Recently I have been having some discussion with fellow cube enthusiasts and it turns out that we feel a little under catered for by the good folk at Wizards
Offering two bodies and a mana sink for three mana is solid, but what puts Minsc over is that the X ability can be used as a sacrifice outlet but paying zero
First, you start with either the normal or an alternative cost
(The copy becomes a token.) A resolving copy of a permanent spell becomes a token, so the token isn't "created." Effects that care about a token being created won't interact with a token that enters the battlefield from Archmage of Echoes's ability
Its a nice change of pace
Originally, we had planned the Planeswalker focus with Future Sight (as detailed in Mark Rosewater's 2007 column here), and now that Planeswalkers had become a reality, we knew we needed to do star building for our Planeswalkers