Now that the match has been declared, thought I would post the outcome. So, there were two unplanned variables that changed the nature of the game. 1) my buddy brought a Beastmaster book when I was expecting a Warlord book, and 2) he brought a friend with a wizard book asking if we could play a 3 player arena match. Fortunately, I had changed my strategy from my original posted book and went with a garden-variety druid. Lots of plant and vine creatures. Much less focus on equipment. I stayed back in a defensive position expanding my garden and doing some serious damage with plant combos. The wizard thought he was being clever by casting poison gas cloud in a zone where I had three of my strongest plant creatures. I snatched both enemy mages into that zone and held them there with all my stuck, tanglevine and snatch abilities. With regen and vampiric traits, my plants had no issue with the poison- it wound up hurting the beastmaster more than anything. When all was done and said, I made easy work of the beastmaster within an hour of play. The wizard was a little more difficult- between sapping mana, and upkeep costs, I was basically down to channeling 4 mana per turn, but by that point I had a massive garden in place. His hydra who stole my bear strength caused some problems, but in the end, the druid is just ridiculously hard to kill. I am still undecided on Togorah- though he is ultimately what rid the board of the hydra (actually they rid the board of each other).

On the flip side, I think Kralathor is my new favorite creature- holy cow that thing is crazy strong. The Beastmaster did take him out, but with the effort it took, it freed up my smaller plants to focus soley on his mage.

The wizard finally decided to call it. Druid is bad a$$ and maybe my new favorite mage! Thanks again for all the suggestions!

I do have another match scheduled for Tuesday. I plan to tweek the book a bit more and give the druid a second play.

Druid is absolutely my favorite mage.  A strategy that I find very effective is running several plant creatures - I personally prefer vine snappers and thornlashers - with an altar of the iron guard.  I normally pack one or two larger nature creatures as well.  Having a garden of guarding plants can be very aggressive and intimidating and cost effective with the vine tree! The thornlashers are obviously used to pull the enemy creatures closer to you or away from you while the vine snappers deal the heavy dice damage. Plus your plants regenerate so if you pack a few brace yourselves you are increasing their staying power and effectiveness. I like to include five tanglevines because they are such a great spells- you are essentially giving your enemy something to deal with instead of pursuing his main strategy which is killing your mage. Plus if you have a guarding plant in the zone with a tanglevined creature - that creature is forced to deal with your plant and can't attack the tanglevine.  I don't think that a battle forge is necessary if you utilize the in--school enchantments such as rhino hide, brace yourself, regrowth, or bark skin as well as your treebond.  My druid likes to hide in the background until forced to attack. Another effective attack for the timid druid is burst of thorns which bypasses blocks, reverse attacks, retaliates, etc.  Its better than you would imagine. Since the druid is able to use level 1 water spells, I also find that is important to include a couple rusts and acid balls to really break the enemy down and make them easier to deal with. And then the corrosive orchid is the best way to dissolve armor and bypass nullifies.  I have been very successful utilizing this strategy and hope it was helpful. 

Thanks for the reply! What are your thoughts on the use of Togorah?

DEFENCE
regen 2 > regen when guarding
fire +2, hydro immunity < aegis 1 (although hydro immunity might get better in november  )

What happens in November?

Thank you both for the feedback!

Never played a druid before, and am actually still very new to MW Arena (my absolute new favorite game). I have a match this Saturday against a Warlord. Looking for feedback from veteran mages. Below is my list with a brief rationale for certain cards.

Equipment

Dragonscale Hauberk x1
Druid's Leaf Ring x1
Eagleclaw boots x1
Elemental Cloak x1
Elemental Wand x1
Gauntlets of Strength x1
Leather Chausses x1
Lightening Ring x1
Meditation Amulet x1
Veteran's Belt x1
Vinewhip Staff x1
Mage Wand x1

Attack Spells

Lightening Bold x1
Electrify x1 (for zone attack)

Incantations

Burst of Thorns x1
Dispel X3
Force Push x1
Force Wave x1
Minor Heal x1
Seeking Dispel x1
Rouse the Beast x2 (thought it would be fun to immediately activate by QCing after Vinetree's newly summoned creatures)
Bloodspine wall x2
Corrosive Orchid x1
Etherian Lifetree x1
Mana Flower x 1
Stranglevine x 2
Tanglevine x4
Vine Tree x 1
Battle Forge x1 (this is the one I'm undecided on. I have a lot of equipment in this list, but 6 points is a hefty cost to have it added to my book)

Enchantments

Barkskin x1
Bear Strength x2
Hawkeye x1
Harmonize x2
Nullify x2
Rhino Hide x2
Rust x2
Bull Endurnace x1
Arcane Ward x4 (initially I had Reverse Magic, but I think 4 AW's go a lot further than 1 RM).
Blur or Astral Anchor- undecided on the last 2 spell points.

Creatures

Tataree x1 logic is obvious here- keep tied to Vinetree to crank out mana
Thornslasher x2
Vine Snapper x2
Kralathor x1
Togorah x1 so this one I'm undecided on. I like that this guy has intercept and vigilant. With Etherian Lifetree boost and a few enchantments, this guy is going to be difficult to take down. My strategy for him is pure defense while my mage makes ranged attacks with a spellbound Lightening bolt (buffed) and melee attacks with a buffed vinewhip staff.

If I get into trouble I can bind minor heal to mage wand, or if I want to be thematic and have fun, thought of binding Burst of Thorns. Of course, the purpose of the AWs is to protect the equipement.

Ok, let's have a good, honest critique. Again, keep in mind, I'll be going against a textbook warlord (my buddy is also a newbie and isn't all that interested in building his own book just yet).

Quote from: Ravepig on April 06, 2016, 11:05:45 AM

Newbie question: can somebody please give an example where I would want to have an enchantment on an enchantment? I could see Nullify attached to a weapon, but Nullify indicates the target must be a corporeal creature.

arcane ward is kind of like nullify and it is non-mage object. so you can counter that dispel

Ah gotcha- that makes total sense. Thank you!

any update when SBB online will be updated with Domination and Academy cards?

So, once the forge's are set up, do you then just take every turn to move to the enemy mage/attacking enemy mage? I'm fairly new to this game so I'm still learning strategy. This book looks interesting to me because I've only played maybe ten times now and I wouldn't have ever thought to create a spell book without the use of creatures.

Also, which weapons do you typically cast first and/or find most useful with this book?