Well yes, seeing them as puppets obviously will create discontent, because they arent. See them as virtual people. Actually followers are very well implemented in Skyrim, by far the best i have seen yet. They walk independently to towns or players, no more cheesy teleports(ok still some). Their AI and pathfinding, aside from that they dont jump, is quite well done, and variative depending from class, which is totally not obvious. Some will use dual weapons, some will keep distance, and some will be close. Also i have yet to see them failing finding me. Sure there are situations, where he/she is lost, but in Skyrim you are sure he is actually walking to the player/town as an independent entity and not just players extension. In other games losing sight a sure sign that the follower is bugged and lost completely. In other words dont worry about his performance he is quite capable. Ofc, player's possible/usual overpowerness does not leave much room for them, unless gimping yourself.

This, follower equipment has multiple bugs. The bow bug is one. An simpler system where the player has full access to all equipment would not have any of this bugs, except then player uses follower as an pack mule and we can live with that.

I have no idea why this broken system was implemented, it should have been much simpler to simply give us full access.

I suspect it dates back to Fallout 3 where it was nice with followers gear who don't degenerate and weapons who did not require ammo, to avoid players taking the gear it was made hidden. Probably made respawning to avoid other bugs.
Do not why as we had no issues with this in Fallout, CK will solve it as many other bugs.

I'd imagine the default gear was locked so that you don't have Followers walking around in their pants and nothing more...

There are MANY issues with the follower Inventories which could be improved upon. I personally would like to be able to see simple things like encumberance or armour rating. That way I could make a number of decisions over what gear I gave them and how much they can carry for me.

I'd also like to be able to manually equip them, because if I take a light armoured sneaky archer follower into a cave system I intend to sneak around and snipe at the enemies in, their then choosing to put on looted Steel Plate armour and carry a greatsword kind of screws up my plan...

You didnt take the other stuff away, its not possible to acess there default armour without console commands. Yes 9/10 if u give them better stuff they use it but they may still change to other stuff or back to default bow ect. its annoying as hell. You cant even give your wife a nice dress insted of a torn one with a muddy edge. Beth was to caught up in stream lining this game for noobs and forgot all the lessons learned in mw ob fo nv, its just piss poor that so many simple things have been complicated, or executed with goldfish like intellect...

On the PC, you can http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=4554 to easily create a mod to change the default clothing to something else (e.g., Tavern Wench outfit) or to nothing at all. You can also modify their default inventory, spells they know, and combat styles. You can also modify their appearance.

It's simple to use - no scripting required, just dropdown menus.

anyone remember the way merchants used to equip stuff in Morrowind?

At that point they're not so much a follower as a slave, are they?

I agree that it's annoying that they seem to equip completely random gear, as previously mentioned, but I don't think they should be slaves either. They're friends/spouses/companions, and they should have some free will (maybe except for Lydia). That means they should equip whatever gear they have that is best suited for their skills (and class, but there are no classes anymore). It's stupid when you use Lydia as a mule, and suddenly she's wielding a Staff of Frost or some chit like that. Use your goddam sword woman!!

Yes. And bizarrely it appears to be the exact same system used by followers in Skyrim.

You are right, however as the current system is bugged multiple ways its one of the few places they should cut functionality as it gives more freedom.
Strangely enough I managed to get Lydia to equip an dress. One of the middle class dresses has an hood, I dumped a lot of stuff to Lydia and strangely she put on the dress instead of armor. Guess this is because she had no helmet and the dress included an hood.

Because it is the same system, updated with some fallout functions.

It'd be nice if they (Lydia) weaponed appropriately.... i gave her staffs..... OH she loves them.... Kills skivers with a fireboat staff! Pisses me off.

I think I'll have to take away her toys and give them back for boss battles. I do like her use of them, but damn - she wastes 'em! She keeps alive more than not with the staffs, but heck, use a friggin bow once in a while, everything doesn't need a big blast!

That's how the women are. They see a staff and cannot stop toying with it. You better get used to it.

LOL - hadn't realized I wrote that! But hey - makes sense.

As bad as the AI is, I'd prefer to totally control the NPC by clicking to wear weapons and armor. Then they could add quick commands for be aggressive or passive like FONV

Huh. My follower will wear normal clothes. She does it at random though. Sometimes I zone, and she's wearing the normal clothes I gave her. Since she wears a robe, if I give her a normal hat, she will sometimes put it on and just be slaying things in her birthday suit. It's really amusing, but she does need to be in her robes for combat. I wish you could just equip the items onto the followers. She's started this habit of using a bow (which you can't remove from the inv), instead of her uber staff. It's very annoying.

And that is why we should all have Dead Thralls instead, because a slave is better than a friend/spouse/companion. Oh wait, Thralls will only wear what they died in. They are even more picky than a normal follower!

Reverse pick pocket, then kill? =)

I really don't get why they don't let us remove their default equipment. What does it matter? They give us so much flexibility and then remove that option which makes no sense at all really. I should be able to remove what I want from them and give them what I want them to wear. Either that or they should have designated equipment slots that force them to wear and use what I give them. Not sure why anyone would think they should have any personal choice in this matter. Even if you take the free will thing into account they are working for me in the game meaning they should do what I tell them to do including what they wear and use for weapons. My biggest pet peave is when I want them to use a specific weapon and they want to switch to something I simply want them to carry for me. I've also had Lydia equip a piece of clothing that was clearly inferior to what she was already wearing.

Of course this goes hand in hand with why they don't allow us to designate what kind of attack our companions will do even though modders always manage to add that in. For example I may want my companion to use ranged instead of melee in a certain area. I should be able to give them that command.

There are many ways they could improve the companions. Fortunately the modders will correct most of these issues before long.

all ready got a mod that makes them wear cloths and I can pretty much give them anything and they will use it XD

I can make them wear whatever I want, such a cool mod

Or once you marry them, passive-aggressive.

I fully understand that companions are much more than meat shields & they should be able to be left alone to decide for themselves...However.

I will continue to burden them with my dragon bones & various other amounts of crap if they insist on trying to kill themselves on every single trap they come across, Multiple times.
My follower Mjoll delights in telling me about all the times she ventured all throughout Skyrim & other provinces while she is desperately trying to decapitate herself on a trap, that's why i made a decision to treat them like mules & it beggars belief how they could have survived into advlthood..

They desperately need micromanaging & to be treated like Toddlers, It's the only way to keep them alive until they learn to behave as a responsible human being & not a suicidal manic depressive.

IF the AI wasn't so broken, I'd be prefectly happy to allow them to make decisions for themselves. However, given the current state of the system, it is just a fact that I DO know what's best for them.

If my follower doesn't have the ability to make intelligent decisions (which with this broken AI, they don't), then I'd rather have a slave that does exactly what I tell them to.

At the very least, there should be the option. This is TES, after all.

Every time I give any follower a good bow they always use the default hunting bow. So my opinion on companions has changed, they are no longer friends they are now meat shields,pack mules and if they refuse to use the better equipment that I give em then their sh@t out of luck!Have fun fighting that dragon with generic gear on master. Anyways,I hope the new patch fixes this issue and my followers use the daedric bow that I give em.

There, fixed it.

I also think it's a bit annoying sometimes.

So far I've only used Lydia as a companion with two characters. And when we are in a town or our house I want her to at least take off her helmet. At first I used to just take it from her inventory and carry it around until I wanted her to use it again. But that got annoying soe now I just pretend she takes it off when were in town.

Meh, im sorry to be so [censored]y!!

Mjoll is unkillable. As in she has godmode enabled.

This will not work.