Stirling and Friends (Preston DnD Store Champ 1st)

So apparently, when you win a Store Championship with not just the worst faction (according to the player group consensus) but with an identity considered to be on the weaker end, people suddenly want to know how it happened. And I guess, as the guy who actually played the deck, I'd be best placed to know how.

Well, you'd be wrong. But I'll do my best anyway.

I should probably explain a bit about how I like to play. I've been playing since mid-way through the first cycle, and at no point have I considered myself a top player. I prefer playing decks that do something different and/or funny than play the top tier 1 deck (previous decks I have played include various versions of The Professor, Power Shutdown combo out of both Cerebral Imaging and Haarpsichord, and a hilarious London Library/install most of my deck Kaplan). However, my go to runner since he was printed was Stirling.

And that's probably the first reason why I managed to do so well. I've been playing the same runner almost consistently for about 2 years. I've come to know where his strengths are, and where the weaknesses are (glances at the influence number, shakes fist in anger). This isn't a deck which can be just picked up and played and you expect to do well. Heck, it took me two years to get somewhere with it.

Anyway, onto the deck itself, the plan, in essence, is simple. Install lots of cards, make lots of money, make well timed runs. Obviously the execution is little more complicated (and sometimes stressful).

Basically, in your opening hand, you really want to see either Off-Campus or The Supplier (preferably both) with the added bonus of seeing Logos early. With Off-Campus installed, you just install any connection you play and get a draw for free. Normally, if it costs 0, you just put it straight onto the Off-Campus, if it costs more, shove it on The Supplier and play for 2 cheaper at the start of your turn.

Important connections you're trying to find after The Supplier are The Source, Film Critic and Fall Guys. As I found out over the weekend, The Source was far for important and valuable than I had initially given it credit for. And form of Fast Advance deck has to blow 2 pieces of fast advance in order to push through The Source, and so long as you have a Fall Guy ready, The Source won't even go away. Film Critic means that you can 'steal' agendas without triggering the trash conditions on The Source or New Angeles City Hall.

After that, there is your economy. In this case, it's 3 Underworld Contacts (getting the 2nd link from The Helpful AI), a Tri-Maf, Kati Jones and in some cases Data Dealer (not including the already mentioned Supplied). Data Dealer's main purpose to get rid of those annoying things that turn up in your score area that just aren't helpful. Shi-kyu or News Team bringing your score down? Sell 'em. Stole a Medical Breakthrough and you're worried you can't stop the Corp getting the others, sell it. Enjoying your 15 Minutes? Remember to earn some money from it. In other dire circumstances, sometimes selling an agenda to get into a remote to steal the Corp's winning agenda has to be done as well.

The other important econ card is Calling in Favors. Obviously, you want to fire this for as much as possible (I, personally, always feel disappointed if I have to use it for anything less than 10 credits, which is usually always the first one played). This card will catch people out, they will underestimate just how much money you can suddenly make and will think they have a scoring window when they actually don't.

And now to the worst part of the deck, the ice breakers. Sadly, we have to use such 5-star breakers like Aurora and Peacock, and super expensive cards like Garrote and Femme. Luckily, a combination of being stupidly rich, and an e3 Feedback Implants can get you through most things. The Overminds are there to help be aggressive early if you need to be. Oh, and as a personal favor, could people stop running Faust, so people would stop running barriers that a good against it? So many people rezzing Spiderweb was distressing. 8 credits! 8! Gods, I didn't think I could dislike Aurora more.

And to bring the deck discussion to a close, some of the cards that weren't discussed. Vamp and Siphon fall in the similar category to keep the Corp's credit pool in check. Vamp also has the added benefit of dealing with Caprice and Batty. Resetting both player's credit pools to 0 is usually better for you, as you can recover far quicker (5 credits at the start of turn, tri-maf, Kati). The Same Old Thing just allows you to reuse either Account Siphon or Vamp (although Calling in Favors is also pretty funny). The HQ Interfaces are pretty self-explanatory (the lack of any real RnD pressure beyond checking the top is disappointing, but was a sacrifice I had to make). The Feedback Filter is there to try and turn my money into not dying (sadly on the day, it did not turn up in time).

Finally, I provide a run down of each game on the day. I didn't make notes, so most of this is me going of memory. Sorry for any mistakes.

Swiss Round 1 vs Weyland: Titan (Harry Esslemont)

So, first game for Stirling of the day, and it's against Weyland. On the one hand, I'm fairly confident against Weyland decks. I can avoid tags fairly well, so I don't have to worry about hellfire raining from above, and I usually have enough to crack through the glacier. However, they do have a couple of annoying cards that can turn up. The more common one did, as my opponent happily over-advanced his Oaktown Renovation to an absurd amount (I think it was close to 20, but I may be exaggerating). There was very little I could do about it, so accepted it and worked on putting out as much stuff as a could to get ready. This was hindered by the lack of Off-Campus. I had The Supplier down pumping out stuff when I found it, and the Logos was ready for when he scored Oaktown. When he finally did score it, I had already drawn into it, so used the search to find a breaker. He got out an Atlas before I was in a position to anything but after that I took control. The Source stopped him from doing anything crazy with fast scoring agendas. His money drained away very quickly after rezzing 2 assassins (and a combo of Siphon and Vamp). After that, it came down to just running and finding the agendas. Which, eventually, I did.

Result: Win (1-1 Corp had lost against his Whizzard)

Round 2 vs Jinteki: Biotech (James Cunningham)

And into the second game, and it was against Jinteki. Jinteki, despite the Feedback Filter, is easily my worst match up, especially if they are trying to kill me. And I demonstrated this by earning my only loss of the day with this deck. While I took my time setting up again (and looking for Feedback Filter that never came), he began the Jinteki equivalent of 'Beale-or-No-Beale' with Mushin-no-shin. I let a Fetal AI through, and shortly after he scored a Philotic (he just left it on the board and then scored it the following turn). Then, played another Mushin and advanced the card. At this point, I was still half-way to setting up, had no Logos (so didn't find any cards), no Feedback, and couldn't get his credit pool to 0. So I ran it, and promptly face-planted into the Junebug.

Result: Loss (2-2 Corp won against Noise)

Round 3 vs Weyland: Blue Sun(Mark Surtees)

So, 2 spilts, and with the new and 'improved' rounds and Cut system, I was worried about getting into the Top 4. I knew any chance I had involved on only winning from now on. Which brings me to my next opponent. And we were back with Weyland, although of the Blue Sun variety this time. This game went fairly similar to my previous game with Harry (although with less super advanced Oaktowns). He got ahead (using Public Support was cool, and annoying, way to do so), but eventually I gained control of the game, so that when he started trying to use Oversights to gain money and to just went and killed the ice, making all my future runs a heck of a lot cheaper. Eventually, I took enough points to win the game.

Result: Win (4-2 Corp beating his Kit)

Round 4 vs NBN: Near Earth Hub (Tom Mason)

And then it was the final round, and fate conspired to pair me against a fellow player from Manchester. Not only did this ruin our chances of both of us getting into the Top 4, he had played against my Stirling deck often enough that he knew what not to do. Luckily, I had also learned from our previous game, and made sure I hostage'd for an early Source to slow him down, and then keep it around with Fall Guys. He did manage to push some agendas through (and they were AstroScripts, for an extra scare factor) but eventually keeping control of his money, keeping The Source in play, and running RnD and his hand relentlessly managed to secure me the win (at one point, I took his winning agenda out of his hand, which was lucky).

Result: Win (6-2 Corp beating his Kim deck)

And on the back of those 2 double wins, I managed to get myself into 3rd place, and a shot at the title. After taking a short break to hand out prizes (and grab a refreshment or two), we proceeded into the double elimination.

Top 4 Game 1 vs NBN: Sync (Alice Rees) First game of elimination, and as the higher seed (placing 2nd in the Swiss), Alice got to choose which side she wanted to play, while also knowing what identities I was playing. After a few moments of consideration, she chose to Corp. Just because it was a different shade of yellow didn't mean I should forget about the Astro-train, so like in the previous game, I ensured I found The Source nice and early, and enough Fall Guys to keep him safe. She did manage to push 2 Astro's through (worryingly) but I was steadily gaining control. At one point, I managed to 'find' all 3 News Teams, which were promptly sold of to a local Data Dealer that I knew. Eventually, we were both on 6 points (Alice having scored a Beale, but using the Astro counter to do so), but Alice was quickly running out of deck, and Jacksons. A run on archives prompted the use of Mr Howard in order to put an agenda back into RnD and leave none in Archives. So I went sniffing around in RnD, which got me the winning agenda.

And that was the end for Stirling. The next two games I played, I had to use my Corp deck, and because I won both, I didn't need to call upon his services again. The deck definitely performed better than I had hoped, but I think one of it's main advantages was that no-one was expecting it, and were even less sure how to deal with it. Folks had their anti-clot tech to fast advance their agendas but couldn't deal with a heavily defended The Source.

Cards that pulled their weight: Top of this list has to be The Source (and by proxy his two best friends, Fall Guy and Film Critic) Vamp was also surprisingly good. It was a very recent change due to it eating up my influence for a Corroder, but aside from whenever I stared at a Spiderweb in distress, I was happy with the swap. Off-Campus and The Supplier obviously did as they intended.

Changes for the future: With the Mumbad cycle here (although, not for this tournament), there are various cards that have caught my eye. In the first pack, Mongoose is the main card here, and will probably replace Garrote and one of the Overminds. Further on in the cycle, we have Political Operative and Councilman (finally, I can deal with Caprice and Batty in a far more reliable manner), and Guru Davinder who will replace the Feedback Filter as my 'I-don't-want-to-die' tech. The other obvious big card is Rebirth. There is obviously a massive incentive to play this deck with Rebirth in Andy, and just swap to Stirling later in the game. 4 more influence and 9 card starting hands are very nice.

Anyway, I'll stop here as it's basically become a giant English essay. If you have any other questions ask away.