The Gingerbread Man

There is actually an icebreaker called Gingerbread, but it's hilariously bad and I had forgotten about it until after I named this deck. The concept is similar, however: with enough cash on hand, you're virtually immune to tags and traces. This deck aims to get there as reliably as possible.

Film Critic and New Angeles City Hall are the centerpieces of this deck. In addition to avoiding effects that trigger when an agenda is accessed or stolen, Film Critic allows Iain to make continuous use of his ID ability and New Angeles City Hall. New Angeles City Hall of course makes him the Gingerbread Man. They are both 2-ofs because they're not essential to have in the early game, and one costs precious influence while the other doesn't stack.

Data Folding, Kati Jones, The Supplier, Underworld Contact, and Iain's ID ability form the economy of this deck. In the early game, just sit back, set these up, and wait for the dough to roll in. The Supplier doesn't stack, but you want to find it every game and find it early, hence three copies. No Sure Gamble? No need. You're just going to wait until you have enough cash to be invincible and run willy nilly, and The Supplier takes care of startup costs. Career Fair also gets a pass because most of the resources cost less than 3 and it can't be used in conjunction with The Supplier. Account Siphon is more to deny the corp credits once you're set up, along with Emergency Shutdown, using New Angeles City Hall to shake the tags instantly.

Hostage, Logos, and Mr. Li help you find what you need. In a deck that needs particular cards over a high volume of cards, these are better than Earthrise Hotel. You'd also like to avoid discarding cards that will be important later without a way to get them back like your programs, Emergency Shutdown, and HQ Interface, so flooding your hand is bad.

Since this deck is so slow, you need to make sure the corp doesn't score too fast. Drive By, Inside Job, and The Source slow them down, while Logos, Gang Sign, and Iain's ID ability make it very punishing for the corp to score. Gang Sign and The Source in particular give fast advance a huge headache while still giving slower decks a hard time, and trashing SanSan City Grid with Drive By is back-breaking. Inside Job and Gang Sign are also good ways of applying pressure without a rig. The corp is forced to put at least two pieces of ice in front of agendas to ensure that you can't get in, and Gang Sign's effect is unavoidable. Don't install Gang Sign against Jinteki, or bad things will happen.

The choice of central-only breakers plus Keyhole is inspired by this deck, but the rest of the deck is decidedly slower. Keyhole doesn't work with Film Critic, but it still denies effects that trigger upon accessing or stealing an agenda and also protects you from traps and denies the corp draws. You'll be finding agendas in HQ and the occasional remote with Inside Job anyway, so Film Critic will still be getting its worth. Hades Shard wins you the game on the spot when there are enough agendas in Archives, Jackson or not. Don't install it for free by running archives; just play it from hand. Because you're the active player, the corp doesn't get to retrieve cards with Jackson before you can use its ability. By the time Hades Shard hits the table, it's already too late.

Keyhole and Hades Shard can be swapped out for Medium and Net Shield or Feedback Filter for the same amount of influence, or a different 1-influence program if you want to be greedy. It feels better not wasting Film Critic's ability when you're running on R&D, but I like Keyhole's draw-denying effect plus Hades Shard insta-win too much.