Blue True Control deck.

x3r0h0ur 8877

The plan of this deck is essentially to give the corp no way to protect itself. It plays in two phases.

Nutshell: It starts with an early agenda steal, and a logos install. If some ice get rezzed, fine, use e-shutdown and crescentus with overmind to derez the ice in preparation for phase 2. Once you have an agenda, build up money and dig for same old thing, blackmail, and frame job. If the corp scores, they've just given you frame job with logos. Begin the blackmail runs.

Phase 1: Phase 1 is the desperate attempts to get an agenda. Inside job HQ and RD to try to luck out. Do this at all costs, if you must, use an overmind to get in. If you get enough money to drop an interface, then do it, increase your chances of a score. Once you've scored your agenda and installed logos you're prepared for Phase 2. Phase 1 ends when you've frame job'ed the corp per above.

Phase2: The corp either removes the bad pub, or can't protect itself. So you begin building mutli access and commence R&D and HQ locking. The source didn't make the cut, so FA is a threat. Overmind protects for when you must run the remotes. Luckily there is room for E3 to help save OM counters. Iain's ability keeps you flush with credits working with Kati to power the OM. Use crescentus to keep ice derezzed. HQI and RDI allow you to sweep HQ and R&D with impunity with blackmail runs. You can use feint and inside job to shut down any ice that gets rezzed. This counters the only known blackmail counters, (OAI and BER, also amazon industrial). Planned assault and same old thing mean you have quick access to blackmail. Levy keeps the pain-train trolling.

Basically it removes ice like a blue/control deck removes creatures in magic.

31 comments
9 May 2014 Maximus

I like the idea, but I think you are making yourself vulnerable to scorch plays since you remove the rezzing of ice as a way to drain the corp credits and run no siphons. Basically you'll have the corp sitting on a ton of credits because of blackmail which could easily backfire. As an additional threat (again, you run multiaccess with a corp sitting on a pile of credits) you have snares to worry about.

9 May 2014 skydivingninja

I posted a deck with the same Blackmail/Frame Job engine a while back, but with a janky resource economy instead of what you have. Looks pretty sharp! I like the Feint/Shutdown combo. Don't know why I didn't think of it.

I also agree with Maximus that finding room for Account Siphon, boring as it sounds, would help against SEA source/Scorch. Not as worried about Snare. Jinteki seems to be devoting its ambushes to protecting archives these days with Shock! and Shi.kyu.

9 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

problem with siphon is they can rez ice. You could go to 3 plascretes or slot decoys I guess. -2 kati -1 HQI +2 hostage +1 decoy....

9 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

NACH + fall guy too but that takes up 6 slots that I don't want to lose.

Keep in mind you can keep loading kati, and you get 2cr per turn that you're ahead, so you should be pretty set on bucks.

9 May 2014 GreatGreedyGuts

Behind. You get 2cr per turn that the CORP has more APs scored than you've stolen.

9 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

Yea meant that typed the other.

10 May 2014 lolpaca

I like the idea! How come Frame Job is a 1-of when it's so critical to your game plan, what happens when it's hiding at the bottom of your stack?

10 May 2014 Dydra

Not enough money in this deck? u have like 6 econ cards :'\ do u think Stirling's ability can really save u 3 more econ cards?

10 May 2014 tacullu

Beautifully done, x3r0h0ur! It's like my CT Blackmail, but better!

10 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

Logos is your frame job tutor, that's why there's 3. The deck doesn't need nearly as much econ as a normal deck since you're not fighting through ice all game. You can possibly sit back and click Kati while blackmailing only.

I think some people are having a hard time grasping that this deck plays nothing like any other deck you've played. Which fits because iain is an ID like no other. I'm going to be play testing this now that my regional is over and I can have fun:P

10 May 2014 GPWK

My brother just put together a version of this deck, but found that stealing a Priority Req early allowed me to turtle and choose not to score things, effectively playing a Shell Game with Weyland:BWBI. It crippled his econ by not having Iain's drip until the last turn of the game.

11 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

you can dig for and use kati indefinitely if the corp doesn't make a move, clicking for credits is also an option. Unless its wombo combo weyland 2 plascretes should cover it if the hand size is a full 6. He also should have sold the PR as a frame job.

11 May 2014 Cancer Ace

Question: If you are playing against Weyland and they give themselves a bad pub, as was the case when I played against GPWK, do you still need to use Frame Job?

Other than that, I tossed the deck together and it worked beautifully, except for a few human errors. I am running down 2 Kati's and an HQI up two Hostages and a Decoy as you suggested to deal with Sea Scorch.

11 May 2014 lolpaca

d'oi, I missed Logos. Good stuff!

11 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

Is 2 kati's enough to find her in time? The deck is admittedly low on cash but I'd want kati in the first 10 cards or I'm sad. I'm half considering a sneakdoor beta just to help score that first agenda.

Obviously you don't need frame job if the corp already has a bad pub. I would just start setting up interfaces and not clue them in that you're only making blackmail runs.

I'm glad to know it's working for others. I'm definitely interested in hearing suggestions based on play testing.

11 May 2014 Cancer Ace

I haven't really had trouble getting Kati. The only games where I didn't manage to draw her or use Hostage to grab her I was losing agenda points wise, so Iain's ability boosted my economy far enough to help. Also, upon looking over my decklist I've apparently been running a 47 card deck, including 3 copies of Easy Mark which I have been planning on pulling since the economy in your list is stronger than it looks. Logos is also huge, giving you Kati early game or your HQIs and RDIs later game. I might tweak some more to fit my individual style, but right now I think this is the deck I may take to my weekly tournament this Thursday. Very fun to play, x3r0h0ur.

11 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

Cool, I post these decks not to show them off, but so that those of us who still want to have fun with the game still can do so. I'm glad to hear its fully functional. Let me know what changes you want to make after your weekly. I'm sure there's several revisions before this deck is remotely good.

12 May 2014 Baotus

How about Raymond Flint? Deck space is super-tight but it seems like he could really help out.

12 May 2014 GreatGreedyGuts

Something that I think isn't always appreciated is just how much Logos does to handle 2/1 and 3/1 agendas. 2/1s especially go from being super-irritating to something more readily managed, by giving you more tools to go to work with. Really liking the look of this.

12 May 2014 mplain

How about going the Activist Support way? You could find it with Logos, get Aesop with Hostage, maybe 1x Decoy too, or play 3x NACH. Would save you all the trouble with early aggression.

12 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

You're right you'd have to have decoy or NACH to get activist support up and running. Which is fine, if you want to run a hostage based econ set up. I would do 3 hostages, 3 calling in favors, 1 kati, 1 decoy and some fall guys, and cut where appropriate. It feels like it would be way more slots and quite a few pieces to come together, but it does ensure you can do it without stealing an agenda first. I'll evaluate that, but it feels more like a Reina Roja build.

My way feels more consistent, and if it absolutely must, it can play a little normal netrunner, breaking ice, derezing, attacking remotes, etc if it has to. The resource based way seems a little cumbersome to set up.

15 May 2014 Cancer Ace

So I took my slight variation, which I meant to fix before playing but forgot, to my weekly Netrunner tourney this week. I had my best record ever in a tournament there.

Round 1 I took on a NEXT Design Deck and really got put to the test. I had to Derez/trash Janus 1.0 on four separate occasions, but it managed. A couple things did go right for me right from the beginning, but he had a lot of stuff to rez his ICE even without my interaction and I still managed to take it on, including using Overmind to break one at a point. The crazy thing is, I know that the list I was using has issues, even compared to the one you've posted here, so the potential is definitely there.

So what I'm really saying is, thanks for the awesome deck concept, x3r0h0ur.

16 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

I'd you find the secret sauce that makes it pop, post it as derived from, I'm curious to see how it looks.

18 May 2014 mplain

Just played with your deck against Harmony Medtech with six 3-pointers, and it's probably the worst matchup ever. Logos will fire only one per game, and you can't steal half their agendas from HQ or R&D, while they cat get them with Fast Track. So basically the whole deck doesn't work unless you chance upon a very lucky Priority Requisition.

18 May 2014 mplain

The only hope is to use Shi.Kyu to play Frame Job, but if they know what you're doing they will never pay for it.

18 May 2014 x3r0h0ur

Yea that would be bad. Every deck has bad match ups. Doesn't that deck require a whole turn of a card sitting in a remote? How many layers of ice do they put down? Can't you just save an inside job and get in pretty easily? Drop the overmind and inside job, or run it, hit the ice, bounce, feint HQ, shutdown, inside job again. By the time the defenses are up that deep you should have had lots of chances to draw.

Just some thoughts, I'm not saying it works.

19 May 2014 mplain

Yeah, that's pretty much what I was doing: Inside Job + Emergency Shutdown. But they usually start scoring behind a 3 ice deep server, and they have enough money since I'm not playing Account Siphon (while they play Celebrity Gift). By that time I usually have accesed a couple The Future Perfects, but did't manage to steal...

23 Jun 2014 trafalco

@x3r0h0ur: If you get a chance, take a look at: netrunnerdb.com

It's another take on a Blackmail deck and would love your feedback!

17 Jul 2014 DaWarMage

I've been running this and I'm undefeated so far (tiny sample size), so it's going well. I did make some tweaks though:

-2 Feint -1 Inside Job -1 Planned Assault -1 Stimhack +3 Account Siphon +1 Sneakdoor Beta +1 Quality Time

So far I've never missed not having Feint. Overmind gets me through fine, with Inside Job, Sneakdoor, and Blackmail as backup. Still I'm tempted to try Feint just for fun.

I love Inside Job and Planned Assault, but my personal playstyle is to hold them for the right moment. If nothing presents itself they clutter my hand up. So I cut back to 2 each.

Account Siphon has been critical for my NBN FA matchup, which is very relevant in my meta. At least one win came off of Account Siphon.

I don't see where I'm supposed to use Stimhack with this deck. It may be inexperience talking, but credit shortage has not been an issue really. Maybe some of that is the extra econ and time from Siphon.

Really though, those are minor tweaks. I'm really running with this idea and loving it.

17 Jul 2014 x3r0h0ur

Cool, I'm glad other people are also getting it to work. I've had people tell me that the deck is shit and will never work. Good to know that guy was just an idiot.

I can see not needing feint, for me...,that and stimhack were cards added late once I had 40 cards and had all I 'needed' I use those cards as I call a pressure release valve. Meaning that if the parts aren't quite coming together, I can drop an overmind and stimhack a remote to get an agenda if needed. Or when you know you're on your last turn, stimhacking HQ and running R&D or the other way around to get those last big accesses.

Point being, you don't NEED to run it, they just fit semi-edge cases (ones that happen like every other game so is it really edge?), that I always hate to be stuck in. I'm curious if anyone else is playing it still

17 Jul 2014 Cancer Ace

For the record, I refuse to dismantle my build of this deck. I am continuously building new runner decks but I always keep this one together. In my experience, if I play it randomly one week with my local group it might never lose. If I then play it again the following week it will lose every game. I use it as my "backup" runner deck if a new build isn't coming together and for the occasional fun week.

It's also my all time favorite runner deck to play on OCTGN because it is so much simpler than playing any of my other runner decks out there.