Darwin Breeding Program

I'm certain I'm not the first to come up with this particular set of synergies but I haven't seen it experimented with all that much so I figure why not add my two cents.

Full disclosure: This deck performed very well in testing but performed less than expected when piloted by my brother at the local store championship. He feels this was more due to a lack of experience in tournament settings (it was his second) than any overwhelming weakness in the deck.

With all of that out of the way ON TO THE DECK.

The core of this deck is the incredible synergy that Hivemind has with any Viruses that stack and store their virus counters. In the case of this deck that would be Darwin, Chakana, Medium, Nerve Agent and Parasite.

Pre-Hivemind all of these cards were good but required time and effort before the runner could really get them to shine, NA needs you to run HQ, Chakana and Medium needs you to run R&D, and Parasite and Darwin required either time or Datasucker tokens which in turn requires, you guessed it, more runs.

With Hivemind in play the only virus counters that matters are the ones on Hivemind. It powers everything, it makes Darwin strong, turns Chakana on without needing to run and allows you to install Medium and make a 6 card dig into R&D right off the bat. It also turns Parasite into an absolute beast, the first iteration of this deck ran Datasucker but it begins to feel irrelevant when your Parasites can insta-kill strength 6 ice. With Hivemind and Parasite not even a Curtain Wall is safe.

Now after I've spent so much time talking about it you've probably guessed that Hivemind is the core of this deck. Ideally you want to install it on to a Progenitor after you've got a Grimoire in play but you shouldn't wait any later than 3rd turn to install your Hivemind, especially when facing any kind of fast advance.

Once Hivemind is installed it's time to focus on putting all the pieces together.

Kati Jones and Virus Breeding Ground get equal priority, Kati is the core of your economy but Virus Breeding Ground powers your Hivemind.

A close second in priority are Chakana and Darwin. Chakana would be top priority if it didn't need 2-3 counters (depends if Grimoire is installed) on Hivemind to be useful. Once you've got Darwin installed and at a decent strength it's time to start face checking ice, ideally with a Parasite in the Heap and a Clone Chip installed, while keeping an eye on your bank. Don't hesitate to use Parasite to bring a piece of ice to within breaking range of Darwin, people are so used to Parasite being used to trash ice that it can be surprising to have it used to effectively double Darwin's strength.

Don't hesitate to be liberal with your Parasites, you're playing Noise after all. But prioritise Ice with multiple subroutines as they hurt Darwin more.

Once you feel confident in your ability to get into servers it's time to install your Medium/Nerve Agent and start wrecking havoc.

When it comes to Progenitor don't be fussy about what you install on it. As previously mentioned the ideal is to have Hivemind installed on one but all of the Viruses benefit from being hosted by Progenitor. It saves you memory and helps to protect against purges. That said the priority is Hivemind > Darwin > Chakana/Medium > Nerve Agent.

Now I know that all seems a little janky and slow to put together but that's why Chakana is so important. Getting one installed and activated is a pain for the corp, two is agony and three is an absolute nightmare. And the best part is that between VBG, Hivemind and Progenitor you can easily get them back online straight after a purge.

That's the core of the deck explained.

Express Delivery and Earthrise Hotel allow you to cycle through the deck and get what you need as you need it. I've Had Worse helps with this too but you often end up holding them in hand to protect against and mitigate meat and net damage.

Fester helps to make the Corp think twice before purging virus counters but it's probably the weakest card in the deck and I'm likely to cut it in favour of something else. Maybe some Stimhacks or Demoliton Runs. Or Day Jobs.

The biggest threat this deck faces is resource destruction, loosing Kati or your Virus Breeding Grounds can be a serious setback, to this I'm also considering Los Angeles City Hall.

So there's the deck in all it's glory. I feel like there's real potential in this rig but I also feel like this may be as far as I can take it, if you have any questions or criticisms I'd love to hear them. But most importantly feel free to steal and improve on this deck, Darwin deserves to be free!