHN safety net, while giving you the option to instantly avoid tags, if you need to whiff a SEA or run through a data raven. Of course on the Lam is finite (twice at best if you play SoT), but I rarely run into situations where I wish I had it again.
Both Strike and Film critic as restricted cards are useful for the matchup. Tapwrm is great in the games where you let their assets run unhindered, and still decent in games where you try to control their economy.
Is there anything specific that you feel makes CTM oppressive? I don’t find it nearly as scary as the old CTM with breaking news.
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I can’t speak to every matchup, but I started playing CtM a bit after worlds and can give a few observations from that perspective.
Anarchs who trash cards in HQ can make things problematic. CtM is kind of strapped for recursion, so Maw, Imp, Wanton Destruction, Bhagat, and Ed Kim can make things difficult.
Shapers with Misdirection and saavy play can be almost impossible to hit with Hard-Hitting News. I know some players have gravitated towards a SEA Source based tag punishment package rather than HHN because of this.
Runners with Artist Colony or Shadownet can forfeit your Global Foods before you exchange them.
High Link runners basically laugh off your ICE with the exception of Data Raven and Tollbooth. It doesn’t help that Hunting Grounds is a very popular tech card right now.
I’ve had opponents who mostly stayed on top of trashing the Daily Business Shows, rather than the Bankers and other economy cards and the end result is usually a flooded HQ. If you can trash the DBS without sticking your neck out, it’s probably worth it.
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Good stuff. I don’t think CtM is unfair, just looking for conversation about playing it.
Unspoken advice - don’t run Criminal.
The problem I encounter right now is that SEA Source/HHN means it is very hard to run without big punishment unless you are super rich. Runners struggle to be rich right now, so that is tough.
I played two games against a friend. In the first, I largely ignored the board and focused on getting set up, getting accesses, drawing my multi-access. I lost.
We went over the game, I asked to run the matchup again.
In the second game I mercilessly killed Bankers and also started killing PAD Campaigns once I had enough money to kill multiple pieces in a turn to get value against CTM’s ability. I didn’t really worry about my Indexing or my other big cards until later. I won.
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I agree, I think you need to keep CtM’s board down early. @rubyvr00m already noted that the deck usually doesn’t have much recursion. CtM is often relying on being able to sacrifice its assets in order to punish you for attacking their strategy, but if you get in early enough, you can very possibly duck HHN, or at least a meaningful HHN. It’s not really so bad to take 4 tags if you haven’t stolen GFI yet, and especially because if you take out a critical asset, that’s one less they have for the late game.
I think some kind of big R&D attack is probably the best option to close out the game. Being forced to challenge the big nasty never-advanced remote over and over is really taxing and usually opens a window for CtM to either Exchange or score out while you remove tags. I really don’t enjoy playing Indexing but it’s pretty handy for closing out against CtM.
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Be aware, Indexing is always risky, some run Miraju. Femme can bypass it, or using The Turning Wheel/The Maker’s Eye/Spooned.
If you have the economy to trash everything and clear tags and beat Hard Hitting News, go for it. If you don’t, trash the Daily Business Shows/Whampoa Reclamation. Most runner decks play Tapwrm and SacCon so letting them get tons of credits isn’t terrible in an era without Midseason Replacements. Just beware of Sea Source combos: Exchange of Information/All-Seeing I/Closed Accounts + Hard Hitting News.