Agent's Control Slide Deck V5
shosuro006 24
Deck I used in the Online Round Up 2026. I was 2nd place in the swiss rounds, but lost the first round in my top 8 match vs Prodigy. This is a control slide deck that does not want to be involved in shootouts. I slotted in some vamoosin to help provide some escape tools if my dudes became wanted on the opposing side of the street, idea being let the callout happen on my dude, let them get wanted, then vamoose myself home unbooted letting me move about again after to threaten a new location. The workhorses of the deck were blood curses and phantasms. If I drew into them early I typically won. Given that I would phantasm opponents dudes onto my home or their adjacent deeds forcing them to boot them to move somewhere and of course blood curse speaks for itself.
Game 1: W vs Aussie Scum playing Morgan Regulators. Drew blood curse and phantasm early.
Game 2: L vs Carter playing House of Many Faiths. I drew into my blood curse and phantasms very late, which at that point Carter's deck had plenty of extra influence to offset whatever I cursed away. In the end I conceded, because he had me dead to rights with overwhelming board presence for the final day.
Game 3: W vs Deputy Way playing House of Many Faiths. He drew into some spells to protect his dudes for shootouts that never happened. I played enough deeds to slide out and I blood cursed just enough to push me over the edge.
Game 4: W vs Queen of Carnage playing Encroaching Darkness. She did not see any forced fights and I just kept spitting out deeds and blood cursing whatever influence she had on the board to let push the win.
Game 5: W vs Zenarchist playing Law Dogs. He did not have enough forced fights to combat my dudes parked at home. I got my blood curses late, but it was enough to seal the deal by sliding out over his reduced influence.
Top 8 match, Game 6: L vs Prodigy playing Serpentine Syndicate. He had a more shooting capable control slide-ish deck. I think I lost lowball 6 times in a row and that really messed with some of my economy. Him winning lowball and being able to play his own deeds without fear me threating them put me in a position that I couldnt come back from. His force fights were enough to do me in targeting my dudes with Blood Curses. Solid performance from him, while I felt like I just made some bad choices.
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| Mar 04, 2026 ironcache |
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Mar 04, 2026
ironcache
Also, no Nicodemus Whateley? Seems like an easy slot in for Kevin Wainwright (Exp.1), IMO. |
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Mar 04, 2026
DoomDog
With defensive Vamoosin', what would your thoughts be on adding a Paralysis Mark or two to force your opponent to commit two dudes to have to call you out? I like to include a copy of Fetch in lists like these - it'll either grab you something useful against a Cheatin' lowball hand or becomes a free spell to boot to move Sylvester Heath somewhere. Seconding adding Nicodemus Whateley in a deck like this. |
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Mar 10, 2026
shosuro006
Swagger did some work. I used it in two situations: I was on opponent side unbooted, allowing me to push opponent to seek me out otherwise I'd stifle their economy OR I was on my own side and let me better regain my own deeds. Also consider that I was using Doris so this gets me some more CP. Same deal for Shortcut on Doris. Shortcut also had the bonus of letting me bypass townsquare. Both Swagger and Shortcut were easy use clubs letting me flush out my hand to find more deeds or dudes. Winning Agenda, was there fore the draw/cycle noon ability. I sadly only ever used it once and I misread the ability. I thought the ability was "up to" not "equal" so a few times I wanted to use it on my 2 inf dudes but only had 1 card in hand, so it was not as useful as I would have liked. I probably could have played it out earlier on my 1inf dudes but wanted big payoff draws. Paralysis I had considered, opted to not include as I did not want to risk failing a spell pull. The 1 Anonimo was the only real risky 8 floating in the deck. I dont even count Agent as she is meant to ace herself when i see one of my better dudes show up. Fetch I really wanted, but same deal, I don't want to risk a spell pull fail. For Ironcache, I really was just trying to spam out deeds and push my opponent to dealing with the threat of losing. I did not want to fight at all. If my opponents got steady income to put out more dudes I was typically in a bad spot. I really needed my Curses and Phantasms to show up as early as possible to put my opponent in a crappy position. Every game I tried my best to flush my hand desperately seeking out the spells I needed to start my own clock on them. No Nicodemus, his ability would be useful but carries the risk of booting out my dudes when I prefer them to be a bit more mobile/able to refuse callouts. went with Kevin for the possibility of getting use of the Noon ability to draw cards. Could be potential swap. |
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Mar 17, 2026
Prodigy
Very fun list! As I suspected after our match, my deck was always going to be a very uphill battle for this one, as I was trying for similar things but went more shooty, which means I could bully the board at will. Although I can see now why you lost some of those lowballs in our match - I should not have won anywhere near as many, since my list was somewhat tighter, but what might be considered your 'off values' are all piled into only 2 values. Where oftentimes a list may have 3 values, but then a smattering of random values to fill in the 'good cards' needed, rarely are those all only 1 or 2 values. I'm betting this sort of structure makes for more 2-pair and 3-of-a-kinds in lowball than average, but fewer full house/4ofK's. I'm not mathy enough to know what that means for the average lowball against an average draw structure, but it's an interesting thought experiement! |
Happy to see a list in this style still at least getting top cut performance (+ 4/1 in the Swiss).
You mention the use of defensive Vamoosin' (IE: save your dudes). Did you find much opportunity to do it offensively (IE: kick dudes off your private deeds)?
Thoughts on the other clubs? I've wanted to like Swagger and Shortcut, but I find they just haven't done it for me. Curious how you felt The Winning Agenda performed.
It is a bit of a shame that the match reports are all something along the lines of "I saw Blood Curse early and won" or "They saw influence (/ did not see force fight) early and I lost". Do you think there's anything that could be done to put this archetype more in the driver's seat (or, challenging the premise, did you feel like that was an issue)?