I prefer support roles but that’s not why I pick the characters I pick.
I go solely based on a character’s personality.
Borderlands 1, I started with Mordy, moved on to Roland.
Borderlands 2, I started with Zer0 and moved on to Axton. (Which is now my pride and joy in the series)
Pre-Sequel? I started with Wilhelm. I cut the crap. I was gonna start as Nisha, but I knew I would end up being Wilhelm.
What’s the link between all 3 of these characters? They’re collected, mostly calm and do what they are told to do, when they do it. They have discipline. Mordecai - he’s a rogue. Does what he wants, when he wants to. Get drunk every night with a bird and passes out. Zer0 talks in haiku. Enough said. Nisha? She killed a puppy. As much as I don’t care for animated deaths and if it was part of the storyline in TPS I would oblige, I am really not fond of the idea that murdering animals is acceptable. Henceforth I wont play Far Cry 4 since I learned you have to skin endangered animals to upgrade your weapons, big no go for me. Her personality sucks.
No matter what, I always get drawn to the more disciplined characters in the game. Arguably, Athena could be in this category of character and to be honest, if she wasn’t Captain America and Black Widow’s love child I’d have probably picked her. Not digging the meleeness of her tree.
I’ve just rambled on, I wont refund your minutes taken lol.
Fun fact: Axton called an airstrike on a VIP he was supposed to be protecting (“hey, it killed the bad guys too!”)
And nobody tried to make animal murder acceptable! Getting to play bad guys has appeal to plenty of people, we all have messed-up/pervy sides to our personality. Check it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ6Q0zqL4gg
Part of Wilhelm’s appeal to me is that he sems utterly uninerested in the fate of Pandora or Elpis or any of the inhabitants. He just wants money, steak and eyes that shoot lasers. Honestly what else is there in life!
He probably has less chatter and fewer threads because the people who are drawn to him as a char are maybe a little like him - less talkative.
I personally do not like pet classes much, but still find him more fun to play than Claptrap. I love that I can play him solo and only use his skill in the most dire of circumstances, that is how awesome he is.
Wilhelm & Timothy are the only characters that can ‘for real’ snipe while using their action skill (Nisha’s auto-aim can’t count here – the sniping happens wherever the action skill decides). Wilhelm is MUCH quieter/chatty than Jack & all the other characters and can be spec’d so there’s not a lot of text flashing on the screen while using his action skill. For solo playing, it feels like you’ve got teammates in Wolf & Saint (“Go get’em Wolf!”) – less lonely. Not least of which – he’s a monster with laser guns. Spread the love, for sure!
I’ve been playing wilhelm as my first toon and I have to admit I love him as a class and he might not be as funny as claptrap talking to claptrap or as talkative as the other characters but he beasts with lasers and HE GETS ROBO VOICE and that’s enough to make him awesome
Athena’s deal is she has very good DPS while also having amazing survivability. She’s sort of like crossing Krieg with Axton, for lack of a better bad metaphor.
That’s an interesting analogy. It reminds me of Roland - his turret was supposed to shield you from the front, but it didn’t work very well. And Axton’s shielded turret was likewise pretty lackluster (i.e. it crumpled like tissue paper), so Athena finally introduced a proper shield.
P.S. More on topic – I love Wilhelm and think he’s the best pet class in the series.
No specific build required, no specific gear required. Wilhelm cannot be stopped, they would need to add a superultimatetruestofthetrue vaulthunter mode to even make him break sweat.