Is there a site out there that lists all the abilities skills give? I hate levelling blind, and I've only found sources for a couple of skills on my own. Lusternia's site advertises a LusterniaWiki, but no such beast seems to exist. Any advice or lovely, lovely links?

Yeah, the LusterniWiki went down. There are a few lists scattered about the forums, maybe try the Search command.

Ask your guild, pretty often they have guildhelp files listing abilities, at least from guildskills.

It's generally taboo to post publicly a list of guildskills so you're probably better of asking in private. Most people would be happy to tell you about the common skills (non-guildskills) and a few people hoard personal lists of guildskills to themselves and if you ask reeeally nicely they might give them to you.

What is the deal with not posting skill lists?
If this game had a manual, they would likely print them.

I don't like wasting time, let alone lessons on skills only to learn I wasted my valuable few lessons on a worthless ability.

If I read things right, you also lose a percentage of your lessons if you make some bigger changes.

Could someone enlighten me on why it is taboo to let the public know what abilities each archtype possess?

Sorry for the rant

The mystery!

Someone please think of the mystery!

If you want to learn about which skills are likely to prove worthwhile, there is a very, very simple way of doing so.

Find someone in your guild who does what you would like to (prospective fighters should probably speak with the Champion, and so on), and ask their opinion. Most of the people you ask will be only too happy to help out.

No, it wouldn't. Har. Estarra and Roark even removed Achaea's AB flaw. I believe Estarra once made it clear she wouldn't want them posted publicly. Maybe I'm wrong.

The Merchant's Guild help index contains all the basic AB's of all the trades, but no one that I know of has really posted the full guild skills or something somewhere. Most of us would be glad to tell you about common skills, your guild will tell you about guildskills, but its considered taboo to have them all posted somewhere (*sniffle* my poor out of date then-complete database of skills from beta, RIP).

I am just curious as to the reason why they don't want them posted?

They give up weapon stats, race stats, etc...why no skill list?

I am not upset about it, so please don't flame me LOL.
I guess I am just confused on the reasoning behind it all.

There are quite a few reasons, ranging from copyright, to allowing the Guilds some secrecy, if they wish it, as to what they can do.

Not much secrecy with the oodles and oodles of alternate characters and wannabe spies.

Most of whom are not trans anything, however.

If you play for any amount of time, visit the forums a bit, and pay attention, you pretty much find everything you need to know out anyway. Or it seems that way at least.

Besides, just posting the list of skills takes making and developing a character more of a powergamer thing than a roleplay thing. I personally prefer not to have the whole list..I'll find out from talking to guildmates, to fellow city members, etc. Lots more fun that way anyway.

It'd be pointless, that's why. If you spend lessons on a skill and end up getting a relatively useless one (actually, i don't think any skills are useless, only less obvious), then you're one step closer in getting a more useful one later down the line. Nothing wasted.

Not posting skill lists is one of the many little things that make it hard for new players. Now, while I agree there are some good reasons for not publishing EVERY skill, I think that it is unfortunate this 'ban' is applied to all skills.

People above have said about creating alts and finding out skills, or have had secondary characters here (or are used to similar skills in other IRE games) and are familar with the skillsets and how they work. However, a new player will not, and making it unnecessarily hard to find out about skills is just one of the frustrating things that helps promote the perception of elitism in these games.

I'm not suggesting that guild skills be posted - but just the common skills. And only to to about Master level.

This gives a new player a level of common knowledge with the more established players, without giving away guild secrets.

I think allowing players to make informed choices about which skills to chose for their character can promote role-play, in that it allows the player to establish a role-play direction for their character.