Turncoat Andy (2nd NZ Nats, 2016)

The main takeaway of this deck is that the name is far more innovative than the deck itself, which is fairly standard ‘Blood Money Andy’ fare. The ‘Turncoat’ descriptor is multifaceted and pertains to various card choices - Rebirth (betraying her true/original self/ideals), Paperclip (it’s a history thing), Political Operative (hopefully speaks for itself), Keyhole (conveys the notion of espionage or something), and The Turning Wheel (mad wordplay). I originally was inclined to call the deck something idiotic like ‘Hilarious and Original’ Andy, but I wisened up.

Anyhow, regarding intentional deckbuilding decisions which might deviate from the norm: Same Old Thing (I see it cut from many/most Andy lists, nowadays) is used most frequently as a fourth Siphon, but also doubles up as an extra Legwork, Inside Job, or Special Order, as required. Quality Time instead of a second Turning Wheel, because draw is of utmost importance. Gordian Blade, because having access to a real, boostable decoder means that, post-Temujin affluence, I can break any code gates without having to worry about needing ‘sucker counters (Yog.0) or having a finite number of times I can assail a remote (Cerberus “Rex”), or my opponent creating a second scoring/Adonis remote (Cyber Cypher) or stacking code gates (Zu.13).

Andy won thrice in Swiss (beating Harishchandra, Gagarin, and ETF) and lost to a meanie SYNC (double Sweeps turn 1 feels bad). ID’d last round, but the practice game also proved Andy to be the loser – in fairness, having the bottom 3 cards of one’s deck be Account Siphon, Legwork, and Rebirth makes the CI7 matchup a little rough.

In double elims, Andy beat Harishchandra and SYNC, but succumbed to the champion’s CTM.