Deals with the Devil

This is a control Freedom list I have playing for a while in different iterations most recently for a 15th place finisher at EACC (going 5-2 at the day). This is the version I would play for worlds if I went.

The namesake center piece of the deck is the Chisel + Devil Charm combo to kill almost all Ice at instant speed. Together with the standard Freedom, Consume and Knobkierie engine this is powerful against asset spam and more galciery decks. The downside to this core is that is quite card hungry. Both games at EACC that this deck lost where because I could not set up fast enough. This leads me to:

Draw Engine

I experimented with different engines from only events to Earthrise with Zer0 (which I played at EACC) to this version. We play 3x Earthrise, 3x Steelskin, 3x Moshing and 2x WCS as draw. Adding to this are 2x Gacha as pseudo-draw. Playing this much card draw is important to not be out-rushed/tagged and allows us to go through the deck in 6-8 turns if needed. On the flipside this deck runs rather low on money, but that is fine because it can deal with ice very cheaply and gains back money through Consume and Knob.

Breaker suite

Early game this deck relies on ChiselCharm and Botulus. Yusuf should be installed as early as possible but will mostly be used for Freedom. The bin breakers are used late game and as Simulchip fodder.

Tech Cards played

The tech cards played and why:

• Consume: This is the backbone of the deck.
• SMC: Usually gets you Consume but can also be used for Chisel or other tech.
• Misdirection: Tech against Ob, but also helpful against NBN. With Consume and Misdirection installed, HHN tags can always be cleard even after Econ Warfare if you let some Virus tokens on Consume.
• Simulchip: Best Card for instant speed Chisel, Botulus or Clot. 3rd is probably not necessary but going down to 1 would be worse.
• Clot: With SMC/Chip/Gacha this cards becomes a very easy include against Sports.
• Imp: Additional HQ-pressure against Combo/Kill/FA decks. Sometimes very strong but sometimes Freedom is enough and paying a click and 2 credits is too much.
• Hippo: Additional Ice desctruction goes well with ChiselCharm. Slots are tight so only 1, also because most of the time this deck has no breaker installed anyways. One off is still strong as the corp will sometimes be too scared to rez Ice or overcommit with installing Ice.
• Cookbook: Important mostly for Botulus, but also accelerates Freedom/Yusuf with every Virus and helps Chisel to instakill 7-strenght Ice (or bounce of just once on a data ward). Strong enough to warrant two, but not 100% necessary.
• Pinhole Threading: Great for Drago, Upgrades or just slowing the corp down with early Rashidas. Pairs nicely with Freedom and Consume. Might be worth to play more.

Some of these tech cards can be cut depending on which corps are expected. Either play other tech cards (see below) or more Econ: 3rd Gacha, 3rd WCS, 2nd Paladin, Mystic Maemi or Daily Casts (roughly in this order of importance).

Tech Cards not played

Tech cards that could be played but don't make the cut:

• Stargate: Very strong with Ice destruction and Consume, but just too slow and greedy. Games were you succesfully set up the engine plus Stargate would most of the time be won without Stargate already.
• Caldera: If you are really worried about PE. But HQ-pressure and trashing cards from central are already very strong against PE and most of the time Freedom is not rich enough to use it anyways.
• Avgustina: Just a win more card.
• Labor Rights: Really strong to recur key tools, but the current meta is too fast.
• DJ Fenris: Same as above but with added influence cost.
• NFL: Seems just worse than Pinhole in Freedom.
• Pelangi: Chisel does not care about subtypes.
• Aumakua: Overloads the deck on purgeable targets. Botulus + ChiselCharm is much more resistant to purges.
• Fermenter: I have to admit that I have not tested this enough.
• Leech: A Yusuf that only gains counter on centrals and can't break Ice on its own. Maaaaybe good in a really glacier heavy meta.
• Light the Fire: Great against Glacier and PE, but currently not worth it.
• Engolo: Too much inf, when ChiselCharm is in faction.

General Playstyle

This deck plays a control style with Econ/Ice denial as its stronges tool. Number 1 goal is to set up as fast as possible and get a remote lock with Botulus and ChiselCharm. If you can afford without risking remote play, the next best target is to invalidate the HQ Ice and go on a trashing spree there.