It pairs perfectly with cheap artifacts like Ornithopter and Mishra's Bauble, making it a natural fit for any token-fueled Affinity strategy that wants to snowball board presence
Slaughter is a perfect card to pop in the deck too it not only delivers some really targeted removal but also triggers Yshtolas damage-dealing ability thanks to its mana-cost and allows you to draw a card when you decide to buy it back for 4 life
(The copy becomes a token.) A resolving copy of a permanent spell becomes a token, so the token isn't "created." Effects that care about a token being created won't interact with a token that enters the battlefield from Mendicant Core's last ability
That led to it becoming a staple in many popular decks thanks to the ultra-powerful Badgermole Cub from the Avatar: The Last Airbender set, which doubles its mana output
cards, so do not mix those two up
It even has a somewhat clunky win condition, paying and sacrificing to provide a buff