Blockade Azmari (1st @ Padova Regional)

In the Final Year of Netrunner (officially at least), Padova got one of the 3 Italian Regionals. I thought a lot about what to bring but I knew that I had just one testing night on Jinteki before the event (no laptop on vacation wasn't something I wanted to change in my habits). I was pretty sure that my choice would have been a standard Val list and Chris Dyer's wonderful SportsMetal list. I thought it was very elegant, pretty versatile and could also get me a possible small surprise effect. I even wrote to Chris on Friday asking for list advices (spoiler alert: he kindly helped me but I shamefully wasted his time). The Jinteki testing though got me a little uncomfortable, realizing (once more) that I'm not skilled enough to pilot successfully something that I'm not accustomed to. So the morning of the event I printed ALSO my Linus-blanket lists: Pirate Hayley (adding FTE as a 46th card because I feared 6 agendas Azmari) and a Surveyor-6agendas-Azmari (freeing up 2 influences for a Miraju because I feared Mad Dash with Indexing and Spy Cameras). While I was waiting for the shop to open I finally chickened out and once I got to registration desk I was already NBN/Shaper (I originally wrote Yellow/Green but I realized that I tragically don't want to be associated to those two colors as an Italian citizen these days).

17 players coming from a lot of different regions, with some international guests (Saan from US, Kai from Germany and Juan from Spain). 4 Swiss round followed by a top 4.

R1: BYE - WIN I won the Padova SC back in November so this was my (last) opportunity to use the bye. I had time to speak with other bye owners (4 more players) and complain about my last minute runner deck choice (too many CTM around).

R2: VS Barbamalvagia (Leela) - WIN Not a lot to say: I got a really good draw with money, enough ice to secure all 3 centrals and build a good remote, Scarcity to slow him down a lot (it was a Gang Sign Leela) and not too many agendas. I got to 6 before I saw my last Echo Chamber bounced by an SSL steal from R&D. 2 turns later he whiffed the Hail Mary accesses before I could close out the game.

R3: VS Bebo (419) - LOSS I ran first and the first game was pretty long so we had to hurry. I mulligan into 4 agendas (bonus card: Rashida). I thought it couldn't get worse but I mandatory drew the fifth agenda. Nice. I even got to discard 3 of them and shuffle them back with a Preemptive Action but they kept popping out of the deck. Time was called and with him up 3-0 he made 2 HQ run in the last turn getting 6 more points.

R4: VS Sargon[?] (Gnaat) - WIN Didn't know what to expect. I Scarcity 1st (or 2nd?) turn and then I started seeing his full hand-demolition package: Respirocytes, Officer Frank, Clan Vengeance & Zero. I was able to never have Agendas in hand when they fired as I was installing them in the remote as soon as I was seeing them (and a Surveryor rezzed thanks to an NGO caused him to get 2 tags that he never ditched being too low on credits to afford the tempo loss). Good starting hand (and/or bad for the runner) helped a lot for sure, I kept board control and scored SSL, Degree Mill and finally Echo Chamber for the win.

6 W (1 timed) and 2 L got me 3rd so I was in. Phew.

T4 G1: VS Sandro (Liza Talking Thunder) - WIN Not the slightest idea about what I was going to face. Damn, I even had a round 1 bye to scout! After seeing a (Timmy the) Turtle I iced all centrals and baited a remote run with NGO seeing that he was keeping Dean Lister as a surprise move. Installed my super secret tech in the remote (Navi Mumbai City Grid) and start scoring there. I realized right after that it would have probably been better kept for the R&D: Mars for Martians+Counter Surveillance for a 8 card dig got only an SSL with my relief (there were only 3 agendas in the deck though), after that I could close with the second 5/3 score and an Echo Chamber.

T4G2: VS Bebo - WIN I ran.

T4G3: VS Sandro - LOSS I hoped that corping was better being pretty scared by another MTI exhausting match. Bad starting hand. 2nd Corp mulligan of the day and here comes 'The Awful Flood pt.2' with the second mandatory draw giving me the 4th agenda. I was hoping to see enough ice to build a remote with a little dignity but it didn't happen and I kept installing unuseful naked Rashida and NGO. Sandro was pressuring me really well and in a pretty short time game is over.

T4G4: VS Sandro - WIN I ran.

Thanks to Tempus Fugit (Padova local store) for guesting our last major event before The (Official) END, thanks to all the fellow runners for the day, especially to those coming from pretty long distance in order to attend. See you at KOS!