Backseat Andy (MTGDeals Summer Tourney, San Gabriel)

This deck took 1st place at MTGDeals in San Gabriel, California on 9/13/2014 within a field of 26 players. It is my take on the President/CEO 2.0 by Nordrunner, with slight modifications from personal playtesting experience as well as his input.

• Why ‘Backseat’?

Andy can drive the corp where she wants by forcing them to rez their ice with no rig out (or one faerie) from fear of Siphon. Backseat Andy can pressure with Forged Activation Orders, gaining money if they rez their ICE from Compromised Employee, and then Parasite it to get rid of it, all while sitting around with her comfy grip not even running. Playing this Andy deck feels like that annoying guy in the backseat irritatingly micromanaging the corp’s every move.

• Why is it good?

The deck has a strong economy from sheer number of money cards (drip + burst). It also is very good at forcing the corp stifled by pressuring both R&D and HQ. You basically push the corp around facechecking ice keeping them broke rezzing it whilst you gain from 1 or 2 compromised employees out (typically). You can FAO their unrezzed ice in front of HQ setting up for a huge credit swing of Siphon. At first the pressure is the corp just defending itself, then the pressure becomes stopping me from Legworking or accessing 2+ cards from R&D. Keeping the Corp reacting to you, and not vice versa, can be hard to do these days and this deck manages that very consistently.

• Why this Andy vs. Fixed breakers/Datasuckers Andy?

I’m not sold that this is the optimal Andy, but in my playtesting it has less variance than the John Masanori, Datasucker, Security Testing, fixed breaker Andromedas. This does well against bigger ice decks because of the drip economy and Emergency Shutdown on big ice. This is especially true with Jinteki: RP, typically rough for Andromeda, because we cut the click needed to get credits from Kati Jones and then run remotes. Parasite kills problem ice or taxing ice that is low str after they have rezzed it (i.e. Tsurugi) which is a great play when the advantage is ours. Parasite can often get them to ditch an extremely taxing ice (Toll, Archer, big HB stuff), or force them to lose a turn to purge (4 credits or more to 0 credits for the corp that turn), or lower that Archer one strength to break for 7 with Ninja.

Cards

• Ninja..? Ninja is your backup in case you run into sentries late game. 3 Faeries are common enough to count as econ cards that let you run relatively safely. Used a lot when the extra 5 credits for Femme will kill your tempo.

• 1x Satellite Uplink? There are times where, late game against a Jinteki: PE who runs Cerebreal Ovewriter/ Ronin/ Mushin No Shin, knowing what two cards are will just win you the game. That deck is good and legitimate in my opinion, and I want to win against it.

• 1x Crash Space..? I think a talented runner can win against Scorcher decks usually with 0 meat damage prevention unless they get exceptional card order; yet it can happen, so I include one. Scorch is not popular right now, and more often I’m just using the two recurring credits to clear tags from one of my Siphons.

Piloting a runner these days is more difficult than it has ever been. I could write more if people are interested in card choices for this deck or piloting tips, and I’m sure Nordrunner has his own in-depth thoughts on these cards. Mulling for 1/5 of your deck that has a ton of good econ/control cards still makes Andromeda my choice over Prepaid Kate.