I think it is sad that only a totalof six mentions of Rik Emmett was done on all 27 pages of this topic. I began listening to Triumph and Judas Priest the same year, 1978, and they both are tied on several things.

But in terms of ability and influence, rather directly or indirectly, no Metal guitarist is better than Mr. Rik Emmett. All kinds of guitar players you all mentioned have claimed to be influenced by the man, for instance:

Steve Vai - Started playing eclectic guitar because of Rik Emmett
Joe Satriani - Started playing guitar period because of Rik Emmett
Eddie Van Halen - Admitted taking the ideas that are featured on Eruption and Mean Street after watching Rik Emmett(Triumph) play a gig in Canada in 1975, when Van Halen was still called Mammoth
Glenn Tipton - Wrote the Hell Bent For Leather and Call For The Priest solo after listening to Rock And Roll Machine
Dave Murray - Decided to take the punk sounding guitars used by Rik Emmett on Triumph's first two albums, one being Rock And Roll Machine
Randy Rhoads - Found a love for Classical because of Rik Emmett, his two favorite classical pieces are: El Duende Agonizante and Fantasy Serenade.

In 1972 Rik Emmett was in a band called Act III, which was the first time an audience ever got to hear the song Blinding Light Show, which features both shredding on a 12 string classical and 12-string electric, without a break. And the following year Tony Iommi and Black Sabbath recorded Spiral Architect which throughout the song features the same exact rhythm section.

Triumph was the first metal band to ever feature Jazz, Classical, Bluegrass, Waltz, Spanish Flamenco techniques or complete songs. Not to mention their ability to pend songs that were commercial yet heavy, makes them either the inventors or the biggest influence on starting the Glam Metal scene, which rather you like it or not, was a good and lucrative sub genre of Heavy Metal. They were also the first to write a Speed Metal song(Street Fighter Man) while the first to ever write a staple of Metal, light verse to Heavy Metal chorus(Bringing Love To You) and the first ever Punk Metal song(Rock And Roll Machine) which was also the first song to ever have a true Shredding guitar solo.

Triumph also goes down in history as the first ever true Metal band of any kind to release a complete uninteruppted concept album, that was not only loosely based, that album was Thunder Seven, which I highly reccomend to all of you. Plus Rik Emmett was the main songwriter behind all their ideas.

And since what also makes Rik Emmett so amazing is that he has done these genres:

Metal
Heavy Metal
Punk Metal
Speed Metal
Thrash Metal
Opera
Country
Bluegrass
World
Jazz(Acid, Smooth, 12-bar, arch-top type, swing, acoustic, bar room)
Every form of classical
every form of blues

there is nothing the man is unable to do