If everything in this game was based purely on numbers, then this would be a dull game. Yes; please rush your Beastmaster into my face so that I can stun him, dispell his STR bonus, and then beat him to a pulp.

This is a game of counters upon counters. Bear Strength is no less counter-able than any other enchantment in the game. Enjoy spending your whole full action to run across the board only for me to spend a few mana to push you backward, then shoot you down with Archers. It's a game of checks and balances.

IMO, in no way, is Bear Strength "busted" any more than, say, highland unicorn, which isn't busted at all.

-nihil

i plsyed against a priestess build and for some reason i couldnt finish her off.  she had 4 heals and 6 minor heals.  i was hitting her with everything i had.  she had over 40 life by the end of the game and ended up squeeking out a win

IMO the priestess build wasn't very well-rounded, because in all my games I've never needed that much healing by merit of doing other, more important things, like generating creatures, throwing attacks, and enchanting the battleground. The best defense is a good offense they say...

Notice I didn't call the other priestess build bad. It won. It's probably a perfectly good build. I said it wasn't well-rounded. Dedicating that much of a spellbook to healing seems, to me, counter-productive, when those points could be dedicated to something more proactive.

-nihil

Quick Solution:

Simply publish the PDF's that you sent to the printers online. It doesn't need to be wrought with functionality...just PDF's of the cards. It would give people a visual spoiler.

Then you can take your time to really work on a visual online deckbuilder. I'd get in touch with cardgamedb.com and see what steps need to be taken to register and have the deckbuilder through them, as they are:
a) already well-known and recognized in the gaming community
b) already have a very stable platform for the database.

-nihil

I thought that was what Decoys were for! :-P

-nihil

I like the school option. I don't think a singles is necessary. As the game grows in popularity, there is sure to be a secondary market crop up (I've already ordered and received from one site that seems to be going this direction). Secondary markets are good for games because those dealers often buy a lot of product to fill their stores. I would think that selling singles directly from the developer would kill any chance of a secondary market, which is, IMO, not good for the game, overall.

Having the mage books is not a good idea, IMO, because that forces players into situations where they are getting what the Dev team thinks should be in a Mage's spellbook, and not as open to interpretation as other options.

My two cents...

-nihil

Priestess Advice:

It really depends on how you've built your spellbook, and how aggressive a player your opponent is.

Example: Against a slower opponent who tries to build an attack base over 2-3 turns before moving in, I like to prioritize Temples, Mana, and an Archer or two. The Temple of Asyra and a Mana Crystal or Flower, or a Temple of Asyra and an Amulet to start the mana flowing. The Priestess doesn't have a lot of options for cheap characters, but a Temple and a Cleric is also a decent opening play.

Temple + Cleric = spawnpoint and a character turn 1.
Turn 2 you have 15 mana, so you can put down an Archer and give him a nice enchantment (Hawkeye is a good one to have on the Archer for obvious reasons), and use the Cleric to put mana on the Temple.
Turn 3 you have enough mana to put down a 2nd archer between your base mana supply and the 2 mana on the Temple.
That's an option that gives you decent board control with the Archers. It does, however, require a few turns of freedom from the opponent, which a Wizard may or may not give you, depending on the build.

If you think the Wizard is going to be highly aggressive, I might start with a Temple and hold a Pillar of Light in case the Wizard jumps over in your face, giving you a chance to stun or daze him while still getting your spawn point into play. If he doesn't jump into your face you've got 20 mana in the bank for turn two, so I'd again grab a pillar of light, and maybe put down a block or perhaps a Dawnstar Ring to increase the Pillar's effectiveness. Reverse Magic if you have it in your spellbook is a really solid play against the Wizard.

-nihil

Saying "you'd have to be careful for counters like Reverse Attack and Block..." is akin to saying "you should know what cards exist in this game." It applies to all instances of 1 mage targeting another mage.

If someone wants to spend magic to dissolve the wand then they aren't dissolving something else, which is fine by me. Dispel Hawkeye? It just weakens the effect of the spell. If my opponent wastes a Dispel on Hawkeye I've probably already won, since the Priestess lives and breathes powerful enchantments that make for much better targets.

Basically: If the opponent actually takes time out of his or her turn to try and mess with this then he or she is a bad player, because I should be playing much more antagonizing things than this in any given turn. This combination does not warrant attention from the opposing spellbook, and, if given, you are winning in another way. This combination is crowd control, because it's exactly the kind of thing a good player will not waste resources on trying to interrupt, and yet it gains you something in the game for a very small cost/setup time.

-nihil

EDIT: Upon re-reading this I think it looks kinda jerkish. I apologize, as that was not my intent. I'm not certain how to re-word it so as to not sound that way, though, so I am leaving the original message text intact. Just wanted to say that I'm not a jerk, and wasn't trying to be one. My basic premise above is that, yes, there are counters to just nearly everything in this game, but as far as pure theorycrafting goes, there are much more tantalizing targets for such counters than this particular combination of cards, which is exactly what makes it a good combination of cards, since this combination does not make a strategy, and can be cheaply included in any priestess spellbook as a simple little annoyance for the opponent that will likely stick around in the long game.