Maximum Christmas Land - 2nd Place, Rochester Regionals

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Halarith 290

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This beauty helped me finish 2nd overall at the regional in Rochester, which had 41 people. It was undefeated in Swiss (allowing me to ID the last two rounds), and went 1-2 in Top 8 mainly due to a couple unfortunate strokes of bad luck.

I can't really take that much (if any) credit for the deck, Simonmoon built the deck and I just played it a bunch. The deck primarily wants to be a fast-advance deck, with Biotic Labor and Jeeves as the engine, but it can also play a never-advance game, and even a half-decent glacier game in desperate times.

Jeeves was already perceived to be a powerful card, but I think this deck maximizes his ability and effectiveness. A weird PAD Campaign at worst and SanSan City Grid replacement at best, Jeeves adds value even the turn you rez him, and if the runner doesn't trash him right away it can allow you to snowball extremely quickly.

I'm just going to list a couple things that Jeeves allows you to do:

• Score any 3/2 from hand with Subliminal Messaging and Shipment from SanSan, or Efficiency Committee with only Biotic Labor.

• Never-Advance an ABT and install Jackson.

• Never-Advance an Efficiency Committee, or a Global Food Initiative with Biotic Labor.

• Over-advance Virtuvius by 1 for a counter.

• Biotic Labor any 3/2 and install Cyberdex Virus Suite to purge Clot.

There are, of course, weaknesses to the deck. Whizzard can, and is, a problem at times as they only need to trash Jeeves for 2. Hayley can snowball faster than you if they have a perfect start, and it can be generally harder to finish out a game against them. However, HB has many problem ICE for Faust decks, and if Hayley stutters even a little early game you can rush faster than them.

There are a few cards that I want to add to this deck, but deck slots are already at a premium. Archived Memories could give you a better Noise matchup and can help you get a Shipment back if you can't over-advance Virtuvius. Fast Track could help you score an agenda from your deck that same turn (which was something that plagued me in the finals). Changing the agendas to maximize 3/2s is also an option, as there are times where the only agendas you draw are the ones you can't Biotic Labor without Jeeves. However, Efficiency Committee is easily the best agenda for the deck, and can create tempo plays for you easily.

12 comments
2 May 2016 mediohxcore

That's an awkward ass PAD campaign you got in there.

2 May 2016 Halarith

More like the best SanSan City Grid.

2 May 2016 rwknoll

Loving the deck idea, and I'm a huge HB fan, so I think this is great.

How does the economy feel? I'm guessing you recur Adonis with Architect occasionally to help, but did you ever have money problems? How did you deal with Account Siphon, if that came up?

2 May 2016 Halarith

The economy of this deck isn't that vital, actually, but you still need to rez ICE.

If you have Jeeves in play you can score from 0. Your ID (or Subliminal Messaging if you're under Employee Strike) gives you the credit you need to advance once after the Shipment triggers Jeeves. Efficiency Committee amplifies this as well; you can always use the counters for credits in a bind but that's one of the worse ways to use it.

You're going to be spending a lot of your credits on rezzing your ICE, or on Biotic Labor.

2 May 2016 Johnny Polite

I think I played against this in the elim rounds and lost. Deck seems good, Jeeves is a 5 cost trash on sight. Congrats on making second!

2 May 2016 thebigunit3000

Were all three ash necessary? The reasoning behind them is that they make it really hard to run a server twice, but with a smaller than normal ice suite, maybe cutting one would make sense? What cards would you consider taking out / adding in moving forward?

2 May 2016 Halarith

In testing before Rochester, 3 seemed necessary; It gave you another card to install in a server and gave you some sort of protection early. After Rochester I wouldn't mind cutting one. Ash isn't as good in this deck as it is in a deck like Foodcoats because most of the time Caprice forces multiple runs, and they're usually too poor for the Ash trace by the time they finally win a Psi game.

CVS was also a card I thought about trimming down, but 2 feels right still; I think any fast-advance deck needs to play at least 2 anyway. You still need to stop Medium, as well.

The first card I'd add is an Archived Memories to return Jeeves or Shipment depending on what's in your hand. Returning Jeeves the turn after they trash it usually means it stays on the board the second time around. I would have made it Interns before the ruling that Jeeves doesn't check retroactively, but Archived Memories might be better for Shipments anyway.

2 May 2016 omnijeff

Do you typically protect the Jeeves behind any ICE? If so, how hard do you make the ICE (presumably harder if they're Whizz)?

2 May 2016 Halarith

I try to ICE it the turn I decide to install it. The ICE is sort of dependent on the matchup, but it's not necessarily a priority; against Whizzard I try to throw Turing or Ichi. Against Hayley I go for anything, but a lot of Hayley players don't trash it for some reason. Against any criminal it's usually Eli, but unless I see Bank Job or Security Testing I don't ICE it; they barely have money as it is.

3 May 2016 Fridan

I would think Oaktown Grid might have a place here for the Jeeves server. Goes very nicely with Ash.

3 May 2016 wynalazca

Do you think a 3rd Vitruvius is better than the 3rd Beta Test here? You talk about getting Vitruvius counters but only have 2 in the deck. It's obvious that Beta Test is a fantastic and potentially very powerful agenda, but instead of playing !slots with Beta Tests, isn't free recursion better vs almost the entire field?

3 May 2016 Halarith

@Fridan I personally don't like Oaktown Grid but I know why people play it. The deckslots in this deck are extremely tight so it's hard to change a couple cards without changing the deck.

@wynalazca An early version had all 6 3/2s that way it was easier to never-advance or Biotic points out. Once I figured out Efficiency Committee was insane, I wanted at least 1 more but had to cut another 2-pointer. For as much as I want a Virtuvius counter at times, Corp needs to play !slots in order to stay ahead. You're racing against inevitability every game; Whizzard will eventually Medium-dig you, Hayley will eventually making FA impossible, Chameleons will eventually R&D lock you. You run out of time faster than you think. Firing ABT with a 16-ICE deck is riskier than average, but having an extra Jeeves click can mitigate the damage and the payoff almost always buys you a couple more turns.

Free recursion might be better, who knows? I'm still trying to sort out the last 3-4 cards anyway. As it stands I'm doing:

• -1 Ash, -1 Wall of Static, -1 Architect • +1 Archived Memories, +1 Enigma, +1 Wraparound

I can see the reasoning behind -1 ABT, +1 Virtuvius, but it depends on how often you're going to try and get a counter. If you don't see yourself getting a counter almost every time, stick to ABT. Even if you don't fire ABT, you at least had the option to.