Y’all can keep your other bases. Eth Cryptic Axe forever best base.
Look you can argue all you want about how CV’s are better than all the other bases but until someone get’s their merc to level 99 and is wearing a garbage andy’s visage wasting a helmet slot for a bunk helmet that gives - 30% fire res, no one is going to use CV’s my dude…
Get off the cloud / high horse you’re on and step down to reality… people are using Threshers 99% of the time because they have low requirements and are faster than other bases generally speaking.
Also, if your merc is wearing a fortitude, it hardly even matters because fort will increase their damage by three times… so if your merc is doing around 1900 max damage on a swing, he’s going to be doing over 5500 damage per hit… the only thing that matters on a merc is his survivability…
One of my mercs currently wipes out most targets in one hit on my Hammerdin because of concentration… which grants him 4 times the amount of damage… he’s using an Insight Thresher, basically 1 shots every target he hits… he doesn’t even have fortitude yet.
WTH do you need a CV for? That’s elitist nonsense garbage. Not to mention Vamp Gaze > Andarials any day of the week… Damage reduction and no -30% fire res… which means you can Cham your Vamp Gaze without having to Ral it like a chump or hope to God you find a Ruby Jewel of Fervor. 
Bro go get a life or a job or something, no real person has time for what you’re doing with your characters… this is real talk now. No one is going to mix/max like that… Thresher or GTFO.
I use act 5 merc for the stun / bash cc, does that make me a bad person?
Maybe just weird, someone said in a random trade game; “Who’s the gimp?”. Never really thought of them that way. It does make sense now that I think about it, and my blizz sorc is the dominatrix. 
And as far as the act5 mercs capability, I’d say they make better tanks than act2 mercs with equivalent gear. Maybe a little less damage, but they run around stunning and knocking back everything on the screen. I don’t know how I managed with my defiance merc before this. I truly do rely on it to the point that it’s a vital compliment to my build. Not only that, they get tons of strength early on for the highest reqs armors as well.
lol only at level 44 you shouldn’t worry about a CV insight
but yeah andy’s helm with a fal will help
what level are you? if you are way high, like in your 70s-80s, just un gear your current merc and hire a new one
for temp purposes you can make a lesser str requirement insight as a temp
I always hate giving up the aura from the Desert Mercs but I’m a Barb guy so I like the idea of running a Barb merc. I just need to get to the point where I can give him a RW sword that gives a nice aura…
Al I have is a regular honor colossus sword, he desperately needs an upgrade. Haven’t found as many eth 2h swords as polearms for some reason. Got lucky and found a duriels (also not eth), so he can run around smacking stuff without interruption now.
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no, Fal rune for the extra strength
Ral rune would be to counteract the -fire res andy’s has
but op was asking about how to get the strength
Fal gives 10+ strength
Ah okay, my bad then. It’s common to take the stock Andy’s strength then use Ral to counter the - fire res, so I thought you had a typo. I’ll edit my post.
IIRC he can use 1H swords as well, just can’t use 2x 1H swords, right? That might help broaden the available bases some?
True, but you lose a bunch of damage if you go 1h only. Only exception may be a grief PB.
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Im fine with your opinion. If you prefer to use worse items cause of preference then do it but dont claim that its better or recommend it unexperienced players. Thats it
Everone is free to do stupid stuff