When face-check does not hurt (2nd at Mancunian Lockdown)

Longi 1899

face-check

Long ago I set myself a goal to bring all criminal IDs to tournament. Diversified Portfolio format has been a great help with that. When I saw that at Mancunian Lockdown organised by @mcg the HHN was banned I knew I could bring some run-based criminal which is my favourite NR archetype. Choice fell on Nero whose ID ability favours the bold. Too bad that times when runners were afraid only of face-checking sentries are long gone.

The strategy is simple. It involves a lot of running, face-checking and praying that you do not encounter nasty codegate or barrier. And if that all works out, you got enough tools to keep the corp poor and benefit from it.

The tournament had only three rounds which was ideal solution for working-day evening. I won against Spark Agency piloted by @analyzechris when the bad pub from an unfortunate Mining Accident helped me to controll his board. I also won against PE piloted by @bergil when my mysterious sixth sence helped me avoid all traps laid down for me. But even this build was too slow to keep up with the tempo that @merrja set up with his Jinja MCA MirrorMorph. Thank you for games guys, it was a pleasure to play against you and chat with you! Also big thanks to @mcg for organising this. I think the ID appearence showed he rated the IDs well and made for an interesting tournament.

7 comments
21 Apr 2020 boreira

thats cool also really like that archetype (RIP crowdfunding) do you find sec testing not worth a slot?

21 Apr 2020 Longi

@boreira I think it is definitely worth a slot in run-based criminals not using Aumakua but with turtle it is kind of nonbo

21 Apr 2020 boreira

ah true works with sucker but not turtle. testing run based leela sometimes but still need to find some boost for it

21 Apr 2020 Longi

@boreira Leela is not in good place now, too many 5/3 agendas is played. Against 6 agenda Azmari her ability is almost blank:( On the other hand she wrecks HB rush decks, Titan and Argus, so hard to say....

21 Apr 2020 Longi

@boreira Leela is not in good place right now, too many 5/3 agendas is played. Against 6 agenda Azmari her ability is basicaly blank:( On the other hand she wrecks HB rush decks, Titan and Argus, so hard to say....

22 Apr 2020 adquen

@LongiIsn't Nero's ability also kinda blank against 6 agenda Azmari? You can check out when they rez a Surveyor, but usually then you're already in a stack of ICE and want to continue?

22 Apr 2020 Longi

@Longi Not sure we understand each other here. I was discussing with Boreira the relevance of Leela´s ability in current meta and as an example I stated that it is kind of blank against 6 agenda Azmari.

As for Nero´s ability, it is not relevant anymore in general since you cannot safely face-check codegates and barriers anymore. I am not sure how much was the ID played during "old times" when I was not around but it is certainly not played nowadays. Therefore I chose to play it only in this casual tournament.