B in a Tree [Denver SC '19 3-0]

Took this list to the Colorado Store Championship at the Wizard's Chest on 4 May, 2019 and went 3-0 (first round bye) in my Corp games. This was my first tournament, and first games outside of casual, kitchen table Netrunner. Let me say that I am still a complete noob, and have only been playing for 3 months. Take the essay that follows with a grain of salt and please feel free to correct my thoughts.

My goal for the day was to score an agenda, steal an agenda, and laugh at how bad I am at Netrunner. Aim Low. Chair Force.

I chose the deck archetype on two main reasons: it's the beginner Jinteki ID, and folks said to learn with what scares you most.

Damage. Damage scares me most. The hideous discard of precious cards gives me nightmares.

I think this deck is straight forward for a new player as the combos are relatively limited and obvious. This archetype forces a lot of decisions on opponents, while having straight forward decisions turn to turn.

One big part of the success was that nobody at the SC was expecting the black tree. I'm uncertain that this deck is good in a very Khusyuk-heavy meta. Khusyuk's multi-access without actual multi-access is immensely powerful, and enables the runner to bypass many of your tricks. Further, Khusyuk decks need time to install enough cards, while PE plays a very patient style. I think it would have been better to go fast advance. Still, you can't discount 3-0 in a time when runners are heavily favored. A single Crisium Grid is not enough to hold Khusyuk at bay.

When Lunar gets rotated, I think the deck loses potency with Chronos Project going out. The power to purge cards from the game shouldn't be understated in a time when recursion is key with Khusyuk. It is also key when milling the runner, though my intent was always to use flatline pressure to fast advance cards instead. I have been considering swapping Chronos for 1 SSL Endorsement or even going toward Nisei MK II to play around all of the Khusyuk once Lunar is rotated. Additional Ark Lockdowns may be necessary. Given how popular Wu Revoir is, Ancestral Imager may be a solid replacement.

I chose to pivot to more Biotic Labor because of the aggressive Leela decks I was expecting. And while I did face 2 Leelas, only one player ran before turn 5. More Shipment from Tennin would have been just fine, and I think will continue to be in the Downfall era.

I can't stress the importance of fast-advancing a House of Knives early in the game. Having that extra pressure is critical, and blocked two Obokata steals through three games.

The second best card is sneakily Shi.Kyū. It should not be underestimated in Archives. The electro-golden-goddess-twins won two of the three games.

The deck runs very poor, but the runner's cards are the real resource of games against it. Also, I'm new, so I don't own a copy of Anansi... And forgot to print one out prior to the SC. Super newb.

Game 1 - Bye - Because Colorado cannot figure out how to do highway construction, and I wound up being 20 minutes late instead of Waze's initial 20 minute early projection. Alexis convinced me to play anyway when I was looking for any excuse to not. #datIntrovertLyfe

Game 2 - Leela - I can't thank my opponent enough for his patience with me on my first tournament game ever, particularly when I was on the runner side. The community really does live up to the hype. Surprisingly, this was the only game of the day that didn't go to time. I got a bit lucky and his breaker suite didn't come together early enough, compounded by the fact that I had most of the ICE installed by turn 5. This was the game where I learned Aiki is a really mean card for the next-to-nothing cost. Fast advancing a Philotic Entanglement won the game on points.

Game 3 - Geist - Starting hand was 2 agendas and no money. I mulligan-ed into 8 of 20 agenda points. 2x Obokata Protocol, Sting!, House of Knives, and Breached Dome. Having far exceeded my goals for the tournament, I wasn't stressed about the bad luck. Got lucky and got a Kakugo on first draw, which enabled me to rush a House of Knives behind it. He had 2 Khusyuk's that totally whiffed (may have grabbed a Sting! on one), and there was an incredibly intense turn where I had the winning Obokata double advanced, and he pulled out a Sports Hopper to be able to steal it, putting us both at 4 while I had 2 Obokata's and a Shi.Kyū in HQ. He ran HQ and pulled the Shi.Kyū to push him back to 3 points, and I was able to finish milling Geist out. By the end of the game his Geist engine had over 80 credits. Important lesson - 80 credits is still not enough to pay for a shirt for Geist. This was one of my favorite games of Netrunner I have played yet. Feeling screwed by the mulligan and simply playing through it was awesome.

Game 4 - Leela - This game featured another lucky start, with loads of ICE that prevented Leela from being able to interact. I don't think he ran until after turn 10, and by that point, had bounced the alternating Aiki and Kakugo off of HQ 4 times. Playing quite a few Fisk Investment Seminars drew through both of our decks quick, but Leela wasn't able to apply the pressure to keep me from scoring the 1 point agendas. Fisk lead to a turn where I had 9 cards in hand, so I installed a Chronos Project and a Sting!, hoping to score one of the two. The 6 cards face down in Archives were too alluring, and Leela ran archives. He was greeted with 2x Breached Domes and 2x Shi.Kyūs, both of which I paid 4 credits in order to get them in his score area. The next turn I pushed the Chronos through, and removed a good 30 cards from the game. He did wind up stealing an Obokata Protocol from the top of R&D, but ran out of cards shortly after that to allow me to push the Obokata in hand through for the win.