I once sent a mail asking him if there would be a sequel to Nethergate and the answer was no. The reasons were that while a lot of people liked the game it wasn´t worth the effort to make a second one.
He´s not evil, I recieved an answer to said mail and once got a few registration codes replaced when they were lost due to a change of computers.
Definently yes, but if you know what it´s going to say (if you´ve played it through once) then you don´t have to carry it around.
But it is the only thing that will tell you where to find the Nether Circle spells.
By the way, could it be that the skill was meant to be a celtic version of Roman Training? They do share some common traits, even though Roman Training is the better (figures, as they´re supposed to be the best fighters)
By the way, buying about one point of Defense for every point of Berserk reduces the enemy to hit bonus. I usually do so and I´m yet to discard that tactic as worthless.