First Step Money

First Step Money, Second Step Defend, Third Step Profit

I love a challenge. This ID is my challenge.

I have play tested and found this deck to be fun, quirky, and amusing. The look I see people's faces when they see this is, "really? Are you serious?" And yes I am. When I am sitting forty credits, 30 cards in hand and they have the choice of running through 30 subroutines on Ashigaru on R&D or a str 30 IQ on my remote; a lot of runner turns end up being, I click 4 times for money.

First Step: Money This deck lives and dies with your credit pool. Blue Level, Hedge Fund, and Restructure are for burst economy while Adonis and Eve Campaigns are your drip economy. Breaker Bay and Eliza's Toybox are MVP's of this deck since they greatly reduce the cost of rezzing upgrades and assets/ rezzing expensive ICE. Priority Req is for that 25 cost IQ you want to rez but can't find your toybox to do so.

Second Step Defend: This deck is slow to set up and hates to spend lots of money so a lot of cheap taxing ice have filled the gamut while we get Ashigaru and IQ set up. If you can get an early IQ rezzed for less then 5 credits, you are already sitting golden. With all the apocalypse running around I increased the amount of ice to compensate for early pressure, otherwise, more upgrades are better. Every part of the defense of this deck is meant to be taxing to the runner. Big ice, lots of subroutines, and upgrades. With Utopia Fragment scored, agendas now become taxing as well, especially a twice advanced NAPD. I took panic button out for this iteration but it and Jackson work really well to fill your hand quickly when you are sitting 5 cards and 30 credits, and immediately put you in scoring position for your remote server.

Third Step Profit: So the first thing I noticed when I built this deck was that I was using all neutral agendas. What can I say. None really appeal to me for the strategy I was going for. ABT was in the running but after 5 games of only trashing agendas, I put in NAPDs. Corporate Warfare is great in this deck since the agenda pays for itself when advanced and then increases your hand size as long as you have 7 credits. It is slightly difficult but not impossible to score this as your first agenda and not lose all your credits. With how large your credit pool should be, having money for scoring agendas should not be a problem.

Notes: This deck is slow to set up and requires dedicated management of money but overall it is very fun to play and can be frustrating for the runners. Depending on your meta, the upgrades are the biggest thing you can play around with to complicate things for the runner since specific cards can be problems. Underway Grid - bypassing IQ with Femme, Crisium Grid for Account Siphon/Vamp and Keyhole Interns and Team Sponsership for ice recursion because of parasite or returning your campaigns back to the field. Successful Demonstration is also a great economy card for this deck due to the unexpected large ice to have to penetrate and it nets you the equivalent of a Restructure.

This is a 54 card deck on purpose since you go through your deck very quickly and need extra cards in your hand to buff your ice without milling yourself. When to play cards is as important as when not to play them since your 6 main ice need a big hand to keep the runner out as well as keep your agendas hidden in your hand.

I appreciate any and all suggestions to make this deck better and hopefully see someone take it to a tournament one day.