NBN - Late Night Infomercial

Everyone knows the power of economics in Netrunner. And this may be a deck that is actually... competitive, if we can get the goal off the ground. Might need some tweaking for that.

So the 'Thing' That NBN is good at, is Traces. Weyland has Meat Damage and Advance-able Ice, Jinteki has Traps and Net Damage and Psi, Haas-Bioroid has Brain Damage and Click Gaining... Well NBN Has Tags and economics - And by Economics I mean Closed Accounts.

But I also mean Traces.

See, a Trace is only scary if the runner 1) Can't break it on an ICE and 2) Is actually afraid of it going off. Most people know that when you play NBN, there will be a point you get tagged, and just play around it. So they stop paying for most of the traces you usually see, preparing for the ineveitable Psycho Beale if that can be pulled off, or Closed Accounts for a scoring window.

But what if we adapted that to make it all scary, so that the Runner must always be broke? Opening up many many many more scoring windows as the Runner has to regain credits?

NBN - Late Night Infomercials

NBN: Making News (Core Set)

Agenda (9)
3x AstroScript Pilot Program (Core Set)
3x Character Assassination (Opening Moves)
3x Restructured Datapool (What Lies Ahead)

Asset (8)
1x Aggressive Secretary (Core Set) ••
2x City Surveillance (Mala Tempora)
2x Jackson Howard (Opening Moves)
3x Marked Accounts (Cyber Exodus)

Upgrade (4)
2x Bernice Mai (Humanity's Shadow)
2x Red Herrings (Core Set)

Operation (7)
3x Closed Accounts (Core Set)
3x Hedge Fund (Core Set)
1x Power Shutdown (Mala Tempora) ••

Barrier (6)
2x Bastion (Creation and Control)
2x Paper Wall (Mala Tempora)
2x Wall of Static (Core Set)

Code Gate (5)
2x Pop-up Window (Cyber Exodus)
2x Tollbooth (Core Set)
1x Viktor 2.0 (Creation and Control) •••

Sentry (10)
2x Archer (Core Set) ••••
1x Caduceus (What Lies Ahead) ••
2x Data Hound (Humanity's Shadow)
2x Flare (Future Proof)
1x Ichi 1.0 (Core Set) ••
2x Muckraker (Second Thoughts)

Deck built on NetrunnerDB.


The only way Trace's remain scary is if they actually have a purpose for that trace firing. As a lot of Trace is on ICE, those Traces become not so scary (or even noteworthy) if they can just be broken without firing. So there is a lot of Program destruction in this deck - we have to keep them out of the Breakers so they can't get through. Drop those Corroders/ Fracters first - because the Barriers are the decks main ETR ice, but dont forget things like Magnum Opus - the goal  of this deck is to regularly bankrupt the runner.

Which means throwing those Trace's becomes a very complicated game. You don't (most times) want to just blow the runner out of the water with credits and make it impossible for him to pay for it. Sure on Flare, that is a great idea. 2 cards out of hand and some hardware? Rockin. But on Muckracker? Unless you really need the run to end, you actually want him to be paying to beat the traces. It's more expensive. Muckracker is a perfect example of the idea of this deck. Pay the Tax (Buy this awesome thing on this late night infomercial for only 7 payments of 19.99!) or you don't get in.

So it becomes a game itself - how much do you spend on this Trace? You want to leave it in the realm for the runner to beat, but you need a reason for him to think he has to beat it. It's a Shell game - much like Jinteki traps, but on a different level - and a level many Runners probably won't be thinking about.

Psychographics is not in this deck, and neither is Midseasons. If you drop a butload of tags on the runner at once, they stop paying to prevent tags. Plus we're pushing the Meta, and we've already seen the Midseasons > Psycho > Beale combo.

So I've included cards that give negative effects for those trace's hitting beyond just tags. Some as simple and understanding as Caduceus, some as scary as Viktor 2.0. A single hosted conter on him makes him scary if the runner ever suddenly finds themselves without cards... 2 or 3 is even more scary.

And so the Making News Identity is used because the goal is to bankrupt the runner, and making them spend 2 more (plus basically canceling out the base 1 Link of some runners) just helps in that. . Just like Account Siphon recursion decks goal is to keep the corp continually without credits, so too is this deck. Closed Accounts is obviously a workhorse here, and the single tag you need for that would be where you want to drop enough they can't fight it cause you're going to hit them next turn.

When using Flare, Carapace is obviously a target, but don't forget about stuff that gives reaccuring credits. The goal is to bankrupt the runner with a thousand little taxes, until they are out of burst economy and are forced to click for credits. And of course, Tag Punishment in the form of killing Kati, Daily Casts, Armitage, ect is extremely important.

Where to go from here?

Archived Memories could be a serious powerhouse in this deck, and maybe moving inf around for a second Viktor 2.0 would be scary. A second Aggressive Secretary would be nice to increase the chances of seeing it. Bad Pup removal might be considered (Veterans Program?) simply because free money is bad.

Will it Work? Doubt it. Will it cause you to think? I hope so.

(though I honestly feel this, so far, has the best chance of actually being competitive)