It taxes your opponents whenever they try to cast spells or use abilities that target your merfolk, forcing them to pay extra mana
Heliod Sun-Crowned and Walking Ballista Walking Ballista was already an extremely powerful card, but its power level went off the charts when Heliod Sun-Crowned was printed
Good night
Legendary Creature - Wizard Otter Commander (CTRL to add secondary) Burn Burn (CTRL to add secondary) Copy Kitsa, Otterball Elite Vigilance Prowess (Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, this creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.) : Draw a card, then discard a card
In fact, Magic designers often grade other mechanics according to what they call The Storm Scale: how powerful is the mechanic on a scale of 1 to storm
Maybe the connection is a creature type, or the cards play well together, or they have some story element in common