As one of the final Nationals to take place worldwide, New Zealand's runners were watching results closely and spent an extra month tuning their decks. In this The Spaces Between meta the corps in particular showed polish. An entire round in Swiss went without a runner win and there were an incredible number of flatlines on the day.
You can find commentated video of the elimination rounds below but first let's meet the runners that survived to the top 4.
Amber - Jinteki: PE and Andromeda
Currently ranked 1st in the NZ OCTGN Tournament with a 7-1 record, Amber was a favourite to make it through to the elimination rounds at Nationals. Her 'pet' deck, Bad Dogs Jinteki: PE, left only one runner alive in the Swiss rounds. The deck features four different dog ice including Grim and Fenris which are a natural fit with Clone Retirement. You'll also notice, no Jacksons! For her runner Amber brought Flick of the Rist, a high efficiency Andromeda based on Nordrunner's Andromeda CEO deck.
Dan - Jinteki: RP and Noise
Veteran Dan has a few tournament wins under his belt but his meddling kids have decreased his playtime recently. Packing tournament winning lists, ffox's Jinteki: RP and Sam L's Noise with more clone chip helped Dan show the rookies what it takes to earn a seat at the final table.
Egor - Near Earth Hub and Andromeda
Egor left unsatisfied at Auckland's regionals and flew over to Australia to take 2nd place at the 33 player Brisbane Regionals. His latest trip to Australia for their Nationals saw him narrowly miss the top 8 in a field of 80 players. His corp is the new powerhouse NEH Fast Advance with a very unusual economy. Security Subcontract with cheap binary ice like Paper Wall and the inclusion of Profiteering give his deck the capability to generate 12 credits a turn or power a pair of Archers.
William - Near Earth Hub and Noise
Riding a superbye train from victories at Store Championships and Auckland Regionals William's bye at Nationals helped him finish top of the Swiss standings and poised to three-peat. Abandoning his trusty Chaos Theory Dinomite he's packed Noise to the limit with economy cards... well just two Sure Gambles: almost the limit. His NEH runs a completely different influence package to Egor's as evidenced by his 75% flatline rate in Swiss. The lucky ones get run over by Astrotrains.
