I'm not much for followers as I feel they just take away from the fun I could've had from killing what they kill. Recently, though, I've been messing around and I finally found my favorite hireling, Stenvar..supposedly he's a 2H guy so I gave him some Daedric Armor, Dragonplate Boots and Gauntlets and even smithed him a Daedric Greatsword....Problem is 80% of the time I'll catch him backpeddling up a hill using some crappy wooden bow that I can't take away. Tried giving him a Daedric Bow and he still uses the wooden one...What gives here? i want him on the front lines with me cracking skulls. Very disappointing. Any way to force him to never use range?

Well what can i say? Stenvar is like Buster in Arrested Development....a very very confused man.
You can't do much about it =/

Just disappointing, I suppose. He boasted all this jive about being the strongest sword arm in all of Skyrim. Methinks he'd rather prance around the forest in tights all day role-playing as Legolas..

Yeah i know what you mean, i took him under my wing aswell, but he was to [censored] to climb up the steps......

This will be totally irrelevant for you if you aren't on PC but here goes:

Just take all his items, then go into the console -> click him for the ID -> type 'removeallitems' -> give him the gear you want him to use.

Also, you can adjust his various skills (two hander, marksman etc.) via console as well, if his marksmanship skill is higher than his twohanded skill he will default to bow.

It's not just Stenvar, it's all companions that have the hidden default companion bow as the weapon selection scripting is a bit wonky at times. It can be fixed on the PC with commands like Reignblazer outlined above by removing their hidden equipment and giving them better gear. Should certainly be looked at for a future patch fix.

If you use the PC console trick, and you do not give Stenvar a bow at all, will he still want to go for the bow? Or does he use the really cool Deadric Battleaxe you give him (since it's the only weapon I want him to use)?