[Calahan]

Part of the attraction of Lanterns over Skull Mentors is that they are more cost efficient, since with a hammer you get 6rp for 3 gems with a Lantern, and 9rp for 7 gems with a skull mentor. But by far the main attraction of Lanterns over Skulls is that there are just so many good uses for Death gems at any stage of the game. Basically you have never have enough Death gems no matter which nation you play. But there are not many good uses for Fire gems, and many consider Fire gems to be by far the least useful type of gem, so forging Lanterns is considered one of the best uses for Fire gems. The other main ones being achemising them into Astral gems, or forging fire trinkets.