companions useless?

[Nanukotu]

I play the game on hard and it seems my companions die so freaking easily so the only point to actually have them out in the field is for the extra perks and nothing more.

Now the question is if they are designed to just be this horrible or am i doing something wrong and the fact that enemies seem to take 8-10 hits to die while i myself take 2-3 hits even with the extra 50% hp perk lol

[Cutlass Jack]

What difficulty are you playing on? And are you giving them better gear? Do you have any points in leadership? All those things have a factor.

[Kenby Clemente]

I played on normal, so maybe things are a lot different on hard. But I went with a full companion build and it was completely broken. I put no points in gun skills and barely ever shot anything (when I did, my bullets usually couldn't even penetrate armor), didn't use a single weapons mod, and never used TTD. The two companions would just destroy everything. The final boss fight lasted under 30 seconds and I didn't even participate beyond spamming inhalers when needed.

When doing an ability build, being able to spam Pavreti's stun on bosses is ridiculous. And the companion you get on Monarch with the machine gun does insane dps.

I died twice the entire game (both to mantiqueens) and that includes killing every guard in Byzantium lol.

Parveti did die really easy in the beginning, but with some perks and leadership skills that stopped. Also, the dude you get on the Groundbreaker is pretty lame. I didn't try the preacher, so I'm not sure how well he does.

They don't use ammo, so feel free to give them all the high dps machine guns.

[Viper]

Change there gear and change there behavior parameters. You can even have them stand far away form you and use only ranged weapons. If there dying easily its because you are letting them.

[Revolucas]

Dude are you kidding? Companions are OP if you invest in the two companion skills. You literally can just stand there spamming their abilities without firing a shot.

[Wolf Fae Witch]

all the companions are amazing in their own right and here is why they are.
https://www.gamers decide.com/articles/the-outer-worlds-best-companions