Burn was arguably the 4th best deck of the era, (I ran it myself) and used cards like Firebolt, Fiery Temper, #3 below, and Violent Eruption to win
The ability to get rid of your own creatures at instant speed can be quite useful against cards like [casthaven]Batterskull[/casthaven], [casthaven]Griselbrand[/casthaven], or [casthaven]Umezawas Jitte[/casthaven], as you can keep them from dealing damage in combat by removing the creature theyre blocking or being blocked by
playability and character still matter
You cant forget Royal Assassin, a repeatable removal outlet that punishes activating abilities or going to combat
In Commander, an eternal format where every card (sans banned and illegal cards) is legal, deck expression is at its highest
Then there's The Endstone (sounds ominous, right?)