I haven't played Magic in 10 years and I'm thinking of getting back into it. This is my first standard deck, any comments/suggestions would be appreciated.

Looks like your mana can use some work. Fortunately the painlands and Smoldering Marsh are pretty cheap.

This is the deck I've been running to decent effect Everything is Awesome and while it isn't entirely budget, you've got a good core in what you have here. Gideon, Ally of Zendikar is house, and Painful Truths is absolutely refreshing when you're down on cards.

Thanks for the feedback. Gideon would be cool, but I'm not making the investment in him since I'm not sure how serious I'll get. Painful Truths is cool too, but I think their price has gone up. I'm substituting Read the Bones.

I have been play testing this a bit and it fairs pretty well for a budget deck I think. The mana usually works out. I am considering making it W/B, but Chasm Guide is pretty clutch with March from the Tomb.

If you wanted to make it WB you could just run Rally the Ancestors in conjunction with March from the Tomb and Nantuko Husk to get that extra punch. Pulling back all your dead chumps, carving chunks out of your opponent, and then smacking them in the face with a massive Husk is pretty good.

Went 3-1 at FNM and decided this is a viable deck. Narrow victories to U/R prowess and B/R vampires and easily beat a mirror match. Lost to G/W Human/Angel.

I am going to try to make this more competitive and B/W midrange, hoping to keep board clear of major threats and bank on Ally synergy.

This started as a budget deck, but I am going to invest some money into better cards. I'm adding better removal, including Declaration in Stone and Anguished Unmaking.

I already cut back on some creatures, but I really like Always Watching Not sure if I should replace it with Oath of Gideon and shell out more money for planeswalkers Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and Sorin, Grim Nemesis. Thoughts?

Looking for help to improve this deck. I feel like it has a lot of good cards and synergy with the allies, but I am struggling with it.

Most of the sideboard is set up to deal with control type decks. Languish is obviously for humans and Bant company decks.

Any suggestions, particularly on how to deal with control decks?

Really great deck, love the synergy. You are running a lot of Gideon, Ally of Zendikar, so you may want to remove two for more creatures but I have no experience with Gideon so I don't know how he affects your deck. For control, I didn't see many powerful things currently in Standard to deal with it. A interesting card to use would be Ally Encampment, so you can pull out creatures and also get out allies a little easier. If you ever decide to have this be a casual deck then cards like Obzedat, Ghost Council and Grand Abolisher could find a place here. But otherwise, awesome deck, if battling control is the main concern you could possibly focus more on getting out tokens with the risk of wrecking the ally synergy.

Thanks for the comments. Wow, I didn't even notice that 3rd ability on Ally Encampment. That is pretty interesting. I may give that a try. Having another colorless source makes it tempting to include Warping Wail in the sideboard to deal with opponents' Languish.

Still looking for advice against control decks. Seems like the meta game at my FNM is dominated by either W/B, R/B, or G/B control decks.

I went 3-1 again this week, losing to B/W control. Should I try to out agro them, loading up on more allies and falling back on March from the Tomb? Or should I try to manage them with things like Duress?

If they're relying on Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip or a few other creature cards to help with the control, then Infinite Obliteration is definitely the card you want. Duress and Transgress the Mind are also useful as you can remove cards before they have a chance to play them.

We have very similar Ally decks: B/W Ally life gain/drain

Look and see if you get any ideas looking at that deck. Also, a further evolution of that deck is my other deck which, in my opinion, is more powerful. I have used this newer deck against B/W Ally and rolled right over: B/W Token generating machine

Nice deck!

Really good suggestions.

I also like your token deck idea. Wonder if there's a way to incorporate Odric into G/W token.

Yes, there definitely is a way to get Odric, Lunarch Marshal into G/W decks! Trample is common in those decks, and Deathcap Cultivator can have the ability of deathtouch. There are other really good green cards that could easily compliment Odric! Put all of this with Cryptolith Rite and you have a deadly deck!

Maybe consider Eerie Interlude to trigger all the allies again?

You might consider Bygone Bishop. It's not an ally, but it will get you clues for playing your allies, and can fly over defenders while holding claws.