Sandstorm

Green sweepers that punish attackers are a recurring design itch the color has been allowed to scratch only at the smallest scale, and this is the original experiment: instant-speed punishment for the attack step that taxes aggression rather than the board. The damage number is the entire design conversation. One point clears a Savannah Lions mirror, a Mons's Goblin Raiders rush, a swarm of tokens; it does nothing against anything with two toughness, dating the card to a time when the format-defining aggressive creatures were one-toughness by default. The structural logic is what holds up in retrospect. Green has long been allowed mass damage when the damage is small (Hurricane, Squall Line), and Sandstorm sits at the front of that lineage with the narrowest possible scope: only attackers, only one damage, only while a single green mana sits untapped. The asymmetry (your blockers untouched, their attackers swept) is the kind of color-pie carveout that later green combat tricks would broaden into the Fog family and its many variations. The card itself reads as a museum piece now, but the design slot it occupies (cheap green instant-speed punishment for going wide on the ground) has never really gone away.