StealthPunk (1st @ Antarctic Continentals)

It has been a while since I last faced a Smoke list on any high table of a competitive event, making me one of very few players who still believe in this ID - even in a very fast-paced meta that puts a runner who requires more setup at a significant disadvantage.

This is the list that helped me win the unofficial Antarctic Continentals. It is pretty similar to my older “A Bird, a DJ, and two Politicians walk into a bar…” list, only now it features no politicians, no birds and no DJs.

Weirdly enough, it also does not slot Clot, which is now often considered the primary reason to play shaper in the first place. It is still the Imp that does the heavy lifting and is brought back to life over and over again by means of Simulchips and sheer persistence.

But how does it keep up with the insane tempo of Sportsmetal and PD, you ask. Well, after the early pressure of Jailbreaks, Dirty Laundries and SMC-Overclocks you just take a turn of respite, declare Peace, install the duo of Aniccam & Net Mercur, and start running like there is no tomorrow.

A common error that makes Smoke look much slower than she really is results from the urge to hoard credits on Mercur. The card should actually be seen more as a draw engine, that together with Aniccam and a total of 20 events builds a world where clicking for draw is no longer needed.

The price for this speed is that we no longer have room for many tech cards that had been helping us in the past, with the exception of Misdirection – yellow is still the hardest color for us to beat.

And when the corp manages to get ahead and create this game state where you simply cannot address that Manegarm Void triple Border remote or more Audacious Biotics than our Impish friend can handle, you can just get your Equivocation from wherever it may roam that late into the game and hammer R&D for an enhanced hail Mary ending.

Trickster Taka was not present in the previous iteration, but now I feel like an additional source of stealth is essential, and the sneaky little rascal is much better at supplying this resource than Penumbral Toolkit or any other obscure alternative. One thing to be mindful about, though, is to keep spending Taka credits and not get ourselves in a situation, where we need to run to avoid getting into tag territory, when there is a better play available. This is doubly important if we are planning to have the mid-game Peaceful turn to recharge our batteries any time soon.

I give you this list forever – feel free to play around and experiment with it however you see fit. I would also like to thank @ValeNetrunner for organizing an amazing tournament and all the players I faced during the event. Rock on, and… Always Be Smoking!