Shutdown AD Haarp: Worlds 2016, 37th - 7-2 record

I played this deck at worlds and did pretty well with it. I believe (but I'm not sure) that it was the highest placed Haarp list in the tournament. Overall at worlds I went 11-7, with my weakness piloting runner keeping me well out of the top 16. Others also placed higher with the Shutdown-BOOM! combo out of NEH. But I think using the combo out of Harrp is worth considering as well: In worlds I went 7-2 with the deck, and over the course of the ICE breaker tournament, worlds, and the KoS team tournament, the deck was 15-4, including wins against strong opponents like Dan D'Argenio on day 1 and 2015 top 16 competitor Peter Hernandez (aka Yoshi) at the KoS tournament.

I hadn't practiced much prior to worlds and I was looking for a linear strategy where the most important things to know were what could stop your combo and what you can do about those things. I started building in Haarp right away and didn't ever really consider another ID for the deck for a couple of reasons: The ID's ability gives you many extra turns to assemble your combo while also allowing you to play a bare minimum of ICE, both things combo decks really want. Haarp's defensive ability also provides a lot more protection from tech hate like Hades Shard that completely wrecks this combo out of other IDs.

Some thoughts on the card choices:

The Influence: This is locked in. You don't want any fewer of the combo pieces and 2 Booms are necessary to beat double Plascretes. For those who don't know, the combo is to first score a Breaking news out of hand as soon as possible and then on another turn after they run, you click 1: Power Shutdown your entire deck, Click 2: Play and use a Jackson to shuffle in 3 events, and Click 3: Play Accelerated Diagnostics to play the three events. The 24/7 does not require a second agenda since the forfeit is an additional cost, which is ignored by diagnostics. Normally you use (24/7, Sweeps, Boom) or (24/7, Boom, Boom) or (Hatchet Job, 24/7, Boom) to kill them through various protection. You can go off with as little as 3 credits if they have at least 4 cards in hand and no other protection and 10 credits gets you though double plascrete.

The card draw: Special Report and Anonymous were the all stars of the deck. Special Report especially shined as a way to find your combo pieces while also safeguarding your agendas. You do end up using Jackson from time to time to do some HQ hygiene, but you want to put that off as long as possible and Special Report lets you do that while also digging for your combo. Playing Tip followed by Report in the same turn is often how you find your last piece of the combo. 10/10 would play again. Lily Lockwell mostly got trashed. She was fine when I actually got a chance to play her, but not good enough that it made up for all the times she just ate 3 otherwise unused Whizz creds (this is also why I ending up cutting Sensie Actor's Union and DBS during testing.) I would run an extra Wraparound over her if I were to play the deck again tomorrow.

The ICE: The ICE package was chosen to provide the most protection with the least investment. I was glad to rediscovered Mother Goddess while I was looking through trash neutral cards to see what my ICE option were. It's a great solution to all the reg-ass ICE breakers when you're running so little ICE. It also has good synergy with Special Offer since Offer never imparts a negative type. Being unique obviously limits how much you can defend, but locking down one server is often all you need. Wraparound compliments MG well since MG is weak to AIs and parasites while Wrap is usually fairly taxing to those solutions. Besides, you need more than 3 ETR ICE to stop early siphon aggression. Obviously, you need to be careful about imparting a negative Barrier type to MG. Special Offers are there to be one credit hedge funds that look like they might be able to stop an Account Siphon on turn 1. It's also a kind of soft counter to Siphon in it's own right in that it blunts the money loss.

The disruption: 3x Targeted Marketing is in there because 2 of the harder cards for you to deal with are both currents: Rumor Mill and Employee Strike. One disrupts your combo and the other makes you vulnerable to R&D attacks and needs to be gone as quick as possible. Between scoring 2/1s and running 3 TMs you normally have enough to win the current war. TM could be Scarcity of resources instead, but I chose TM primarily because it costs 0. Hatchet Job is basically part of the combo since it's how you get around some of the of the big problem cards like NACH or Plascrete +2 IHW. You can also use it from hand in combination with Salem's Hospitality to get rid of some threat that's stopping you (like Councilman or NACH). Salem's is also good for naming IHW before you go off or Employee Strike before you think they are gearing up for a big turn.

Beyond the Lily cut that I mentioned above, after seeing some of the other lists that did well this weekend, I think I would cut one of the 24/7s for a Midseasons replacement since it gives you an out against decks that can stop you from scoring your Breaking News with Clot or something similar. You aren't the best at making a boat load of money, but you're not bad either, especially if you can force them to play into your Targeted Marketing.