Cohorts and Followers: What do you or your players use them for?

[cthulhu_duck]

One of my players (I'm currently DM'ing in my D&D group) asked this morning about the number of followers he should have after gaining a new level - given that the character's followers and the cohort seem to mostly do things like looking after the party's horses or looking after the party's house etc - I asked the player what he envisaged his character doing with his followers.

His response is largely a 'what can you do with your cohort and followers' question - so, since ENWorld has proven to be a good source of diverse answers, I thought I'd ask here:

Cohorts and Followers: What do you or your players use them for?

 

[DM_Jeff]

Cohorts and Followers

>>Cohorts and Followers: What do you or your players use them for?

This PC keeps all his followers in the same city...

* Runs the day-to-day activities at his little house to the goddess of luck.
* Another tours the city singing the praises of said goddess.
* Acts as a spy and information gatherer at local watering holes.
* Runs simple errands for the PC like getting supplies or buying suff.
* Fill out the ranks of the addittion to the city guard he started to quell magical threats.
* Act as an apprentice to the PC.
* Runs messages for the PC to others in the city or in nearby towns.
* Spies on locations the PC wants watched.
* One he's developed into a romantic interest.

-DM Jeff

 

[Shadowdancer]

They guard and take care of the PCs' main stronghold. Some also patrol the surrounding area to watch for pending attacks by humanoid tribes that live in the area. They also serve as apprentices, and create magic items for the PCs (mainly scrolls and potions). There's been a little romance, too.

I like the idea of having them run simple errands. Their list of duties just expanded.

 

[STARP_JVP]

Cannon fodder.

 

[cthulhu_duck]

This PC keeps all his followers in the same city...
...
* Another tours the city singing the praises of said goddess.
* Acts as a spy and information gatherer at local watering holes.
...
* Act as an apprentice to the PC.

In 3.0 I seem to recall there was a limitation that followers should have classes only in NPC classes - in 3.5 I don't recall that limitation being specified - do people use that limitation at all?

 

[Herremann the Wise]

In 3.0 I seem to recall there was a limitation that followers should have classes only in NPC classes - in 3.5 I don't recall that limitation being specified - do people use that limitation at all?

Our group pretty much sticks to that limitation. We feel Player Classes are more for major NPCs, not followers.

We used to have cohorts as adventuring with the party but in the end, it just slowed things down too much. One of my characters, Lucifus Cray (see story hour below) has the majority of his followers making up his harem which he takes around with him from town to town. With over 50 females of various persuasions following him, Lucifus is quite the neighbour. They are there purely as flavour and a bundle of roleplaying potential for the DM, NPCs and other players.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[theRogueRooster]

Cannon fodder.

I like to dress mine up in red shirts.

-tRR

 

[luke_twigger]

In our last campaign, our adventuring group "acquired" a fort. We made a pact to all take Leadership feat when we reached 6th level. Our cohorts and followers then staffed the fort while the main PCs went off on quests, etc.

We did plan for the cohorts to be spare PCs, in case of accidents, so that a new PC would already have some connection to the ongoing campaign, but it never came to that.

Actually now that I think about it, we reached 6th level in the middle of a module. So we recruited our cohorts in a nearby town and then continued the module. The cohorts were left to watch the camp while the PCs did the adventuring proper. This involved finding a magic ship in a bottle. All our PCs ended up magically trapped in the bottle aswell and at the end of the day our cohorts rescued them.

Bear in mind the Leadership feat awards plenty of negative modifiers if cohorts and followers get killed, making it unlikely to recruit more. So I'm generally very protective of them.

 

[Griffonsec]

My group used followers to protect a keep they captured, but I figured the 900 gold that 1st level NPCs start with was a bit much (especially since the Absolute most a 1st level PC can start with is 200) so I nerfed them a bit. The PCs complained, so I eventually just got rid of the feat.

 

[Finley DaDum]

My current character is likely to make 5th level very soon along with most of the rest of the party. Both my Cleric and the Wizard are looking at leadership for 6th level. I have allready introduced my cohort, an Orc we saved during an adventure involving interclan warfare between tribes of orcs. He was a 1st level Barbarian and I left him in the hands of a Cleric of Kord. When he joins the party at 4th level he will be Barb1/Clr1/Ftr2 and be built purely as a TANK.

We are a more skill and magic oriented party so the addition of a strong tank should be helpful. Honestly I am a little worried that he may require more attention to keep alive, if that happens I will likely reavaluate and consider a support cohort or possibly one who stays away from the adventuring alltogether. The Wizard plans to take a Bard as his cohort which should work well as a support character to the large party we have.

I plan to recruit followers later, but they will almost certainly just remain at a homebase whatever that may be. I have no idea how hi a level we will actually get to so this may never be more than s small group of converts.