Shushing ICE for Self-Defence

znsolomon 449

This is the deck I've taken to the Nottingham and Aldershot regionals (and hopefully will take to Cambridge!), finishing with a 5-3 record in both tournaments combined. Unfortunatley I was let down by some pretty shaky corp play (a combined 2-5 in corp games) and didn't make the cut, but I'm sure I'll get there one of these days!

Self-Defence continues to be absolutely fantastic (I've been playing this archetype for quite a while now), and even better in a meta full of easy HB prey. Shoutout to Cobrabubbles for being the only HB player to realise what I was up to and slow down enough to make the game a tight thing, although I managed to clutch it out on a hail-mary R&D run the turn before my aumakua got purged.

In terms of changes since last time, Hush has 2 main targets: Border Controls on HQ, and Anansi basically anywhere. Unfortunately, Hush against Ob has the tricky situation of the BC just getting Extracted, so save it for an explosive play. The real star is Leech however, that card is fantastic! It gets charged up early on, and it lets you slap down a turtle and start running immediately. We also have one mad dash for punitive matchups, although it is also great for challenging Ikawah project using your swift click.

This deck absolutely rules, and there's no way I'm abandoning it any time soon. Happy running, and feel free to ask me any questions in the comments!

3 comments
30 Aug 2024 AlPi

The deck is awesome! I do think Manuel never survives when you're tagged. I would fit in a Deep Dive instead. Also Carpe Diem is super good with Swift. I'm surprised its not in the deck.

31 Aug 2024 AceEmpress

Speaking from experience watching and playing against it, it's way harder than you'd think for the corp to afford trashing Manuel without giving up enough tempo that the runner is happy, and the extra accesses and Zahya cash add up so quickly. Deep Dive, in comparison, would be way too much of a dead draw too often - this deck is constantly pivoting targets and putting pressure on and trying to close out the game and relying on boomerang over a full suite. If it ever could have landed a Deep Dive it's probably already in a winning position without it (even before the inf cost.)

31 Aug 2024 znsolomon

Carpe Diem is a good card don't get me wrong, but I like dirty laundry a lot more to be able to target servers specifically. I'm not sure what else I'd cut for carpe diem is the thing.

And yes, Manuel will get trashed, but you don't care, you just keep applying pressure. If you're on top of it enough, you can use the corp's spending of resources to attack their weak spots. You can also get the second Manuel down for a surprise burst of accesses and cash later on.