Mesâ (23rd at Worlds 2024)

This is the mulch-inspired Esa deck I brought to Worlds 2024.

Leading up to the event it was clear that while there was a lot of diversity in the meta some flavor of shaper was probably the "best" deck. Two problems: I've never been a particularly strong shaper player and I didn't have time to learn matchups. Instead, I continued refining this Esa list that I've been grinding for a while. Although I'm pleased with my overall performance, I feel like the deck is stronger than its record (4-3) would suggest. The deck has decent matchups against all the popular corp decks, is pretty resilient to corps doing weird/unexpected stuff, and is comfortable being slow and grindy or incredibly aggressive depending on the matchup. I think there's a lot of room still left to explore and tinker with Esa decks and I'm excited to see how they evolve over time. If you ever want to discuss Esa please reach out!

Cards

Ghosttongue — This was cut relatively late on the advice of GreatA1exander. I played some games tracking the credit savings from it and while it ranged anywhere from fine to good, I think I'd always rather see one of my other pieces than draw into a Ghosttongue. Also, taking the first core damage from anything besides Marrow always felt a bit awkward especially into a field with a decent number of kill decks. I didn't really miss it all day, but I can see an argument for putting one in and going to a nice, round 50 cards.

Mimic — Good into awkward sentries like Drafter, Saisentan, and Unsmiling Tsarevna. Lets us poke more in the HB/Ag matchups.

Cupellation — This card is so good in so many ways and slots nicely into what the deck is trying to do. Don't be afraid to Simulchip flash it without getting HQ access value if you really need to keep a board under control (especially into corps looking to punish trashes with Oppo). That said, agendas tend to pile up in HQ as you go around sabotaging and being a nuisance. Checking archives into a Cupellation run on HQ at the right moment will end a lot of your games.

Ashen — Didn't play it a single time, but I was also expecting to run into more than 0 PE decks. Games usually go too fast to get much value out of this in non-PE matchups, but in my experience you go through your deck incredibly quickly against PE (especially with Lago out) and really need to play it at some point.

Hush — Hugely impactful in the AgInfusion matchup with the bonus of a lot of decent targets in the meta right now. Even just stranding a Tatu Bola can be fairly impactful if a corp was relying on the credits.

Pelangi — I absolutely love this include in jan tuno's deck and think it would work especially well in this shell if you can figure out the influence.

Games

I didn't keep any notes on the day, so here are match recaps as best as I can remember them:

R1: Win vs Gambit on Asa Group

Gambit builds a standard Asa board fairly quickly. I don't find my Bankhar for a little while so I can't effectively keep him honest. I do, however, get sweet Lago value, sabotage a bunch, and poke HQ. When I eventually check Archives and see no points, I know Finality is probably good and use it to grab 6 points. Next turn, I Labor Rights the Finality back into a depleted stack and play it again to find the last agenda.

R3: Loss vs Diego on PD

This was a painful one to lose. We play a long grindy match where I sabotage him down to 2 cards in R&D. Next turn he jams a card into a remote I can't get into. I know that there are very likely 2-4 points in archives, that the top card of R&D is a non-agenda, and that an Ikawah is in HQ. Instead of running Archives, using Simulchip for Cupellation, and then hitting HQ for an almost guaranteed win, I spend a turn setting up. Major punt. When I pass the turn back he double seamless scores an Ikawah for the win.

R6: Loss vs Santa on AgInfusion

The matchup against AgInfusion can be tricky. In my experience, you need to be very aggressive or you're going to get locked out relatively quickly. This game starts decently well but takes a quick turn to become one of my most embarrassing competitive netrunner performances. I land two Chastushkas relatively early by Hushing a Border Control. Next turn, I play Steelskin and then run into what I'm fairly confident is a Saisentan on Archives. Santa rezzes, calls event, and hits a Steelskin that draws into my Ashen and the last Labor Rights in my deck, both of which end up in my heap. Distracted by the loss of all my recursion so early in the game I click to draw three times, taking an extra action and seeing a card I shouldn't have. We call Judges over to help us fix the board state and then just a turn or two later I facecheck into a Bankhar'd Anansi with only 5 cards in hand. Losing to Santa is utterly unsurprising, I just wish I could have made him work a bit harder for it :). Huge shoutout to Santa, his friendliness and empathy during our after-game chat helped me walk away from the table un-tilted and ready for the rest of the day.

R7: Win vs Blurbie on The Outfit

Another grindy game. Blurbie gets an early Hammer on HQ that kills a Botulus and keeps me out almost all game. I end up installing two Botuli on a Trebuchet on R&D and poking for singles/Finality as I can. We eventually get to a point where he's got the win in the remote and I need to make something happen. I Botulus a Trebuchet on archives, pay through the trace, and Simulchip out the Cupellation. I then run HQ, use my last Simulchip to Botulus the Hammer, break the program trash sub, eat the rest of them, and pop Cupellation for the win.

R8: Win vs FireRL on AgInfusion

This Ag game goes much more according to plan. I'm aggressive right out of the gate and he's on the backfoot all game. I Hush a Border Control on R&D and steal an early Bacterial. He later stuffs a dangerous Finality, but I manage to find the win right as it feels like he's starting to stabilize.

R11: Loss vs AnOddRadish on R+

A terrible mulligan decision on my part and solid play by AnOddRadish make this game a scrappy slog right from the start. I somehow manage to steal 5 points and be generally annoying through the onslaught of tags and SGPs, but he patiently builds his board. The turn before he wins I've got no cards in play and desperately fire multiple Moshings looking for the Hush to get through a Starlit Knight protecting the win in Archives but can't quite find it.

R14: Win vs Nick on RH

RH is already a great matchup for Esa, but I also get unreasonably lucky right from the start. I grab a Fuji off of a turn one R&D poke and manage to end my turn with 6 or 7 cards in hand. Next turn I roll a die to pick which one of his three remotes to check and manage to grab the Regenesis. From there, I sit back, sabotage a bunch, and hit Archives for the win.

Worlds

This was the first worlds I've been able to attend since I started playing in 2013 and I had an absolute blast. I was overjoyed at reuniting with familiar faces and at seeing some of my west coast friends absolutely kill it.

To the entire SoCal (LA/OC/SD) crew: I'm so happy to see our meta thriving and all the wonderful new people joining. Worlds would have been empty without you all there.

Huge shout out to NSG, all the volunteers, and the community. I'm forever grateful that I still get to play this amazing game 11 years later with some of the absolute best people around. Somehow, literally every single person I interacted with at this 200+ person event was lovely, friendly, and warm. I can't wait to see you all next time!