Seamusmodernism V3 (1st Place Scottish Regional Undefeated)

Thanks very much for posting this (I was the guy pestering you on facebook). I've been looking at Argus decks for a while now, and I saw a few cool ideas.

An early Housekeeping slows down most popular runners considerably nowadays, as they are almost all resource-focused econ that requires multiple installs. I saw someone pair it with News Hound for a super-Hunter, but that might be too much influence.

Salem's Hospitality is an interesting way to knock I've Had Worse out of hand before you kill, and can also be used early to slow the runner down. You'd only need one more NBN card for it as well. Maybe paired with the upcoming Subcontract to allow for over-3 click turns to get past multiple plascretes.

Looks awesome, Seamus :D glad it took a Regional! Good times.

How much work has Casting Call been doing for you? I'm sure you're tired of hearing this, but... you could cut it for a third Jackson...? :P And maybe a second Wraparound instead of the singleton Ice Wall. That said, I can see how it could be a powerful disincentive for the runner on your penultimate agenda.

How about Crisium? I'm always dithering about Crisium.

@GoomBard No problem!

The effect of Housekeeping is really nice but the reality is that you're going to hemorrhage agenda really regularly with this deck. There isn't the time, money or even really ICE to protect your centrals and so I didn't find it worth the three credits and the click to play.

I tested Salem's Hospitality on its release and it's not a great fit. Once again, it's a clicks and credits that aren't advancing you towards seven points. The deck might look like it has a strong kill threat but it's really quite fragile and speed is key. Make the runner play fast and they'll kill themselves more often than not.

@ouroborosglyx Cheers!

Casting Call is amazing. Every time I consider swapping it for a second SEA to improve consistency it wins me a game. Wraparound is a tricky one. While it's great to tax Faust or drain D4v1d before you rez an Archer, it gives the typical anarch runner two breaking options - D4v1d or Faust (admittedly at a high cost). It's critical that you make the runner find as many pieces of their rig as possible to challenge the remote.

I honestly wouldn't want the third Jackson. If I had another influence point I'd spend it on something else. Between 12 agenda, Fast Track and Atlas tokens I can almost always be trying to score and if you can be trying to score with this deck then you should be.

If I could fit a second Crisium Grid in I would. As ever, one of the greatest constraints is deck space.

@GoomBard Argus/News Hound/Housekeeping guy here, and let me tell you, it is absolutely too much influence :P

@Seamus This is just about as tight of an Argus deck as I've ever seen. No fluff, just good cards and a tiny bit of meta tech. I love it. I adore that you put Mother Goddess in here. My favorite ICE for Weyland rush. Did you find that Grim and Cobra sniped many breakers? I really wish there were influence for a second Casting Call here. That card is legit.

Congrats on the win! If Liberated Mind is legal by the time of my Regional this weekend, I'll probably be taking a Titan Midseason deck with Consulting Visit and Exchange of Information, but this is really tempting me to go back to an Argus build. I'd hate to straight up net deck yours, because I'm too proud to not take my own home brew, but this list just looks too good. Thanks for posting! Keep the Weyland dream alive!

@WayneMcPain Unless there's someone else doing the Newshound thing in Argus I think we played on jinteki. I really liked your deck! Newshound is filthy.

If memory serves Cobra took out a Gordian Blade in a match-up that was already going rather sideways for my opponent. I'm not sure that I rezzed Grim all day. It's definitely one of the cards I'd love to replace if Weyland had some better ICE.

This Titan deck sounds mad. I'd be keen to see it!

Love it - been playing Argus myself so I will take a look at this deck and come back with some comments! :)

@Seamus Well done mate. Always awesome to see a fellow Argus lover get excellent results with the ID. Hadn't have the chance to chat with you in jinteki.net in a very long time. Congrats!

On another note. Find room for 3x Mausolus when they get released. It's the ice Argus always needed. 4 to rez, 5 STR code gate. ETRs, does net damage, gives tags and gives you money.

The DREAM i tell you!

Thanks! :) News Hound IS filthy. Especially with Housekeeping on the board. I think I just need to go down to two copies so I can keep 3 Snare in the deck. Like you said, Snare is MVP.

Grim was the one card in the list that concerned me. It seems good on paper, but then it's expensive and gets hosed by David. I'll probably swap that out for something else, maybe another ETR.

If my Titan deck doesn't completely fall flat on it's face, I'll publish the list. :)

Hey Seamus,

congratulations!

Will you share your Kit-Deck as well?

Good job Seamus - by winning a regional you have irrefutably shown the Weyland card pool is fine and the designers can bin all those good weyland card designs they were planning for future cycles ;)

Well done, nice deck. I've been playing your Stealth Kit a lot. I'm very interested in your new build.

Casting Call-Posted Bounty is my favourite Argus shenanigan. Even better when you have Data Ravens, but we can't have it all I guess ;)

@Letsaros Cheers man! Interestingly, while Mausolus is exactly what Weyland have been waiting for as a faction, it doesn't quite slot into this build. I was discussing this with someone last night. It's not quite rushy enough and all the bad pub threatens to take the tax off it. However, I think if there's another good piece of Weyland ICE in the next cycle then the deck could be slowed down a bit in order to get the most out of Mausolus, squeezing in Zealous Judge and Dedication Ceremony. I'm definitely looking forward to having new options in Argus!

@WayneMcPain The concern is you really need to maximise relevant ICE types against non-anarchs and tax Faust multiple cards against Faust. You could replace Grim with a Spiderweb but you're then more vulnerable to Parasite or to anyone who happens to have a Corroder. I'd maybe even consider, if you're going to turn it into a Spiderweb, swapping the wraparound for a Lotus Field to give you another ETR codegate.

Best of luck with the Titan!

@Dis I'm hoping that if I can trick FFG into thinking Weyland are as good as NBN. Then the good cards will flow.

@b3ar Cheers man. I'll hopefully get the lift up today!

@glaivemaster I had a Data Raven previously and I do miss it but in the current meta the influence is better spent on anti-Faust tech, unfortunately. I wish I could run three Casting Call. What a card.

Gratz dude! Who'd you run with?

@Badeesh Cheers mate! Kit, of course! I am, if nothing else, a creature of habit. Deck list for the runner should be up tonight.

Solid Argus deck.. Much like the one I took to regionals last year and placed second. The ID is still strong to this day with few or no modifications. I feel like Checkpoint might be a good addition for early game. 3 meat damage on successful run is really scaring early game. Of course late game the trace 5 seems less intimidating with 10 bad pubs. Another idea that went through my head was to get all that taxing bad pub ice. Score out all the hostile takeovers and then use a combination of Test Ground and Elizabeth Mills to remove them to make ice taxing again. This might suit a GRINDL deck better though.

Sorry. Meant Isabel McGuire not Test Ground

Added a link to my runner deck for the day.

@how is BP a problem for Mausolus?It's is not a tracer. Has flat routines and with a simple dedication ceremony has a flat ETR. For 4 to rez. So advancing it is not a tempo hit.

I have a version with 3x Mausolus and 3x Zealus Judge i made recently but haven't tested yet because i only want to play with released cards when playing online. Too bad there is no inbox in jinteki.net so i can send it to you. Any ideas?

@Letsaros It would remain effective against a Faust/D4v1d rig but but it's not uncommon for me to take five or more bad pub in this build which makes even lower end decoders good against it. It's still good for the cost but either requires support (dedication ceremony) or time and money to fill the role ICE in this specific build needs to.

Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing card and I'll be playing it for sure. I'm just not sure it drops right in here. I think broader changes would be required to make the most of it. Of course, given that it's still seven datapacks away I'm confident there will be more cards released between now and then to help shift the deck towards less of an extreme rush deck (please, FFG?).

Congratulations on the victory! I'm another long time Weyland player and have had decent success this regional season with Argus as well (top 8 & 3rd). The deck I took is much more rush focused though, similar to this) (-1 Beanstalk, +1 Corprate Town). I like the ability to make a lot of money early and fully embracing the bad publicity never really hurts. Announcing Oaktown seems like it can be tough after the early game. Do you think your version is better overall, or do you think they're equally viable?

@WhackedMaki Congratulations to you too!

I'm afraid you don't have the sharing settings on so I can't see your deck.

Re Oaktown, the fact that it funds itself while you advance it is huge and more than makes up for the downside. The deck wouldn't function without it.

Yeah, I can't tell you how many times Oaktown has more than made up for its weaknesses. For example, I advance it once behind an Ice Wall turn 1, opponent siphons me to 1 credit, I can still score it out the next turn.

This looks really fun, congrats on the win. Have you given any thought to Vanilla? It seems like it fits the mold here, cheap ETR. I will give it a try over Icewall and maybe Meru Mati but I wanted to know your thoughts on it.

@AkAnderson The problem with Vanilla is that it can be instantly Parasited which gives them another way to access your remote in a single turn. I think I'd consider Paper Wall first, although that also pairs relatively badly with trashing ICE.

Amazing deck.

My only question is, have you considered Corporate Sales Team over Fracking? Is Sales Team too slow? Would you rather spend 2 clicks Fracking and getting bad pub, then letting the Sales Team pay out over the next 5 (combined) turns?

I feel like the Sales Team is JUST fast enough, but basically, what are your thoughts?

@ren666 I did some testing with it a couple of weeks ago (along with Salem's Hospitality). It wasn't terrible but it also wasn't great. If you find yourself with a weird window between scoring it's really nice and intimidating to click twice for 14. Corporate Sales Team is also more vulnerable to Turntable since it takes longer to pay out (although I did lose a fully loaded Fracking in the final). I think it's OK but since the Bad Publicity is basically irrelevant I feel that Fracking edges it out.

My testing wasn't hugely extensive though so it might be worth trying again. The clickless drip is appealing.

Love this deck! I'm gonna try this one tomorrow at a casual gathering, I think I'm dropping the jacksons (for enhanced janky casualness) and placing 2 Reversed Accounts I think it's perfect here, an advanceable card that punishes if you run and punishes you if you don't, also opening scoring windows, love love love it. Also I don't want to remove the jacksies from my other deck in between matches :)

Praise be to you, almighty Seamus, for reminding me how much fun Weyland Rush is. Just went 5-0 on Jinteki within 35 minutes. Deck is damn fast. Love it.

@teky Haha. Respect on the change being to lose the Jacksons! I would recommend Ghost Branch or Junebug over Reversed though. It's really unlikely you'll win a money race in the long run against most runners. Or you could get in another SEA Source or Casting Call.

@CobraBubbles Cheers! It is good for ensuring you get plenty of time between tournament rounds. I think I had fifteen minutes left at the end of the round in which I faced IG with my runner!

@Seamusthanks for the feedback :) the thing is that if I'm not gonna win the money race anyway having another SEA would be useless... I think the reversed can get you at least on sea source zone, the thing with ghost branch is that, again, it's an ambush that the runner needs to run, and I think I'm pretty bad on putting bites on the runners... something I should work on...

@Seamusalso, any recommendation on replacing cobra? I don't have Salsette yet, I'm up to Business. I've slotted an Assassing on that slot, but between my somewhat not strong econ and the BP the runner might have, the traces can turn out to be uneffective... Still, I want some ice with teeth besides Archer...

@teky I suppose I should have been more specific - you won't win a straight money race. A second SEA increases the chances that if a runner breaks their back stopping a score you're more likely to have naturally drawn it to punish them.

The strength of Reversed - at least in my opinion - is in big money fights with a taxing remote. Your remote is really unlikely to tax them and it's entirely possible that Bad Pub will cover the cost of trashing it for them to.

I think this deck is actually quite good at building both your instinct for scoring windows and your instinct for when a runner is sitting on a trick to get a surprise access on the remote. Still, Reversed Accounts is still a good card and will definitely do some work.

I think Grim is probably your best bet. That's what was in the slot before Salsette came out. It's not ideal but there isn't another great candidate. Assassin is expensive to rez and, as you say, Bad Pub can really diminish its ability to tax.

@Seamusthanks again, I just played it on jinteki and managed to trick the runner to run a remote with archer and snare, he fausted it and then died :)

I'll go for the second SEA and second Grim, that will leave 1 space for 1 more econ card, maybe another restructure or fast track?

@teky Excellent work. Archer rez to protect a trap is a beautiful thing.

I've never found the space to test a second Fast Track but it could absolutely do work. You could also consider a second Crisium to protect against siphon/indexing. The only other econ card that really fits is a second Restructure which is fine but you never want to find yourself clicking for credits up to ten so just bear in mind that it may end up sitting in-hand sometimes.

Been playing this with a couple simple modifications and enjoying the heck out of it. Great against all this anarch/Faust nonsense going around. Adam is surprisingly annoying against it, but he's fortunately rare enough.

One thing I did try is fitting in a Global Food Initiative. There's a bunch of Film Critic in my meta, so I dropped the Casting Call and both Geothermal Fracking for a Ghost Branch, a Global Food, and a Profiteering. The Profiteering gives me the quick money that Fracking can, while the Food is a great agenda if you find a window. Ghost Branch is just fun, and can really punish someone running on last or next to last click.

@Seamus: Great deck mate. Won the Western Australian regionals with it yesterday and 2nd place was using it too. Been looking for something similar ever since the original Supermodernism deck fell by the wayside. Thanks!

@Ayanami congratulations!

@seamus : there's actually an easy way to fit a 2nd fast track in your deck : cut a swordsman for a 3rd archer, then remove the 2nd Geothermal (or 3rd Oaktown) and the posted bounty for a GFI. You have now one less agenda in your deck and a slot for a 2nd fast track :)

@Calimsha In the current meta Swordsman is better in this deck than Archer. Moreover, you really don't want to rez an Archer. You frequently have to but if two get rezzed something has gone seriously sideways. I definitely wouldn't want three. Hostiles are for points, not ICE rezzes.

As I mentioned above, the scoring rhythm is also better suited to 4/2s than it is to 5/3s.

If you fancy testing that change late me know how it goes.

could also cut wraparound, for what it's worth if you really need to find 1 inf, or just play a real 5/3 like a boss :p.

I obviously didn't tested argus as much as you did but i've been playing supermodernism type of deck for a while now and having multiple fast track feels more important than having one "dead" agenda in your draw, especially if you consider that you will get your good agendas more often if you have more fast track.

Any thoughts on trying to fit in a single Exchange of Information? This is a deck where you will have your agendas stolen, and being able to trade a 2/1 for a 4/2 seems good. Again, probably dropping the Casting Call to fit it in, though.

Been playing this deck for a week now, since I first posted here and I love it. I've played it card for card this whole time but I think I'm going to cut the Grim for a 2nd Cobra. That snake has been so good in my playing, and there isn't a whole lot of parasite around my area these days. Other than that, I can't think of a single thing I'd want to change, you created a monster.

@tzeentchling No dice. Unless tag-me runners come back in a big way (at which point, and it pains me to say it, you'd probably be better playing a different deck) I don't think Exchange of Information would do enough work.

Also, I really really love Casting Call.

@AkAnderson Interesting. I agree that Grim is god-damned terrible. I'd be nervous about another relatively pricey parasite target but it might be worth a go. Fancy letting me know how you get on with it?

my current version is running 2 SEA, but I was thinking, why not Midseason + Consulting? Then you can just put the tags on him for good. And even try the swap of exchange for casting

@teky Plenty of runners will out-money you no problem and leaking agenda risks turning Midseasons off if you can't fire it early.

Additionally, by Midseasonsing, you turn off your ability and give the runner license to not care anymore, which is actually really problematic if you can't end the game very quickly.

I played around with the Titan deck built by the chap from the Metropole grid (which is great fun). It has a fair chunk more econ and I still got out-moneyed by smart players who knew what I was doing. Midseasonsing is tough these days if you're not NBN with must trash SanSans and ticking asset econ. Saying that, if you want to Midseasons out of Weyland I think that's the deck to do it with. You could even add in Salem's now as it was already rocking six NBN cards.

What about adding some Hive for early game protection?

Have you ever tested this deck against Jesminder? R&D absolutely cannot be left unprotected unfortunately. You have to shore up an extra turn (or two) to adequately protect yourself against both HQ and R&D pressure in the form of Account Siphon/Vamp and the fact that she can get lots of single accesses from your R&D with little to no consequences.

Took this to Colorado regionals and went undefeated with it (2-2 with an ID with my runner, and only played runner in the cut) Thanks for bringing back a style of deck I love to play!

@PaxCecilia Jesminder isn't very popular over here. Only about two of us gave her much of a play locally on release. If she were about a lot then one would certainly need to re-evaluate the value of playing Argus. However, since she's likely to be a bit slower than Kate (having to pay full price for her installs) or Kit I think you'd still have reasonable game in rushing her.

Obviously some play to avoid Siphon/Vamp would be required and if this became a common match-up a second Crisium would be needed at the very least.

@Duxmar You're very welcome! Glad you enjoyed it!

OK So I just listened to the Run Last Click you were on. How the hell do you deal with Blackmail? You can't bait runs very well, you can't ice up, you can't do anything except lose agendas.

I took this deck to the london regionals, and have beaten valencias before, and I can say it's all about the speed of play. The simple fact is the only ID that can reliably have bad pub out (Valencia) has a 50-card deck, meaning there's a high chance they don't see it until you're already on 4-5 points and can just stick a snare in the remote to threaten the win. Even if they find one, there's a chance they don't find another, or a same old thing. You just have to outpace the runner, and that's easier when they have a deck of 50 cards.

@RubbishyUsername, GoomBard is correct. You have to race them. Test them on their access to Blackmail. It's not ideal but it can be done.

One thing I would say is - don't completely neglect the ICE on your remote on the assumption that you're only defending against Blackmail.

In a recent game, a friend assumed my ICE would be rubbish and couldn't find a Blackmail so ran with Faust, allowing me to rez an Archer. This meant the agenda/snare/shattered remains dance was a lot harder for him to play, even with Blackmail.

I took your version for a spin a few games and am really impressed with the build. I used to play something similar that tried to get cute with false leads, ghost branch and DRT, and I think yours is better (although it's so satisfying to rez a DRT before the runner hits a snare).

It's a huge contrast to play this style of deck in a meta where prepaid Kate isn't a thing anymore.

A cracker of a deck pal! I am a very average player but with this, I won 9 games out of 10 on Jinteki! I only lost to a swift Keyhole spam when I couldn't find any ice.

My favorite win was when I was on match point. I had a good remote with Archer and two other ice and placed a card in there. My opponent was forced to check it, burning their hand with Faust- only to get flat-lined by the Snare! that was waiting for them!

This is my first ever try with Weyland, it's so much fun to play. Also, all the games were done within 10 minutes will very little "brain tax".

Will be taking this to my nearest nationals for sure! Thanks again!

PS any suggestions to replace Grim? He doesn't do enough for my liking.

I try instead Caduceus.

@Hayati Glad you're enjoying it!

Keyhole is a nightmare. Don't stress about losing those games! It's impossible to build a Weyland deck that covers all the bases at the moment. Sometimes you're going to have a horrible match-up.

Grim is a bit crap but it covers a very specific ICE area. Not only is it a third ICE-type (Sentry) in non-AI match-ups, is relatively taxing for Faust or forces a D4v1d install, and requires Atman or D4v1d from most common Shaper builds at the moment.

It's definitely something I'd look to replace if there were a better option but I'm not really convinced that there is.

The problem with Caduceus is that it doesn't help with plan A which is scoring behind gearcheck ICE (since the runner can just pay through the ETR trace without a breaker) and the bad publicity you generate quickly makes it a meaningless tax on centrals.

If you could guarantee getting it on a central opening turn that would be great but drawing it pretty much any time after this and it'll be meaningless.

Due to being a creature of habit, I'll likely take Weyland to our nationals in August and I'm working on some changes for that. If it goes well I'll be sure to publish!

Am I crazy for thinking 2x Zealous Judge could take the role of SEA Source? Would free up 2 inf for another casting call

@Conphas I doubt the Ice suite is up to defending a 2nd remote. And without protection, many times the runner running 1st or 2nd click is just going to trash it the turn its rezzed.

This deck is so awesome! Thanks for sharing!

My meta is a bit too vegan and nobody packs Plascretes. I think that will change now...

@Seamus Thanks for the great article, new to NR and really enjoying it, and looking forward to playing your deck. Was just wondering where in Scotland there are places to play NR? I've lived in Edinburgh but the scene wasn't super big when I was there.

Cheers, Josh

Any thoughts on how the new MWL meta effects this deck?

Have you considered swapping out the SEA Source for a Hard-Hitting News?

@wesselal In testing modern day Weyland I've found one of each to be useful. SEA 2x Scorch is still very powerful, and losing it means you have no kill threat on anyone over 8 credits.

@WhackedMakiin that case what are you dropping? Casting Call? Seems rough to lose that.

@wesselal I'd probably cut a Swordsman and a Wraparound from this. I've been playing Blue Sun to great success myself lately

@Seamus would love to see your regionals updates and/or hear your thoughts on Flashpoint cards you've got your eye on for this deck.

For instance, thoughts on Prisec?

@GarrattJ We play at the Edinburgh Games hub on Mondays and the Lock 25 pub on Thursdays. There's also a more beginner focused thing on Thursdays at Tabletop.

If you join the facebook group Edinburgh Card Gamers we can point you in the right direction and fill you in on other netrunner groups in Scotland also.

@Balkmeister I have no idea. Weyland are so weak right now that you basically have to be reactive. There's no hope of shaping the meta with them. You really need to react to what the big runner decks are. I'd just finished adapting to the rise of Hayley in the UK when the MWL update dropped so right now everything is up in the air.

@wesselal I don't think Hard Hitting News fits in this deck. You never tax the runner and you're not really rich enough to land a big trace if it doesn't end the game (which HHN doesn't).

Casting Call is in a weird place. People are dropping Film Critic which is making it better (it was cut prior to MWL 2). I'm not sure if it keeps its slot at the moment.

@WhackedMaki The Wraparound and one Swordsman can go if Whizzard doesn't reappear in dominating numbers but I don't think HHN is where to spend that influence. Saying that, I'm not exactly where is right now. I've included a Data Raven but I think it's yet to appear in any testing games.

@poorhaus As I imagine you can see from my responses to others - I haven't a clue what the runner meta is doing right now which makes it really difficult to figure out how this deck needs to respond. Prisec looks great but should have been a Weyland card and in neutral will probably end up in NBN kill decks out of Sync instead. Hurray.

As for the rest of the Weyland cards spoiled, Mausolus looks good (but not in this deck) and the rest look like complete trash, sad to say. Boom will be good in NBN. I can't imagine playing any of the others.

@Seamus I was feeling good in Weyland, but then Employee Strike came back really hard. I'm "The Worlds Best Murder Weyland" from 2015 worlds, but it feels really helpless right now.

After alot of testing I conclude that Temüjin Contract probably will be what kills this decks chances. It already had a rather poor criminal matchup since they were fast enoughto keep up and could siphon you into clicking for credits. The contract have caused alot more players to play for the blue team and that's bad news for us. =( I will probably shelf this deck untill the meta changes back to slower, rig building decks.

I think the even bigger problem is that there is now so much incentive to play Valencia, both because she's amazing with Rebirth and because her bad publicity gives her All Seeing Eye protection.

Either way, agreed. The meta is not in a good place for this deck.

@Seamus Hi, big fan of this deck which got me hooked on Argus. Have you checked out Supermodern Russian Butlers deck? It is awesome.