I'm planning a 50/50 split amongst my 18 characters. Half will use Bastian, while the other half will use Mirri. This is also why I unlocked both on all my characters already.
For now I have leveled Bastian to level 12, and Mirri to level 7. Going to work on Mirri to 12, and then Bastian to 20. Then Mirri to 20.

Not going to bother with rapport much, as it is so slow, it might as well not even exist. This is also why many think it is broken. ZOS should add a number with the friendship-bar, so we can actually see it going up. Or they could make rapport accountwide.

I still dream about drunk alfiq companion though.

Bastian is such a wuss I can barely stand him. When I was doing his quest and he stated with his wimpy attitude "But that would be... dishonorable" I rolled my eyes so hard I got dizzy. He is such a caricature - and a bad one at that.

Not looking forward to leveling him up. I'll do it for the achievements but then i'll put him away and never use him again.

Level 20 Mirri with epic bow and damage gear does 8-10k dps. She can also stealth < 50% health which Bastian cannot do. Mirri almost never dies. She helps the most with soloing world bosses and makes fights much shorter.

Bastion is good with healing. Mirri has much more interesting dialogues plus she doesn’t mind if Sammy steals stuff. They are both good for different reasons.

I just got both, so haven't really played with them a lot, but from the intro quest dialogues, I think I will like Mirri more.

I entered the zone without any guides since I like exploring on my own when a new DLC comes out, so I ended up at Doomvault Vulpinaz - I have no idea what Vulpinaz means, but made me think at he lilmothid fox kin which are extinct by 2nd era when ESO takes place. There I completed the quest I got Mirri.

I just let her tag along during quests and exploration after that, and I also started doing the guild dailies again to level those skills too. In 4 days I managed to get her to level 11. At some point I found a blue inferno staff and equipped it instead of her default bow. By that time I had also unlocked some more class skills, and so I turned her into a simple magicka nightblade, with a few damage skills and heals. Letting her play melee with the class skills got her killed even in fights with delve bosses, ranged feels much more effective. Both my Dark Elf characters are magicka so magicka NB just felt right.

I got Bastian a bit later but I only summon him when I'm scrying for antiquities to raise his disposition - for any given action the disposition cooldown seems to be around 15 minutes. I play stamina DK I'm not too fond of another DK tagging along, especially considering most class skills are melee. There's little synergy with my play style, and I don't need a tank for encounters. Considering how squishy those companions are and how their AI fails to avoid AOE they probably make really weak ones anyway. Also his personality seems less pleasant than Mirri's from the little interactions I've had with him.

Leveling is pretty slow, but I think the pace is right, since the developers don't want players to blow trough the system in a couple of days and get fed up with it. The biggest problem I've ran into is gearing. I've only found half a dozen companion items, most of them blue quality by clearing Blackwood zone almost entirely - at this point I only have the main quest to do - as well as delves, public dungeons and dolmens outside the area, during the guild dailies. Personally I dislike the idea of giving companions a separate gear type, instead of letting the player gear them up with whatever he can craft or farm.

Overall companions are the least useful addition in terms of end game which was introduced by a chapter. If you look at the other chapters/large DLCs they all brought important additions for the end game: Morrowind - new class, Summerset - two new skill lines, which are quite impactful for end game, Elsweyr - new class, Greymoor - a new system that is essential for acquiring mythic gear pieces which are very strong in end game. If companions get destroyed so easily fighting a delve boss, not to mention world bosses, in real dungeons they will probably end up dead most of the time. I haven't even tried bringing them there.

RaddlemanNumber7 wrote: »

Bastion's speech and character frequently conflict with game mechanics. His attitude to killing innocents, which he does without mercy or prompting, is the prime example.

Mirri has freckles.

No competition really.

Bastian DOES NOT 'attack without prompting'... in fact, he basically does nothing until the player enters combat. So if the PLAYER does something and is attacked by an innocent, then yes, Bastian will attack them for attacking you. Therefore, it's not Bastian who is initiating the attack, it's the player... there is a HUGE difference. It's amazing how so many players seem to always take themselves out of the equation when blame goes around, instead of realizing that the Companions do nothing, wear nothing, equip nothing, have no skills... without PLAYER choice and decision. The only thing that's outside of the player's hands, are their likes/dislikes and no customizing that takes away their specific identity.

Mirri reminds me a lot of Naryu, with the whole sassy sneaky Dark Elf thing. I like her, but her personality just seems a bit derivative to me. Great character design though, she's very pretty.

Bastian is a kind, sweet goody two-shoes, but then you take off his armour and he's covered in dragon tattoos...I have so many questions about that. He's not particularly handsome either, but he's grown on me more than Mirri has.

Bastion's dislikes are too restrictive whereas Mirri is very lax as long as you don't take any bugs.

I don't like dark elves and I can't put a helmet to cover her ugly mug

I wish I can bring both.