It would actually be really interesting to see how players with several years of experience approach a single-Core set meta. I don’t think there were any big tournaments with just one Core set. Both the first Icebreaker when it was released at GenCon and the World’s tournament allowed up to 3.
IIRC, it was actually Gabe that was the dominant runner (winning the first World’s) and many smaller tournaments. Noise became a beast in the Genesis cycle, but with just 4 virus in the Core set (10 cards max total in a single Core, plus 2 Deja Vu) it was just second banana. But, with just one Core, you can only use 2 Siphons and 2 Scorch (and 1 Aesop’s!), so the signature cards of the best factions are limited, which may open it up much wider.
Also, Crash Space is another Scorch tech card, that’s also useful for Siphons. Probably another reason why Gabe was so good. No need to spend influence against the biggest threats.