Dude, uh... relax. If you're so b/a then you don't need a follower dogging your heels anyway.
You're really going to say that companion AI in FNV is so much better? Really?

I rather like Lydia and it takes very little for me to get her to be a pretty good follower/tank. Her "I am sworn to carry your burdens" is annoying though...

obviously, i consider your post to be a jest.

the companion "system" in new vegas was so much better done it doesn't warrant skyrim's mentioning.

relax? lol.

yo, dude, take your flimsy, skyrim love and shove it up your

Ironically, I think they nailed exactly what followers should be in this game, not perfect. Lydia loves to run the opposite direction I do, and loiter around well behind me, probably out of spite and irritation that I make her run almost everywhere and schlep all my swag. Lydia is like my indentured servant, my property, and I protect her as I would any other expensive item. She's just not perfect, and I do my best to correct her as needed, but she can't help that she has a shallow learning curve. Lydia reveres me, especially when I heal her. I think we have a good relationship and understanding. I've grown to love my property.

Theres ways around that using

I hate it when you go into combat and they stand, weapon poised, around a corner and do absolutely nothing to help. Kind of like they're saying, "I'll get the next one, boss! You can handle this fine by yourself." Sometimes my summons/zombies do this too.

@Akanaro: I'm actually playing on PC so for me it's not a problem, but it is a rather significant bug that still hasn't been adressed after 3 months. I feel sorry for console players.

vD

Lydia is dead.....Erandur is dead....

Found I like playing solo. Haven't come across any enemy my Deamora and I can't handle....yet. The only downside is the quick trip sback to Breezehome to dump loot. In my experience followers are just glorified pack mules that get in the way and get themselves killed.

The follower system is awful in comparison to Fallout New Vegas. FONV has a awesome system.

Lydia is annoying. She lags behind, appears when you finished fighting or midway, runs in front of every attack you do. She won't put on armour or weapons you give her sometimes.
I don't use her much.

Agris The Bulkwark is worse though. He is not at all bulwarky, yields sometimes and is weak.
I am so tempted to sacrifice him to Boethiah.

Aela gets lost and appears at the end of fights. She sometimes charges into battle with a bow and not her sword. But she is ok usually.

It is easier to travel alone.

Lydia staying too far behind. Pfffft. Not a problem. Cicero has no sense of "personal space" whatsoever. He keeps running into me. Once he bumped me into a fire trap. (All Lydia ever did was block my exit and go "OW!" when I pushed her out of my way.

I share your troubles. If I had a septim for every time I've had to resurrect her or reload a save because she was stupid and jumped in front of my arrows...

Ended up ditching her for Aela anyhow, shes a little bit better I guess...

"Look a cave!"
"Look, its a Dwarven ruin!"

I miss your sweet, sweet repetitive and extremely obvious words... but... its for the better now... I've moved on...

Early on, Lydia had crashed me off any number of cliffs. Now she just seems to run into my horse's *rse no matter how far she has had to run to catch up.

This is how you fix weak followers like Lydia. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gJdkajr2sM

Is there a fix for their limited brain power? "Oh noes, my boss is walking into the distance, and I'm walking forward but not moving forward! If only there were some way to, say, go around this six-inch high rock, or perhaps a way to jump over it! Bye master! Sorry I'm so hopelessly stuck by this insuperable obstacle!"

One of the most annoying things about followers is having to wait for them to always catch up. I remember a mod for Oblivion called CM Partners, where all followers would sort of teleport behind you if you got to far away, you never really noticed the teleport either because you could just keep running knowing full well that the follower cannot get lost. Bethesda should of had a similar system i feel.

Witty and hilarious.

If you're going to be sixist make it funny at least.

I was telling the OP to relax, but it looks like you could use the same advice.

Companion AI is pretty much the same in FNV and Skyrim, so I don't know what you're talking about. There were a few combat commands that they never followed, a few more dialogue options which were nice but navigating around them was not exactly immersive. They were just as dumb about pathing and combat behavior, and even harder to equip correctly.

only the AI in NV was better, they never got caught on a rock and always kept up with me and i never had problems with them using a crappy pistol (bow) instead of the hunting rifle i gave them (legendary deadric bow with a super powerful enchantment)

No, they were always running in place or lagging behind. Half my Fallout experience in FNV and moreso in FO3 was waiting for Charon or Boone to catch up. They did have better starting weapons, but they're just as squishy as Skyrim companions.

As for equipping.... there were at least always http://i678.photobucket.com/albums/vv146/gmosko/Fallout%20New%20Vegas/Boonelegionhelmet.jpg.

Of course, there's a failproof solution to all these problems. Don't use a follower.

And carry my own loot? Surely you jest!

I gave my Lydia a full set of enchanted Deretic armor and long sword. She likes the heavy armor and will use high damage bows if given to her. She may not however wear anything around her neck. She has dawned a ring I've given her. She will use a short sword/shield but prefers a long sword.

Even with the best of game weapons/armor she got weak and I had to do the disable/enable consule trick to get her stats reset. She's pretty killer now. I also gave mine the 'essentual' flag so if/when she jumps in front of me and takes one of my full power hits - she won't die.

My Lydia can kill a blood dragon on her own but sometimes will knell from a magic user. She is VERY good at using staffs! Just remember STAND BACK! With two fully charged balls of fire staffs she gets a little crazy and if your not wearing enchanted armor - your going to get hit fairly badly in the cross fire!

(I always thought she was just getting me back!)

Yeah, I've handed her staffs to carry around as loot, thinking she wouldn't use them, yet she did.

Unless she's got some magic ability I don't know about, though, I wouldn't think she'd get much use out of them.

Oh, yeah. Never give a companion an area effect staff. Sure way to die from friendly fire. That's one of the reasons I avoid spell casters with high destruction. I die often enough as it is....

Oh, I'm sure Lydia would fire it at an enemy two feet away and kill herself, the bad guys and me all in one shot.

I wouldn't travel with a mage follower unless my pc had 100% magic resistance. They would kill me from friendly fire more than any enemy would.

Loot too heavy? Invest in alchemy and only loot plants and other alchemy ingredients. They're much lighter than weapons and armor, and (potentially) sell for more money too. My pc only gets over-encumbered now after carrying dragon bones/scales from multiple dragons.