The initial version of my Chameleon deck tried to include Hyperdriver as well, but I basically knew from the start that that was too much for one deck. So I got rid of Hyperdriver (2 copies), Quest Completed (2 copies), and Notoriety (3 copies). Also, Hayley’s identity never helped, so I swapped her out with Chaos Theory, giving me more memory so I could get rid of the two copies of Cybersolutions Mem Chip.

That brought me down to 41 cards; and, I figured that, with the smaller deck, I’d get rid of both Diesel’s as well. I used the freed up influence to add two copies of Forged Activation Orders; also, Film Critic seems like the new hotness, so I included two of those.

That was a clear improvement; I needed more tools to get stuff out, though, so I added two SMCs, making room by getting rid of one Personal Workshop (which I’d been feeling a bit dependent on) and one Dinosaurus (which is important but, given the number of tools I have to match Chameleon’s strength, not essential to get out early). Here’s the result:

Chameleon v. 1

Chaos Theory: Wünderkind

Event (7)

• 2x Forged Activation Orders •• ••
• 3x Sure Gamble
• 2x The Maker’s Eye

Hardware (11)

• 2x Clone Chip
• 2x Cyberfeeder • •
• 2x Dinosaurus
• 3x LLDS Processor
• 2x Plascrete Carapace

Resource (11)

• 2x Armitage Codebusting
• 2x Daily Casts
• 2x Film Critic
• 1x Ice Carver •••
• 2x Kati Jones
• 2x Personal Workshop

Icebreaker (6)

• 3x Chameleon
• 1x Deus X
• 1x Gordian Blade
• 1x Sharpshooter

Program (8)

• 2x Datasucker • •
• 2x Parasite •• ••
• 2x Sahasrara
• 2x Self-modifying Code

15 influence spent (max 15)
43 cards (min 40)

It’s certainly a lot better than its initial version; I’m not surprised when it wins, though I think it doesn’t win half the time. It’s just on the edge of having enough money; also, I don’t run as much as is a good idea in general. But, when I do pick my runs, I can make it in: for example, yesterday I won a game where I could walk right through strength 7 ice, which is a very useful ability. Film Critic has been useful in a couple of situations, too, I’m definitely keeping that.

Still: needs improvement, given its record; and being three cards over the minimum is a sign that I’m not looking hard enough at it. I also think I need to learn how to pilot the deck better…

The initial version of my Next Ice deck had some success, but there was work to do; I decided to start by tweaking the ice. I had a little too much expensive ice and Architect wasn’t being helpful enough to support three copies; so I was thinking that I’d try switching some of the ice over to economy-generating ice, to have the economy work better with my identity power.

So I added two copies of Errand Boy and one Pop-Up Window; to free up the influence, I swapped a Sundew with an Adonis. And the ice I got rid of was one copy of Heimdall 1.0, one Architect, and my only Rototurret.

Errand Boy really did not work out well: I’m not sure I ever saw a copy get run through twice, and without that it was hurting my economy instead of helping. So got rid of both of those, adding in a second Pop-Up Window and a Lotus Field.

Here’s the result:

Next Ice, v. 1

NEXT Design: Guarding the Net

Agenda (10)

• 3x Accelerated Beta Test
• 1x Corporate War
• 3x NAPD Contract
• 3x Project Vitruvius

Asset (10)

• 3x Adonis Campaign
• 2x Jackson Howard • •
• 2x Melange Mining Corp.
• 2x PAD Campaign
• 1x Sundew •••

Operation (8)

• 2x Enhanced Login Protocol
• 3x Hedge Fund
• 3x Peak Efficiency

Barrier (7)

• 3x Eli 1.0
• 1x Heimdall 1.0
• 3x NEXT Silver

Code Gate (6)

• 1x Lotus Field •
• 3x NEXT Bronze
• 2x Pop-up Window • •

Sentry (7)

• 2x Archer •• ••
• 2x Architect
• 3x NEXT Gold

Other (1)

• 1x Mother Goddess

12 influence spent (max 12)
20 agenda points (between 20 and 21)
49 cards (min 45)

It’s been winning about half the time at work? Archer just keeps on paying off: I was intending this to be a nice deck, but it can really destroy my opponent’s rig. And I’m getting into a rhythm where I can usually get out a Melange pretty early, have enough ice to defend it and my centrals so nothing awful happens while I click on Melange for maybe three turns, and then go on the offense with enough money to rez ice. But I’m not doing well against one of my coworkers’ Noise deck: both the Noise identity ability and the ice destruction from Parasite put me on the back foot, and I don’t work quickly enough to win before Noise’s ability takes over.

So I have work to do on that; also, it’s time for me to work a trap or two into the deck.

In the July Minecraft session, I decided I wanted to keep on building in the circular cave I found. But, when I looked at it, I couldn’t think of ways to work on the main cave in ways that would help more than hurt it:

Looking at the entrance

Looking down into the cave

But then I noticed a small cave on the other side, with a pool in there, so I decided to fiddle with it.

The stone wall in front of the side cave; I carved a path into the stone going around it on the left

The pool inside the cave, I think this is probably the view from the path

I added a wooden fence on the edge of the water on the side of pool inside the cave; this is actually looking out across the water into the main plaza

A banner I hung in the back of the cave

I put some plants in the back, though I don’t think it turned out very well

Some more random decor

Then I decided to fly around a bit and see what other people were doing.

Snow on top of the area I’d been working in

Looking down at the stockade town Pat and Miranda had been working on in previous months

A forest with lava

Pat and Miranda had moved on to a nearby forest; one or both of them were building treehouses. (I can’t remember the details of who built what.)

That large trunk is an artificial tree, there’s also a path in the treetops behind it

A closer view of the treetop path

Inside the treetop room

Looking down into the large tree trunk

After poking around, I tried to go back, but I got pretty lost; but Pat mentioned that he’d found the path that Dan had been working on for probably a year now (though Dan is far beyond this point), so I went and found that and then followed it back to the city by the spawn point.

Some cows I met while I was lost

I found Dan’s path

A village by the side of the path

My last three corp decks have all been focused on offense in different ways, so I figured I’d build a deck based around ice and money. No traps at all! (At least in this iteration…) I decided to experiment with Next ice; and I figured NEXT Design must be a good match for that, right?

Next Ice, v. 0

NEXT Design: Guarding the Net

Agenda (10)

• 3x Accelerated Beta Test
• 1x Corporate War
• 3x NAPD Contract
• 3x Project Vitruvius

Asset (10)

• 2x Adonis Campaign
• 2x Jackson Howard • •
• 2x Melange Mining Corp.
• 2x PAD Campaign
• 2x Sundew ••• •••

Operation (8)

• 2x Enhanced Login Protocol
• 3x Hedge Fund
• 3x Peak Efficiency

Barrier (8)

• 3x Eli 1.0
• 2x Heimdall 1.0
• 3x NEXT Silver

Code Gate (3)

• 3x NEXT Bronze

Sentry (9)

• 2x Archer •• ••
• 3x Architect
• 3x NEXT Gold
• 1x Rototurret

Other (1)

• 1x Mother Goddess

12 influence spent (max 12)
20 agenda points (between 20 and 21)
49 cards (min 45)

10 pieces of Next ice (counting Mother Goddess), out of 21 in total; I decided to tilt more heavily towards ice than towards money, to maximize the identity ability. Though, thinking about it a bit more: maybe I should find room for some economy ice, say Pop-up Window or Errand Boy? Influence is tight, though; we’ll see how much money I have as I try it out…

The initial version of my NBN Interference deck had its moments; in particular, Psychographics plus Information Overload can make for a very entertaining combo. (Whereas I didn’t get as much out of isolated tagging.) So I decided to focus on that when slimming down to 49 cards.

I got rid of my Gutenberg and Virgo, and added a third Midseasons. I decided I didn’t need both Blacklist and Chronos Protocol, so I got rid of both copies of Blacklist. The agenda I ditched was one copy of Market Research, and PAD Campaign was the last card I ditched.

Playing that a bit, I felt low on money and vulnerable to Noise; so I added a third Hedge Fund and a third Jackson Howard, removing both copies of Daily Business Show.

Here’s the result:

NBN Interference, v. 1

NBN: Making News

Agenda (11)

• 3x AstroScript Pilot Program
• 1x Breaking News
• 2x Chronos Project
• 2x Market Research
• 2x Project Beale
• 1x Restructured Datapool

Asset (10)

• 2x Aggressive Secretary •• ••
• 3x Jackson Howard
• 2x Marked Accounts
• 1x PAD Campaign
• 2x Primary Transmission Dish

Operation (13)

• 3x Hedge Fund
• 3x Midseason Replacements
• 2x Psychographics
• 2x SEA Source
• 3x Sweeps Week

Barrier (3)

• 2x TMI
• 1x Wraparound

Code Gate (3)

• 1x Inazuma ••
• 2x Tollbooth

Sentry (9)

• 2x Archer •• ••
• 2x Data Raven
• 2x Ichi 1.0 •• ••
• 2x Information Overload
• 1x Rototurret •

15 influence spent (max 15)
20 agenda points (between 20 and 21)
49 cards (min 45)

I took it to a tournament, and if I’m remembering correctly, I went 3-2 as Corp, which is certainly better than I expected! I’m sure I got lucky, but the two losses also both easily could have gone the other way. I still don’t think it’s a great deck, and I’m not planning to work on refining it, but maybe there is something there? (Though it’s pretty vulnerable to Film Critic…)

I have no idea why Inazuma is still in the deck. Also, I’m not sure I need to focus on blowing up rigs in quite as many ways: Information Overload is staying (though two copies is enough, I think), and Archer is fabulous, but maybe I should replace one or both copies of Ichi or Aggressive Secretary?

Oh, also, one technique that I figured out at the tournament: if your opponent is running Astrolabe, then, by creating two servers on your first two clicks, then you can net 6 credits out of Sweeps Week instead of 4.

When The Underway came out, both Chameleon and Hyperdriver caught my eye. So, of course, I decided to build a deck that incorporated both of them! Here’s the initial version:

Chameleon

Hayley Kaplan: Universal Scholar

Event (12)

• 2x Diesel
• 3x Notoriety
• 2x Quest Completed •• ••
• 3x Sure Gamble
• 2x The Maker’s Eye

Hardware (14)

• 2x Clone Chip
• 2x Cyberfeeder • •
• 2x CyberSolutions Mem Chip
• 3x Dinosaurus
• 3x LLDS Processor
• 2x Plascrete Carapace

Resource (10)

• 2x Armitage Codebusting
• 2x Daily Casts
• 1x Ice Carver •••
• 2x Kati Jones
• 3x Personal Workshop

Icebreaker (6)

• 3x Chameleon
• 1x Deus X
• 1x Gordian Blade
• 1x Sharpshooter

Program (8)

• 2x Datasucker • •
• 2x Hyperdriver
• 2x Parasite •• ••
• 2x Sahasrara

15 influence spent (max 15)
50 cards (min 45)

The Chameleon side of the deck is to have it ready to install with Personal Workshop, and to match strength with Dinosaurus / LLDS Processor / Ice Carver / Datasucker. And the Hyperdriver side of the deck is Notoriety and Quest Completed.

Having said that: even as I wrote it up, I couldn’t convince myself that Hyperdriver will work. I want to play it that way for a week or so, but I imagine that I’ll get rid of those cards, at which point my tentative plan is to also get rid of the mem chips and switch to Chaos Theory. (Or maybe to Kate if I decide I’m more comfortable with 45 cards than with 40 and that I need money and/or link.) We’ll see.

And I’m not super optimistic that it will work in general; but I figure I’m way too conservative in general with icebreakers, so this will try to force me out of my shell. (And it will probably horribly backfire!)

The previous version of my Leela Patel deck had been doing quite well at work—so even though it was 51 cards, I didn’t really know what to get rid of! I eventually decided to get rid of my last Dyson Mem Chip, one copy of Crescentus, and both copies of Symmetrical Visage: I didn’t end up needing much memory, Crescentus seems like it fits with the theme but in practice I never used it, and while Symmetrical Visage is nice, I mostly wanted run-based economy, and the fewer resources I have, the easier it is to float tags.

Here’s the result:

Leela Patel

Leela Patel: Trained Pragmatist

Event (20)

• 3x Account Siphon
• 2x Dirty Laundry
• 2x Emergency Shutdown
• 3x Forged Activation Orders
• 3x Inside Job
• 2x Legwork
• 2x Special Order
• 3x Sure Gamble

Hardware (9)

• 2x Clone Chip •• ••
• 3x Desperado
• 2x Plascrete Carapace
• 2x Prepaid VoicePAD

Resource (5)

• 3x Compromised Employee
• 2x Security Testing

Icebreaker (8)

• 1x Cerberus “Rex” H2
• 2x Corroder •• ••
• 1x Faerie
• 1x Femme Fatale
• 1x Mimic •
• 1x Passport
• 1x Yog.0 •

Program (5)

• 1x Crescentus
• 3x Datasucker • • •
• 1x Parasite ••

15 influence spent (max 15)
47 cards (min 45)

I took it to a tournament on Saturday; unfortunately, it did just as badly as my Cybernetics Division deck, leading to by far my worst result in a tournament. This deck was a lot closer to winning than my corp deck, so I was somewhat unlucky going 1–4 (maybe I went 2–3, I can’t remember for sure which side I won my first game with), but still: I’d been right to feel that I wasn’t sure why I was winning so often with this deck.

I’m going to leave it assembled for a while—I do like the criminal “mess with people” approach, and I still think it’s a decent deck—but I’m going to experiment with a Chameleon deck for a bit.

With the previous version of my Cybernetics Division deck, I still wasn’t getting enough use out of my traps: I need some there to make the runner nervous, but if I can’t win with them, then I need to win other ways, which means more money and ice.

So the first tweak was to remove Project Junebug, Hourglass (which was really only there to set up Ryon Knight), and one copy of Ichi 1.0 (which was a nice threat but didn’t stop people) for a third Eli 1.0, a Viktor 1.0, and a Sensei. The Sensei was probably a bad choice (though it’s been useful one or two times when playing)—it’s not a great piece of ice in general, and in a deck without a lot of ice it’s probably even worse—but in general the idea behind my additions was to slightly increase the number of ice that I have and then use one of them to set up a second remote for an economy server. (I actually had a decent number of economy assets, I just couldn’t keep them alive.)

That seemed like it was a little better, so I continued the theme: I got rid of one Cerebral Overwriter and one Ryon Knight, adding in a second Melange and a second Viktor 1.0. I figured that would give me a decent chance of keeping a Melange alive for a while, and (as with so many decks) if I have a lot of money then good things can happen.

Here’s the resulting deck:

Cybernetics Division

Cybernetics Division: Humanity Upgraded

Agenda (10)

• 3x Accelerated Beta Test
• 1x Priority Requisition
• 3x Project Vitruvius
• 3x Self-Destruct Chips

Asset (12)

• 3x Adonis Campaign
• 1x Cerebral Overwriter
• 1x Edge of World ••
• 2x Jackson Howard • •
• 2x Melange Mining Corp.
• 2x PAD Campaign
• 1x Ronin ••••

Upgrade (1)

• 1x Ryon Knight

Operation (7)

• 3x Biotic Labor
• 3x Hedge Fund
• 1x Restructure

Barrier (5)

• 3x Eli 1.0
• 2x Heimdall 1.0

Code Gate (5)

• 1x Sensei •
• 2x Turing
• 2x Viktor 1.0

Sentry (4)

• 1x Architect
• 1x Cortex Lock ••
• 1x Ichi 1.0
• 1x Komainu ••••

15 influence spent (max 15)
18 agenda points (between 18 and 19)
44 cards (min 40)

Unfortunately, it’s still not good. I can often get the runner off of their feet, but turning that into a kill or 7 agenda points is hard. And they often get into R&D early and/or have multi-accesses on it late, so it’s easier for things to snowball their way than mine. (I even had situations where I took Melange turn after Melange turn, had dominating economy, but couldn’t quite get the agendas I needed to win before they sniped one.) I took it to a tournament on Saturday; the deck went 1–4 (I think; it might have been 0–5?), and it deserved those losses.

I’ve had recent corp decks focused on bludgeoning my opponent and on reducing their hand size; at some point, I actually am planning to build a deck based on straightforward scoring, but my ideas there involve HB, and I already have one HB deck assembled. Also, at work, there are some very successful resource-based runner decks right now, so I figure we need some more tagging. So I decided to build a deck mostly around tags, though I threw in some program destruction as well, and some recursion defense.

Here’s the initial version:

NBN Interference

NBN: Making News

Agenda (12)

• 3x AstroScript Pilot Program
• 1x Breaking News
• 2x Chronos Project
• 3x Market Research
• 2x Project Beale
• 1x Restructured Datapool

Asset (14)

• 2x Aggressive Secretary •• ••
• 2x Blacklist
• 2x Daily Business Show
• 2x Jackson Howard
• 2x Marked Accounts
• 2x PAD Campaign
• 2x Primary Transmission Dish

Operation (11)

• 2x Hedge Fund
• 2x Midseason Replacements
• 2x Psychographics
• 2x SEA Source
• 3x Sweeps Week

Barrier (3)

• 2x TMI
• 1x Wraparound

Code Gate (3)

• 1x Inazuma ••
• 2x Tollbooth

Sentry (11)

• 2x Archer •• ••
• 2x Data Raven
• 1x Gutenberg
• 2x Ichi 1.0 •• ••
• 2x Information Overload
• 1x Rototurret •
• 1x Virgo

15 influence spent (max 15)
22 agenda points (between 22 and 23)
54 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Breaker Bay

I’ve played it a few times; I don’t think it’s a great deck, but if I just force out SEA Source at the right time, I can do some damage, and if I can continue to stay ahead on money, then Midseasons and Information Overload make an amazing combo. And of course there’s always the classic Midseasons / Psychographics / Project Beale combo.

The best game, though, was against one of my coworkers who has an amazing Haley deck; once it gets going, has these combos of large hand sizes (Beach Party, filled up with Game Day) feeding his multiple installs, paid with by Power Nap and a bunch of other double events. And there’s Starlight Crusade Funding supporting the doubles, with Adjusted Chronotype and Gene Conditioning Shoppe preventing him from losing clicks from Starlight Crusade and Beach Party.

In that game, I managed to play two Sweeps Weeks right after he’d double-Beach-Partied plus Game Day to get his hand size to 14 cards; 26 credits in two clicks is pretty good! And I tagged him (I can’t remember if it was Midseason’s or SEA Source) to get rid of Aesop’s, so he had a hard time getting rid of the Beach Parties, leaving him down on clicks. He started to recover from that, but then I landed a Chronos Project just before he was about to Levy, so all of a sudden he only had 13 cards available in total, most of which were already in his hand. Then, a bit later, after one more tag, I got rid of Adjusted Chronotype and Gene Conditioning Shoppe while leaving him two resources installed that each cost him a click; and, it turns out that running with only two clicks per turn doesn’t work very well.

So the deck isn’t a complete disaster, at least; that one game was a total fluke, but I’ve won a couple other times with it. It’s just a first pass; I imagine I’ll fiddle with the ice significantly, and probably cut down on the program destruction. I think it’s probably a useful addition to our local meta; I’m not at all sure I’ll be able to evolve it into something that wins even half of its games in tournaments, though.

The initial version of my Leela Patel deck had 55 cards, which was ridiculous. And, when playing it, there were indeed some cards that I never played; unfortunately, they actually largely served useful roles, they just were the wrong cards. So I swapped out two copies of HQ Interface with two copies of Legwork, and two copies of Crash Space with two copies of Plascrete Carapace. That last swap did at least mean that I didn’t have any resources that I would be really sad to lose, so I got rid of my Decoy, but otherwise, that didn’t help with the card count.

Nels suggested that I didn’t need the Dysons: his attitude is that Sneakdoor Beta (which is the main memory hog) is useful for a time, but then you discard it once you need memory pressure. The thing is, with one Sneakdoor Beta, I couldn’t even count on that; so I ended up removing the Sneakdoor, one Dyson (the second may go away soon), and also one copy of Emergency Shutdown (because my HQ access isn’t particularly reliable now). And with no non-event multi-access, Demolition Run was much less useful, so I replaced it with a Parasite.

Here’s the current state: 51 cards, so it’s still bloated:

Leela Patel

Leela Patel: Trained Pragmatist

Event (20)

• 3x Account Siphon
• 2x Dirty Laundry
• 2x Emergency Shutdown
• 3x Forged Activation Orders
• 3x Inside Job
• 2x Legwork
• 2x Special Order
• 3x Sure Gamble

Hardware (10)

• 2x Clone Chip •• ••
• 3x Desperado
• 1x Dyson Mem Chip
• 2x Plascrete Carapace
• 2x Prepaid VoicePAD

Resource (7)

• 3x Compromised Employee
• 2x Security Testing
• 2x Symmetrical Visage

Icebreaker (8)

• 1x Cerberus “Rex” H2
• 2x Corroder •• ••
• 1x Faerie
• 1x Femme Fatale
• 1x Mimic •
• 1x Passport
• 1x Yog.0 •

Program (6)

• 2x Crescentus
• 3x Datasucker • • •
• 1x Parasite ••

15 influence spent (max 15)
51 cards (min 45)
Cards up to The Valley

The main problem that I’m having now with winnowing it down further is that it’s actually doing surprisingly well! (And I am very glad I have three copies of Desperado.) I definitely don’t feel like I’m getting my icebreakers out quickly enough, but I’m also feeling that I’m messing with people enough even without a full breaker suite.

So I’m really not sure what to do next. Get rid of the remaining Dyson? I haven’t actually used Crescentus yet, though I’ve seen some situations where I was a credit or two off from it setting up a perfect combo; maybe get rid of one or both of those? (But it still seems like derezzing is useful for Leela, and I just got rid of one Emergency Shutdown…) It seems ridiculous having both three sentry breakers and three code gate breakers; but if I’m feeling that I’m not getting to my breakers enough, then reducing those might not be the right tactic. Security Testing is nice but hasn’t paid off hugely in practice; maybe ditch that, or Symmetrical Visage? Maybe ditch one copy of Account Siphon, though the counterargument there is that three of them increases the chance that you’ll get them early, where they are by far the most useful? (So maybe ditch all three? But keeping the corp broke is very useful, especially if I want to play Forged Activation Orders.) Heck, maybe deal with my icebreaker-finding troubles by adding in a third Special Order?

I dunno: I think that, for now, I’ll keep on playing it and try to figure out more about the core of this deck.