Fireglass Mentor's ability cares whether an opponent lost life this turn, not how their life total changed
There are quite a few ways to get crafty and keep your tokens, too
Tolarian Academy is arguably more powerful, producing one blue mana for each artifact you control, which are easier to generate and harder to kill
The artifact decks were often the best at this, because they brought out their mana so fast that they could shrug off losing two lands while they crippled their opponent's development, and decks with green mana creatures like Birds of Paradise often used the same plan
I'm expecting a creature-heavy deck list and spells all built around doing damage or buffing creature power
The halfling can threaten to end games fairly early with plenty of Ring-tempting options in black and white, and nearly all of them cost four or less