Introduction
Greetings! This is a Grand Calcutron brew. I wanted to create a lantern control deck, and then I thought to myself, we can do better. Then I saw The Grand Calcutron. I began scheming immediately, and this is the result of said scheming. Thus, I welcome you all to my brainchild: The Grand Calcutron Blink Lock!!!
Mission Statement
Here at Calcutrontis, we have one very simple mission. It’s to make our Pods insist on the exclusion of UNset cards from the meta. The goal is simple. We want to stop our opponents from casting spells! However, as opposed to traditional Azorius lists, we’ve skipped the control suite and (attempted) to lock opponents out of casting spells from their hand.
Game Plan
With a blink effect, Deadeye Navigator or Eldrazi Displacer, and a Nevermore effect in play, Calcutron makes it so that they can never cast a spell as long as the nevermore is naming the first card in their program. This is a quite strong effect. There is however, a slight problem with this game plan: Drawing cards. That allows the opponents to place cards in front of nevermore. If only there was some way to manipulate what they draw each turn to mitigate that effect.
Lantern!!!
The more astute amongst you may have deduced the solution to our problem already, namely, top deck manipulation. With the addition of Lantern of Insight and a Ghoulcaller's Bell effect, we can bin any cards that we don’t want them drawing!
The Tutor Suite
But Chane, you all say, how can we rely on the Calcutron-Nevermore-Lantern lock if there are only 6 Nevermore effects, 4 Ghoulcaller’s Bell effects, and, gasp, only one Lantern effect?! Haha, I say to you, silly reader, we have a tutor suite to grab any pieces in our deck! More seriously though, I’ve designed the tutor suite to grab pieces and interaction as needed throughout the game. I’ll go over each tutor and what they’re useful for.
Dizzy Spell : It grabs lanterns, bells, and Mystical Tutor/Enlightened Tutor, can also turn into spot removal or (though not very efficient) ramp in a pinch.
Enlightened Tutor : Grabs any bell, lantern, rock, etc. as well as Nevermore, Declaration of Naught, Revoker, Spellskite, Ballista, Unwinding Clock, Phyrexian Metamorph, and 1/2 of Dramatic Scepter (the rock half).
Mystical Tutor : Grabs a ton of tutors, interaction, and half of our win condition. Great utility.
Artificer's Intuition : The whole purpose of this is to grab Lanterns and Bells. At worst it turns a 2cmc rock into a 1cmc rock, and it can be grabbed from other cards in the suite.
Merchant Scroll : Grabs capsize, Mystical Tutor, Cyclonic Rift, and 1/2 of dramatic scepter (the blue instant half).
Muddle the Mixture : Grabs Meddling Mage, Phyrexian Revoker, Declaration of Naught, Spellskite, Artificer’s Intuition, Merchant Scroll, and Torpor Orb/Rest in Peace/Cyclonic Rift as the situation calls for it. Also grabs rocks and KOTWO.
Drift of Phantasms : It grabs Eldrazi Displacer, Nevermore, Flickerwisp, Capsize, Detention Sphere, Aura of Silence, and Imprisoned in the Moon. Furthermore, it grabs the top half of our tutoring suite, tutoring Fabricate, Idyllic Tutor, Recruiter of the Guard, Spellseeker, Tribute Mage, Trinket Mage, and Whir of Invention. It’s good.
Fabricate : This tutors up mana rocks, bells, lantern, Ballista, Unwinding Clock, the rock half of Dramatic Scepter, or Spellskite.
Idyllic Tutor : This is literally here to grab Nevermore, Declaration of Naught, or Copy Enchantment. It can also become a lantern/bell tutor in a pinch, through Artificer’s Intuition.
Recruiter of the Guard : This serves to tutor Arena Rector, Spellseeker, Tribute/Trinket Mage, Flickerwisp, Metamorph, KOTWO, Meddling Mage, Revoker, AND Ballista, it’s a house in this deck.
Spellseeker : Grabs tutors, interaction, and the blue half of Dramatic Scepter.
Tribute Mage : He’s here to turn into Scepter, but can also be a Torpor Orb, Spellskite, Revoker, or rock as the situation calls for it.
Trinket Mage : He’s here to turn into a lantern or bell, but can also turn into a pithing needle or sol ring if necessary.
Whir of Invention : Turns into unwinding clock, any rock/bell/lantern, any utility artifact, Revoker, and Scepter.
Arena Rector : This is mostly cheeky, however it is a combat deterrent and grabs tezzeret (a tutor) or venser (a value engine).
Tezzeret the Seeker : He can grab artifact in the deck, as well as being a bell value engine.
But how do we win?
I’m glad you asked. I despise players whose only win condition is the rest of the table scooping, so I sought to avoid that. There’s nothing wrong with winning through forced secession, and a lot of games you’ll find you’ve effectively won, however, it was easy to slot in a 3 card combo that already had a lot of synergy in the deck. The combo(s) are Walking Ballista, paired with infinite mana from Dramatic Reversal/Isochron Scepter or Peregrine Drake/Deadeye Navigator/Eldrazi Displacer (note: there are only 2 colorless land sources in this deck, and 3 colorless rock sources in this deck, and thus dramatic scepter was the infinite mana combo of choice, but deadeye navigator/eldrazi displacer have a lot of synergy in the deck already so the peregrine drake was free basically).
Cool Synergies
Displacer/Navigator paired with Recruiter of the Guard/Spellseeker is a repeatable tutor. Paired with KOTWO is repeatable ramp. Paired with Archaeomancer is recurrable spells/interaction. Paired with Sun Titan is graveyard recursion.
Flickerwisp with any of the above is also great, recurrable value is always awesome. Can also bounce any of our Nevermore pieces if necessary.
Venser may seem a little cheeky, however many games will stall and he will ult, and capsize + venser ult closes out games fast.
Sun Titan recurs almost every card in our deck so that is a no brainer.
Farewell, Friends
I hope our time together has been as enjoyable for you as it has been for me. And I hope everybody enjoys my sweet ass brew!!!
