So, I'm looking for a little advice as to what I should be dumping my lessons into. At the moment I'm mainly focusing on bashing, since I'm building my own system as I go and there's little point putting effort into the offensive side of it without transing at least two of my guild skills. In the meantime, then, I'm wondering which will provide more of a payoff when bashing - psymet or ninjakari? I've only just gotten Ironskin in psymet, which has proved useful (and if I'm reading the AB file properly, will become moreso as my skill increases), but if I understand correctly, pumping more lessons into ninjakari will increase accuracy/damage/speed (I'm ~80% expert). Any advice as to which I should focus on transing first?

I'm not a monk, but I've heard from a few people here on the forums that your monk primary ability has no effect on bashing accuracy, etc. It's absolutely necessary if you want to PvP, but for pure bashing psycho will give you more defensive bang for your buck. Maybe get up to EnergyContainment and then swap back to raising Ninjakari.

I don't think skill really has any bearing on damage whatsoever, unless it's a magic skill (mage staff, guardian symbol, and so on) and you have skill ranks in connected lessonpools. Honestly, if you are mostly bashing, your best best is to put lessons into planar until you trans it (conglute) then work on resilience.

Not wanting to derail this, but I was curious as I've never gotten into influencing, what is some of the best race/class combinations for influencing? What sort of things would I look for when making a character focused towards influencing for EXP, and what would I want to train the skill to, etc etc?

Right now, I believe elfen spiritsinger is your best bet. Highmagic for netzach, get some gold together and buy a throne maybe.

No! Shadowsinger harbingers are better than elfen SS for charisma! true fact!

I ended up going with psymet, and it did make quite a big difference. Regeneration is awesome, and energycontainment coupled with ironskin, biofeedback and psiarmour mean I can actually bash in shallamurine now (as an Illithoid, that lvl 2 magic weakness was previously hurting bad). Kind of wondering what the use for shift is. Similar to evade/tumble, but with the added bonus of going through wooden doors as well?

It's an RP skill, really. It just goes through wooden doors and walls.

Anything with high charisma will gain stupid amounts of xp as an influencer. Faeling, tae'dae, etc.

Really? Awesome! ...except now I'm going to go mad finding an opportunity to use it.

With Bardic presence, Moonchilde, Netzach, Karma Blessing Beauty, and Domoth Beauty thingie my Elfen Spiritsinger doesn't need a throne as my charisma is boosted +5 already, to 21 (22 now as Titan). Don't always have the Domoth boost of course, but can't justify a manse+throne for sometimes wanting an extra +1 charisma.

I think Zallafar has answered this above, but aside from what he said, wild elfens have a higher con than shadowsinger faelings, although the harbs are faster, either way, I think both races are good!



Experience earned from influencing does not deserve to be called 'stupid', influencers have to be very, very, very patient especially those who are in circle 80++. Charisma does not determine how much experience you earn from influencing, but having high charisma does help in decreasing the number of 'attacks' or turns you do to win the ego battle, and from what I've experienced, experience earned from influencing is more or less equal to what you earn from bashing.

At lvl 83, influencing archons is slow (.05% per). And as a Kephera with only 13 charisma, my system doesn't react fast enough and I often get "questioned" by the mob

Back to the original topic though, bloodboil in psymet is nice for hunting. I usually lock psiarmor, bloodboil, and regeneration now.

.05% at 83+ is good stuff, like you said, it's just the low charisma that hurts you.
Then again... influencing as a male kephera tahtetso?! Really now?
You should be beating the living out of stuff. Illithoids, UV tunnels, Catacombs, Shallamurine, Bubbles.

I also run into problems with the guards "lecturing" me, although like Zallafar, I can ramp my CHA up a bit (often from 11 to 13, 14 or 15 with blessings, 16 if Nejii cult-rites). I'm sure it's slower than bashing, especially in a group; However, that's really the trade-off- if you get people to go with you, the XP only ramps up; if you're on your own, influencing's probably the next best bet.

Yeah...Kephera Tahtetso is ridiculously good for bashing, not influencing.

I locked bloodboil and regen, kept super open so I could suspendedanimation if things got bad.

Regeneration is very nice, as is energycontainment. Out of interest, is it worth using bonedensity at all? Currently I'm bashing with all three channels locked for psiarmour, biofeedback magic (necessary due to the lvl 2 magic weakness as an illithoid - shallamurine is *very* dangerous otherwise) and regeneration, but I could probably swap out biofeedback if I were hunting somewhere with breakages (grey moors or nagas, for example). Since I generally hunt with gold as a priority over xp, less breakages = higher profits.

Further question (and yeah, this thread has now been derailed about eighty times): does doublepain work with physical attacks with a weapon, or does it have to be actual touching (i.e. punch/kick)?

That's your choice. 50% chance to avoid a break.

And yes, it does. Not worth the locked channel, though. No damage increase and I think it is like... 7-10 extra wounds per a hit.

Furrikin are decent influencers as well. If Ackleberry ever gets released, the Furrikini bards will be able to conquer the world of Influencing, I think (I kid, Shadowsingers stomp everything flat.) But really, the faster EQ helps. Unless I'm really just being jerked around between when I was Tae'Dae influencing and Furrikin influencing I felt a difference betwen victory and mobs crushing my pitiful ego beneath their feet.