Best Base Pals in Palworld: 7 Workers for Every Job

A base runs on eleven separate work suitabilities, and seven Pals is the smallest roster that covers all eleven without a single dead job. This guide names those seven, gives every one of their work ranks, shows where each one is caught, and lists the catchable stand-ins to slot in while you are still working toward them.

The Eleven Jobs a Base Has to Cover

Farming is the odd one out — it only ever happens at the Ranch, so it gets its own slot later. The other eleven are the ones that decide whether your camp actually produces anything. What matters when you are staffing them is scarcity: 140 Pals can haul crates, but only 25 in the entire Paldeck can run a generator, so the electric slot is the one you plan a base around and the transport slot is the one you can fill with whatever you happen to catch. The other thing worth knowing before you start is that only two structures in the whole build menu care about a worker's rank — the Ancient Farm and the Ancient Power Generator, both demanding rank 6. Everything else accepts a rank 1 body; rank buys you speed, not access.

Job	Pals that can do it	What it runs	Covered here by
Handiwork	109	Every workbench and assembly line — the most used job in the game	Solenne at rank 8
Transporting	140	Carries finished goods into your chests	Knocklem at rank 7
Kindling	44	Furnaces, cooking pots, campfires and heaters	Renjishi at rank 8
Watering	46	Plantations, the Mill, the Crusher, the Skillfruit Orchard	Shaolong at rank 8
Planting	45	Sows every plantation plot	Dandilord at rank 8
Generating Electricity	25	All three power generators	Orserk at rank 8
Cooling	38	Coolers, refrigerators and cold food boxes	Bastigor at rank 8
Mining	57	Ore, coal, sulfur, quartz and soralite sites	Knocklem at rank 7
Lumbering	63	Both Logging Sites	Bastigor at rank 6
Medicine Production	43	Clinics and all three medicine workbenches	Dandilord at rank 6
Gathering	109	Pulls ripe crops out of every plantation	Renjishi at rank 5

The 7 Best Base Pals in Palworld

Seven of the eleven jobs land on the game's rank ceiling with this roster — Handiwork, Kindling, Watering, Planting, Generating Electricity and Cooling all cap at 8 and all six are filled at 8, while Transporting caps at 7 and is filled at 7. The four that fall short are Mining at 7 of a possible 8, Lumbering at 6, Medicine Production at 6 and Gathering at 5, and there is a section further down on exactly what to do about each. Note that the ranks in the table are base work suitabilities, before any handbook or condenser rank-up pushes them higher.

Pal	Best job	Every other job it does	Why it makes the seven
Dandilord	Planting 8	Handiwork 6 · Medicine Production 6 · Gathering 5 · Transporting 3	28 work points across five jobs — the highest total in the Paldeck, and the only Pal here that fills three roles well on its own
Solenne	Handiwork 8	Gathering 4 · Transporting 2	The lone rank 8 in the job you use more than any other, and it is catchable in the wild
Renjishi	Kindling 8	Handiwork 6 · Gathering 5 · Transporting 5	Rank 8 Kindling plus a rank 6 second job — it runs your furnaces and still helps craft
Knocklem	Transporting 7	Mining 7 · Gathering 4	Both of its main jobs are the highest a base can practically staff, and it hauls at 400 transport speed
Shaolong	Watering 8	Gathering 5	Watering is one of the thinnest job pools in the game and this is its outright ceiling — plus it doubles as a flying mount
Orserk	Generating Electricity 8	Transporting 4 · Handiwork 3	Only 25 Pals generate power at all, and this is the only one that clears the Ancient Power Generator's rank 6 gate with room to spare
Bastigor	Cooling 8	Lumbering 6 · Mining 5	One slot covers your entire cold chain and your logging site, and it is a rideable mount on top

Dandilord — the Best All-Round Base Pal

Dandilord carries 28 points of work suitability spread over five jobs, which is more than any other Pal in the game, and none of it is filler — rank 8 Planting, rank 6 Handiwork and rank 6 Medicine Production would each be a respectable specialist on their own. Put one down and you have simultaneously staffed your plantations, your clinic and a slice of your workbench queue. The catch is getting hold of it: this Grass/Dark Pal has no spawn points anywhere on the map, so it is a level 70 boss fight rather than a walk in the grass, and the payout for winning is 5–10 Toxin Filtering Membrane alongside 6–8 Ancient Civilization Parts. The membranes are the material behind the Corrosive Mist Mask, so you will likely be fighting it anyway.

Solenne — Rank 8 Handiwork, Catchable in the Wild

Handiwork is the job your base leans on hardest — 23 different structures need it, from the Primitive Workbench all the way up to the Gold Coin Assembly Line — and Solenne is the only Pal in the game that hits rank 8 in it. 109 Pals can do handiwork; exactly one does it this well. What makes it the easiest recommendation on this list is that you do not need a boss fight or a breeding project to get one: it has 47 spawn points on the map. It is nocturnal, so go looking after dark.

Renjishi — Kindling 8 and a Real Second Job

Most Kindling Pals do nothing else, which makes them expensive slot-for-slot. Renjishi breaks that pattern: rank 8 Kindling for your furnaces and cooking pots, then rank 6 Handiwork, rank 5 Gathering and rank 5 Transporting on top, for 24 work points across four jobs. It also happens to be the lightest eater of the seven at 8 food slots against everyone else's 9. There are no wild spawn points for it, but it does turn up as an alpha at level 78, so it is a late but straightforward target rather than a mystery.

Knocklem — the Hauler and Miner in One Slot

Transporting caps at rank 7 across the whole Paldeck, and Knocklem sits right on that ceiling while also mining at 7 — the two jobs that pile up fastest once your base starts producing. Its 400 transport speed is well clear of the 250 that Solenne, Renjishi and Orserk manage, so crates actually reach the chest instead of queueing. It has 33 spawn points plus an alpha at level 55, and it earns its keep outside the base too: its Steel Guardian Mode partner skill scales from +50 to +200 Ranged Attack and Defense across condenser ranks. If you would rather have Kindling than Gathering as the third job, Knocklem Ignis runs the same 7/7 mining and hauling with rank 5 Kindling instead, across 58 spawn points.

Shaolong — the Watering Ceiling and a Mount

Only 46 Pals water anything, and Shaolong is the single rank 8 among them. That matters more than the raw number suggests, because watering is the job that stalls a farm: a plot with nobody to water it never produces, no matter how good your planter is. Rank 5 Gathering rides along, 63 spawn points make it catchable, and once you reach Technology 77 for the Shaolong Saddle it becomes a flying mount as well. It also has the fastest transport speed of the seven at 450, despite not carrying a Transporting suitability at all.

Orserk — the Only Generator Worth Building Around

Generating Electricity has the smallest pool of any base job at 25 Pals, and Orserk is the only one at rank 8. That gap is the whole argument: the next best generators in the game sit at rank 6, and the Ancient Power Generator at Technology 75 will not accept anything below rank 6 at all. Orserk clears that gate outright and throws in rank 4 Transporting and rank 3 Handiwork for the hours the generator is idle. 33 spawn points is thin but real, and unlike most of this list it is a genuine fighter as well — a Dragon/Electric attacker worth pulling out of the base when a tower boss needs killing.

Bastigor — Your Whole Cold Chain in One Pal

Bastigor is rank 8 Cooling, which covers every Cooler, Refrigerator and cold food box you will ever place, and it backs that up with rank 6 Lumbering and rank 5 Mining — so the same slot also runs your Logging Site. It has the joint-highest HP of the seven at 140 and the largest hunger pool at 730, so it goes longer between trips to the feed box than anything else here, and it is a mount once you unlock Bastigor's Hammer at Technology 73. The one thing it cannot do is haul: it has no Transporting suitability, so pair it with Knocklem rather than expecting it to move its own logs. 69 spawn points makes it one of the easier catches here.

Where to Get All Seven

Five of the seven are ordinary wild catches, which is the pleasant surprise in this roster — you do not need a breeding programme to staff a base properly. Bastigor is the most common at 69 spawn points, and Solenne and Shaolong are close behind. The two exceptions are Dandilord, which never spawns in the world at all, and Renjishi, which only appears as a level 78 alpha. Both are endgame targets, so plan on running stand-ins in those two slots for most of a playthrough.

Pal	Elements	Where to find it	Mount	Food slots
Dandilord	Grass / Dark	No spawn points — level 70 boss encounter	No	9
Solenne	Dark / Neutral	47 spawn points · nocturnal	No	9
Renjishi	Fire	No spawn points · alpha at Lv 78	No	8
Knocklem	Ground	33 spawn points · alpha at Lv 55	No	9
Shaolong	Dragon / Water	63 spawn points	Yes — saddle at Tech 77	9
Orserk	Dragon / Electric	33 spawn points	No	9
Bastigor	Ice	69 spawn points	Yes — saddle at Tech 73	9

The Four Jobs This Seven Doesn't Max Out

Being honest about the gaps is more useful than pretending there are none. Mining, Lumbering, Medicine Production and Gathering all sit below their ceiling with this roster, and only one of those gaps actually breaks something. Gathering at rank 5 is the one to watch: the Ancient Farm demands rank 6 in Planting, Watering and Gathering, and this seven clears the first two at rank 8 while missing the third by one. Feeding an Applied Gathering Handbook to Renjishi or Shaolong closes it for a single item. The other three gaps only cost you speed, so fix them when a spare slot appears rather than reworking the roster.

Job	This roster	Game ceiling	Who holds the ceiling	Worth fixing?
Gathering	5	8	Jetragon at 8 · Starryon Primo at 7 with 63 spawn points	Yes — rank 6 is the Ancient Farm gate
Mining	7	8	Aegidron at 8 — no spawn points, alpha at Lv 79	Only for a dedicated quarry base
Lumbering	6	8	Celesdir Noct at 8 · Celesdir at 7 with 1,613 spawn points	Cheap to fix — Celesdir is everywhere
Medicine Production	6	8	Silvance at 8 · Lyleen Noct at 7 with 42 spawn points	Only if your Pals take a lot of damage

If you would rather solve the Gathering hole with a body than a handbook, Lyleen is the neat answer — rank 6 Gathering, rank 7 Planting and rank 5 Medicine Production in one slot, over 42 spawn points with an alpha at level 58. Swapping it in for Dandilord costs you a point of Planting and clears the Ancient Farm gate in the same move, which is a good trade for anyone who has not beaten the Dandilord fight yet.

Catchable Stand-Ins Before the Endgame

Most of the seven are late-game Pals, and a base at Technology 30 still needs its furnaces lit. These are the substitutes worth catching in the meantime, chosen for how easy they are to actually find rather than for raw rank — a rank 5 worker you own today beats a rank 8 you will meet at level 70. Dualith deserves a special mention: rank 6 Mining, rank 6 Transporting and rank 5 Lumbering across 75 spawn points makes it the single best mid-game body on this list, standing in for most of what Knocklem and Bastigor do later.

Job	Endgame pick	Catchable stand-in	Its rank	Spawn points
Handiwork	Solenne 8	Anubis	6	35 · alpha at Lv 55
Transporting	Knocklem 7	Dualith	6	75
Kindling	Renjishi 8	Dupin	7	81
Watering	Shaolong 8	Faleris Aqua	6	197 · alpha at Lv 66
Planting	Dandilord 8	Broncherry	5	482 · alpha at Lv 23
Generating Electricity	Orserk 8	Grizzbolt	5	40 · alpha at Lv 30
Cooling	Bastigor 8	Whalaska	6	187 · alpha at Lv 55
Mining	Knocklem 7	Dualith	6	75
Lumbering	Bastigor 6	Cryolinx Terra	6	156 · alpha at Lv 62
Medicine Production	Dandilord 6	Mycora	6	42 · alpha at Lv 78
Gathering	Renjishi 5	Venusa	6	26

Passives Change More Than the Pal Does

Work suitability decides which jobs a Pal will take and how well it does them; Work Speed passives decide how fast it gets through the queue. A Pal carries up to four passives, and the good ones are enormous — Demon's Hand alone is +90%, and there is nothing stopping the three big craft-speed passives from sitting on the same Pal at once. The trap is the negatives, because they roll on wild catches just as often: Slacker at -30% and Musclehead at -50% will make a rank 8 specialist feel broken and you will blame the Pal. Check what you caught before you assign it, and re-roll the bad ones through breeding.

The Eighth Slot: a Ranch Pal

Farming is the twelfth suitability and it is a different animal — it only works at the Ranch, it caps at rank 4 rather than 8, and only 29 Pals have it at all. Which one you want depends entirely on what you are short of rather than on rank, because the Ranch accepts any Farming Pal. Mau is the standout for anyone tired of being broke, since it produces Gold Coins passively, and Dumud Gild is the highest-ranked ranch worker you can realistically catch at rank 4 over 312 spawn points. The Ranch itself is cheap and early — Technology 5 for 30 Wood, 20 Stone and 30 Fiber.

Ranch Pal	Produces	Farming rank	Spawn points
Dumud Gild	High Quality Pal Oil	4	312
Sibelyx Primo	High Quality Cloth	4	82
Beegarde	Honey	3	43
Foxcicle	Ice Organ	3	187
Shroomer	Mushroom	3	60
Mozzarina	Milk	2	111
Chikipi	Egg	1	274
Mau	Gold Coin	1	No spawn points

The Short Answer

Catch Solenne for Handiwork, Bastigor for Cooling and Lumbering, Shaolong for Watering, Orserk for power and Knocklem for hauling and mining — those five are ordinary wild catches and they already cover most of a base. Add Renjishi for Kindling and Dandilord for Planting and Medicine once you are deep enough to take them, run Dualith and Dupin as stand-ins until then, and put a Farming Pal on the Ranch as the eighth body. Then stop worrying about ranks and start checking passives, because that is where the rest of the speed lives.

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