Pacesetter Paragon

Exhaust reframes the familiar aggro pump into a one-shot decision: the ability can be activated only once, so all of its pressure lives inside that single window. The math is front-loaded and steep. Pay the activation on top of the you already spent casting the body, and the 2/3 climbs to a 3/4 with double strike for the turn, six mana total for one guaranteed alpha-strike beat. That cost is terminal, though. There is no repeatable engine, no threat of a second pump to bluff around; once activated, the counter and the double strike are cashed, and what stays behind is a permanent 3/4 that will never be dangerous again. That finality is precisely what balances a rate that would break if it recurred. Spend it too early and you hold a mediocre body until the game ends; hold it too long and the six mana never comes free. The wrinkle worth playing around is that the counter and the double strike arrive together: because double strike deals damage in two separate combat steps, the boosted 3 power lands twice, so a clean, unblocked swing rewards the commitment far more than a chumped one. Two answers, no take-backs: hold the mana and the threat as a live bluff, or convert both into damage now, knowing that once the ability is spent, exhaust will not offer it a second time.