The Balrog, Durin's Bane

The discount is the whole engine, and it reframes what looks like an overcosted seven-drop into a payoff for a board that was already dying. Each permanent thrown away before casting shaves the price, so the demon rewards a deck that has spent its turn converting tokens, dorks, and spent permanents into pressure: the more the battlefield has crumbled, the sooner the shadow-and-flame arrives. Haste means the reduced cost buys immediate damage rather than a turn of exposure, and the evasion clause is a genuinely unusual restriction rather than raw keyword soup: only legendary creatures can block it, a condition most boards simply cannot meet, which turns a 7/5 into a near-unblockable clock the moment it lands. The death trigger closes the loop on the sacrifice theme by making removal a poor answer; kill the Balrog and it takes an artifact or creature with it, so the aggressor rarely comes out behind on the exchange. What makes the design coherent is that every line points the same direction: sacrifice to deploy it, swing unimpeded, and punish anyone who trades. Black-red aristocrats finishers have long asked you to spend a board to build a threat, but the unblockable-except-by-legends wrinkle and the guaranteed parting shot give this one a shape those older payoffs never quite had.