Seeing as there are no senior combatant-types left in the Spiritsingers, I've had a hard time figuring out how exactly a spiritsinger is supposed to kill somebody. Freeze isn't nearly effective enough to do... anything, really, as far as I can tell.

So! some strategies, and how well they've worked:

Cairnlargo Freeze, then bardoon: Not enough stun to make this work. Web beforehand helps, but not enough to kill. Same with discordantchord-bardoon.

Discordantchord-minorsixth has killed some people, but not anybody over level 80.

Flare-mesmerize until falling asleep, then web/freeze/bardoon, still isn't enough to kill somebody.

Am I going about this the wrong way? How are spiritsingers supposed to be able to kill an opponent, 1v1?

Magic arti rune, minorsecond damage kill Xiel-style.

Edit: I have no idea what this actually entails, but hey.

That'd be easier if I were something besides a 10-int loboshigaru

Bardquisition?

EDIT: And, um, reincarnate into a race that doesn't suck for bards?

Okay. Assuming that I were a wild elfen... How would I kill? Besides minorseconding to death, since I'm sure that that'll be envoyed down if it hasn't been already.

Bardquisition (aka the 5-spirits move).

Freeze? It doesn't stun for long enough to bardoon...

Super-long-stun lets you do super-bard-damage when target is unable to heal or do anything...

Even CrowCaw (with a shorter stun time) is really nasty with proper pre-prep (barbs and the like, or if you don't feel like doing that just spam minorsecond).

You need to take advantage of your opponent being unable to do anything CairnLargo is not a bad skill by any stretch of the imagination, so use it!

So you're saying freeze, damage, death, then? Am I reading that right?

Well, preparation work beforehand to help the damage stick doesn't hurt. But yeah, freeze does damage by itself along with the stun, so I don't get why you wouldn't take advantage of that.

This is the kicker right here, and it's a mindset thing. Don't think like Malarious and assume that, just because a predefined set of steps won't net you a kill, that you can't kill. Don't think like a monk/warrior and assume that smashing that damage button should eventually get you a kill. Don't even think like a druid with a fixation on maintaining one specific state. Watch your opponent, respond, and maintain control. There's no bullet point list for this (and believe me, I've tried).

If you want something specific to work on in the short term, try illusions. Illusions are a brutal complement to anyone's offense. Use them. The inevitable next question is, "What should I illusion?" Don't ask that. Illusions are situational. Illusions work differently depending on the person. The illusion you send depends on the action you need your opponent to take. Working on your awareness of your opponent's state so that you can illusion effectively is good training for affliction combat in general.

For people not incredibly chunky (which tends to be, basically, everyone but demiwarriors) you have a chance to kill one on one with a Freeze + fully prepped DiscordantChord combo. The stun on Freeze is enough to stop the health sip before you can DC and maybe even follow up with a minorsecond, but besides that, you're pretty much out of luck and depending on Bardoon.

You're putting a lot on him by saying "see what your opponent does, react" when he's new at PvP here

Two things I would suggest to try and help: illusion bardoon fairly often to throw them off, maybe with a movement-triggered illusion, before you try a real bardoon. Try similar tactics with harrow (that gives afflictions, I think?)

A different race will probably help a lot, though

I've been doing bardoon-illusions since before I had bardoon

And, uh, yeah. Illusions won't really help a bard's offense, especially the freeze-discordantchord one, will it?

You need to blanknote every third action or so to keep earwort down, or they cure out of the aurics, so illusions aren't as helpful for bards, are they?

EDIT: Also, illusioning Bardoon makes them gust you out or run, which throws off the Octave you need for discordantchord...

Nonsense. Need them off-eq another couple seconds? Try a sap, ectoplasm, or hills smudge illusion. Need them to lay off the horehound? Try ear ache or stupidity. Want to try to shut off a system? Try choke, death, conglutinate, or an arena exit message.

Is that worth more than using that balance for, say, an auric, though? I'm already using every third balance for blanknote, so I don't really see the benefit to 1 action plus an illusion... Situational, I guess, but not at all reliable.

So far, I've heard DC/Freeze/minorsixth as a strategy. Are there any other strategies? Or is that the only way to plan an attack?

Basically, illusions might be lovely, but they're worthless if there's no viable way to kill attached to them. That's what I'm looking for now, not "how can I improve my already-viable combat plan?" Because as far as I am aware, there's not really a viable combat strategy besides what Viynain has pointed out.

So, I suppose my next question, is how do you turn these illusions into a way to kill somebody?

What illusions do is turn a borderline combat plan into one that's achievable by playing off the way systems work. You're not going to kill anyone through illusions alone, but they can certainly allow you to do something otherwise near-impossible.

As Xavius said, it depends on what you want them to do. Do you want them to stick around and not run so much? Then illusion something to knock them off eq. Do you want them to not eat horehound, so they don't cure aurics? Then illusion a higher priority herb cure. Illusions are highly situational and you can't just say "weave this and they'll die".

Part of the reason why the illusions don't seem as useful to you is you're a lobo, with higher HP and the HP regen then your class will normally have. If you switch to something with more offense, you'll be glad to be able to make them spend some time on a pointless gust etc.

Your race is a problem. get something that can achieve 20 or so cha. And I don't know whats wrong with minorsecond'ing someone to death. With the long stun it should take you further along the kill than without it.

And the spiritsinger skillset was the envy of the other bard guilds (or it used to be) when it came out.

Some of the replies you got are actually very good. Even if it didn't work one time, it doesn't mean it will not another time. There is no one cookie cutter strategy that works against everybody. So you can't just dismiss something outright based on one test. Each person has their own tendencies and you need to figure out exactly what will work against them

But I think, based on your replies (i.e. its worthless, can't kill, etc.) you already have some preconceived ideas. So maybe you need to figure this out on your own. Just take a little time to be familiar with each of the skills and find out exactly how they interact and for how long.

Regarding the 'rendering them unable to do many things' tip, you can use cairlargo to set 5 spirits on a target, watch when faeditty ticks, anticipate it, and when it ticks again, use Freeze at the same time. The eq loss will give you time to damage kill them. Do note that this will require you a proper set-up. Use your glamours - I recall, see: rainbowpattern, colourmaelstrom, hypnoticpattern, etc. I once tested a Faeditty+Freeze+DC on Hadrian in the Arena, and it seems to be effective. Oh, and you can also do Flare+Maze, it can't kill, but it can buy you some time.