Favorite companion weapons

[Vyss]

My companions seem rather lackluster.  They are sword/shield with some form of range (bow/arrow,siege bow/bolts, 2x throwing).  Is it better to switch them off of sword into a blunt? I can't seem to find any good blunt weapons for them.  Also is 2hd/lance a viable alternative?  The AI seems pretty horrible with 1hd swords on cavalry and often miss, lances not so much.  Any item suggestions would be appreciated. Going for the long haul so training up is viable.

Thanks

 

[Ultra]

i absolutely love to level my companions as super fighters and i equip them without a horse (i never fight mounted) and when they have enough Str i Role Play they have been indoctrinated into my elite cadre, where i equip them with specifically a Pendor Great Sword and allow them to upgrade their armour into plate, they also all wield a xbow and stand in my infantry line.

Like this they prove to be serious cav killers and can stand toe to toe with huscarls after some dedicated training.

I find this to be much more fun then dedicating them to say, looting, training, etc.

Each to their own though.

In the early days (first year mb released) when i experimented with them with lances i found they wouldnt take out the sword or offhand almost at all, fail to couch after the 1st charge and constantly try to poke people in their face failing miserably when not mounted (ie sieges). My advice is not to equip them with lances at all, if you must have them mounted a sword and shield and nothing else is best, if you give them ranged  they would just circle around the enemy firing and throwing, which they arent very good at.

 

[raider969]

It really depends on what role you want them to serve. Do you want them to be mounted knights or infantry on foot? Melee or ranged? Offensive shock units or defensive tanks? Almost anything is viable.

Blunt weapons deal more damage to armor than cutting weapons, with the added bonus of turning enemy into prisoners.  If you're going with mounted troops, I'd get the Doom mace which has 30b damage and 104 range.

Lances are very good on the charge, but fare poorly if your cavalry gets bogged down. To use them effectively you need to micromanage them and avoid densely packed infantry (most cav units should). I often put my lancers lower in the spawn queue so that by the time they spawn, the enemy would be dispersed all around the map, making them easy pickings.


I suspect the real reason why your companions seem lackluster is their horrible weapon proficiency.

 

[Flingit]

I don't think doom maces are in shops otherwise I would equip all companions with them. I did loot a madterwork doom mace once, I believe it was 35b damage yay.

 

[shoshuro]

I don't think doom maces are in shops otherwise I would equip all companions with them. I did loot a madterwork doom mace once, I believe it was 35b damage yay.

You can find them in shops, they are rare though.

 

[CaptainJax]

It kinda depends on the companion for me. I like to give Friedrich a serious crossbow and a morning star and shield. Diev pretty much stays an archer with 2 slots of arrows and a two handed sword of some sort. Siggy is crossbow and 2 hander.  Just depends on their starting stats.  If they are on their horse I tend to give them something like a fierdsvain berserker sword as watching them poke people in the face with their lance gets too frustrating unless I am being more of a commander instead of fighting with my army. Since they can't use a shield I will hide them behind a hill until they can charge cav or archers without getting as messed up.

 

[Brujoloco]

I usually equip them endgame with either Dragonspine Axes and/or morningstars. Since endgame for me is mostly castle taking those two are THE best siege weapons in existence. People always dismiss the Dragonspine Axe, but man, that short range is godly in castle taking. Half your troops are wasting swings while you swing merrily splintering shields and lacerating pixelated flesh like butter. The Fierdsvain Axe too is very very good as a horse weapon with the 100+ reach/speed, and because it can only swing the AI uses it quite effectively. Thats my 1h trainer of choice for companions.

 

[joeman]

I like to know how to equip my companions too.

I used to play M&B original and PoP 2.x, but didn't play warband until now.  There are some changes to the game, I don't like.  The battle interface is getting worse, and my guy on horses is getting harder to control then before.

Anyways, I still found that my companions can do better if they can stay on their horses rather than on foot.  In PoP 2.x and 3.01, I tried equiping my companions with crossbows and pendor great swords and it worked well, but they get crushed when they run into tough opponents.  For example, there is no way that configuration can survive against an equal number of Jatu warriors unless they get to at least level 20, but they can if they fight on their horses at level 10+ and reasonable equipments.

But the main thing for me is to be able to capture prisoners in early to mid game.  I equip them with maces and shield but so far I am not having good success.

 

[kevinflemming]

My usual companion set-up goes as follows;

隐藏

I've played with the companions stats though, resetting everyone to 0 in everything and putting them at level 1. I find this more enjoyable, as it gives me something else to do, sorting them out with levelling-up and skill distribution.

Three Infantry with one/two-handed swords and shield, wearing medium-to-heavy armour. I've stood about watching them and having the option to swap between two-handed or one-handed and shield (without giving them an extra weapon, adding to weight) really helps in combat. Good against most things, provided they have decent Shield Skill and weapon proficiency. These have quite often been the reason I've won certain battles.

Three Archers with longbows, one-handed sword and shield, wearing light-to-medium armour. Again, I've watched them and they rarely get knocked unconscious. Even in close combat they can still hold their own, due to the shield.

Four cavalry which are basically the same as Infantry, just with horses and a small bow as a side-weapon. These decimate in combat when using two-handed, which they often prefer to use. I've taken to just charging these in and watching the chaos.

I also use one/two-handed with shield. Personally, I find two-handed is good against most enemies, cavalry included. I've tried lances but never liked them, especially on companions. They're a bit of a one-hit-wonder, literally.

Never really focused on prisoners. Occasionally I'll take Sir Timothy with me if needs be, but overall I've found quick kills and quests are more beneficial than prisoners. At least for my style of play.

 

[Panpiper]

To a degree, it depends on the skills of the companion. Generally speaking however, in my opinion the optimum weapon set is single hand and shield. Other than that, you have the option of having a single hand  blunt in addition to whatever other single hand weapon you equip 'or' going for a ranged weapon. By concentrating on a single melee weapon category, your companions can much more efficiently level up their weapon skill than if they are using all sorts of different weapon types. Single hand weapons don't kill quite as fast as two-hand, but shields more than make up for that with extended life expectancy. Moreover, in siege combat, the shorter range of single hand weapons is an advantage and the shield almost crucial.

If you mount your companions, I strongly recommend against using bows. In fact unless your companion already starts with a high level of power draw, I strongly recommend not using bows at all. You will need to spend skill points boosting power draw in order to make their range option truly effective, and those are skill points you are 'not' then putting elsewhere. Give your troops the biggest crossbow they can carry instead. It requires no investment in skill points and is far more efficient with ammo use, with each bolt doing a 'lot' more damage than arrows from bows.

隐藏

I should note however that I do much as does kevinflemming, modding my game to have all my companions start at level one. I am not as brave as Kevin however and have most of my companions start with stats of 10 and a few points in some basic skills. (I boost Lethaldiran over that, so that he will be a more effective trainer for my CKO.) This may color my thoughts on weapon outfitting somehow.

 

[Jean-Philippe]

I am still in the beginning of my game and money is a major issue, so I equiped everybody with blunt weapons to make prisonners. Anyway it seems they are striking too hard and get more kill than inconsciousness.

 

[Brujoloco]

I am still in the beginning of my game and money is a major issue, so I equiped everybody with blunt weapons to make prisonners. Anyway it seems they are striking too hard and get more kill than inconsciousness.

You can always raid caravans! If you don´t care much, kill them all and loot their goods for $$$ or you can always ask "protection" money off them, not as profitable but then again all you will do is anger the King if you talk to him. During war time and working as merc (which is highly profitable too as the kingdom pays for your troops) I always extort caravans  , though looting villages could be profitable too the net relations loss and companion squabbling is sometimes not worth it. Raiding caravans is like the middle ground of banditry.

 

[Sheep-Goats]

Gear that I feel is better than the rest:

-Heavy D'Shar Saber
-Huscarl Shield
-Fine Light Crossbow or whatever regular bow they have the skill for if it's compound+
-Pack of bolts / arrows
-Caprisoned War Horse of some sort (or better)

Armor just depends on strength.  I use D'Shar Brass (10 STR required) on my weaker troops and whatever they can handle for stronger troops.  The Huscarl shield is very large so low shield skill characters do very well with it, it's durable enough, and it's big enough and presents my insignia strongly enough that I shoot less arrows into my own guys that way.

I bring my guys up to 10 strength and 3 riding if they don't start there.  If they do I don't up any stat other than Intelligence.  I cover Surgery, Wound Treatment, First Aid, Pathfinding, Tracking, Tactics and Engineering with one skill for each lower leveled character and they also get Trainer maxed out.  One character gets looting and levels up agility instead of intelligence.  Any high level companions only really round out their stats to certain points for training a custom knighthood order and put points into training.

Lower weapons skill characters get more kills once they have a decent horse if you give them a lance, but if you give them a one handed weapon and let them use it for about a hundred days they can kill bandits and Vanskerries reliably and that's enough. 

The Heavy D'Shar Sabers are 125 long and true one handed weapons so on horseback they hit with them better than most any other weapon.  They're only sold in D'Shar towns and are pretty rare there so in the interim I either just set them to auto-loot one handed weapons or I give them silvered long swords or regular D'Shar sabers. 

Early game I let them ride around and get kills without instructions so I can level them up.  In the midgame when I'm raising an army they follow me out to draw away the initial cavalry charge while my infantry groups up on a hillside.  They're terrible with their projectile weapons but when they use them they run away from whoever is chasing them and this does a lot to bust up knots of cavalry and infantry so my more concentrated forces can mop up behind them.  Late game I bury them at the bottom of the stack to keep them from getting KO'd so I can benefit from their perk buffs as much as possible.  Even Leth or Siggy never seems as good as a top tier troop and if you put them at the front of your army they take up a lot of slots in tight battles and you end up doing all of the work getting through a 1000 man army when eight of your ten troops are trash (and often start at half health thanks to being revived after gettign KO'd from the last battle from First Aid).  I've tried making them into fighters or archers in the past and unless you're going to use ctrl+X and cheat that just takes an impossibly long time and you end up with mediocre troops when you could have your crack troops out to fend off the crack troops the enemy usually fields first. 

If I had a 10 persuasion character or whatever I would consider just making a couple of intelligence guys with shields and putting them on horses but designating them archers so they stay back in the protected zone and making the other 16 or 17 guys into heavy archers with a two handed weapon (probably two handed maces).  As is charisma is always the last thing I touch as everything in it can be worked around with less effort than Intelligence or Agility or especially Strength (power draw and power strike are just irreplaceable in Pendor thanks to sky high enemy armor values on most tougher armies -- unless you just don't fight yourself, but that's boring as ****). 

I do most of the prisoner harvesting early on myself.  In the midgame army-raising stage I'm just killing dangerous foes with a bow as quickly as they can before they plow into my formation and kill a handfull of guys I've spent so much effort on leveling.  In the lategame I either get Ebony Guantlet or put Doom Maces on my Custom Order and let them gather prisoners for me while I continue to pound jerks into the sand as efficiently as possible, usually with a Ruby Bow and Ruby Axe (often without a shield -- my current guy has 88 chest armor* and I don't have noldor stuff on him yet, so unless I'm fighting Empire or Noldor so some other missile heavy force I don't need the shield).

I also rely more heavily on tournaments for income in the early and mid-game instead of prisoners.  I always stop by the arena and ask if any are going on and if they are that's where I usually go next.

I actually think it's only a little better to use your troops this way than making them into worthwhile warriors or archers or whatever.  Either way they're only a little helpful so you can basically use them however you like and not worry about it.



*Reinforced Eventide Helm adds 10, Lordly guantlets 12, and Reinforced Something Plate adds 66.

 

[Diavolo]

I tend to give some of my companions party roles (surgeon, pathfinding, wound treatment, first aid and engineering) Those with the most important roles get the heaviest armor first and is made into archers on foot to stand safely in the back. The rest is made into heavy cavalry with lances, shields and blunt one handers: doom maces if I can get it, but warhammer is the most common. Then I give the fighters a bit of training skill once they get high level, and the agility woman gets looting. (Sara the Fox)

 

[joeman]

I have a question.  What equipment do you give to a companion that is required to survive?  (e.g. the one with surgery)

Should the companion be on foot or on a horse?  What equipment to give to the compapion and how do you develop?

So far I put Ansen on foot and give him a shield and a mace, but he might survive better if he is on a horse.  When I used to play the old M&B, I give surgery to Sara the Fox because she has a high riding skill and can be put on the horse that cannot be chopped down (I can't remember the name).  However, she is always the first one to get knocked unconscious.    But for this play through, I choose Ansen to be my surgent instead. 

 

[Filou]

I have a question.  What equipment do you give to a companion that is required to survive?  (e.g. the one with surgery)

Should the companion be on foot or on a horse?  What equipment to give to the compapion and how do you develop?

So far I put Ansen on foot and give him a shield and a mace, but he might survive better if he is on a horse.  When I used to play the old M&B, I give surgery to Sara the Fox because she has a high riding skill and can be put on the horse that cannot be chopped down (I can't remember the name).  However, she is always the first one to get knocked unconscious.    But for this play through, I choose Ansen to be my surgent instead.

The main thing to do is to have them in a separate command group so you can order them away from the fight.

I had good results with keeping my surgeon and ranger on foot with shield/1h and a crossbow/bolt. The crossbow lets them get the odd kill in fights where they don't have to hide too far away, and they have their use in sieges.

I also use a fodder group where I put low level troops, they would hang with them. The idea is that if a stray cavalry gets to them the fodder mobs it while the companions do the kill.
In fights where I was expecting to be overrun by heavy cavalry I would sometimes give them the Retreat order to make sure they didn't get knocked-out.

edit: as for developpement, 12STR/9AGI. I max their WM, spare skill points go into IF, PS and shield.
Ansen can get the 3 medic skills at 10 by level 24 with that development. As you push further you can put points into STR for better armor, and Trainer.

My second playtrough I used Adonja and Riva.
Riva maxed her 3 medic skill at level 24. She eventually got 10 in Trainer, 15 STR, and some spiffy armor.
Adonja starts at 12STR/15AGI so you can dump all points into INT right away. She was a slower to get to 30 INT at level 29, but she had 10 in P-F, Spotting, Engineer and Trainer.

 

[azxcvbnm321]

After watching how companions fight, I now equip everyone with 1H + shield and take away all lances except for Alyssa which has a light lance.  They are much better fighters without the lance. 

Those with high 1H weapon proficiency I equip with as many doom maces as I can find, which is usually 2-3.  The rest get a mixture of longswords and Fierd Axes.  The longswords I use are always 110 range or so, the range is very important when fighting on horseback.  High speed is also important, especially for those with medium to low proficiency (in the 200's).  The Ebony Longsword has both great speed and range, but is pretty rare.  As someone else said, the Fierd Axe is surprisingly good stats wise and very common with around 100 speed and 105 range. 

Only those with power draw to begin with get a bow.  I don't use crossbows except with Ansen because they will often not block when they should and will behave like horse archers.  Ansen hardly fights anyway since he's at the very bottom of my troop list and I want him to skirmish.  Those who do get bows will eventually all get Noldor bows, though the bows will be cracked or bent. 

I like fast horses with at least 40 speed so that companions can catch up to other cavalry and won't spend all their time chasing, but never catching.  Good armor and HP are also critical, there are quite a few horses that fit those requirements. 

 

[Panpiper]

I don't use crossbows except with Ansen because they will often not block when they should and will behave like horse archers.

Is this the case even if you equip them with siege crossbows, which they cannot use on horseback? I usually equip my companions as you do with one-hand/shield but then fill the other two spots with a siege crossbow and bolts so they have something to do while waiting for siege towers to roll. That said, them hiding behind shields might make more sense given their low proficiency.

 

[joeman]

Are lances really that bad?  I regularly get a lance in the face and get knocked out.

Right now I am in the early phase without any troops.  My companions all have blunt weapons for prisoners. 

Watching the companions fight, I think fighting with lances are okay when companions are riding high speed.  They get into trouble when they get bogged down with horses standing still.  In that case, the AI sometimes does the right thing and switch weapon, but sometimes doesn't. 

I get a good result having a mixture of calvary and infantry.  It's better than having all calvary. 

 

[Panpiper]

In my experience, if you give companions lances they will almost always keep using their lances, even in the thick of the press, rather ineffectually playing pokey pokey (as I understand it, long weapons loose effectiveness at much closer ranges than their range permits). Sadly there is no command to have them 'stop' using lances. There is a command to force them to go to blunt however. While I would prefer for them to switch to their longswords or whatever, I've often thought of equipping them with a lance and a blunt so they could charge to contact, and then I would order them to switch to blunt for the melee. Once the first press has been dispersed and they are charging again, I could give them the 'weapons free' command (or whatever it's called) to let them go back to lance, until I again see them disadvantaged by it.

I do wish there was a command to order them to go to one-hand weapons, as opposed to just 'anything' or blunt.