Gaining you 2 life every single turn regardless of the zone its in offers incredible consistency for your lifegain triggers, turning your otherwise mid-tier value creatures into powerhouses
Anti-Venom gets stronger the more damage it takes, so with Entangler on it, it can block an unlimited number of creatures and turn all that damage into +1/+1 counters
It has a secondary path of using Erratic Portal, Lava Zombie, and possibly even Palace Siege to get multiple uses out of creatures with good enters-the-battlefield effects, from goad as well as other kinds, most notably Kardur, Doomscourge
In the first of the two set six decks, we see the combination of Ruby and Amber and many classic characters reimagined as swashbuckling, sword-slinging pirates
For example, Blood Moon changes Dryad Arbor into a Mountain