Scion of the Swarm

Lifegain payoffs usually scale their reward to the trigger's size: gain a lot, get a lot. This one flattens that curve entirely. Every instance of lifegain, however small and from whatever source, is worth exactly one counter, which quietly changes what kind of lifegain you want. A single trickle from a tapland is as good as a fat drain, so the deckbuilding pressure shifts toward frequency over magnitude: many small gains beat one large one. That flattening is the design's central move. The trigger fires on any lifegain event, not just combat or spell-based gain, which turns incidental life totals into a growth engine and rewards playing the widest possible set of gain sources rather than the biggest. Because it flies, it converts accumulated size into a clock that ground blockers cannot touch, so the counters are not just insurance against a sweeper; they are the win condition itself, on a creature the opponent has to answer through the air. The catch is the same as any single-permanent engine: everything rides on one 3/3 body, and if it dies the accrued value evaporates with it. But while it sticks, it rewards a build that treats gaining life as something to trigger often, not a cushion to hoard.