I've been pondering long and hard about this choise for a while now, but I just can't make up my mind. So if someone who has a certain skillset would like to elaborate about it, or just anyone who knows a bit about it, it would be appreciated. What I am mainly curious about is the useability for bashing and for pve, as well which skills are "must haves" and which are just a waste of credits.

Here's a bit of my pondering so far to help:

Tarot:
+ Love the idea of cards to battle.
+ Freedom of movement
- Needing to prepare the cards.
- Fast races are better I heard and I'd like to stay human

Hexes:
+ Prepare a room for a fight
- Fixed in a room and the rooms around it

Astrology:
+ Personal buffs, and buffs to apply on others
- Dependant on time
- Complicated

Tarot, hands down.

Utility, highly useful afflictions (hangedman for stacking with shackles and web, aeon for stacking with stupidity and anorexia), a viable instakill... Tarot is just... better in every way.

Astrology also requires a fairly high skill level to get the more utility type skills. The first basic block of skills is the planetary rays, which are just afflictions, so not terribly useful for much. We also get passive benefits one month out of three. And not being able to be blocked off Astral can be handy for a commune person. For a city mage, I'd guess Astrology would be a lot less handy than it is for me. And as you've already noticed, it's complicated. And sucks every so often, when none of the really handy buffs are positive.

Tarot is the best, as Shorlen said. Hexes is amazing for Wiccans, not as good for Guardians because their abilities don't support it as well. Astrology can also be fun, and has some utility to play with, but it's complicated and not functionally all that useful for city guardians.

Thanks for the replies, certainly when it comes to class and skill synergy. Just pondering though, being a human and slower (think people talk about the aslaran balance bonus here?) affect it a lot?

Aslarans are definitely better in that regard, but as you reach higher and higher levels humans will catch up in terms of effectiveness. If you rely primarily on tarot, you probably won't do quite as well as you could as an aslaran, but you'll still be effective.

Even slower, you'll find the support far more beneficial. Hexes, for one, require speed more so than tarot does. Astrology really isn't all that useful most of the time anyway, and only marginally useful when it is useful, to be honest.

Hermit and Catacombs are two of the very best travel skills in the game. Lust tarot is amazing for stopping druids/magi from hitting you with their demesnes, and bards from hitting you with their songs. Aeon tarot is godly with an angel/demon to back it up. Speed doesn't matter so much with those things, honestly. Soulless tarot provides a kill condition that is both viable and doesn't rely on speed for it to be effective, but rather on timing.

All in all, aslaran may be a bit better at spamming tarot, especially hangedman/aeon, but other races still benefit strongly from the skillset.


Only consider possibly maybe taking hexes as a guardian if you are a mugwump, I'd say.

I've been both a Nihilist and have tried trans hexes/tarot/astrologly. Your going to have the most fun with tarot, hands down. This is coming from a mugwump. Tarot versatility is unmatched, and IMO, is the strongest skillset in the game. Tarot wins.

Slight correction, if you use hexaura your hexes will move with you, no matter if you go, swim, teleport, snort spores etc, so you do not have to be fixed to a room. However, hexaura is also the transcendent skill and costs 10 power to put up..

EDIT: Drawn hexes also last around the 600-700 seconds. So you can carry them with you for a bit.

o_O so it was fixed, then.

Nihilists do have access to some pretty hodius combos (and even locks) if they take only a little bit of hexes.

Tarot, definitely.

In my opinion, Tarot is hands down the best skill-set in the game. No other skill-set affords the versatility, mobility, and lethality that it can offer. Heck, you don't even have to trans it, since World is by and large not very useful.

Sometimes it makes me sad that Starleaper wasn't changed so that being attacked sent you to a random room anywhere on that same plane with the exceptions of places like stockrooms, Guildhalls, etc.

But that was ages ago being talked about and not many would like it now I'm betting.

Not for long.

Ok Nihilist asking combat questions.. I am here.

First off Aslaran is one of the best if not the best race for Nihilists.. the equilibreum and balance bonuss come in handy.. adds a whole nother hit under quickening. Resistance to cold... aquamancers.. all I ave to say. Bad part is low speed bad herb balance and slow elixier healing.. not as bad as viscanti though.

In terms of the acutal post... Tarot.. hexes have been tried and there is NO way to make them work with our skills right now.. sleep is the most viable but it is too easily countered and without tarot no aeon to use it with. Astrology.. not even going into it. Tarot is best as everyone said.

Also I handle combat questions and training IC.. so talk to me in game if you have problems

Stop making me jealous of city bards. I'd kill for tarot.

Astrology is better for bashing, and Tarot is by far the best for PvP as a Nihilist.

Astrology can be nice, just looking at the skills they have some nice combos (aeon+chills+crucify... add in contagion and maybe ectoplasm and you've got a nice setup... this would be very difficult to pull of of course)

I mean, it's nice to have a skill that you can combo with quickening to get fast affs with... With quickening and Astrology you could get aeon very fast (during the right times...) Which is pretty nice.

The buffs of astrology are always nice, and papaxi can help you go for your damage kills that are a specialty of nihilists.

I think a mugwump Nihilist astrologer could have potential... (goes to make one...)

Bearing in mind you could only do this like once every third day, astrology isn't bad when you can do stuff but the problem is most of the time you can't.

Actually, one of the issues with astrology is that you can't really control the afflictions well. Sure, they could get aeon from that ray. If their birthsign is right (1/3 chance). If it isn't, then they'll be getting either pox or anorexia.

Six rays, three possibilities for each (discounting sun, which is damage):

Moon: Cardinal - Hallucinate, Mutable - Dementia, Fixed - Dizziness
Eroee: Cardinal - Sensitivity, Mutable - Love, Fixed - Peace
Sidiak: Cardinal - Stupidity, Mutable - Confusion, Fixed - Amnesia
Tarox: Cardinal - Reckless, Mutable - Asthma, Fixed - Freeze
Papaxi: (-20%) Cardinal - Ego, Mutable - Mana, Fixed - Health
Aapek: Cardinal - Aeon, Mutable - Pox, Fixed - Anorexia

That's it. There are ways to get other afflictions than the one on the target's birth chart, but it requires retrograde motion and casting rays via the zodiac signs, etc. It gets quite messy, and really isn't typically all that great. Astrology is very fast, and the affliction you get is masked. But if you have someone read your birthchart to you, then you have the list of afflictions you can typically expect. I'm one with bad luck, I have a lot of cardinal signs, I believe. A lot of Skull.