Ready, Set, Build!

     So, in my effort get back into magic more lately, I've been working on building a competitive Standard deck. I've always had a tendency to play white more than anything else, and I definitely didn't break that mold with my current construction, I've gone with a mono-white humans build, I'd call it loosely based on the meta deck haunted humans. It's usually a blue white deck, but as I've never really enjoyed either 1) playing blue and B) xeroxing Meta-game decks, but that's a post for another time. I'm going to go ahead and post the deck list, let you form an opinion, then write more about what I'm thinking about it. 

Standard Humans

21 Plains

     21 Lands

4 Champions of the Parish

4 Gideon's Lawkeeper

4 Thraben Doomsayer

2 Hero of Bladehold

2 Elite Vanguard

4 Doomed Traveler

3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

     23 Creatures

2 Elspeth Tirel

2 Gideon Jura

     4 Planeswalkers

4 Oblivion Ring

4 Gather the Townsfolk

4 Honor of the Pure

     12 Spells

     There it is, it hasn't been through nearly enough testing to say this is the final build. but after some discussion with a good friend and an amazing player, Barret Haskins (his blog here), I think it's at the very least a very solid start. The win condition is fairly straight-forward, it's pretty much beat-down, I can use Elspeth to keep myself in the game in case it goes long, or to help me mob the board with either cannon fodder in a pinch, or even some solid beaters if I have a copy or two Honor of the Pure on the board. I can also use Gideon Jura (who's a beast!) to 1) smack some sense into people, 2) as creature control to take care of any specific creatures who may be causing me grief, or D) I can (maybe?) sack him off by forcing my opponent to swing at him with all of their creatures, opening the door for me to get as much damage through as possible, even if he dies it's, as barret put it, "no skin off my balls", because I, if played the way it's supposed to, should be able to seal the deal on the next turn when they have no blockers.

     I put Hero of Bladehold in because, well, because she's fan-fucking-tastic a 3/4  for 4 mana that brings in 2 soldier tokens every time she swings. and for every 2 she brings in, or Elspeth brings in, or the Doomsayer brings in, or Gather the Townsfolk brings in, (see a theme here?) my Champions will get beefed up beyond recognition. 

     The deck should have no problems at all opening up quickly, with 10 creatures on the 1-drop, 12 options for the 2-drop, and then my power cards curving out nicely. So, between me opening strong, I also am running a solid amount of control and disruption in the form of the O-Rings, Gideon, Elspeth, the Lawkeepers and Thalia, who will slow their game (and mine, which is why if anything in here is possibly on the chopping block, it's her). 

     I feel like it's going to be pretty strong, I still need to tweak it and build a sideboard to gear it towards playing against the Meta-Decks. I'm hoping there are some solid players out there who may have some tips and or critiques for me.