Adam: Bioroid Sage

akonnick 2076

I've been interested by Adam since I saw him revealed. Even more than the ID, I think all of Adam's faction cards have great synergy and a good standalone power level in the right shell. I'll be honest, I don't yet have Data and Destiny and haven't tested this deck. Rather than talking through my experience with the deck, I'll offer up some points of why I think it seems promising.

-Independent Thinking is one of the best card draw abilities in Netrunner. In an Adam deck built around it, you can draw 10 cards for 1 credit and you can set this play up multiple times a game. This deck is very much built around it as you have lots of cards to trash where you can get value out of them and trash when you need cards (Rolodex being the biggest instance of this). Coupled with his directive that let's you draw a free card every turn, Adam gets some impressive draw power.

-Rolodex seems like an auto-include for Adam. You get huge card selection for free (5 cards is no joke). When you are ready to use Independent Thinking, you just blank the Rolodex with Dr. Lovegood so it doesn't trash cards and then you can draw an additional two cards as part of the Independent Thinking. That is fantastic value. I'm really excited to test out this interaction in particular.

-Sage/Overmind - I've seen Sage decks. I've seen Overmind decks. I can't say that I've seen many that I liked. Part of the reason was the setup time of the decks, but another part is that you always seemed strained to fit in all the other cards you wanted after putting in the core cards needed in that archetype. I really like this breaker suite in Adam for a couple of reasons. First, his console is a potentially huge memory boost for only 2 credits. Second, MemStrips is the next most efficient non-console memory option and you have enough influence to play it. Third, you have a reason to play Q-Coherence Chip since you are just going to get value early when you install Overmind and get two cards later off Independent Thinking. A Sage/Overmind rig that gets to the late game is very difficult to stop when I've played against them and I think that Adam may very well be the best home since he also gets the added boost of Multithreader in faction.

-Win conditions: You get a built in HQ Interface from his directives, so that is a nice plus. Couple that with a Medium and Legwork recursion and you've got two very powerful win conditions. This is honestly the biggest benefit I see to Adam and this deck - you have enough influence with the streamlined breaker suite to include all the goodies you struggle to include with 15 influence.

I'm excited to try this out upon general release and would love to hear any feedback from others as they try to build Adam.

2 comments
10 Oct 2015 HolyMackerel

Is one brain cage enough? You really want to see it early to mitigate Safety Fist, which only gets really strong when you have a bigger hand size.

10 Oct 2015 akonnick

Against the decks where I'm worried about a Scorched Earth/damage threat on turn 2, my plan without Brain Cage is just to use Independent Thinking (part of the benefit to running 3) to get rid of the directive and immediately get up to normal hand size. While I know having that directive is very strong, I do think that is a better plan than loading up on Brain Cages, which is useless in multiples and not great on its own. You can draw through the deck fast enough to reshuffle the directives with Levy and get the benefit of them later once you have Brain Cage online. I do agree with you that having to handicap yourself so much is a significant downside of Adam, but I'd rather take my chances that I can draw one of 4 answers in my opening turn than load up my deck with otherwise dead/bad cards.