Criminal hold their own at (pre)Worlds Showdown
Against an intimidating field of diverse Corp strategies
Worlds Showdown
28th-29th Sept 2024
Online
86 Players
8 rounds SSS, Cut to top-16
Watch the Swiss and Top Cut streams on Aksu’s Youtube channel
Find the Top Cut decklists on Aesop’s Tables.
The “showdown” series of online events—organised by maninthemoon—are a popular feature in many netrunner player diaries. Over the weekend, a total of 86 players from across the globe gathered—some virtually, some physically—to test their latest decklist brews, and hone their skills in preparation for the World Championship that’s happening in San Francisco in just three weeks time. All of which gives us the best meta snapshot that we can hope for ahead of the main event itself.
In terms of faction diversity, we can see a very familiar shape, with most players preferring HB (37%) and Shaper (47%), but with all factions represented. However, unlike any tournament in 24.05, NBN had a healthy showing (28%), with Azmari [9] and R+ [9] the most popular Corp identities (behind PD [23]). Notably, no player chose to bring RH—a highly successful ID in the previous meta. Whether this was in anticipation of an explosion in the popularity of Lat [17], or a deliberate choice by players to keep their powder dry ahead of the Worlds Championship, remains to be seen.
Both the popularity of NBN, and the absence of RH, go some way to explain how six criminal players (including two mercury) were able to fight their way into the Top Cut. Curiously, Criminal had both the lowest winrate of all runner factions (31%), but also the highest cut conversion (24%, well above the baseline of 19%). While some Criminal players were carried by their Corp picks, others did legitimately well, giving some credence to the idea that, rather than being underpowered, Criminal is just quite difficult to play well.
The variety of successful Corp archetypes on display at this event was impressive—perhaps even intimidating. PD and Asa both underperformed (compared to other Corp identities), but still managed a better than 50% win rate. NBN assets came in multiple flavours (some murderous, some note), and all performed exceptionally well. The standout Corp deck, though, was Charlotte AgInfusion, which secured 4 places in the cut (50% conversion) with a 69% winrate.
On the Runner side of things, it’s notable that, even with World Tree now banned, Arissana outperformed Lat both in terms of win rate (55% vs 50%) and cut conversion (20% vs 12%). It’s possible that Arissana is (still) better prepared to deal with NBN assets, whilst also being capable of going the distance against Jinteki glacier. World Tree or no, Physarum Entangler is still a heck of a card in the hands of our favourite frog enthusiast.
Corp winrate in Swiss was 56%, dropping to 47% in the Top Cut.
It’s hardly surprising to see Corp winrates gain a few points following a banlist update that only affected the Runner (up from 53% in 24.05). Corps doing worse in the Top Cut is potentially interesting, but the lack of data points means that it is not necessarily significant. We’ll just have to see how things develop.
Final Standings
Santa (Muntal Bost) - Azmari [4-2-0] / Arissana [6-0-1]
enkoder (Muntal Bost) - NEH [7-0-0] / 419 [6-3-0]
Baa Ram Wu (TAI Breakers) - Asa [4-3-0] / Arissana [5-1-0]
Hectorest - Asa [3-3-1] / Lat [5-0-1]
arlekj - AgInfusion [3-2-1] / Hoshiko [5-0-1]
wyld - AgInfusion [6-1-0] / 419 [2-3-1]
FireRL (Muntal Bost) - AgInfusion [4-1-1] / Hoshiko [4-1-1]
NoodleSoup - PD [4-3-0] / Kit [3-1-1]
snoobz - PD [4-2-0] / Kit [3-2-0]
davz131 (EA Sports) - PD [3-2-0] / Steve [4-2-0]
ChonkySeal - AgInfusion [3-0-2] / 419 [3-3-0]
dezigerator - R+ [3-1-1] / Mercury [3-2-1]
Baserton - Earth Station [3-2-0] / Esâ [2-2-1]
Amarum - Asa [3-2-0] / Kit [2-2-1]
xou - Asa [2-3-0] / Lat [3-2-0]
zhansonic - R+ [3-2-0] / Mercury [2-3-0]
Some data seem to be wrong either here on Aesop's (e.g. dezigerator R+ 3/0/1 in Aesop, here is 3/1/0; Hectorest Lat 5/0/1 in Aesop, here is 5/1/0).