Grefter / NotMiki: You are correct on the rules from the beginning to Tempest / 6th edition. After that, they expanded the "damage prevention step" from being restricted to "prevent damage" to "do whatever," hence all the saccing of things that were shortly on their way to the graveyard. And now it's changing back.
One interesting note on the old rules is that damage only killed stuff when the stack was empty. So damage-based removal in response to defensive buffs wasn't as good; A lightning bolt in response to a Giant Growth doesn't help because the 3 damage just sits there, the Giant Growth happens, and the game only checks for death once everything's been resolved. They changed that in 6th edition, and this is unchanged with the new new rules, so zapping in response to pump is effective.
kokushin: Having more than 60 cards is almost always a handicap, but it's a failrly minor one, so 61 and 62-card lists are generally fine. Jace vs. Chandra is pretty cool indeed, though the games I've played with it tend to feel a bit like "does mana work out for Jace y/n." Still a lot of fun, and much better balanced than Angels vs. Demons (Angels are much better, but Demons have 2-mega-bombs and ways to tutor for them, so it comes down to "could the Demons player find a super bomb" assuming mana is good on both sides.)
metroid: Eh, yes, in straight-combat, toughness boosting is now better. You can use that to save "later" troops by toughness-boosting the first target of the attacker. They'll be forced to pile all the damage on the toughness-boosted creature. Doesn't change the fact that damage prevention is much, much worse (though Harm's Way is clearly a major power-up for damage prevention, which will be needed.), and more generally tricks are still completely owned by removal - that toughness pump still won't help in response to Terror or Lightning Bolt or whatever.
The first strike example is... not quite right. You should only lose 3 tokens under the old rules, and you only need 4 total - block, let the attacker put first strike damage on the stack. Then Giant Growth a token that had 1 damage assigned. It'll survive and kill the 4/4 once normal damage rolls around (and 3 tokens die). Of course, examples of tricky stack usage are exactly why they're changing the rules, I suppose.
