Mobs got both lower delay and higher damage with weapons (if the weapon did more than the mob) in Classic EQ and I have no idea when it was changed... I'm guessing significantly post-Velious. The problem here is that the developers err dramatically on the side of gimping the player characters whenever something is in doubt. I believe it has been stated by Rogean (or something like this anyway):
"Yes, that's the way it was in Classic, and no, it will never be that way on P99 because pets are already so powerful. Handing them weapons will not drop their delay here, ever."
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