Rig in a Jar

Idea

The idea was to make a working deck around Ekomind. After a lot of trial and error with different strategies I settled on utilizing the huge amounts of late game memory for a powerful and flexible endgame rig.

The payoff is a fun, flexible deck that can keep some pressure early and sets up a monster rig late game. Think around 8 MU worth of programs with room to pull fast ones combined with Magnum Opus and Kati Jones for economy.

Playstyle

This deck plays differently than most decks because it wants to go through the deck fast. You'll often find yourself depleting your stack during the game and playing with a hand of 9 to 11 cards in your hand.

Your first order of business is to have Public Sympathy and Duggar's on the table as soon as possible but without giving the corporation to much leeway. What this means is you're going to be drawing hard while building up your economy and installing Clone Chips. Inject is the perfect card for this since you want to toss most of your programs onto the heap anyway while keep everything else so why not get a few credits while we're at it. It also synergises very well with Retrieval Run. This way you can dig through your deck while keeping pressure by having credits and ways to install your breakers from the heap if the corporation tries to pull a fast one.

When you get that Duggar's installed use it to refill your hand. You'll usually be around 2/3rd of your deck after you do this and will most probably finish with Ekomind in your grip. With 7 or more cards in your hand you can install it and start completing that monster rig. Take care not to shine a 'scoring window' spotlight at the corp by using Duggar's when you're poor. Daily Casts are good here since you get while you draw. It's interesting to note that you'll most probably use Duggar's only once per game but it's still worth the investment.

ProTip: Pay attention to what you're tossing into the heap. You don't want to end up with Torch in your hand when you could have installed it for 3 with Retrieval Run.

Generally speaking Clone Chip and Retrieval Run are your most useful assets during the whole game and should be used to adapt to the situation on the table. Don't make the mistake of installing your big breakers if you don't need them. It's about pulling the most efficient programs you need right now or feel you'll need for this game.

One important thing to note about playing this deck is that it takes a tempo dip the turn you install Ekomind because it makes you 'switch gears' so to speak. From now on you lose MU when playing cards from your hand and you need to account for that. It's something other decks don't have to do and it takes some getting used to.

A few words on the choice of cards

• Whizzard: Master Gamer is the ID of choice because his ability helps us greatly against corporations that run assets. We'd lose too much tempo if we had to pay the full trash cost of those SanSans, Campaigns and IT Departments. It complements our play style well.
• D4v1d should be self-explanatory. It's a super cheap way to break anything that would normally stop or hurt us. Having one ready to install via Clone Chip enables to run more aggressively. It also helps counter IT Department.
• Torch is the most effective decoder in the game - you can break Lotus Field for 1 and Tollbooth for 5
• Morning Star - You can play this blind against Jinteki and NBN. Often it can replace Corroder on the table later in the game if the corp is not running any stronger barriers. It's disgustingly good against Eli, Wall of Thorns and other popular smaller barriers.
• Ninja is your 'get out of jail free' card against decks playing a lot of strong sentries and it complements Mimic really well.
• Magnum Opus goes without saying - it's the best runner economy card and we have the MU to play it.
• Incubator is a fantastic card that helps swing the tempo in your favor. It's a ticking time bomb that the corporation shouldn't ignore. It basically forces them to wipe viruses from time to time or risk a deep Medium or Nerve Agent dive.
• Feedback Filter since we can't afford losing cards and taking brain damage. And we have the economy to play this.
• No Datasucker for a couple of reasons. It makes people ice up archives (and we want them open for Retrieval Run) and we don't really need it since we're not relying on the Anarch rig - we have appropriate breakers for tougher ICE.

Cons

This deck struggles against tagging decks because you won't be able to play Public Sympathy. You'll be effectively forced to operate on a 4 MU rig without any economy.

Another thing is meat damage. A corporation can just SEA Source into Scorched Earth 'for funsies' during late game and it costs you half your rig. Or they can just SEA Source and thrash two Public Sympathy. Obviously you can put Plascrete Carapace in and my advice would be to include a single copy since you're going through your deck quickly. But it's always gonna be a problem.

Also Komainu costs a ton to break. Kill it with Parasite.