if you're running this much white and black, you should look into getting some Declaration in Stone and putting Anguished Unmaking into the mb. Standard is basically "play on opponents turn because counterspells aren't a thing." Take out Painful Truths for another Read the Bones; scry allows you to dig 1 card more and gives you more control over what you draw. Clip Wings needs to be in the sb!!!! I don't know if you saw this yet: PT Decks, but it has a mardu control and an abzan control that both performed well. I think you could incorporate some of what they did into this.

mcstang1986- How does this look now? I feel like it could take down a FNM at least.

I like it. I still am not a fan of ayli, but I don't know what would replace her

mcstang1986- Ayli profitably blocks and kills opposing 2/3s and anything without first strike. You can also block kalitas with something then sac it so they don't get the lifelink. Sac'ing a guy for life in order to use Anguished Unmaking is also an option. It can block 2/2 knight tokens from gideon all day long too. If I were to run blue, I'd remove it for Reflector Mage, but it does a good job stalling early aggression until I take over with PW's without me needing to run out Sylvan Advocates if I have them both in my opener. I hope you noticed that I added the Westvale Abbey  ^Flip back in. I just never wanted to have a 2nd Canopy Vista in play, but going up to 4 evolving wilds ended up being good enough for mana fixing in my goldfishing.

I get the advantages, it's just I am not a fan of the card. If it were a vampire of zombie, I think I would like it better.

I have to say, I respectfully disagree with mcstang1986 about Read the Bones over Painful Truths. Read may allow you to look one card deeper when looking for something specific, but often the extra card from Truths will be well worth not getting the extra scry.

SpringingTiger- Thanks for looking at the deck! So far in testing, I've noticed that the deck already hurts itself a bunch between painlands, Ob Nix, and especially Anguished Unmaking. For that reason I've decided that Read the Bones is better in this shell just to save the life. Most of the time I cast it, I keep 1 and scry the other to the bottom, so it's essentially the same as drawing 3 and having 1 be a dud from Painful Truths, so I'd rather save the 1 life. I totally agree with you about using Painful Truths in most other cases, but here (where I often take a painland damage just to get green mana), the lifeloss just adds up too much.

Your land base seems super slow to me. What about Fortified Village? It at least has the chance of being untapped. Maybe trade a Wilds and a Caves for a pair? The Vista works as a reveal too for them. +1 seems very interesting.

Thanks for commenting Mj3913! The manabase is pretty slow, but that's mostly due to the limited enemy-color fixing available in standard right now. I think of the deck as mainly a BW deck that splashes G, but the only BW lands are Shambling Vent and Forsaken Sanctuary and I'm not keen on using the sanctuary. I've found that I never really want 2 lands on the battlefield that don't produce B in the early game due to the amount of low-costing B cards, which is why I'm pretty painland-heavy. I was running 2 Canopy Vistas before, and it just felt horrible drawing the 2nd one over any other B source even when it came in untapped. I figure that more Evolving Wilds is the better way to go since I'm looking to run more Tireless Trackers if I can get them. I'm all for having a faster manabase, but for now I don't think it's possible in a black-heavy abzan.

+1 I actually like this deck a lot. I would probably tune it to my personal standards, as usual. Hows the matchup against Grixis Control and Selesnya Tokens?

Also, not sure why people don't like Ayli! I personally love this card, she's an answer for early game and can gain back some life.

Thanks for the upvote Karniv04! I like this deck a whole lot too! Nobody in my meta plays grixis control, but the token matchup feels good especially after sideboarding. I take out all the spot removal that doesn't also hit PWs along with an Ob Nix, and side in the Duresses, Silkwrap (for Hangarback Walker), and if I'm on the play Thought-Knot Seers. Eldrazi Displacer is the best card against tokens, but you need to make sure the cost is clear with a duress or something to assure that you can get value from it if you drop it before turn 6. Ayli really is great against early threats like Lambholt Pacifist  ^Flip too. It's important to pressure their PWs with early aggression if they land one, but the match is certainly winnable.

I really recommend taking out Read the Bones entirely and going up on Tireless Tracker, especially if you're not seeing many red-based decks. There isn't any creature removal besides Fiery Impulse that punishes low-toughness creatures, so if you play Tracker your opponent is pushed to find an answer and usually that means throwing away a valuable Ruinous Path or what have you, clearing the way for your game-ending planeswalkers.

I play her over RtB in my Jund midrange/control and I've never missed RtB since I took it out. She almost never gets removed because other threats are more pressing (planeswalkers, Sylvan Advocates, Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim). If she sticks around for more than a turn she'll draw you at least the same amount of cards as RtB-- with a mana investment, but it's an instant speed mana investment that you can do on opponents' turns if they don't play something you have to deal with.

People are really loath to get rid of their draw-a-card spells, but she feels so much smoother in my deck, which is very similar to this one in build (you can check it out here if you'd like: Arlinn on the Midrange (Jund with Full Primer)). Give her a try c:

abby315- Thanks for taking a look at my deck! So far in my testing Read the Bones has been great for adapting to different situations for me. Most of the time I'm casting it on turn 3 to find my 4th land (yes, even in a deck running 26 lands I get screwed sometimes). It also makes a very good topdeck later in the game when I'm searching for answers/threats. That said, I only own 1 atm, and will definitely try out more if I get ahold of them. I agree that my opponents do treat him as a must-answer threat, but my list here runs more PW's than your list (as threats) so I'm not sure that I need more creaures to fill that role. My meta is mostly control, but I haven't been in a few weeks so it could have changed.

Awesome Deck Tech! I am gonna try it this coming FNM and will comment the outcome lol. +1!

Thanks its_rully! This deck has been very fun for me so far, and there are so many lines of play you can take depending on if you're against control or aggro. Make sure to practice sideboarding before you play it at FNM!

but i need to ask, why 2 Ob Nixilis insted of 2 Sorins since the life loss hurts a litte? is it because its a turn earlier?

its_rully- That's pretty much it. We also want to use the CA we get from our PWs as fast as possible, so playing Ob on turn 7 along with a 2-drop makes for a better board state faster than a 2nd Sorin. We're a mid-range deck, so we can't play the long game against control as well as they can (but we can sure put up a fight then too!).

That being said, against something like esper control if I need to side something else out after the targeted creature removal, sometimes I'll cut the 2nd Ob.

Ah! I see you went up on Tireless Tracker! Did you like the way she played in testing over RtB? A looooot of people fight me on that replacement in my own deck and if I suggest it, but I do really feel like it's smoother to put all your card advantage on a stick when playing controlly-midrange. :)

Sorry about the double post, but it looks like editing is disabled right now; what do you think of Naturalize over Conclave Naturalists? I run Naturalize because I can flash it back with Goblin Dark-Dwellers, but I also feel like it's just really nice to have at instant speed and for 2 mana. That way you can get back a creature exiled with Stasis Snare before your turn starts and it can attack again, and you can get rid of Sphinx's Tutelage before draw spells, in addition to destroying the Goggles (though they still get to tap them first for mana).

I did run a Naturalize for a while, but I found that I wanted to bring in additional threats against control, and the naturalists pull double duty as artifact/enchantment removal (you'll notice I still have Dromoka's Command for the instant-speed interaction). The only artifact that I'm worried about is goggles, everything else is enchants that D.command helps out with too. It's just a way for me to stay well-rounded in other matchups. Against Tutelage decks, I also board in the Duresses to help out as well since they don't often run much in the way of creatures. However, it's a match that I haven't tested extensively against. Most people in my meta run some variant of control, GW tokens or humans.

Also, I'm trying out the additional trackers. There have been a few instances where I have trouble hitting early land drops, but otherwise they've seemed ok. Much of this deck was patterned after the BW control deck, with me adding green in order to close out games better (sooner) than they could and making it more midrange. I haven't tested it irl against control yet, so I still need to see how much of a difference it makes. It was a good suggestion nonetheless!

abby315 i actually wouldn't mind the Conclave Naturalists cause the Eldrazi Displacer would just bounce it reactivating etb lol

Fair point about the Obs especially against esper control, i would take note on that. From just a look on the deck i can see it can fight decks like tokens and company too. I will definitely test more with it

Drana, Liberator of Malakir is a nice option...

Pitiless Horde is a SB allstar against control.

Splashing 2x Dark Petition and 1x Seasons Past could be a useful side-plan.

Gilt-Leaf Winnower is pretty sweet, and gets better with Eldrazi Displacer.

Thoughts?

NotSquishedYet- Thanks for commenting! I'll try and answer as best as I can.

There aren't many creatures in this deck, so Drana's ability wouldn't be as useful here as it would elsewhere. All the other creatures in this deck either immediately impact the board or are very efficient for their costs. Drana just isn't where this deck wants to be, as I feel she works better in a more aggressive deck with lots of creatures to pump.

There is enough instant-speed interaction in control decks nowadays that Pitiless Horde isn't as good as it used to be. The top performing control decks are Grixis and BW control, and they have plenty of instant-speed answers to a 3-toughness, mono-colored creature. I'd rather use Thought-Knot Seers as a 4-mana creature against control since it's essentially a 2-for-1 if they can't remove it right away.

The Petition/Seasons Past engine is pretty nice, but I'm aiming to be more of a midrange deck that can play the role of a beatdown deck instead of trying to win the long game. I think that package is only worth using if you're going to purposely build the deck around it and run multiple copies, otherwise an early Transgress the Mind from your opponent will break it up. It's also pretty mana-intensive, and with my early game creatures instead of the extra removal, I'm not certain I'd be able to stall the game long enough to bring it online. However it might be fun to brew around with it sometime if I can borrow those cards.

I use Gilt-Leaf Winnower in my standard elves deck, and it's nice there. In this deck it's overcosted and too conditional to be used as an option for removal. I'd rather have a 3rd Anguished Unmaking or something instead of the winnower. I also only have 1 displacer, so counting on that synergy showing up in any given game wouldn't be likely.

Hey, so my FNM was not bad with this deck,

i won my first two matches againts a grixis control deck, and then won another againts a esper control deck. the side board of this deck was just murder againts them.

Then 3rd match i lost againts a bant company deck 2 - 1, the first game i won by a land slide as i kept drawing removals after removals until he was top decking and gideon just slammed him turn after turn, second game he sideboarded alot of counter spells which messed up my plays, but then third game, i got land flooded and that was pretty much brutal.

4th match i matched up with a mardu ally deck which was pretty much one sided as i denied him everything as my sylvans and trackers kept bashing in.

5th match was againts an atarka red deck, basically so much turn ones that kept bashing and a huge Goldnight Castigator. I lost completely againts this deck. It could be the draw luck but it hurt a lot.

Overall not bad 3 - 2 for the night.

Would you mind a rebuttal to defend my points and explain them in greater detail too much? I have more time on hand now.