Transcendence

Hostage is an interesting choice here. Did you consider Cyberfeeder though? Would go nicely with your viruses as well as fueling icebreakers during a run. I might drop the Stimhack and one Hostage to put in 3 copies.

I think i'd likely go for cloaks before the cyberfeeder as it'd be a quicker payoff and mem constraints aren't too bad. The stimhack has been so good in games against decks that run low cost ice though as a way to save my economy that Im really looking at putting more in. Basically Im considering now dropping one parasite and adding 2 stimhacks for 46 cards.

Could turn hostages into Lucky Finds.

Yes, Stimhack is definitely great with Personal Workshop, and Cyberfeeder doesn't make as much sense if you're dropping viruses.

I guess the question is, how often do you find you're hostaging for underworld contracts? Assuming you want to get all of them out asap, hostage might actually be your best use of influence.

I'd consider some form of HQ multi-access. Maybe -1 parasite -1 femme +1 stimhack +1 legwork could work?

And considering you only need 1 of 3 men chips to turn on the contacts, you could even drop the second copy of the toolbox if you're hurting for card slots and don't care if it doesn't come out every game.

I found drip economy to be problematic. Sometimes I want to have 0 creds, and don't want to spend a click playing a card to get rid of them. I swapped my Daily Casts for Armitages and I'm pretty happy with the change.

@EwMatias I'm not too worried about getting rid of the economy one click 1, especially if you have your workshop setup so that you could drop it in the middle of your run. I have found though that you need some minimum economy at the start of a run to even threaten the server properly, for example you have to have 1 cred to threaten a melange server (even if its unrezzed and you didn't know you needed that 1) Likewise is to threaten an ash, or an NAPD or red herrings etc. Thats the reason I've found the drip economy most beneficial as I can threaten a server on click 1, and then use the rest of my turn accordingly, running other servers if they've gone broke rezzing or cashing in kati for a proper run on that server if its particuarly important.

@DrunkenGineer I find the underworld contacts are particularly useful but not an utter necessity so Id think the kati jones is the more important immediate tutor in order to get your bank going asap. Currently testing having dropped 1 parasite in favor of 2 stimhacks as several popular new decks only run an abundance of the cheapest etr ice there is in which case the stimhacks can revitalize your economy.

How games have seemed to go for me is that when I get my workshop up, I can pile tech on it and really effectively blitz install the goods. Around mid game I can also establish a really strong r&d lock for cheap.

@AsteriskCGY I think hostages would potentially do very well as lucky finds too. Once a server is entirely rezzed you need to go from low credits to high creds quickly so you'll end up cashing out kati jones typically. Lucky find is another very strong choice for that and as its a more unexpected play coming out of your hand, it has better potential to create false scoring windows for the corp.

@ExplodyCat, if you find yourself tutoring for Kati, just drop the hostages and add a third Kati! Then blow all that influence you just saved on HQ Interface.

@DrunkenGineer Thanks for the idea drunken, and you're very right. I have plenty enough draw effects to get her fast if I wanted her and I've severly considered an hq interface already so I'll put it in for testing tonight.

How about emergency shutdown and rook? I feel those cards work really well with Nasir as it punishes the corp and compliment his ability. Emergency shutdown a tollbooth and you are in business (costs 7 to break with gordian+toll). Put a rook over HB servers and now you are able to break most Ice with the money you gain from razzing.

I really like your idea of using imp, as trashing assets might be a problem in the beginning. At first I though scrubbers also might be a very good option.

@Weezel Ive been thinking a single rook, more as it slows them down further, can act like a parasite inciting a trash but most of all as it helps against decks with low ice rez cost. They just cant wipe your creds even with a tollbooth sort of thing. The imp is great for exactly that, allowing you to still threaten servers with low to no creds (kill an napd and such) as well as Im using it for my scorched earth protection, and to dig harder in r&d lock. Since Im not using plascretes I want something to threaten their combo pieces with either fast advance or scorched.

@Weezel Ive been thinking a single rook, more as it slows them down further, can act like a parasite inciting a trash but most of all as it helps against decks with low ice rez cost. They just cant wipe your creds even with a tollbooth sort of thing. The imp is great for exactly that, allowing you to still threaten servers with low to no creds (kill an napd and such) as well as Im using it for my scorched earth protection, and to dig harder in r&d lock. Since Im not using plascretes I want something to threaten their combo pieces with either fast advance or scorched.

Thanks for this @ExplodyCat, I've just given this a try with a friend though I have had to slightly modify it as I only have 1 core set. I've had to remove 1 Femme Fatale and 1 The Toolbox but noticed you mentioned you had also tried it with Spinal Modem.

As that's not a core card I can effectively run 2 or 3 of them and wondered why you opted to try Toolbox instead? Was it just a case of experimenting or do you think it works better? Also, with regards to Hostage, I drew that in my starting hand and wasn't quite sure what to tutor for as I didn't have enough link to use Underworld Contact. I'm assuming it should have been Kati Jones but I also drew her early. Don't think I ever actually played it but that may have just been because of the luck of the draw.

I did have some issues with economy as he was running a lot of cheap ETR ice though I was able to do a few runs on R&D with an R&D Interface but annoyingly kept getting his bloody Domestic Sleepers agenda's.

I really enjoyed playing it though and this is the first deck on here I've ever commented on. Would be grateful for any further advice you could give in terms of adapting around a single core set and swapping out the consoles.

Thanks for reading in any case :)

@KillerBot Hey there, so It started purely as the spinal modem and really the testing tollbox is exclusively since it boosts link and makes it easier to trigger those underworlds. For one core box I would go back closer to my original build.

Drop both hostages, Drop both toolboxes. Drop both hostages. Run 2 spinal modem, +1 helpful ai (or 1 access to globalsec) should give decent enough link. Also drop 1 parasite and put in 1 stimhack, 1 cyberfeeder. I'm currently testing the stimhacks +cyberfeeders to see how helpful it may be against low rez cost decks. The cheaper console will greatly help towards being more agressive including against low rez decks since the recurring credits will make a difference quicker. Stimhacks will get your femmes to the board more easily on demand and the one off recurring from the cyberfeeder will help also against low rez decks.

Let me know how well it works out for you and if anyone else has had any success with variants of their own.

Spinal Modem is too dangerous. You simply can not win a trace without lots of link, and sadly the bes source of link is Toolbox. Helpful AI and Globalsec aren't good enough, which makes spinal modem really bad. If you find Toolbox too unwieldy, I'll try Dino, Desperado, or Astrolabe once it comes out. Or none at all. You dont't NEED a console. Memchips are better just for the MU.

Any concern about Midseason Replacements here? Your econ is really resource heavy (Kati Jones and Personal Workshop).

@jeremyorion No real concern for them no, mostly a local meta choice as I'm blessed by not having to stare them down every game. I have given consideration to a disrupter before but the truth is, Nasir is just incredibly vulnerable to nbn to begin with. An nbn willing to risk a breaking news in a remote for a turn can easily wipe a well stacked kati or workshop. Same goes for seasources from rich weylands.