Encrypted Code Gates for the win!

sebn83 99

I have been repetitively playing this for a few weeks making changes along the way, and it has had a decent level of success. I have found it strong in the current meta as it provides strong counterplays against:

a) Parasite owing to the presence of Lotus Field which I have found all round to be a fantastic central/scoring remote piece of ICE. Also having quite a lot of low cost:decent strength ICE makes parasite less problematic (also lag time/encrypted means i can often buff parasited ICE to keep it alive for one or two turns)

b) Fixed breakers/Atman owing to the presence of Encrypted + Lag time which means your ice strength will fluctuate throughout the game

Generally speaking Neo-Tokyo Grid has been a very strong card here, synergising well with the ID (you can place the Tennin tokens directly on Neo Tokyo to gain a cred and create an expensive to trash TOL bank).

The grail ice were a recent sub for 3 x ice wall and a surprise ICHI 2.0 (as a one of ICHI 2.0 can be a brutal game winner). I have only played a few times with the grails but with potentially both end the run and program destruction they function very well, especially when preceded by Inazuma.

RSVP is just a great card for making stealing punishingly expensive/impossible. It links up superbly with Caprice, Future perfect and NAPD, even if it doesn't stop the runner (the primary goal here) it can make the runs you can't stop horribly expensive.

Often TOL isn't even necessary for the 4/5 pointers and is often best deployed just as the mid game begins to rush out an encrypted portal to buff the majority of your ice and earn a few creds. Extending the mid-game by successively increasing the strength of your deployed ice through portals and lag time is usually the key to winning.

Anyway I look forward to adding Utopia shard here, I realise having no Jackson may strike as odd but I tend to ICE up all my centrals anyway, and Future perfect/NAPD represent 65% of my agenda points all of which can be semi-defended in archives through RSVP/Caprice if needed.

13 comments
17 Oct 2014 HauntPun

Looks good. Only criticism would be lack of program destruction apart from Lancelot . Not the most reliable, method and you need some as once a Gordian Blade hits the table, this deck would fall apart....

17 Oct 2014 sebn83

Gordian Blade is not actually the horror show you may assume. There is not a lot to trash here (Neos, which, at 5 creds is a real tempo killer, and Caprice which is, admittedly, annoying). And stealing from R/D is generally unproductive and can be iced v lightly at the start of the game.

Using the grails means you have a possible 6 ICE with program destruction, which you can have trigger on sentry or possibly barriers. So while physically weak they are quite reliable in turns of turning up and/or surprising the runner.

Getting the Tennin token is nice but often not essential and is generally quite useful as a method of baiting the runner into making costly runs.

17 Oct 2014 MarbleMunkey

If you're running RSVP, why no Fetal AI?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 asteriskreaper

Why the grail ICE? you have to have one or two in HQ for them to be good, why not NEXT ICE?

17 Oct 2014 sebn83

Fetal is not a bad idea, but I'm happier costing 4 through NAPD - you are right though it does work ok with RSVP especially when Utopia comes out. Possibly worth swapping for Nisei but I find Nisei sets you up wonderfully for the home straight.

re. NEXT ICE, the influence is double, and the grail is actually quite flexible. They do a job on their own perfectly fine, and even if you rez one early in the game with none in hand the runner can never know whether you will have additional subs later so it screws with their maths. Also i want a small number of barriers/sentries in there so the runner needs the breaker.

20 Oct 2014 aermet69

When Merlin comes around, I can see this with Grails be a cool deck. Been working on Code Gate only for a long time as well. I just somehow always lose my encrypted portals right away :(

28 Oct 2014 slevin38

Maybe since there is no Jackson a Hades would be nice?

9 Dec 2014 daytodave

I played against this in Chicago, but I didn't really get to experience the deck because I was playing Kit. Is there a plan for Kit?