Purification Song (1004) Question

[Zhiart]

I know after speaking w/ Galen a couple of days ago that bard songs and manipulation both play a role in 1004. After rerolling to pure I've noticed that I get the 'the gem becomes more perfect' messaging quite a bit more, so it takes a lot more casts to get down to cracking. I had a few questions around this I was hoping to get answered.

1. Do these skills help prevent explosions as you progress down the different stages of purification? I.E. with enough of these skills is it safe-ish to purify more when you get cracking?
2. Does one of these skills contribute to orbing more than the other?
3. What stage do most people stop at when purifying?

[Methais]

I know after speaking w/ Galen a couple of days ago that bard songs and manipulation both play a role in 1004. After rerolling to pure I've noticed that I get the 'the gem becomes more perfect' messaging quite a bit more, so it takes a lot more casts to get down to cracking. I had a few questions around this I was hoping to get answered.

1. Do these skills help prevent explosions as you progress down the different stages of purification? I.E. with enough of these skills is it safe-ish to purify more when you get cracking?
2. Does one of these skills contribute to orbing more than the other?
3. What stage do most people stop at when purifying?

I'm no bard, but I'm pretty sure I'm correct:

1. No, but you can sing to the gem more before it reaches that state.
2. Uhhh....
3. Cracked or improves somewhat, depending on how lucky you're feeling.

[Tgo01]

At cap with 101 ranks of manipulation lore I keep purifying until the gem can't be purified any further. I still explode one once in a while but it's very rare and I actually make more silver in the long run by purifying every gem as much as I can and losing a couple then by stopping early.

But yeah, that's at cap with 101 ranks of manipulation lore. At lower levels I was destroying gems left and right if I attempted to purify every gem as far as they could. As Methais said "cracked" is usually a good place to stop if you're not yet capped.

[Zhiart]

Awesome, thanks guys