Headline not found for UK Nationals 2024
The Process / Snare Bears collaborate on an asset based NBN at the second largest event of the year, with one conspicuous absence...
UK Nationals 2024
16th - 17th Nov 2024
Bristol, UK
115 Players
10 rounds SSS, Cut to top-16
Top Cut decklists are here
You can watch all of the swiss and top cut streams on Wu-Tube
You can browse a gorgeous set of professional photographs from the event here
After a hasty relocation of venue, 115 netrunner players from across the world huddled together for warmth in the music room of a 15th-century manor house on the outskirts of Bristol. With the glory of aruzan’s World Championship win still fresh in their minds, each and every player was ready to compete, and hungry to claim victory over the field at the second largest event of the year.
What lessons had these players learned from the recent World Championship in San Francisco? What spicy new decks had been brewed? And what on earth was the plan to win against Lat?
The Field
The most popular Corp IDs at the event were PD (18) and R+ (17), with PE (13) also making a reasonable showing. Only 10 players chose to bring Asa—the same number of players that chose to bring Ob—which was surprising given how well Asa performed at the recent world championship.
Far less surprisingly, Lat (36) was the most popular runner Identity by far. In fact, there was more Lat at the tournament than Anarch (27) or Criminal (23). Kit (14), Esâ (13) and Sable (12) were also reasonably popular.
Only 6 players chose to bring Arissana—cementing her reputation as a niche identity choice, albeit the niche identity choice of the reigning World Champion.
Team Preference
EA Sports, TAI Breakers, QEH and QtM all played a complete mix of different Corp and Runner IDs, although Lat was a common runner pick
NWE played Ob and Asa, paired with Esâ
SCRUBS played AgInfusion and PD, paired with a variety of different runners (Lat, Kit, Freedom, Arissana)
The Process / Snare Bears mostly played Lat and a previously unseen ARES R+ build—combining the best runner deck with an asset NBN list, neither of which should really come as much of a shock to anyone that has attended UK nats before
The Top Cut
Ob (2.16x) and R+ (2.11x) converted incredibly well into the Top Cut, claiming 3 and 5 slots respectively. PE (1.66x) did well, and Azmari and A Teia both managing to each stake a claim despite a very low Swiss attendance is notable. PD (0.4x), Asa (0.72x), and AgInfusion (0.9x) were all present on day two, but not in the numbers that you might have expected.
Lat (1.8x) made up more than half of the top cut, but the best runner to convert was actually Esâ (2.21x) who—despite a lacklustre win rate (45%)—sent 4 players into day two. 5 if you count the tournaments’ only Quetzal player—whose deck played Chastushka, Finality and Laamb (but no Begemot).
Overall Performance
A 51% runner win rate (in swiss) makes UK nationals the most balanced tournament we’ve seen in 24.09—or since Rw/oR was released. That number drops to 37% in the Top Cut, but even so.
Faction wise, NBN (57%) and Weyland (52%) outperformed both HB and Jinteki (47%). Meanwhile, on the Runner side of things, Criminal (55%) was the breakout success of the lower and middle tables, while Anarch (46%) struggled at all levels of play.
If we look at the average swiss points for each ID, we can see that Azmari, MirrorMorph and Ob were most likely to be found playing against Esâ, Steve and Lat on the higher tables, where as Thule, Thunderbolt and Issuaq were more likely to play against Hoshiko, 419 and Kit on the lower tables.
For the first time since the release of Rw/oR, Ob delivered some solid tournament results (59% win rate, 2.16x conversion)—with Eden playing facet, testrunning playing Tucana, and J0N4LD playing Urban Renewal.
Zahya was technically high performing, but it’s worth saying that most Zahya games were played on the mid/lower tables, and that King Solomon somewhat relied on his Corp deck (PE) to get Zahya into the Top Cut. A similar thing can be said about Cornelius and Azmari, although most Azmari games did tend to be played at the higher tables.
It’s no surprise to find that both Lat (58% win rate, 1.8x conversion) and R+ (57%, 2.11x) performed exceptionally well. Notably, the only R+ to make day two that wasn’t assets was rushing out agendas with Better Citizen Program—there were no kill threat R+ in the Top Cut. Lat players were fairly evenly split between Swift and Aniccam—both did very well.
Meta Breakers
Intentionally Unpleasant Assets R+ (sans Headline)
Find the official nrdb writeup here.
Described by various members of The Process as both “absolutely sick” and also “not good”, this is yet another in a fine tradition of asset NBN lists to do well at UK nats, only the assets in this list are all intentionally unpleasant. Bladderwort, Vladisibirsk City Grid, Amani Senai, B-1001, Cohort Guidance Program, Warm Reception, Working Prototype, Federal Fundraising and MCA Austerity Policy have all been selected by different players as must trash cards, to force the runner to interact with the board as frequently as possible. Else you risk getting hit by an Artificial Cryptocrash.
It lives or dies by an ARES score, so make sure to check at least some of the remotes on turn one.
(almost) Breakerless Quetzal
Because paying credits to break ICE is cringe—and always has been.
Whether this is a real meta breaker or a personal pet deck played to perfection is unclear, but lif3line did undeniably well with this viciously off-meta Runner deck, beating Asa, MirrorMorph, AgInfusion and BtL, but losing 2 games to R+.
It plays Chastushka, Finality and Divide and Conquer, so be prepared to get hit right where it hurts (in the centrals).
Before I sign off with the final standings, I wanted to say a huge congratulations to the tournament organisers for pulling off a UK nationals that I know that everyone will remember. It was my absolute privilege to be on the emergency call—less than 72 hours before the event was due to start—with not_yeti, CobraBubbles, harmonbee, dreadmaaw, Nicky3.0 and Baa Ram Wu, when we first learned that the original venue had been flooded. It took the team less than an hour to get organised, and, despite the challenges, at no point at all was I concerned that this event would be anything less than incredible. Not only were the TOs all over it, I knew that the volunteers, and the players themselves, would all do what needed to be done in order to make it happen.
Because this community is just that good.
If you are one of those players or volunteers from the event—and you haven’t already—then please make sure to give the TOs a high five the next time that you see them. Until then, we would appreciate any feedback (good, bad and ugly) that you have. As good a job as we did, we know that not everything was perfect, and your feedback will help us to prioritise what’s important for any tournaments that we run next year. You can find the feedback form here.
Congratulations to our new UK Champion Dapperatchik on resisting the allure of unpleasant assets R+, and going almost* undefeated through two days of some of the most high profile netrunner games that you can play!
*and a small congratulations to JonnyDL for being the only player to take a game off of him
Final Standings
Dapperatchik (The Process) - Asa [5-1-0] / Lat [7-0-0]
Nemamiah (The Process) - R+ [6-1-0] / Lat [6-2-0]
J0N4LD (TAI Breakers) - Ob [7-1-0] / Arissana [5-2-0]
Seamus (The Process) - R+ [5-2-0] / Lat [5-1-0]
Fabio/Baserton (SCRUBS) - PD [5-2-0] / Lat [4-3-0]
JonnyDL (The Process) - R+ [6-2-0] / Esâ [4-3-0]
davz131 (EA Sports) - R+ [4-2-0] / Esâ [5-2-0]
kysra (Snare Bears) - R+ [6-1-0] / Lat [3-4-0]
AugustusCaesar (TAI Breakers) - AgInfusion [4-2-0] / Lat [4-2-0]
Cornelius (EA Sports) - Azmari [3-3-0] / Lat [5-1-0]
King Solomon (QEH) - PE [4-1-0] / Zahya [4-3-0]
mays.leyline (SCG) - PE [3-4-0] / Lat [5-1-0]
nervousnightjar (EA Sports) - A Teia [4-2-0] / Esâ [3-2-0]
Eden (ESA) - Ob [4-2-0] / Lat [3-3-0]
testrunning (NWE) - Ob [4-2-0] / Esâ [3-3-0]
lif3line (SCG) - PE [3-3-0] / Quetzal [4-2-0]
The Surveyor 24.09 meta analysis spreadsheet is available here
For live tournament coverage you can follow The Surveyor on mastodon