Actually, at high levels a travelling cohort becomes a bigger and bigger liability. A 20th level character who is not charisma based can have a hard time getting his max cohort level above 15th level. A character 5 levels behind at 20th level is a liability. Also, the cohort cannot rise above 17th level with the Epic Leadership feat and that requires a Cha of 25, ridiculously high for a say a fighter. QUOTE]
In my experience, only characters with high Cha take the feat otherwise there is too big a level discrepency. Currenty, I have a Cleric with the feat and his Cha is 25. We are currently playing Age of Worms (AoW) and started with an 18 Cha, has a +4 Cha bonus item and bumped it + 1 on each of levels 4, 8 and 12. His cohort has died twice already and they have raised him both times. I assess penalties (in the sense that the NPC is beginning to think this is a little too dangerous) but the bonuses the PC gets to up his leadership score from doing the deeds outweighs the penalties so the NPC never leaves. In addition, the party does supply the NPC with some great magic items. Essentially, a character designed to take Leadership should find it difficult to lose the cohort short of DM intervention. Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining, just pointing out my experiences.
