It does look that the Macing skill gains brake near the 79 -80 level as only way to get it going again is to restart the client (wait for your character to time out). The the macing skill advances 0.2 points and get's stuck again. The skill training guides say that the tactics skill is used to lag behind the other combat skills but my tactics is now over 91 when the macing skill is stuck at 80.3 This needs a fix.
Macing is the slowest of melee skills to train (not including LJ, that's just a bonus skill). The fact that most people train with wands is potentially part of the slowness. Quarter Staves are actually faster, you just have to heal your target more. Melee skill gains on swings, not hits. Tactics gains on hits, so hitting someone with 0 melee or defensive wrestling will allow Tactics to gain optimally. I'd be inclined to think your gain blocks are coincidence as I have trained multiple macers without issue or interrupt from 0-GM.
Oh, would just hope that you are right. My tactics is now at 98 and have trained for 2 hours without no gains for macing. Macing is still stuck at 80.3 In the process have broken one wand and shepards crook.
Yeah, I think it took me nearly two days to do Macing as opposed to other melee skills and last time I used qstaves, I didn't time it but it seemed to go by quicker
The problem is likely that you're hitting someone with very low skill. Find a character - player or otherwise - with 50+ skill and you should be able to gain just fine.
The macing skill started to re-gain after the opponent raised one of his combat skills over 50. Now the macing gains are keeping steady.
