That said, as long as you don't spread yourself too thin, there isn't a way to gimp yourself really.

The exception are those with special effects, which is more a late-game thing, and a few that give quite considerable boosts to speech skills.

Stones that improve major stats (Body, Mind, Spirit) are usually preferable to those at affect minors, since they also boost the associated minors.

You get enough points during a game to fully max about 4 or 5 styles/weapons/etc, but you can save a bit by skipping Chi Damage for Support styles: that one only applies when you activate the drain chi for extra damage ability, and most of the time you want to save your chi for either magic styles or healing.

You have to reinforce this attitude through dialogue, and some of it requires you pass a speech check.

You can influence some of your companions to take either an Open Palm or Closed Palm view of the world, regardless of their natural inclination.

I tend to avoid them because they do take away much of the challenge of fights.

Transformation styles can be very overpowered, especially if you sink points into them early.

They usually have something new to say, and if you miss too many, you may not have enough triggers left to actually get to the end of certain dialogue chains.

Talk to your companions after each major mission.

Despite the game insisting that it has moral depth, the Open Palm and Closed Fist options are always obviously evil or good. Choose to be either a good or bad dude, talk to all your buddies for backstory, and do every sidequest you can. That being said, you are probably still best off just picking a path and sticking to it, because the differences in philosophy are quite different. You do get an item near the end of the game, if you max it, but it's not a gamebreaker.

They main link is the special magical styles Stone Immortal (open) and Tempest (closed), where you need more than 75% to gain the highest boost. You don't have to max Open/Closed Palm to gain most of the benefits.

Every style works though, so it's mainly a case of taste. Thousand Cuts has a drawback that the end of the combo has you step back a bit, so keeping in range can get annoying. The White Demon style is extremely powerful, but the combo is not very flashy.

Jade empire martial styles