Leonin Lightbringer

A 3/2 that wants a weapon in its hand, and a Ward tax positioned to protect precisely the play the equip clause enables. The +1/+1 while equipped is a small conditional buff, but the strategic weight sits in what happens next: an opponent looking at an armed attacker wants to shoot the creature before combat and strand the Equipment, and Ward makes that removal cost more than it should. Tax the answer, keep the weapon attached, and the investment stays on the board. The card defends the tempo swing of equipping rather than the body itself, which is why the Ward reads as modest until you factor in that you have already spent a card and an equip cost to make this thing threatening. Without a weapon it is a fragile beater whose two toughness folds to almost any burn; the design assumes you will pay to change that, and prices the protection around that assumption. It sits in the long white line of Rebels and weapon-carriers built to be efficient only after you have committed extra resources to gear them up, the kind of creature that offers little the moment it arrives and earns its slot a couple of turns later, once the sword is on and the removal that could have answered it now costs two more than the caster wants to pay.