Does Maladicting them do anything at all? If so what?

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It's basically like maledicting a warrior: it does impact their ability to dodge and deal damage.

The flipside of that being, just like a warrior you can gear to counter that strategy if you're of a mind to as a shifter. Just as boneshatter can be pretty good against a warrior, but then you run into someone geared like Eleagra and not only do they not lose a weapon from boneshatter, you need another -15 STR to even get them off max.

Regardless of those considerations, some maledictions cause major or minor shifting trauma, which is a very useful tactical consideration, assuming the shifter can't just beat you straight up with the form they first attack you in.

The problem you might be facing is, can I survive long enough to land the maledictions to change the fight?

I can't really help you unless you sent me some actual logs.

I will say this, a shapeshifter (especially an air shifter) is built on dictating the terms of the battle. Shifters cannot zap themselves in form, so they have to basically prep up and hope their opponents are around to fight while they have their preps up.

Also, mana is essential to a shifter. Without mana, he's just a completely utterly gimped transmuter who can't cast spells. So practice the art of stringing out battles against shifters. Especially air shifters (since they can't fly to you if they have no movement).

Low levels, often you can just gear for damage and just lag them to death.

If the form seems to be dodging a lot, you can lower their dex but remember that shapeshifters get haste (which increases dex). As well as a smart shifter gearing for their prime stats (which happens at higher levels). Just lowering their stats wont always do it. I found that the best specs against shapeshifters have been mace and dagger for me. Things get harder at higher levels (with my axe, mace spec, I only had one shifter that didn't seem to be affected at all by my maldicts).

This also depends on what class or spec you are playing too.

Decreases their damage output, defenses, land rate of some of their skills, shifting damage, and in some cases adds shifting lag.

It works, and is noticeable even on the low end (-3 or less) of the malediction scale.

I just seem to get hit with one or two big hits a round. Silly as it sounds can you feint a shifter? I've heard they resist the skill.

Feint does work; generally speaking, if a form is built to have one or two big attacks per round rather than a lot of attacks (e.g., shark rather than manta) feint will be less effective.

Generally speaking, shifters shouldn't really get the drop on you unless they're air, and in that case they only really have one form to fight you with and you should be able to adjust your strategy accordingly. (With a few exceptions, if you're getting beat straight-up by air shifter in air form that didn't find you messed up or nearly dead, you probably have PK-relevant weaknesses big enough to drive a truck through.)

That's in broad strokes; I don't know how helpful it is.

fngs

Running an air shifter off is a lot easier than actually PKing them since most just fly away before they get near death, especially if their air form happens to be their most offensive. Air/Off you're not usually fighting the air form, just the offensive after they've done flyto peck or whatever.

You could take the fluid deceptions legacy (I imagine auto feinting every round is actually nice on certain builds, though probably not taken all that often as a legacy) to feint an attack every round possibly while using other commands, or do a double feint with the skill which can remove certain forms entire amount of possible attacks (i.e. Great white only gets 1 or 2).

My biggest problem with fighting air offense is that you have an offensive form with great ability to get the drop on you when you are not ready for them. Flyto murder is really only to seal a PK after the offensive form has trounced you to near death, and even then quaffing is a pretty easy counter, unless you're a rager in which case you're probably dead unless you're near a place you can evade the shifter.

Still, as annoying as air offense is, all things being equal there are generally much tougher things to try to deal with or avoid. Personally, I think skilled thieves, assassins or conjurers tend to be far more difficult to deal with than skilled air offense shifters.

I can't recall running any off.

"If you're getting beat straight-up by air shifter in air form that didn't find you messed up or nearly dead, you probably have PK-relevant weaknesses big enough to drive a truck through"

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fgb wsg