AI Criminal Esa Isn't Real, She Can't Hurt You (Startup)

Do you like to go fast? Do you have an unhealthy fascination for things like explosives and poison? Well do I have the deck for you. AI Criminal ESA is fast, effective, and extremely fun to play. Here’s a quick summary of what it does

This is essentially a cycle deck. You need to get these pieces and everything else is to help you draw them or make enough money to use them:

Botulus, Poison Vial, Mayfly, Finality. Let’s talk about why these 4 cards work so well together.

Pros of this Deck:

1. Extreme Early Pressure: This deck brings the heat from turn 1. You do this with free runs such as Carpe Diem, Ice bypass with Inside Job, and our new Parhelion combo, Botulus+Poison Vial. For 3 clicks and 3 credits, you can break any single piece of ice in Startup, no questions asked. Just put PV down, slap Botulus on that ice, and dare your opponent to rez it. Any ice with up to SEVEN subroutines can be broken in one go.

2. Maximizing Early Damage: so you hit HQ and saw nothing. Feels bad man you just basically wasted a click. But wait! Here comes Time Bomb! Always late to the party but like a grill at a cookout, when it shows up Corpo Daddy is gonna be preoccupied for a turn. If you manage to hit every single Time bomb you will trash 9 out of the 45 cards in a normal Corp deck. That’s 20% and that’s TERRIBLE.

3. End Game Potential: It’s turn 7-9. You have 3-5 points and you’re eyeing just one or two more agendas so you can finish the game, reconnect with your teenage child, and do something more meaningful with your life. But there’s multiple ice on the servers and your Botulus isn’t doing much anymore. You’re devastated, the previous combos are no longer working and you’re reevaluating every decision that you’ve made in your life that’s lead you here. But fear not, Parhelion has the finisher that we need: Finality+Mayfly! This, along with whatever you have left on your Poison Vials and Leech, will allow you to break your way into R&D to find the last few agendas that you need. And in true Anarch fashion, it is very messy. You get a bonus little Sabotage 2 along with the 4 R&D cards, which is very nice. Plus it’s very thematic to win an Esa game using her signature card.

Cons of this deck:

1. Lack of Icebreakers:

“But Peren, this is a one to three use combo, I need my ice to stick around because I feel scared and exposed when I don’t have my breakers waahhh”

Let’s be real, you won’t use your ice breakers more than 5 times in a game anyways. Count it if you don’t believe me. Just imagine Poison Vial as your teenage kid who’s too cool for your stupid card game and decided they’re leaving early to hangout with their tik tok followers. The card left the game early because it’s done its job and knows you’re gonna win. Congrats. You only have three mayflies. Three nearly assured successful runs, so make it count.

1. Very little mid game pressure: Once a corp rez more than one ice in front of their central servers then you’re going to have problems getting in. You have to focus on two things here: getting the cards that you need, and working on the weakest servers. Unless you know for a fact that one of the remotes is an agenda, it’s usually not worth it to run it. Save your money for Finalities and look for your Mayflies.

2. Card Draw: YOU NEED EARTHRISE. YOU NEED EARTHRISE. YOU NEED EARTHRISE. When you don’t have it, draw to max handsize every turn.

Mulligans: If it’s Thule or Jinteki, mulligan for your marrow. If it’s NBN, mulligan for more money. You want Earthrise in hand, along with either Carpe Diem, Sure Gamble, or Dirty Laundry. Time bomb is nice, Fermenter is nice, Botulus is nice. Liberated Account is a bait and my least favorite card because it takes too many clicks. Use only when desperate.

FAQ:

“There’s only 3 core damage in your deck, why are you using Esa?” Until I stop seeing Snares, Jinteki, Weyland, and Thule in my matchups I’ll leave the dmg for the corps to do. I’m not a masochist.

“I don’t have enough programs to break into my opponent’s servers. I need more ice breakers” No you don’t. For a deck like this any extra icebreakers will slow it down and be too costly.

This is my first published deck, so feedback is greatly appreciated. Thanks and happy running!