Quarterfinals: Mark Herrin vs. Gerald Camangon

Each player was handed each other’s deck and decklist before the match began. Herrin was given a warning for shuffling his cards face up but reasoned out that he was just trying to randomize and spread them apart because all the cards were still stuck together after the deck check. Gerald thought it was fine.

The players shuffled their decks, Herrin wins the die roll, and… they shuffle their decks again for good measure before presenting it.

Game 1

Herrin ships back his opening 7 and found the next 6 to be satisfactory while Gerald keeps and starts with a full 7 card hand.

Both players started with a tapped Hallowed Fountain which prompted Gerald to comment; “Pareho tayo martyr (deck)?”.

Herrin plays the 1st spell of the game; a Compulsive Research. Gerald plays a late martyr on his turn, signaling (or bluffing) counter backup. Herrin plays Wall of Roots on his turn and plays an untapped Breeding Pool, also signaling (or bluffing) counter backup.

Gerald attacks during his turn and Herrin puts the wall in front of it. Gerald plays a Compulsive Research and discards a Chronosavant and another martyr leaving 2 mana open.

Herrin plays another untapped Breeding Pool and plays Farseek looking to gain resource advantage. As for the damage race, it’s Herrin at 16 (thanks to the shocklands) while Gerald is at 20. Gerald reanimates his Chronosavant at Herrin’s end of turn, giving Herrin a free Time Walk.

Luckily, Herrin happened to have a Brine Elemental with 10 mana available; enough to morph it and face it up in 1 turn. Gerald misses his untap step and passed the turn with no action. Herrin plays a face down Vesuvan Shapeshifter on his next turn to complete the lock prompting Gerald to scoop.

Herrin -1, Camangon - 0

Gerald asks the table judge, Raffy Sarto; “Pwede ba tingnan yung SB ulit?”. Raffy can’t answer and so Herrin asks Surge; “Can we look at the sideboards?”. Surge, in true call center fashion, replies; “Aym gonna hab to ask da hejaj.”

Surge came back with a “No”, Herrin goes; “Fine!”

Game 2:

Both players keep their opening 7.

Gerald starts the action with a martyr, followed by a signet next turn. Herrin casts a Wall of Roots on his second turn. Gerald digs for gas with a Compulsive Research on turn 3, discarding plains. Herrin plays a rather hasty Krosan Grip on the signet during his turn. Gerald plays another signet and a Jester’s Scepter (Brine Elemental, Vesuvan Shapeshifter, Farseek, 2 lands) but Herrin had an answer for it in the form of an Indrik Stomphowler.

There was a bit of commotion when Herrin tried to look at the 5 cards under the scepter, but the judges stopped him in time, telling him that he won’t get to look at the cards because they are removed from the game face down.

Gerald plays a Story Circle for green on his next turn while Herrin plays 2 Loxodon Hierarchs over 2 turns. Herrin is managing to get some damage thru because Gerald needed to produce white mana off an Adarkar Wastes to prevent damage.

Gerald heightens his defenses a bit more by playing Compulsive Research (discarding plains) and playing a Forbidding Watchtower.

As for the life totals, its Herrin at 23 and Gerald at 18. The game does not look like it’s going to end soon because Gerald just prevents combat damage with his Story Circle (for 3 turns). The 9 point life gain he did off the martyr followed by a Wrath of God would not help speed things up either.

After all the beats that went on, the life totals are: Herrin – 21, Gerald -27.

Things got a bit exciting when Herrin plays a face down creature, and turned it face up as a Brine Elemental (he also had a shapeshifter in hand but Gerald does not know that). Gerald had an answer for it though in the form of his own Vesuvan Shapeshifter. Gerald completes the lock on Herrin and builds up an assembly worker token army over the next turns.

The match has lasted for over an hour already and it seems that we still have a few more hours to go. Match tied 1 – 1.

Herrin: “Best of 5?”
Butch Maniego: “As if you do not know”

Game 3

Gerald mulligans to 6 cards and we were on to game 3.

This game had a bit more action than the previous 2. The 1st action was by Herrin; a Wall of Roots. Gerald tries a morph but got remanded. He tries again on his next turn, but it was remanded again. Gerald tries compulsive research the turn after and it was good. He discards plains. Herrin puts some action on the table in the form of a Loxodon Hierarch. Gerald finally gets his morph on the table during his turn.

Herrin attacks with his elephant and Gerald takes it like a man. Life totals are: Herrin – 24, Gerald -16.

Gerald, staying true to his “macho” deck, faces up his Vesuvan Shapeshifer copying Wall of Roots (of all things). He also plays another morph and faces it up as, you guessed it; Wall of Roots!

Herrin can’t get his 4/4 elephant through the 2 walls and so decided not to attack. Gerald reloads with a Compulsive Research on his turn. That would be the last spell that we would see for the next 20 minutes as both players went into draw-land-go mode.

Gerald broke the silence when he started making assembly worker tokens.

Herrin finally finds a spell in the form of Compulsive Research. Gerald asks Herrin; “Ako?” but Herrin replies with a “Wala, hindi Willbender yan e”. Gerald tries to Spell Burst the card drawer but Herrin answers with a Chord of Calling for Mystic Snake.

The life totals are: Herrin – 22, Gerald – 14.

We went back to draw-land-go mode again after that brief action sequence. This time, the silence was broken by Gerald when he played a Compulsive Research discarding Wrath of God and Story Circle. Not to be outdone, Herrin played another elephant on his next turn.

Gerald just continued to accumulate assembly workers (4 in play now) while I took a short break for a pictorial with Ms. Dylan.

After the photo was taken, I actually came back in time to see Gerald make a 5th assembly worker token. He did nothing on his turn but Herrin played a Teferi while sculpting a grip full of gas.

Gerald makes a 6th token at Herrin’s end of turn.

Herrin: “Go boring lands!”

It was actually all lands over the next hour. Herrin had 2 Calciform Pools with 9 and 14 charges while Gerald had 8 assembly worker tokens.

Herrin breaks monotony and casts a morph while Gerald sacrifices a martyr to gain 12 life and reveal a grip full of control.

Gerald: “F@<# this game!”
Herrin: “I will win by boredom”

Gerald forecasts a Proclamation of Rebirth on his upkeep.

Herrin: “Foresight?”
Gerald: “Its forecast you fool!”
Herrin plays a morph on his turn. Gerald plays a Jester’s Scepter that got remanded on his turn. Herrin casts Compulsive Research on his turn followed by a Farseek that fetched a basic forest. He got a warning from the judges because of this.

Herrin: “Hilo na ako e.”
Gerald: “Sino bang hinde?”

Gerald tries the scepter again on his turn but Herrin hits it with a Rune Snag. Gerald simply paid 2 extra mana for it and it sticked (Compulsive Research, Rune Snag, Venser, 2 lands). Gerald tries for a second scepter and Herrin hits the 1st with a Krosan Grip.

A bit of commotion went on when Herrin drew some mana from his Calciform charges and while they were counting; Gerald reacted; “NANDAYA!”. This prompted the judges to confirm the mana count and was found to be all good. Herrin used the mana to chord a Brine Elemental and face up 3 shapeshifters. Gerald’s scepter entered play though, dropping Herrin’s library to 1 card.

Herrin: “This is sooo boring!”

Camangon leads 2 games to 1.

After over 2 hours in the match, the head judge allows the players to take a break. They were escorted by judges to the restrooms to make sure that no untoward incident would happen.

By this time, the other 3 matches have already concluded. Butch Maniego suggested that Jason Ascalon should just watch a movie first and guarantees that this match won’t be over before he comes back.

Gerald: “Walang umulit na national team?” (puro new faces)
Herrin: “Bayaran kita tapos concede ako” (uhmm, ano daw?)

Game 4

Both players keep their opening hands for this match.

Herrin started quick with a 2nd turn Farseek. Gerald matched it with a signet.

Herrin takes 2 damage from a Breeding Pool on his next turn.

Gerald: “Ano yan snake?”

Gerald tries a Compulsive Research on his turn and Herrin plays the well read Mystic Snake.

Herrin follows up with a Compulsive Research on his turn and when Gerald attempted to draw, Herrin commented; “Sige bunot ka! Game loss!”.

Gerald had another Compulsive Research on his turn and it sticks. He discards Chronosavant and a scepter. Herrin just put his snake to work and passed the turn. Gerald casts a face down creature on his next turn while Herrin plays a Vesuvan Shapeshifter in response.

Gerald: “What the hell?!”
Herrin: “Sorry nasasabaw na ako e”

Apparently, he pulled the wrong card. He casted Teferi in response.

Herrin attacks with his Teferi but Gerald reanimates his Chronosavant and copies it with his shapeshifter. Teferi gets blocked by the 5/5 and dies. Herrin simply played a morph on his free turn.

Gerald attacks with his Chronosavant. Herrin copies the 5/5 with his shapeshifter and does the same on his turn. Herrin tries Compulsive Research but Gerald had a Spell Burst (with buyback) for it. Herrin hit it with a Rune Snag and proceeded with the resolution of his draw spell.

Gerald attacks with 2 Chronosavants on his next turn. 1 of them got chump blocked by the Mystic Snake. Gerald plays Compulsive Research discarding a Hallowed Fountain, plays a martyr, and passes the turn.

Herrin does nothing on his turn and passes. Gerald on the other hand, continued the assault and sent the 2 5/5’s into the red zone once again. Herrin had a Venser to bounce one of them though.

Herrin plays a morph on his turn while Gerald made an assembly worker token.

Gerald plays a Jester’s Scepter which Herrin countered using a Rune Snag it for 4. Gerald tries to Sunlance the face down creature but Herrin had a Mystic Snake for it. Gerald tries a second Sunlance and it was good. The morph was revealed to be a Brine Elemental.

Gerald continued to beat Herrin down with his assembly workers. Venser died in combat and Herrin goes down to 6.

Herrin drew a Loxodon Hierarch on his turn and played it immediately to bring him back up to a healthy 10 life. Gerald just continued to build the token army and decided to play the Chronosavant again.

The Chronosavant went solo in combat for this turn, leaving the tokens back for defense. This put Herrin into a fragile 5 life, and within striking distance of the Chronosavant. Gerald plays 2 more martyrs to up the beat count.
Herrin plays a morph on his turn and Gerald makes another token at end of turn.

Gerald was contemplating an alpha strike at this point but chooses to send the savant in combat alone. Herrin unmorphs a shapeshifter to block and kill the 5/5.

Herrin reloaded with 2 Compulsive Researches in 1 turn. Gerald made another factory guy at end of turn.

While Gerald was computing damage, the table judge points at his library and flips the top card (plains).

Herrin: “Warning! Match loss ka! Pero di na kita sumbong baka matanggal ka pa.”

After conferring with fellow judges, they decided to let Gerald reshuffle his library.

Gerald finally decided to do the alpha strike but Herrin had a few tricks in the form of a Teferi and a shapeshifter inside combat. Herrin goes up to 9 life and was able to block everything except 1 token and 1 martyr (3 damage).

Herrin flips the shapeshifter face down on his upkeep.

Gerald topdecks a Wrath of God on his turn but Herrin had a Remand for it. It was met by a Rune Snag when Gerald tried to cast it again.

Herrin decided to go on the offensive in his turn and sent an elephant into the red zone. Gerald simply put 2 tokens in front of it to kill it.

Gerald had only a signet on his turn but Herrin played another hierarch at end of turn which put the life totals at 10 and 15, still in favor of Gerald.

Herrin continued the offensive and sent the hierarch and 2 face down creatures into the red zone. Gerald animates a watchtower to block the elephant. He also blocks 1 morph using the martyr, gaining 6 life before it died.

After combat, Herrin pays 2 life to play a Hallowed Fountain. Gerald made another assembly worker at the end of turn but Herrin flashed out a Brine Elemental and turned a shapeshifter face up to complete the lock. Herrin actually had 2 shapeshifters in play and was eventually able to make Gerald succumb to the beats.

Game 5

Gerald mulligans to 6 on the play.

Herrin had the 1st spell in the form of a Farseek while Gerald seemed to have some mana problems (he had a lot of watchtowers). He was able to resolve a Jester’s Scepter on his third turn though (chord, compulsive, 3 lands) but Herrin played a much more threatening Loxodon Hierarch on his third turn.

Gerald tried to search for answers with Compulsive Research (discarding Hallowed Fountain) while Herrin was content with attacking and just playing a land.

Gerald played another scepter (Crovax, chord, shifter, 2 lands) and Herrin flashed out a Teferi at his end step.

Herrin’s attack put Gerald down to 9 life.

Gerald tried a Wrath of God on his turn but Herrin had a remand for it. He also had a morph that he flashed at the end of Gerald’s turn raising his power count to 9.

Gerald concedes and Herrin wins 3 games to 2 after over 3 hours of play.


Mark Herrin wins the game 3-2 and advances to the Semifinals!