No, you get Vhailor when you go for him. There's no magic to the number 9. You can get him significantly before that level. I did, the first time around.
You're incorrect. The lowest level you can get him is level 9. Take a look at the VHAIL.CRE file in Near Infinity, if you doubt. That number doesn't magically change. I actually don't think you'll get him at a higher level either. It's level 9, every time.
Assuming you've upgraded him while he's still at level 2, he gains those points. Did you do so? I never managed it, but I suppose it's possible. I'll be curious to know how you did it, if you did.
When his CON goes up, his hit point bonus is added retroactively. I just tested it to make sure. Had him at level 8 with 92 hp. Upgraded him. Result: level 8 Morte with 108 hp.
...and Morte has a lot less, if you go earlier. Or more, if you go later. I go earlier, so Morte is by no means a tank compared to Vhailor in my party. And once you have them both in a party, Vhailor continues to outpace the rest of your party in gaining HP per level. If you keep him in party and shoot to level 20 or higher, he's insane. (And not literally, unless you mention a few things about his...current condition.)
As already mentioned - no, you can't get Vhailor at any level other than 9, no matter how early you go.
Also, Morte and Vhailor would both continue to gain HP at the same rate. They're both fighters with high CON. But every hit point Morte gains is worth 4 hit points for Vhailor, due to his 75% damage resistance. There's really no comparison.
It's true that Morte has great damage resistance. But if you have them both in a party for a long time, Vhailor's insulting amount of HP can just absorb whatever is thrown at him.
Again - Morte is going to gain every bit as many HP as Vhailor. More, since as I said, the CON bonus for upgrading is retroactive.
Though I should mention that toons gaining constitution bonus after level 10 anyway is a bug. Fighters should only be gaining 3hp per level. So the insane hit point totals they acquire really shouldn't be the case, and its why the endgame is so terribly easy. My TNO had 325 hp facing TO in my last game, sigh. Shoulda been more like 170 at most.
First, I pointed this out already. Please read my posts.
I did read your post. You acknowledged that he got 18 CON when he upgraded, you did not mention anything about AC also upgrading, and reading your post it certainly sounds like you think Vhailor's AC advantage is permanent.
Second, it doesn't happen at the start of the game. So the two ACs are not "essentially the same" until Morte upgrades.
Which you can easily do long long long before you are ever even capable of getting Vhailor. All you need is to get FFG in your party.
BTW, I checked my game... by the time I got Vhailor in my party (at level 9), my Morte was at 11. Since the vast vast vast majority of the xp you can get by that point -cannot- be skipped (the xp you get for quests in Sigil is roughly 1% of the xp you get once you leave Sigil), I don't really think it's possible to get Vhailor with more xp than Morte has by that point, unless you're deliberately skipping as much xp in Curst as possible by not doing any quests there and just going through the Caretaker's shortcut, which would be really silly.
EDIT: Just checked. Vhailor starts out with 250,000xp. Morte probably gets that much during the Ravel conversation and the Curst quests alone. In my game, he had 715,000 by the time we met Vhailor, and as I said, the non-Curst quests you -could- skip getting to this point probably don't amount to more than 100,000xp, if that.
Qwinn
