Alice Rees: Rogue Rising Star ⧉

Well-behaved women seldom make history (shout-outs to Laurel Thatcher Ulrich), nor do they spend afternoons blowing up their rivals’ apartments and cars, but that’s the kind of incendiary violence Alice Rees employed at Birmingham’s Netrunner regional last month, on her way to becoming the first woman to win a major, Premier-level tournament for the game*.

She will also appear on the popular Winning Agenda podcast soon to talk about her win at Wayland’s Regional (credit to them for the above photo of Alice with the rest of the top 8 cut), so keep an eye/ear out for that! In the meantime, let’s learn more about Alice and her thoughts on the game in our profile below!

Based in and plays at:

Preston, England - Harlequin’s Shop and Dice & Donuts

Manchester, England - Fanboy Three

Tell us about Alice Rees.

I’m 25 years old and grew up in South Wales. Somehow with no Welsh accent, I moved to Lancashire for university and never really escaped. When I was growing up, I tried a variety of things – Magic the Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh, Pokémon – but there wasn’t a local meta. Everything went in a big box until I was 19, and then it was time to play children’s card games again! My good friend Sam Wicks (aka glaivemaster) introduced me and several of our other best pals to Netrunner, and though I was skeptical at first, after a few forays, I went from “definitely not buying into it” to “I accidentally bought all the cards” in about two months. This was right around Order and Chaos, so [that was] a ton of cards to buy all at once, but I was hooked!

Tell us about your meta.

Preston’s meta is… weird. I love it. You don’t see the “top” decks; you see people playing cards they love, nurturing pet decks, and doing stuff that makes them happy. There are people of all skill levels, people who are casual and competitive, new players, and others who have been in it since the start. Would not change it for anything.

What do you bring with you to a Netrunner tournament?

Chewing gum! I’ve got Litko credit tokens and an awesome custom playmat from Dice & Donuts. I use Dragon Shield sleeves. I’m not superstitious, so nothing for luck. I always intend to take water, tissues, and Ibuprofen too, but I often forget some or all of them. I want to start making sure I have a notebook too, to track my games better. A friend keeps stats about his wins and losses against each ID, and I think that’s a really good idea.

What’s your favorite way to play or deckbuild?

With a mocha in a lovely bright room with lots of space, ideally. I also really love tournaments, playing against people I don’t know or rarely see – the atmosphere is really something you don’t find anywhere else. It’s what I missed most after I quit MtG, but in Netrunner it’s so much better than it ever was in MtG.

Deck building is a lot of me sitting and thinking, then asking my friends if Plan B is good yet (answer is always no). I like to look at a lot of lists similar to what I want to build, and then come to my own favorite “version.” Sometimes I go through my cards and get out everything I think might go in a deck, and end up with piles of cards all over the table.

What impact has Netrunner had on your life?

A huge one! The biggest thing is that I met my boyfriend through Netrunner (Hi, Dave!), and I moved to a new city for a whole load of reasons, but I won’t deny that the huge Netrunner scene in Preston was a factor.

I’ve also met a huge number of awesome people and travelled across the UK. I’ve seen a lot of train stations and game stores. It’s great. I love having this huge shared experience, and being part of a meta that is bigger than me and my local group.

What do you hope to see in the future of Netrunner?

Honestly, I love how the game is going. Flavor-wise, the Mumbad cycle has been brilliant and enriches the game universe. I’m inclined to trust the developers for now with their balancing decisions – they almost certainly know better than me. Card-wise I’d love to see something for recursion in Criminal. It doesn’t have to be great – we just want something. And a barrier for Weyland with teeth, a barrier you can’t face-check and bounce off.

Psi bet (0, 1, or 2?):

I don’t do Psi games. I play Film Critic and Political Operative so I don’t have to. But if you’re forced into it, be erratic so you can’t be predicted, or bid 0 so the corp has to spend money.

We’ll also share tips from Alice on how you can run better soon!



*Props of course to Nicole Campbell, for winning last year’s ANRPC/BABW Uroboros Cup fan event (also with a corp built to kill), which would have been classified as a Premier tournament if FFG had run it and thrown in a cut.