RPGs: Useless companions

[Freaky Lou]

Every character in Fire Emblem that isn't Hector.

This, except Sacred Stones, and Ewan instead of Hector.

I'd also add Rex from New Vegas, but because he always gets in the way of my shots. I have that problem with most companions, actually; which is why Boone is the most helpful. I do use Veronica a lot though, just 'cause I like her so much.

Pretty much everyone in Skyrim, at that. Companions really ruin the feel of the game for me, and get in the way of my many projectiles.

 

[Daggedawg]

Persona 3: I literally never even touched Mitsuru or Ken. I tried out having Koromaru and Shinji in my party for a while, but eventually, I just stuck with Junpei, Yukari and Akihiko.

 

[pirateninj4]

Pretty much every Final Fantasy has at least one person I don't use.

*list snipped*

Hmm, you really don't like blue magic, do you? It was implemented really, really well in FF5 and never quite as well since, so I have to say I'm pretty much the same way. Quina is overpowered though, not underpowered - level her blue magic and she's pretty much a gamebreaker.

Fuck yea she is. All those group heals and buffs...man I loved using Quina.

*Edit: Also Quistis (or however you spell it) from FF8. OT: Cid from FF7 and Wakka, although one of his limit breaks actually turned out pretty decent end game.

 

[Diablo2000]

In FFX you're missing out the wonderful Rikku. What's that; you're hideously weak and have no offensive skills? Ok, back to the pile you go!

Actually her skills are one of the most useful.
That mix skill can have the most awesome effects like making all the characters affect by it receice\deal 9999 of damage.

 

[AD-Stu]

Much as I loved most of the games themselves, I'm going to nominate about half the party members in any given Bioware game from the past 10 years.

- Mass Effect 1 was probably their best effort, given the small number of squadmates. I found Ashley pretty redundant since she's basically just a less-versatile Wrex, and to a lesser extent I found the same to be the case with Kaiden compared to Liara. But for the main part I thought everyone had their uses depending on your main character build.

- Mass Effect 2, on the other hand, I found about half the squad rarely got used, especially since they removed the need for tech skills outside of combat so everything is focussed on combat abilities. I don't think I've ever used Jacob or Mordin outside of times when I was forced to, Zaeed was pretty redundant and I rarely used Kasumi or Thane either. I did use Jack a bit though, and the shockwave attack was boss on those irritating flying-platform Collector levels in particular...

- I can't remember the names but I'm pretty sure I never used more than a couple of the companions from Jade Empire. Can't remember if it was because I didn't think they were useful, they irritated me, or both.

- Same goes for KOTOR 1 and 2. Mission, T3, G0-T0, Carth *ugh*, Bao-Dur... those games were all about the Jedi party members for me. I appreciated that KOTOR 2 gave most of your squadmates a chance to shine through their solo / group missions though.

 

[Caverat]

I enjoyed T3-M4, him and HK were my homies. I just loved the idea of an astromech firing dual heavy blaster pistols rapidly, while hk providing heavy weapon support.

For me, mission's pet wookie, never bothered. Also the wookie in KOTOR2, as well as the blind chick.

FF7 Tifa. yeah, I just didn't like her

DAO: Wynne DA2: The gay one, the really gay one.(Not why, his whining annoyed me) Can't remember his name. Character from Awakening brought back.

 

[RuralGamer]

Fallout 3 - Everyone except Fawkes

Fawkes is the uber companion. it was actually kind of ridiculous and unfair to NPCs just how strong and useful he is.
as awesome as he was, he actually died on me once. somehow, he got stuck on some derbies, wouldn't move or fight back, and got mowed down by a laser turret. it was actually kind of funny: he just stood there for almost 30 seconds while this laser turret chipped away at his health.

I was in a similar situation; Fawkes kicks so much ass and at higher levels seems to be nigh on invincible, whereas most of the others either die really easily, or are useless in combat.

 

[DanielBrown]

Thinking back of my old Final Fantasy days it's pretty clear that I didn't take any girls along for the ride, but when it comes to more recent RPGs;
Dragon Age - Sten and the Dog. Why is harder to say. The dog was pretty useless and I assume it didn't have much voice work apart from the barks. Sten never felt intresting enough. There are already lots of warriors I'd rather take with me.

Fallout 3 - Only ever taken Fawkes as a companion there. Usually end up just staring at him while he screams and charges the enemies.

 

[iseeyouthere]

I find all companions useless.

Yes, I am a loner in games.
More loot for me, less wasting health items and less worrying about their pathetic AI.

 

[JesterRaiin]

Skyrim :
Mjoll the Lioness. Decent character, good 2handed weapon specialist but i always felt she's Skyrim's Batman and Riften needs her more that i do.

Mass Effect 1-2 :
Krogans. What can i say... I'm a racist.
Jack. She's useless and uninteresting.
that thief chick. Ditto.

Fallout 3 :
Everyone except Fawkes. Not interesting enough.

 

[Jandau]

KotOR - Everyone who isn't a Jedi
KotOR 2 - Everyone who isn't a Jedi/Sith

No love for the assassin droid and the Locust? Man, you're no fun.

That said, it's not like companions were actually necessary in those games anyhow, even if you built one into a glass cannon and you were a tank you'd still take things down just as fast solo.

HK-47 was a fun character, the non-jedi characters weren't bad AS CHARACTERS, but when it came down to actual usefulness, Jedi outclassed everything else. Attack damage, special abilites, everything. Non-Jedi were always one step behind.

 

[Amnestic]

Sten's crap simply because Mages > Everything in DA:O. Bring a rogue for the traps, a tank, a healer and then a damage mage. Granted, you don't HAVE to do that, but whenever I brought Oghren or Sten, they felt like a waste of space. At least when I played a 2H Warrior myself, I got all the free stats ans whatnot that made me decent.

Or you could just go 4 mages. Arcane warrior tank + healer mage + 2 damage mages. Kill every boss in the game using autoattack!

Considering that an Arcane Warrior can solo DA:O on the hardest difficulty...yeah, mages are completely freaking broken. If you rock an Arcane Warrior, you can just pick and choose your companions based on which ones you like personality wise and screw whatever combat aspects they have.

Carla and Yuki from SRWOG2. You got them wayyyyy too late in the game for them to be any real use. You ended up with a lot of superfluous characters by the endgame though. Between the ATX and SRX teams you had almost half your deployment slots filled already. Add in Cybuster, the Valsione, and the Aggressors and you've only got a few 'wild card' slots remaining.

 

[Brawndo]

Pretty much every Final Fantasy has at least one person I don't use.

FF5: Class-wise, the Ninja. Not sure why...

Then you don't know about the Ninja ability Gil Toss, which practically breaks the game.

Step 1: Throw gil at enemies for massive damage
Step 2: Get gil from dead enemies to replace gil thrown at said enemies
Step 3: Repeat Steps 1-2 in every battle ever
Step 4: ???
Step 5: Profit

 

[TD_Knight]

Jack. She's useless and uninteresting.
that thief chick. Ditto.

Jack's shockwave was somewhat handy against husks and the like, and she did have pull to set up warp detonations. And she's a tsundere woobie, go give her a hug

As for Kasumi, her flashbang was one of, if not, the most overpowered abilities in the game. I mean seriously, an ability on a relatively short cooldown that staggers enemies through shields/armour/barriers, causes weapon overheats, does damage, has a huge radius, and knocks down unshielded targets for about 7 seconds or so.

Forget her shadow strike, flashbang's where it's at.

Anyways, Sten from DA:O lacked a specialization and didn't really have anything to compensate, and Zevran was supposed to be a Cunning based Assassin but he starts out with high Dexterity instead, and his friendship bonuses give him more Dexterity, even though the Assassin tree scales with Cunning and Lethality makes rogues use Cunning in place of Strength.

Oghren too, since 2H warriors in DA:O weren't that great even if you micromanaged them and weaved in Sunder Arms/Armour in between normal strikes.

So, I'd just go with those three.

 

[ms_sunlight]

- Same goes for KOTOR 1 and 2. Mission, T3, G0-T0, Carth *ugh*, Bao-Dur... those games were all about the Jedi party members for me. I appreciated that KOTOR 2 gave most of your squadmates a chance to shine through their solo / group missions though.

Bao-Dur can be a Jedi if you want. He's brilliant as a Jedi Guardian, does serious damage and can tank too. He's one of my favourite characters in that game - I love his relationship with the Jedi Exile.

I love the Exile's companions in general, especially if you go light side; if I had to pick the best set of companions in any RPG ever, they would probably be it.

 

[JesterRaiin]

Jack. She's useless and uninteresting.
that thief chick. Ditto.

Jack's shockwave was somewhat handy against husks and the like, and she did have pull to set up warp detonations. And she's a tsundere woobie, go give her a hug

As for Kasumi, her flashbang was one of, if not, the most overpowered abilities in the game. I mean seriously, an ability on a relatively short cooldown that staggers enemies through shields/armour/barriers, causes weapon overheats, does damage, has a huge radius, and knocks down unshielded targets for about 7 seconds or so.

Forget her shadow strike, flashbang's where it's at.

Naaaaaaaaaaah. Other Shepardites were way much better without any supervision whatsoever... I'm not big fan of doing it hard way.

 

[everythingbeeps]

There are companions in EVERY RPG I don't use, because I'm one of those people who will typically find my three or four favorites and ride them the whole game.

Perfect example is Mass Effect 2. My go-to party will include two of the following: Mordin, Miranda, Jack, or Tali. The rest of the companions sit unused in their little hidey-holes. It's not that they're "useless" per se, I just have no use for them.

 

[McMarbles]

Pretty much every Final Fantasy has at least one person I don't use.

FF5: Class-wise, the Ninja. Not sure why...

Then you don't know about the Ninja ability Gil Toss, which practically breaks the game.

Step 1: Throw gil at enemies for massive damage
Step 2: Get gil from dead enemies to replace gil thrown at said enemies
Step 3: Repeat Steps 1-2 in every battle ever
Step 4: ???
Step 5: Profit

And if Gil-Toss/Zeninage doesn't break the game, dual-weilding/the Ranger's Scattershot does.

 

[putowtin]

I got a confession, my first playthrough of Fallout 3, I didn't even realise you could have companions!
In my second playthrough I used companions... never again! Idiots just run off and get shoot or shot me in the f@cking back!

 

[Reishadowen]

While not technically an RPG it is described as one, Mass Effect 2's Jack has to be one of the most useless characters ever. In a possible case of worst false adverting ever, Jack is described as being one of the most dangerous and most powerful biotic in the galaxy. And when you first meet her, it seems that way as she has single handedly almost destroyed half the prison complex where she is being held. However, once she joins you cheery cast of misfits...well...my cat is a more powerful biotic. Her only use is to make the biotic shield during the suicide mission and thats it. Ever get the feeling you've been conned?

Haha truth. I have no idea why the devs thought the shockwave power was remotely useful for anything in that game. At least she has pull?

Well, while I admit "pull" kinda sucks, as does her special ammo power, she is the only team-mate to learn Shockwave. While not great, it absolutely SHREDDED husks like a hot-knife through butter. One well-aimed blast and you could take out a whole platform of them; those that didn't go off cliffs would insta-die anyways regardless. Another fun use was that it destroyed destructible cover almost instantly, and it would often send enemies that were taking cover(destructible or not) flying out into the open.

But otherwise, I too feel she was a little bit of a letdown when you finally recruited her.

I would also comment about Fire Emblem characters, but if I did, I'd be here all d*mn day. To put it VERY short and generalized list, pretty much anyone who isn't a Lord, Amelia from Sacred Stones(as general-class), or part of the Greil Mercenaries, has a better chance of sucking than being good.