Chameleon worked well for raising earth for me - just cast every time after you sleep and every time it wears off. Handy spell when you wandering around too....

I must beg to differ - the game makers added the ways to practice in the game to be discovered and plundered; editors are just plain cheating. There is also effort involved as well in using the practice techniques and the cunning to figure them out in the first place.

Going for all 4 books is pretty difficult with Bishops, I would consider it once they got past 75 in the books they started with. I especially like to "rush" a Bishop up in alchemy for $$ early on.

I am actually using this party now, the Bishop will do everything but try to raise Psionics (he's a 3 booker with a heavy early emphasis on Alchemy), that will be the Monk's job:

Human Monk - bare fists and a bo; mental magic for ranged
Felpurr Samurai - dual swords, magic for ranged
Lizardman Valkyrie - polearm, extra healing guy
Mook Ranger - bow and polearm, also will go for healing
Hobbit Gadgeteer - omnigun and staff, plus his gadgets
will make the ranger happy with a 3x shot x-bow [img]smile.gif[/img]
Faerie Bishop - alchemist first so he can make $$ for spell books

I don't plan on taking any NPCs for this group - so far they are pretty fun and I think in the later stages of the game will be really powerful. Only class change I can see coming is to eventually (at like 18th level) change the Valk to a Fighter. But whatever people want to do in the game shouldn't matter so long as they are having fun with it!

Also a reply to this note:

Gimli:

With 2 bishops why have 1 with alchemy/divinity & 1 with psionics/wizardry?

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If dont correctly you can have 2 bishops with ALL.

Knock-Knock - Wizardry
Heal/Cure Lesser Cond. - Alchemy
Charm - Divinity
Mindread - Psionic.
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Problem with that is that those spells are in more than one school of magic; for a Bishop, whichever school is higher will be the one that gets raised. For example, Charm is in Divinity and Psionics. If your Bishop has a 40 in Divinity and 30 in Psionics, he can charm as much as he wants but he'll only raise Divinity. Knock knock is in Alchemy and Wizardry; Heal in Divine and Alchemy; Mindread I think only in Psionics, but you'll need to already have raised that one by some other device high enough to learn it as it's 3rd level I think.

Tough to do a Bishop in all 4 books without learning spells that are *exclusive* to one school of magic that they will use alot. Hence that is why I say split the schools to Alchemy/Divinity and to Psionics/Wizardry. The two best "training" spells are knock knock and charm early on. Bishop #1 will raise Divinity with charm and Alchemy with knock knock; Bishop #2 will raise Psionics with charm and Wizardry with knock knock. You'd have all 4 books covered and very nice early boosts to boot.

But I've now decided to go with a Monk for Psionics, lol, and have my now lone Bishop go for Alchemy and Divinity through practice spells and will pump points into Wizardry on level ups. Also my Gadgeteer will help make up for the loss of the second Bishop with gadgets, and from what I have been reading they get effects better than level 7 spells (albeit less to choose from), plus you gotta love the omnigun and ability to make 3x shot xbows for the ranger.