Also, certain card effects happen at the start of turn if applicable
In addition to this, a big part of the reason these cards were so popular was because the mana in that Standard format was quite bad, to the extent that you were pretty close to wanting Attune with Aether in your decks even before the energy bonus, but once you have the energy bonus you might as well play Harnessed Lightning, which means you may as well play Rogue Refiner to power up your kill spell, and so on
Paying 2 life has never been a significant cost in the history of Phyrexian mana, so this is a premium situational counterspell
These feature amazing concept art and the classic borderless treatment
This one is perhaps my favorite ridiculous bomb finisher that has ever been printed for white
Then Time Spiral was released, and in it