Honeybadger Deathtrap V2

Hello internet!!

So I've been playing PE since I started with this game. It has always been close to my heart, but has suffered in the past. But when rotation, core 2.0 and the banned/restricted list hit, Wotan has once again smiled upon this deck. Its a shell style kill deck with a lot of mean stuff. It aims for a 1 turn kill so no need to score anything before you go in for the big turn (except maybe Labyrinthine Servers). This can be achieved in a variety of ways as you have probably been on the receiving end of before ;)

So why is this deck strong again? Jackson Howard is gone. May he rest in peace. This has become sort of a problem for corp as you once again have to worry about flooding. This deck does not have this problem. Mirāju is awesome for filtering your hand and you can easy hide agendas naked on the board as well. I would rather that Labyrinthine was Obokata, but you want Bio-Ethics as your restricted card. Well, you can't have everything you want in this world. Labyrinthine actually have a fun upside if you do score it. Mind Game fires and this can win you games. Don't rely on it though.

Siphon is gone! PE has always had trouble against siphons. You usually don't run rich, so not having to worry about that means that you don't necessarily needs ICE turn 1 which was the requirement before. Also no more need for Crisium Grid and that frees a bit of influence. Which leads to the next part:

Mother!! F******!! 3!! Overwriters!! This card wins games. And since you have more influence available you get to bring 3. 3 Archived Memories. It is almost used exclusively to bring back Mushins. But that means you can play more Mushins and who does not love that?

Ronin was saved and that is essential for this deck. And with Show of Force you actually have 6 in your deck!

The ICE suite is just mean. Cortex Lock is awesome early game, Mirāju is awesome all the time and puts in enormous work against shapers on RND as a lot use indexing at the moment. Mind Game Is just bad ass. It does not really matter where you point them because they will jack out. So you get to do some double bluffs by just point at the server. Is that really the Overwriter or are you trying to divert focus from a Show? Good times to be had.

Annnnnnd we have to talk about Mushin. I know a lot of players dislike this card as it can lead to some cheesy victories. And it can be really frustrating to sit across a guy who just makes a ton of remotes and you know you die if you make a wrong move. Even I dislikes playing against PE. But it is a good card and a cornerstone in this deck.

BTW... Mass Commercialization is good! It consistently gives you 8 credits. And that is almost all the money this deck needs.

So why does this deck not win worlds? Well, it has the same problem as PE always have had. It relies on the runner. It is not consistent no matter how consistent you are in your skills as a pilot because you are more playing the person on the opposite side of the table then you are playing your deck. Which is also why I love PE. And why playing this deck in person is so much more fun then on the internet.

The only real counter to this deck is feedback filter in my opinion. And yes, that has had a bit of a resurgence, but it is expensive. So you can usually tax them out in the mid game if they hit a snare for example. And if they just sit back and click Mopus to counter? Well, you just score out. It is not standard, but can happen easily. Getting 1 agenda score usually mean that you are on "game point" as you usually have 2 more on the board that can be scored in 1 round. That leads to them running and, probably, dying.

To me, this deck is an essential part of Netrunner and one of the reasons I feel in love with the game. It is high variance, highly bluffing based and relies a lot on yomi. You are playing a person and not a deck. And the best thing about Netrunner is the people, so nothing to complain about here.