CtM - Expanding Portfolio

"We're pleased to announce an exciting new line, coming out of Lakshmi Smartfabrics this Summer! Your new style comes right off the Silver Screen, ensuring your fashion sense is always at the front..."

After some playing with Lakshmi Smartfabrics in a bog-standard Haas-Bioroid: Engineering the Future deck, I decided to flip colours with it to get the most out of, what I feel, is a sorely underrated card. While preventing an Agenda being stolen is all well and good, I figured - "why not take advantage of the fact that the card is still accessed?"

EARLY GAME:

The Deck is very ICE light, with roughly an 85% chance to see an ICE in your opening 6 cards, and a 54% chance to see two. Finding a quick ETR ICE can be ideal for a quick start, but don't panic if not. Throwing down some assets, especially with Mumba Temple to efficiently rez them, can help your opening. The advantage of NBN: Controlling the Message is that the Runner will be very cautious of trashing assets early game, even if they're Whizzard, or have cheap-trash cards like Imp hanging around.

Start to establish your core servers, and a single remote protected by at least an ETR Subroutine. Keep in mind that this remote doesn't need to be totally impregnable; instead, you'll sit your primary Lakshmi Smartfabrics and tax the runner heavily if they try to trash it.

At this stage, minimizing the number of Agendas in hand is ideal - keep it to one if possible, and preferably, make it Explode-a-palooza. Helping, as always, is our hero Jackson Howard, but Daily Business Show can be VERY useful in finding key ICE that you may need, or other assets that can be useful.

MID GAME:

Once your Lakshmi Smartfabrics is set, hold a few assets un-rezzed, ready to surprise the runner. Keep digging through until you find a second Explode-a-palooza (Or whatever Agenda[s] you may be holding). Once you're holding two, you're ready.

Install-Advance-Advance, out in the open if you care to, behind an ICE if not. If you get away with it - great! If not, use your Lakshmi Smartfabrics to keep it safe. If its an Award Bait, having a Reversed Accounts on the table, or a second, Lakshmi Smartfabrics-proof Agenda down is a great place to send the spare counters - Project Beale can quickly gather you 3 or 4 points from this trick. Or just Advance the Award Bait once, and use it on itself to get a cheap score out of it.

Learn how the runner reacts to your plays. Do they run at every advanced card you show them? Great, toss a cheeky ICE in front of the next one, and tax them. Set up your Franchise City's and get ready to multiball points up. Runner goes after your Lakshmi Smartfabrics like it insulted their mother? Fantastic, hide the next one in the open, and surprise them every time. You should only need two or three uses of them to score to 7, which should give you the game without needing the recursion. Runner refuses to play the game and belts HQ and every opportunity? Fantastic. Hold onto an Explode-a-palooza and bask in the unorthodox wealth!

Museum of History has been included to re-roll broken assets (Specifically Lakshmi Smartfabrics!). A smart runner will go straight for it when they see it - it may be worth hiding it behind a random ICE to further tax the runner. Bear in mind that it isn't just 3 to kill it - its also potentially another 2 + to clear the tag it earns them, too. Its a horrible tax, especially when your next Museum will bring the old one back up for its first action!

LATE GAME:

Near the end of the game, you should have found yourself pretty easily on 4 points. The runner may have gotten in for about the same, but at this point, you should have control: - Keep your stronger defense over R&D, as you have the least control of what happens in here. - HQ can be left relatively vulnerable. If they run here, you can Lakshmi to save whatever Agenda you may be holding (It isn't uncommon to be able to throw 3 or 4 counters to save many cards, if need be). They may have decided HQ is the wrong place to be after some earlier BS - if so, great! - Your asset spam may or may not have gone unchecked; NBN: Controlling the Message makes it almost too painful for the runner to keep up with everything you're throwing down, and force them to pick and choose what assets they remove (Museum of History, for example). You should have more than enough assets to keep installing, and keep control of the game.

OBVIOUS PROBLEMS:

• Film Critic. Straight up kills the deck. For this reason, Snatch and Grab makes an appearance. Strike when the iron is hot, and get rid of them as soon as you can. If they continue to be a pain, turn your Lakshmi server into a scoring server, and play a more conventional game.
• Hacktivist Meeting. BAD NEWS. This jerk of a card is so hard to play around. You'll either have to wait for your hand to empty, or try to score out a Project Beale or Award Bait to get rid of the damn thing. I've considered trying to fit some current cards in as a direct counter, I've considered adding a few currents in to counter, but there is very little card space left. I could add a News Now Hour... hm..
• Casting Call would be a fun card to include in the deck, as it would also fire on a protected card - however, it maybe drags the balance from "I should check that, even though I can't steal it, It'll cost Lakshmi Counters" to "Yeah, no way, you can have it.

This one is turning out to be great fun, and I can't wait to drag it in for an event. Feel free to add any questions or comments!