First part to the question is, is there some kind of cap on the damage that shapeshifters are capable of doing in form? Like, if a form is naturally able to "DISMEMBER", will it only ever be able to rise to "MANGLES"?

Secondly, how does damroll affect them in form? I've been experimenting and noticed that it certainly isn't anywhere near similar/potent to any other class that I've had experience with. As example, say I added 40 points of damroll to my form and only went from "MASSACRES" to "DEMOLISH". I'm fairly certain I'd get a much bigger bang for my buck as any other class if I were to go from a 30 damroll to a 70.

Third, why are shifters (maybe druid forms?) the only people that can't benefit from gear that grants resists? There's a little older gear and a steadily growing pool of new gear that grants various resists, i.e. not just ancient hides, that would be helpful for a shifter.

Lastly, why does lupine aspect not transfer over into form? Every other minor magical affect in help file 2685 all do.

Forms have a set average and hit/dam inherent to each form. Your hit/dam from gear doesn't carry over into your form which is why shapeshifters never gear for damage once they get their forms. If you have actually been able to increase your forms damage based on gear damage roll alone I'd be very curious to know as that is a change I never heard about!

Other affects, such as bless and frenzy, that show up in your affects list will improve them if I recall correctly, however. These would, at most, add only maybe 12-20 extra damage roll though which would mean only 12-20 more damage or something similar. Remember that you don't have enhanced damage, as far as I know, which increases damage roll effectiveness even more, for say a warrior, which means you simply won't see as large a benefit from these affects. The main aspect of damage on forms is their inherent weapon average from what I can tell.

Lupine aspect is meant to be a lowbie helper for before you get your forms basically. Just a little perk to help you get out of lowbie levels. Some of the other mage guilds in galadon have similar little items that do some special spell to help lowbie mages level up.

It is not from gear. It is a combination of additives. Similar to though not exactly all of: frenzy, ferocity, lesser form ferocity, blood frenzy, berserk, brutality of the shark, beastial fury, enrage, feral growl, dragon's strength, wardance, chestbeat, and/or aristaeia.

The comment about enhanced damage does make some sense, though I wouldn't have figured it to be such a large factor. A shapeshifter's damage output already goes way down if their strength is hindered, similarly dodge and dexterity, regeneration and constitution.

From what I've noticed, they play very similar to warriors except they don't get to choose their specs, have a much smaller hp/skill pool, can only sustain their combat abilities for certain periods of time and can't call for help during fights, along with all the other things I noted. To compensate, they're given some magical advantages like 'word of recall' and access to wands. Without going into something akin to a rant, I just think it's weird that they give up so much for only a mid-level power ceiling even if someone puts in an enormous effort.

they don't need to master anything but controls and are one of the easiest class to powerrank and jump to action.

Which is huge.

You can't be stolen from or disarmed or have your equipment broken. That's a pretty big perk also!

TL;DR = damage verbs are harder to increase at higher ends due to increased damage range for each verb.

Now, most of what I am putting below is just going to be speculation since I don't have the code but comes from 20 years of observation, coding experience, and others posts so it may or may not be completely accurate. Weapons come in various forms and have various ranged of damage. Coding wise, I'd imagine a shapeshifter form has a weapon designed for it that you cannot see as it would be the best way to interact in the combat code. Consider the following ave 28 weapon dice rolls.

All of these are avg 28 weapons with the dice roll possibilities in the parenthesis:
8d6 (8 - 48)
7d7 (7 - 49)
14d3 (14 - 42)
4d13 (13 - 42)

This means the range of damage for each of these average 28 weapons is in the range of those parenthesis. I'd imagine the weapon dice roll for each form is different and custom made for that form but likely the high damage forms are similiar, or likely higher, than this.

So then if you have an ave 28 weapon and you have 20 damage roll:
ave 28 + 20 dam = 48 damage average but depending on weapon would be randomly between 27 to 69 damage which is a range of damage verb between decimate and MASSACRE. I'm also pretty sure is a damage range smoothing algorithm that tries to keep your damage closer to the weapon average since the extremes don't seem to occur that often.

Now, let's say enhanced damage is 25% increased damage, I think it might be more but not sure:

48 damage + 25% enhanced damage = 60 damage average which is DISMEMBER with a range from 34 to 86 damage or maim to MANGLE

Say then you have 50 damage roll instead
ave 28 + 50 dam = 78 damage (99 max) + 25% enchanced damage = 98 (123 max) average damage here is just barely below ***DEMOLISH** and will show MANGLE - ***DEMOLISH*** most often.

Note that the amount of damage between damage verbs after MASSACRE starts increasing a lot. So instead of only 15 or so damage in the MASSACRE verb range you get 30 in *** DEMOLISH *** and like 50 in *** DEVASTATE *** range. This means you would need a LOT of increase in damage roll to see a damage verb increase past MASSACRE on a form. You are still doing more damage oin average, by the amount of damage roll added, but the verbs won't shift as much. Hope this answers your question!