The companion books adds greatly to this deck
I bought this deck last week because of the panoramic capabilities of the majors shown on the back of the box, as well as the deck review here on AT. I am a collector, mostly of decks, and have only recently begun trying to read them, which means my 40 or so decks are all opened, but vastly underused
I must say that the "story" in the companion book, however has opened up my eyes to the way that all tarot decks can be read as a continuum of events, thoughts, feelings and actions - very much like life! Reading the story of the Grail Seeker's journey in the majors, and the journey of the young Templar Novice Seeker through the minors on his way to becoming a Templar Master is a fascinating journey. This is true not only through the deck itself, but through the concepts of grail "lore", if you will.
Also, the treatment and order of the courts in the story, and even their position within the deck when you open it, and within the story itself puts a whole new spin on each card and its relationship to the other 15 within the court. This deck places the Queen first ("Lady" in this deck), followed by the King ("Master"), the Knight ("Preceptor") and finally the Page ("Brother"). Each of the ladies represent the Virgin Mary in various pivotal parts of her life, for example; and the text explains how important she is/was to the members of the Templar order. So you can consider all of the ladies in a vignette all their own, by lining up all four cards to follow Mary from her youth all the way through the birth of Jesus, to just after the Passion and finally to her ascention into Heaven. It's fascinating.
As a final note on quality, the backs of my cards are fine; clearly printed. The cutting on the majors is not perfect (some of the cards have a little more depth to the title across the bottom, so they don't all line up exactly evenly), but overall, the panoramic effect is still striking, and easy to see. The SIDES of each card still blend together seamlessly, even if some of the cards jutt UP or DOWN just a little bit when you lay them out in a row.
Overall, the image technique used by the artist for this deck makes the journey aspect of the Fool (the Grail Seeker) so much easier to get into as you explore this deck and its accompanying book. I find myself using my LEFT hand to go through the deck card-by-card, just so the images move to the back of the deck in the "proper" sequence, from beginning to end. In this deck, little things like that really matter!
All in all, it was WELL worth the $24.95 retail price I paid on a whim in a retail bookstore; and for me, that says it all!