"Armouring" a mercenary?

Hey there, me again!

I was looking up the rules for creating my army of automated yes-men, I mean mercenaries, and was wondering something about this passage:

"A quick way of creating mercenaries of any profession would be to create a PvP character (already at level 20), give them appropriate armor, costumes and/or hats, and register them."

Just a quick clarification here... Does the armor "value" of the armor "copied" hold any meaning other than "a target for runes"? If not, what's the most efficient route for a relatively fresh account to get "good enough" armor for a hero being set up for the straight line, non-hardmode point a-z path of the PVE storyline?

Thanks in advance for any and all constructive replies

armor for merc heroes will always be max for that particular profession (ele heroes get 60, rangers 70 and warriors 80 etc)

the graphic of the armor does not correlate to the efficiency of the mercenary hero's armory at all. The only thing thats taken is the graphical look of the character. You could have an entire army of naked mercenaries running around that'd have max profession-specific armor ratings if you wanted (havent tested, don't take my word for it)

I was hoping that would be the case, thank you very much!

Don't forget that any character needs to be lvl 20 in order to be used for a Mercenary Hero. If you want fast ones, use PvP characters.

Just to say, you can register a naked character as a mercenary, its mercenary equivalent will be wearing (non-visible) max armor regardless.

also remember that any runes/insignias WONT be transfered to the merc. They will have max armor--with NO runes, NO insignias and ....no weapons either (and no skill set set up as well). You will have to give them runes/insignias as well as weapons and set up their skill bars.

Just out of interest, has anyone added a merc hero that is unclothed? I'm not sure why you would, unless you wanted an underpants raid, but will it default to an armour or still show the merc in their unmentionables?

registering a partially or completely naked character as a mercenary will have no difference to a fully clothed character registered... with the exception of being less dressed.

I've done a "partial" nudity thing, of registering several without helmets or gloves. But the mercenaries still have the AL and rune/insignia slots of wearing gloves/helmet.

I've not got mercenaries, but if I did, I'd have to have a complete "naked" team at least once, just for the novelty.

The mercenary gets 5 pieces of Mercenary Armor in inventory, but its 3D model doesn't show any and it's displayed just like a naked, playable character.