Ken Tenma - Nowhere to Hide - 1st place small 2016 GNK event

Hello, this is my first posted deck. It won me a small GNK last weekend beating both NEH and Food Coats 7-2. It's fast and simple to play with.

I'm playing Netrunner for about a year and started off with Gabe as my first runner. I loved the aggression that the criminal cards afforded me and I do think a number of my early wins were as a result of hitting the corp hard before they had a chance to set up.

Over the last 6 months, I have learned to play Anarch and Shaper but as a player, I feel that utter aggression suits my play style much better.

Ken's ability has always interested me - getting paid for doing something I liked doing is right up my street. Selverin's worlds deck seemed to touch all the bases as to what I would like to see in a runner, but I think I wanted to build something that gives me even more early aggression before rushing to late game asap.

I prepared Ken in response to a meta where I saw very little murder and so the main decision was to run without any tag protection. NBN and Foodcoats are the decks to beat and this deck hits them incredibly hard before they get a chance to set up.

-Against NBN, it can go tag me IF later in the game if you have determined through accessing cards that the kill is not there.

-Against Foodcoats, I'm going tag me all the way. All four resources should be played and used immediately.

EARLY AGGRESSION - The deck possesses a number of tools which affords extra aggression to the Runner. A pair of Faerie have been added to counter early Architechs, Assassins or other dangerous sentry ice that can really hurt early facechecks. Two Inside Job also allow access to lightly protected servers in the early game and it also is an early target for your ability. Both cards can be used later in the game even with a full breaker suite on the table. With these includes, I feel I can threaten the dominant decks before they get their board state set up to their liking.

ECONOMY - The usual suite of economy is here, with Lucky Find added just twice as a result of influence being needed elsewhere. However, i was never stuck for credits. The deck makes money for doing what you should be doing anyways - running aggressively and cutting off the corp's economy and card draw. Stimhack helps to burst through what looks like a scoring window. The deck contains 14 run events so Ken's ability is usually making you a credit per turn. Do not be afraid to use Same Old Thing to recur a Lucky Find if it sets you up for more aggression.

CARD DRAW -I find Selverin's draw engine to be pretty perfect. I had tried Earthrise Hotel but I rarely needed it and preferred money in my bank. Given the fact that this deck runs tag me, Drug Dealer was not considered (but would be amazing if you were committed to clearing tags). Again, if you need draw and have a Quality Time in your heap, use Same Old Thing again. The quicker I get from early game accesses to having a full breaker suite out, the better.

SURPRISE! -One of the main additions to the deck was Hades Shard. This won me two games while sitting on 4 points. Jackson is amazing but Hades cannot be reacted to if played from hand. The beauty of this is that even if an opponent knows you are running it in subsequent games, the only thing they can do is hide the agendas in open play, in HQ or in R&D and that will play into the multi access and aggressive remote checking. It is very rare to have less than 7 credits to threaten this.

-In addition, Stimhack means no scoring window is as secure as it seems. Ken on 2 credits at click 1 could be close 20 credits and threatening a remote on click 3 after a lucky find and Stimhack...

POST- MWL: Most Wanted List rules changes this deck and I have not yet tested the changes. Public Terminall is a very decent substitute for Prepaid VoicePAD and I think three of the former and one of the latter would be a nice cost-reduction engine.

The deck ran with two Desperado and while it was nice to have, I think the deck could run well without it. Doppelgänger is the obvious console to consider but I'd love to try Comet as it fits into what seems to be a usual turn for Ken - play a money event, play a run event. However, the influence means cuts elsewhere.

My feeling here is that two High-stakes Job could replace the pair Desperado.

CLOSING THOUGHTS: I love aggressive Netrunner and this deck plays to my strengths. There are quite a number of free slots that can be used to suit your meta. Clearly if Kill decks are prominent then Plascrete Carapace and some net damage protection can be included.

Enjoy!