Intro

After playing Hammer Party and having some success (but mostly lots of fun) I threw together this Iain Stirling house party style deck. It may seem slow, but if you Mulligan into a Hostage or Mr. Li it can be surprisingly fast!

Programs

This deck uses a pretty standard breaker suite for Crminal. Corroder, Peregrine and Mongoose are your primary breakers, with Femme Fatale kicking around for that annoying sever with two sentries. If things go sideways and an essential program gets trashed you've got Breach and Passport as backups.

A pair of Tapwrms round out the program suite, early or late game either way it's a fantastic card. Even better when you consider this deck has Sacrificial Construct. Does the crop REALLY want to burn a entire turn just to have you say 'no' and burn the Sac-Con instead? Probably not.

I'm considering replacing Peregrine and Femme Fatale with Abagnale and Lustig but I'm on the fence right now.

Also Mammon might end up replacing Passport and Breach as it's a INSANE AI breaker.

But for now the current suite works just fine.

Events

Account Siphon, it's Account Siphon, the main reason you're playing Criminal in the first place. Enough said! ^_^

Calling in Favors and Sure Gamble are your hard credit events, both are fantastic but Calling in Favors really shines in this deck because it contains a total of 11 connections. A single click operation that generates an average of 7 credits of value? Solid!

Hostage is honestly the real MVP card of the Criminal faction. In this deck it brings some serious consistency and flexibility to the table. Facing off versus a fast advance deck? Use it to get The Source. Need card draw? Go get Mr. Li. Best of all those connections install onto Off-Campus Apartment giving you even more card draw!

Interdiction is a strange choice for this deck, so why is it here? Well simply put, it's here to ensure that you can get at least one successful run on a glacier scoring remote. Caprice Nisei cant stop runs if she cant be rezed. Furthermore if Ash 2X3ZB9CY or Marcus Batty are in that same remote then they aren't helping either.

With Interdiction you drop it, credit up and run their scoring remote. Crops don't want to spend money unless they have to, so they wont res their defensive upgrades until they are needed. EG on your first run on the remote, which in this case is impossible.

Another benefit of Interdiction is that you can play it and Account Siphon HQ the same turn denying the crop the ability to res Crisium Grid or other defensive upgrades.

Also it helps out with Jinteki thousand cuts decks as you can drop it and run, avoiding having the corp res things like Hostile Infrastructure when you go on a trash spree!

The alternative to playing Interdiction would be to slot Political Operative, a great choice if you can keep pressure up and trash defensive upgrades before they make it into a sever. However you may find your self running out of them awfuly quickly, considering that you need to trash not only Caprice but also Ash 2X3ZB9CY and potentially Marcus Batty too.

(As an aside it's important to note that resing a defensive upgrades on approach is by far the best practice when playing a glacier deck. In fact it's so optimal that some players may even forget that they can't do it when you've got Interdiction in play.

This is because players tend to play off of instinct/habit. The best players think everything though and choose the most optimal path, however in a tense situation that process can be interrupted. Put the crop on the spot with The Source and some HQ pressure you may find they make a few play mistakes like forgetting to res caprice on their turn! )

Lastly we've got Legwork which gold standard HQ multi-access, a must have for most Criminal decks.

Hardware

Reflection is the cheap link and MU and it has a neat secondary effect which really isn't that important as you shouldn't be jacking out all that often. I'll replace it with Polyhistor when it comes out, but that's a ways off!

Sports Hopper Is mostly used as an alternative way to turn on Underworld Contact, the primary way being Reflection. But it can help out in a pinch when you expect to take damage.

Resources

Aaron Marrón, Clickless tag clearing and draw, don't mind if I do! I only run 1 because I've got Hostage and Mr. Li which lets me find him pretty fast when I need him.

Fall Guy keeps your Off-Campus Apartment from getting trashed, which is pretty important when it's loaded up. But perhaps more importantly it keeps The Source in play even after the crop scores. The Source is the linchpin of this deck, with out it the crop could rush out agendas before you're setup. Fall Guy keeps that form happening, he can also make you a slick 2 credits!

Agendas 'scored' with Film Critic don't trigger on scored abilities, like the auto trash on The Source which as mentioned above is good! Also it allows you to safely pick up dangerous/annoy Agendas like Fetal AI, NAPD Contract, The Future Perfect and that up coming 5 for 3 jinteki agenda that does 4 net damage when you steal it! Furthermore it helps you avoid getting hit by Midseasons, which I hear is bad for your health!

Kati Jones makes you money, which you need to make runs and thus win the game, so she's pretty cool! Just remember to always charge her last click. Also I tend to install her by herself, not on Off-Campus Apartment just in case Off-Campus Apartment gets trashed.

Mr. Li The best draw resource that criminal has on offer and most often my number one target for Hostage. His ability to quickly and efficiently find a card you need is key to getting the deck up and running fast. Except no substitutes!

Off-Campus Apartment is the sinew that binds this deck together. Without it the chances of you getting it setup fast enough to threaten the crop mid game are pretty unlikely. Three of them solves that problem!

Sacrificial Construct as mentioned above lets Tapwrm stick around. The crop wont know if you've got more than one Sacrificial Construct in your deck, if they purge Tapwrm they loose a turn and you can burn Sacrificial Construct to just ignore that. Now they have to purge AGAIN, giving you a total of 8 clicks to advance your board state.

If they don't they could be looking at giving you a massive amount of money. Furthermore you can FORCE them to purge by installing two Tapwrms and a Sacrificial Construct. Lose lose for the crop, not bad for you!

It also provides some measure of protection from surprise unbreakable sentries, Marcus Batty shenanigans and Keegan Lane. None of that is bad either!

Temüjin Contract is in every deck now in days and for good reason, the profit you can gain from it is incredible, enough said!

The Source slows the crop down and gives you more time to setup. Works extremely well with Fall Guy and Film Critic, all of which can be brought into play with Hostage. A fantastic card, well worth the influence.

The Turning Wheel is the only multi-access in this deck other than Legwork and often that's all you'll need. I tend not to install this on Off-Campus Apartment in case I run out of Fall Guy and cant stop the crop from trashing Off-Campus Apartment.

Underworld Contact makes you money, if you luck into two of these and a Reflection early you've got a stable economy for the rest of the game. Just as a note, Underworld Contact is another card that sometimes get installed all by it's lonesome just in case.

Final notes

If any on has suggestions or feedback I'd love to hear them!