Smurf games not included

and 26 events this year, learning a bunch (or rather every) archetype to exist ever since I started playing standard in mid 2023, it finally feels like I understand the game (I'm still bad at it but that's a different story).

The most difficult thing to get a grasp of was how to actually pilot individual decks. A lot of my learning came from pestering people I knew who are good at the game, jamming a lot and then picking up from there, made doubly difficult without a testing group and into a fray of jnet casual with PE, Thule, BtL, shell game, the works. The real testing came from in person events and about 25% of jnet games.

Learning how to play "Reg Hosh", at least at higher levels isn't as simple as it sounds when people say "it just works" and then you fumble into PD not knowing what to do and end up losing after installing one program or against wide sickos installing misery and then you're broke again.

Since quite a few people have asked me how to reg hosh (and because there's no resources on how to pilot individual decks and matchups), I'll try to explain how I play the deck and/or card choices. Ultimately, I look at it as self-expression, playing and building how I like it (not necessarily what's correct) and catering to my own playstyle is how I go about it because it feels comfortable to pilot to me. Hopefully this helps people looking to dive into the competitive side of netrunner.

General Strategy & Deckbuilding

Gone are the training wheels I felt I needed like recursion, Hush, Light the fire, no free lunch etc. Learning the matchup(s), knowing the threats, knowing when and where to run is all you need.

I cannot stress this enough: Play more aggressively, stop being scared of ice. Your turn 1 should be to faceplant ice & get the ID flip no matter the faction you're up against, Saisentan isn't that bad of a facecheck. This deck has all the tools to be aggressive early game, taking somewhere between turn 3-6 to cool off and build your board then going back to being aggressive resulting in a win.

You need to not be attached to your cards. There is no one card you need to win. Keeping a high enough credit total (or the ability to bounce back to 5c with moshing/stirke fund in a click) is important across all matchups. The key wincon is slowing the corp down enough in their own gameplan, allowing you to setup your rig as and when needed (and rarely before, you don't want to show your tools until the turn you need them).

You run when it slows down the corp first, then gets you tempo, you facecheck no thoughts head empty if it means the corp is going to spend some credits. Overdrawing is okay, sometimes it is more important to get to the next piece of rig quicker than holding on to the gamble in your hand (or the first copy of maw). You think you need insert your favorite card here but you don't.

Asa

I normally try and be aggressive until the first fully op is played. Until then, I keep running remotes, forcing ice rezzes and trashing most (if not all with Bones) of the cards in roots. Eventually agendas pile up in HQ and by keeping remotes clean, you deny some amount of fully op value. Drafter is probably the most annoying facecheck early on but its not the end of the world. Just don't facecheck last click.

Aginfusion

All the non spiky ice goes on the remote. If you keep it locked down and deny charlottes, with no/minimal ice rezzes on centrals, your rig can eat up the ice late game. Often, my turns go click for 4 or draw up and build your board state when nothing is being pushed.

Ob

Svytagor is a must trash. Apart from that, facecheck freely, and try to install 2 echelons if possible to survive stavruns and get it closer to Archer breakpoint. Twinning otherwise makes short work of it with finality when all the agendas are in R&D mid to late game.

PD

Forcing early ice rezzes to slow them down as well as knowing when to sit back and build your board is crucial. A turn too late and PD can run away with it. Also important to know when to let them score vs. when to challenge. You want to try and save the pinholes for skunk/void the turn you intend to run it (and know you can get in).

Sports

I have no idea, I can't win against sports.

R+

lol lmao

Hyperglaciers

Normally, if you dont allow them to stabilize and prolong the game, you can often snipe early points/win on time.

Iceless cringe

Maw normally wins the game for you but its not super important to have down early. Knowing what to trash when/if is. Federal, rashida, cohort, wage workers, H&M, warm reception are the must trashes with anything else being on a case by case basis. Corp low on econ, trash their marilyns if you can ensure you're not going to be clicking for credits yourself as a result.

While flipflopping hosh feels good, getting attached to alternating it (and thus being predictable) is a losing game. Try and change up your play patterns in every game. Maybe run everything one turn, run nothing the other, and so on.

TL:DR deck just works, stop being scared of ice and stop trashing cards from centrals.

1) Identify the corp's gameplan

2) Identify how to dismantle corp's gameplan

3) Slow them down and control their tempo by using the basic run action while drawing your key pieces (breakers, boomerang, bankhar)

4) Identify the turns you need to run vs. turns you can set up and concede an agenda if need be. (Normally when you know your doomrig will be ready to run anything and everything soon-ish and you can block any future agenda pushes).

5) Doomrig go brr