Decklist of the week

Send it for Self Defense - 👑1st at NorCal Districts👑

Identity

Description by the author: Tak 506

Zahya is good, y'all. Just send it. Keep the corp down with a couple well timed Diversions just long enough for you to touch 17 cards and win. Play aggro, make the corp decide between protecting centrals or letting you Inside Job the remote.

Origin and card slots

This deck is just a riff on @znsolomon's Self Defense. Hot Pursuit and Manuel are excellent, and Rogue Trading funds basically everything, especially once you get purged or the corp glaciers a bit. I swapped Cat's Cradle for Shibboleth because it's cheaper early game, and by late game you should have the money or the tricks not to care. I also added a second Leech for consistency because it gets your engine rolling faster after getting purged out in the mid game.

@znsolomon, if you're reading this I'm so sorry for cutting the best draw in the deck. (Am I truly playing Self Defense without it?) In my testing I found it difficult to reliably land Joy Ride, and I wanted to be ready for kill, so I slotted 3 Steelskin instead.

Piloting

@znsolomon has a bunch of versions of this deck and a whole guide on playing self defense, but here are a few of my own observations after jamming this deck for a bit.

• You're leading this dance. As long as the corp is responding to you, you're winning.
• You can disrespect almost anything the corp wants to do. Just keep the mindset that anything the corp does is worse for them than it is for you. Rez an anansi? Great that's 8c down the drain and don't think I won't just run through it. Gatekeeper? Cool, it's 0 strength now. Tags piling up? The corp can only Shipment an agenda if they find it before you do. Trashed my Rogue Trading? Good, I didn't need it anyway.
• Forks, lots of forks. Pressure the remote just so the corp has less money to protect centrals. When the corp looks like they're preparing to score, install Manuel or Rogue Trading and make them decide between scoring and keeping you out. By threatening what the corp doesn't want, you can usually get away with what you actually want.
• Cupellation is Aumakua's best friend. Obviously you could cup the End of the Line or Neurospike or whatever, but remember you can also cup mavirus so you can charge up your turtle and leech on archives.
• Diversion doesn't have to land. Especially with swift, it's worth it to burn one just to make the corp spend money.
• This deck is meant to be aggro, but don't lose sight of the late game if the corp starts locking you out. You have a full rig and non-interactive money when you need it.

The Event

Northern California Districts was a blast. I had some really tense games that came down to the wire. Thanks to all my opponents for the great games, and shout out to @tzeentchling for organizing!

And lastly, shout out to my teammates on Logic Bomb for all the testing over the last month leading up to the event!

Check out my corp here.