Gideon Jura

The most aggressive taunt mechanic ever stapled to a planeswalker, and the one that taught a generation of designers how to make a defensive planeswalker close games. Most early planeswalkers protected themselves by removing threats or making blockers; this one protects itself by commanding the assault, forcing an opponent's whole board to swing at it next turn while keeping the controller's life total untouched. Six starting loyalty makes that a genuine wall, not a bluff. The lethal subtlety is the interaction between the two plus-and-minus halves and the zero: the taunt leaves attackers tapped going into your turn, which is exactly what the destroy ability wants, so the same loyalty bank that survives a swing converts directly into one-for-one removal. The zero is the finisher and the reason this reads as a creature trapped in a walker's body: turning into a 6/6 that takes no damage means it can attack into anything and still be a planeswalker on the other side, shrugging off the usual planeswalker-killing strategy of just attacking it (it can swing back as an indestructible-feeling beater). It was the template for the self-defending control finisher: a card that absorbs aggression, trades down the board, and then ends the game with its own face. Later white planeswalkers borrowed pieces of this kit, but few combined the taunt, the removal, and the alpha strike in one loyalty pool this cleanly.