After taking 6th at Nationals with a sub-optimal build of rush/murder Earth Station, I chatted a bit with Mr. Buggles, who had taken 4th with a similar build (but had actually done testing!). It was concluded that NGO just does more than Wall to Wall Lin this kinda deck, since it can run light on cash, and you really need something other than agendas to advance in a remote. Also, Data Raven is great on HQ with Crisium, since if someone is going to run twice on HQ to trash Crisium and flip the ID, if they then run the remote it only leaves them with 1 click to clear 2 tags. It also makes the same play with DoF riskier. I also threw in a couple Spiderwebs for the same reason that a lot of Weyland players are: to tell Boomerang to get stuffed. Data Raven also punishes Boomer somewhat.
I started off the day playing like actual garbage, forgetting that Citadel Sanctuary protects against my HHN, after literally telling myself "Okay, remember to trash that CS before going in for the kill!". The next game I lost to bad ICE placement vs 419 -- Data Raven should have been on HQ behind the Afshar, but instead i just put Afshar on HQ and used Raven on the remote, being greedy trying to rush too hard. This stops the play where he runs HQ click one to trash Crisium (outer ice was Spiderweb), DoFs me, flipping my I'D, then runs my remote. If Raven had been where it's supposed to be, he'd have 2 tags to deal with. Beyond that, the only agendas i drew in a match where i do really want to rush some was 3 GFIs, and that's all I saw for half my deck. Meanwhile, Corp Grant is sitting there, just waiting for a Hostile to clear it... a Hostile that never came.
The next 4 games were great, though. I successfully used HHN to both slow runners down, as well as murder them, killing a 419 and a Hoshiko, and rushing out a Hayley and a Geist.
I think this is a pretty good version. If anything, i might honestly drop one Afshar and one DRaven and add back in 2 Slot Machines... maybe. Data Raven is great on HQ, but kinda meh elsewhere, and it's the same with Afshar. It feels like most other copies are in a waste. Slots is still a great face check. Something else I was planning with was 2 Eli 1.0, but with the Spiderwebs I'm worried it might just be too many barriers. Also, no face check!
Thanks again to all the players I played, met talked to, and hung out with! Super special thanks goes out to Dome_, without whom Germany would lose one of the best tournaments I've been to.