Guns and Bombs, 24/7 -- 1st at Red Castle Games, Portland OR

Saan 3111

Yeah, I made another -- Jemison -- build. I think I have a problem.

I won, though, so I guess it's a good problem =D

When I saw Armed Intimidation, I thought what probably many of you thought. "This seems like Breaking News, but bigger." And yeah, that's basically what's going on here. It's a larger, harder to score agenda, but kinda more dickish. The possibilities of abusing 24/7 seemed obvious, so I built one deck in Argus, and one deck in Jemison, and took a look at them. I decided on the Jemison deck because there's more scoring patterns that allow you to score Armed Intimidation and threaten BOOM! through fast advance tools, and because 24/7 can, in a pinch, act like a FA tool as well. Also, it is much easier to get Atlas counters using Oberth Protocol, and those help greatly finding combo pieces.

As a note, this is my literal first pass at this deck, so there's almost certainly optimizations to be made.

Agenda Comp

Jemison needs agendas to sacrifice to FA crap, but this build also needs those small agendas in order to use 24/7. I really wish I could stop using Hostile Takeover, because I really, really hate the BP it gives, but honestly the 2/1 agenda type is just too good. Standoff is a no-brainer here as well, since it usually gives a small tempo boost (so small) and then lets you rez Archers, Tithonium, sometimes Oberth, gives a 24/7 target, and gives you a great agenda for Exchange of Info. False Lead rounds out the small agenda targets, and is mostly there to deny the runner clicks after a HHN that they normally would be able to just clear tags, but is also good for Never Advancing Global Foods, Project Atlas with 1-2 counters, and Armed Intimidation (which you can also advance once instead of NAing it to then threaten BOOM with).

The other agendas I've talked about already, and their inclusion should be pretty obvious. If I can, in the future, I'd love to fit a third Standoff, since it's the perfect agenda for most of what this deck wants to accomplish. It's hard to fit, though.

Non-Agenda Card Inclusions

So in order for Armed Intimidation to be lethal (either regularly or with 24/7), the runner needs to have less than a full hand. The Snare!s was an idea of how to get that to happen more frequently, as was the Cobras. Mausolus can also deal a damage, so can be relevant in that capacity as well. As much as I did like the Snare!s, I really think the deck might benefit more from another HHN.

As for the Exchange of Information, I really really believe that Weyland needs a punishing card for people that float one tag after clearing 3 from an HHN, or keeping one from Mausolus, or some other source that they didn't immediately expect. People see BOOM! as Weyland's only threat, and think that one tag is going to be safe for at least a bit. If you thought that Exchanging a Breaking News for a Global Food was fun, just wait til you Exchange a Standoff for one. Even a Standoff for a 2-pointer is still a 4-point swing, and usually game ending. It's good, my dudes.

And everything else in this deck just makes sense, right? Honestly, for a deck with such fun interactions, it's a really boring deck to just look at. Or maybe that's my reaction because I've spent so long on Jemison.

One thing I would love to fit in is a single Audacity. I lost a game to a Maw Gangsign Leela (which is a god damned nightmare of a matchup for this deck, especially if they get their set pieces going early, which of course they did), and a single Audacity would have won me the game easily.

Signing Off

Until next time, my Weyland brothers and sisters =)

-Saan

Yeah, there's already an Edit

So the genius that is @ino209 asked me if I'd considered Neural EMP over the Snare!s. This way you can 24/7 first click, threatening BOOM!. If they take the 5 meat damage, you just Neural them. I think it's a much better inclusion than Snare!.

11 comments
6 Mar 2018 Severijn

Looks like my first comment was made already. This deck desperately wants to run neural emp. My other suggestion would be to slot Forced Connection as a masquerading oberth protocol.

I am not sure whether you gain a lot of benefit from exchange of information when you are only running a singleton hard-hitting news with the ability to tutor for it. It sounds to me that if you are able to tutor for HHN and the runner removes 3 of the tags, then you used your HHN too early. If you get to tutor the card whenever you want, you would expect to tutor it when you can guarantee two tags sticking. If we live in the world where you get to force the runner to keep the tags, then there is no reason to exchange of information the runner.

My impression is that this deck is rather fragile. I never have enough forfeit options with just oberth, and I do not want to pay clicks for forfeiting agendas. It sounds to me that oberth is going to die pretty frequently. I personally enjoy Corporate Town as a secondary fofeiting option. I also enjoy playing Team Sponsorship in jemison so that I can recycle my assets. I have been tempted to use this with forced connection to force this connection over and over...

6 Mar 2018 themeanlady

Deck looks very fun! Maybe cerebral overwriter or junebug to protect oberth would be nice, because you can sac something in 4.3 and make it un avoidable to hit.

6 Mar 2018 Saan

@SeverijnYeah, Team Sponserships seem perfectly reasonable, as does a Corp Town or two. My last build included more forfeit options, but I pared down on them in order to include a more robust kill package. But as I said, this deck was a first draft that I then brought to the tournament, so I'm sure tons of improvement and optimization can be made on the concept!

@themeanladyYeah, I love me some Junebug in Jemison. It can be a surprisingly easy kill =D

7 Mar 2018 Severijn

Well, I'll be looking forward to the next version. I am not sure on the one exchange of information still since you only have one 3 pointer to steal with it. Even so, this deck looks like a blast. When I get the council of the crest cards, I will try playing this with the forced connection/team sponsorship plan.

8 Mar 2018 mcg

Love the Neural suggestion! You're both bad people and I doth my cap.

9 Mar 2018 Severijn

Building from the recursive Forced Connection with Team Sponsorship idea, you could increase the jank factor by running a singleton Meteor Mining, which should be trivial to FA out if you scored an atlas with 1 agenda counter earlier.

It also presents the same kill as BOOM! does. Spice it up with Project Junebug so that you can try to bluff your way to scoring an Armed Intimidation in the corp's start of turn. If they ran, then you can Neural EMP them out of the game. If they didn't, then you kill them with FA'ing a meteor mining.

12 Mar 2018 phette23

DoW this one already. It's a blast to play. I tried swapping the Snares for a Neural & 2nd Hard-Hitting News & I liked the change.

14 Mar 2018 Saan

@phette23 Yeah, that's the change I'd recommend for sure. I messed around with Team Sponsorships for a bit, but especially once you get a BP, no one let's them live. The extra HHN is way better, plus you don't have to try and find another card slot.

Also, I regret not calling this deck Bomb Shop, in honor of the many deadly Shop decks of the past =(

14 Mar 2018 Saan

@themeanlady If you wanted to fit in a Junebug, I'd recommend dropping either the second HHN or the Exchange and user that influence for the Junebug and maybe a Wraparound over an Ice Wall. Maybe a IP Block, but BP makes the trace sub pretty bad. I really love Junebug in Jemison.

17 May 2018 Severijn

After doing some further experimentation with this style of jemison, I think I would recommend ditching one IPO for the final standoff. The more I play jemison, the more I am convinced you want all the forfeit fodder that you can get. Usually you will also get your money out of standoff, though it is obviously less than an IPO.

18 May 2018 RvdH83

Man, this deck is fun to play. It's fast and mean. I played +1 Junebug, +1 HHN, +1 Neural EMP, -2 Snare!, -1 EoI. I went 6-1 with it so far. I think I scored out once and all others were HHN -> BOOM!, usually by forfitting one or two False Leads.

I can see the use for another Standoff instead of an IPO. Not getting a small agenda is usually really tough. The only game that I lost was by not scoring any early small agenda.