[Startup] Secretly Jinteki (4-0 at Worlds 2022)

This deck was designed with a big help from Choux (CyberStein on jnet). We swapped some deck ideas and this emerged out the other side. This deck would not have been possible without their help. I felt very confident about it going into the day, and it carried me to 35th while my Ken deck dropped almost every game. Cpt_nice’s deck was also based off this same template, and performed similarly well.

My NEH shell game deck was precursor to this, which took me to top 3 in the GLC Ashes to Ashes tournament. Big plays, mind games, and sheer audacity will pull you through games, if you have the guts to IAA a Bellona on turn 1.

Cards that are incredible

Remastered Edition: This is the clincher. A floating advancement counter that can be used at instant speed? This allows you to close out a game through fast advancing a Bellona on Vladisibirsk City Grid, getting that last point with Superconducting Hub, or – critically -packing the extra unexpected point of damage into Urtica Cipher to make it lethal. While a Remastered token is on deck, all of your forks are more dangerous.

Mitosis: This card lets you take two turns of IAA shenanigans, with a discount of 1 credit and 4 clicks! FOUR! You can IAA two upsetting-looking targets, AND still have a click left over to, I don’t know, play NAPD Cordon, or slam a Vasilisa in front of the Urtica Cipher you just installed beside your Bellona. It’s extremely spicy and very threatening.

Vasilisa: On centrals, this enables your crock pot of shenanigans cooking up in your many remotes – basically free clicks. On remotes, it makes NAPD Cordon’d agendas tougher to steal, and traps even deadlier to check.

NAPD Cordon: This card is just incredible in Prav, I don’t know what else to say. A win condition, and the only reason to really defend HQ in any capacity.

Urtica Cipher: This wins games. Costs nothing to fire, and does a base 2 damage (3 if you slam the Prav counter on it at the last second). The deadly 50/50 that the runner sometimes cannot afford to NOT check. Half my wins on the day were due to Urtica. Running an Urtica click 1 behind a Vasilisa, on top of a 2 advanced Vlad Grid, with a Remastered token waiting in the wings? That’s 7 damage in Prav. Bless this card.

Playing the Field

Playing against Boat: What does boat do? Break ice. Break ice very efficiently, especially if the runner can make at least 1 successful run each turn, which will happen if you’re running asset spam. The solution? Just don’t play ice. Or, even better, play ice that will do something no matter if the runner breaks it or not. Here we have Funhouse and Gold Farmer to slow the runner down, and Vasilisa to speed us up. Funhouses go on centrals only, effectively costing an extra click and 2c to run through the server – I find runners are hesitant to go tagme when boat is installed, because of Retribution. We have no tag punishment (Predictive Planogram aside), but incidentally keeping down a runner’s resource econ is often enough for us.

Playing against Stargate: Rez a Vasalisa on RD and pray. Get through RD lock with a DBS or two and jam fast. Naked install 4/2s and use the Prav advancement to score it out, if that seems reasonable. This brings me to my next point…

Establish Strange Scoring Patterns: NBN shell game is about reading your opponent – which cards are they running? Which ones do they ignore? Is your opponent Lat? Then perhaps they’ll be focused on setting up for their draw trigger and getting money. I’ll usually score early agendas against shapers, rushing out a Remastered Edition to put me way ahead on turn 2. IAA just a bunch of cards and observe.

The Ultimate Score Plan

The killer play here relies on econ denial, which is easy with Artificial Cryptocrash and Reversed Accounts if they refuse to drain themselves by running your many, many remote servers. On two points, use Mitosis to install a Remastered Edition and a Bellona, then use click three to lay down a NAPD Cordon. With the Prav counter, Remastered costs 10 creds to steal, and Bellona costs a whopping 15. A previously scored Remastered token will bring these up to 12/17 to steal.

If the runner makes a run to check either of these without a big stack of creds, or tries to unsuccessfully poke centrals for the win, their fate is sealed. Place your free advancement on Remastered. Next turn, advance and score Remastered click one, and then score out the Bellona with your remaining 2 clicks and your newly acquired Remastered token. That’s 5 points in 2 turns. This can be attempted as early as turn 1 if you land the dream hand of Mitosis, NAPD Cordon, Bellona, Remastered Edition, and Subliminal Messaging, landing you back on 5 creds at the end of turn 2.

Go Fast: You can NAPD Cordon for game point only if the runner is poor. Make them poor, and rush out before they can get infinite green orb credits. Absolutely rez multiple DBS to draw into your key pieces – Mitosis and NAPD Cordon – so you can close the game out as quickly as possible. Your best Spinny targets are typically Mitosis, then NAPD Cordon, then Vlad Grid. Use your “failed” traps to protect Vlad Grid until you can either FA out or protect it with NAPD Cordon (and pray they don’t Light the Fire!).