Why do starting characters suck?

[sirwilliamthomas]

Why is it when you create a starting character the 4 characters cannot have the same trait and you also pick 2 and have a negative trait. The mercs you hire are so much better. The only disadvantage you can't customize them

[Arctuhris]

I find Glutton (+1 food per rest) to be a very cheap offset to have Bloodthirsty (+3 Crit Chance), as there are very few ways to boost crit and it is exceedingly powerful if you can stack it. NB, I do play on Hard/Hard with free scaling, so being able to 1 v 2 or 1 v 3 with my main damage dealers is very important.

Pushing crit on a berserker w/ the legendary 2-H axe is *amazing.* I always make my berserker the camp tinker for the boosted crit. Going one-handed for the boosted crit skills that can be earned are not iMHO worth giving up the legendary 2-H axe. Perhaps if they put in legendary 1-handers later, I would go 1 handed, as it is 8% crit (I think), for the dagger and the 1-handed earned trait.

Likewise, 5% strength/dex doesn't seem like much, but at high levels, it is usually at least a +5 bonus, making it one of the best damage boosting traits a character can have. Again, totally worth +1 food.

[Red Grail]

Your characters gain traits as you fight anyway so eventually all your companions will have a dozen good traits. It really doesn't matter in the long run.

[Dorim]

Originally posted by sirwilliamthomas:

Why is it when you create a starting character the 4 characters cannot have the same trait and you also pick 2 and have a negative trait. The mercs you hire are so much better. The only disadvantage you can't customize them

Starting mercs are fine, the reason you see mercs at the inn with 3 or more positive traits is because they've already got some of the unlockable ones you can earn through combat.

Just take the lazy trait. 10% less profession exp just means it'll take you a couple more crafts/nodes to cap out a profession, which you'll cap out long before end game anyways.

[Stardustfire]

strange, you game must be bugged, i can choose the same trait for all 4 start mercs.
also if all tavern mercs you can hire all have only positive and useful traits than there must be something bugged again. i can visit the tavern for days and what i get offerd is mostly as worse as prison recruits, because they have really bad traits mixed in as well.

[Andrey]

Originally posted by sirwilliamthomas:

Why is it when you create a starting character the 4 characters cannot have the same trait and you also pick 2 and have a negative trait. The mercs you hire are so much better. The only disadvantage you can't customize them

I believe you could pick those traits which you can't get later.
All other traits you could get during the game.