Credit to Zac Elsik who won a GP with this deck - I made some slight edits to the list as I saw fit for my meta.
Primer
1.What is Lantern Control?
1.1 Overview
Lantern Control is a very slow deck which has the potential to dump its hand on turn one to turn two and then not turn back. It then wins very slowly by either milling the player or over a multiple turn clock.
1.2 How does it work?
Lantern Control is focused around the card Lantern of Insight. It then either uses Codex Shredder, Ghoulcaller's Bell, or in some cases
Pyxis of Pandemonium
. This allows them to make sure that the opposing deck cannot draw any card that could sustain a threat. The focus is either to let the other deck draw a lot of lands or very little cards that are relevant in the current game. Then the lantern deck drops an Ensnaring Bridge to make sure the opponent cannot attack, and then the opponent is "locked out" of the game
1.3 How does it win?
The Current Lantern deck has 3 ways of winning.
Milling the player out - Codex shredder and bell put a slow, but effective clock Academy Ruins +
Pyrite Spellbomb
- This puts another slow but effective clock, it also removed key creatures quite nicely Ghirapur AEther Grid - This card is a house. It can kill a player very efficiently and also wipes the board quite nicely.
- Why Play Lantern Control?
2.1 Overall Gameplay
Lantern Control is an efficient deck that usually drops its entire hand on turn 1-3 and then can lock the opponent out of the game. It has extremely good game 1 matchups against every high tier deck with the exception of burn.
2.2 Strengths
All slow decks usually fall to Lantern, especially if they cannot provide a fast enough clock to shut down Bridge. Twin has a tough time because of our main board pithing needle and spellskite. We just need to make sure they do not surprise us with the combo. Grixis decks and B/Gx midrange decks also have a tough time because they do not have much Artifact hate mainboard, and do not provide an early clock Bogles can be shut down by an early bridge, and the Bogle is usually so big that it doesn't matter how many cards we have in our hand. If we dont have bridge however, it can get ugly fast
2.3 Even Matchups
Tron can be a difficult matchup, where we need to make sure the player does not draw Ugin or Karn, which are both very dangerous to us. Id call this matchup 50/50. B/Wx tokens is 50/50, because their 1/1's get past bridge relatively effectively. This is good matchup post-board because we have pyroclasm, which can shut them down.
2.4 Weaknesses
Burn is by far our worst matchup. The only real way to win [against burn] is to play an early hand disruption spell and then pithing needle a fetch, so they cannot cast anything, and then lock them out. Sun droplet helps in our sideboard, but not much. Infect is also a large problem as they run noble hierarch, which gets past bridge. It also can kill us before we drop bridge, which is a problem.
3.How do I play Lantern Control?
3.1 Basics
The best possible hand for a lantern player consists of one hand disruption spell, 2 lands, a lantern, a mill effect, and a bridge. This allows us to disrupt their turn 1 play, drop our prison lock or turns 2-3, and draw into win conditions from there.
3.2 Land vrs. Spells
When we get or lantern + mill effect combo down, we need to make a decision. Do we just mill the opponents lands, or do we mill there spells that are going to affect us? This is a totally circumstantial response, and it depends on the stage in the game and how far ahead or behind we are, and if we know what the opponent has in their hand. Usually though, we should be milling spells, unless the opponent is mana screwed and we want to lock them out. Never mill spells such as Terminate and Path to Exile, because they are useless against us. Make informed decisions while milling and do not be afraid to let the opponent draw a bolt, make sure you play it safe always.
4.Budgeted List
Budget Lantern List Boardfire
