Could you post all the forms you had with this last shapeshifter and give us a run down of some of the utility (Not just the utility focus) you had?

It occured to me that I shy away from Shifters because lack of versitility but in reality, I only use a handfull of skills with my warriors/paladins anyway.

I would go double Utility, or Utility/Defense. Best combat option is usually ABS and bite bite bite. But like everyone says this is pretty dull. Shifters dont have to be played dull and you could challenge yourself to play them diferently.

Faerie fire for hiding classes, dispel magic, pugil underwater, ect.

Most Utility forms can hide. Forest blend, stalk your foes like a ranger. When a ranger ambushes someone there combat options arent exactly mindblowing (entangle, serpent strike, bearcharge) is what takes place most of the time. Big deal shifters can bite instead of those. Forms like camel can blind. Snakes can poison. Utility forms can also run down anyone. If they flee west down east road...simply blast off 10 wests and get way ahead of them. Then as they come to you, be spamming murder...they cant get past you. You dont need air forms to chase someone down.

Some forms can steal. Spidermonkey, racoon. Can revert to these forms and steal from someone...pisses them off. Then fly off. Water forms cant be seen if you are underwater with them. Stalk ranking groups.

Anyone can get a quest form. Main thing is to roleplay well, and have a god that you find interesting. If you play a good follower and start doing some semi-interesting things, I am sure you will get some kind of perk. The IMMs know this is the goal for shifters, so give them the chance to reward you. Be consistant.

As far as the break down for forms, Utility has more options for 'neat things'

He played Utility/air. In this combo, air is mainly used for chasing and finding foes and fast combat in fight situation.

From his PBF:

Level 16 Anteater Confident

It can forage in wilderness. Piercing attack.

Level 24 Giant toad Confident

It is amphibious. Poisonous bite attack.

Level 30 Spider monkey Confident

According to Dikuclan it has forestblend, facebite and steal.

Level 36 Hawk Skilled

Air form. Fly, flyto, peck(can start combat).

Level 44 Hyena Confident

Never had it myself, but it has bite and carrionfeed. Probably minimal movement cost and danger sense too. It also uses second attack skill of the shifter.

Level 49 Golden eagle Confident

Air form. Fly, flyto, peck(can start combat). Fights better than the hawk and the perks are more reliable.

Level 50 Ice drake Confident

Quest form. You won't get it.

Offensive out of form tricks at shifter's disposal are fumble, dispel magic(good against magi and prepwhores) and faerie fire/fog(and the partial shifts). And of course wands and other magey stuff. There are situations when these tricks can come useful, but being out of form is always a risk.

Of foci, utility has most perks and balanced off/def(avoidance tanking). Defense has great def, poor off. Offense has good off, poor def. Other foci tend to have less perks than utility. Air has fly, flyto, avoidance tanking. Water has good off good def, limited to water. Useful fighting strategies depends much on foci, but of individual forms and what they are good for too.

Personally, I recommend you utility major because it has the most interesting perks. Minor can be any focus.

It isn't like he's some sort of noob. Hell, he's practically a genius. Let him do his own goddamn research and figure out forms. And besides, you forgot the fact that all shifter tactics end up in the form of zap self;!;!;shift;bite;bite;bite;bite;bite... etc etc.

I used wands to great effect with Hyzin and they scored me a good number of kills. Trying the unusual could swing the fight my way very swiftly. The problem with shifters is they become ever more predictable the more you fight them. Once you have an idea of how a form is going to match up and what you'll have to do to avoid/disable it - fighting a shifter becomes pretty boring. A shifter with a huge amount of wands at his disposal can do anything from chase wounded people underwater (say, with a big nasty lvl 45+ wand of fire breath) to using 'item only' spells (like restrain, malisons, unnerve and prismatic spray) to scare a foe into foolish tactics. Or mislead a veteran into thinking they're okay fighting on maledicted.

Just throwing out some ideas to the masses, proving that shifters have a variety of out-of-form tactics despite their insanely boring forms :P I'm still an advocate of 3-path shifters!

Yhorian

I'll start using wands when shapeshifters get exision or evoke (or whatever that old empire power was) that works in form. Sure it's fun busting out the wither wand on the unsuspecting, but given the large amount of time already spent gathering wands, and the general crappiness of out of form shifterhood, I can't say that it's really a viable tactic. I'm sure Nep will prove me wrong sometime, but quite frankly, I didn't find it worth it...

To be fair, I also didn't try very hard or for very long... I just hate shifters.

Revert;zap is a really dumb idea for the AVERAGE skill level. It will get you killed more than it helps if you don't have a firm idea of just how things could go wrong, especially since maladicts slow shifting and make it painful.

And while I might be average skill level, I wouldn't say that is why it's a stupid idea in general. The problem is that even with full ABS, chance are those two rounds out of form are going to hurt you more than help you unless the wand is truely fight changing like a wither that drops weapons (with no backups) against a non-hand spec. Unfortunately that isn't part of your skillset, so it's just one more thing to gather.

Even with the best wands/scrolls/staves available they have to REALLY effect a fight (not just add a niggle) to be worth it IMHO. Chain lightning vs a non-lagging gang when you're full ABS and prot vs lightning... possibly a fight changer. Plague vs a single opponent who doesn't drop weapons... Only in a prolonged fight. See my point?

>I can't say that it's really a viable tactic.
>I'm sure Nep will prove me wrong sometime, but quite frankly,
>I didn't find it worth it...

Wands/staves/scrolls can be situationally good for a shifter. They aren't the answer in every fight or even most fights.

Being shifted will usually deal you the most damage the fastest, but is that what seals kills? In a gang or fighting someone who isn't good enough to know when they need to bail, sure. One on one? Not always.