Low curve mono white weenie. Just playing around with some ideas. Mostly want to build around Godsend if possible. Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit into Abzan Falconer has potential.
This sorta is an aggro deck, but it feels different than the stereotype that red has. It feels more like you're casting some early bears and they get buffed slowly over time and are backed up with a bit of removal. Everything is efficient enough that you tend to stay a half-step ahead of your opponent every turn even though the card quality in their deck might be bigger on an individual basis. Seems competitive across a range of decks.
Plan A is a two-power one drop on turn 1, Anafenza Kin-Tree Spirit on turn two, and Abzan Falconer on turn 3. That sets up a decently threatening board state a turn earlier than many decks are ready to handle. Anafenza works great with a lot of bear friends to distribute out a handful of +1 counters. Abzan Falconer turns those counters into flying keywords and many decks in the current meta have real difficulty handling early 3-power fliers.
Having 4 mana on turn 4 is not dependable given the low land count. But with Nykthos you do get to 4 mana often enough, and this deck has some 4 mana plays like bestowing the Eidolon of Countless Battles, Mastery of the Unseen, Citadel Siege, and Ajani.
The deck also uses Acolyte's Reward as a devotion payoff. Much like Valorous Stance, it's often a two mana removal spell that has the option of dealing some key points of damage to the opponent's face.
Pacifism is decent as psuedo removal as well, contributes to devotion, and has synergy with Eidolon of Countless Battles.
Godsend has been overperforming for me. It deals with Stormbreath Dragon nearly perfectly (it's exile effect is not targetted so can affect pro-white creatures). The mana costs are hard to manage, but even if you don't get time to equip it it's still a devotion enabler.
There are a significant amount of enchantments here, but with a lot of Dromoka's Command floating around, having a couple extra enchantments in play helps minimize the damage.
The one drops I've settled on Dragon Hunter and Soldier of the Pantheon given they have abilities that interact well with combat.
The deck tends to eat up opposing decks relying on dragons, with the Dragon Hunter, the Hidden Dragonslayer, the Valorous Stance and so on.
Lifegain is potent in the deck as well, with Hidden Dragonslayer and Lightform having lifelink, which gets better with the buffing potential of Anafenza, Eidolon, and Godsend. Mastery of the Unseen's lifegain is useful too.
You'd think this deck is vulnerable to sweepers, and they do hurt, but with the low land count the deck is denser with playable cards and can followup somewhat smoothly. The opponent needs more answers than just one sweeper, and needs them on a quick tempo.
Master of Pearls seems like an odd choice, but this deck wants some two drop bears for these slots, and it's a good combo with the manifest aspect of the deck, plus it helps disguise Hidden Dragonslayer morphs.
Not sure if Citadel Siege and/or Ajani are good enough compared to other possibilities. If these slots are going to be 4 drops then I want them to play a top end role, which these sort of do but they rot in hand a little too often for my comfort. I've considered other cards for the deck like Myth Realized, Echoes of the Kin Tree, Gleam of Authority, Spirit of the Labyrinth (to defend against decks built around card drawing), Spirit Bonds, Brimaz, Chariot of Victory (Godsend-equipped creatures are easy enough to block that a cheap trample effect could be sorely wanted), and a bunch of other bears. Nothing stands out as a perfect choice.
I'm not sure what should be in the sideboard since this isn't a deck that seemingly has a lot of adaptive, reactive, or transformative options. Most of the deck is pretty much locked in. Mardu Woe-Reaper can do a bit of work against graveyard strategies but it's a bit of a longshot and it's much more vanilla in combat than Dragon Hunter or Soldier of the Pantheon. I can see swapping the Master of Pearls for Spirit of the Labyrinth against decks running Dig Through Time and other card drawing spells. I can see wanting access to Feat of Resistance but I don't like it in the main deck because I don't want to take out devotion-enabling permanents for them and I prefer Valorous Stance and Acolyte's Reward in the main. Maybe an End Hostilities is useful, and maybe a Return to the Ranks can be a hedge against a deck heavy on sweepers and removal. I like always having access to a land in my sideboards.
