Weyland Consortium has always been my favorite mega-corp. A financial behemoth with a shadowy background, that does not shy away from the use of brute force to resolve problems. My kind of corporation. Wow. Much Cyberpunk 2020!

“The real mission? We’re going to save the human race.” Jack Weyland

In other words, (per aspera) sic itur ad astra: (through hardships) to the stars!

Concept

Gagarin Deep Space is quite a different Identity for Weyland. Still somehow linked to the concept of economy, but more in a taxing kind of way. One extra credit just to access any and each card installed in remote servers can become quite the expense.

It also means that, given the additional cost, the runner can refrain from stealing an agenda (or from accessing any cards, actually), but that is a problem only if you were planning a Midseason Replacements. Not this deck's case.

This one plays the taxation game, making it expensive to steal an Agenda, and making expensive to run on centrals thanks to the new breed of advanceable ice.

Ice Selection

Asteroid Belt, Nebula, Wormhole and Orion all have quite a decent strength value, but they also have just one subroutine, so they will be perfect targets for Femme Fatale, Knight or D4v1d.

At least Femme is quite expensive and is otherwise a quite expensive Killer, when it comes to raising her strength; Knight can only go against strength 7 or lower, so it won't work against Orion; D4v1d costs 4 influence and as such can't be everywhere, plus it has a limited number of uses anyway.

The first possible solution to a deck using plenty of the above mentioned programs is Tyrant which works the other way around and with a limitless number of subroutines can become exceptionally expensive. It only has strength four, however, so it might be a prime target for another annoying program: Parasite. Moreover, it needs to be rezzed before you can advance it, so you might need to rez it on your own with Executive Boot Camp or you'll be unable to move advancement tokens on it with Constellation Protocol.

Fire Wall and Ice Wall can be other good targets for those mid-to-late game advancement tokens exchanges and are otherwise needed so you can benefit from that little jewel that is Builder even after you rezzed or advanced all those Wormholes and such.

Lastly, Orion is a true beast and the way it's discounted also means you won't have to fear Crescentus or Emergency Shutdown (just like for the other 3 with the same mechanic). You do have much to fear from it being a rainbow, however, cause anyone between Forked, Spooned or Knifed can trash it for good. So beware of those who handle cutlery / silverware.

To solve a few of the above mentioned (and possible) problems, I use two more cards:

• Rainbow, placed in the outermost layer, works as a protection from all kind of cutlery-based shenanigans. Wanna trash my Nebula? You're gonna have to fork the server twice.

• Patch can make a Knight useless, but it also works to increase the cost of any ice. It can make Builder a pain to break, or Wormhole a true nightmare for Yog.0-based decks.

• Architect will protect your servers from Forked, if installed in the outermost layer, but it also works perfectly well against Eater. If they want to access, they will have to let it fire... and those two subroutines can do a lot!

Assets & Upgrades

• Constellation Protocol goes without saying, and it's quite expensive to trash, while it doesn't cost anything to you and also makes you save money. In previous versions I had only 2 copies, but after some more games it became evident to me that you really wanna have all 3 installed. That way you can make the rez cost of your new ice equal to 0 without a click, keep moving those tokens around, or drastically increase the cost of ice such as Fire Wall and Tyrant when those advancements are not needed elsewhere. Besides, 3 copies means you'll always see at least one quickly.

• Executive Boot Camp is mostly here to help out with Tyrant and you can rez it & move advancement tokens (with CP) before you even spend your first click of the turn! It can also help a lot in fetching some economy assets or that damn Executive that never shows up at the right time. Of course it is kind of a life-saver against Valencia Estevez: The Angel of Cayambe, so there's that as well.

• GRNDL Refinery can provide a lot of economy (it served me very well in my Sly Fox deck. It is also necessary, in my opinion, to have some other card that can be advanced, other than the agenda. Otherwise the runner will always know exactly when you're going to score, but a bit of confusion is always advised. Two copies only because even a single one might change the game for you.

• Jackson Howard? Never go out without, in these troubled times of bloody milling with all the Noise Clones that go around. Essential in so many ways. Had a game against a cutlery deck, and had to put back in my deck 6 pieces of ice just to have some to protect my centrals. Crazy stuff!

• PAD Campaign will pile up money in your bank accounts, unless of course the runner wants to pay 1 to access each copy and 4 more to trash each. Either way, it's a win-win scenario.

• Red Herrings was such an annoying card, back when there was just the core set (man, I can't believe it's already been 2 years). Now it will make NAPD Contract a freaking monster to steal, since they will have to pay 10 credits (plus 2 if they also want to trash the little herrings). It also costs very little to the corp, and it's been a lot of time since I last played it, so I wanted to try it out again.

• Ash 2X3ZB9CY is a card I did not want initially, because it's everywhere (mostly Replicating Perfection, ok!) and I like to change, but truth be told, it does add a lot to this deck. Together with Red Herrings it makes for a crazy price to steal an Agenda.

• Crisium Grid is de facto the new card every deck would love to have. It does wonders against the new Keyhole + Eater decks and provides a lot of protection from plenty more stuff. It also has a relatively low rez cost (meaning you will be able to rez it after spending a turn making credits with clicks, and this is important), and a high trash cost.

Thoughts

I've been playing and tweaking this deck quite a lot recently.

Your main concern here is your economy. Most of my games I've been quite poor early game, and became quite rich in mid-to-late game (thanks PAD Campaign).

Truth is, you won't need much. You just need to place advancement tokens on your advanceable ice and protect your centrals in early game, which will tax your opponent pretty much already. Besides, they should be already wary about Nebula, and when they see it, they should be even more cautious due to Wormhole. The new Code Gate is really a beast, and I even used it to replicate a subroutine from Architect more than once. A mistake that my opponents wisely decided not to repeat.

You might think Gila Hands Arcology should be included to provide an alternative source of income. I had it in almost all the previous versions, but I basically never used it. Why? Because one more credit hardly makes the difference here, so you're better with a lower Agenda density and using Clicks for credits.

I also noticed that being poor kinda discourages those annoying Criminals from going with Account Siphon against you, which I do consider a bonus! :)

It takes time to get used to this play-style, managing every credit is extremely important, and you really need to make accurate calculations to figure out the right time to place an Agenda in your scoring server.

Ice placement is also of the uttermost importance. For example, always use Architect on your centrals, especially HQ and R&D. And possibly keep Patch for those. A strength 5 Architect on R&D will make Keyhole runs troublesome for your opponent, and discourage spending a whole turn on Wanton Destruction if installed on HQ instead. They won't be able to freely access, and that is everything against the frail economy most Anarch decks have.

Conclusions

Make no mistake, this deck is not fast at all.

It is my opinion that cards like Clot and / or Traffic Jam (search for Snowjax's spoilers) will make fast advance very hard to use, so I moved away from it entirely and am currently searching for valid alternatives.

This deck is an example, but of course it could be a problem using it at tournaments, so we'll have to see if by playing and playing (and playing) it, I can get quick enough. Or I might just have to rely on a very fast runner deck to balance it out... ;)

Anyway it's a fun new playing style for Weyland, and it works quite well, so if you're searching for something different, try Gagarin Deep Space!