Deuces Wild Is a Criminal Card

Or at least it fits criminals better than anyone else. To get into why you fist need to realise that it's actually a poor econ card as it requires other things before you can get any tangible econ out of it (like a Tag or Prepaid VoicePAD). It's better compare to a draw card like Diesel since the first 2 options are the only ones you can guarantee full value out of.

When looked at this way it's a slightly worse Diesel that costs 1 influence and has the flexibility to be an econ card in the right situations, all in all not bad but as a Shaper / Anarch you have good draw free of influence so it's unlikely you'd want to spend influence on this. Criminals & the Mini runners however don't have any good draw so that's one reason why it's going to fit them better. Criminals also have cards in faction that can turn this into econ and criminals generally run tho's cards anyway.

Account Siphon allows you to get the most out of the "tag" option, Desperado & Security Testing can allow you to get the most out of the "expose and run" option.

This is all not to say that it wont fit any other faction you could run cards like John Masanori / Datasucker to get more value out of the "run" option or Vamp / Code Siphon to get value out of the "Tag" option but it already fits most criminal decks without changing anything which in my mind makes it a great criminal card.

IMO the most powerful console in the game the ability to bypass an ICE is Incredibly powerful see Femme Fatale this gives you that ability but on any ICE once per turn. with a link of 5 this will most likely be free to bypass on top of that but even with only 2-3 link it's more than likely to only cost you 3-2 credits.

It's not that it's not got it's down sides however you gonna need some good econ for this thing as it's got a high install cost and the corp is likely to pump the trace if your poor but if your sitting their with a pile of money they won't do a thing. Theirs also cards that works with the console Power Tap,Data Leak Reversal, Account Siphon & Jak Sinclair (tho that's more Jak needing the console).

Data Leak Reversal & Account Siphon are IMO the best of these as they work by putting the corp into a lose lose situation. For instance you Account Siphon and use Nexus to get in do they now spend all their money to keep you out or let you in where you then steal all their money either way they end up poor. Data Leak Reversal works in a similar fashion you run use nexus now they can pump the trace to keep you out but then they get milled and you remove the tag last click or they don't pump let you in and it cost you nothing.

or if your links low enough you get the tag and mill them anyway, this approach also works well with Jak Sinclair as now you can do the run click-less.

It works well for the 1 link shaper runners thanks to Rabbit Hole been a thing. But I feel it's most notable in Nasir Meidan: Cyber Explorer where you can use the console to bypass you own ability or trigger your ability first then use the free money for the trace.

I've been playing around with this guy alot now and I feel he is a powerhouse. The real trick seems to be learning to live with the directives they are after all his ID so cards like Independent Thinking & Dr. Lovegood don't make much sense to me am sure they can come in handy but they just don't feel right.

So how to live with the directives well Safety First is the best place to start been the easiest. It's free draw... down side your opened up to Scorched Earth, fortunately its solved with something as simple as Public Sympathy / Brain Chip. Personally id go all out and include Brain Cage as well to give you as big a chance as possible to not die on the first turn from Scorched Earth.

Next up Neutralize All Threats this ones harder it's your HQ Interface but you have to trash the first card you access, theirs a few ways to go here either have loads of money, no money or use something like Paricia / Imp. Theirs also a few tricks you can use to limit it's effect using cards like Dirty Laundry to lower you econ until after you've run. Running archive first is another way meaning it fires just like Edward Kim: Humanity's Hammer on something you can't trash. This however brings in other problems thanks to the last directive.

Which brings us to Always Be Running easily the most powerful & hardiest to live with. The power to break any ICE for 2 click is amazing but you have to run click 1 each turn the downside therefore is two fold. Doing this leaves you with only 1 click each turn and on top of that if you have anything important in your hand you can't play it before you run so could easily lose it. Since you only have one click econ such as Armitage Codebusting / Kati Jones is out the question you really are going to need things like Daily Casts & Data Folding.

All this means you won't need a breaker though for sometime or much econ & Safety First is drawing you cards, you also have multi access meaning that actually you start the game almost already set-up giving him a massive speed advantage. With all the extra MU & Hand size form Brain Chip the most obvious breakers seem to be Overmind & Faust as with only one click a turn your rigs set up with only one of them and the bigger hand size or MU helps both. His major problem really only seems to be tags as taking them off is difficult with lower clicks and your ID been able to be wiped out essential though them.

For a long time this card has been pretty poor mainly as it's a poor man's Desperado that if you cannot make a successful run is lost. However I've found use for it as of late with the D&D expansion playing online.

It actually has some positives over Desperado. Firstly it's not unique, Secondly it's cheaper both on Influence and cost and lastly it's virtual so Apex: Invasive Predator can use it and I would recommend it their. It also works well in Adam: Compulsive Hacker since he has Always Be Running. Sadly I can't see it seeing much use anywhere else however as it just doesn't fit other runners decks but expect it to start to see some play in those decks because it's actually fantastic in the right build.

After playing Faust something struck me firstly how surprisingly good using cards as econ actually is for ICE breaking and what it actually dose to your deck. You see in away Faust turns all the cards in your deck into econ cards for lets say about 1-2 credits depending on what your doing using it for but unlike Infiltration you don't need to play the card you just throw it, you also choose the cards so useless card go first and useful cards get played meaning theirs now no redundancy in your deck since they get thrown to get into servers. This all means your actual money is still free for things like trashing cards, paying trace's or anything else that requires money. Faust is also obviously an alternative to Eater all this made me think about Edward Kim: Humanity's Hammer first. As Eater don't cut it in Ed's deck because you can't access which ruins your ability. Your also gonna want cards which Anarch lends it's self nicely to and even free of clicks with cards like Vigil & the Wyldside combo.

Your also gonna want to e3 Feedback Implants to save on card trashing since breaking subs is the worst way to burn your cards which lends you into D4v1d / Knight and to consider Quetzal: Free Spirit i certainly think she can use this AI just as well as Edward Kim: Humanity's Hammer. I am unsure how useful this card will be out of faction tho, i can see Exile: Streethawk maybe making some use out of it but the only real problem with this card is you need to build around it. Your deck needs to be able to mass draw and have plenty of useless cards to happily throw away.

All in all a very powerful cornerstone of a deck and something to build around otherwise tho don't both.