Argus Mud Marathon

Card draw simulator
Odds: 0% – 0% – 0% more
Repartition by Cost
Repartition by Strength
Derived from
None. Self-made deck here.
Inspiration for
Tabletop Random Deck Feb - Corp - Checkpoint
Board meetings are frustrating.
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x3r0h0ur 8891

I've been muddling over the new cards for Weyland, and Argus appears to be the toughest to crack. So, I spent a good deal of time thinking about this, and hopefully I'll be able to sleeve it up and tune it.

The influence looks odd, especially the BLC. It makes more sense once you're playing. The idea is to solidify the centrals hard, make them taxing to run. The runner has to deal with the big barriers, and checkpoints, all to score a whole 1 point, which they have to take a tag or meat damage for. Sure there's 1 big agenda, and that's where your ice goes...protecting whichever server it's living in. If they hit it, they hit it. Most games, they wont.

Eventually you glacier up a remote, build it up big and tall (don't hesitate to advance the shit out of ice!), maybe even big enough to score the government takeover (probably not though). A standard scoring turn involves installing 3 cards, any of the installables (agendas, snares, roots, drts). The agenda you REALLY want to score can go in the remote server, a secondary agenda could go out with a snare or DRT, or root, wasting time. Ideally you want to flood the runner with choices.

The runner run a big risk running any of these remotes, if they're snares with DRTs, or even agendas with DRTs. You should be able to do this no later than every other turn. Thus, it's like running in mud. Clearing tags and drawing up is annoying to do every turn.

The final thing to note is that if you get The Board early game, pitch it, forget it, don't bother. If you draw it late, you can make it impossible for the runner to win without trashing it, since it blanks all the 1 pointers, and even government takeover only gives them 6 points! At that point the race is on. Save those interns!

I think that false lead is the only definitive agenda to consider adding, given the nature of the ID ability.

The 1 of ichi 2 is interesting, the runner must trash a breaker, or they'll take a brain and a tag (if they lose the trace), and be on their last click. A tough decision at most points in the game. It also sucks to break at all. There's a few options to slot there, but I like Ichi 2 for testing.

Excited to test, open to feedback.

8 comments
23 Dec 2014 cpsubrian

I like what you have going on here. I haven't had a chance to look at all the O&C ice yet and you have already given me some invaluable substitutions to make in netrunnerdb.com I've got economy problems that you have solved.

A combo that I would love to figure out how to fit would be False-Leads/Snare/ID/Scorch. Once you have that false-leads then almost any central access is tag-bait. Add archived memories for more access to double scorch. Lots of influence though.

23 Dec 2014 Syntax

I'm not sure about this.

tl;dr : It's a critical point of vue, I hope you won't take this against your deck.

So first, there's 15 ices, 3 centrals, 1 scoring remote + satellites with DRT or the Root and eventually the Board.

To me, this means that the DRT or the Root will be very ligthly protected and instant trashed after you installed it but if you place them in the scoring remote.

The problem is you can't place DRT in the scoring remote because you have no tagging ice. So it means every time you put a DRT, it's behind a 1 ice server.

Since you already have 4 big servers to protect, I'm not sure you will be advancing a wall very much in a 5th server. You have only 5 boostable ice so you would have this situation only in the very late game. So if DRT hit the table they are instant trashed if the runner know your deck. OR you don't protect one central.

Keeping a tag is always a very bad idea running vs Weyland, and running clic 4 too. Meaning your Scorched Earthes would be always dead cards vs experimented runners. There is also no chance that the DRT will work on more than Snare, so a runner behind a plascrete - ditch an Archer to drop a Taurus btw - with 5 cards in hand is heavilly protected vs anything you throw at them.

Data Raven is always a nice idea with DRT so I think your influence would be better with this one than with BLCs.

I think you also need more brain occasions, a midseason maybe, or Cerebral Cast maybe and tagging ices. The Root is the one asset that will never be protected - with NEH runners are used to trash pricy asset today - and Scorched Earth will never be played I think.

Also, about DRT : without rezzing them before the Runner take an Agenda, the runner would take a tag then remove it in clic 4, so best choice for them is either you rez it, they take 2 meat or you don't rez it they take the tag. When seeing Snare this means they would never ever run on you with less than 5 cards => more brain would be very cool.

And... Last but not least... 15 agenda no Jackson, this is madness ! THIS IS SPARTA ! :)

23 Dec 2014 zithith

I like it. Definitely a good idea to take forward and something I'll try when O&C comes out.

Some bits I need to feed into my Argus deck. Like Checkpoint (How did I miss that?!). And from some of @Syntax's statements I feel a bit more ICE might be warranted, I dunno though - that's kinda the point of the playstyle isn't it?

I agree that this one does seem a bit lacking in tag sources pre-successful run and a Jackson or some other recursion might not be a bad plan (how to fit it in though is a mystery).

23 Dec 2014 x3r0h0ur

These are all good thoughts, and most of them did occur to me in construction. This is a very different style of play than normal, so I'm not sure how it'll work off paper.

I should note that yes, DRT and other assets go out unprotected most of the time. The difference though, is that you should be playing remote after remote, similar to the NEARPAD builds, eventually the remotes will overwhelm the runner's ability to check all of them, becoming more deadly as they stack up. The BLC's fill in the role of the NEH identity, AND give you cash. This allows you to pad your hand after a turn of installing 3 cards.

The scorches are there only to make the ID functional. You should be forcing the runner into clearing tags, without scorched, they can just take tags and trash DRTs. I would like tagging ice, but even the raven is vulnerable to parasuckering. The econ is too light to drop BLC for raven, so in testing, I'll see if money is the issue, or if ice is the issue. Ultimately, midseasons is the goal, but slots for econ are light in a deck that wants to run lots of 1 pointers.

The first thing I did when setting out for this deck, was to add 3x manhunt, to give you an idea of how devious this idea was. The issue there was that the 1 pointer density makes manhunt cry, even at 3 copies. I'm quite sure there is an Argus/Bernice/Manhunt deck to be made though...simply overwhelm the runner with tag sources, no need for credit disparity.

Braining is another option, and casts does seem like a good idea. Definitely on the table!

I do want to note this is 100% conceptual, as are most O&C decks, so if anyone plays this in proxy and finds something please post it here!

24 Dec 2014 Syntax

The raven, without taking a tag, is imune to parasuck :D You can't etr AND suck, at encounter. Cerebral cast will almost always give you brains in Weyland ;)

24 Dec 2014 Syntax

"Hey do you want double scorched or a brain ?" : I'd play with that, removing maybe scorched earth :)

8 Feb 2015 Oisin

Any update on this deck @x3r0h0ur? I've been working on an Argus that is of the more standard SEA Source / Punitive Counterstrike variety--using Data Raven with Melange Mining Corp. to try and force the runner into tough choices.

3 Mar 2015 x3r0h0ur

This deck is 4-0 on game night. Not the stiffest of competition, but fun still. Typically I end up scoring out all 7 1 pointers. Got 1 flatline.