PE Class: Son of Jerkteki

For about 18 months I played a deck I called Dead You, which at one point I updated to "Jerkteki." I had a tremendous amount of success with the overall concept, only abandoning it after my meta became beyond savvy to the build, which in turn encouraged me to change things up and try other decks. For the last year or so, I have been playing new things, none of which I have ever enjoyed as much as good ol' PE. And then the Most Wanted List happened...

It is worth mentioning I had been working on a Jinteki: Biotech deck for a few months, which was doing quite well, but which fell prey to the aforementioned MWL update--my Fisk deck basically imploded after this announcement, by-the-by. So, on a whim, I decided to look at my old deck and try updating it. After playing it now religiously since the MWL announcement, I can say with certainty, this deck still holds water and this incarnation is the best one by far.

For those of you unfamiliar with the original deck, it used damage as means to rush scoring. It wasn't a flatline deck, but it killed often by putting runners on tough calls--namely the dreaded "is that the last 1-2 points or a Snare!" play. The deck still has this functionality, in so much that it plays no advance that rushes out agendas, but it leans a little heavier toward a kill strategy now, abandoning old tools like Shi Kyu and Shock! Truly, this is no vast achievement; we have all seen this before, as PE is wont to play a good many cards herein. The difference here lies in a few key cards and knowing how to orchestrate a game state that ends with a dead runner once you get your rush going.

ECON:

The deck has a pretty stable econ in the form of 8 operations and 3 Mental Health Clinics. A great deal of the ice is inexpensive, and at times it is not unusual to have upwards of 30 credits at the ready.

The operations are mostly straightforward with the exception of Sweeps Week, which may at first seem counter-intuitive in a deck that spams net damage. However, most runner decks are playing draw power galore, and finding a runner with a full hand isn't out of the ordinary, esp. after you snipe cards on the regular. Further, this combos up nicely with Mental Health Clinics, as some runners will take the opportunity to hold an extra card or two in hand, making Sweeps Week all the more viable--not to mention our good friend Komainu, but more on this later.

ICE:

The ice really bivouacs into two categories: taxing and ETR (many of which can work as both). There isn't a lot of ICE, and this is by design. The deck doesn't need a lot to get off the ground.

PUP: this is just there to make the runner math miserable and be a pervasive nuisance. In truth, most times letting the runner into R&D isn't a problem, even with a Medium or RDI. This just makes things like trashing your assets more taxing. Keep these on centrals, of course.

KOMAINU: With Parasite affected by the recent MWL update, this card rests slightly easier. When it hits, it is obviously pretty damn nasty. It becomes more taxing when the runner pads their grip by a few cards from Mental Health Clinic. Tossing this down with an agenda behind it is a solid scoring threat for a runner with no killer to be seen. And let us not forget about the deadly possibility of hitting this while a House of Knives is active.

CHUM: Some may think, with only 12 other ICE, this is a wasted slot. The fact remains, the threat this card represents, esp. against decks not sporting D4V1D, is enough to cause a runner to abandon a run. When combined with things like Archer and Fetal AI, things can get especially nasty for a reckless runner.

HIMITSU-BAKO/WRAPAROUND: Cheap ETR, with the latter being yet another tool against decks that depend on Faust as a primary breaker. The 1 Bako has been a nice foil to Parasites, Knights, and other such hosted programs.

LOTUS FIELD: Another workaround on Parasites and Datasuckers, albeit expensive. Still, it helps to round out the runner's need to find breaker types while you set their hand on fire.

ARCHER: The all-star ambush ICE of the deck. Rezzing this usually elicits a "what the..." from an unsuspecting runner, trashing programs and allowing scoring windows to boot. With Clone Retirements and House of Knives, this is an easy inclusion.

TRAPS AND SUCH:

A great deal of playing this deck in just flopping 2-3 cards down naked. With 6 traps in the form of Snare and Psychic Field, blindly running can spell certain doom. I remain convinced Snare is one of the best corp cards in the game for its ability to punish multi-access cards. In short, running with a low hand and/or on your last click is rarely a smart move against this deck. (It's also worth mentioning that these traps are potentially taxing in both cards and credits: psi games and removing tags.)

The Neural EMPs are there for reckless runners that leave themselves open for a kill. This doesn't come up often, but it represents a substantial threat for less courageous runners, therein playing right into things like Sweeps Week and Komainu.

Jackson Howard doesn't require much explanation, right?

AGENDAS:

Rounding out this little thread are the very points the runner is aiming to steal. Interestingly enough, the agendas remain the same from the last incarnation of the deck, forcing the runner to steal at least 4 agendas to win the game.

Clone Retirement is another ninja star to the skull for a runner that ends their turn with no cards in hand.

House of Knives makes casual runs to poke and prod servers less equitable for the runner, while helping to setup kills--often on the runner's turn.

Philotic Entanglement is another devastating weapon in the arsenal, esp. considering that a runner could have their hand cleaned out in a single fell swoop, or worse yet, die.

Braintrust... well, it is an unexciting no advance tool; nothing more, nothing less.

Used to be that Fetal AI was the bastard child of this deck. I was always worried about trying to advance it, trying to keep in my deck if possible by shuffling it back in with Jackson. Well times they have changed. I now drop this to be sniped, sometimes drop it unprotected if the runner has the unfortunate combo of being poor and out of cards. Things like Neural EMP also give the card a little more reach in the means of potentially killing the runner. On average, I will score out one or more of these in this newer iteration of the deck.

That's all this time. Give the deck a try. I have logged 70+ games with this, and my win ratio is higher than it ever was with the prior incarnations--which were doing quite well.