The French Open 2002

by Yannick Mescam
(translated from the French by Jens Kreutzer)

The Paris Open Netrunner tournament (Open de Netrunner de Paris) was held at the weekend of May 4-5, 2002, at Ostelen Game Center. This tournament was characterized by two novelties:

• In the Sealed tournament, each player started out with just one Starter deck, but before each of the following rounds, one booster was added to the card mix ("Incremental Boosters").

• In the Constructed tournament, Neal's Draconian Banned list was in effect (meaning that 60 cards each of the Corp and Runner sides are banned, mainly card drawing for the Runner and fast-advancement for the Corp).

First day: Sealed

Eleven players showed up for the first round of the tournament, among them Belgian Gilles Delcourt and a newcomer (Jean-Francois Cataldo). I had a double advantage in this format because for one, my Starter wasn't bad, but even more so because I got the bye in the first round, which allowed me to play my first match with a Starter and one booster. The "Incremental Boosters" format was very interesting, since it allows the players to change their decks in between rounds, in some cases adopting a completely different strategic approach ("Oh look, there are at last the two bagging cards I needed to go along with my six taggers!").

Sealed results:

1. Yannick Mescam
2. Olivier Flament
3. Ali Hamra
4. Caroline Croizier
5. Remy Berenguer
6. Francois Chenebit
7. Bastien Durel
8. Gilles Delcourt
9. Patrice Gross
10. Frederic Garnier
11. Jean-Francois Cataldo

Second day: Constructed

Only five players returned for another day to play the next round on Sunday (some had to go to attend elections in the country, while others were really put off by the format), but two new players joined as reinforcements. The decks that were played had a lot of variation, but one old favorite was well represented: the Rent-to-Own strategy. Among the other Corp decks, we had a Corporate Negotiating Center/Setup!/TRAP! deck ("Go and search for my agendas in my hand if you dare!"), a wall deck, and a Rockerboy Promotion/Corporate Guard Temps deck (At one time, Frederic Chorein drew only Rockerboys and decided to install and empty them all for a 13-turn Corporate Guards!). This last card was frequently used as a replacement for the usual fast-advancement cards. The Runners mainly set their bets on a Mystery Box strategy, but there were also adherents to "normal" card drawing who used Cruising for Netwatch, and two Big Dig stacks with a Lucidrine Booster Drug/ Liberated Saving Accounts combo to fuel the machine. Gilles Delcourt won this round (and the tournament) thanks to two robust decks:

Corp: Panzer Division

14 Colonel Failure
14 Rent-to-Own Contract
3 Superserum
3 Marine Arcology
2 Corporate Downsizing
4 Vapor Ops
4 Rio de Janeiro City Grid

Runner: The Best Things Are Free

6 Mystery Box
4 Joan of Arc
3 Codecracker
2 Worm
1 Japanese Water Torture
3 Redecorator
1 Dropp
8 Succubus
5 Cloak
7 Clown
1 Shredder Uplink Protocol
1 Bakdoor
1 Cascade
1 Crumble
1 Force Shield

His choice of Japanese Water Torture paid off versus Patrice Gross' wall deck, who had his forts heavily fortified with Aardvark and London City Grid.

Constructed results:

1. Gilles Delcourt
2. Bastien Durel
3. Yannick Mescam
4. Frederic Andres
5. Frederic Garnier
6. Frederic Chorein
7. Patrice Gross

And finally...

The new champion of the Paris Open 2002 is Gilles Delcourt. Though his Sealed performance was rather disappointing, his Constructed decks tended to dominate the others. Congratulations to Gilles, and please come to the next tournament, the French Nationals in November 2002.

Combined results:

1. Gilles Delcourt
2. Yannick Mescam
3. Bastien Durel
4. Patrice Gross
5. Frederic Garnier
6. Olivier Flament
7. Ali Hamra
8. Caroline Croizier
9. Remy Berenguer
10. Francois Chenebit
11. Frederic Andres
12. Frederic Chorein
13. Jean-Francois Cataldo