Do "fighter" thralls use Strength weapons better? Should "archer" types use agility?

[EmberStar]

I'm curious, since the NPC character sheets don't show actual damage numbers. Do "fighter" type thralls have a better default damage modifier for Strength weapons? Should Archer types use dagger/katana and a bow? I know Bearer type thralls have a massive damage debuff for being Bearers - the calculation I saw was that if they had a weapon that did a base ten points, in their hands it would do less than three points. (Assuming that was correct.)

So, should I try to match thralls with the "right" kind of weapon? Or should I just give them whichever one they have the best bonus for? I'd like a little more variety than just giving them all a copy of the Tenderizer. I'm aware that because thralls are stupid and the attack animations and area of effect are uneven, thralls don't benefit from some weapons and should probably NEVER use Short Swords. Apparently they just do NOT have the ability to use those well at all. But I've got a ton of Legendary weapons from booping the various skeleton lords in the Nameless City, and I'd kind of like to use them rather than just shredding them all in the Improved Dismantling Bench.

[BurlsoL]

I usually just give my archer thralls spears or 2 handed axes. The weapon effect tends to be useful enough in those rare cases they have to fight, the damage is usually high enough that they can deal with petty enemies without issue, but the damage isn't so much that I can't pull back attention from what it is that we're trying to fight so they can go back to using range. Daggers could probably work well for base defense, but the frequency of attacks almost assured that they'll keep the attention of the enemy.

[Xevyr]

Originally posted by EmberStar:

I'm curious, since the NPC character sheets don't show actual damage numbers. Do "fighter" type thralls have a better default damage modifier for Strength weapons? Should Archer types use dagger/katana and a bow? I know Bearer type thralls have a massive damage debuff for being Bearers - the calculation I saw was that if they had a weapon that did a base ten points, in their hands it would do less than three points. (Assuming that was correct.)

So, should I try to match thralls with the "right" kind of weapon? Or should I just give them whichever one they have the best bonus for? I'd like a little more variety than just giving them all a copy of the Tenderizer. I'm aware that because thralls are stupid and the attack animations and area of effect are uneven, thralls don't benefit from some weapons and should probably NEVER use Short Swords. Apparently they just do NOT have the ability to use those well at all. But I've got a ton of Legendary weapons from booping the various skeleton lords in the Nameless City, and I'd kind of like to use them rather than just shredding them all in the Improved Dismantling Bench.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2869231805

That shows the stats of all thralls as well as damage modifiers and the likes (hover over the column headers in the spreadsheet for more info)

As far as their weapon efficiency goes, when it comes to fighter thralls, especially T4, and against bosses, their best performance is with 1 handed maces, regardless of anything else.. you could dress a RHTS built for agility in full agility damage gear and it will still do more damage with a 1h mace than with any agility weapon.
It's mainly because of the defined combos and not having any downtime (like holding the katana dash animation for a few seconds) as well as having longer hyper armor windows on the heavy swings than with most other weapons so a higher chance of resisting knockdown effects from bosses.

They're also pretty good with 2h swords against bosses who don't have knockdowns or large groups of weaker things like humanoids

With that being said though, we tend to get too focused on numbers and "best" things.. so just remember that you don't have to min-max, if you want to build an agility thrall with a katana that's perfectly fine too and it will still do viable damage that will get you by in most situations.

Also, archer thralls don't differ in any way from fighters aside from the different templates set up for them that you can see in that spreadsheet, meaning that the tag "archer" is just a text and doesn't influence their actual behavior or fighting skills.. they just generally have worse stats set up then the equivalent tier / race fighters.

What does that mean? If you're still starting out and only have access to cannibals or exiles along the river but you happen to get a Varpnir from the caravan merchants who is an archer.. you can still just slap a mace on him and use him as a melee fighter just fine and it'll be better than what you can get around there.

[thurgond]

The faction determines if a combat thrall is strength or an agility based, plus their growth chances and what you feed them.

Fighters and archers of the same faction and tier will start with the same stats. Usually their bonuses for melee and ranged are also the same or close. Black Hand, Dogs of the Desert and Relic Hunters start with high agility. Lemurians, Nordheimers, and Cimmerians start with a high agility.

I tend to feed thralls gruel which bumps their strength growth (and is cheap, stacks to 100 and heals well). Some times I will feed them steak which bumps vitality.

Thralls then to complete combos best with maces and the penetration is good on bosses. Two handed swords are good on strength fighter when fighting numerous foes and the penetration is good enough for bosses. You should never give thralls the Predatory Blade, but other short swords are pretty good on agility fighters. Katanas aren't bad on agility thralls.

Poisoned weapons work well on bearers as they will survive long enough for stacked poisons to work.

In short, give the thrall whatever you have that matches their best bonus. It will make some difference, but won't matter much for your base guards.

[EmberStar]

I figured out about the Predatory Blade. It has really high damage, but essentially no heavy attack damage at all. (I think it actually switches to Concussive on a heavy attack, and even then does almost nothing? The grey "stunned" bar pops up on humans if I forget and whack them with a heavy attack.)

From the few times I've tried to give them one, the problem seems to be that Thralls like to combo and Short Swords have a *very* narrow collision box. It's super easy for an enemy to step out of it (or the thrall to slide past them during the animations.) And as with the legacy Undead, thralls are too stupid to realize their combo has missed, they'll finish it no matter what. I still have a couple of the old Undead on my Exiled Lands character, and with the Well Trained perk the Silent Legion one is *really* strong... when he manages to hit anything at all. He's usually doing heavy lunges at nothing on the far side of the clearing while a wild bear gnaws on my head. Thralls tend to do the same thing with short swords, and spend a lot of time swinging at air.

I hope at some point Funcom does another balance pass on weapons and Thrall AI so that more than just maces are a viable choice. Because yeah, even for a T3 Bearer with mostly agility and wearing my old set of Skelos Cultist Master armor (where she can benefit from the +agility and +concussion stats, I think?) she's better off with a spare Tenderizer for booping random hyenas as I'm traveling and looking for a T4 blacksmith.

( OnO )

[Teratus]

Not sure if Fighter/Archer makes any specific difference.. might be a difference in base damage for ranged or melee weapons but in general I give Thralls weapons based on their highest stat.

If a Warrior has higher Strength, they get a strength weapon, if it's agility then they get an Agility weapon instead.

I do tend to prefer my Archers to use bows though, just because they're Archers.