Sorry in advance for the long response.
Why would my response be sarcastic?
Sorry if I misread your response; I wasn't entirely certain if it was sarcastic, or if you really didn't see any synergy between those examples. Granted, I probably should have mentioned that I wasn't referring to direct interactions with the abilities, but how they help the Mage type as a whole.
Curseweaving helps the Warlock avoid running out of curses (since they are his bread and butter), and Bloodreaper allows the Warlock to heal every turn, so long as he is being aggressive (and his pet stays alive). Both abilities allow the Warlock to stay in the game for a moderate amount of time while his curses wear down the enemy mage.
Arcane Zap and the Voltaric Shield both allow the Wizard to avoid damage at the expense of mana. Arcane Zap gives him a default range advantage (making him less likely to be attacked), and Voltaric Shield lets him absorb one small hit every round (assuming that you've activated it). These help give the Wizard enough time to disable enemy creatures, starve the opponent of mana, or set up a base.
The Priestess' cleanse and life-gain abilities create an advantage for her the longer the game goes on. Cleansing a single condition (such as rot) is enough to save even the biggest creature's life, given enough time. The life-gain, when combined with the holy school's numerous healing options, allows the priestess to become the hardest mage to kill (again, given enough time).
You can't use both her Ranged +1 and Fast at the same time, but you can build your strategy so that you will get to benefit from one or the other turn to turn depending on what your opponent is doing. If your opponent fights your creatures, you can remain at range 2 and attack with your bow repeatedly. If they chase you, you can use Mongoose Agility, Tanglevine, and Teleport to stay away from your opponent while your animals maul them, and use other ranged options to harass them. Acid Ball, Surging Wave, Hurl Boulder, and curses come to mind.
While the Johktari Beastmaster doesn't start with Elusive, having innate Fast makes Mongoose Agility a much stronger card for her than for a Straywood Beastmaster doing essentially the same thing.
While the Straywood Beastmaster can try to kite, Enfeeble is much more crippling if you don't play Cheetah Speed, you're more vulnerable to Destroy Magic, Purge Magic, Dispel, and Arcane Corruption if you rely on Cheetah Speed, it requires more setup (this is the real reason I don't think it works as well), and you're not able to punish your opponent for fighting your creatures as well.
The thing is, any mage (or regular creature) can move 2 spaces by default. The only benefit of being fast (other than being more resistant to enfeeble, as you mentioned) is that you can attack after moving those 2 spaces. Since (as we've established) no bow will allow you to attack after moving at all, the only 2 ways the Johktari can possibly take advantage of both her fast and ranged +1 traits in the same game are to keep switching weapons (which wastes mana and actions), or to deliberately move into an enemy's zone at the end of her turn and use her basic melee attack (which is counter-productive in almost every situation).
In addition, although I'm sure this varies by playing community, none of the opponents I have ever faced have focused on my creatures instead of my mage. There might be occasional threats that they divert their attention towards temporarily (Shaggoth-Zora, Iron Golem, Hydra, etc.), but they will still almost always keep pressure on my mage as well.
Let's say that the enemy does decide to chase you with 2 fairly threatening, melee only, non-slow creatures. For the sake of simplicity, let's also say that neither player can play any movement spells (teleport, tanglevine, etc.). How can the Beastmaster respond (with the bow, not out-of-school attack spells)? She can run away without firing her bow until the 2 creatures inevitably corner her. She can stand still, fire her bow once, and then stand her ground (which won't allow her to use her bow anymore) while allowing the enemy creatures to take full-action attacks against her. Or she can fire her bow once, and then futilely attempt to outrun the creatures while not being able to attack them, while she in turn suffers quick-attacks from them every turn.
It might seem like I'm being overly harsh against the Johktari Beastmaster, but she simply isn't well put-together. She absolutely needs elusive in order to function properly, and even that won't allow her to make good use of her bow. No other mage needs a single card as badly as she does. A Forcemaster can function just fine without her Forcefield, and a Warlock doesn't necessarily need Lash of Hellfire or Sectarus to win.
And bows do have an offsetting advantage over one handed weapons. They let you kill things without getting killed back, and let you exert force on a larger section of the board. Without spending additional mana. Wands cost you mana repeatedly to use. I don't particularly relish getting in a slugging match with Iron Golems, and a bow allows me to pressure my opponent without doing that. Whether that's enough of an advantage is up for debate, but you shouldn't discount it.
Besides, you should consider playing Hawkeye on the Johktari Beastmaster anyway, so you're still ahead on damage with a bow playing Johktari over Straywood.
I might have been a bit hasty in saying that bows don't have any advantages. What I should have said was that they most definitely are not worth it in the vast majority of circumstances. They are simply too limited. Wands are infinitely more flexible, can target things within the same zone as you (usually), and allow for both positioning and an attack on the same turn. Attack spells usually also deal more damage or have better effects than bows. From personal experience, wands are my biggest dissolve targets. But I have never, not even once, bothered to dissolve a bow.
Hawkeye will give the Johktari Beastmaster an advantage over the Straywood one. However, for reasons that have yet to be explained to me, Hawkeye only gives +1 die while Bear Strength gives +2 (for 2 more mana). So once again, melee weapons beat out bows.
