I have a alt shadowdancer and I kinda need some help with focusing on his skills. He has gifted wicca adept hexes and has scourge in Night.

You're gonna want trans wicca, trans hexes, and at the very minimum succumb in night.

Contemplation in Discernment is a nice addition as well for anyone who has a mana-instakill, but certainly not as much as those others, I just know I regret not having it, as toadcurse is my only way to kill.

Anywho, for any class, it's always your three guild skills you want to increase the most. Tri-trans is a term people used to throw around so often because of that.

Edit:Also, how many lessons can you afford to throw into the alt? Wiccan (at least for moondancers) doesn't have anything very useful in it for quite awhile, I guess shadowdancers get Barghest early on, which on the other hand is exceptional, especially with the recent eartwort change. Then again, if you've already got gifted you already have that. so umm... well choak+fae entourage is a pretty strong base tactic, but that's up at Fabled 66%. Well, these guild skills are synergistic, so while they're all effective, they're best used in combination with each other. Anywho, Trans Night in and of itself is something to shoot for though, damage reduction + an attack that isn't 100% Magic.

Lemme see... you want him for PvP or just bashing?

If it's PvP, I suggest the following skills:

Wicca: Toadcurse makes killing stuff much easier. But if you don't have credits, you can go as high as Redcap (Fabled), or even leave at what you have altogether. Fae aren't very good.

Night: You'd need Succumb. Very good skill (but not overpowered in my opinion), at Fabled. It won't be so powerful if you don't have Toadcurse though. Maybe Choke too - 66% Fabled.

Hexes: Good PvP skill. Most of your afflictions will come from this. Doublewhammy (Fabled) is VERY cool, although higher skills are great too.

Combat: Shieldparry, against warriors. Obviously. No shieldparry = death to them.

Discernment: Contemplate is nice, but not needed for a Shadowdancer. Succumb is pretty intensive on removing enemy's mana, especially if used in Choke.

Planar: Obvious choice. You like to conglutinate, don't you?

Oh, and CharismaticAura (trans Influence) is good, but costs quite a bit of credits.

If you want the character for PvE/bashing only, it's easier to answer. Trans Night (Nightkiss) and Virtuoso Wicca (Sprite). Don't forget Planar.

Fabled in all three guild skills is actually a pretty good plateau to shoot for at first.

In terms of barghest, the change made barghest -less- powerful, because in the past when losing deafness you also generally had to cure blindness before restoring the defence against barghest, now it is -much- easier and faster to restore truehearing than it was old sixth sense.

I plan on using the alt in PvP. I could get some credits for him just don't know when.

for combat you need: redcap in wicca, succumb in night, and reckless in hexes then you should be able to wreck most opponents (obviously you need to learn to use everything effectively) everything after these skills is just a helpful bonus, and of course is what you will need to deal with top tier fighters

Which is why I said RECENT, not enough earwort=barghests decimating, I know full well about the technical side of the faeleaf/earwort change and have even posted about it.

And how is a shadowdancer with those skills expected to kill anyone? Nature curse?

Apparently *snicker*

Ignore everything Silimaur says, you should aim for tri-trans to kill as a wiccan, although possibly only double-trans for Shadowdancers. Hexes needs hexaura to be sufficiently versatile, Night will have succumb and nightkiss, nightkiss giving increased resistances and a better damage attack than nature curse. Trans wicca will give toadcurse, which works with succumb as the most viable wiccan kill method >.>

So, I shouldn't even bother with Astrology? I'll miss the Spheres, though.

Astrology is the second strongest, Healing the weakest of the three, Astrology only comes into it's own when you can stack afflictions quickly (sygengeny or some weird term) where I think you can cast 7 afflictions at once for little or no power. There are also lesser convergences more often, but anything with limited or psuedo-random usage and power flux isn't reliable and thus weaker. The same holds true in a lesser extent for abilities that depend on times of the month, or day. Why settle for abilities that wax and wane when you can pick a dependable skill like hexes? In the end Astrology and Healing hold more basic utility abilities, though not much that can't be done in another way. When it comes down to it, almost all combat minded Wiccans will pick Hexes due it it's power, and ease of usage, afflictions from the other two depend on extensive prep work (gathering vials of poison and checking the plants).

I think you're misunderstanding a few things about astrology...that syzygy only turns up every 7 or so RL years according to Tuek's calculations. Other than that, minor convergences cost 2 power to use at all, and if you don't spend the 2 power, actively disadvantage you by randomising some of the otherwise useful skills there.

Spheres rock for bashing though.

Well, if this is just an alt and you dont really have much time or credit to invest in it, just pick hexes for minor combat support or healing (for bashing ). But I'd rather invest all my skills in wicca first though, or just enough to get that fae that puts agros to sleep.

I think it was supposed to be in excess of 100 IC years for a syzygy. And we had one just before I switched to hexes.

It says 250 years in the file for it.

Why on earth would they design a skill that will pretty much never be used? I'm a little gobsmacked right now...

No, it just only has maximum effect "almost never." It has a usable effect probably every few hours, and a usable effect that's actually worthwhile every few days.

Ah ok I understand. Still, there's no point having that maximum effect at all really.