The body isn't great but it is near impossible to kill in combat, first strike scales up to be more of a resilience ability than an evasive one as it is when attacking with smaller first strike dorks
Put four copies in your deck and mulligan until you find one of them
The passive ability matters a lot, too
The first stage, which I will call "theory crafting", was when Richard Garfield developed the core concepts of the game and mostly worked by himself
They can't cast spells during your turn, and you can look at and cast spells from the top of that player's library using mana of any color - at a discount, if Gonti is in play
The fact that Conqueror can also swing for five in the air makes it much more competitive in current Magic, too, even if it is more vulnerable to removal