Talk:Henchman

I'm not really sure what to do about listing level breakdowns. All that information should be contained within the individual area locations; you'd hit, say, Nolani Academy page and it'd have a little notation: Henchmen Level: 6 (or whatever it is, I forget). It'd still probably be good to have a shorthand version of that on this page, but if we list every city, outpost, and mission JUST to list the level.. enh. Maybe add a link here to zome "master zone list" (do we have one floating around?) and on this page, have a broad level range list; Post-Ascalon henchmen are 3-6, N. Shiverpeaks are mostly 10-12, and so on. Nunix

Yeah, a location taxonomy style box would be useful, which could contain this sort of info. Might knock one up tomorrow and start playing about. LordBiro/Talk 11:12, 5 Jun 2005 (EST)

... cult of (dead) personalities. Sigh. Gravewit

Henchman article content
So, a couple of ground rules I think we should set (though remember that at this stage, everything's open for discussion): Other things: Nunix
 * Word things as "factual" as possible. Biggest instance of this is the "Alesia is not a good healer!" line that was in her article before. I think she's great. I've done every mission with her as only healer and have completed 'em all (with, at most, 1 other PC in the party). Even ran Villainy with her @L 16. So obviously people are going to to have pretty different experiences with the henchmen.
 * Add an image. I'm going to put up a few of these (took some screenies at Yak's Bend) but they're far from the best, and if you've got a better one, upload it (as maybe 1, 2, etc).
 * "Origin" is where you first meet them; I know you first meet Orion on a quest in Pre-Sear, and Thom's sitting there at Barradin's Estate. I don't know the origins of any of the others, but maybe someone else does? Be a good thing to fill out for trivia's sake.
 * Don't forget Category:Henchman and Category:NPC in the top of the article.

We may need to qualify some of the skills within each henchman section as they vary depending on level. Thom, the Cultist and the Enchanter keep getting dropped from the party as they change level so I suspect the changes may be significant between levels.

Alesia uses Heal Other at level 15 or so, but I think not at lower levels. Dunham uses Aura of Restoration at the start, but switches to Fire Attunement again at about level 15.Fengol

Hmm, I'd been wondering about that! Since these pages will remain pretty static, it's probably best to simply assemble as complete a list as possible, and then tighten up the presentation later; maybe add level range after each skill (i.e. Restore Life (L 3-20) or something similar) Nunix

There is are skill listing for all the earlier henchmen in this article. Not sure what the general position is on using the information vs testing ourselves. --Dlanod 10:19, 5 Jul 2005 (EST)

I find the groupings extremely corny. :) "The Ascalon Four" the "other guy#1" :) I think we can break it down by party size. i.e. 4 member parties get to choose from: Orion, Reyna, Alesia and Stefan. 6 member parties get to chose from those plus Thom, Claude and Dunham. 8 member parties are 4 types: Temple of the ages has those same guys. Tomb of the Primeval kings has 4 generic henchmen. Dragon's lair to Thunderhead keep has Lina and then finally the Ring of Fire Islands have the Ascalon Heroes. What do you guys think? If I hear no complaints soon, I'll go about resorting it that way. --Karlos 15:24, 7 Jul 2005 (EST)

Sounds good to me. I contributed to the chaos when adding in the later henchmen without fixing up the earlier groups. Also, the main page still refers to this as "the magnificent seven", back from when people didn't know/there wasn't anyone after Yak's Bend. --Dlanod 15:44, 7 Jul 2005 (EST)

Resurrection Signet
The article says that all henchmen have a Resurrection Signet on them. I'm pretty sure most of them do, but I know that Reyna does not. There have been many times where she is the only member left alive and it will begin a countdown until resurrection, because there is no other way for the rest of the party to respawn due to her not having a Res Signet. Does anyone else know if other henchmen don't have it as well? --Big Blue 04:53, 14 Sep 2005 (EST)
 * They all have a signet or restore life. The timer will start if there are only henchmen left alive with no way to resurrect (as in, they already used their signets).  --Fyren 04:57, 14 Sep 2005 (EST)
 * I can confirm she has it. Only problem is, she is excrutiatingly dumb in using it. In general, you may lose a res signet or two along the way and not notice. In the heat of battle, Alesia gets skewered by a Minotaur and Reyna resurrected her while no one is looking. But, the worst thing is, because she is fairly resilient with Troll Unguent, she will stand around, and then try to use her res sig on Alesia, res her, fight with her for 10 more seconds, then Alesia gets mauled again, then Reyna dies peacefully content that she just added more DP to Alesia whom she actually hates. :) --Karlos 17:07, 14 Sep 2005 (EST)
 * Yes, I noticed that, too. But it's not only Reyna, they're all like this. When a Monk goes down and there is no one left alive in the party with regular means of resurrecting (i.e. a secondary monk player who has a res skill, too) any henchman will usually immediately use a res signet, no matter what the combat situation is. --Eightyfour-onesevenfive 17:15, 14 Sep 2005 (EST)
 * OK, I guess I'll just pay closer attention next time. Thanks for clearing it up, guys! --205.173.169.253 23:21, 14 Sep 2005 (EST)

Comment on Henchmen "Pro & Con"
When talking about pro and con, my immediate impression is a comparison between different henchmen. For example, Alesia's pro is that she's a healer, because most other henchies don't heal. If I want to decide whether to pick Alesia over other henchies, I look at the pro and con of each henchman. On the other hand, some of the entries compare the pro and con against profession sterotypes or other factors. Example, Dunham is a mesmer, but does not interrupt/shutdown. I feel like this kind of issue should be in a different subsection, because if I decide to leave Dunham out of my group, based on that con, I'll be taking someone else who can't interrupt/shutdown either. I'm not saying ppl can't complain about Dunham not doing shutdown, but is there a logical way to put it in a different subsection? I hope I'm making sense. -PanSola 12:30, 18 October 2005 (EST)


 * I think telling players what to expect is a good thing. Frankly, this is semantics. Do you question that the info should be there? No. You just don't like it in the form of "pros" and "cons." I disagree. --Karlos 16:34, 18 October 2005 (EST)


 * I believe we got two types of info mixed up in one single catagory. For pros, it's pretty much all comparisons between henchies, whereas for the cons, we got a mixed bag of inter-henchie comparison and individual deficiency as characters of respective professions.  Yes, it is semantics, and in my humble opinion this is one of the case where semantics does make a helpful difference.  I'm not asking stuff to be removed.  I'm wondering if there's a way to distinguish comparisons among henchies from deficiencies of individual henchies, by creating a new category outside of "pros & cons".  Both information are helpful to players, and I believe the helpfulness to players can be increased if two different types of evaluations are in two different sections.  There are time when I want to know all the evils of watching TV.  Othertimes I want to compare the good and bad of watching Television on my couch, playing GuildWars in front of my computer, drinking beer at a bar, or doing homework that was due an hour ago.  Two types of evaluation, two lists. Useful semantics. -PanSola 21:34, 18 October 2005 (EST)


 * I categorically disagree:
 * The example of the TV and the couch is not pertinent. Please explain the pertinence in terms of usability to the user or readability or something related to this wiki.
 * The content is not even big enough to warrant a division.
 * I frankly don't see your point altogether. It's not like the user reading that Devona is not as good defensively as Stefan yet at the same time she packs a powerful punch is going to be concerned and confused that one info was relative to Stefan and the other is not. I am really trying to see the need for us to change all those pages to some new format just because semantically, this note is made in reference to Cynn, while that note is made in reference to human players.
 * In contrast, I believe this is a list of "What can you do with him" and "What to watch out for (how he may fail you)." I am looking at it purely from a user's perspective. Especially a user who is new to the game who doesn't know Little Thom from Big Ben. I think they should be be told what the henchman does well, what he does poorly, what he can do and what he can't do. I only put the stereotypical stuff because that's what a "noob" would expect. That Claude can raise the dead and that Dunham can abuse spell-casters.
 * --Karlos 21:59, 18 October 2005 (EST)

Some Changes
Cynn: Fire Ele Little Thom: Axe War :)

--Melly 23:13, 21 October 2005 (EST)

While Dunham was labeled as an "Enchanter" in the game, he has no enchantment skills whatsoever. A Hexing Mesmer might describe him better, since 2 out of 6 of his skills are hexes. -PanSola 02:45, 23 October 2005 (EST)


 * I would describe his as a useless mesmer, but it's not up to me. :) The game uses "Enchanter" in the same sense as "Enchanter's Armor" Enchanter here being one who enchants others, not necessarily one who casts "Guild Wars style enchantment spells." Loosely, enchantment as a word contains hexes. --Karlos 07:44, 23 October 2005 (EST)
 * Which always makes me wonder if those "Enchantments last 20% longer" mods work on hex spells too (anyone actually knows the answer for sure?)... Anyways, it's still misleading.  We can't do anyting about Anet's labeling, but since we aren't calling Little Thorn a "brawling warrior", might as well NOT call Dunham an "enchanting mesmer".  Besides, the only things Dunham can do that would make him "one who enchants others", are his two hexes, nothing else...  So I vote either just label him as a plain "mesmer", or a "hexing mesmer" to lower the possibility for confusion.  -PanSola 10:30, 23 October 2005 (EST)

I updated the section mentioning that the Zaishen henchmen were only available during the PVP Beta event as that's been and gone now and they're still here. Planescape@gmail.com

Reyna/Dunham Res Signet
Can anyone verify the recent anon edit about Reyna and Dunham's res signet? I would tend to discredit it as Dunham isn't available before Yak's Bend (which is where it says they start using it), but I can't say as to wheather Reyna might behave like this as I've never used her before at least Kryta (and she seems to me to be the first one to always use a res signet). --Rainith 22:37, 6 December 2005 (UTC)


 * It's just people being stupid. I don't know how this got to be such a popular myth.  I've verified that all the henchmen have restore life or a signet.  --Fyren 23:05, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Henchmen old names...
I remember the whole "We are only going to reflect the state of the game now" deal. From that perspective, should all the notes about "Henchmen Blah used to be named Blah Bludder" be deleted? Or do they still serve some value of present relavence? -PanSola 01:10, 7 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Probably should be gotten rid of. --Rainith 01:21, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

ranger descriptors
Reyna and Aiden are simply listed as 'Ranger' while everyone else has their main skill line before their profession. Would it be fair to call them 'Marksmanship Ranger'? They don't use traps and they don't have animal companions. --Nunix 04:47, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Arching Ranger? d-:


 * I believe they are generic rangers. They're no exactly super archers either. --Karlos 05:33, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Weill their only attack is with the bow (with enhancing preparations), so I figure they'd be archers. -PanSola 05:38, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Death Penalty
I heard that the henchmen do not suffer from DP although my own experience felt like they were getting squishier after falling several times. Any thoughts on where and how this rumor came to be? --Ishmaeel 02:14, 15 February 2006 (CST)
 * That must be a rumor. I can't say I have any sources to confirm this, but experience tell me that they must have DP. (Things like claude dying faster each time and such :P) --Markild 02:32, 3 March 2006 (CST)

Redundant Information
At this point, almost everything in the section "The Henchman" appears redundant to what is shown in the following table "Henchman Availability". Is there any objection to simply adding notes to the table for the four Zaishen henchies, as well as the two special event groups; then eliminating the section "The Henchmen"?
 * Does no reply signify acceptance of the change, or lack of traffic to this talk page? If no one replies, I'll just make the change later today.  I guess it can always be reverted back if someone objects. --161.88.x.x 01:32, 2 March 2006 (CST)
 * A long enough period of no reply probably means it's ok to change. People will certainly speak up after that if they disagree(d).  ;)  --JoDiamonds 04:21, 3 March 2006 (CST)

"Yes" and "No" templates are broken
Well, I have no idea why they stopped working (perhaps it's just an IE issue?) At any rate, I made a change that removes the "style" text from the henchmen table so that the style actually affected the text, but the data still isn't showing in columns like it should. --Barek 22:54, 4 March 2006 (CST)
 * Fixed by Skuld --Barek 23:07, 4 March 2006 (CST)

Henchmen Penalty
I was playing with some people last night, and one of them told me that parties recieve a "penalty" for taking henchmen, in that the chance of recieving loot is disproportional to the number of people in the party. The example he gave was that if you were in a party with 7 henchmen then rather than having a 1 in 8 chance of getting a drop it was actually more like a 1 in 15 chance, I.E. every henchman counts as two people.

I said that I didn't think that this was true, but someone else in our group (a guy who is generally right about these kind of things) said he thought this was the case as well. Does anyone have any information on this? 23:31, 10 March 2006 (CST)
 * I'll try some tests this weekend to actually quantify the drops. But I really don't think it makes a difference.  You'll see fewer drops on the ground, but that's just because the henchie drops aren't visible.  I've done most of the explorable areas with both henchies and with human groups, and my memory is that I came out of it with the same count of goodies as long as the overall party size was the same. --161.88.255.140 00:32, 11 March 2006 (CST)


 * Yeah, that's what I thought 161.88.255.140, I think this would be something that's difficult to test. I mean, if you do end up getting less in a party of the same size with henchmen, you could just argue that you were unlucky. It would take a number of averages to show any conclusive evidence. I'm just thinking out loud really :) Any confirmation would be a help! 00:46, 11 March 2006 (CST)


 * Hi Biro, long time no see! :) I've read that rumor, too, somewhere. To me it is just another rumor about drop rates. Hmm, maybe if I'm really bored some time soon, I'll see if I can prove it wrong. :) --Eightyfour-onesevenfive 02:15, 11 March 2006 (CST)


 * Lord Biro lives!! :) Good to see you around, sir. And to answer your question, I believe such a hypothesis is Charr Doodoo of the highest quality too. :) First of all, why would ANet do that? To discourage using henchmen? Because they know henchmen actually outperform human players 90% of the time? And second, it is not corroberated by any evidence. I can make a note of drops in a mission and get back to you on that, but I think it's overkill. I think the only difference (a slight one at that) is that henchmen won't leave drops behind that you can come around and pick up later, so it feels like you had more drops with people than henchmen because many players leave drops behind. --Karlos 07:36, 11 March 2006 (CST)


 * Ok, I just went out for a stroll with Alesia into the Black Curtain.. I was up 10-8 on drops when I got tired of doing it. I do two man farming a lot and the drop pattern with Alesia is the same, you get an item she gets one, you get two in a row, she gets two in a row soon after. No surprises. --Karlos 18:25, 11 March 2006 (CST)