Quarter Foods (4th Place at Eternal Games Regionals)

Not the most creative list, but Palana rush is quite good right now and I liked the small changes to the deck with the exclusion of Tsurugi, which was a change I made without testing and hated all day. I was previously on a list with Agroplex, and I do like that card, but I dropped it after anticipating a Strike-heavy meta, which was an excellent call. This went 4-3, losing once in Swiss and twice in elims, both to Josh01.

Double Crisium to acknowledge PolOp and the slow return of Criminal, and a mix of Ichi and Roto so that Atman on 4 can still experience a blowout. Batty helps a lot against the current control Connections, but I really wish we had some non-influence trash ice that isn't freaking Grim. Jinteki ice is super fair and super mediocre, but every card with Nisei in the name is insane, and TfP is so good even with Film Critics roaming around. I think Foodcoats is probably stronger, but this style of rush matches my playstyle more, so I went with this.

The only weird thing about this list is no Pups. I haven't played much lately due to a busy life, so I forgot to include them, and was rll sad. Cut Tsurugi and maybe an Enigma for 2 and this should run smoother.

Round 1: Ken Tenma: I Batty away all the Fracters and proceed to play the slowest game of rush ever. Can't draw agendas for the life of me, but I keep recurring Crisium Grid since his econ is Sec Test reliant. End game he shows me a Deja, so I wish I had played faster.

Round 2: Noise: I fake being upset at some mills, and he faceplants into an Assassin, breaking his Scheherezade and hitting some good stuff in the grip. From there his economy is shattered and I rush out 7-0. Hooray for social experimentation.

Round 3: Leela: I don't know that Mr. Li actually says draw 2, so I miss around 10 dollars of value this game. R&D is very punishing this game, but I play my upgrades around PolOp and trash the Fracters to close the game.

Round 4: Noise: He got the turn 1 Wyldcakes and so I had to rush as hard as possible. The agendas came in a weird order and I had to score two TfPs in a row. Install advance advance one for game point, but he Medium digs and gets 5 points on top of the 2 from an early R&D snipe for game, winning the TfP psi game in the process.

Round 5: ID.

Elims Round 1: Whizzard: I draw all 8 agendas. Sit on 4 in hand almost all game, and draw no ice. I have to Gift showing him 11 points in hand so that I can at least rez anything against the cutlery package. The Jackson came too late and I was in losers bracket pretty quick. Also was Striked all game, so I lose around 20 creds to that.

Elims Round 3: Kate: I expect a traditional Hyperkate list and am displeased to get Apoc'd after scoring a TfP, losing 8 ice and a ton of upgrades. Thankfully Jackson is apparently a doomsday prepper and I get the chance to recover, scoring a Corporate Sales in the jankiest server I can muster. He Indexes and gets all three Niseis so I have to score a 5/3. I Fast Track my GFI and install it in the jank server with Caprice protection, and now if I get blown out on R&D he does have to win psi games. He doesn't see one, he's too poor to get through my server, and I somehow turn it around.

Elims Round 4: Whizzard: Josh again. This game is a lot more fun, with him getting a Strike early and me scoring a Nisei behind a Lotus Field when he's crazy poor. I don't get to recover fast enough economically though, and then somehow get flooded again. He wins psi games stealing a TfP and Nisei through Medium digs, and then hits a TfP and wins the psi on HQ once I start recovering. I honestly can't remember much of this game, but it was my favorite one of the day, being very swingy and sans silly upgrades.

Conclusion: I dunno, psi games are fine. This deck isn't anything new or creative, so it suits me fine.