Schwarzenegger's 'Roids

Mancini 62

The strategy here should be fairly obvious: spam bioroids and score behind them with an Anoetic. There isn't much nuance to the deck—just money up and slap bioroids everywhere. You want to take advantage of the 4 credit discount as many times as possible, so make sure to always have an unrezzed 'roid somewhere. Usually, I end up making two or three remotes: a heavy scoring remote and some more lightly defended remotes for my campaigns. In terms of centrals, I'd typically place the most emphasis on ICEing up R&D since you'll ideally be slapping agendas in the scoring server immediately after they enter HQ.

The one oddball choice in here is the single Brainstorm, which I consider to be the MVP of the deck. People seem to assume that they can click through anything spiky and will be more careless with their runs as a result. It combos nicely with Cyberdex Virus Suite to punish Botulus/Musaaki based runners with crippling amounts of brain damage (I once got a Freedom player on Jinteki.net down to a hand size of -1, though tragically I didn't get to see what the victory message said as they conceded before the end of turn).

I only played this deck casually on Jinteki.net and it's been met with mixed success. The toughest matchup by far is against ICE destruction anarch, since you don't get the 4 credit discount if the bioroid is trashed before they pass it. I found this deck neutered Diversion of Funds as long as I had an unrezzed Tyr/Fairchild on the board since I could just blow my money on rezzing something expensive.

The ideal opening hand has 2-3 pieces of ICE and some sort of econ. Prioritize getting a campaign out early, even if it means leaving a central server exposed. You really, really, need the money. Poverty is a major issue with the deck despite all the economy assets and it's something I've yet to fix.

Unfortunately, the lower influence of the ID meant that I couldn't include a third Global Food Initiative and I had to settle for an Ikawah instead. I've considered swapping it for a Send a Message to get free Tyrs and Fairchilds on the board, and I'm still conflicted about it. I used to have 3x The Twins, but found them too unwieldy and cut them and a Spin Doctor for another Anoetic Void. Another consideration was ditching the single Subliminal Messaging for an Ark Lockdown, but I ultimately opted against it since the runner would just install their bin breakers manually once I rezzed the corresponding type of ICE with the ID ability. I tried including Biotic Labor and Bass, but found myself too poor to really use it effectively.

So, whaddaya think?

1 comments
27 Feb 2022 Greasythumb

While the one game you rez Brainstorm and it ruins the runner's day will feel marvellous, I feel like it's mostly useless here. Maybe a Manegarm Skunkworks or a Bass CH1R180G4 would do better in the slot? Depending on how rich you feel, it mighyt be that Lateral Growth gives you better speed than Regolith Mining License, although it might be that the muscular stack of creds is important.