Sure, Populate was fine in Standard - this article from 2013 is a nice snapshot of the kinds of things I was doing with Voice of Resurgence at the time, and Ryan did a lot of work with the build
Land Enchantment - Saga Urza's Land (CTRL to add secondary) Landfall Valakut Exploration Landfall Whenever a land you control enters, exile the top card of your library
For Unchained, this was the destruction of their own cards, something card design has gone out of its way to stop you from doing to yourself after learning the lessons of interacting with your own board via bounces and pops (such as Brionac, or Heavy Storm ) the hard way over and over and over
In addition, he is a great Ally support card as it gives Allies we control Menace and Prowess
That is, he changes states based on external criteria but there are a large number of iterations