Nim Gral is a blessed addition to the inner circle of the apostle, and non can find fault with the way it fills the position as shield for the Apostle in combat. But the late and missed Amarath was far more than a simple shieldbearer, he was the first devotee that the young Apostle Castor got, the first that said he would not only die for the word, but for His Apostle Castor...the first soul one brings before the gods(apart from your own) echoes the deepest and the longest.