CT: She's a Lady (Whoa whoa whoa)

'She's got style, she's got grace, she's a winner', so saith Tom Jones.

This is my current 'goto' Runner deck which has actually got a lot of love from the recent cycle (Astrolabe, Lady, D4v1d). It's a very solid, dependable deck that absolutely belongs in CT. I probably hit all 6 memory in 8/10 matches and the reduced deck size really helps in making the Magnum Opus more consistent.

Turn 1-2 Magnum Opus is an absolute must so mulligan aggressively for it or for an early doors SMC/Test Run > Scavenge. An ideal hand will also include another means to tutoring to apply early pressure to faster decks (so a double SMC hand or an SMC/Clone Chip hand is very good). Basically though, any hand that gets you MO early is a good hand and one that doesn't is an instant mulligan. If the stars don't align on getting the early doors MO (unlikely with 3x MO, 3x SMC, 3x Test Run and 3x Diesel) then you have to draw for it and will definitely be on the back foot.

So you've got your MO and you're ready to start putting pressure on the corp. What you do next very much depends on who you're facing off across. If you're expecting fast advance then it's important to apply steady R&D pressure via the RDI's and to crack out the 'cheap' breaker suite to start causing problems. Cheap suite consists of Mimic and Zu with Parasites to blow up anything 0-1 str (Quandary, Pop Up, Pup, Chimera and Komainu at the end of the corps turn), with Lady there to deal with any and all barriers (take that Eli). I honestly think that 2x Lady is the right call, and if you find yourself running out of counters, you're probably not using it correctly. Test Run, Scavenge and Clone Chip can let you reset it when needed and there's no reason why you should need more than 12-16 counters (probably more) in a game (unless the corp is running nothing but barriers). Mimic is important at the moment due to the abundance of Architect in NBN/HB and Caduceus out of Blue Sun so never leave home without it. Deny the initial scoring remote (Test Run > Femme is a great way into remotes on the fly), wait for agendas to either build up in hand and attack with Legwork or just seal off R&D as much as possible. Imp can also be used to trash key cards like Biotic Labour or to trash SanSan on the cheap.

Against taxing decks, MO will become your bestest buddy. Click consistently for credits and try and always have enough to deal with 'the worst case scenario.' Usually the worst case is program trashing (losing MO hurts) so always be prepared to bring out the sharpshooter (for Ichi, Archer Grim etc), D4v1d or Cyber-Cypher (for the Inzaumas and so forth). If their deck is messing around with IT Dept or is Oversight AI'ing stuff, D4vid is fantastic at being able to deal with the problem cheaply (and can always be reset with scavenge).

Against Scorchy decks, patience is the watchword, only run when you know you're safe. Wait for the Plascrete and get ahead on money via MO and try and deny the early agenda scoring. Imp is also strong here in a HQ assault to trash the scorches while they sit in your opponents hand, and could save waiting for the Plascrete to hit the table. If you're playing against Jinteki, you have the power of Deus X to avoid the Snares (also great against Weyland a lot of the time), just don't forget to install it before access - if in doubt, play it safe. Deus X also deals with other pieces of ice cheaply, against HB it can get through a Janus or Heimdall just for the install cost while against PE it can protect against the unexpected Komainu or Tsurgi.

Other tools include Atman, often put in at Str4 to deal with pain in the backside pieces of ICE like Mother Goddess, Data Raven (kind of), Changeling, Eli (though Lady is a better answer here), Lotus Field (again, Cyber-Cypher is a better answer here too) and Ichi. If you see a lot of str 4 ice hit the table, an Atman can really ruin the corp's day. Atman often ends up the 'use in case of emergency' breaker, and though it won't come out in the majority of games, in the matches where it does hit the table, I probably would have lost without it. Femme is also great for dealing with Tollbooth and encounter style ice, don't be afraid to scavenge it around when appropriate.

Scavenge actually ends up being one of the stand out cards in this deck, cards like Lady, D4vid, Imp, Cyber-Cypher and Femme all absolutely love being reset. On top of that it can be used as an emergency means of bringing something back from the heap or to bring out the MO/Femme with Test Run early doors. Test Run is equally flexible. Bringing out a 'temporary' breaker like Lady with a Test Run, using it all up in a turn and then letting it go back on top of the deck can really swing a game in your favour. If you have clone chips available, overwrite any exhausted cards and reinstall them during the run. Don't forget you can use Clone Chip to bring out an SMC early on if you need something from your stack. Clone Chip is very rarely a dead draw in this deck needless to say.

Astrolabe is great early doors against NEH/RP matchups but even against everyone else, it does exactly what it needs too in getting you up to 6 memory (this allows you to have an MO, full suite and still have 1 mem to spare to pop cards like Parasite and Sharpshooter - very important). Astrolabe really greases up the deck nicely and can help recover from a bad start potentially as well.

Finally, Modded fills out the rest of the slots, amazingly good in an opening hand with Opus or to install Plascrete/RDI/Atman/Lady/Mimic/D4vid from hand on the cheap. Definitely better than Sure Gamble in this list, just watch your handsize against Scorchy decks.

There is one key card incoming that will change this deck slightly; Clot. Clot in Shaper is going to hurt Fast Advance quite badly and at 1 influence, seems like an obvious include. Not sure yet what I'm going to drop for it (possibly Imp, swapping the moddeds out for stimhacks) but I know for sure that it's going in as soon as first datapack from the new cycle hits.

The other change that could be made to this deck depending on your own local meta would be to drop a Plascrete for 1 more RDI. RDI is hugely important against FA at this stage in the game, and not seeing one could hurt more than not seeing Plascrete against Scorch. In both instances, Imp is your friend and can stop a problem from occurring. Our meta is very scorch heavy atm, so 2 Plascretes seems more important at this stage.

In conclusion, this often feels like a 'control' style deck, picking the right tool for the right job at the right time (very Shaper). In many respects, this is a Professor deck out of Professor (and there really is little reason to run Professor atm) and can change its gameplan dependant on which corp is sat across from you. I think the weakest match up is probably RP, as MO is very click intensive. That being said, Parasite does very good work against RP and I find that opening up HQ often pays dividends early on if you can.