To add to Ixion, you won't be able to use any inherents a beast possesses unless you can teach beasts that skill anyways. So, if you don't plan to put lots of lessons into beastmastery soon, you won't be able to enjoy the use of the chimaera's inherent any time soon either.

Raising is hard to gauge, since the prices you can get feeds/reagents at will vary a lot. I can say you can have up to 600 trains on a standard beast, which would require the use of 60 reagents and 120 feeds to support the use of said reagents. Stable fees are 150gp per IC month if you use Mag's stable.

At the prices available within the Scorpion's Sting in Glomdoring, we have feed at 27g a pop, and reagents at 360 a pop. Not sure if we are charging fair market prices here... but to give some data:

3,240 in feed to prep the beast (minimum)
21,600 to max out trains
4,500 for one RL month of stable fees

That's about 30k just to get the beast up and running. This doesn't count: the personal cost of trans'ing another skill; feeding the beast now and again; 3cr zimorou you may spend to get the best physical appearance; 10cr wackadou you may spend when you screw how you trained your beast. Plus all the arties if this beast is something you want to buff up.

I know this has been covered somewhere sometime before... but does beastmastery balancing and trampling require the rider to be mounted for use?

Yes. Balancing doesn't make sense without being mounted, and trample requires it to use. Trample is the only ability that uses your balance rather than your beast's, too.

Is there a date when the Wayfaire will leave?

I'm trying to figure out if I want to work for the lessons IC to get enough Influence skill and finish it, or if the 25db aren't all that worth it given the timeframe.

I'd guess it will be at any moment, once whoever's responsible for it remembers that they were going to make it leave and flips the switch.

Is Nexus not working and appearing to be a broken link for anyone else at the moment? (Or is there an announce I missed saying it would be down that wasn't posted on the forum announcements or in-game news?)

http://lusternia.com/nexus/ loaded

So it did. Link on main page isn't. Thanks.

Have I been playing an old version of Nexus for a while, or are these crazy neat features new?

New to me as well, but I've always just clicked the "Play Lusternia" button on the homepage.

This version of Nexus was available in beta for a long while, they just replaced the previous one with the new though.

Just looking into some things:

How many points of strength does Flex give?

What are the stat increases by draw down?

Flex gives two weighted points. Unsure about draw down.

Is there an announcement somewhere about the Nexus (client) changes? I can't seem to get it working on my Mac... Keeps killing Firefox and Safari

You probably mean the same thing I do, but last I checked Flex gave +3.

This way, city warriors can use their Highmagic skill that gives +1 str without wasting it, just as Totems warriors in communes can still reap the benefits of the Bear skill. (Nevermind the lulz comparison between the two skills themselves.)

Ack. Yeah, you're right. It's late and I'm wrong again... I need to stop doing that. Though Highmagic isn't a city-Warrior only skill. Given that Highmagic isn't a requirement for Rituals, I'd assume that Lowmagic isn't required for Totems. Though last time I assumed:

So don't take my word for that either.

Edit: Meh. I sound too cynical sometimes.

Does this affect traveling to a demesne center outside the meld and/or traveling to someone in your meld?

Ditto! *satiates Lusty addiction*

For prestige purposes, do plays have to be watched and rated at the Vesteran stage, or can you do it at your home stage and have the rating and viewing still count?