Comet Ken and the Party of the Apocalypse. [Feedback]

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GoldenHawk 57

I've held a candle for Ken since he came out with Honor and Profit, but unfortunately I was unable to find a decent deck for him. Time went by and I left Netrunner, but now I've been getting back to the game and found my long lost love for Ken. With new cards out I feel the time is now ripe for Comet Ken and the party that will end the world (or atleast wipe the board).

The basic game plan is to get Comet online for click compression and hit the first apocalypse when the corp thinks it's safe to score an agenda (preferably 3 pointer). What could be better than wiping the board and still having 2 more clicks left? The deck plays really fast and you need to keep the corps ICE in check. Leave No Trace, Inside Job and Spear Phishing help with this, but the bottom line is you don't want heavily ICEd centrals if you can help it. After the Apoc you want Aumakua up and running fast and then try to snipe agendas where possible. Traffic Jam can give you the much needed respite towards the end or with FA if you need it. All in all, close the game fast or be prepared to go home with 6 points. Really fun deck to play, with quite a few shenanigans that make it a blast.

I would really appreciate feedback and ideas, thus I'm listing a few that I've considered here. I'm also making a few notes on cards that I think are instrumental to the decks core. Thanks in advance for the feedback.

Core cards

Comet: This is instrumental to the deck. With it, you can SOT into Apoc or use Apoc even with MCA Austerity Policy. With so many events you're rarely lacking for an event to play and Ken's ID helps to keep you afloat economically. Of course it's no Desperado, but well.

Apocalypse: This was originally En Passant, but Apoc is just so much more juicy. I can consistently pull of 1 Apoc against most corps and even 2 is possible with little luck. Great way to shut down lot of troublesome cards.

Inside Job, Leave No Trace, Spear Phishing: These give you the ability to A) keep corp on their toes and B) help you Apoc with no breakers. If I had to lose something, it might be 1x of LNT.

Exclusive Party: Great card all in all, especially with Comet. Pretty much the only decent crim econ/draw card for this kind of deck.

Aumakua: After Apoc you can rack up 3-5 counters fast and snipe those agendas from HQ/R&D/lightly ICEd new remote. All in all great card.

No One Home: With HHN and other tags galore stuff out there, one needs some tag-protection. This comes cheap and usually is enough. Also comes with the added benefit of net damage -protection.

Ideas for possible improvement

Levy AR to Gang Sign: An argument might be made to swap Levy with Gang Sign to free some influence and help with Aumakua. Also, this deck could definetly use more multi access, and this might help. Comes with the risk of running out of cards since the deck goes so fast.

Express Delivery: This is sort of a silver bullet when you need it. Helps bring Comet online or bring in that Apoc when you need it. Pretty situational though, but great when you need it.

Leave No Trace: Works as either ICE or Econ denial. 3x might be too much though. Perhaps something else might fit here?

Traffic Jam: Argument might be made for Interdiction or with Levy gone, some other current (Hacktivist Meeting maybe?).

Notoriety: The deck suffers from not being able to close early. When I lose, I usually do so at 5 or 6 points. One could argue that this might bring in the necessary points.

Diversion of Funds: When it comes out, it might be worth testing. It's no Account Siphon, but one could argue that some econ + econ denial might be worth it. Who knows.

The rest of the cards, that are not mentioned, are sort of yay and nay with good and bad. I'm open to suggestions regarding those too.

8 comments
28 Mar 2018 CelestialSpark

Comet is definitely great on Ken and is a great complement to Exclusive Party, but Doppleganger provides more value post-Apoc for spamming out runs to stack Aumakua/take advantage of free access and still helps you get out Apoc with a click to spare (or play Apoc with Same Old Thing). Just an option for a variant that needs more influence, maybe for an Eater or DDoS.

Unscheduled Maintenance is an interesting current to consider for Apoc Ken--really forces the corp to pick where they want to install ice (because you can bypass one piece easily) and allows you to run Fisk Investment Seminar to potentially mill ice or force agenda flood against glacier decks (but this will hurt you against fast advance, which Traffic Jam helps counter).

I'm with you in thinking Ken is awesome, at least conceptually... though HHN still makes my "run like a madman" aggressive self cry inside.

28 Mar 2018 CodGod

I love the deck. I used to run a Comet/Exclusive Party Ken deck with Notorietys and Oracle May (ultimately piloting it to mediocre results but a lot of fun at NZ nationals). Aumakua definitely seems like it would make getting set up to run faster, and makes Apoc more viable because you have less to lose.

I'd definitely recommend trying out Notoriety for closing out games, especially if you can spare the influence for multiple, because Comet and Early Bird can help you play more than one in the same turn, which can be great.

Really happy to see someone else playing this kind of Ken deck and continuing to improve it. There are dozens of us! Dozens!

28 Mar 2018 GoldenHawk

@CelestialSpark Doppelgänger is a great card, but I feel it doesn't work as well since you can't play two bypass events in a row. The great thing about Comet is that you can Inside Job into Spear Phishing or another Inside Job, or LNT to IJ or SP. It makes a world of difference when you're able to make a bypass run on server with zero breakers and ignore the first round of ICE. Comet also helps you click compress your other cards, not just give you more runs. With event econ one tends to find oneself with more events to play than possible, and this is where comet really shines. I think that if I were to run Doppelgänger I would need to move more towards resource econ, which kind of defeats the purpose of Ken.

Unscheduled Maintenance might be a solid call with Fisk, since the deck could sometimes use more draw. Going to have to test that, thanks!

When it comes to HHN it's sort of a bullet you just have to eat. If I could find a solid event to dodge or remove tags, it would help tremendously. So far No One Home has been adequate.

@CodGod Thanks! Yeah I think I'll see about swapping Levy AR for Gang Sign and then slotting some Notoriety. Or maybe I'll lose one Comet, but that seems a little drastic.

11 May 2018 Crowe

@GoldenHawk Just curious here, how is using comet any different to using Doppelganger when using Inside Job into Spear Phishing? Both initiate brand new runs. The benefit of Doppelganger is that it lets you choose when, whereas Comet is always the first time.

12 May 2018 GoldenHawk

Doppelgänger allows you to make a run, not play a (run) event. Consider the Corp has ICEd all centrals. In thst situation Doppel would send you headfirst into an ICEd server, where as Comet allows you to drop another event from your hand. Comet is also more flexible here since it allows for other events where as Doppelgänger allows for runs only. This deck is not a run-every-turn-atleast-once -deck, instead relying on snipes. The latest iteration runs Notoriety for closing the game and Feint for helping with multiple apocs. All in all event compression is fundamentally much more efficient here than click compression. It gives you bursts of power. If you want go Doppel route, you're looking at different kind of deck with the intention of actually breaking ICE.

29 May 2018 Lancezh

Hey look an apoc deck with ken! I have also an apoc deck that is completely different, there's a video on it if you're interested i can write up why i didn't go for comet and a completely different build overall: Here i played with it against beyoken www.youtube.com

29 May 2018 Lancezh

Ok i've played this deck a couple times and Exclusive Party is just not good as card draw, i constantly miss Earthrise and Fisk. If you go against Kakugo's or don't have eco in your hand you're constantly starved. Also Scorpios instantly hardcounters this. Comet is nice but doesn't save the lack of draw for me.

29 May 2018 Lancezh

Sorry to spam you, another problem i see with just Aumakua you're pretty inflexible against IP Blocks and if you have to run on 2 servers to trigger Apoc with IP Block you can choose to be tagged on the corps turn or not trigger apoc at all. I have alot more programs in my stack plus i slotted a DDoS with Feint, it gets into everything from HQ. I even got rid of legwork, accessing multiple cards is not what this deck does, it's trashing you want to make sure that you can get it at every price, this seemed to be the best strategy so far.