dknight27

I would recommend going with some collective brutality. Give the deck either hand disruption, removal, or draino and is easy and cheap to escalate, as this deck can get by on minimal lands, and you can ditch lingering souls then flash it back. I would also consider maxing out bitterblossom, as it works best when dropped early. Perhaps also consider a copy of sorin, lord of inistrad over the double up of solemn visitor.

Just my thoughts

This build looks a tad too top heavy, I would consider cutting some 3 and 4 drops and upping the 1 and 2 drops

I think he means a "by the book" burn deck

I'm not a huge fan of running 12 critters in here. It cuts down on the accuracy of delver (12 critters + 20 lands is more than half the deck), and the lightning angles slow the deck down (4 drops are tough in a deck with 20 lands with 8 fetches). I would consider swapping them out for electrolyze, which does precisely what this deck wants to do, is affordable, and ups the instant count.

I'm also not a fan of psyonic blast, as you have access to red and can use any of its much better burn options. I would consider 3 copies of risk factor, which also helps with redundant lands/bad top decks.

Just my thoughts.

You're missing some staples of tribal builds and some red/black staples in general that might help boost the build.

Kindred dominance
Adaptive automaton
Coat of arms
Ever after
Decree of pain
Grave pact
Gratuitous violence
Nihil spellbomb
Skullclamp
Night's whisper
Bloodghast
Gilded lotus
Thran dynamo
Flameshadow conjuring

Are you looking to modernize this?

Nothing in particular, just general feedback. i have no delusion that this will compete with tier 1 decks, but when I look at the mechanics of cycling, and the huge augmentations that have hit in the last few sets, I see a potential answer to the central problem in magic, which is the equilibrium of fast development vs post development material

I'm not a huge fan of 4 niv's, as you dont' want it in the opening hand, or realistically until you have PLENTY of mana available, and you are running plenty of tactical draw (opt, the planeswalkers, treasure map). I think you can get away with 2-3 niv's and 2 drakes (has sort of the same problem (don't want it in the opening when it's weak)). Have you run into any of these problems?

collective brutality would be right at home in here

I'm not a fan of ghostly prison in here, especially with 16 lands. By the time you play it, opponent will have enough mana built up for it to not matter very much. Maxing out inquisition of kozilek makes more sense to me, as this deck desperately wants a turn 1 play, and you aren't going to get a much better one.

I see a couple areas of redundancy that can be smoothed out to help streamline this build. Your commander already boosts the kitty cats extremely well, so you don't really need any of the boosts from the equipments, which slow things down anyway.

You're also missing a few staples for this build and white/green EDH in general, like: white sun's zenith, collective blessing, dictate of heliod, true conviction, kismet, return to dust, brave the sands, cathar's crusade, and commander's sphere.

Just some ideas

It's all good, EDH is a very strange format. Completely backward from every other format in magic. Takes a while to get the hang of it

This deck is designed as a multi-player EDH, so spot removal in general is far less effective. In general I stay away from spot removal in EDH as it puts you at -1 against every player but the one you moved against, so in a 4 player game it puts you at -2, and in a 3 player game it puts you at -1. Far more effective in EDH are nukes, targeted mass removal, and activated abilities that take care of stuff. In here, Lyzolda has a shock effect that is super easy to activate, there are plenty of search cards, tremendous draw power, some good nukes, and the enchantments that make opponents sac critters when mine die (which is devastating), so I don't think this build needs any spot removal, even for super problematic critters.

Lighting bolt in particular doesn't work in EDH because the life totals are doubled, everyone ramps higher, and important critters usually don't die to 3 damage.

Claim // Fame is a very good card, but works much better in modern where what you want is sleek speed, and Claim gives you ETB boosts, as well as fetching back key matchups like dark confidant and death's shadow. This deck doesn't really care about mechanics like that, as it has extremely effective reanimator and token mechanics working to keep the field full of small critters to smack around.

Kolaghan's command is, in my humble opinion, a contender for best card made in the last few years, there's no doubt.

https://www.mtgvault.com/dknight27/decks/modern-bant-control-budget/

This is how I would structure the deck you're going for with the bones you've got at hand. I would go with garruk, primal hunter over kiora, but that might be outside the budget so no biggie.

The basic idea for the swap-ins is to fix the tempo problem with the lands, as censor is about the biggest cheap utility belt I've found in modern. Works like a regular counterspell in the opening and early middle game, and if you don't need it you cycle it off for U and say thank you as you thin your deck for minimal cost. In other words, you want it in the opening hand, and you are ok with top decking it. Find me another 25 cent card in modern that does that and I'll bake you a cake.

Torrential gearhulk goes for a little over 4 bucks these days, and does exactly what this deck wants. Beat stick flashes in, retains material, then goes to work on a 4-turn clock.

I'm a bigger fan of Jace, unraveler than Karn in here because of how hard it is to field and protect a 7-drop, and because Jace (hopefully) replaces himself with the first activation.

The rest of the bones are basically the same, with some tweaks on concentration.

I positively love the theme in here, especially for a budget, but I see a couple big problems.

You are going to be miles behind on tempo because of the land situation. 12 of your lands come in tapped no matter what, and 4 that come in conditionally untapped (with semi- hard conditions to fulfill in this build), so in most games you will be a turn behind in development which is absolute death for control.

There are also some, in my opinion, weak slots going to things you either don't need or have better alternatives.
Farseek isn't necessary, as you're running 25 lands, 4 opts, and 4 growth spirals. If you don't have the white or blue mana you need while having 2 lands out to play farseek, its your destiny to lose that game. On top of that, you can't count on it as there are only 2 copies, and 1 extra land won't speed you into ulamog quickly enough to justify the spot or trigger tracker enough to justify the spot.
I like mainboarded negates over mana leak. You have 7 mainboarded direct critter hate (including 3 nukes), 5 flexible critter or non-critter hate, and only 5 conditional counters for non-critters, so negate would go a long way to keeping the balance.
Kiora looks weak in here to me, as the win condition is fantastic once activated, but takes a decent amount of time to get to, and she is weak on loyalty anyway so any interference means the win condition won't connect. Plus, you don't want to field it turn 4 as you can't protect it or respond during the next turn, so you will be better off running something more proactive.

Just my thoughts, not trying to put the deck down.

I like remand, as it retains tempo, give you a solid turn 2 after you field your delver or 1-drop tactic sorceries, feeds the delve, and retains material. It also works fantastically with the discard you are using, as you can retain tempo and material, then make them discard it if its threat enough.

You can get away with running a lot fewer creatures in here. You only need 1 on the field (as they are all buff), and you need a lot of material to protect them, so I would advise trimming the critter count and upping the control instants.

The more I look at and play this deck, the less I like it. I think it's built on a flawed concept, as it takes a considerable amount of mana to field talrand and support him simultaneously, and the normal way you would do this is with counter spells/effects, which work poorly in EDH in terms of general card advantage. They stop specific threats, and buy you time to build up drakes, but as you are playing against 2-3 opponents your 1 for 1 counterspells make you run out of material much more quickly than opponents. Granted, this is a general problem of mono-blue in EDH, but I think there are much better mono-blue commanders that have less temperamental conditions.

Its around 3 bucks a pop today, but I get ya.

I guess what I'm getting at is that if you're going to play casual, your best move is to take advantage of as much of the ridiculous tempo boosts non-tournament legal cards give you, the biggest of which is the ability to accelerate mana development and ramp into heavy hitting spells much more quickly than possible in a regular format.

If we are going casual I would suggest going 4X sol ring, cutting back on the lands to 21, and working in effects like plow under