Most of them help the deck ramp mana, pay you off for having lands of a specific type, or assemble a critical mass of lands with a specific land type
White Armageddon - EX Savannah Lions - EX Blue Copy Artifact - NM Black Lich - LP Mind Twist - GD Word of Command - GD Red Raging River - GD Shivan Dragon - NM, LP, PL, Wheel of Fortune - LP Green Berserk - PL Artifact Illusionary Mask - LP Jayemdae Tome - LP Mana Vault - EX Nevinyrral's Disk - EX Arabian Nights This week brought in most of the staples from the first Magic expansion set
Have we noticed a trend here
Then theres the activation cost of paying X to move X counters
Move to faster formats like Modern and the priorities change quickly
Back then, decks weren't packed with one drops and two drops and there was no play/draw rule, so if this came out on turn one then you considered yourself lucky to get away with only six damage