I think there's merit to the statement that AC is especially important.
Kuma wrote: ↑Sun Mar 31, 2024 2:02 pm
This may also be a good place to list weirdness or inconsistencies with DCs to hire being out of wack with their capabilities.
On my experience with UD henchmen, there seems to be a massive gap of henchmen varying from very powerful to nigh-useless, hopefully others will also share their perhaps more in-depth analysis:
Low level henchmen seemed alright from my experience, but further in there are some oddities.
Shanz'ix and Caine (noble-only), level 15-25, are really good henchmen, bearing 50-ish AC, with one of them having rogue abilities. They're very reliable.
When one leaves the level 15-25 area, next up, level 20-30 is Gn'Taath. They require an invested 50 leadership and have barely about 30 (28? I have that number written down somewhere) AC, immediately at risk of dying to an average encounter. First time taking them out and seeing them dead, I thought they got hit with a death spell I didn't notice, before reading the combat logs and seeing them just get obliterated.
There is also the noble-only level 20-30 Mystefixzes. I haven't used them personally, but everyone I talked to says they're nigh-worthless, having not tried them myself (Bloodbeard proved sufficient for most things without occupying more henchmen). Things I hear is low AC, barely able to deal damage, supposedly their only recommended use is as a pocket healer.
Effectively, after level 25, one loses access to 2 really good henchmen which get replaced by squishy ones that you have to -guard (if you yourself have the leisure of being tanky) and babysit.
On the flipside, there is the Matron Bloodbeard Also 20-30, noble only. Very powerful henchman, high AC and generally a lot of features, though they're noble-restricted so many people won't have the opportunity to use them.
Inside the Greyport authority building, there is also Raktarh, who also suffers from 30-ish AC ranges. Not a particularly great henchman, also one that many won't have access to.
Update: Having tried them, they're very mediocre. They'd contribute slightly in a group, but playing a bard I wasn't able to rely on them to handle PVE content, even supported by the (admittedly now heavily nerfed) summons.