BG Midrange (Standard)

---STRATEGY---
Disrupt your opponent's hand and kill their creatures. Use Deathrite Shaman and Scavenging Ooze exile cards from graveyards and gain benefits.

Desecration Demon is a huge threat that can beat your opponent into the ground unless they either feed it creatures (which can then be exiled with Scavenging Ooze) or kill it.

With Reaper of the Wilds on the battlefield any creature killed will allow you to scry, ensuring you get the cards you need when you need them. In a similar vein Read the Bones allows you to dig 4 cards deep to find the cards you need.

Whilst Whip of Erebos doesn't work that effectively due to Scavenging Ooze and Deathrite Shaman exiling cards from graveyards it does provide a vital role in regaining life lost from Overgrown Tomb, Read the Bones and Thoughtseize.

---SIDEBOARD---

VS Control (UW, Esper):

+3 Duress
+2 Erebos, God of the Dead
+2 Golgari Charm
+2 Pithing Needle

-3 Abrupt Decay
-3 Doom Blade
-1 Reaper of the Wilds
-2 Scavenging Ooze

As control runs very few, if any, creatures. Replacing Doom Blade with Duress provides the deck with more hand disruption to get rid of troublesome spells and counters.

Erebos primarily comes in to combat Sphinx's Revelations. To make room for Erebos I cut 2 Scavenging Oozes, as there aren't too many creatures in control decks.

Golgari Charm helps to destroy Detention Spheres and regenerate your own creatures in the face of board wipes, such as Supreme Verdict. As Abrupt Decay only really hits Detention Sphere in UW/Esper control decks it's easily replaced with Golgari Charm.

Pithing Needle is brought in to combat Aetherling and Planeswalkers.

I removed 1 Reaper of the Wilds as its abilities aren't too useful against a deck that doesn't run too many creatures.

VS Mono-Black Devotion:

+2 Erebos, God of the Dead
+2 Fade into Antiquity
+2 Pithing Needle
+2 Ultimate Price

-1 Deathrite Shaman
-3 Doom Blade
-3 Lifebane Zombie
-1 Scavenging Ooze

Apart from Nightveil Spectre all creatures in the Mono-Black Devotion decks are mono-black meaning Doom Blade is essentially useless so Ultimate Price takes its place. Unfortunately Ultimate Price doesn't hit Nightveil Spectre, however Abrupt Decay and Hero's Downfall do.

Pithing Needle is useful against a number of cards in the deck. In most cases Pithing Needle will name the land Underworld Connections is enchanting but can also be used to stop Pack Rat, Erebos and Whip of Erebos.

Erebos serves as a block against the Mono-Black Devotion player gaining life through Gray Merchant of Asphodel.

Fade into Anquity is mainly brought in to remove opponent's Erebos, however is also useful against other cards in the deck such as Underworld Connections, Whip of Erebos and Pithing Needle.

Lifebane Zombie was cut as neither its ETB ability nor intimidate really help against the Mono-Black Devotion deck.

The last 2 cards were the hardest to cut. There's arguements for keeping most things in the deck. In the end I decided to cut a Deathrite Shaman and a Scavenging Ooze, I'm not entirely sure this is correct however it does mean there are still 3 copies of each in the deck.

VS Mono-Blue Devotion:

+2 Fade into Antiquity
+2 Ratchet Bomb

-2 Abrupt Decay
-1 Doom Blade
-1 Read the Bones

It seems that the two main considerations to take into account when playing against Mono-Blue Devotion is Thassa, God of the Sea and Master of Waves.

Master of Waves can flood the field with tokens which can easily overrun you. Whilst watching the Pro Tour Theros coverage I saw 8-10 tokens enter the battlefield in one go. Spot removal helps to remove Master of Waves and kill all the tokens due to them having 0 toughness once Master of Waves has left the battlefield, however if multiple Master of Waves are on the battlefield this strategy isn't great. To help combat this Ratchet Bomb is brought in to kill all the tokens in one go.

As long as your opponent's devotion is high enough Thassa, God of the Sea can make herself unblockable and start attacking to give you a very small clock. Even if she's not made unblockable her indestructible ability means it's very hard to get rid of her. Fade into Antiquity deals with her as well as answering Bident of Thassa.

Abrupt Decay may seem like a strange cut, however there is plenty of other spot removal in the deck and it's being replaced with Ratchet Bomb and Fade into Antquity which helps answer more prominent threats. Instead of cutting the last Abrupt Decay I cut a Doom Blade instead, this is to boost removal that hits Nightveil Spectre.

I took out 1 Read the Bones as the Mono-Blue Devotion deck can put you on a very small clock quite quickly I wanted more answers in the deck.

VS Green/Red Monsters:

+2 Pithing Needle

-1 Abrupt Decay
-1 Read the Bones

I feel the deck is already quite good against Green/Red Monsters as it contains enough removal to take out problem creatures and the combination of Thoughtseize and Lifebane Zombie provides enough hand disruption to deal with problematic cards before they hit the field.

Pithing Needle is brought in to combat creatures activating Monstorous and the Planeswalkers in the deck.

I removed 1 Abrupt Decay as the other removal spells hit more than Abrupt Decay can. I also removed a Read the Bones so that there would be enough removal in the deck.

VS Aggro (RDW, Boros, Rakdos):

+2 Ratchet Bombs
+2 Golgari Charm

-2 Lifebane Zombie
-1 Read the Bones
-1 Thoughtseize

As aggro decks try to cause as much damage as quickly as possible I removed a Thoughtseize and a Read the Bones as they both end up costing you 2 life. In their place I brought in Ratchet Bomb to blow up the field and remove a lot of the lower costing creatures that can end up dealing a lot of damage in the early game.

Golgari Charm's ability to give all creatures -1/-1 can be very useful as a lot of the aggressive creatures only have 1 toughness. Even if the creatures aren't destroyed they are weakened enough that they won't deal as much damage, allowing you to survive til a bit later in the game when you can mount a counterstrike.

Lifebane Zombie seems good for its intimidate ability, however as Golgari Charm puts it at risk and its ETB ability isn't relevant I decided to cut 2 copies.

VS Selesnya Beatdown:

I'm not entirely sure what to sideboard in against Selesnya Beatdown decks as the combination of spot removal and hand disruption seems to be quite effective against it. I think I need to play more against a Selesnya Beatdown deck before I can decide, unfortunately there doesn't seem to be that many around at the moment.