18-0??!?

Yes, 18 wins zero losses is my current tournament record on the list over the last 6 events I've played in 😳

A bit of background:

I've been playing around with Midnight-3 Arcology PD lists since just after worlds last year. I originally thought the idea was just a meme, a very fun meme, but I wasn't really taking it seriously. I found the original QTM Midnight PD interesting, but after losing to NetDad's Too Big to Fail PD during swiss at worlds I was curious enough to start playing with my own versions. As I continued to refine the list it became less and less of a meme. After losing my Holo Ops list to the Bellona ban I needed to find another corp. I played a weaker version of this in ACC with more FA and no Offworlds. The list showed a lot of promise, but didn't become the power house it is now until I hit on this version. Though this deck is clearly incredibly strong I think it's managed to fly under the radar as I so far haven't been able to pair it with an equally strong list runner side.

Meta Thoughts:

Why is this deck good? It's faster then most runners, but also incredibly flexible. You can rush faster then a typical Void PD deck, but you can also slow down and lock up your centrals vs WT Ari or Esâ. Big Deal and NEXT Activation Command give this deck powerful tools to close out games vs mid to late game runners who could crack your remote.

Honestly I have been wanting to play around with @Santa's Thule deck. It's super strong and very cool if you haven't seen it do check it out, but I just can't justify putting this down while it's still undefeated 😅

Strategy:

From my experience this list is harder to play then Holo Ops if similarly powerful. First and foremost in order to win you need to understand how you are going to lose the game. This is important because in a lot of the current meta matchups you have to play more defense then your typical rush list.

Step one - Rashida Jaheem: In almost every matchup you want to open Rashida behind an ice. This gives you credits and card draw you need to continue rushing out, or stabilizing in a matchup you have to play defense. One of the best ways to shut this list down is to try and cripple it economically in the first few turns. The list can be considerably resilient though and if you're behind you can often play cautiously for a few turns and stabilize pretty well.

Step two - Midnight-3 Arcology: In general this is the best agenda to score. Recurring YDL after scoring a Midnight is this deck's bread and butter. Versus WT Ari OffOff can sometimes be the better score since you can't let your credit total and defenses dip down even if you'll be bouncing back with Your Digital Life the next turn.

Step three - RLC and Greasing: Use these cards to get full value out of your 10+ card hand. This means you can often snowball scores while still protecting centrals. In general you want to either use RLC's turn one for draw and acceleration or save them for a turn where you need the addition click for a critical install.

Step four - Big Deal: I would say at least 10-12 of the 18 wins have been with a BD close. BD gives you such a strong finish and although FAing Ikawah for your 3rd score is amazing, you can also YDL> install > BD a 4/2 as an easy 4th score from as little at 9 or so credits.

Slots and Advice

Gatekeeper:

Amazing Ice, I'd play 13 gatekeepers and nothing else if I could. The 6 strength and draw is amazing on facecheck. I have shuffled back agendas maybe 2x in all the games I have played. Even if you are flooded I'd recommend keeping the agendas you need them for winning and if the runner steals one or two it's fine.

Spin Doctor:

95% of the time I think Spins should be rezed on the opponents turn. This is particularly true for YDL lists, but for rush in general it always surprises me when I see people rez spin on their own turn. If you primarily install and rez Spin immediately try leaving it un-rezed, you might find you like it better. (note: glacier, assets, ob and some other corps use spin in a much different manner and this advice doesn't apply to all decks).

For this deck in particular you almost never pop the spin doctors. You usually want to let your opponent trash them or just over install them. The spin doctor is often more powerful in archives with Ablative Barrier and Drafter than recurring a couple of cards. That being said there are plenty of situations were you would want to pop spin, but usually only to shuffle back your second copies of cards from archives. ⬇️

Precision Design ID ability:

In this deck you are only pulling Seamless Launch back about ~40% of the time with the ID. You want to pull Your Digital Life after most Midnight-3 Arcology scores and you want to pull Rashida Jaheem, Big Deal, NEXT Activation Command and Sudden Commandment back situationally depending on how you plan to close out the game.

Sudden Commandment:

This is a very powerful card and part of what pushed this deck from tier 1.5 to one of the best decks I have every played. 80% of the time this card is just the 4th RLC which is fantastic as RLC is one of the best cards in the list for sure. But, Sudden Commandment has a much higher celling than RLC letting you YDL before big dealing out an Ikawah Project or FAing Luminal to close after a mid game Ikawah or three 4/2s.

Tatu-Bola:

Another amazing card in the current meta. This is primarily there for Tsakhia "Bankhar" Gantulga, but also feels incredibly good vs early and mid game Arissana Rocha Nahu: Street Artist.

Magnet:

This doubles as an annoyance for Ari and Esa and can actually end up as your scoring ice when combined with NAC vs Turbine-less Buzzsaw rigs (looking at you Begemot).

Ablative Barrier:

Good

No Hedge Fund:

The card is a crutch I quit cold turkey 6 months ago and it's felt great. It's like cutting out all the junk food and snorting a kilo of kale every morning. . . liberating.

Replays

I always find replays are one of the best way to learn a deck. I didn't get around to adding them originally, but here are a few games you can check out.

I ended up play @Xiaat's World Tree Ari twice over APAC and ICC. These were some of the closest games I had, but I think this PD is one for the few decks actually favored into WT Ari right now. @Xiaat you have gotten so good! ❤️ Both games were a total pleasure to play.

Game 9 in APAC
Game 1 in ICC

This is a pretty great game vs @ThatsNoMun's reg sable. I think ThatsNoMun played extremely well, but this deck can play really solid centrals defense and then FA to win. Not something that run based sable likes. I think this list does much better into crim then typical skunk void PD. This game is a great example of RLC's power and utility.

APAC Cut game 3

Reg Hoshiko with Maw. The ID ability is so nice here. I decided to just rush out in this game and didn't stabilize centrals until fairly late in the game. Maw can't hurt you that bad if you keep drawing a lot of cards. Just make sure you can still score your agendas if the Seamless/s get maw-ed.

APAC Game 6

Shout outs and Thanks!

I have to mention fellow Muntal Bost member @ThatsNoMun who took this list to APAC fairly last minute and ended up making the cut and placing 12th. It was a true shame knocking you out of the cut friend 💔

If you have any questions or thoughts about the deck list, ideas for a solid runner I can play, or anything else feel free to throw them in the comments 🙂 I try to make sure I read and reply to everyone!! ❤️

I'm going to be running another Summer Showdown in two weeks with US and APAC friendly timing. There are some bonuses for signing up before 7/20 and/or playing in your first-time online tournament!! I'm hoping people can use this event to help prep for Cascadia (West coast Nats) and just have a blast. I've been wanting to run an event to help support the APAC Netrunner scene for a while now and it's finally happening. Please join in and help make it a huge success. You can even play for free if the ticket cost would hold you back at all ❤️

@Santa, @CTZ and I will be running a stream for some wild, wacky and hopefully hilarious off meta netrunner content this coming Monday evening (Pacific time). Check it out here ➡️ https://www.twitch.tv/sansanfrancisco

I want to say a huge thank you to NSG, Kror, the team running EMEA and all the wonderful players and commentators who came together to make this whole continentals season such a wonderful success! It was a total blast and I look forward to even more next year 👀 🥳

Lastly I want to thank my team Muntal Bost for being incredibly supportive, fantastic friends and powerful netrunner players! Keep up the amazing work, I love you all!!

As always feeling so blessed to be part of such a great community ❤️

~ Abraham (ManintheMoon)

PS: Love you back @Jan Tuno