I'm a bit curious as to what I should use mercenaries for when slaves don't have the daily money upkeep. Are they just early game fodder then or are there unique things for them all like Loren? Should I marry Loren to nix her daily pay? Can she pass on traits to offspring giving me more Jaeger trait NPC's?
Or should I just keep the uniquely useful ones like Loren around and send the rest to guard my mines? I know Ansel did the tutorial quest and Bud has a hidden quest but I haven't seen anything from the rest. They seem like expensive slaves.
Also found some stuff called Revital but I can't use it from my inventory. How do you use it?
About the low level merc. Most of them have a nice niche in your household once that they are no more useful as mercenaries.
Anselm, Bud, Mr Doyle, Jack The Peasant and Kile the Rifle Savant all of them come with the trait Scavenger. A scavenger with this trait brings to your home, per day, 3 extra merchandise + 1/15 of Durasteel +1/15 of tendistim and 1/15 of Energy Cell. Well worth his 5 to 25$ salary
Plus Jack made a good Foreman for the Zappin fields (he have a high Gardening and Discipline) and Mr Doyle it´s the best bartender, and if you get him with the trait Techie he can be assigned to the Academy as a Professor and be keep for your Techy Team, when you have a mission that requires to deal with hacking doors.
Enya it´s a very solid option to be send to the Arena, and a standing member of your Techy Squad. She can also be (not sure but you have chances, work alcoholic and Nymphomaniac) so he can fit the role of normal Slavemaster of Slavemaster to your female slaves to increase corruption and remove vanila traits
Aiko also have granted the Techy trait, and it´s one of the most polivalent characters. Head Maid, Slave Master, Workshop Worker, Nurse, Performer...May be not oustanding in any of this roles, but she can plug the hole.
May be the weakest early merc its Loren. She increase your meat and hides yield if you go hunting (+20% chance and +30% yield) and can have the work alcoholic trait and the Nympho Trait, but if you don´t go hunting and she don´t get any of this traits she don´t bring anything special to the table. But hey!, she is not high maintenance (20$ per day only).
And last but not least, Dexter Colt. He is not fish of fowl, being the most expensive of the low level merc by far at 140$ per day, but he can increase your stats if you expend time with him and he have granted Crackshot and Techy. In my current run, right out of the box he have Science 110, Academics 70, Admin 50, and 113 hit with a not so great Strengh and Stamina (65 and 70), so he can be send stright to teach to the Academy, make a decent foreman and, if you train him can perfectly be in your Elite Squad and, if you don´t train him, he will be for sure one of your more solid choices for your Techy Squad.
All this said, this can change radically with the new Educator role that will replace the old Slavemaster trait.job