Diagnostics NBN v0.5

This is the best version I've tried so far, but I feel like there's still probably room for improvement. In particular, there are a lot of ice variants.

I am definitely a Spike (as the MtG stereotypes go), so when it comes to deck design, I'm not interested in oh-look-how-cool-this-combo-is, I just want to have an efficient, flexible deck that wins. I've tried the HB version quite a bit and I feel like NBN is much better. HB does have some things going for it - Efficiency Committee is amazing and makes your Shipments into free Biotics, but scoring Committee early can sometimes be difficult. However, Sweeps Week is very strong, SanSan City Grid is much better than Biotic Labor, Psychographics gives more win options and Astroscript is the best corp card in the game.

The archetype feels like it may be a tier 1 deck to me. It certainly has the ability to win from seemingly unwinnable positions and can win very fast. I've only played about 20 games with it though, so I could be wrong about how good it is.

I have a couple of innovations in this design I haven't seen in other Diagnostics lists:

• Minimal number of dead draws - drawing Diagnostics is essentially useless unless you are ready to win. Psychographics, similarly, is often a dead draw. There's only one copy of each, and every other card is useful.

• Use of Data Raven to strengthen Sentry ice (more on this later).

• Can win without drawing Jackson Howard (if the runner goes tag-me) - possibility of wins via Psychographics without Midseasons.

• A reasonable number of ice so you actually have a decent chance of scoring the important first 3-4 points and less chance of auto-lose hands.

The big advantage the deck has over normal NBN fast advance is that it can win from under total R&D lock. This is probably the most common way I lose with NBN FA, so that is a big deal. The disadvantage is that the combo components take up a lot of room and so you don't have as much economy and/or timewasting stuff like Bernice. Because you don't have so much money, you are almost always poorer than the runner so I really don't like Midseasons in this archetype. You can also score on very few credits thanks to Shipment from SanSan, so being repeatedly Siphoned is also not an automatic loss.

In case you haven't played one of these decks before, here's your plan. Get to 4 points as per a normal NBN deck, then just win. A typical win from 4 points might look like this:

• Hand: Power Shutdown and Archived Memories in hand. Board: Jackson Howard on a SanSan behind ice.

Action 1: Power Shutdown for whole deck. Action 2: Archived Memories for the 1 Accelerated Diagnostics. Free paid action: Remove Jackson from the game, shuffling in Interns, Shipment from SanSan, Shipment from SanSan. Free paid action: Rez SanSan City Grid. Action 3: Accelerated Diagnostics: Action 3a: Interns for Priority Requisition. Action 3b: Shipment from SanSan, 2 counters on Priority Requisition. Action 3c: Shipment from SanSan, 2 counters on Priority Requisition, win game.

There are a lot of variants on this theme. Astroscript counters help a lot.

It's possible to win from less than 4 points but it's significantly harder. Winning from 5 is very easy.

Now, the deck. There are a few card choices that look odd.

• Priority Requisition is not a card I'm happy to have to include. It increases the variance of the deck to the runner getting a lucky hit and it's hard to score. But, deck space is at an extreme premium, so I think you kind of have to run at least 1 3 point agenda. It's unfortunate that NBN doesn't have a good one for this archetype, but at least you can sometimes get a free Tollbooth out of this. That said, it's worth having at least 1 5/3 agenda in the deck because of Beale's limitation (it doesn't let you get 3 points via 4 tokens and SanSan). I liked having 2 because if the runner hit one early, you still had a second one to Interns back out for the combo win.

• Data Raven looks weird here because it's the only tag source (and incidentally the only use for the NBN: Making News free credits). But, if the runner doesn't respect the Ravens, they will probably lose at some point. The reason is that you don't even need Jackson Howard, just Power Shutdown and Psychographics or Archived Memories. If they have a lot of tags, you can just go Shutdown -> AM -> Psycho and score a Beale that was on the table. With Diagnostics, you can go Shutdown -> AM -> Diagnostics -> Interns -> Psycho -> Shipment which gives even more counters. The Ravens felt like they made the deck a lot stronger - at the beginning of the game they are a great ETR ice on your remote, and they are always great taxing ice on R&D.

• Archived Memories is really important. In fact, there's an argument you should go to 3 and drop Ice Walls for Paper Wall or Wall of Static. I like having more ice for more consistent openings though.

• Tollbooth is fine, but not really exciting. It always gets Femmed or Shutdown, but it does at least make them find the answer. It also makes a decent Requisition target.

• I liked having 3 Pop-up because money is always good. I guess you could run more ETR there instead, since there are a bunch of code gates. RSVP is another possible cut for the same reason and also that it's not useful without multiple ice on the server - and even then it's vulnerable to the ice behind it being Parasited.

Running the deck well makes my head hurt, because there's a fair amount of math you constantly have to do to figure out whether you can win in the near future. Make sure you don't play too slowly because of that. And if they run your first Jackson, unless you need to hide agendas, let him die into Archives. You might never draw another and need to Memories or Interns him back to win.

Finally, don't forget that you don't have to win via combo. It's surprisingly easy to get tunnel vision on a plan when you're thinking about it a lot. Sometimes just IAA on Priority Req from 4 points or something is the best play.