Copenhagen Nexus Kate (4-0 in Copenhagen post MWL Winter tnm

Having been away from Netrunner since regionals in may I was having a bit of trouble deciding what to bring to the Copenhagen Winter Tournament, where it had been decided by the danish netrunner facebook group to implement the Most Wanted List early (everybody seemed to agree with this, including myself).

For the corp side, I just adjusted NEH astrobiotics, because it was what I played in may. Infact, that didn't go too well, as it fared 2-2 and definitely cost me a top 2 spot, as I ended up third (18 man field, but only 4 rounds of swiss played due to time constraints).

Anyway, Kate has always been the ID I have been most comfortable with so I looked at a few of the Nexus Kate builds on this site and decided to tweak them a bit to my own liking. Playtesting was almost non-existent. I managed to get a few Jinteki.net games in on the day of the tournament, but my opponents where mostly playing janky stuff, so it told me next to nothing about how it would hold up in an expected more serious tournament setting. I did however, get a feel for the deck, which was pretty crucial.

I want to deliberate over some of the deck choices and also want to make it clear that this deck is NOT optimal at all. I will give my thoughts on that, but first a quick rundown of the tournament. Being the first post MWL tournament people were bringing all sorts of stuff. Infact, I faced 4 different corp ID's and 4 different runner ID's. Very diverse.

The thing with this deck is, that once it sets up, it gets very rich and you can't keep Nexus Kate out.

First game was against a GRNDL deck. I expected him to try to kill me, so I installed a Plascrete. As it turned out, plascrete was useless on the day, as nobody was trying to scorch me, not this GRNDL deck, not anybody else. He was instead playing a program destruction deck with Batty and some nasty ICE. Unfortunately for him, Security NExus laughs in the fact of program destruction ICE and the one time he got to fire off a Batty, I won the psi-game - the rest I trashed off of R&D. The match-up was heavily tilted in my favour and I won pretty handidly.

Second game was against a semi-janky Chronos Protocol deck. Having him trash targeted cards off of my hand was annoying, but Professional Contacts is stupidly good in these match-ups and again, I won without too much trouble once I was set up.

Third game I played NEH astrobiotics, probably my most feared match-up as Nexus Kate takes a while to build up and I was NOT rockin' Clot. I decided to forego my usual gameplan and instead went for a turn 1 mooded-R&D interface and started digging. I snatched a few early agendas which turned out to be crucial. However, the match-up isn't great. My opponent had to fastadvance Beales instead of the Astros that he didn't draw, and still the game went down to one key turn. Clot is probably needed for this matchup and Security Nexus is overkill against a deck that doesn't really play much scary ICE, even though he was playing a Grim.

Fourth game I played a HB ETF deck focusing on NEXT ICE. Man, could I have used a parasite in that match-up. Runs were getting stupidly taxing towards the end, but fortunately I was also stupidly rich. Very close looong match that almost went to time, but in the end I won off an R&D run.

OK, now for some deck choices and the default game plan.

Default game plan: Mulligan for Professional Contacts. Click PC insessantly to setup. Instead 3xRabbit Hole and then Security Nexus. That alone will take you places, even with no breakers in play. Add an SMC and you are doing fine. Forget early game pressure - from the midgame on, they can't keep you out, nor keep up financially.

The most controversial is probably having Magnum Opus and Professional Contacts in the same deck. Seems counterintuitive, but what I will say is that with this deck you give up early pressure to instead get insanely rich towards the midgame. If the corp isn't playing Astrobiotics and wins before you get set up, he is gonna have great trouble keeping you out of anything. If the corp is trying to murder you, plascrete and being very rich will save you from Scorch and Professional Contacts is awesome against Jinteki net damage decks. In most games, I will mulligan for Professional Contacts, and very often I won't even install MO. If you are suspecting Scorch, do install MO and get rich early.

Lack of draw: I rely almost exclusively on Professional Contacts for draw - which isn't really draw at all, but economy. I pretty much only installed Earthrise when I did not open with Contacts or when I am digging hard for stuff I want. Yes, you could go for Diesel/Quality Time/Earthrise and maybe have Baby instead of PC, and that might very well be better - I just personally love PC. It's my kind of card.

Influence: - Went down to two clone chips, which was fine. This deck doesn't have Parasite or Clot or silver bullet programs, so two is plenty. I'm still doing two Lady, although in the HB matchup, I really wish I had a Corroder instead.

• The GS Shrike M2 is probably a stupid idea. Mimic would be better and less influence. It costs 4 to break architect with Shrike, which is stupid. Shrike is great against huge taxing sentries like Archer or Janus or Orion, but that's what you have Security Nexus for. DEFINITELY put in Mimic instead!!

• Career Fair is just a cool econ card, I wish I could play more of them.

• 2 Security Nexus is OK. A third would be awesome, but you don't absolutely need it early on and probably can't afford it either (neither financially nor influence-wise). So two is correct. In one game I did dig forever for it and almost lost the game because of it.

• 3 R&D Interface. This is a must, I feel. Sets up inevitability.

• 1 Legwork. I had 2 influence to use for something good. I mostly considered Legwork and Clot. It's a metacall really. If astrobiotics is prevalent, you NEED clot in this deck. Legwork is awesome, but in the end, it didn't do much work for me. Also consider that a one off event might not show up at all, while Clot is toturable. In the end, I believe Clot would be the correct choice. You could also didn't Shrike for Mimic and play one Parasite, which would have been game-winning against the NEXT ICE deck I faced.

• No Film Critic. I don't think the deck needs it. You can avoid Midseasons problems by being rich and having two plascretes. You can afford NAPD. It's not a big deal, I think, and if you rock a single Film Critic, you might never find it in the match-ups where you really need it. I'm pretty happy with leaving it out.

• I considered Power Tap. It's a fun card and how frustrating it must be for the corp. But really, I think it is a "win more" card. This deck is RICH. It doesn't really need more money. Power Tap only works once you are fully set up and at that point, you are probably winning anyway. A card like Career Fair is just better for the deck, I think, as it helps you in the setup fase.

In short, this would probably be better: + 1 clot + 1 mimic + 1 Career Fair - 1 Legwork - 1 GS Shrike M2 - 1 Earthrise Hotel or Plascrete Carapace

And of course, some would probably like to go: + 3 Symmetrical Visage - 3 Professional Contacts

...but not me! :-)

EDIT: The Akamatsu Memchip is a brainfart on my part due to not playing netrunner for a LOOONG time. At the last minute of deck building, I forgot that Zu and Shrike don't actually cost me any MU, so the memchip is useless.

So definitely ditch the memchip and get something good instead be it Diesel, Film Critic or whatever.