Karma Chameleon v2.0

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paddosan 3413

Second version of my Hayley-Chameleon deck.

I've done a lot of playtesting of this one, and finally reached what I think is a good point. It might not be a tier 1 deck, since it can struggle a bit against NBN fast advance or Butcher Shop (albeit an early Film Critic helps), but it's very funny to play and quite solid in mid or late game.

The major changes from the other published version are as follow:

  • D4v1d has been removed to save on influence, and because it's not needed anymore, since there's two ways to make Chameleon enough, now: LLDS Processors and Datasucker tokens.
  • Turntable has been removed in favor of Desperado, which helps the economy a lot. Still one of the best console in the game, if not the best.
  • Autoscripter was not worth it. Sure it saves you one click, but when you don't have to spend much on each run, you can spare the first click to install your breaker. And since Hayley allows you to save one click anyway, it's more than enough.
  • Test Run was the least used card in the whole deck. I only got a program trashed due to carelessness and an unexpected encounter with Ichi 1.0 on my last click. Don't run last click, kids, it's not safe!
  • Net-Ready Eyes isn't really necessary, plus each card in this deck is important, so getting to trash two of them was kind of a pain.

The best opening hand would probably contain an LLDS Processor or a Datasucker, a Chameleon and a Sahasrara or Scheherazade. This way you could start running early on, with relative safety: when you get to strength 4-5 there's really only Archer to fear, and that ain't no early game ice.

One might swap Desperado with Astrolabe, but while that would accelerate your setup, it would leave you without any passive return in credits, and would make you waste more clicks getting money. Which can be especially bad against fast decks.

Since there's no recursion whatsoever, you have to be careful, so weird decks might give you a sense of insecurity and make you spend way too much time building up. You could still add a Levy AR Lab Access or 1/2 Clone Chips, but since there's nothing to actually recycle, they might be a waste most of the time.

Other that NBN FA decks, Blue Sun can be quite annoying. For things like Hive or Spiderweb, other than the obvious Curtain Wall. Multiple subroutines increase your expenses considerably, while the high strength can slow you down, but won't make you pay more by itself. Sure, these are all barriers and you have Corroder as your fracter, but keep in mind that you can still name Chameleon as your fracter if needs be. And believe me, against Weyland decks it's always a good idea... especially considering they don't really have many Code Gates or Sentries anyway.

8 comments
17 Sep 2015 RubbishyUsername

Why Corroder over say, Lady? Lady makes more sense supplementing an AI breaker because the only way you'll need 2 chameleons and a Corroder is against 3 iced servers with three different types, and even then lady works for the first up to 4 runs. The biggest reason I can see against it is deck space, but the amount of influence and money it would save...

17 Sep 2015 paddosan

My main issue with Lady is that it could become a problem against barriers with multiple subroutines, and I have no recursion, so I went for a breaker that doesn't need power counters. I would have to use 3 copies, so deck space is another issue, albeit a minor one.

The extra influence though... there's not really anything important I could add, other than maybe Imp, since trashing assets is often a problem... but then I'd have memory issues and no recursion means very limited use out of it.

I'm actually thinking about GS Sherman M3, when Data and Destiny comes out. It might be better than Corroder or Lady, given how I already have Datasuckers to lower the strength.

18 Sep 2015 daytodave

For Chameleon, London Library is equivalent to Sahasrara and doesn't cost memory. This would also open you up for a 1x Fem Fatale and 1-2x Overmind, which would really slow down the corp early game.

Since you're trying to maximize your 1 run per turn, why not John Masanori? You don't seem to be facechecking,

19 Sep 2015 OrdiNeu

@daytodave, I think it's trying to gain two credits per turn on the first click with Scheherazade, which you can't use London Library with.

19 Sep 2015 paddosan

As a matter of fact, I used London Library in the early versions of this deck, but given how it cannot be tutored, I needed three copies of it to draw it early, which deprived me of deck space for other things.

As @OrdiNeu mentioned, with Sahasrara and Scheherazade you'll end up actually making money when you install Chameleons, which is even better than London Library. It might take some time, but the most important thing is that even with just one Sahasrara or Scheherazade you can save money.

19 Sep 2015 OrdiNeu

Curious if you've tried Autoscripter in place of Desperado here. The extra click is nice, though you could only play it once you had your full rig out...

19 Sep 2015 OrdiNeu

Whoops disregard that I apparently can't read in the early morning.

8 Oct 2015 melipone

Have you tried running this deck with a Magnum Opus economy instead? It seems a natural fit with Sahasrara and the synergy between Test Run and Chameleon. This would allow you to ditch 3x Sure Gamble, 3x Armitage Codebusting, 2x Kati Jones, 3x Daily Casts and replace with 3x Magnum Opus and 2x Test Run = saving of 6 card slots! You'd probably want to replace the Akamatsu Mem Chips with CyberSolutions Mem Chips, and perhaps add a couple of Moddeds for good measure.