The wiki claims they can't but once or twice I've seen a Mender swing their staff in my direction when they start to get cornered (and the staff has a "weapon swing trail" and everything) but I've always been able to dodge so I'm not sure if it actually does damage and/or knockback.
This was in a tier 2 dungeon if it makes a difference.
Except it wasn't actually fixed and they can still do it. I've just experienced it yesterday.
So instead of the small wrench wand bullet ( I haven't seen them do that anymore ) they just randomly swing at you, mostly happens in deconstruction zones.
I saw Menders shoot bullets at me before but that is a long time ago, I am not sure if they are still able to do it. Those bullets aren't glitches, they definitely do hurt.
I also got wacked and took damage before, not sure if it still the case.
Menders used to shoot bullets (I think - but these are month-old CB memories) and, if you got close enough, they would swing at you with their wands and actually do a good amount of damage. I remember this making it harder to take them down quick with a Sword. Perhaps the Devs have tried to get rid of these Mender attacks over time, but maybe they still show themselves every once and a while.
They did release a fix but it didn't work for gremlins getting stuck in the swing forever loop.
Menders used to attack all the time. It was frustrating because they gave no warning before they whacked you, and they rapidly swung three times so they did decent damage. Now, menders have taken a vow to "do no harm."
However, I've still seen them attack at very, very low health. This will usually happen a few seconds before they die. I'm not sure if that's intentional or a bug. If it's a bug I'm not sure if they fixed it.
Ember Bolt!
*Wildly swings staff while moving forward*
Nope, the wand whack was a glitch and it's been fixed, gremlin menders mend and mend only.