Avowed's Companions: A Ranked Guide from Worst to Best
Beyond their narrative roles and dialogue, Avowed's Companions offer significant gameplay advantages, from pathfinding to combat prowess. This guide ranks each companion, from least to most effective.
4. Marius
Early game exploration benefits aside, Marius quickly becomes outmatched. His strengths lie in item and plant discovery, but his combat capabilities are underwhelming.
- Abilities & Upgrades:
- Blinding Roots: Roots enemies (upgradeable to stun, trap multiple, inflict Bleed).
- Heart Seeker: Piercing shot (upgradeable to hit two enemies, increased damage vs. low health, reduced cooldown).
- Shadow Step: Vanishes and strikes (upgradeable to instantly kill stunned enemies, increased damage vs. low health, multiple strikes).
- Wounding Shots: Inflicts Bleed (upgradeable to reduce enemy damage reduction, slow enemies, reduce enemy damage).
Marius' abilities primarily focus on crowd control and weakening enemies. While useful against specific enemy types, particularly when paired with a melee-focused Envoy, his overall combat effectiveness falls short for most of the game.
3. Giatta
Giatta, a support-oriented Animancer, excels at healing, shielding, and buffing the party. While lacking in direct damage, her utility is invaluable during challenging encounters, especially boss fights. She also possesses the unique ability to activate Essence Generators, opening up late-game areas.
- Abilities & Upgrades:
- Purification: Heals allies (upgradeable to increased healing, enemy interrupt/knockback, increased ally damage reduction).
- Barrier: Grants allies temporary health (upgradeable to increased temporary health, healing on barrier expiration, self-protection).
- Acceleration: Increases ally movement and attack speed (upgradeable to damage reduction, extended duration, ability cooldown reduction).
- Reconstruction: Attacks heal allies (upgradeable to increased healing for low-health allies, temporary health for full-health allies, ally revive on enemy kill).
Giatta synergizes exceptionally well with magic-focused Envoy builds.
2. Kai
Despite being an early recruit, Kai remains a valuable asset throughout Avowed. This tanky companion delivers substantial damage with minimal player intervention.
- Abilities & Upgrades:
- Fire and Ire: Blunderbuss shot with stun and taunt (upgradeable to ignite target, increased stun, reduced cooldown).
- Unbending Defense: Health regeneration and damage reduction (upgradeable to increased damage reduction, increased health regeneration, area-of-effect damage).
- Leap of Daring: Stuns and taunts nearby enemies (upgradeable to increased area of effect, temporary health per hit, bonus attack damage per hit).
- Second Wind: Self-revive (upgradeable to increased health restoration, attack speed burst, ability cooldown reset).
Kai's abilities are effective against both single, high-health enemies and groups. His self-revive makes him incredibly reliable, and his fire attacks can remove environmental obstacles.
1. Yatzli
Yatzli, a powerful Wizard, boasts high-damage attacks and exceptional crowd control. She's the closest thing to air support in Avowed's Living Lands.
- Abilities & Upgrades:
- Essence Explosion: Explosive arcane damage (upgradeable to increased blast radius, fire accumulation, reduced cooldown).
- Minoletta’s Missile Battery: Volley of homing missiles (upgradeable to increased fire rate, range, shock accumulation).
- Arduos Delay of Motion: Slows enemies (upgradeable to increased slow, area of effect, frost accumulation).
- Blast: Area-of-effect damage on hit (upgradeable to explosive damage for breaking objects, increased stun, status effect chance).
Yatzli's potent abilities and environmental interaction make her the top companion choice. While recruited last, she's invaluable for the remainder of the adventure.
Avowed launches on PC and Xbox on February 18.
