All Hail Aruzzana - 3rd @UK Nats '24 ("Worlds 2")

J0N4LD 378

This is the list I piloted to a 3rd place finish at UK Nationals - aka "Worlds 2" - losing only to Chris Dyer's R+ in Swiss, and JonnyDL's R+ in the Cut (whiffing Deep Dive's in both πŸ™ˆ)

(despite offering to judge the top cut, whoops!)

It's very similar to this year's Worlds winning list from @aruzan, hence the title, and all the credit goes to them for making their cracked 50-card Spree list πŸ’œ The main changes I made were:

Slots

  • +1 Aniccam, +2 Into the Depths β€” draw consistency is the biggest weakness of the deck, particularly at 50 cards. Adding an extra console improves the chance of drawing it, and upping the event count seemed sensible (especially as econ was cut elsewhere)
  • -2 Fermenter, +1 Mystic Maemi, +1 Hush, +1 No Free Lunch β€” Fermenters felt too slow to me, and further incentivized purges that can wreck our favourite trojans, while Maemi really helps the deck bounce back from low credit totals, especially with Commission, ITD, and Spec Work
    • Not playing Hush in Arissana is criminal in my book πŸ˜‚ it's so good against so many ice! NFL was the last influence because it's a good meta call for a UK Nats(πŸ™„), and it's another low-cost econ option vs. other decks 🀷
  • -2 Daily Casts, -2 Environmental Testing β€” cut for slots and replaced with the aforementioned econ options (mainly because I wanted another Aniccam and less Fermenters)
  • -1 Gauss, +1 Slap Vandal β€” Slap is just a good cheap trojan that can get us into a lot of places, and can even be another great Spree target on gearcheck servers
    • Gauss never felt particularly good in my testing, but I'm most dubious about this cut... leaving barrier-breaking down to just Propeller / SV / Botulus is definitely risky against glacier decks

If I had more time to test and tinker, I would have liked to try and cut down to 48 or lower to improve consistency, but I'm really not sure what I'd be dropping at that point, and if 50 works for the world champ...🀷

Special Thanks

  • All the organisers, judges, volunteers, etc. β€” UK Netrunner is such an awesome environment, but turning around such a smooth event despite all the crazy venue issues was incredible ❀️
  • The TAI Breakers team, as usual β€” from our Heathrow roadtrip, to losing my voice yelling about being "team mum", to endless rounds of braille shithead that nobody wanted to end, y'all are amazing and I couldn't have done it without you ❀️
  • Of course, @aruzan, for restoring my faith in Arissana, and showing the world that she don't need no tree πŸ’…πŸ’
4 comments
19 Nov 2024 Baa Ram Wu

have you ever considered just playing Lat?

19 Nov 2024 J0N4LD

@Baa Ram Wu who's that? Do they have cool frogs and graffiti?

🌲🐸🟰❀️

19 Nov 2024 Council

Into the Depths let's goooo

20 Nov 2024 xdg

Watching you finish 3rd felt so good after seeing you judging and not playing at Worlds. I wish I could have been there in person to see it and celebrate! Huge congrats! πŸ‘”πŸβ€οΈ