just to be clear, Councilman only triggers Off-Campus Apartment. it doesn’t have the trash symbol, so he doesn’t trigger Geist or Tech Trader
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I like cycy in theory. In practice, do corps not manage to punish you for having a cycy with insufficient ways to point it at different servers? Shapers usually have 3 clone, 2 or 3 scavenge and levy.
I guess there’s only one way to find out but it makes me nervous, very nervous.
Be careful - it’s highly likely corporation play with shift entirely to fast advance if Political Operative is as good as it appears. It doesn’t help much in Geist decks there, and it’s already a matchup that is unfavourable.
(Aside: Political Operative will probably get played as default in Gang Sign Leela builds, where it helps stop Jackson clear the hand, as well as ensure remote lock through Caprice. I think the right builds there could really shine against FA too.)
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You don’t play cyber cypher like you’re building your rig; you play it almost like an inside job. I play it once I need to, usually because my opponent believes I have no answer to a lotus or Turing remote once I’m out of crowbars. make sure you have another program kept in hand when you play cycy- this gives you the option to trash it and then levy once your opponent has wasted credits structuring their ice incorrectly against you.
Once your econ is online and you levy, you can cycy r&dv with your medium and dig deep for cheap through Archangel or what have you and go nuts.
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Fast advance seems like a big achilles heal for Geist, and with political operative we will probably see even more of it, since the caprice score plan becomes more difficult. With that in mind, I’m thinking that in the future we might want to try to squeeze in turntable to the list. With all of our burst multi-access, it should be possible to disrupt the astro chain pretty easily. Forger becomes less important once sports hopper comes out, so maybe we cut OCA and something for 2x turntable, and run 3x sports hopper, 1x access to globalsec for link. I think with 2x turntable+ 2x political operative, we might be able to hedge against both glacier and fast advance.
@CJFM Tech writer it turns out is actually pretty bad in Geist despite its synergy with his ability I put in UC to give me constant drip instead.
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I respectfully disagree. TW is good in Geist, but it can’t be your only money-making resource. UC drip is far too slow to be worth it, and it’s another one of those combo pieces (finding link) before its dripping. That means that it effectively takes three turns (UC + console) to break even (not counting click values) and then it only gives you a credit a turn. TW may take that many turns to get about 4-5 credits on it, and it will almost always be a better value than UC when you crack the first one. Effectively, TW speeds up Geist’s midgame, while UC speeds up his late game. His late game, in my opinion, is already his strongest suit. Does it need more speeding up?
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At first I agreed with the original builds which included TW, but then moved off of the TW for the UWC. I find both lackluster to be honest. Not sure what the right answer is…eplace them with 2 PolyOps and something else?
I agree that both are less-than-satisfactory. I recommend Daily Casts, though. Surprise: it’s still a good card. 
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With only 9 Connections (cutting the UWC), is OCA worth the influence? With some # of PolyOps, the count goes to 10-12. What’s the right number for the 3 slots and 3 influence to be worth the draw? OCA has been strong for me so far. What replaces it? Symmetrical Visage?
I play 15 playable connections in Sunny and it feels great. Considering the 50 card deck and that Geist plays Levy, I think 10-12 connections is a fine amount.
The OCA is great because Geist has trouble drawing unless he’s breaking things or Fall Guying, otherwise he’s just another chump runner clicking to draw. Symmetrical is great in him for sure despite that. OCA also has the benefit of being ‘discardable’ because Geist overdraws very often no matter how well you manage your turn. Most of his cards he wants to play or keep, even the dupe Forgers.
realistically that slot will become political operative for me when the card comes out. its not like I ever need money which is why the Tech Writers were overkill.
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That’s fair. I sometimes need them early to jump-start my economy, and I never feel bad popping a TW for about 5 credits and a card. I dunno about losing more economy cards for cards that require you have economy to use, though (referencing your old version). Unless, of course, you have compensated by adding some other economy.
I dropped Crescentus and Savoir-Faire and have tried out Gorman Drip instead, can make some nice money with it, and draw a card plus the obvious Tech Trader bonus, and people seem to ignore it in general, or at least not modify their play much because of it.
If it builds up you can sometimes provoke a purge which is also fine to slow them down.
Having used Gorman Drip in the past, I can only say that it is hugely inconsistent. In some games it does very well, (e.g. PE using 3rd click for a card or credit every turn), and others is is completely useless (e.g. ETF). Corps can’t always avoid the clicking for cards/credits, but they do build their decks to use these inefficient actions are infrequently as possible; if they are clicking for cards/credits, then things probably aren’t working well for the corp anyways.
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Maybe in a Siphon build, which also runs Scrubber to be able to clean up servers, Gorman Drip would have a nice home. It is inconsistent, but playing a deck that loads the dice in your favor helps.
Not sure I can buy the argument that Gorman Drip is better than Crescentus in that slot. The draw order is too relevant to maximum Gorman value, whereas a Crescentus shines any time past the early game. The issue is that a card which is strongest in the early game needs to be found in the early game, whereas Crescentus is always good anytime after the opening, and arguably gets better as more Traders are on board and there are larger ICE rezzed or Siphon spamming is underway. It also suffers from needing to Click to be trashed, which opens it up to accidental wipes by CVS, which is otherwise completely dead vs. Geist.
Maybe Gorman Drip v2 will fit better!
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Gorman is a cool card, best in a pure denial deck. While geist is close, its also kinda a ramp deck in a way. I like compromised employee due to the trace ice, and the damned if you do damned if you don’t situation you can put the corp in. Also nice from 0 recovery if the corp wants to try to stop you. Works with OCA too. Riding it till the hop comes out.
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My old list:
3 Sure Gamble
3 Crowbar
3 Account Siphon
2 Datasucker
1 ZU.13 Key Master
1 Corroder
1 Decoy
1 Legwork
1 Easy Mark
3 Same Old Thing
3 Career Fair
1 Mimic
3 Shiv
1 Plascrete Carapace
3 Spike
1 R&D Interface
3 Underworld Contact
3 Fall Guy
2 DDoS
3 Forger
3 Daily Casts
I tried this and didn’t like it. My build started looking like an Andy build so I scraped it. I was running 3x Daily Cast 3x Earthrise and 3x Career Fair. Not enough targets for Career Fair. There’s a reason Career Fair is seeing play in Anarch builds.
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