The Nivs are especially centric to this category, where they actually are on flavor for either representing the guilds or some Izzet mechanic that was featured, Niv being the prior leader of the guild
After all, there have been multiple Standard formats in the time period that Pioneer covers where Mono-Red has been the best deck, and suddenly all those toys get to play together
That complexity will intimidate casual players, but it suits my tastes
Bananas we gift to our opponents are noncreature tokens so we can easily poison our opponents to death if they dare use them, or at least we can prevent them from using them until we eventually destroy them
The focus on Pokemon is also evident in Sword & Shield's Trainer Gallery, where Trainers appear, but aren't named on the card
The way these charm style cards improve magic is nothing to do with reducing floods or screws but to do with their utility and how that allows you to improve your consistency