HB Counter Kill

DSLCactus 15

This is a silly, janky deck that I threw together after looking over the new Punitive Counterstrike. I really like this card, but I think it's best potential for a kill isn't actually in Weyland, but out of faction where meat damage is a lot less usual.The plan:

1) Get enough agendas in archives through seemingly unintentional means (mill with Power Shutdown, go nuts with Accelerated Beta Test). Leave a Jackson to file some agendas back in in case you get a little too unlucky.

2) Try your best to keep the runner out of HQ and R&D so the runner doesn't see your Punitive Counterstrikes, gets complacent, and doesn't put down their Carapaces. I mean, when was the last time you had to worry about meat damage from an HB deck that wasn't Custom Biotics?

3) If possible, over-advance Vitruvius to make the eventual kill easier.

4) Lure the runner into the kill turn. Either get them to run on archives, which is usually doable by Beta Testing or liberally using Power Shutdown and not protecting archives. Eventually a smart runner will poke around to see what free points they can get. It's probably a good idea to leave a Jackson on the table before you do this, to make sure you don't get unlucky and put enough points for the runner to win in the bin. Alternatively, just overdraw, and discard agendas naturally, and let the curious runner find them in archives. Plan C is to install, advance, advance any agenda, knowing that they can get in. If they run, boom kill turn. If not, hey, free agenda.

5) On the kill turn, use as many Counterstrikes as you have in hand, plus Archives Memories and Vitruvius to get multiple uses out of each card. Efficiency Committee can give you that extra click if you need it. It will be easier if you can lure them into archives to grab 3 or 4 points, as two Counterstrikes with 3 or 4 damage on each will easily kill the runner without Carapace. If they only steal 2 points, then you'd need to hit them with 3 Counterstrikes to kill from a full hand, which is hard, but doable if you have two copies and a) Archived Memories + Biotic, or b) a Vitruvius or Efficiency counter. Alternatively, it should be possible to catch the runner with their pants down, as drawing up to full is not something you have to do against HB most of the time.

It's not a super competitive deck, and as Punitive Counter Strike is not available where I live yet, it is also completely untested. But if you are able to maintain a steady money advantage over the runner, and convince them that you are not trying to kill them with meat damage, then it should be at least a little fun.

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