Redder is Better (Undefeated San Diego GNK 12 people)

BlueHg 639

This is a deck I brought to a GNK where Au Wuvoir and Crowdfunding were the biggest threats. Original design is by @Bronson, but I changed up the ice suite a lot and threw in Jinja. It's a pretty standard Punitive list with an ice suite tooled to deal with both main threats, and has game against the field.

My Runner was a pretty standard Leela which went 3-1, with a couple swaps.

Gameplan is pretty simple: Lock up your centrals, gain a money lead through burst econ, build a taxing server, and constantly threaten scores in it. When they finally steal a 5/3 (or even two 5/3s), use Punitive and Consulting Visit to kill them.

Agenda Suite

SDS Drone Deployment: Incidental program trash is good in this field. You can set Wu back a lot by killing her Laamb/Ankusa, and really hurt Crims. Criminal is normally not running too many expendable programs, so even if they steal this one, it'll be a pretty major tempo hit for them. Also fun: scoring this naked against Anarchs who think they can dump everything in the bin.

SSL Endorsement: You want to make money and kill people when they steal your three pointers. This serves both purposes.

Divested Trust: This serves the deck well but I'm not 100% sure it's worth it. Basically, you can forfeit it to gain money and you can still Punitive off of the steal. Useful if you just need to delay the game to get a money lead to Punitive, or make them run through the remote again for another steal. It's useless against Turntable though, and might be better served as an Oaktown or an Atlas.

Assets

NGO Front: You want to establish a money lead, and the main way you do that is by continuously threatening a score and having them break themselves on the remote. No brainer really. Plus it makes you richer.

Why no Rashida? Rashida is great, and generally synergizes really well with both kill combos and Jinja. However, I rarely found myself needing extra draw beyond Red Level Clearance since the deck is so patient, and Rashida would often fill my hand with agendas before I was ready to deal with them. I could very well be wrong on this one, and probably am.

Operations

Most of these are self explanatory, considering the ID and gameplan. A couple require explanation:

Punitive Counterstrike: Your main kill threat. You have to beat the Runner's econ twice over, so the taxing remote with constant scoring threats is essential.

Consultive Visit: Punitive #4.

Death and Taxes: It's a Transaction! Some games it makes you tons of money, some games it doesn't. There aren't any major threatening currents anymore, so this probably doesn't need to be here. This should probably be a second Consulting Visit and something else that makes you richer. Rashida probably. I did have afunny Geist game where I made 20c off of this though.

Red Level Clearance: Oh baby. This is a great card. It's basically free in the ID, can draw you cards for Jinja if you need them, can bump you up in the money fight if you need it, and just in general lets you do stuff on turns you need to be doing other things. Want to get a foothold against that turtle running amok? Use RLC to install an ice on Archives and gain a click so you can purge. Trying to threaten a score but you don't have agendas? Draw it and gain a click to IAA. Did the runner steal an agenda last turn but you only have one Punitive? Draw into your Consulting Visit and gain a click to play it and Punitive in the same turn. It's so flexible and synergizes well with Jinja.

ICE Suite

The ICE suite is tooled to lock down centrals and build a nasty remote. It won't keep people out for too long, but it'll cost them plenty of money to get through. Which is exactly what you want. Almost every ICE ends the run, so you can lock out Crowdfunding and Turtle decks well, and keep them from accessing your 5/3's early game when your Punitive threat is at its least potent.

Jinja City Grid and Surveyor: This combo is an essential part of the ICE suite, really. Lets you build a taxing server fast. Jinja saves you clicks, keeps ice from clogging your hand so you can keep your kill combo in it, and stops you from spending money and time making the server so you can save up for that Counterstrike. And the downside of revealing the ice is pretty much nil here, because you're not trying to stop them, you just want the math to work in your favor. Surveyor goes with it naturally, like milk and cookies.

Afshar: This ICE is amazing on HQ, and everywhere else it's essentially an Enigma. Au Wuvoir can't Ankusa it, and Anarchs will groan at trying to use Black Orchestra to break it on HQ.

Slot Machine and Mausolus: These fill the same role really; taxing central ice that Crowdfunding decks won't find it worth it to get through, and will cost Au Wuvoir decks an entire turn of tempo to reset (13c for Laambkusa). You don't leave these alone on a central past midgame, but it'll strongly delay these decks in the early game. Mausolus also has the benefit of likely just firing when Runners want to get through, so the net damage can ping other threats like Apocalypse or getting an I've Head Worse out of hand so your Punitive is more likely to kill.

Tithonium: Hands down the worst piece of ICE for Au Wuvoir to run into turn two. Someone did this to me while I was testing Au Wuvoir and I in turn did it to someone else during the GNK. It feels so good, and they won't recover. And really, this is a relatively taxing piece of ICE since the meta is mostly off of Paperclip. People forget about this card, and its flexible rez cost allows you to forfeit that SDS you scored earlier so you can keep your money lead.

Gatekeeper: Good with Jinja and grooming your hand, but I didn't get a ton of use out of it. There are probably better uses for this influence.

Why no Border Control? It's a natural include with Jinja, it's influence free in Weyland, and it can tax the Runner out of servers. So why not include this card? First, the rez-to-break ratio is really bad. I need all of my ICE to be useful early game to prevent steals when my Punitive threat is fragile, and this sets me back without really helping much. Second, it's terrible against Laambkusa, and that can be fatal early game. The one gear check ice I have is at least cheap to rez. Third, sometimes you want to bait the steal to land the Punitive, and if you Jinja out a Border Control, they'll be wondering why you didn't use it. It's not bad, and maybe it deserves to go in here over that second Death and Taxes, but it absolutely should not replace one of the 17 ICE that need to stick around and strengthen your servers.

That's basically it. I had a ton of fun with this deck, and won against four pretty reasonably skilled people: one Au Wuvoir, one Apoc Val, one regass Val, and one Mining Accident Leela. None of them were joke decks, and I was very happy to win with Punitive against the main threats I expected. Thanks to everyone for coming out, and thanks @Bronson for providing the spine of the deck!

2 comments
14 May 2019 ayyyliens

This looks sick.

Gatekeeper can be a Seidr instead maybe?

15 May 2019 BlueHg

Seidr would be fine. I also considered Thimblerig to fix early ice placement. Ark Lockdown could also be good in this meta.