Unlikely Alliance

A repeatable toughness pump that pointedly refuses to help the creatures doing the fighting: the activation only targets a creature that is neither attacking nor blocking, which is the entire design tension here. Instead of bolstering an alpha strike or shoring up a blocker mid-combat, the buff is reserved for the bystanders, turning it into a tax on patience rather than a combat trick. The result is closer to a defensive deterrent: a creature sitting back gets harder to burn or sweep, and the repeatable cost lets you stack toughness across a turn so long as the recipient stays out of the brawl. That restriction does all the work; without it, two mana for a repeatable +0/+2 at instant speed would be a perfectly serviceable combat enhancer, and the era it comes from was not in the business of handing out efficient repeatable pumps. As written, it favors a grindy, attrition-minded white deck that wants its noncombatants to survive everything pointed at them rather than a deck looking to win a damage race. A quiet, narrow build, the kind of small enchantment that fills out a set's white commons with a mechanic that sounds useful until the targeting clause reminds you it cannot touch the creature you actually wanted to save.