Matsu-Tribe Decoy

Pay the mana and you nominate which of the opponent's creatures has to throw itself in front of this 1/3 Snake. That single declaration is the whole control scheme: a lure that doesn't just bait a block but conscripts a specific defender, then taxes it. Force a small creature in and the trade is lopsided in your favor; force a large one in and the freeze trigger does the real work regardless of who survives. Combat damage is simultaneous, so a big enough blocker kills the Decoy outright, but the Snake's one point lands in that same instant, putting the tap-and-freeze trigger on the stack even as it dies. The nominated creature taps, and it skips its next untap step no matter the outcome. A fatal exchange strands the defender for a full turn cycle; a non-fatal one (toughness 3 absorbs most early bodies) leaves the Decoy alive to point again next combat. The trigger reads "tap that creature," which matters: a vigilant blocker that came in untapped gets tapped down by the freeze anyway and stays tapped, so vigilance buys no immunity here. This is a tempo piece wearing a fighter's frame, caring less about killing than about dictating where the defense must stand and pinning it there afterward. The honesty is in the activation cost: the lure asks for mana every single time you want to aim it, so the engine runs only as fast as your green mana allows.