The Digital Ascetic

Free your mind. When you let go you can embrace the digital world.

Do you want to get paid to install things?

AND trash things?

Do you wanna draw cards when you trash or install things?

Do you want to be a cyber monk like Morpheus?

Well then I have a deck for you! Exile: The Digital Ascetic

OVERVIEW

The core game plan here is that you can use pawnshop and Reaver to pawn a Cache or conspiracy breaker every turn, gaining three credits and a card. Follow that with any run that requires the install of a breaker and you draw a card by installing from the heap Exile: Streethawk synergy. This mechanic gets better with Sahasrara, Technical Writer and Scheherazade which means you get paid to install breakers and draw cards.

Two free draws a turn more or less eliminates the need to click to draw in shaper. Giving you more clicks to advance board state and threaten remotes.

In short, by embracing the Aesop's Pawnshop and learning to plan 1-2 turns ahead, you can create a flowing board state that rarely loses tempo.

EVENTS

3x Indexing is my new go to for Shaper RD access. The game is so fast now that I find myself rarely able to take the tempo hit for R&D Interface. Also, Indexing is your out as Shaper against asset spam. I have found that teching for asset spam in green means that you take critical influence away from winning and put it towards not losing. Winning is better than not losing as a general rule.

Turns out this deck has a lot of disposable money like Daily Casts Technical Writer and Cache. A single Levy AR Lab Access is good for cycling that money for long games and doubles your hit points against net damage decks. Also, you will often end up pitching cards when you overdraw so you can recycle what you didn't use on the first pass.

Mad Dash is my new favorite run event. It is a breath of fresh air into Adam: Compulsive Hacker and all Shapers. This card enables you to close the game much faster and turns your tutoring into a rush threat, as it should be. If I can get a single indexing to land with 1-2 mad dash I can launch myself forward by 3-6 points in a single turn. That is how you make your Shaper bullshit count.

Money is good even for digital monks Sure Gamble

HARDWARE

Akamatsu Mem Chip provides the MU for each of the three Sahasrara we play while keeping the average price point of cards in this deck low.

Astrolabe helps us study the heavens and draws even more cards.

LLDS Processor is one of the central pillars of this deck. Paperclip is good on its own but MKUltra and Black Orchestra are not. The math on several often used ICE like FC3 and DNA tracker as well as many sentries is nightmarish. These breakers get significantly better when you can install them at higher strengths. This is a key combo of this deck and one of the piloting requirements. Knowing which breaker to pawn and bring back in a given turn to save you the most money is critical.

If you don't need to run pick one breaker this turn and one next turn. Any time you can get the LLDS bonus on a breaker it will end up saving you at least 3c but usually much more.

LLDS also turns Chameleon into a monster when the ice is revealed. Is the math still bad on that code gate with Black Orchestra? use a str 6 Chameleon instead. Evaluate the board and count the costs, if Chameleon is cheaper get it down for profit and then run.

ICEBREAKERS

Atman 4 does a lot of work. It helps with Mother Goddess crap, and if you see a common strength for single sub ICE it can save some money.

Black Orchestra is pretty rough but it gets a lot better when you install it for profit and it can start for even one strength higher.

Chameleon Is your one-two punch of easy Scheherazade and Technical Writer credits and brutal breaking efficiency.

MKUltra is slightly better as a base breaker than Black Orchestrabut still benefits a lot from LLDS Processor.

Paperclip is the only breaker here that is incredible on its own but that is the price we pay for all this magic.

UTILITY PROGRAMS

Cache is still great even without Clone Chip. A minimum gain of 2c but if you have Sahasrara, Scheherazade, Technical Writer and Aesop's Pawnshop it becomes a total of of 8c and a card draw. VALUE TOWN! any combo of the above cards makes Cache a value for us.

Reaver is the core of how this deck sets up and how we maintain tempo/synergy. You want to mulligan for it or a Self-modifying Code in your opening hand. The first time each turn we trash a card, corp or runner, we draw a card. This means whenever you pawn you get 3c and a draw, 4 clicks of value for no clicks. There are neat tricks where you can trigger this at weird times and with powerful effects, but I won't spoil them. Part of the joy of this build is discovering all the planning and choices it offers.

Sahasrara Is the key to cyber enlightenment. It is the flux capacity of this deck. It makes reinstalling things every turn a profit proposition and not a tempo destroying nightmare. In the mid to late game you should have 4-6 recurring credits to reinstall Chameleon and whichever conspiracy breaker you fed to Aesop's Pawnshop in order to apply the LLDS Processor bonus.

Scheherazade is for a little 1c icing on our install/draw cake. Be wary, but you should be able to put Cache and conspiracy breakers on here without fear, you don't care if your breakers end up in the heap. If you are not against best defense / power shutdown and you know how to pilot around trashing effects than everything except Reaver and one Sahasrara can go on here.

Self-modifying Code That's the name of the show!

RESOURCES

Aesop's Pawnshop is a critical combo piece. It triggers Reaver and draws us cards while setting us up to reinstall breakers triggering Exile: Streethawk. It also is our LLDS Processor enabler and our primary source of clickless economy.

Beth Kilrain-Chang is just solid and often you are hoping for the free draw early and the free click late.

Daily Casts are clickless econ and enable us to make money while focusing on installing and running. It is worth noting that when they run out they trigger Reaver. That is my only weird Reaver interaction spoiler.

Same Old Thing is for Levy AR Lab Access. It can, however, also be used to recur Indexing and Mad Dash.

Technical Writer gives you large infusions of cash as it gains a credit every time you install hardware or programs, something we do a lot of at the monastery. It also triggers Reaver and is just a great way to build dread. It reminds the corp that their remotes are not safe and causes them to shuffle agendas into RD for Indexing. Its would be good in this deck just with 8 hardware and 17 programs. It gets to shine brighter because you end up reinstalling programs like Chameleon and the orange breakers for additional triggers.

NOTABLE OMISSIONS

Clone Chip is not included because our breakers can clone themselves from the trash and they aren't worth the influence just for an additional Exile: Streethawk trigger.

Clot is not in here because we do not have the Clone Chip or the slots to support it. Pressure is our anti FA tool, as is Indexing.

Anti asset spam tech. Indexing and Mad Dash is much more effective in my Ele "Smoke" Scovak: Cynosure of the Net and general Shaper experience at saving you from asset spam than adding cards to turn you into a bad version of [Whizzard: Master Gamer].(/en/card/02001)

I don't have a counter current because I currently don't need one. If that is not the case in your meta, cut an indexing for a "Freedom Through Equality".

CONCLUSION

Give this a go and embrace the tranquility of detachment from your rig.

If you fire this up, thinking it will be like other Shaper decks you will lose. This deck sacrifices the 'OH SHIT' insurance of Shaper for a tempo that is almost impossible to derail. If you play this slow and careful you will be rewarded. Patience, forethought and training. That is the path to digital enlightenment.

Enjoy, -CodeMarvelous