Like, A Billion Cuts

Check out this deck in action!

Thousand Cuts is back, baby!

This is a modern version of the cram-a-bunch-of-agendas-into-PE deck that I brought to the first GNK of the new meta.

This particular style of deck wasn't very feasible pre-rotation, as its econ of PADs melts to Whizz. The introduction of the restricted list helps heaps too because many runners are choosing MOpus or Employee Strike over Film Critic.

Although this could be played in a very degenerate "I'll advance all the remotes - hope you get the right ones!" way, I think it rewards you for playing to your opponent. Are they checking face-down remotes? Be sure to feed them a Snare or Project Kusanagi. Are they drawing up and checking your advanced traps so to avoid both Ronin and Junebug? Use PAD Factory to advance a Shi.Kyū. You can punish them for stealing agendas with Philotic Entanglement, Voter Intimidation, and Stock Buy-Back, so you don't necessarily need to keep Ronins on the board or anything.

Gameplan

Early game you're looking to put on pressure. Rush out some 3-cost agendas to get some points on the board. Mushin an Obo, ice it, and then score it out next turn. Then you have a server for your PAD Factory, which the runner will almost certainly trash once they realize you can advance snares with that shit.

Mid game is when you're trying to get a pair of Ronin / Show of Force to fire in the same turn. The runner will have to draw up to disarm them, protecting themselves from Junebugs. That's okay, because they're depleting their deck.

Late game, you're trying to deck them. You'll need big ice on your centrals to slow down their multiaccess. You'll be piecing together a 24/7+Philotic kill, so you want them to have several Kusanagi/Shi Kyu. You'll either deck them or get your kill combo together.

5 Ways to Get a Kill:

1. Do 6 net with a combo of Show of Force and Ronin. You'll have to keep some advanced cards on the board. My fav play of Mushin + Install Ice is probably best. That way they need to have 6+ cards in hand AND the breaker and money to break. Much harder to check and clear your board.
2. Score out a Philotic when they have several agendas. Remember Kusanagi and Shi.Kyū are great for boosting this.
3. Use 24/7 News Cycle to trigger Philotic or Show of Force on demand. Best use is right after having scored them.
4. Land a Brainstorm. It's an ice that can outright win you the game. Plus, its stock got better without Parasite in the meta. Also, a Project Kusanagi counter flatlines after a Brainstorm faceplant.
5. Deck them. You're not PU, but the damage output from just stealing and scoring is pretty good. Combined with the plethora of traps and ice, runners who thoroughly check remotes to disarm your traps will be out of a deck near game's end.

FAQ

54 cards? Yeah, you need to outlast the runner's deck. If they're aggressively disarming your board, you'll end up decking them, so it's important to have more cards in your deck than they have in theirs.

I want to change up the influence. What's flexible? The core of the deck is having many agendas, which makes Philotic amazing, which can be triggered with 24/7. You need to keep at least one. And Stock Buy-Back gets absurd at 4 agendas in their score area, so you're getting a lot of bang for your influence buck with that. Feel free to take out Brainstorm if you like.

But Punitive and Obokata are so good together! They are! But Punitive is a trace. This deck is pretty poor, and the low ice count is not exactly taxing for the runners. You're just not likely to win the trace.

Your Agendas are weird. I was looking for agendas that double as other card slots. Think of Neural Net as an extra ice on HQ. Kusanagi is a Shock! that powers up Philotic and Stock Buy-Back.

Caldera? Voter Intimidation.

Feedback Filter? Oh shit.