Maxwell's duelists are bad at their core and what to replace them with

[Szczuku]

Back in singleplayer giving Maxwell fighting minions was a pretty decent idea

Nowadays, however, Maxwell's duelists seem to be useless against difficult enemies and not needed against weak ones.

Sure, their AI/health could be improved or just replace them with his Forge ability. BUUuuuuuuut...

We have 2 combat-focused characters and like 4 ones which are above-average at it. We don't need Maxwell to fall into that category as well.

My idea: Maxwell is fragile but knows his way around shadow magic, so now instead of duelists he spawns a Shadow Phantom of himself (no legs and without a weapon) which follows Maxwell for some time. It acts as a single use of Bone Armor, dying to take Maxwell's damage for him. 

I feel it would be a better improvement to Max's gameplay than 'new' duelists. A solution to his lower health and a 'fighting benefit' that's not just making a character deal more damage

[Frosty_Mentos]

Was told that they're intended to be weak against swarms of enemies and better against solo fights. Practically powerful against creatures like dragonfly since also you can cage her and just spam duelists till she's dead. They barely cost any nightmare fuel now compared to the old counterparts same for single player ones.

At least they can sorta kite which combined with shadow prison keeping their target stationary it'll be quick till they kill what you were targetting.

Maxwell's less of a combat character but more of a character to stand back and let his minions do work for him kinda thing. Really fits well for what he has right now.

[WhackE]

I think Maxwell can keep his duelists if they improve on them, and I feel that he can keep them without falling into the category of a combat character, because that's not Maxwell's main purpose, He still wouldn't be great at combat, and that's fine, it's just something to make up for that lack of combat power he has which is a fair trade.