Surprised that you haven't pointed out the synergy between Amped and Wanton Destruction. Amped also allows to twist the knife if you get a turn of easy acccess to R&D with Medium or Keyhole. Can easily happen after an Acoount Siphon or so.
Krystian Majewski Good point. I guess I see Wanton Destruction as being awesome even without Amped Up. Amped Up is far scarier with Medium or Keyhole as you mentioned. I'd have to go back and listen, but I remember my review of Wanton Destruction lacking detail. I was pretty much like "OMG I like this card because I like that it's likable and I hope that you like it too because I do." I was too excited or - dare I say - AMPED UP to be able to think it through. :)
Hivemind + Progenitor + Virus Breeding Ground x2 is nuts. If and when virus counters are purged, you can spend just two clicks to put your Hivemind back up to three, which does a ridiculous number of things, to name a few: 1. Brings Medium and Nerve Agent up to three cards per access, which already makes for quality central runs. 2. Brings Darwin up to strength 3, 4 if you pumped him at the beginning of your turn. Strength 4 Darwin is good enough to handle most relevant ICE, although that may change with the space ICE from Weyland. Still, it's good value for only two clicks, plus Darwin can go up to strength 7 on the next turn if the Runner doesn't purge for just two more clicks and a credit. 3. Triggers Chakana's ability of upping the advancement requirement of all agendas. Having three of these out on a Djinn is not only good MU management, but it totally hamstrings a fast advancing Corp, if not slowing every other Corp to a crawl. 4. Revives Imp and Gravedigger for trashing more stuff. 5. Pumps up Gorman Drip for economy. Gorman Drip is considered to have all the virus counters Hivemind has (plus whatever Gorman Drip gets on its own); when Gorman Drip is trashed for money, Hivemind still retains all of its virus counters, but you still get the money you would have gotten if they were on Gorman Drip. 6. If Grimoire is installed, it allows for a freshly installed Parasite to kill any ICE with strength 4 or less. This is especially good for R&D locks or if your Darwin has to deal with big ICE protecting a remote. Plus, if the Runner doesn't purge again, you can effectively put three more counters on Parasite on your next turn. This is even more brutal with Clone Chip. The only pieces you need to draw for this to work are the breeding grounds and Progenitor. Everything else you can tutor for with Djinn.
Disembow1280 I've messed around with deck concept that you're referring to and agree that it's pretty strong once it gets going. Hivemind is pretty beastly for the reasons that you described, but it's expensive and requires a lot of pieces to come together. I have a couple of questions: 1) How do you pay for all of that stuff? I've seen a few versions playing Personal Workshop and even some with Stimhack as well to help install of the programs needed to "lock down" the game. I'm not sure I really like that idea but haven't seen an appealing alternative. I've liked Noise for quite a while because the Cache + Aesop's engine makes a lot of money, but it seems like this deck won't have enough influence to do this properly. Is there a way that we could integrate some of the Hivemind stuff and preserve the basic economy of the Cacheshop deck? 2) You said that we need to draw Breeding Grounds x2, Progenitor, and Djinn. Do you have a preferred way to do that? I've Had Worse seems pretty good but is that enough? Looking at Cacheshop, we have Inject. I don't see that working too well in the Hivemind deck. Thoughts? 3) If we're playing Chakana x3, what's the rest of the influence look like? Let's say at least one Gorman Drip for the play that you mentioned. That gives us eight to spend on Clone Chip, Aesop's, or Cache. Something's gotta give here. Clone Chip is definitely the best of the three, right? It seems to me that it might be worth considering cutting one or two of the Chakanas to get more of the out of faction economy stuff. Here's what I'm thinking: all this Hivemind stuff sounds great, but is there a good way that we could integrate it as smaller package into existing Cache + Aesop's style Noise decks?
Hey, thanks for the reply. Here are a few thoughts regarding your points: 1. Money will admittedly be tight, especially early on. Seeing a turn 1 Sure Gamble is probably our best bet, but cards like Day Job will give us a good boost for a strong next turn, and with our use of Progenitor, Data Folding can give us some decent drip econ. After that, standard Cache + Aesop's sprinkled with a little Deja Vu is our main source of continual income. Still working on better economy. 2. I completely agree that Inject is no good here; since the majority of a Noise deck is programs, everything we had would be trashed. I've Had Worse is a game changer for Anarch, so that fits here, but another really good card draw source is Wyldside. Sure we lose a click, but after drawing two cards during the time of the game when we need to prep our rig with the right cards, do we really lose it? The only problem here is our hand will get full fast and cards will have to be pitched; recursion like Deja Vu and Clone Chip help out a lot here. Plus, after we have all the cards we need, we can pawn off Wyldside for more money. 3. Actually, having two Chakana out over three seems to have a similar effect on the board state now that I think about it. We could run 2x Chakana, 2x Aesops, and 3x Cache as our core. 1x Clone Chip could work with all the card draw we have, but I only see it as a situational means of recurring a Parasite for key ICE destruction in the middle of a run; we could swap it out for another Aesop's, depending on meta. Cutting Gorman Drip and one Cache could give us another chip, but that digs way too deep into our already streaky economy. The final influence point is on Hades Shard for a late game all-in plunge into Archives. After all, Hades Shard is the only proven method to trump Jackson Howard. The optimal starting hand would be Sure Gamble, Wyldside, Aesop's, Grimoire, and Djinn. We can live without Sure Gamble and Grimoire (and Aesop's ever-so-slightly), but mulligan if we don't see Wyldside and/or Djinn. We need immediate card draw and a way to tutor for Cache (among other viruses) to set up our early game. Virus Breeding Ground and Progenitor are nice to see, but we can always draw for those when we feel obligated to depending on the board state and when we need Hivemind out to slow the game down. A turn one Hades Shard is huge, but it's not the card to chase. I'll be the first to admit that this kind of deck requires a BOATLOAD of luck and methodical card management to pull off. Seven out of ten games have the probability of being brutal losses, but it's those three games during which everything comes together and not even infinite virus purges can stop us.
Willingdone Here's my attempt at the deck construction. It's still in its alpha stages: Identity Noise: Hacker Extraordinaire (Core Set) Event (12) 3x Déjà Vu (Core Set) 3x Day Job (Order and Chaos) 3x I've had worse (Order and Chaos) 3x Sure Gamble (Core Set) Hardware (3) 1x Cyberfeeder (Core Set) 2x Grimoire (Core Set) Icebreaker (1) 1x Darwin (Future Proof) Program (17) 3x Djinn (Core Set) 1x Medium (Core Set) 2x Parasite (Core Set) 1x Imp (What Lies Ahead) 1x Gravedigger (Order and Chaos) 1x Hivemind (Order and Chaos) 2x Progenitor (Order and Chaos) 1x Gorman Drip v1 (Opening Moves) • 3x Cache (The Spaces Between) • • • 2x Chakana (Creation and Control) •• •• Resource (12) 3x Wyldside (Core Set) 2x Virus Breeding Ground (Order and Chaos) 1x Hades Shard (First Contact) • 3x Data Folding (Order and Chaos) 3x Aesop's Pawnshop (Core Set) •• •• •• Total Cards: 45 Total Influence: 15 www.acoo.net Seeing as Clone Chip is too situational for consistent success, I switched it out for a third Aesop's.
Disembow1280 I like some of the ideas of your list but think that it's going to be a big problem that we basically can't run. We don't have a solution to even the most basic ICE other than "sorcery speed" Parasite and one very slow breaker. I'd like to see the deck focus more on the "traditional" Noise shell with the Hivemind + Chakana thing as a mid to late game option. The biggest strength of Noise IMO is that he can get "free accesses" from his ID ability. This makes it much easier to close out a game after scoring a few points early on. Clone Chip rules. I don't think I could bring myself to go lower than 2. It's so essential against ICE like Komainu (with Parasite) and makes the Cache-Shop thing go a lot smoother. It also makes Inject playable. I've had a lot of good experiences with Inject in Noise mainly because the Programs aren't what we want to draw early game while the non-Programs are. I've Had Worse + Inject is good enough without Wyldside IMO. Clone Chip also makes Datasucker a lot more appealing with Parasite. Addressing some of your points in light of the above: 1. It's okay for money to be tight if what we're doing is cheap. This is part of the reason that I want to relegate the Hivemind stuff to the Plan B. Cache-Shop + Cyberfeeder + 1 or 2 other economy cards has been enough in my experience as long as we're not looking to install a lot of expensive programs to the table. 2. We should try to play Inject. I don't think it's worth cutting it to make other stuff work. It's so good at find the critical cards like Aesop's, Cyberfeeder, etc at the stage of the game where they matter most: turns 1 and 2. We really want to get Cache + Shop going ASAP and Inject facilitates that. It's a lot better than Wyldside IMO. 3. Is it even necessary to have access to two Chakanas? Isn't one good enough to deal with the decks that it's really good against? I can see the appeal of locking the game down with multiples, but it seems better to use it as a speed bump. While it's still very possible for Fast Advance decks to score under one Chakana, it's going to slow them down if we can do it reliably enough in the mid game. I really think we need to play as many Clone Chips as possible, and Chakana is the only wiggle room. I've been messing around with this influence package: 3x Clone Chip 2x Aesop's Pawnshop 3x Cache 1x Chakana No Hades Shard sucks, but I'd rather lose it than Clone Chip or Cache. Not sure how to fit it in the deck. One more thought about the Hivemind prison thing: Progenitor doesn't do a lot for us without Hivemind. Rather than making Purging really hard for the Corp, why not focus on capitalizing on the tempo swing of a Purge? Making the deck more run-oriented will help with this. That means more breakers and more extensive use of Parasite. Here's a basic idea of what I'm proposing. Obviously, there are some big strategical differences in our two decks. Noise: Hacker Extraordinaire (Core Set) Event (9) 3x Déjà Vu (Core Set) 3x I've Had Worse (Order and Chaos) 3x Inject (Up and Over) Hardware (7) 3x Clone Chip (Creation and Control) ••••• • 2x Cyberfeeder (Core Set) 2x Grimoire (Core Set) Resource (7) 2x Aesop's Pawnshop (Core Set) •••• 3x Daily Casts (Creation and Control) 2x Virus Breeding Ground (Order and Chaos) Icebreaker (2) 1x Crypsis (Core Set) 1x Darwin (Future Proof) Program (20) 3x Cache (The Spaces Between) ••• 1x Chakana (Creation and Control) •• 3x D4v1d (The Spaces Between) 2x Datasucker (Core Set) 3x Djinn (Core Set) 1x Hivemind (Order and Chaos) 2x Imp (What Lies Ahead) 1x Medium (Core Set) 1x Nerve Agent (Cyber Exodus) 3x Parasite (Core Set) 15 influence spent (max 15) 45 cards (min 45) Cards up to Order and Chaos
Willingdone Strategy differences aside, I'll admit this decklist is much more versatile than mine; perhaps I got starstruck by the potential of Hivemind that it disrupted my deckbuilding fundamentals. I forgot that this is Netrunner, not "Never"-runner, heh. 1. Daily Casts is okay for drip econ, and it's an attractive pawning target when it has two credits left, but I do like a little bit of burst econ when we need a big run on a scoring server. Maybe a singleton Kati Jones would work, or would that be a momentum killer? 2. Now THAT was the solution that was fleeting me with Inject: Clone Chip. If we trash a program we need, we just recur it. If any of those are viruses, we just Deja Vu. Wow, I can't believe I missed that. Again, I blame Hivemind. 3. There has to be some sort of math to do to gauge how many Chakana would be the most ideal in different situations in different Corp matchups. For simplicity's sake, I'm willing to concede that the influence spent on 3x Clone Chip over 3x Chakana is the more powerful move, though. As for Progenitor, we need it (at least on Hivemind) because of Virus Breeding Grounds's requisite that we can only move virus counters on VBG to another virus program with at least one virus counter already on it. If we get purged and Hivemind has no counters on it, Hivemind becomes a dead card which takes a finite amount of resources to get back up and running without Progenitor. A Progenitor'd Hivemind also helps with keeping Crypsis active in case of an emergency, if that adds any more weight to the argument. I'll be playtesting these two decks throughout the coming week, but I'm pretty convinced your list has the edge, regardless of meta (except for maybe Swordsman; that ICE is coming back with a vengeance ever since Eater/Keyhole became a thing :P).
+darmamu It would be a very, very good start. From there, you'd probably want to seek out a few packs based on your choice of Anarch ID. But with just Core + Order and Chaos, you'll have a pretty flexible pool of Anarch cards to draw from.
Great video! Gonna send this to my friend, her favorites were anarchs and Weyland (she loves to "burn down your house"), so she'll love this release. By the way, how is archives accessed again (I'm a newbie)? You mentioned it but for example if there are traps there can I normally just choose not to access them and get punished? I always thought you access all the cards whether you want to or not. Guess that seems silly.
Prothope Thanks! I hope she likes it! I've been having a lot of fun with Order and Chaos. With Archives access, the Runner turns all of the cards face up and then choose the order to access them. You're right that the Runner must access all of the cards. The only exception is if the Runner wins the game during the accessing. So if the Archives has seven points of agendas and some nasty traps, the Runner can access the agendas first, winning the game before the traps matter. In the first video, I mentioned that the new Gagarin ID adds an "additional cost" to remote server access. Whenever a player needs to pay an additional cost, he or she can decline to do so. So in that case, if there is a Snare and a rezzed SanSan City Grid in a Gagarin remote, the Runner can choose to pay the additional cost to access SanSan and decline the additional cost on Snare. Without the additional cost, he or she would be forced to access both like you said.
Wow, thanks for the clarification! That really helps. Netrunner can seem overwhelming when new stuff comes out that changes the meta, your videos are very high quality, educational, and I look forward to them. Thanks and keep up the good work! :D
I honestly think you are underrating MaxX. Too me she seems to be built to be super aggressive. It’s possible she’s the second fastest runner after Andy. Possibly. Lol. I’m not as excited about Valencia. Bad pub is great. But Elizabeth Mills counters that. And a 50 card minimum deck sucks to be frank about it. Five more cards is a big hit to your consistency. I do think she’s cool though, and she will inspire some sweet deck building ideas. But I feel she is going to have to prove herself. All said and done though, good review man. Keep up the good work!
Seth Dortch Very possible. I think MaxX is probably faster than Andy in a lot of situations. I don't think that Andy's main thing is that she's blazing fast; it's that she's consistently the same (pretty quick) speed. I'll admit that I haven't played with MaxX a whole lot, but I find it hard to believe that she'll achieve anything like Andy's consistency. I'm mostly excited about Valencia because she will force Corp players to take Bad Pub seriously. I agree that she's going to spur a bunch of exciting deckbuilding. I'm not totally sure she'll end up in the tier 1, but I think she's got a lot of neat tools to mess around with. Thanks for watching!
Showing off has won me many games because of how popular daily business show is right now. I score more agendas in this meta because they always send agendas to the bottom of the deck. It a meta card
Thanks for the review. Here are a few notes (and disagreements): - I think you're underestimating MaxX's ability. My MaxX deck is 7-0; she comes out of the gate swinging because she draws so fast. I don't need to include any draw cards in her deck because her innate ability gets me more draw power than I'll ever need, which of course frees up deck slots. Also, her trash should almost be seen as a secondary grip. It's a sideboard full of tools you can use at any time. Being able to Retrieval Run out big breakers like Femme and Morning Star is incredible, and Deja Vu remains one of the best, most flexible recursion cards in the game. My MaxX is very event based, so Same Old Things do wonders as well. She runs at an incredibly brutal pace, giving her a speed on par with Andy, but in a much more anarchy/destructive way. In Anarch, because of their recursion ability, trashing 2 cards and drawing 1 card is almost like drawing 3 cards at the beginning of your turn. Going through your deck that fast is immeasurable. - Amped Up is incredibly strong, especially when combined with a Wanton Destruction run. Getting 6 clicks pretty much guarantees you'll trash their entire hand, and can allow room for a follow up run on Archives in most cases. It also allows you to use a Day Job for a big econ boost and still have 2 clicks for running. It's in the same suite as Stimhack; it's incredibly powerful, but if you're a player that hates taking that brain damage, you'll probably never play it. Personally, I maintain that taking 1 or 2 brain damage during the course of the game isn't a big deal, especially if it secures a win. I keep 2 copies in my Maxx deck and it has led to many Wanton victories.
Dan Marshall RE: MaxX Quick quibble: no extra draw effects? So you don't play Inject or I've Had Worse? Even if we have disagreements about the strength of MaxX's ability, I find that a bit strange. More to your point: I agree that MaxX's main strength is that she can use the Heap as a sort of secondary Grip, but it isn't the same as a secondary Grip. The MaxX decks I've seen have three cards that interact in this way: Deja Vu, Same Old Thing, and Retrieval Run. That means you need to have the right one of those and have the card you need to get back in the Heap. Admittedly, that's not terribly difficult to do, but it's not as good as a second Grip. I get that it's nice to have access to a lot of cards, but that's something other decks can do with less risk e.g. Shapers. As I've said elsewhere in these comments, I think MaxX is probably going to be faster than Andy. That said, she's got a lot of weaknesses that Andy doesn't have. I'm not sold that faster = better. It seems to me that the biggest strengths of MaxX are actually the other good Anarch stuff: Eater + Keyhole, Wanton Destruction, draw effects, etc. Like I said in the review, I don't think she's terrible or unplayable. In fact, I think she's pretty good. I'm just not sure that MaxX is the best way to build around the cards I just mentioned. I don't see Retrieval Run as a huge argument in favor of her, and the other recursion stuff is going to work well is basically every Anarch deck. I don't think any of us have tested this stuff enough to know "for sure." Based on my instincts and my limited experience with her, I see MaxX being really popular for a few months and then everyone going back to Noise or doing the same basic thing with Quetzal or Valencia. I wouldn't mind being wrong about this, since MaxX represents a type of aggression that's truly new to the game. RE: Amped Up Yeah there's a nice interaction between Amped Up and Wanton Destruction, but I don't see it being necessary in most cases. I agree that it doesn't matter that much to take 1-2 brain damage against non-flatline decks. If you're playing a really aggressive deck like MaxX, I can see playing a couple copies of Amped Up for some of the reasons you described. Thanks for watching and the good discussion!
Willingdone Referring to the draw in my MaXx deck, no it really doesn't need any additional draw power. I had 3x I've Had Worse in it, but I never actually played them. Getting two cards into your trash and one card into your hand for 0 clicks every turn is a HUGE draw engine. Over my many games (10 or so as of writing this comment) with my MaXx deck, I'll maybe Click to draw a single card 3-4 times a game. And to me, that's acceptable. I'd rather use 3-4 Clicks a game on drawing rather than waste precious card slots on draw cards, especially when there are so many other useful tools to include. That's really the style of the deck (as well as my personal playstyle). The deck itself has so many options that makes it not only fast, but flexible. And I'm not a player that wastes a million Clicks searching for that one card I want. I go with the flow of what's in my hand, and the tools MaxX has allows me to do that easily. Personally, I took out 1 I've Had Worse (still like 2 in there for the damage protection) and I'd never add Inject. If you haven't played a MaxX deck yet, I highly recommend giving it a shot. In theory, it sounds like you'd need more draw power, but in practice, you'll definitely find this isn't the case. MaxX goes through her deck quite fast. I can see your point though about MaxX's main strengths being Anarch strengths in general (Eater, Wanton, Keyhole, whatnot). However, MaxX is more about the style in which you use those combos and how you set it up. Her innate draw is going to allow her to get her RIG set up faster and her trashing allows her to get more options out on the table. Think of it this way. On Turn 1, Edward Kim starts with 5 Cards in hand and 0 in the trash. On Turn 1, MaxX starts with 6 Cards in hand and 2 in the trash. Right off the bat, you've seen 3 more cards than Edward Kim. MaxX's recklessness actually makes her more consistent in a sense. Let's say Edward has 5 cards in hand, none of which he wants to play; in order to get more options, he needs to spend clicks/cards drawing, which definitely isn't a guarantee as that draw could come up empty. MaxX however, as the turns fly by is gifted with more and more options through her constantly growing trash. By Turn 2, without spending a single Click, she's seen 6 extra cards; 2 of which are in her hand. With nothing but a single Deja Vu in your Grip that is insanely dangerous for the Corp. Again, this is something that may not make itself apparent from reading the game text on her card, but through actually playing her identity, you'll quickly notice how much less "blind" you feel. I can safely say I'd rather KNOW that my Account Siphon is buried in my trash rather than have it floating around in my deck with no reasonable way to tutor for it. The faster you get things into your hand OR trash, the faster you can use them in the game, rather than spending clicks hopelessly drawing. As far as Amped Up goes, I don't think the question should ever be "Is this card good?" but rather "Is this card going to be great in a few decks?" The game has come far enough that I don't think Fantasy Flight WANTS to make any blatantly "good" cards anymore. It's the very reason they said they've been doing different things with breakers other than pure "pay to boost, pay to break" which can easily be compared through math. They want to expand the game horizontally, not vertically, and ensure that players can't straight up say "Mathematically X is more efficient than Y". I don't think we'll ever get another Sure Gamble or Jackson Howard (aka a card that will be in EVERY deck). I think FFG is going to go to great pains to avoid that. So trying to find if Amped Up is a good card is a bit moot; it's obviously not meant to be in every deck or fit every playstyle. But I can personally attest (after using at least 1 in nearly every MaxX game I've played) that it creates incredible opportunities, especially in a meta where the Runner's Clicks are so precious (since Corps are so damn fast with such taxing ICE). Like I said, it will never be "good" in all decks, but it WILL be great in a few decks! And I think that's the direction Netrunner needs to go. Also, I agree, great discussion. Let me know what your thoughts are!
Edvando Filho Thanks! Do you have any ideas of how I should go about that? I've spent a fair amount of time working on the videos, but I agree that I could do more to promote them.
Willingdone I'm not a specialist in this, but I see a lot of people posting in Reddit, forum and sometimes other youtube videos, trying to expose their channel. Just don't look like a spam and you will do fine. If you comment in somebody else video, you have to say something pertinent to the video and link one of your videos that is also relevant.
Edvando Filho Good advice, but advice I'm already following. I'm post 16 on r/Netrunner right now. Reddit has been a big source of new viewers for me. I also link my videos on Boardgamegeek. I had one video on Stimhack.com as well. I'd like to get more active on social media. I definitely haven't done much with Twitter, Facebook, or Google+. Thanks for the suggestion! If you think of anything else, let me know.
Wolven Spirit Aatami The core idea of most MaxX decks is good, but I'm still not convinced by the choice of ID. We really need more stuff that works with the Heap before I'm totally sold. In my opinion, you can do almost everything the MaxX decks can do with Quetzal or Reina and have better matchups against certain popular decks. The appeal of MaxX overlaps with the appeal of the rest of the new Anarch tools. I think that the community largely chose MaxX as the vehicle for testing these tools. In the near future, I envision several decks, each taking an aspect of the new Anarch stuff and focusing on it extensively. Not all of these will be best as MaxX but some will. MaxX's ability really helps with consistency and run pressure, but Quetzal does Icebreaking much better than MaxX and is less reliant on Eater. E3 + David is really good, especially in a metagame rife with Blue Sun. Reina does denial better than MaxX. She has a lot of appeal against decks with fragile economy like most Flatline and FA decks. All of these IDs have a lot of ground to cover exploring the new options in Order and Chaos. Order and Chaos was a big deal. MaxX is a decent addition, but I've Had Worse, Day Job, Eater, Amped Up, Wanton Destruction, The Silverware, and Vigil freaking rule. I'm careful to not to conflate these cards' success with MaxX's. Anarch just got a massive stim in the arm, and we've yet to fully feel the effects. It's too early to tell RE: MaxX in my opinion. That said, I feel that I downplayed the strengths of her ID in my review. The draw thing is very nice, really helping you to keep the pressure on. You have unparalleled information about your cards since you see three new ones every turn. I imagine her getting better over time as more cards are released that interact with the Heap.
Incubator + hivemind + grimoire + personal workshop is The most brutal thing you can imagine. Darwin and parásites in workshop, and do and unique run Of 10 to 20 cards. Add demolition run and forked up to that final turn. Hivemind is Probably the best card Of all expansión
titonosfe It certainly seems strong, but I worry that the setup will take too long. That's a lot of credits and drawing to get everything in play. Not impossible, just difficult. Hivemind is certainly powerful and cool. I hope you're right, and we see it in competitive play if just for the sake of variety.
Willingdone yeah maybe the bloody fast avance is a problem (imho fa neh is killing the things i love from this game) but in my experience That deck had more troubles With PE than fast advance.
I'm curious to know what you think about the "Punk rock" deck linked below. Most interesting MaxX deck I personally seen yet. boardgamegeek.com/thread/1312563/punk-rock
Zhab80 I think that's a really interesting deck concept that I would never take to a tournament. It seems like that type of deck that does a lot cool, powerful things but has blatant weakness (like PE, as several mentioned). I really like the deck as a thought experiment, but I worry that it would lack consistency and have near unwinnable matchups. I like it conceptually and the deck's creator certainly has an innovator's mind, but I'm not sure we'll need to reinvent the wheel to make these new cards work. That said, I'm anxious to see revisions of this concept as well as other innovative ideas involving MaxX.
It's funny how I see people being very excited about Day Job, even though I never really understood why it would be better than, say, Liberated Accounts. Especially in MaxX (and many other decks) taking the whole turn to get money worth of 2/click just isn't as good as having less (or same) value with more flexibility. I never graded Day Job really high, and hated playing it once I did. Even people in NetrunnerDB have started talking it might not be AS good as people said it would be. Then again, it still hasn't been so long into experimenting with the whole box, so maybe I'll be proven wrong and it actually is such a god card people insist. Thus far I haven't been sold.
Peetu Makkonen I generally agree with your point but with some additional context: both Liberated Account and Day Job are quite good, but I don't see them as being totally comparable. Each has advantages/disadvantages based on the other cards in your deck/your general strategy. For example, Day Job is probably better if you have ways to gain clicks or Prepaid. Liberated Account is probably better if you're not going to get tagged or play Supplier. Another huge difference is the up front cost. Day Job gets you from poor to moderately rich. Liberated Account usually gets you from some money to more money. The initial six to play can be a big disadvantage. Likewise, forcing a whole turn click investment all at once can be a big disadvantage for Day Job. It seems to me like these cards fit somewhat different styles. It's hard to say which one is better without context. I'm just excited that Anarchs are getting new economy options that don't totally suck.
Willingdone I very much agree with that they indeed fill different roles. And it is always great to have more variety in card pools to construct decks with different kind of pacing. Prepaid and additional clicks are definitely boons for Day Job, but clicks are kind of wonky to get access to, and prepaids will not generally pay themselves back until later on in the game. But, yes, they do help Day Job. :) I was thinking about the front cost. This is something that should be taken into consideration when planning for strategies. To be fair, I have found myself recently actually clicking for credits just to install Liberated Accounts, and click to refill my credit pool... So, the value isn't exactly much off from Day Job. I do get a few clicks worth of credits 'safe' though. Sometimes its better to have credits scattered instead of having everything in the pool. What I am surprised about is how excited people have been about Day Job. If I were to argue it's actually bad compared to other options I think I would have to slap myself for being wrong and too straightforward, but it definitely isn't much better than the alternatives. :) I will need to experiment with Day Job with Stimdealer and Rachel though... Anyways, even though I disagree with some notions, that doesn't undermine the excellent work you've done with the reviews. Nice work mate, and keep it up!
You should look at this Noise Hivemind decklist. It may change your feelings towards this card: -> netrunnerdb.com/en/decklist/14677/can-o-whupass The obvious conclusion is, that it's not that strong on cards that use up counters, instead it's very effective on permanent effects like Chakana. And that is a really good one, especially for the playstyle of Noise.
TheSyn1cal Chakana seems like the best use of Hivemind, and I wish I mentioned it in my review. That list has some potential. I like the idea but am not sure about a few of the card choices. Is Virus Breeding Ground really that good? I understand that we need to get the counters from somewhere, but that thing seem so clunky and awkward. Here's my thing: if we're playing Chakana and friends, we don't have enough influence for Clone Chip. Clone Chip is amazing in so many ways, not the least of which is recurring D4V1D's and Parasites. The deck that you posted not only doesn't play Clone Chip for mid-run Parasite/D4V1D, it doesn't even play Parasite and D4V1D! I find it hard to accept an Anarch deck without those, at least for the conceivable future. I really like what the deck is trying to do, but I don't see how we're going to be able to make relevant runs. What does this deck do against very common large ICE? Even a single rezzed Tollbooth/Archer/pick something big seems impossible. What is our plan against Flatline? It seems like a dedicated Tag and Bag would run this deck over. I'm not even sure we'd be able to beat PE consistently. I can imagine slow advancing House of Knives behind basically any ICE as a viable play, even with multiple Chakanas going. I really think if we could incorporate this idea into a more standard Noise list, it would be a lot better. I haven't played the list you posted, obviously, so I could be wrong. But I generally don't like decks that are weak at running. Also, that deck description is hilarious.
Willingdone Haven't played this either, just saw the list on netrunnerdb and thought it was a great idea. Slow setup, but otherwise petty nice. VBG, good or not, is obv. needed in here, since you can get new counters onto Hivemind after a purge for two clicks and you'll be at full Chakana denial again. This deck needs some serious testing, it's really not that easy to understand the impact just by seeing the decklist. It's just so different.
i really wish you had more viewers, your great at what you do
ghostdog6220 Aww shucks! Thanks! Tell all your friends! We'll get there together. We're approaching 1000 subscribers.
Yeah, his signal needs boosting. In my opinion Willingdone's card reviews are top notch on analysis and very well done.
Surprised that you haven't pointed out the synergy between Amped and Wanton Destruction. Amped also allows to twist the knife if you get a turn of easy acccess to R&D with Medium or Keyhole. Can easily happen after an Acoount Siphon or so.
Krystian Majewski Good point. I guess I see Wanton Destruction as being awesome even without Amped Up. Amped Up is far scarier with Medium or Keyhole as you mentioned.
I'd have to go back and listen, but I remember my review of Wanton Destruction lacking detail. I was pretty much like "OMG I like this card because I like that it's likable and I hope that you like it too because I do." I was too excited or - dare I say - AMPED UP to be able to think it through. :)
Hivemind + Progenitor + Virus Breeding Ground x2 is nuts. If and when virus counters are purged, you can spend just two clicks to put your Hivemind back up to three, which does a ridiculous number of things, to name a few:
1. Brings Medium and Nerve Agent up to three cards per access, which already makes for quality central runs.
2. Brings Darwin up to strength 3, 4 if you pumped him at the beginning of your turn. Strength 4 Darwin is good enough to handle most relevant ICE, although that may change with the space ICE from Weyland. Still, it's good value for only two clicks, plus Darwin can go up to strength 7 on the next turn if the Runner doesn't purge for just two more clicks and a credit.
3. Triggers Chakana's ability of upping the advancement requirement of all agendas. Having three of these out on a Djinn is not only good MU management, but it totally hamstrings a fast advancing Corp, if not slowing every other Corp to a crawl.
4. Revives Imp and Gravedigger for trashing more stuff.
5. Pumps up Gorman Drip for economy. Gorman Drip is considered to have all the virus counters Hivemind has (plus whatever Gorman Drip gets on its own); when Gorman Drip is trashed for money, Hivemind still retains all of its virus counters, but you still get the money you would have gotten if they were on Gorman Drip.
6. If Grimoire is installed, it allows for a freshly installed Parasite to kill any ICE with strength 4 or less. This is especially good for R&D locks or if your Darwin has to deal with big ICE protecting a remote. Plus, if the Runner doesn't purge again, you can effectively put three more counters on Parasite on your next turn. This is even more brutal with Clone Chip.
The only pieces you need to draw for this to work are the breeding grounds and Progenitor. Everything else you can tutor for with Djinn.
Disembow1280 I've messed around with deck concept that you're referring to and agree that it's pretty strong once it gets going. Hivemind is pretty beastly for the reasons that you described, but it's expensive and requires a lot of pieces to come together. I have a couple of questions:
1) How do you pay for all of that stuff? I've seen a few versions playing Personal Workshop and even some with Stimhack as well to help install of the programs needed to "lock down" the game. I'm not sure I really like that idea but haven't seen an appealing alternative. I've liked Noise for quite a while because the Cache + Aesop's engine makes a lot of money, but it seems like this deck won't have enough influence to do this properly. Is there a way that we could integrate some of the Hivemind stuff and preserve the basic economy of the Cacheshop deck?
2) You said that we need to draw Breeding Grounds x2, Progenitor, and Djinn. Do you have a preferred way to do that? I've Had Worse seems pretty good but is that enough? Looking at Cacheshop, we have Inject. I don't see that working too well in the Hivemind deck. Thoughts?
3) If we're playing Chakana x3, what's the rest of the influence look like? Let's say at least one Gorman Drip for the play that you mentioned. That gives us eight to spend on Clone Chip, Aesop's, or Cache. Something's gotta give here. Clone Chip is definitely the best of the three, right? It seems to me that it might be worth considering cutting one or two of the Chakanas to get more of the out of faction economy stuff.
Here's what I'm thinking: all this Hivemind stuff sounds great, but is there a good way that we could integrate it as smaller package into existing Cache + Aesop's style Noise decks?
Hey, thanks for the reply. Here are a few thoughts regarding your points:
1. Money will admittedly be tight, especially early on. Seeing a turn 1 Sure Gamble is probably our best bet, but cards like Day Job will give us a good boost for a strong next turn, and with our use of Progenitor, Data Folding can give us some decent drip econ. After that, standard Cache + Aesop's sprinkled with a little Deja Vu is our main source of continual income. Still working on better economy.
2. I completely agree that Inject is no good here; since the majority of a Noise deck is programs, everything we had would be trashed. I've Had Worse is a game changer for Anarch, so that fits here, but another really good card draw source is Wyldside. Sure we lose a click, but after drawing two cards during the time of the game when we need to prep our rig with the right cards, do we really lose it? The only problem here is our hand will get full fast and cards will have to be pitched; recursion like Deja Vu and Clone Chip help out a lot here. Plus, after we have all the cards we need, we can pawn off Wyldside for more money.
3. Actually, having two Chakana out over three seems to have a similar effect on the board state now that I think about it. We could run 2x Chakana, 2x Aesops, and 3x Cache as our core. 1x Clone Chip could work with all the card draw we have, but I only see it as a situational means of recurring a Parasite for key ICE destruction in the middle of a run; we could swap it out for another Aesop's, depending on meta. Cutting Gorman Drip and one Cache could give us another chip, but that digs way too deep into our already streaky economy. The final influence point is on Hades Shard for a late game all-in plunge into Archives. After all, Hades Shard is the only proven method to trump Jackson Howard.
The optimal starting hand would be Sure Gamble, Wyldside, Aesop's, Grimoire, and Djinn. We can live without Sure Gamble and Grimoire (and Aesop's ever-so-slightly), but mulligan if we don't see Wyldside and/or Djinn. We need immediate card draw and a way to tutor for Cache (among other viruses) to set up our early game. Virus Breeding Ground and Progenitor are nice to see, but we can always draw for those when we feel obligated to depending on the board state and when we need Hivemind out to slow the game down. A turn one Hades Shard is huge, but it's not the card to chase.
I'll be the first to admit that this kind of deck requires a BOATLOAD of luck and methodical card management to pull off. Seven out of ten games have the probability of being brutal losses, but it's those three games during which everything comes together and not even infinite virus purges can stop us.
Willingdone Here's my attempt at the deck construction. It's still in its alpha stages:
Identity
Noise: Hacker Extraordinaire (Core Set)
Event (12)
3x Déjà Vu (Core Set)
3x Day Job (Order and Chaos)
3x I've had worse (Order and Chaos)
3x Sure Gamble (Core Set)
Hardware (3)
1x Cyberfeeder (Core Set)
2x Grimoire (Core Set)
Icebreaker (1)
1x Darwin (Future Proof)
Program (17)
3x Djinn (Core Set)
1x Medium (Core Set)
2x Parasite (Core Set)
1x Imp (What Lies Ahead)
1x Gravedigger (Order and Chaos)
1x Hivemind (Order and Chaos)
2x Progenitor (Order and Chaos)
1x Gorman Drip v1 (Opening Moves) •
3x Cache (The Spaces Between) • • •
2x Chakana (Creation and Control) •• ••
Resource (12)
3x Wyldside (Core Set)
2x Virus Breeding Ground (Order and Chaos)
1x Hades Shard (First Contact) •
3x Data Folding (Order and Chaos)
3x Aesop's Pawnshop (Core Set) •• •• ••
Total Cards: 45
Total Influence: 15
www.acoo.net
Seeing as Clone Chip is too situational for consistent success, I switched it out for a third Aesop's.
Disembow1280 I like some of the ideas of your list but think that it's going to be a big problem that we basically can't run. We don't have a solution to even the most basic ICE other than "sorcery speed" Parasite and one very slow breaker. I'd like to see the deck focus more on the "traditional" Noise shell with the Hivemind + Chakana thing as a mid to late game option. The biggest strength of Noise IMO is that he can get "free accesses" from his ID ability. This makes it much easier to close out a game after scoring a few points early on.
Clone Chip rules. I don't think I could bring myself to go lower than 2. It's so essential against ICE like Komainu (with Parasite) and makes the Cache-Shop thing go a lot smoother. It also makes Inject playable. I've had a lot of good experiences with Inject in Noise mainly because the Programs aren't what we want to draw early game while the non-Programs are. I've Had Worse + Inject is good enough without Wyldside IMO. Clone Chip also makes Datasucker a lot more appealing with Parasite.
Addressing some of your points in light of the above:
1. It's okay for money to be tight if what we're doing is cheap. This is part of the reason that I want to relegate the Hivemind stuff to the Plan B. Cache-Shop + Cyberfeeder + 1 or 2 other economy cards has been enough in my experience as long as we're not looking to install a lot of expensive programs to the table.
2. We should try to play Inject. I don't think it's worth cutting it to make other stuff work. It's so good at find the critical cards like Aesop's, Cyberfeeder, etc at the stage of the game where they matter most: turns 1 and 2. We really want to get Cache + Shop going ASAP and Inject facilitates that. It's a lot better than Wyldside IMO.
3. Is it even necessary to have access to two Chakanas? Isn't one good enough to deal with the decks that it's really good against? I can see the appeal of locking the game down with multiples, but it seems better to use it as a speed bump. While it's still very possible for Fast Advance decks to score under one Chakana, it's going to slow them down if we can do it reliably enough in the mid game. I really think we need to play as many Clone Chips as possible, and Chakana is the only wiggle room.
I've been messing around with this influence package:
3x Clone Chip
2x Aesop's Pawnshop
3x Cache
1x Chakana
No Hades Shard sucks, but I'd rather lose it than Clone Chip or Cache. Not sure how to fit it in the deck.
One more thought about the Hivemind prison thing:
Progenitor doesn't do a lot for us without Hivemind. Rather than making Purging really hard for the Corp, why not focus on capitalizing on the tempo swing of a Purge? Making the deck more run-oriented will help with this. That means more breakers and more extensive use of Parasite.
Here's a basic idea of what I'm proposing. Obviously, there are some big strategical differences in our two decks.
Noise: Hacker Extraordinaire (Core Set)
Event (9)
3x Déjà Vu (Core Set)
3x I've Had Worse (Order and Chaos)
3x Inject (Up and Over)
Hardware (7)
3x Clone Chip (Creation and Control) ••••• •
2x Cyberfeeder (Core Set)
2x Grimoire (Core Set)
Resource (7)
2x Aesop's Pawnshop (Core Set) ••••
3x Daily Casts (Creation and Control)
2x Virus Breeding Ground (Order and Chaos)
Icebreaker (2)
1x Crypsis (Core Set)
1x Darwin (Future Proof)
Program (20)
3x Cache (The Spaces Between) •••
1x Chakana (Creation and Control) ••
3x D4v1d (The Spaces Between)
2x Datasucker (Core Set)
3x Djinn (Core Set)
1x Hivemind (Order and Chaos)
2x Imp (What Lies Ahead)
1x Medium (Core Set)
1x Nerve Agent (Cyber Exodus)
3x Parasite (Core Set)
15 influence spent (max 15)
45 cards (min 45)
Cards up to Order and Chaos
Willingdone Strategy differences aside, I'll admit this decklist is much more versatile than mine; perhaps I got starstruck by the potential of Hivemind that it disrupted my deckbuilding fundamentals. I forgot that this is Netrunner, not "Never"-runner, heh.
1. Daily Casts is okay for drip econ, and it's an attractive pawning target when it has two credits left, but I do like a little bit of burst econ when we need a big run on a scoring server. Maybe a singleton Kati Jones would work, or would that be a momentum killer?
2. Now THAT was the solution that was fleeting me with Inject: Clone Chip. If we trash a program we need, we just recur it. If any of those are viruses, we just Deja Vu. Wow, I can't believe I missed that. Again, I blame Hivemind.
3. There has to be some sort of math to do to gauge how many Chakana would be the most ideal in different situations in different Corp matchups. For simplicity's sake, I'm willing to concede that the influence spent on 3x Clone Chip over 3x Chakana is the more powerful move, though.
As for Progenitor, we need it (at least on Hivemind) because of Virus Breeding Grounds's requisite that we can only move virus counters on VBG to another virus program with at least one virus counter already on it. If we get purged and Hivemind has no counters on it, Hivemind becomes a dead card which takes a finite amount of resources to get back up and running without Progenitor. A Progenitor'd Hivemind also helps with keeping Crypsis active in case of an emergency, if that adds any more weight to the argument.
I'll be playtesting these two decks throughout the coming week, but I'm pretty convinced your list has the edge, regardless of meta (except for maybe Swordsman; that ICE is coming back with a vengeance ever since Eater/Keyhole became a thing :P).
Kit with Paintbrush and Tinkering with Spooned is pretty fun to play.
I want to get in to netrunner, and play anarch. Would this, and the core set be enough for start?
+darmamu It would be a very, very good start. From there, you'd probably want to seek out a few packs based on your choice of Anarch ID. But with just Core + Order and Chaos, you'll have a pretty flexible pool of Anarch cards to draw from.
Great video! Gonna send this to my friend, her favorites were anarchs and Weyland (she loves to "burn down your house"), so she'll love this release.
By the way, how is archives accessed again (I'm a newbie)? You mentioned it but for example if there are traps there can I normally just choose not to access them and get punished? I always thought you access all the cards whether you want to or not. Guess that seems silly.
Prothope Thanks! I hope she likes it! I've been having a lot of fun with Order and Chaos.
With Archives access, the Runner turns all of the cards face up and then choose the order to access them. You're right that the Runner must access all of the cards. The only exception is if the Runner wins the game during the accessing. So if the Archives has seven points of agendas and some nasty traps, the Runner can access the agendas first, winning the game before the traps matter.
In the first video, I mentioned that the new Gagarin ID adds an "additional cost" to remote server access. Whenever a player needs to pay an additional cost, he or she can decline to do so. So in that case, if there is a Snare and a rezzed SanSan City Grid in a Gagarin remote, the Runner can choose to pay the additional cost to access SanSan and decline the additional cost on Snare. Without the additional cost, he or she would be forced to access both like you said.
Wow, thanks for the clarification! That really helps. Netrunner can seem overwhelming when new stuff comes out that changes the meta, your videos are very high quality, educational, and I look forward to them. Thanks and keep up the good work! :D
I honestly think you are underrating MaxX. Too me she seems to be built to be super aggressive. It’s possible she’s the second fastest runner after Andy. Possibly. Lol.
I’m not as excited about Valencia. Bad pub is great. But Elizabeth Mills counters that. And a 50 card minimum deck sucks to be frank about it. Five more cards is a big hit to your consistency. I do think she’s cool though, and she will inspire some sweet deck building ideas. But I feel she is going to have to prove herself.
All said and done though, good review man. Keep up the good work!
Seth Dortch Very possible. I think MaxX is probably faster than Andy in a lot of situations. I don't think that Andy's main thing is that she's blazing fast; it's that she's consistently the same (pretty quick) speed. I'll admit that I haven't played with MaxX a whole lot, but I find it hard to believe that she'll achieve anything like Andy's consistency.
I'm mostly excited about Valencia because she will force Corp players to take Bad Pub seriously. I agree that she's going to spur a bunch of exciting deckbuilding. I'm not totally sure she'll end up in the tier 1, but I think she's got a lot of neat tools to mess around with.
Thanks for watching!
Showing off has won me many games because of how popular daily business show is right now. I score more agendas in this meta because they always send agendas to the bottom of the deck. It a meta card
John Gawboy That's an interaction that I hadn't thought of. Good call! I've seen a lot of decks playing Daily Business Show lately.
Thank you VERY MUCH for your videos. Great job! Like to see more analytic from you.
Brafgard Thanks for watching!
Thanks for the review. Here are a few notes (and disagreements):
- I think you're underestimating MaxX's ability. My MaxX deck is 7-0; she comes out of the gate swinging because she draws so fast. I don't need to include any draw cards in her deck because her innate ability gets me more draw power than I'll ever need, which of course frees up deck slots. Also, her trash should almost be seen as a secondary grip. It's a sideboard full of tools you can use at any time. Being able to Retrieval Run out big breakers like Femme and Morning Star is incredible, and Deja Vu remains one of the best, most flexible recursion cards in the game. My MaxX is very event based, so Same Old Things do wonders as well. She runs at an incredibly brutal pace, giving her a speed on par with Andy, but in a much more anarchy/destructive way. In Anarch, because of their recursion ability, trashing 2 cards and drawing 1 card is almost like drawing 3 cards at the beginning of your turn. Going through your deck that fast is immeasurable.
- Amped Up is incredibly strong, especially when combined with a Wanton Destruction run. Getting 6 clicks pretty much guarantees you'll trash their entire hand, and can allow room for a follow up run on Archives in most cases. It also allows you to use a Day Job for a big econ boost and still have 2 clicks for running. It's in the same suite as Stimhack; it's incredibly powerful, but if you're a player that hates taking that brain damage, you'll probably never play it. Personally, I maintain that taking 1 or 2 brain damage during the course of the game isn't a big deal, especially if it secures a win. I keep 2 copies in my Maxx deck and it has led to many Wanton victories.
Dan Marshall RE: MaxX
Quick quibble: no extra draw effects? So you don't play Inject or I've Had Worse? Even if we have disagreements about the strength of MaxX's ability, I find that a bit strange.
More to your point:
I agree that MaxX's main strength is that she can use the Heap as a sort of secondary Grip, but it isn't the same as a secondary Grip. The MaxX decks I've seen have three cards that interact in this way: Deja Vu, Same Old Thing, and Retrieval Run. That means you need to have the right one of those and have the card you need to get back in the Heap. Admittedly, that's not terribly difficult to do, but it's not as good as a second Grip. I get that it's nice to have access to a lot of cards, but that's something other decks can do with less risk e.g. Shapers.
As I've said elsewhere in these comments, I think MaxX is probably going to be faster than Andy. That said, she's got a lot of weaknesses that Andy doesn't have. I'm not sold that faster = better.
It seems to me that the biggest strengths of MaxX are actually the other good Anarch stuff: Eater + Keyhole, Wanton Destruction, draw effects, etc. Like I said in the review, I don't think she's terrible or unplayable. In fact, I think she's pretty good. I'm just not sure that MaxX is the best way to build around the cards I just mentioned. I don't see Retrieval Run as a huge argument in favor of her, and the other recursion stuff is going to work well is basically every Anarch deck.
I don't think any of us have tested this stuff enough to know "for sure." Based on my instincts and my limited experience with her, I see MaxX being really popular for a few months and then everyone going back to Noise or doing the same basic thing with Quetzal or Valencia. I wouldn't mind being wrong about this, since MaxX represents a type of aggression that's truly new to the game.
RE: Amped Up
Yeah there's a nice interaction between Amped Up and Wanton Destruction, but I don't see it being necessary in most cases. I agree that it doesn't matter that much to take 1-2 brain damage against non-flatline decks. If you're playing a really aggressive deck like MaxX, I can see playing a couple copies of Amped Up for some of the reasons you described.
Thanks for watching and the good discussion!
Willingdone
Referring to the draw in my MaXx deck, no it really doesn't need any additional draw power. I had 3x I've Had Worse in it, but I never actually played them. Getting two cards into your trash and one card into your hand for 0 clicks every turn is a HUGE draw engine. Over my many games (10 or so as of writing this comment) with my MaXx deck, I'll maybe Click to draw a single card 3-4 times a game. And to me, that's acceptable. I'd rather use 3-4 Clicks a game on drawing rather than waste precious card slots on draw cards, especially when there are so many other useful tools to include. That's really the style of the deck (as well as my personal playstyle). The deck itself has so many options that makes it not only fast, but flexible. And I'm not a player that wastes a million Clicks searching for that one card I want. I go with the flow of what's in my hand, and the tools MaxX has allows me to do that easily. Personally, I took out 1 I've Had Worse (still like 2 in there for the damage protection) and I'd never add Inject. If you haven't played a MaxX deck yet, I highly recommend giving it a shot. In theory, it sounds like you'd need more draw power, but in practice, you'll definitely find this isn't the case. MaxX goes through her deck quite fast.
I can see your point though about MaxX's main strengths being Anarch strengths in general (Eater, Wanton, Keyhole, whatnot). However, MaxX is more about the style in which you use those combos and how you set it up. Her innate draw is going to allow her to get her RIG set up faster and her trashing allows her to get more options out on the table. Think of it this way. On Turn 1, Edward Kim starts with 5 Cards in hand and 0 in the trash. On Turn 1, MaxX starts with 6 Cards in hand and 2 in the trash. Right off the bat, you've seen 3 more cards than Edward Kim. MaxX's recklessness actually makes her more consistent in a sense. Let's say Edward has 5 cards in hand, none of which he wants to play; in order to get more options, he needs to spend clicks/cards drawing, which definitely isn't a guarantee as that draw could come up empty. MaxX however, as the turns fly by is gifted with more and more options through her constantly growing trash. By Turn 2, without spending a single Click, she's seen 6 extra cards; 2 of which are in her hand. With nothing but a single Deja Vu in your Grip that is insanely dangerous for the Corp. Again, this is something that may not make itself apparent from reading the game text on her card, but through actually playing her identity, you'll quickly notice how much less "blind" you feel. I can safely say I'd rather KNOW that my Account Siphon is buried in my trash rather than have it floating around in my deck with no reasonable way to tutor for it. The faster you get things into your hand OR trash, the faster you can use them in the game, rather than spending clicks hopelessly drawing.
As far as Amped Up goes, I don't think the question should ever be "Is this card good?" but rather "Is this card going to be great in a few decks?" The game has come far enough that I don't think Fantasy Flight WANTS to make any blatantly "good" cards anymore. It's the very reason they said they've been doing different things with breakers other than pure "pay to boost, pay to break" which can easily be compared through math. They want to expand the game horizontally, not vertically, and ensure that players can't straight up say "Mathematically X is more efficient than Y". I don't think we'll ever get another Sure Gamble or Jackson Howard (aka a card that will be in EVERY deck). I think FFG is going to go to great pains to avoid that. So trying to find if Amped Up is a good card is a bit moot; it's obviously not meant to be in every deck or fit every playstyle. But I can personally attest (after using at least 1 in nearly every MaxX game I've played) that it creates incredible opportunities, especially in a meta where the Runner's Clicks are so precious (since Corps are so damn fast with such taxing ICE). Like I said, it will never be "good" in all decks, but it WILL be great in a few decks! And I think that's the direction Netrunner needs to go.
Also, I agree, great discussion. Let me know what your thoughts are!
You should do more publicizing of your videos. They are very well done, but people need to discover that it exist.
Edvando Filho Thanks! Do you have any ideas of how I should go about that? I've spent a fair amount of time working on the videos, but I agree that I could do more to promote them.
Willingdone I'm not a specialist in this, but I see a lot of people posting in Reddit, forum and sometimes other youtube videos, trying to expose their channel. Just don't look like a spam and you will do fine. If you comment in somebody else video, you have to say something pertinent to the video and link one of your videos that is also relevant.
Edvando Filho Good advice, but advice I'm already following. I'm post 16 on r/Netrunner right now. Reddit has been a big source of new viewers for me. I also link my videos on Boardgamegeek. I had one video on Stimhack.com as well.
I'd like to get more active on social media. I definitely haven't done much with Twitter, Facebook, or Google+.
Thanks for the suggestion! If you think of anything else, let me know.
What are your thoughts on MaxX now that the meta has had time to shape competent MaxX decks?
Wolven Spirit Aatami The core idea of most MaxX decks is good, but I'm still not convinced by the choice of ID. We really need more stuff that works with the Heap before I'm totally sold.
In my opinion, you can do almost everything the MaxX decks can do with Quetzal or Reina and have better matchups against certain popular decks. The appeal of MaxX overlaps with the appeal of the rest of the new Anarch tools. I think that the community largely chose MaxX as the vehicle for testing these tools. In the near future, I envision several decks, each taking an aspect of the new Anarch stuff and focusing on it extensively. Not all of these will be best as MaxX but some will. MaxX's ability really helps with consistency and run pressure, but Quetzal does Icebreaking much better than MaxX and is less reliant on Eater. E3 + David is really good, especially in a metagame rife with Blue Sun. Reina does denial better than MaxX. She has a lot of appeal against decks with fragile economy like most Flatline and FA decks. All of these IDs have a lot of ground to cover exploring the new options in Order and Chaos.
Order and Chaos was a big deal. MaxX is a decent addition, but I've Had Worse, Day Job, Eater, Amped Up, Wanton Destruction, The Silverware, and Vigil freaking rule. I'm careful to not to conflate these cards' success with MaxX's. Anarch just got a massive stim in the arm, and we've yet to fully feel the effects. It's too early to tell RE: MaxX in my opinion.
That said, I feel that I downplayed the strengths of her ID in my review. The draw thing is very nice, really helping you to keep the pressure on. You have unparalleled information about your cards since you see three new ones every turn. I imagine her getting better over time as more cards are released that interact with the Heap.
Also Gravedigger + Incubator + Hades Shard = Bad times for the corp. I think the Runner's won this box!
Seth Dortch Agreed. My head says that Runner's got the better part of the box, but my heart says WEYLAND GLACIER.
Incubator + hivemind + grimoire + personal workshop is The most brutal thing you can imagine. Darwin and parásites in workshop, and do and unique run Of 10 to 20 cards. Add demolition run and forked up to that final turn. Hivemind is Probably the best card Of all expansión
titonosfe It certainly seems strong, but I worry that the setup will take too long. That's a lot of credits and drawing to get everything in play. Not impossible, just difficult. Hivemind is certainly powerful and cool. I hope you're right, and we see it in competitive play if just for the sake of variety.
Willingdone yeah maybe the bloody fast avance is a problem (imho fa neh is killing the things i love from this game) but in my experience That deck had more troubles With PE than fast advance.
I'm curious to know what you think about the "Punk rock" deck linked below. Most interesting MaxX deck I personally seen yet.
boardgamegeek.com/thread/1312563/punk-rock
Zhab80 I think that's a really interesting deck concept that I would never take to a tournament. It seems like that type of deck that does a lot cool, powerful things but has blatant weakness (like PE, as several mentioned). I really like the deck as a thought experiment, but I worry that it would lack consistency and have near unwinnable matchups.
I like it conceptually and the deck's creator certainly has an innovator's mind, but I'm not sure we'll need to reinvent the wheel to make these new cards work.
That said, I'm anxious to see revisions of this concept as well as other innovative ideas involving MaxX.
It's funny how I see people being very excited about Day Job, even though I never really understood why it would be better than, say, Liberated Accounts. Especially in MaxX (and many other decks) taking the whole turn to get money worth of 2/click just isn't as good as having less (or same) value with more flexibility. I never graded Day Job really high, and hated playing it once I did. Even people in NetrunnerDB have started talking it might not be AS good as people said it would be. Then again, it still hasn't been so long into experimenting with the whole box, so maybe I'll be proven wrong and it actually is such a god card people insist. Thus far I haven't been sold.
Peetu Makkonen I generally agree with your point but with some additional context: both Liberated Account and Day Job are quite good, but I don't see them as being totally comparable. Each has advantages/disadvantages based on the other cards in your deck/your general strategy. For example, Day Job is probably better if you have ways to gain clicks or Prepaid. Liberated Account is probably better if you're not going to get tagged or play Supplier.
Another huge difference is the up front cost. Day Job gets you from poor to moderately rich. Liberated Account usually gets you from some money to more money. The initial six to play can be a big disadvantage. Likewise, forcing a whole turn click investment all at once can be a big disadvantage for Day Job.
It seems to me like these cards fit somewhat different styles. It's hard to say which one is better without context. I'm just excited that Anarchs are getting new economy options that don't totally suck.
Willingdone I very much agree with that they indeed fill different roles. And it is always great to have more variety in card pools to construct decks with different kind of pacing.
Prepaid and additional clicks are definitely boons for Day Job, but clicks are kind of wonky to get access to, and prepaids will not generally pay themselves back until later on in the game. But, yes, they do help Day Job. :)
I was thinking about the front cost. This is something that should be taken into consideration when planning for strategies. To be fair, I have found myself recently actually clicking for credits just to install Liberated Accounts, and click to refill my credit pool... So, the value isn't exactly much off from Day Job. I do get a few clicks worth of credits 'safe' though. Sometimes its better to have credits scattered instead of having everything in the pool.
What I am surprised about is how excited people have been about Day Job. If I were to argue it's actually bad compared to other options I think I would have to slap myself for being wrong and too straightforward, but it definitely isn't much better than the alternatives. :)
I will need to experiment with Day Job with Stimdealer and Rachel though...
Anyways, even though I disagree with some notions, that doesn't undermine the excellent work you've done with the reviews. Nice work mate, and keep it up!
Hive mind is amazeballs!!
Havicc Brine Can't argue with that! xD
You should look at this Noise Hivemind decklist. It may change your feelings towards this card:
-> netrunnerdb.com/en/decklist/14677/can-o-whupass
The obvious conclusion is, that it's not that strong on cards that use up counters, instead it's very effective on permanent effects like Chakana. And that is a really good one, especially for the playstyle of Noise.
TheSyn1cal Chakana seems like the best use of Hivemind, and I wish I mentioned it in my review. That list has some potential. I like the idea but am not sure about a few of the card choices. Is Virus Breeding Ground really that good? I understand that we need to get the counters from somewhere, but that thing seem so clunky and awkward.
Here's my thing: if we're playing Chakana and friends, we don't have enough influence for Clone Chip. Clone Chip is amazing in so many ways, not the least of which is recurring D4V1D's and Parasites. The deck that you posted not only doesn't play Clone Chip for mid-run Parasite/D4V1D, it doesn't even play Parasite and D4V1D! I find it hard to accept an Anarch deck without those, at least for the conceivable future.
I really like what the deck is trying to do, but I don't see how we're going to be able to make relevant runs. What does this deck do against very common large ICE? Even a single rezzed Tollbooth/Archer/pick something big seems impossible. What is our plan against Flatline? It seems like a dedicated Tag and Bag would run this deck over. I'm not even sure we'd be able to beat PE consistently. I can imagine slow advancing House of Knives behind basically any ICE as a viable play, even with multiple Chakanas going.
I really think if we could incorporate this idea into a more standard Noise list, it would be a lot better. I haven't played the list you posted, obviously, so I could be wrong. But I generally don't like decks that are weak at running.
Also, that deck description is hilarious.
Willingdone Haven't played this either, just saw the list on netrunnerdb and thought it was a great idea. Slow setup, but otherwise petty nice. VBG, good or not, is obv. needed in here, since you can get new counters onto Hivemind after a purge for two clicks and you'll be at full Chakana denial again. This deck needs some serious testing, it's really not that easy to understand the impact just by seeing the decklist. It's just so different.