@Ensnaringlaom, I think that list speaks to the strengths of the deck. It's still Lantern, but it does open up a weakness of an opponent just mulling to an answer and sandbagging it.
@jfuite, the maindeck Engineered Explosives is very helpful in acting as a near-catchall. It takes out Leylines, Chalice of the Void, various planeswalkers, Eidolons, etc. I personally used it recently to lock a Bogles opponent out using Academy Ruins. I plan on uploading the video today, I'll edit this post to link. You should be able to find kanister's list either on the Facebook group or his twitch stream. Both should be linked in the primer.
@thinkr, agree with you on the discard, but what do you think about search for azcanta? It seems similar to glint nest crane in the old crane build, but maybe better when you have bridge but no lock?
It seems pretty cool, and I don't want to make the mistake of saying "it's not right for the deck" again I think I would personally rather have Crane, though, as it can at least potentially block and search for cards immediately, and can even act as an alternate win condition. I that person had success with it, though, maybe it's at least worth testing out for a bit. I personally don't want to test it, though
You can watch the gameplay videos linked in the primer, or look at the spreadsheet linked in the primer, to see how it performs as compared to the BG version.
Am i the only one who dosn't like the mishra's bauble ?? everytime i draw this card and it's not in my opening hand i feel like i would have like to draw something better.
I understand your sentiments about the card, and I had my doubts as well, but I found that my issues with Bauble was in my incorrect use of the card. We can easily see the function of the Bauble as a Mox Opal enabler for acceleration, and as a scry machine when we start with it and a Shredder, Bell, or Pyxis in our opening hand.
When we draw Bauble later in the game, there are a few utility options it provides. If we have a mill rock, then while it might "set us back" a card (because we've used a draw state to draw it), it allows us to get two draw states, thanks to the pseudo-scry effect. This is relevant even if it's not in our opening hand. Thus, it allows us to dig to cards that we need, much faster.
When we have Whir, it acts as another Opal.
If we don't have Whir, a mill rock, or an Opal, then it allows us to dig deeper into our deck for one of those three things. Due to the nature of how Magic works, if we don't have some set of cards, then we must have drawn another set. Thus, if we do not have Whir, a mill rock, or an Opal, then it means we probably have some combination of the rest of the cards in the deck, like the lands we need, Lantern, Bridge, Stirrings, a discard spell, etc.
On top of all of this, it allows us to play around hand disruption. We can play it and then sacrifice it on the opponent's turn to dig a card deeper for cards we need, without having to worry about the opponent getting an opportunity to discard those extra cards. You can see this in effect in my most recent video against Humans, where I used two Baubles to dig to a Bridge after having a Bridge and a Whir stripped from my hand. It was perfect timing, as it was on my 3rd turn, when I had the three mana to cast it.
For additional analysis on this card and it's effectiveness, you can take a look at the spreadsheet and see the win rates of "explosive" hands (Bauble + Opal) and "scry hands" (Bauble and mill rock). Both of these have positive numbers, and therefore we want to increase the possibility of having those sorts of hands if possible. Therefore, it seems to warrant running a full playset when we can, to increase the chances of these sorts of hands occurring.
I seem unsure how to utilize Engineered Explosives in our deck that critically relies on permanents at costs 0, 1, and 3. Tips or insights on when to use EE, and against what?
So against Eldrazi Tron, Engineered Explosives gives us a way to deal with Chalice of the Void. Best part is, we can use Whir of Invention to put Explosives on the board and immediately blow up every Chalice in play (since on the battlefield they have a CMC of 0).
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks: UBG Lantern Control GBU BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
Hey guys, I've started dabbling in Lantern and have been having a blast so far. Few matchups that I've played a few times that's given me trouble: Eldrazi & Taxes and U-Tron. How are people dealing with these/are these bad matchups?
E&T I feel like it has the right mix of aggro and disruption with their flickerwisp/Displacer/TKS/Sculler/Thalia suite. I feel like if I don't draw an early bridge or an early lock I feel like I'm out of the game very quickly.
U-Tron I feel like they have a lot of business cards that matter and the counterspell suite makes it hard to establish a lock...
Hey guys, I've started dabbling in Lantern and have been having a blast so far. Few matchups that I've played a few times that's given me trouble: Eldrazi & Taxes and U-Tron. How are people dealing with these/are these bad matchups?
E&T I feel like it has the right mix of aggro and disruption with their flickerwisp/Displacer/TKS/Sculler/Thalia suite. I feel like if I don't draw an early bridge or an early lock I feel like I'm out of the game very quickly.
U-Tron I feel like they have a lot of business cards that matter and the counterspell suite makes it hard to establish a lock...
For E&T, if you can name Eldrazi Displacer with Pithing Needle, it helps a lot for the match up. Other than that keeping them off of Flickerwisp and landing a Bridge should end the game in your favour.
As for U-Tron, I'm not sure what to do. Most Tron deck are generally our worst match ups, and I have honestly never seen anyone playing U-Tron in the 4 years of me playing Modern, so I can't really give you many suggestions
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks: UBG Lantern Control GBU BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
Hey guys, I've started dabbling in Lantern and have been having a blast so far. Few matchups that I've played a few times that's given me trouble: Eldrazi & Taxes and U-Tron. How are people dealing with these/are these bad matchups?
E&T I feel like it has the right mix of aggro and disruption with their flickerwisp/Displacer/TKS/Sculler/Thalia suite. I feel like if I don't draw an early bridge or an early lock I feel like I'm out of the game very quickly.
U-Tron I feel like they have a lot of business cards that matter and the counterspell suite makes it hard to establish a lock...
For E&T, if you can name Eldrazi Displacer with Pithing Needle, it helps a lot for the match up. Other than that keeping them off of Flickerwisp and landing a Bridge should end the game in your favour.
As for U-Tron, I'm not sure what to do. Most Tron deck are generally our worst match ups, and I have honestly never seen anyone playing U-Tron in the 4 years of me playing Modern, so I can't really give you many suggestions
Thanks! It does seem like Displacer is the key guy there as they can establish a TKS/Sculler lock or invalidate your bridges with Flickerwisp.
It's been a little bit since I had a decent E&T matchup, but I think I have a replay somewhere. I agree with putting Needle on Displacer being key.
As for Utron, they do have a lot of business cards, but are threat-light. This matchup kind of feels like the UW Control matchup to me, in that it's a fight for control, except that they rarely have a decent clock. Much of their most important control comes in the form of Repeal and other bounce spells. Needles are super important here. My most recent replay is actually a Utron matchup, but I have plenty more you can check out. I think I only have one that's with the Whir build, though. I do think that the Whir build might be best against it, although Ghost Quarters in the BGx builds are excellent.
So, I've been getting pretty deep into the core concept on which Lantern was built on, and I think I've figured out a thing or two.
First, I've already made a video and tried describing it (the theory of relevant interaction). To my surprise, this concept is already known in the study of game theory. In game theory, this is known as minimax and maximin.
To paraphrase it, it means that in a zero-sum game, the best option available is the one that will simultaneously minimize the opponent's number of available options and/or the relevance of potential options, and to maximize the number of our own available options and/or the relevance of our options.
I'm sure that we can agree that blind self-mill does create the opportunity to have more options as the game goes on. Eventually, we might get a Shredder and five mana or an Academy Ruins online to make use of our graveyard after blindly milling ourselves after a bit.
However, if we look at this minimax principle of game theory, we have to consider - Are we increasing the number of options that the opponent might have? Are we increasing the potential meaningfulness of the options that an opponent might have?
We can take some examples. If the opponent is running Tarmogoyf in their deck, if we blind self-mill, are we increasing the potential power/toughness of that Tarmogoyf? This doesn't matter, of course, if we have a Bridge out. But what if we don't? That Tarmogoyf is about to get very relevant to the gamestate if it is cast. This isn't even counting if it's drawn. There is a chance that the opponent will draw a Tarmogoyf, and if we've made it potentially bigger by putting more cards of various card types into our graveyard, then we have made that option more relevant to the gamestate.
Sure, we also potentially make our own options better, in that we might be able to recur cards with Ruins or Shredder. But the key principle here is that we want to prioritize minimizing the opponent's options over maximizing our own.
To put it into simple math, let's say that we have increased our options to a value of 10, but we have simultaneously increased the opponent's option value to 5. Of those option values, one of them may be able to turn the game into the opponent's favor, swinging the values in the opposite direction, so that suddenly their value is higher and/or our value is suddenly much lower. This is explained in the L/R, T/M/B table in the wiki link I provided.
Therefore, it would be much better for us if we create a gamestate in which our option value is 1, and the opponent's option value is as close to 0 as possible, or is 0. Of course, this is what the lock provides - ensuring that the opponent's option value is 0. But until we get to that point, we want to keep that option value as low as possible, even if it means our own option value is low. So long as ours is higher, we are still winning. But, again, we are trying to prioritize making sure that the opponent's option value is a minimal as possible, and then try to maximize our own.
Thus, the only time that it seems that blind self-mill is correct is when we have absolute certainty that the opponent has zero possible interaction with us doing so. If it gives them more options, or increases the relevance of their options, then we do not want to do it. And it turns out that the solution to this debate existed all along, documented in the concepts of game theory that the deck was built on in the first place
Al_Z_Heimer, I also like Torpor Orb for shutting off lots of cards in the Humans deck. In my most recent Humans video, I used it to turn all of their Vithian Renegades into dead draws. Other creatures it works great against are Spell Queller, Flickerwisp, Tidehollow Sculler, Champion of the Parish, Thalia's Lieutenant, Kitesail Freebooter, and so on.
I would definitely bring it in against Titanshift decks, as it avoids Chalice on one, snd stops Reclamation Sage and Primeval Titan. I'd also bring it in against the control decks running Snapcaster Mage and Spell Queller. Against Taxes decks, it helps with the Flickerwisps, Scullers, and Thought-Knots, as you point out. It also does quite a bit of work against other various lower tier decks, like the Saheeli combo deck.
I only run it as a one-of, but it's one of those cards that does great things as a singleton, but we don't want to draw multiples of.
RE: Fair. I'm thinking that the second Ruins may be better than the first Fair as well. I mean, there's only so much tempo you can spend on tutoring, and Whir in conjunction with Stirrings on top of the top control elements make this deck pretty friggin' good at finding what it's looking for already, where the activation cost of Fair is veeeeery high. Ruins brings a totally different axis of play on the table, grinds through counterspell and discard in a pinch, etc. When I asked Kanister about this, he pointed out that the lifegain is very important, against rogue Hierarch etc. That's true, but does it warrant a slot solely for that? Unsure.
RE: Torpor Orb. FYI, I've been running a singleton Orb in the side of my Whir build for a very long time and I love it. Like @Thnkr pointed out, it's great against disruptive bears and such, but also against Titanshift. It shuts down a whole chunk of their gameplan against us.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MODERN Blue Lantern, UBx Tezzerator. OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Has anyone thought about or playtested Thopter Spy Network? I know it's 4 mana, but it nullifies an attacker every turn, and can possibly draw cards if you want. What do you think? I'm looking for another bridge effect aside from magus, whir helps, but just looking for other options.
Hi guys! I'm new to the deck, I'm currently playing the Whir of Invention version and I think it's great. The deck seems strong, it's quite hard but you can get some free-win thanks to Ensnaring Bridge, which is great! This is my current list, any feedback will be appreciated:
As for siding out Baubles, I have started siding them out against 8rack and some decks that run Stony Silence to make room for more artifact/enchantment removal.
@jfuite, the maindeck Engineered Explosives is very helpful in acting as a near-catchall. It takes out Leylines, Chalice of the Void, various planeswalkers, Eidolons, etc. I personally used it recently to lock a Bogles opponent out using Academy Ruins. I plan on uploading the video today, I'll edit this post to link. You should be able to find kanister's list either on the Facebook group or his twitch stream. Both should be linked in the primer.
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
Modern
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
When we draw Bauble later in the game, there are a few utility options it provides. If we have a mill rock, then while it might "set us back" a card (because we've used a draw state to draw it), it allows us to get two draw states, thanks to the pseudo-scry effect. This is relevant even if it's not in our opening hand. Thus, it allows us to dig to cards that we need, much faster.
When we have Whir, it acts as another Opal.
If we don't have Whir, a mill rock, or an Opal, then it allows us to dig deeper into our deck for one of those three things. Due to the nature of how Magic works, if we don't have some set of cards, then we must have drawn another set. Thus, if we do not have Whir, a mill rock, or an Opal, then it means we probably have some combination of the rest of the cards in the deck, like the lands we need, Lantern, Bridge, Stirrings, a discard spell, etc.
On top of all of this, it allows us to play around hand disruption. We can play it and then sacrifice it on the opponent's turn to dig a card deeper for cards we need, without having to worry about the opponent getting an opportunity to discard those extra cards. You can see this in effect in my most recent video against Humans, where I used two Baubles to dig to a Bridge after having a Bridge and a Whir stripped from my hand. It was perfect timing, as it was on my 3rd turn, when I had the three mana to cast it.
For additional analysis on this card and it's effectiveness, you can take a look at the spreadsheet and see the win rates of "explosive" hands (Bauble + Opal) and "scry hands" (Bauble and mill rock). Both of these have positive numbers, and therefore we want to increase the possibility of having those sorts of hands if possible. Therefore, it seems to warrant running a full playset when we can, to increase the chances of these sorts of hands occurring.
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
So against Eldrazi Tron, Engineered Explosives gives us a way to deal with Chalice of the Void. Best part is, we can use Whir of Invention to put Explosives on the board and immediately blow up every Chalice in play (since on the battlefield they have a CMC of 0).
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
E&T I feel like it has the right mix of aggro and disruption with their flickerwisp/Displacer/TKS/Sculler/Thalia suite. I feel like if I don't draw an early bridge or an early lock I feel like I'm out of the game very quickly.
U-Tron I feel like they have a lot of business cards that matter and the counterspell suite makes it hard to establish a lock...
For E&T, if you can name Eldrazi Displacer with Pithing Needle, it helps a lot for the match up. Other than that keeping them off of Flickerwisp and landing a Bridge should end the game in your favour.
As for U-Tron, I'm not sure what to do. Most Tron deck are generally our worst match ups, and I have honestly never seen anyone playing U-Tron in the 4 years of me playing Modern, so I can't really give you many suggestions
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
Thanks! It does seem like Displacer is the key guy there as they can establish a TKS/Sculler lock or invalidate your bridges with Flickerwisp.
As for Utron, they do have a lot of business cards, but are threat-light. This matchup kind of feels like the UW Control matchup to me, in that it's a fight for control, except that they rarely have a decent clock. Much of their most important control comes in the form of Repeal and other bounce spells. Needles are super important here. My most recent replay is actually a Utron matchup, but I have plenty more you can check out. I think I only have one that's with the Whir build, though. I do think that the Whir build might be best against it, although Ghost Quarters in the BGx builds are excellent.
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
First, I've already made a video and tried describing it (the theory of relevant interaction). To my surprise, this concept is already known in the study of game theory. In game theory, this is known as minimax and maximin.
To paraphrase it, it means that in a zero-sum game, the best option available is the one that will simultaneously minimize the opponent's number of available options and/or the relevance of potential options, and to maximize the number of our own available options and/or the relevance of our options.
I'm sure that we can agree that blind self-mill does create the opportunity to have more options as the game goes on. Eventually, we might get a Shredder and five mana or an Academy Ruins online to make use of our graveyard after blindly milling ourselves after a bit.
However, if we look at this minimax principle of game theory, we have to consider - Are we increasing the number of options that the opponent might have? Are we increasing the potential meaningfulness of the options that an opponent might have?
We can take some examples. If the opponent is running Tarmogoyf in their deck, if we blind self-mill, are we increasing the potential power/toughness of that Tarmogoyf? This doesn't matter, of course, if we have a Bridge out. But what if we don't? That Tarmogoyf is about to get very relevant to the gamestate if it is cast. This isn't even counting if it's drawn. There is a chance that the opponent will draw a Tarmogoyf, and if we've made it potentially bigger by putting more cards of various card types into our graveyard, then we have made that option more relevant to the gamestate.
Sure, we also potentially make our own options better, in that we might be able to recur cards with Ruins or Shredder. But the key principle here is that we want to prioritize minimizing the opponent's options over maximizing our own.
To put it into simple math, let's say that we have increased our options to a value of 10, but we have simultaneously increased the opponent's option value to 5. Of those option values, one of them may be able to turn the game into the opponent's favor, swinging the values in the opposite direction, so that suddenly their value is higher and/or our value is suddenly much lower. This is explained in the L/R, T/M/B table in the wiki link I provided.
Therefore, it would be much better for us if we create a gamestate in which our option value is 1, and the opponent's option value is as close to 0 as possible, or is 0. Of course, this is what the lock provides - ensuring that the opponent's option value is 0. But until we get to that point, we want to keep that option value as low as possible, even if it means our own option value is low. So long as ours is higher, we are still winning. But, again, we are trying to prioritize making sure that the opponent's option value is a minimal as possible, and then try to maximize our own.
Thus, the only time that it seems that blind self-mill is correct is when we have absolute certainty that the opponent has zero possible interaction with us doing so. If it gives them more options, or increases the relevance of their options, then we do not want to do it. And it turns out that the solution to this debate existed all along, documented in the concepts of game theory that the deck was built on in the first place
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
I would definitely bring it in against Titanshift decks, as it avoids Chalice on one, snd stops Reclamation Sage and Primeval Titan. I'd also bring it in against the control decks running Snapcaster Mage and Spell Queller. Against Taxes decks, it helps with the Flickerwisps, Scullers, and Thought-Knots, as you point out. It also does quite a bit of work against other various lower tier decks, like the Saheeli combo deck.
I only run it as a one-of, but it's one of those cards that does great things as a singleton, but we don't want to draw multiples of.
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan
RE: Torpor Orb. FYI, I've been running a singleton Orb in the side of my Whir build for a very long time and I love it. Like @Thnkr pointed out, it's great against disruptive bears and such, but also against Titanshift. It shuts down a whole chunk of their gameplan against us.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
4 Ancient Stirrings
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
2 Collective Brutality
4 Whir of Invention
Artifact (26):
4 Mox Opal
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Lantern of Insight
4 Codex Shredder
2 Pyxis of Pandemonium
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Sorcerous Spyglass
4 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Witchbane Orb
1 Engineered Explosives
3 Darkslick Shores
3 Botanical Sanctum
1 River of Tears
4 Glimmervoid
4 Spire of Industry
1 Island
1 Academy Ruins
1 Inventors' Fair
3 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Collective Brutality
1 Nature's Claim
1 Seal of Primordium
1 Quiet Disrepair
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Welding Jar
1 Pithing Needle
1 Torpor Orb
2 Surgical Extraction
Quick question for everyone: do you ever side out Mishra's Bauble?
As for siding out Baubles, I have started siding them out against 8rack and some decks that run Stony Silence to make room for more artifact/enchantment removal.
Lantern Control
(with videos)
Uc Tron
Netdecking explained
Netdecking explained, Part 2
On speculators and counterfeits
On Interaction
Every single competitive deck in existence is designed to limit the opponent's ability to interact in a meaningful way.
Record number of exclamation points on SCG homepage: 71 (6 January, 2018)
"I don't want to believe, I want to know."
-Carl Sagan