Round 1 – Chaos Theory vs Replicating Perfection
The hand took off great for me. Hedge fund, ice, ice to start the day off right and just continued to build up. The game lasted about 15 minutes and was able to keep the money up, build up a small server, pop me a beautiful Caprice in there, and went to town scoring. I think my opponent made a slight mistake strictly focusing on R&D and not trashing my Mental Health Clinics and Sundews and keeping my HQ ice and a Jackson up for me to cycle through R&D to grab all the agendas I could need and throw the rest away. In the end he scored 1 Nisei and I knocked it out with 1 NAPD, 1 Nisei, and 1 Future Perfect. Great game!
Round 2 – Nasir vs Haas Bioroid: Engineering the Future (i.e. End the Fun)
Now this match, holy crap, this one took a while and was a close one. I started out the gate strong with a Earthrise and Astrolabe (although Astrolabe wasn’t that great at the start). My opponent built up some strong servers and remotes and I was sure to take advantage of it. The savior of this game turned out to be Stimhack. I ended up making two Stimhack runs that brought me out an Atman at 4 and the other that helped me pull out a Femme I was saving on Personal Workshop. Eventually, the score got to 5 and 5 for us both and it literally came down to the last turn. I took a glory run on R&D that was sitting on 1 unrezzed card, Enigma, and Eli 1.0. Sadly, my opponent made a slight miscalculation on the Caduceus he had not rezzed yet and I was able to pull the last agenda I needed out for the win. Close match and among my favorite matches of the day.
Round 3 – Nasir vs Near Earth Hub
Sigh, well this match was inevitable and my most feared of the tournament, but I feel I made a pretty good showing throughout. Started off pretty standard for NEH, he ices up HQ, sure gamble, and places a face down. For me, I had the best had I possibly could; Earthrise, Astrolabe, 1 x Atman, and Workshop ready to go. I start off by playing Earthrise/Astrolabe (my standard opener) and check R&D and see an Eli. For giggles I check out the remote and what do you know, there is that crazy ol’ San San Grid sitting there mocking me. Over to his turn he scores out an Astroscript and from there the train has officially begun. I continue drawing and making runs on R&D. Nothing this turn, but the draw netted me some decent stuff and I think I had maybe an R&D Interface sitting ready on Workshop. Next turn he makes a new server and gets money if I remember right. Next I run R&D and pull a Making News and decided of a glory run on HQ to get some money. Sadly, wraparound doesn’t net me a ton, but it’s enough for me to click so I can trash that San San next turn. Before I’m able to trash San San he is able to get another Astroscript out and ready. I continue to pressure R&D for the next few turns and trash the San San and eventually find a Project Beale and maybe one other (can’t remember exactly), but I do know is he eventually iced up R&D with that Eli which cost me each turn to get in. Eventually I run into an NAPD (curse you Nasir gods) and I just don’t have the money to pay for it nor a Self-Modifying Code/Imp to trash it. Came proceeds and he grabs the 7 points before I can find my last one or steal the NAPD. Great game though and I am proud Nasir held his own pretty well.
Round 4 – Andromeda (Stealth) vs Replicating Perfection
This became a pretty crazy match as well and came down to the very end. I will say this about the Andromeda: Stealth build, it is super-efficient. I don’t remember much of the early details of match, but he kept me pretty poor throughout the beginning as we worked to set up. He was able to set his rig up a lot faster than I could gain money and ice up without all the Account Siphons. He grabbed a few agendas early on, but I was eventually able to get enough ice out to tax him decently and score out an NAPD and Nisei. I finally got the Future Perfect I needed and proceeded to get my money ready to score it out. I had a sneaky little trick on both R&D and Archives sense those seemed to be his two biggest Security Testing servers. I placed and Excalibur on each and prepared to score out the Future Perfect over the next two turns. By this time he has three R&D interfaces out though and makes a fun run on R&D. He happens to pull my other Future Perfect and win the Psi game for the win. Was an amazing game and came down to the last couple of clicks. Only thing I regret is not using that Nisei counter to stop that last run.
Round 5 –Blue Sun vs Nasir
The Blue Sun matchup was not one I was too scared of because Nasir loves forcing the rez for those 14 credits (which I did on an HQ run just to see what he had in hand) which put me in a great place. I then proceeded to run R&D and got to see the Sea Source. No problem though, since he continues to ice HQ and R&D this time and get a ton of money (at one point in this game he was sitting at around 35 credits, maybe more). I run on R&D with no rez and see the dreaded Scorch. Now, it’s time to start digging. We both keep digging and digging. I draw two, place two on Workshop for about 4 turns until I finally see one of the two Plascrete. Now, it’s time to run and I proceed to bust my way into R&D with my interface up and get lucky and pull a 2 and 3 pointer. Next turn same thing and pull two more for the win.
Round 6 – Andromeda: Stealth vs Replicating Perfection
This match was completely different from my previous matchup. I was sure to keep more barriers up and going in HQ to stop the Siphons and scored out a Nisei pretty early which stopped another Siphon. My opponent had not really played against RP before, so remembering to run the central first was kind of weird for him. I eventually got and Excalibur on Archives and again on R&D and was able to utilize the combo again as he security tested my Archives and R&D primarily. Also of note, I made sure every run on every server cost him at least 3 credits beyond the stealth credits. Eli and multi sub routine Code Gates helped a lot on this, even if they were low strength. Eventually last turn came and I put a Future Perfect down advanced twice. Here, he decides to run R&D with an inside job so the Excalibur failed me, but I kept him out of the remote with (from outside in) Pup, Tollbooth, Enigma and a Caprice to top it all off. Another fun game and Replicating Perfection kept me happy.
Round 7 – Jinteki: Personal Evolution vs Nasir
Being a PE player myself I figured this wouldn’t be a bad matchup for me because I understood how PE worked. Boy, was I wrong. I made the mistake of checking the remotes and ran into a nasty Inazuma to Komainu combo that was just painful. Next, I decided that it was prudent I just keep my hand built up, keep my two Atmans (one at 0 the other at 4) and did a bunch of runs on R&D (curse you Pop Up Window and my inability to get an SMC for some reason or my Parasite). I kept up the pressure and pulled one Philotic Entaglement, but he was able to score out a House of Knives and three Fetal AI for the win.
Round 8 – Replicating Perfection vs Kate
This was another great matchup, but sadly I had to rush due to time. I built up an outside server, scored out an NAPD. He keeps up the runs on R&D and somehow nets two Nisei in the same run. Well, that kind of looked bad and we were getting close to time, so I get my Future Perfect into the remote and a Caprice just in case. From here, the Excalibur Combo was finally able to go off over R&D and he didn’t get to attack the Future Perfect. With the score at 5-4 we are down to the last few seconds of the match. I have an NAPD advanced once in the remote and a Caprice and 2 pieces of ice to tax him in R&D. He makes a glory run on R&D (with 3 R&D interfaces installed no less), wins the Psi game on Caprice and goes in and sees a Future Perfect. With only 1 credit left though I am able to secure the Psi victory right at time and proceed to advance out my NAPD for the win.
Conclusion:
Over all I was very satisfied with the ways my decks played out. Tied for second place overall and believe I made a good showing against the first place winner (the round 3-4 NEH/Andromeda player). Nasir is my favorite runner at the moment because he is able to influence the decisions of the corp in a way that no other runner can (except Leela and Noise) I still need to make a few more changes which I think will be pretty simple once Order and Chaos comes out. For now I am really enjoying the play style, but will definitely need to make a few changes before the next big tournament. AS for Replicating Perfection, I feel I was able to get the hang of it pretty quickly for a deck I have never played. I would really like to try a Grail version because of the Excalibur combo, but am not sure what to trade out.
Anyways, hope you all enjoy the write up and be looking for videos of table 1 to be coming up here in the future. You will also be able to see Rounds 3-6 that were written here in action (since I got to play at table 1 a few times). Thanks and any critique of my writing, play style, or deck lists is always appreciated.