The Organized Play team is happy to announce the 2023 National Championships! Prepare to run with the best your country has to offer in a new series of these prestigious events. Like Circuit Openers, they are run by local organizers, but generally hold more prestige due to the limited distribution and being run under the Competitive-tier policies.
This year sees a significant change in the format and allocation of National Championship kits: whereas historically these were limited to one per country, regardless of the size of the country or the population of its players, this year we will be approving more than one application to run a National Championship for countries of a certain size. To read more details on how this policy will be applied, see below.
Organizers can use this link to apply for a Nationals Kit or the one at the end of this article. Applications have closed. Once applications close, Organized Play will review the submissions and select one or more per country. Approved organizers will be sent an email with instructions, and will be given one week after that to complete their purchase of the prize kit. After all purchases are complete, our supplier will pack and ship the kits, which will take approximately 4-5 weeks. You’ll be able to track updates on the 2023 Competitive Season Status Page.
If a member of NSG applies to run their country’s National Championship, their application will be reviewed by senior leadership instead of Organised Play. Anyone within Organized Play or senior leadership will recuse themselves from reviewing applications if they have a personal stake in an event or a specific application.
Kit Contents
This year’s kits are the same size as last year’s, and will come in both Basic and Boosted iterations. Inside each kit you will find the following:
Basic Kit
- 1× National Champion Plaque (design by Jakuza)
- 1× National Championship Event Poster (art by Scott Uminga)
- 1× Circuit Breaker Invitational Invite Card
- 5× Hush Playmat (art by Scott Uminga)
- 8× Top Faction Pins (1x each Haas-Bioroid, Jinteki, NBN, Weyland, Anarch, Criminal, Shaper, and Neutral)
- 51× alt-art Engolo (art by Adam S. Doyle)
- 99× alt-art Anoetic Void (art by Cat Shen)
- 12× alt-art Marilyn Campaign by (art by Dimik)
Boosted Kit
- 1× National Champion Plaque (design by Jakuza)
- 1× National Championship Event Poster (art by Scott Uminga)
- 2× Circuit Breaker Invitational Invite Card
- 9× Hush Playmat (art by Scott Uminga)
- 16× Top Faction Pins (2x each Haas-Bioroid, Jinteki, NBN, Weyland, Anarch, Criminal, Shaper, and Neutral)
- 102× alt-art Engolo (art by Adam S. Doyle)
- 198× alt-art Anoetic Void (art by Cat Shen)
- 24× alt-art Marilyn Campaign (art by Dimik)
Applications for these kits will close three weeks after this announcement, on March 19th, at 23:59 UTC. The Basic Kit will cost 85€, and the Boosted Kit will cost 160€ (approximately $90.21 USD and $169.81 USD, per exchange rate on February the 22nd). These prices include free worldwide shipping.
Kit Add-On
For the first time, organizers can purchase an add-on to their prize kits. This exciting offering is a roughly 2ft × 6ft (or 70cm × 180cm) standee banner with generic Null Signal Games and Netrunner branding which you may use for your National Championship and any other events you might run for years to come. If your local game store allows it, post up your standee and let local players know exactly what game you’re playing! Standees will be priced at 50€ (approximately $53.07 USD, per exchange rate on February the 22nd) and carry no additional shipping charge.
Prize Structure
Events are expected to follow the Basic Prize Structure outlined below, or the Boosted Prize Structure for kits that were purchased with that option.
Basic Prize Structure
- Winner: Invitation to the Circuit Breaker Invitational Championship, 2023 World Championship Ticket, and National Champion Plaque
- Top 4: Hush Playmat
- Top 1 of Faction: Faction Enamel Pin
- Top 16: 3× Engolo
- Top 32: 3× Anoetic Void
Boosted Prize Structure
- Winner: Invitation to the Circuit Breaker Invitational Championship, 2023 World Championship Ticket, and National Champion Plaque
- Top 8: Hush Playmat
- Top 2 of Faction: Faction Enamel Pin
- Top 32: 3× Engolo
- Top 64: 3× Anoetic Void
Each kit contains additional playsets of Engolo, Anoetic Void, and an additional Hush playmat for the tournament organizer to keep. The kit also contains a number of copies of Marilyn Campaign. This card was originally a 2019 National Championship promo, and is included as a special rebooted promo card. These rebooted cards can be used as side-event prizes, door prizes, in raffles, or anything else at the organizer’s discretion.
Tournament Organizers may collect an entry fee to cover the cost of the kit (and venue hire, where applicable). Organizers are also allowed and actively encouraged to supplement the prizes with other prizes sourced from GNKs or the amazing stuff made by the community. Players should log on to AlwaysBeRunning.net to find events.
Policy Changes
New First Place Prize
As we announced previously, 2023 National Championships will no longer offer a first round bye at the World Championship. Instead, we will be offering the winner of any National Championship with 8 or more participants a free and reserved ticket to the 2023 World Championship. Organizers will need to collect the full legal name and email address of their winner for them to be able to claim this prize. If the winner has already bought their Worlds ticket before winning a National Championship, they will have the ticket price refunded.
Tournament Restrictions
The other big change from previous years, as noted at the top of this article, is that we will have multiple events for large countries and those with large populations of players. The United States will receive up to 3 kits, Australia will receive up to 2 kits, and Canada will receive up to 2 kits. Additional Nationals kits for other countries will be considered based on declared interest and perceived size of the playerbase. Multiple events will only be approved subject to us receiving sufficient viable applications to run them: these countries are not automatically guaranteed to have the maximum number of events. We will also be considering whether the different applications are taking place in venues sufficiently removed from each other geographically that it would allow more players to attend.
In the case of countries with multiple Nationals levels events, all National Championships will be events of equal standing and winners will hold the title of National Champion for that country with the same prizes.
Event Restrictions
2023 Nationals must be run in the Standard Format. No other formats are acceptable for this event kit. Please do not apply for a kit if you are unable to run the event as Standard.
The 2023 National Championships are Sanctioned events for the purposes of the Organized Play Policies. This means you are expected to follow the given prize structure, and the tournament structure outlined in the policies for Competitive tier events. You are also expected to advertise your event on AlwaysBeRunning.net.
Purchasing this kit means you are obliged to run a 2023 National Championship. Buying a kit to either keep for yourself or to resell undermines the spirit of these competitions and the legitimacy of the prizes which other players had to enter and place in a tournament to win. Excepting extenuating circumstances, not using your kit to run a tournament may lead to you being barred from purchasing non-GNK kits in the future.
This event can be run at any point during the 2023 calendar year. However, for the winner to be able to take advantage of their free World Championship ticket and Circuit Breaker Invitational entry, it must take place before October or December 2023 respectively. Tournaments that take place after these cut-off dates may award these prizes with deferred effect for the following year’s World Championship and Circuit Breaker Invitational tournaments.
Season Tracker
To help both players and organizers keep track of which type of tournament is happening at any given point in the calendar, we created the 2023 Competitive Season Status Page. There, you can find information on what types of tournaments are running now, what the permitted period to organize certain events is, which tournaments are in the application stage and when the application period is, and other useful information. Please keep checking back, as it will continue to be updated as we solidify more of the competitive season schedule!
Safety First, friends, and Always Be Running.
