Tech Talk - Doppelganger Shut It Down!

This week, Tech Talk is going to try something a bit different. We're going to propose and discuss a deck built around a card that is currently not getting much respect - the brand new Criminal console, Doppelganger.

First, let's take a look at Doppelganger (A Study in Static) itself. A three-cost console, just like its Criminal brethren Desperado (Core), Doppelganger lets you immediately make another run after completing a successful run. Desperado gives you a credit for every successful run. Both Criminal consoles give you a free, use-restricted click. Pretty sweet, huh?

Here's the thing – Desperado's free click is far more universally useful. You will always need more credits. Doppelganger's free click, on the other hand, isn't always going to be useful. It's like going out to eat: everywhere you go, you can order the grilled cheese, which will always be exactly what it is OR you can try something different from the menu that might turn out *way* better than a grilled cheese or might be awful. Desperado is grilled cheese, Doppelganger is wild turkey ravioli in a blue cheese and nutmeg béchamel.

So, if Desperado is always useful, then why would you ever use Doppelganger? Easy. You build a deck around it. In order to do that, you need to pin down exactly what it is that Doppelganger enables. On paper, making extra runs sounds great but in practice, there are a couple questions:

1) How do you afford multiple runs every turn?

2)What do you do when the Corp stops giving you hard targets for runs (i.e. slows down or stops installing Agendas/Assets)?

We need to answer those questions with our deck. There are two possible answers to the first question – have an incredibly robust economy and super-efficient rig, which enables you to pay your way through any ICE and ensures you can do something (trash an Asset or pay off Red Herrings, for example) when you get in; or keep the Corp poor, which will stop him from rezzing helpful Assets or ICE to block your way. The first approach (economy and rig) tends to be a mid- and late-game build, and with the popularity of fast-advance style Corp decks, something that gets going a little earlier seems like it might be a good idea. We want something a bit tricksy that can get set-up fast, so let's try the "keeping the Corp poor" route.

The second question has one answer that comes in three flavors, like a Neopolitan ice cream of Corp sadness: Central Servers. If the Agendas aren't in play, they have to be somewhere, and that somewhere is either HQ, R&D, or Archives. The Corp can never really stop giving you targets as long as you can get into their Centrals. If you want to target Archives, you're best bet is a Noise Workshop deck to passively toss lots and lots of cards in the trash. However, those decks don't run very much, so Doppelganger won't be a good fit (Grimoire is just too perfect). Focusing on HQ would scream Gabriel, since that's his go-to anyway. Nerve Agent (Cyber Exodus) is only two pips of Influence, so splashing it is easy. However, Nerve Agent suffers from diminishing returns in that most Corp players' hands only change by a card (maybe two, if they draw once) every turn, so multiple runs will eventually be a waste. The best bang for you Central Server-busting buck is still R&D, where an on-line Medium (Core) or two will reward as many runs as you can possibly make. The problem with R&D is when you find a bunch of non-Agendas on top of the deck. A Runner can only afford so much trashing, even if the Corp can't mount much defense because his coffers are empty. Enter that tubby master gamer, Whizzard. His built-in ability helps (mildly) ease your need for credits and his faction allows you to bring in all sorts of destructive tools and tricksy shenaniganery.

To sum up, we are now looking at building a Whizzard deck around Doppelganger that will focus on keeping the Corp poor so we can affordably make multiple runs per turn and packs Mediums to target R&D so that we always have a worthwhile target to run at.

Keeping the Corp poor requires two cards: Account Siphon and Vamp (another Tech Talk favorite). Account Siphon is expensive in terms of Influence, so we'll only pack two. Luckily, Vamp is in faction, so we can take three. Since we're building an Anarch deck we have Influence-free access to Deja Vu, which will let us grab Account Siphon, if we need a third (or fourth) in addition to letting us recover from any program trashing. Doppelganger works well with Account Siphon and Vamp because we can make an immediate run to benefit from the Corp being poor. The more actions we can take before the Corp can recover, the better.

We want to have a quick-to-build, flexible rig, so we can just grab three copies of that awesome rig-in-a-can Crypsis. Special Order is a possibility for making it easier to find Crypsis, but since we're Anarch and Crypsis is a Virus, why not pack a couple Djinn and save the Influence? Djinn lets us tutor for Crypsis (and any other Viruses we include) as well as taking care of any extra MU needs. Relying on Crypsis as our full 'breaker rig is nice in that it allows us to not sweat MU as hard as a traditional triple-'breaker rig does, so even if we draw into Crypsis and our Mediums without Djinn, we can still get our core rig (Crypsis + 3x Medium) in play with no help. Including Djinn opens up the option to pack a few more Viruses that can be easily grabbed from the Stack. Since we're going to be focusing on hitting HQ (Account Siphon and Vamp) and R&D, we'll throw in some Datasuckers and Parasites to deal with the few pieces of ICE that the Corp does manage to rez.

Vamp requires money and, often, lots of it, since you need to break into HQ in the first place. The Corp is most likely to hve rezzed ICE on HQ since the first time you run it, they will probably still have money, so you'll need to be able to break in several times throughout the course of the game. Crypsis is flexible but he ain't cheap, so we're going to need to build a pretty robust economy anyway. Account Siphon pulls double duty here, getting us money in addition to draining credits from the Corp. Liberated Accounts is in-faction for Anarchs and is just such a monster when it comes to crediting-up for a Vamp run, we'll include three. Stimhack, also in-faction, can help us make those last few runs to seal the game. Since we're packing more than a few Viruses, Cyberfeeder will help defray install costs and let us run more often without spending clicks for cash, so we'll take three. Sure Gamble and Armitage Codebusting will round out our economy, but we'll wait to see how many of each until we've made the remaining decisions about cards.

We've already spent 12 Influence on 2x Account Siphon and 2x Doppelganger. We could pack a third Doppelganger to better ensure we'll see one, but Tech Talk likes to run two copies of a console out of personal preference, so we'll look to spend the remaining three Influence. Since we have a bit of recursion with 3x Deja Vu, we'll take one copy each of Emergency Shutdown (since we'll be hitting HQ anyway) and Crescentus, because shutting down ICE when the Corp is broke is hilarious!

We've got a few slots left, so let's see if we can't strengthen our main focus of hitting R&D with loaded-up Mediums. Demolition Run is a no-brainer, letting us clear the decks, so to speak, so we can dig even deeper. It also opens up the possibility of hitting the alternate victory condition of decking the Corp. Joshua B. is in-faction and having even more runs at R&D in one turn, when the Corp can't respond by purging Virus counters, is a good thing, so we'll bring a couple of him along, too.

You may be asking yourself, "Self, how does Tech Talk think it is going to deal with all the tags generated by Account Siphon, Vamp, and Joshua B.?" Well, Self, we deal with them by ignoring them. If we are truly keeping the Corp poor, then there isn't much he can do to us. He could take two credits and then trash a Resource, and while it would be sad to see Joshua B. go, it means the Corp is still broke when our turn starts. Our other Resources (Liberated Accounts and Armitage Codebusting) should be drained out before we go back to running, so they won't be around to get trashed. Scorched Earth costs money, more than the Corp can get in one turn while still being able to play it, so we've got a little wiggle room there. In general, the Corp should be too busy figuring out how he's going to do anything to worry about punishing tags.

Alright, we've all the decisions, so now it's time to put the deck together, deciding exact quantities of cards and, most importantly, coming up with a name. Since we're big fans of 30 Rock here at Tech Talk HQ, we've decided to call the deck Shut It Down, and here it is...

Deck Created with CardGameDB.com Android: Netrunner Deck Builder

SHUT IT DOWN!


Identity:
Whizzard: Master Gamer (What Lies Ahead)

Total Cards: 45

Event (17)
Deja Vu (Core) x3
Demolition Run (Core) x2
Stimhack (Core) x3
Vamp (Trace Amount) x3
Account Siphon (Core) x2
Emergency Shutdown (Cyber Exodus) x1
Sure Gamble (Core) x3

Hardware (5)
Cyberfeeder (Core) x3
Doppelganger (A Study in Static) x2

Program (15)
Datasucker (Core) x3
Djinn (Core) x2
Medium (Core) x3
Crescentus (A Study in Static) x1
Parasite (Core) x3
Crypsis (Core) x3

Resource (8)
Armitage Codebusting (Core) x3
Joshua B (Cyber Exodus) x2
Liberated Account (Trace Amount) x3


Influence Values Totals -
Criminal: 15
Shaper: 0


And just to leave you thinking a bit, here's a variant on the above that you can try:

–2 Datasucker (Core)
–1 Stimhack (Core)
–1 Cyberfeeder (Core)

+2 Public Sympathy (Cyber Exodus)
+2 Wyldside (Core)

Datasuckers can be crazysauce when we are mostly hitting HQ and R&D, however, with Djinn, one can be enough and since this deck is so event focused, having a larger hand size may be more beneficial than extra Datasuckers. We've also been looking to try an untrashable Wyldside build to see if it works. Doppelganger gives us back the missing click (as long as we want to run twice) and the Public Sympathy lets us hold onto more cards so we can spend clicks draining our economic resources instead of playing things out in order to not have to discard.