Most useless cRPG companions.

[NecroLord]

Who do you consider to be the most useless and insufferable companion in any cRPG? I mean the most absolutely dogshit companion you know.

Here's mine:
1. Garrick. This motherfucker is about as useful as a kick in the groin. Seriously. Have you guys ever bothered including him in your party,gearing him up and turning him around to be a useful addition to a party?

2. Myron. Myron,baby,MYRON! Alright,so Myron is well known for being a sleazy,amoral douchebag(seriously,he tries to rape you if you are an attractive,but really dumb woman with low Int) who is the literal goldmine of Family Mordino,the biggest Jet dealers in post nuclear California. Even though he is extremely lacking in any combat ability(he does have some minor Small Guns and Energy Weapons skills),he can make stimpacks and even super stimpacks for you,not to mention some other consumables. Still better than fuckin' Garrick if you ask me.

3. Cernd. Ah Cernd. The personification of blandness. He is a Druid(Shapeshifter class kit),and aside from a high Wis,he is severely lacking in physical abilities. With the Shapeshifter Rebalancing Mod,he becomes extremely powerful while in his Greater Wolfwere form,but does it truly redeem him?

 

[lukaszek]

3. Cernd. Ah Cernd. The personification of blandness. He is a Druid(Shapeshifter class kit),and aside from a high Wis,he is severely lacking in physical abilities. With the Shapeshifter Rebalancing Mod,he becomes extremely powerful while in his Greater Wolfwere form,but does it truly redeem him?

you seem to forget about anomen

 

[Üstad]

Katrin in M&B Warband. Starts at level 8(lower level the better) and has inventory management skill prioritized which is not even a group skill.

 

[Ghulgothas]

Devil of Caroc, Fassina, Tekehu, Rekke... really about a fourth of both Pillars' companion cast altogether.

And IIRC both of the Halfling companions in Arcanum were too underleveled to be useful when you finally got around to them.

 

[plem]

Dorna Trapspringer in Shadows of Undrentide. literally has the wrong feats picked, she has Dual-Wield and Ambidexterity instead of Two-Weapon Fighting, which not only should be impossible without Ranger levels but also does nothing. she also doesn't have Weapon Finesse despite having higher DEX than STR, and her feat choices as she levels up are garbage.

 

[Erebus]

3. Cernd. Ah Cernd. The personification of blandness. He is a Druid(Shapeshifter class kit),and aside from a high Wis,he is severely lacking in physical abilities. With the Shapeshifter Rebalancing Mod,he becomes extremely powerful while in his Greater Wolfwere form,but does it truly redeem him?

you seem to forget about anomen

Anomen may be annoying, but he's fairly useful. He's not as strong a cleric as Viconia, but he can tank and he's an okay fighter during most of SoA.

Cernd is horribly weak. It's hilarious to see how easily he defeats Faldorn in a cutscene if you don't let him join you, because that fight is very hard if you do control him. The fact that it takes ages for druids to reach level 15 in 2nd Edition doesn't help.

 

[Atlantico]

1. Garrick. This motherfucker is about as useful as a kick in the groin. Seriously. Have you guys ever bothered including him in your party,gearing him up and turning him around to be a useful addition to a party?

Sure, beat the game with Garrick in the party more than once. It's fun to have a bard, this is roleplaying, not minmaxing. Do what makes sense to you.

If you're minmaxing, then Garrick, Myron and Cernd make no sense. Obviously.

 

[Pink Eye]

Hmm. Too many to list. My vote goes to Imoen (Baldur's Gate 2), Jaheira (Baldur's Gate 2), Hexxat (Baldur's gate 2), Mischa (Ravenloft: Strahd's Possession), Vladislav (Ravenloft: Strahd's Possession), and Elf (Dungeon of Naheulbeuk).

 

[jackofshadows]

Any Fallout companions, especially the dog.

 

[NecroLord]

Any Fallout companions, especially the dog.

That Ian burst fire,right?

 

[Sarathiour]

It obviously depend on how you play the game, but Garrick is pretty decent.

He come with an unlimited remove fear, got way more hp than you average mage, and will get his level 2 spell at the same time as a mage, and just a bit later for level 3(which by the way does not matter because you're not getting anything good before cloakwood).
Also, the ability to use Xbow with not a complete dogshit THACO is nice and make him contribute to the fight.
His main problem is his quite low INT, you have to babysit him to learn spell.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Anomen may be annoying, but he's fairly useful. He's not as strong a cleric as Viconia, but he can tank and he's an okay fighter during most of SoA.

Anomen is a quite strong cleric, probably a much stronger character than Viconia in general. The only thing Viconia's 18 WIS gets her over Anomen is one bonus level 3 and level 4 spell slot (if you go down the lawful route so Anomen can get 16 WIS) and a bonus to lore (lol). It turns out WIS isn't that important, even for a cleric as it has nothing to do with spell DC in game. The only other thing Viconia has over Anomen is 65% magic resistance which can be easily ignored given how plentiful magic resistance items are in the game and how early you can get them. Plus Viconia is a drow, any self-respecting Gnome, Human, Dwarf, Elf, etc. would allow the town guards to deliver her to justice anyways so you shouldn't even be using her.

EDIT: Bros before Hoes.

 

[Filthy Sauce]

The annoying girl from jagged alliance 2

Ira

 

[Baron Dupek]

Dynaheir? Don't remember anyone talking about her, people ususally arranged "accidents" that separated her from Minsc so you can have free slot for Edwin...

Sparkle & Myles - good for not-minmaxers looking for a variety and challenge (by additional burdens)

 

[NecroLord]

Anomen may be annoying, but he's fairly useful. He's not as strong a cleric as Viconia, but he can tank and he's an okay fighter during most of SoA.

Anomen is a quite strong cleric, probably a much stronger character than Viconia in general. The only thing Viconia's 18 WIS gets her over Anomen is one bonus level 3 and level 4 spell slot (if you go down the lawful route so Anomen can get 16 WIS) and a bonus to lore (lol). It turns out WIS isn't that important, even for a cleric as it has nothing to do with spell DC in game. The only other thing Viconia has over Anomen is 65% magic resistance which can be easily ignored given how plentiful magic resistance items are in the game and how early you can get them. Plus Viconia is a drow, any self-respecting Gnome, Human, Dwarf, Elf, etc. would allow the town guards to deliver her to justice anyways so you shouldn't even be using her.

EDIT: Bros before Hoes.

Anomen is a surprisingly effective tank,since he has fighter levels and gains half an attack per round,not to mention grandmastery in any blunt weapon. Armor of faith,Draw Upon Holy Might,Holy Power,Righteous Magic,he can buff himself with impunity. He is quite a douche at first,but becomes better if he passes his trial to become a knight. His personal quest is also one of the better ones in the game,I think. The moral implications of it,not to mention Anomen getting screwed either by The Order of the Radiant Heart or his father(both which are important to him) depending on how you solve his quest.

 

[Shadenuat]

High level Anomen is around Sarevok and Korgan as melee machine.
Hes problem he needs to be developed first, you need to deal with his proficiencies etc. some of his power kicks in more with leveling (like lvl 1 Divine Armor that give flat %all res).

 

[Sarathiour]

Anomen is one of the strongest companion in BG2, he's a great fighter packed with a good cleric in a single deal, pretty hard to beat that. The only companion that I could see haead of him would be Sarevok if you dual him into a mage or a thief, but you're going to have to work to get there.


Back on topic, the most useless companion would be faldorn in original bg1. Druid with shitty stat and no decent spell,and low hp to boot. Good luck salvaging that.

 

[Shadenuat]

Back on topic, the most useless companion would be faldorn in original bg1. Druid with shitty stat and no decent spell,and low hp to boot. Good luck salvaging that.

Nah she's good entangle charm call lightning summon dog summon bear gal and Bear Form is solid.

My favorite weak char is Jayna Stilles from Arcanum, a dirt kingdom herbs florist tourist who primarely exists do burn through all your 200 bandages / hour. Adorable!

 

[GloomFrost]

Anomen is one of the strongest companion in BG2, he's a great fighter packed with a good cleric in a single deal, pretty hard to beat that. The only companion that I could see haead of him would be Sarevok if you dual him into a mage or a thief, but you're going to have to work to get there.


Back on topic, the most useless companion would be faldorn in original bg1. Druid with shitty stat and no decent spell,and low hp to boot. Good luck salvaging that.

Agreed. Also after becoming a Paladin he turns into unstoppable undead/vampire killing machine.

 

[Sykar]

Mud:

 

[Sarathiour]

call lightning

Ha yes, the only good druid spell in bg1. Would be shame if you got it JUST BEFORE HEADING TO A MINE AND THEN A TOWN.

TRASH

summon skeletton is way better, never used bear form but I doubt it's any good.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Mud:

Why is making the soyface? Is he about to point to something?

 

[notpl]

Cernd is very powerful after the EE fixed his bugged greater werewolf form. Even without that, he's a pure spellcaster with 18 in his primary stat, making him better than any character that isn't. Jaheira will become more powerful in ToB with HLAs from both her classes, but during SoA cernd does a better job of spamming the 3-4 useful druid spells and his greater werewolf form has the highest defenses in the game, letting him block off doorways or other chokepoints while remaining untouchable. His personality sucks, but his personal quest is fully aware of that and is clearly making fun of him for being a piece of shit, which I found pretty funny.

Most useless companion I can think off actually goes to Camellia from Wrath of the Righteous, a very recent contender. She comes skill focused in rogue skills despite not having them as a class skill. She's an even shittier version of a druid, with a truncated version of the worst spell list in the game. Her highest stat is dexterity with a class that doesn't benefit from it at all - in a game that's already absolutely drowning in dex-based melee fighters - and from a pure roleplaying standpoint she's an outrageous liability that anyone sane would summarily execute the moment they meet her, if not for the fact that the player controlling them has a terminal case of horny. Oh, and to add insult to injury, she has a locked equipment slot.

 

[Daidre]

Back on topic, the most useless companion would be faldorn in original bg1. Druid with shitty stat and no decent spell,and low hp to boot. Good luck salvaging that.

Iirc, with xp limit of BG 1 ToSC - 161 000, pure Druid was hitting lvl 10 and had an access to lvl 5 spells, when cleric stopped at lvl 8/lvl 4 spells. That is potentially huge advantage for Faldorn, although I don't remember if Insect Plague was in the game back then.

 

[Shadenuat]

Also Faldorn has OK WIS, with book + ring she has a lot of spells.

There wasn't Insect but in BG vanilla meta as I said entangle charm summon doge and beare and mass strength ok.
there are also some uses for stuff like rigid thinking as degenerate gameplay it's a spell that doesn't proc aggro from npc.

in non-vanilla nymph summon is obvious cheese since you basically duplicating your caster into micro summon casters with up to 5th level spells.
summon dread wolf is also alright as free scout unit.

my last run she ended up mauling Shandalar of all things