mtg loxodon cards Altered Art you may have your life total become the total toughness of creatures you control MTGNexus - Mago, Loxodon Smuggler

You don't need to cycle the Alliance as it is a decent enough removal spell in the late game against the slower decks

Wakeing Suns Avatar: In the worst case, you wipe the battlefield and have a 7/7

So what counts as card advantage, and why is it important

The Grave-Troll could have been a 0/0 and it would have seen just as much play Golgari Grave-Troll and other Dredge creatures being used to fuel a dedicated Dredge strategy was first proposed by John Rizzo, who envisioned using a critical mass of Dredge cards to allow him to quickly cycle through his deck and finding Ichorids

Regrowth allowed you to reuse your restricted cards a little too easily (only got unrestricted recently, 2013!) There had also been a new set released in the meantime: Antiquities