sounds about right nearly 8k bone chips *) 4 chips per turn so nearly 2k turn ins at 1 faction pt each.

This however does not fix the Merchant of Cabilis issue. But, from extensive talking, it would seem that you would likely need to do the max 16k bone chips / 4000 points worth of turn ins to see HOW that would affect your class/race/god combo. As I have been told that any Inny worshippers have the lowest negative faction hits for any cabilis faction. This means that the MAX possible faction one would hope to obtain for Merchant of Cabilis is the Apprehensive ish mark and that is after around 12k-16k bonechips.

Well I certainly won't be testing with another character any time soon, but once I start raising my faction once more (shamans and necros keep to themselves so there's no point for me right now), I'll report my findings here. I'll see where I max out with my class/racial/deity modifiers, I imagine you're right and I won't be able to raise much higher than Apprehensive. I feel indifferent may actually be possible with the merchants for my class, but possibly not for others.

As of 6 months ago, the bone chip quest was not bugged. I did it on one of my characters. Once I maxed Legion of Cabilis, the other factions continued to improve as I handed in more bone chips.

Your baseline faction is calculated based off your race, class and deity. The "good" deities start at a lower baseline. The shaman guild has extra hate for bards, enchanters, wizards and magicians, so these classes will take longer to be tolerated by them.

As an agnostic enchanter, I was able to hit ally with the warrior, SK, monk and merchant factions. I'm currently apprehensive with the shamans (while the other factions raised on the bone chip quest are ally) but I have not maxed any of the factions (other than Legion of Cabilis) yet.

The necros seem to start off at the same spot as the other factions (excluding the shamans). I'm dubious with them. It did not take too long, but I stopped killing the outcast iksar because I no longer felt like doing it.

The non-iksar illusions appear to have no effect on faction. In other words, assuming the same diety, they will start off hating you just as much whether you're a wood elf or dark elf. The shamans, in addition to being more difficult to raise for certain classes, see through iksar illusion. Tread carefully.

Hope this helps!