DLeelaR (DLEE-lar)

spags 7955

image RTJ

“I guess DLR is still a thing, eh?” –rando JNETer

Have you been feeling down about the state that the Blue Team has been in lately? Sad that the Wireless Net Pavilion errata ruined your favourite way to ruin people's day?

Fret no longer.

I will start by crediting my inspirations. @cranked and @d1en both played Leela DLR at King of Servers, the ANRPC 128 person team tournament I ran at Worlds 2015. Their builds were probably different, but, the idea was the same. THEN, @crimsonwraith played me Round 1 at Worlds with Leela DLR. It was a sign.

I glanced at their builds, and liked what I saw, but, thought some moves could be made. Hence, this build.

Thoughts:

What to do

The deck is nice combination of pressure and veiled threats. Leela is an ability that shouldn't be taken lightly, firing for both thefts and scores. DLR increases the possibility of this occurring, making an installed card in a server quite the vulnerable target. The deck generally builds its board state, as Leela doesn't want a ton of unrezzed ICE. You can generally wait to reveal you are on DLR, setting up with non-DLR Resources first. However, due to Faust, DDoS, and Siphon, early Siphons and other aggression are welcome. However, JNET testing (I put in at least 60 games with this there; I know, JNET is not a good indicator of quality.dec) showed severe hesitation, giving plenty of setup time, esp. v. non-NEHFA. When the score is 0-0, and the Corp is under 25 cards, you feel really good about your chances.

Onto the cards.

Events

Pretty standard stuff. There was some flux here. I decided to go with 1 Special Order and 2 Faust. I rarely played Special Order, so I felt dropping to 1 was fine. It can be used to find that special breaker, if needed. Legwork was added after I tried the deck in a SC, as it needed something else v. Yellow. I got to game point v. both I lost to, but, couldn’t close (no Siphons one game; no DLR the other).

Easy Mark over Gamble is easy. Drugs frequently drive you to zero creds, and a Mark fuels your most important tools (Inside Job, DDoS, Faust, breakers).

Speaking of, Inside Job x3 is key. You don’t want a ton of ICE rezzing, and sometimes you need help getting in. IJ helps with both. I love how people never, I mean NEVER, rez v. IJ. It would help v. bounces, yet, the idea of rezzing on a 1 ICE server for no reason v. IJ is so subconsciously heretical that it never happens. I have honestly never seen anyone do it, and laugh every time. SO, IJ is also key, because it works so well with DDoS. No 2 ICE server is safe with those two tools, leading many a rush deck trying to outrun DLR’s inexorable conclusion. Gotcha, Denny.

FIS is a generally panned card, but here it shines. The Corp generally has a full hand, and problems building up in HQ. At the right time, when poor, right after a score, or both, a FIS can not only lead to Corp distress, it can fuel Faust, find Siphons, etc. Finally, it greatly reduces the clock that DLR is running on. Combined with LARLA, it can greatly accelerate the mill out. Note: FIS when they’re at 2 or less in R&D with Howard/Museum out is a nice feeling.

Hardware

Need to stop kill dex dead. ‘Nuff said.

Resources

The bread, butter, mustard, pickles, and catfish of any DLR deck lie in the resources. Sadly, compared to Anarch DLR, we don’t have some of the same lovely tools available. Josh B is so key and cool, but, his INF cost is too rich for an Indian boxer’s blood. My surrogate is Gang Sign. It’s in faction, works well with Leela, and creates even more slowdown and hiccups in the Corp’s plan. Super cheap to play, and even draws trashing hate, occasionally. It can be cut, but, I love it.

Other DLR tools are self-explanatory. I dropped to two DLR for other tools. Honestly, at times, this doesn’t feel like a DLR deck. Leela can create enough pressure other ways, like running 6+ Siphons, that the DLR becomes the digestif. Drug Dealers are the Faust fuel, the draw engine, and another way to avoid Corp turn kill. Bank Job is a cheap influx of creds. 1 Pap is in there in case you can’t land a tag on yourself.

DDoS is a pricey usage of INF, but, combined with Siphon, IJ (as noted above), and Leela, it’s a brutally good Crim tool. Did they just IAA? Drop and/or pop DDoS, Siphon, run R&D, run Archives, or run the damn remote. If you limited their rez, you should have a good shot to score/bounce that card back. Drop it early to force double/triple ICE of centrals. The beauty of this deck is that it reliably pressures all centrals, and the remotes, and bounces ICE. Hard to defend everywhere. Lastly, DDoS/Siphon early ensures they can’t dump the creds into rezzing 1 ICE on HQ.

Breakers

Straightforward. Faust is your breaker. The others take creds, and are emergency stoppers for very specific ICE: Mongoose for Swordsman/Komainu, Breach for Wraparound, and Passport for Turing. LARLA ensures that Faust can rise again in a long game.

Afterthoughts

The deck is fun, a bit different, causes Corp player stress, and straight hard wins various matchups. Major enemies are NEH, Crisium/Sealed Vault, Caprice on HQ, etc. If they stop Siphon, it’s hard, but not the end of the world. The deck has undergone numerous changes over the past two months. Here are some possible changes:

-Turntable I know @d1en was on this. It’s cool. GREAT v. FA. Could drop the LARLA for this and a 3rd DLR.

-No LARLA This does free up a fair amount of INF for things, even a 3rd DDoS. The beauty of LARLA is that if the Corp thinks they are free/clear by trashing all your shite, dropping this will drop jaws/expressions quickly.

-3rd DLR This would be nice, but, it’s not the be/end all.

-Different breakers Could run Peacock over Passport, if you really want to get into a remote, for example.

-More creds. Sometimes, money is an issue. Not sure where to shoehorn it in. Gamble is too hard to play at times. Maybe Dirty Laundry? Seems like a poor usage of a deckslot.

Enjoy! Hopefully, you too can ruin peoples’ days, even for just a little bit. HAIL LEELA!

22 comments
18 Feb 2016 Inermis

Good stuff.
Try Armitage so junkie Leela to get up from 0 credits. I am exeprimenting with other Drug Dealer build with Faust, it's so fun, but not so strong as Faustowhizz.

netrunnerdb.com

I tried actually adding DLR, but it felt as a win-more. But I need to give it a try DLR focused build.

18 Feb 2016 spags

@Inermis Very nice. Logos is a nice add, since even DLeelaR usually lets them score one or two. It is a bit pricey. I like ArmCode, but, it's very click intensive.

DLR is more than win more. It's the multi-access of the deck, and can allow one to keep glacier at bay when one can't get into HQ/remote easily.

18 Feb 2016 x3r0h0ur

In addition to Sneakdoor, if you find DDoS uninspired, 2x TME can help stick the RnD lock on FA decks. Lets you run Turnable too.

18 Feb 2016 spags

@x3r0h0ur Sneakdoor and HQI are good adds.

18 Feb 2016 chill84

I've been playing a deck exactly like this except running a sea source + scorched earth kill package, have you considered using that? I think SE-leela is better positioned in the metagame right now.

18 Feb 2016 solaris187

What do you do when you run into quantum kitties?

19 Feb 2016 Saan

I think the plan for quantum kitties is that they get to score quantum kitties. On the plus side, you get to steal everything else!

19 Feb 2016 CodeMarvelous

This looks great @spags <3<3

19 Feb 2016 spags

@solaris187 They score them.

image brule

@CodeMarvelous Thanx! Put a lot of timing into tuning her.

20 Feb 2016 rumirumirumirumi

People concede games and call me a degenerate when I play this deck. That tells me it's doing something right. How do you typically approach the Foodcoats match up? Keeping resources alive with all their campaign cash is pretty difficult.

28 Feb 2016 IceRay42

@spags

Notch another SC win for this deck. Its only loss was when FIS found more 24/7 news cycle than it bargained for. Absolute monster.

3 Mar 2016 CrimsonWraith

@spags Yet another SC win here. Excellent job optimizing and refining the archetype, it's much improved over my initial attempts. =)

6 Mar 2016 tmancino

@spags Just took your deck to the Team Covenant SC in which I was lucky enough to win. It dropped two games on the day, probably due to my poor play. I made some minor changes to the deck, but in all cases they were worse, so I won't list them. Thanks for sharing with the community.

20 Mar 2016 thebriarfox

@spags Chalk up another 4-0 SC performance, opposite my trademark DoomSun (2-2). Slightly tweaked. (-1 Levy AR Lab Access, +1 Déjà Vu, +1 Day Job, and while the Day Job did set me up with a commanding credit lead Turn 2, Game 4, Vu was useless (recurred a single Fisk Investment Seminar) and the Day Job didn't work as well as I hoped, especially once the Drug Dealers got going. Hard to keep a gig with a monkey on your back like that.

2 of the 4 wins were the slow bus to mill town (including a simply hilarious game vs Pālanā Foods: Sustainable Growth that went something like "Click for 3, run and trash Museum of History" interspersed with "Mill 4" and maybe a first click Fisk Investment Seminar). The other was against a Foodcoats who managed to nuke my deck with a Chronos Project, but everything was running by that point and even tho I was stuck with 6 cards and no deck, with only Faust on the board, she still got there.

I agree that the economy is garbage, but a) I'm not sure where to go with that (Day Job ain't it, that's for sure), and b) I'm not really sure it matters. I spent 90% of my time at zero credits and didn't ever really mind.

This thing is the real deal. And now I have the alt art to prove it.

20 Mar 2016 thebriarfox

I should say Faust was the only breaker. I had the full mill engine set up and running behind 3 Fall Guys.

20 Mar 2016 spags

@thebriarfox Nice job!

5 Apr 2016 Ebrey

So what's the reason to stay broke all the time rather than use Desperado? Is it just that the desperado creds end up going to the drug dealers?

5 Apr 2016 Ebrey

If the plan is to stay broke, why have the non-Faust breakers at all? There's no money to use them.

5 Apr 2016 spags

@Ebrey Well, isn't it better to stay broke than pay the Dealer? Deck can gain money in spurts, when needed.

The other breakers are emergency valves. How do you deal with Swordsman, Wraparound, or Turing on a central?

5 Apr 2016 tmancino

@spags Any thoughts on the new cards re: this deck? Political Operative? Planning on taking it to a Regional this weekend. How has it been doing vrs the IG/NEH/Gagarin asset spam decks?

5 May 2016 Badeesh

IMO it struggles. You aren't rich enough to keep trashing things and the corps multiple Museums make a mockery of DLR turns. I don't see any viable solutions just yet. Would love to hear if anybody does.

5 May 2016 spags

This deck can't survive in a Temple/Museum world. Sorry.