I think this is the best use so far of victory counters, since it gives a defender deck a way to win.

Not unless you've got Rage Nimbus or something. Otherwise the opponent just won't attack if you've got enough defenders to push you over the magic number 10.

The intent is to have something of that sort as well as something like Luminarch Ascension that rewards victory counters for not being damaged: Immé's Challenge.

­True-Name Tactician is a pretty good solution to that need, I'll give you that.

Thank you. Right now there's that, Immé's Challenge, and possibly Scepter of the Wild which are intended to either enable this or work well with it.

I hope there'll be more than just that. Only three cards in a deck to make your two-drop not worse than Yoked Ox isn't great. Only three in the whole cube is much worse.

Of course, if there are also a bunch of one-off victory counter gainers, the equivalent of Pistus Strike, then the opponent won't know quite when to stop attacking onto this, making it much better.

I was always queezy about cards like Pistus Strike. Seemed too... simple? Obvious? If you had to work for it, it wouldn't bother me as much. Something like:

­
Instant
Target creature gets +4/+1 until end of turn. At the end of your turn, if that creature is on the battlefield, gain a victory counter.

Or something to that effect. You get the idea. The counter isn't guaranteed, and you're encouraged to work for it (though, this version technically doesn't. You could just play it on a clear board I suppose. Meh.)

The idea is to mostly avoid victory counters on nonpermanents because I don't feel like they're something that wants an element of surprise. I could be wrong, though. As of writing this, he only nonpermanent that grants victory counters is Winning Argument, which gives the opponent a choice.