I'm leaning towards the cats for AP and range reasons.
Buddy and Rando have the AP advantage;
The
0.031 Tons of TNT feat Brad scales to is done rather early on in the game, and he gets considerably stronger over the course of the game and by end game Brad and co can deal damage on par with TNT, which is
0.062 Tons of TNT. Failure Brad is far stronger, reducing several waves of soldiers comparable to his base form to bloody paste, and
Rando can
punch a hole through this Brad's chest.
Buddy is even stronger, fending off an even stronger Brad at the beginning of the game and by the end could hold her own against Sweetheart and defeat a Joy Mutant Buzzo, the former could one-shot someone who pummeled Rando and the latter is a stronger version of the guy who utterly destroys Brad and his party everytime they attempt to fight him,
one-shotting them and no-selling all their attacks.
TL;DR:
End Game Buddy >≈
Joy Mutant Buzzo >
Buzzo ≈
Sweetheart >>>
Rando >>
Failure Brad >>
End Game Brad and Co ≈<
0.062 Tons
I think it's also safe to say that Buddy and Rando hold a pretty large skill advantage here;
Buddy was
trained to kill by Brad. She regularly takes on teams of enemies solo and has killed the strongest people in Olathe, the "strongest,"
Big Lincoln, fought toe-to-toe with Satan, who is so powerful that the villagers of
EWC, which is populated with professional wrestlers, forbid anyone from going near his truck, and managed to fight on par with Brad's gang in a 1v4.
Rando is no slouch either, an expert martial artist who could hold his own against Brad in combat; And Brad is really skilled:
Brad is an immensely skilled martial artist who invented an entire martial arts style, and those taught to use it are by far the most efficient fighters in all of Olathe. He has demonstrated his prowess by defeating champion-class wrestlers in direct combat, learning other styles and incorporating their teachings just by reading their scrolls, using his style efficiently even against armed adversaries, ranging from swordsmen to gunslingers, and he can accomplish these even with both arms chopped off at the shoulder.
It should also be noted that these two are really tough to take down, taking slices, gunshots and very painful strikes with little impediment to their fighting ability, with Buddy herself even
claiming that she doesn't feel pain, and this is without taking into account their healing items;
Rando Rations basically being a full heal to both stamina and health, and the big one,
Joy would fully heal them, further increase their strength (x2/3 in-game) and make them completely insensitivite to pain. (Buddy especially is known to abuse it)