Razorfoot Griffin

First strike on a flier is the wrinkle worth dwelling on, because it changes who wins an air battle without changing the size of the body. A 2/2 with flying trades evenly with most early evasive creatures; staple first strike onto it and the same body kills its mirror without dying and beats the 2/2 fliers across the air, dealing its damage in the first-strike step before they can hit back. The keyword is doing combat math, not deckbuilding work: it converts an unremarkable air-defense body into one that holds the skies against creatures its own size. It does not turn the 2/2 into something it isn't; against a 3/3 the first-strike damage still falls short, and the 3/3's three damage kills it in the regular step. That ceiling is the point. This is the most conservative way a designer can hand a defensive flier some teeth, and the Griffin type keeps drawing the assignment because patrolling the air is its whole reason for existing; first strike lets a small one do that job credibly without inflating it into a threat. The body's price is no bargain, deliberately taxed so a creature this resilient in the air does not run away with an early-game board. The lesson sits underneath the cost: first strike and flying compound, and a creature you can read in two seconds demonstrates it more cleanly than a flashier card would.