HervantaShop (Helsinki Poro Store 1st seed, 2nd place, 16 pl

RTsa 361

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"Watch this. It'll be funny." - the design philosophy of HervantaShop.

I had already won two SCs so I wanted to do something different for the last one of the season (on 26th of March with Business First being the last legal data pack). I built this as a troll deck to get some laughs and maybe a win if I would get lucky but it turned out it worked really well. This deck was undefeated during swiss, but lost a game during finals (after 4 failed single access sneakdoor runs on HQ with three cards containing one agenda, leading ultimately to the day's only loss).

The gameplan is simple: get money, Apocalypse, continue to wreck havoc on the corp with Wanton, Keyhole and more Apocalypses. When you have Imp, Sneakdoor Beta and DDoS installed the first thing the corp does is NOT install more ice on R&D, which is usually the correct way to prevent Apocalypse. The best turn to Apocalypse is after corp goes to score an agenda. Next turn you can even get Power to the People off very reliably. Sneakdoor is another card to reliably get it to trigger. When all else fails, mill with an Imp to get the winning agenda. :-)

Hacktivist Meeting is surprisingly annoying after Wanton. I had CBI Raid in the deck earlier but wanted to slot a second Sneakdoor to see it early. It really helps with the Apocalypse requirement. I wish there was more influence to really reverse the corp's boardstate.

Gameplay video from tournament is up here (Swiss round #4): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-09m94qYmnA

Anyone netdecking this should ditch Inject, hardly ever really wanted to play it to avoid spoiling the surprise or trashing Keyhole/Eater/Sneakdoor. Not sure what to slot in its place, perhaps Joshua B? There was also a single Same Old Thing in the deck before and it was sometimes good to guarantee Apocalypse staying in hand after a necessary Amped Up.

Why not Faust? Because the deck doesn't draw enough and there's lots of hate for that card anyway.

Why Noise with only three viruses you may ask? Because good players will not see it coming before it's too late as they start the game differently vs this ID. This deck should carry you to the elimination rounds if you can keep the tech hidden from your opponents between rounds, but it's hard to see competent opponents lose to it twice. Also beware of people who like to play janky decks themselves as they are more likely to figure out what's going on sooner.

Deck's name comes from the Finnish language. Hervanta is Finnish and roughly translates to Apocalypse. ;-)

11 comments
29 Mar 2016 ajon

I played against this deck in the final, having no idea what to expect. I was just about to score an ABT with Team Sponsorship when the first Apocalypse hit. The audience reaction was great, as most of them had played against this deck during swiss.

29 Mar 2016 RTsa

That was a great game. Well done on the recovery. It seemed like people always drew a Jackson right after Apoc. :D

30 Mar 2016 Phoenix

Awesome deck, I like it a lot. I definitely think Noise is a good call - who the hell would expect this?

What is the plan if a Swordsman or Turing manages to get rezzed on a central server (ABT or Bootcamp, for example, both of which are fairly common Even a double stacked central with Turing on the inside?). Obviously you have the surprise factor before the first Apocalypse so they may save these cards for the remote.

30 Mar 2016 RTsa

@Phoenix Thanks! It's pretty rare that the corp gets to rez much ice on centrals before the first Apocalypse. I think a Swordsman took down an Eater once or twice during the tournament, but I fortunately didn't run into Turing. A Swordsman doesn't end the run, so it's not a problem as long as you don't need the breaker anymore before the Apocalypse and don't lose it from hand to the net damage. People tend to place Turing on HQ (and not R&D!), which can be countered with Sneakdoor easily. However, I don't think I ran into a single rezzed Turing the whole day (even though I played a couple HB matches). It's also somewhat rare that ABT gets scored AND triggered vs this deck (either they don't get to score or they don't want to risk it). It's a winning move though, so you definitely should risk it if there's any chance of an Apocalypse coming in because you don't.

1 Apr 2016 CJFM

This deck makes me really happy. Great finish and nice deck!

3 Apr 2016 BizTheDad

I'm kind of a newbie so forgive what could be a dumb question. Why Noise? Just to throw the other player off?

3 Apr 2016 RTsa

@BizTheDad The deck description answers your question. ;)

@CJFM Thanks! :)

8 Apr 2016 The Broken Meeple

If you weren't going for the "surprise" factor, which ID would you normally pick to run this?

8 Apr 2016 RTsa

Good question! Ed would be my first attempt. I feel like Hacktivist and Apoc are enough asset hate to be able to confidently dismiss Whizzard as an option. Quetzal could also help as sometimes that would be quite valuable as econ or getting accesses. Reina doesn't do much because you don't want ice to get rezzed. Did I miss any?

9 Apr 2016 underflow

So, I've played this deck a few times, and the only thing I truly fear is double iced archives. What's the win con if archives gets iced? No Hades, no backup breakers...

9 Apr 2016 RTsa

You can still fire Apocalypse to clear the ice. Double iced R&D/Archives with ETR inner ice + Crisium Grid is pretty much GG though. Don't let it get there. :)