(The first three paragraphs are background, if you aren't interested, skip!)
Well I'm a long time Spidweb player, I've bought and completed every Exile and Avernum game (2 was the best of both ), but I just never got into Geneforge very much. I'm not sure why, but it just never really got me into the game very well.
Then I got my leg into a cast and needed something to do until I could go back to my normal routine, so I picked up Geneforge 5. I played a significant way through on one run (joining the Rebellion at one point), but was generally unhappy with my character. It was a shaper with an absurd load of skill points in intelligence (my army consisted of two Rots, a War Trall, a Gazer and two Cryoas), and I generally just sat back and let them go bananas on people. There was never really a problem with him, I just wasn't satisfied, so I deleted all my saves. I do this a lot. You should've seen my WoW phase, it wasn't pretty.
So now I'm trying to decide between a warrior and a shaper. I put a lot of stock into the player models, and sorry ladies, I just don't like playing the other gender, even if it doesn't affect gameplay at all (I switched the Shaper and Shocktrooper models in the files, but it ended up not working well).
Questions
Shaper
Should I stack points into a single shaping class? If so, which one?
How much intelligence/endurance should I aim for?
Should I stack points into a particular magic class?
Warrior
What should be my balance for strength/dexterity/endurance?
What shaping class should I use for support?
Should I stack blessing or healing magic?