UnDecodable 3.0

Kalavouna 79

A deck I've had a lot of fun playing over the last six months. Sadly, I think it's time is over now as I move on.

The game plan is fairly easy to understand, snipe breakers either from the runners grip or Batty them away with a program trash right after encountering the ICE but with no window for Clone Chip or other shenanigans. Making somebody run through an Archer because you trashed their Killer is one of the sweetest feelings in the world. Seriously, I'm pretty sure the runners lamentations are the lullaby that Batty falls asleep to.

Now, to break the deck down.

Agendas: As many 3/2s as possible so that we can never advance, don't really care too much what they do, but getting a peak at the runners hand for scoring Philotic Entanglement is a nice bonus. House of Knives is great to see in the early game as you get value the entire game. In fact its my preferred first agenda to score. The tokens clear any breakers, parasites or recursion that you see the runners has early in their grip and in the mid-late game becomes Archer food after using all of the tokens. I've also kept 1 token on them before if I have multiple scored just to threaten a kill. The Future Perfects are there just to round the agenda suite out and so that I don't waste slots on more agendas. The reason I didn't go with GFI is just because of influence and I'd personally prefer to play the psi-game. Generally the last agenda scored to close out the game.

Assets: Jackson, no surprise here, target Batty and Caprice to shuffle back in. Launch Campaign: If your bluffing out 3/2s to never advance, you have to have something to bluff with. These are most of your flex slots. I'd suggest maybe a snare or two if you want to go for a longer game, but personally I prefer just trying to rush out quickly and the money from Launch Campaign helps you do that. Shock is great for this deck, you only ever really care about that first point of net damage and this can trigger it from anywhere. Also can be used to bluff never advance and keeps archives safe from people wanting to run there to deny you your Subliminal.

Upgrades: Caprice is still good and lets you close out games that have gone on too long. Batty is what makes this deck work. After they get their breakers down he lets you trash them. Make sure to use him at the last possible moment so that the runner can't Clone Chip their breaker back in. Also works as a 2nd Caprice if they win the first psi-game. I've even flat-lined careless runners by triggering two net damage from Cobra for the kill. Navi-Mumbad Grid: Stops shaper shenanigans. Honestly is only useful in that matchup. Another flex slot and influence. Just make sure you get a sixth NBN card for Salems.

Operations: Money is good, thus the Celebrity Gift and Hedge Fund. Also nice that it can't be touched by Whizzard. Try to Gift Click 1 and then use a Subliminal you showed. Subliminal works because people don't like to run until they have everything they need down, and once again, more money is always nice. Targeted Marketing are NBN cards 4 & 5 for Salems. The extra money is nice and sometimes people keep their breaker in hand if you name it. Especially funny if you name the breaker of the type they don't need to get into your remote. Salem's let's you trash the runners breakers even if they don't run during the early game. Power Shutdown let's you snipe SMC and Clone Chip. Occasionally let's you get a Zu.13 as well, just more ways to touch the runners programs after they've been installed.

ICE: Mostly rush ICE, Vanilla and Quandary for cheap ETRs to let you score early. Make sure to put the first one you see on you scoring remote unless under special circumstances. Cobra does everything you want a piece of ICE to do, trash programs and peak into their hand. I prefer to have these over centrals but can go over the scoring server if need be. If Cobra does everything you want ICE to do, then Archer is your dream. Gain credits to rush more, end the run. Yep that's all. Nothing else for it to do ... .... .... So, I guess it also lets you do a rig wipe if you can land the Batty to trash everything. Seriously, Archer is perfect for this deck. Nobody expects it since everything else is so rushy, and it gets you value out of your agendas after you've used them. If you get to trash some breakers and can rez, do it. Always worth sacrificing a HoKs, or a 3/2 if you can try for the Batty rig wipe or your certain you'll get 2 breakers. I've even forfeited TFPs when they didn't have enough money to play Batty and I could get a rig wipe.

Matchups: The deck is weak to dedicated ICE destruction because it only has 11 prices of ICE, only 8 of which end the run, also 9 die to Parasite in 1 turn or less.

It actually has a fairly good matchup against Shaper surprisingly. They rely on their recursion in normal games, so by taxing it more, they can't really keep up. Criminal is good as well since they don't have any/much recursion. Anarch is difficult because of Parasite, make sure to target it in their hand over anything else, along with Deja Vus. Try to hit Clone Chip in the hand or with a Power Shutdown if that doesn't work. After that you target breakers. It is nice though that Whizzard is pretty much useless against the deck since all of the ICE isn't taxing and your econ doesn't rely on assets. Overall the deck seems to be swingy as you either win easily or feel you never had a chance. This mostly seems to be based on who sees the Battys first.

As a note, the deck may have too much econ and some slots better spent on better ICE or more tricks. I seemed to face a lot of Siphon spam and so the current deck is designed to just power through it at the moment.

I find the deck to be fun, if anybody wants to try it, tell me how it goes in the comments as well as any changes you've made. Now, go land some Archers.

0 comments