The companions are not all evil. Gale and Wyll seem to be on the CG/NG side of the fence. The rouge may seem evil but I have been with him long enough to know he actually isn't the standard evil type either.
People pigeonholing characters into black and white alignemnts here. Unusual since I know many have expressed how much they dislike BW characters … and now we have some gray ones .. the complaining begins.
I have zero problem with setting on a character group after the first act. This could be do to story reasons and maybe provides a way to do something far more in-depth with characters. They might have some really cool stuff planned.
So odd that I was rather negative about this game and yet now I keep defending it
lol.
But more interested in just enjoying things these days and curious to see how it plays out. I think it is a pretty cool idea myself assuming they have some reason for doing it.
Seriously - I doubt they would something like that unless they had some good reason for it. Why annoy certain players for zero reason? Instead of looking at this as a negative I prefer to see it as a positive - something that has potential for some cool follower interaction and plot lines perhaps.
EDIT: I read Akradias post and I can say with confidence that is not the case. They are not all evil complaining whining hateful companions at all.
So many of the previews are complete and utter shit (sorry for the language but its true). It is so clear to me, now that I have spent time playing, learning the controls, that people previewing did not spend time getting to know the followers or game mechanics.
The worse being that Ars Technia - just about the most inaccurate and misinformed review I have ever read.
First the die rolls are hard but that is because not everything is pushed to the characters favor like in other games. Having played a lot more the rolls are well done and I get plenty of good rolls as well as bad.
Companions - I don't want to spoil things but people shouldn't make them BW. There are layers to their alignment. Nor are they all hateful by any means. Even Shadowheart, who was mentioned as being so hateful, can be nice and even feel gratitude and companionship.
The other annoyance is one article said (paraphrase) "what is so horrible about the combat is that while the enemy can spread themselves out all over the battlefield, you and your team are stuck together meaning the enemy is always getting you with AOE spells"
At first I thought so too till I realized how stupid I had been. Granted if you get into combat mode suddenly you have to break up during combat, but so does the enemy in some cases.
What I learned this weekend is to break up my group if I know a battle is coming. I then use invisibility, stealth, grease (spell/bomb), cloud fog, and other things to break up my party and slow down the enemy. Battles got a lot easier to manage this way.
Also the rogues sneak attack is the most powerful ability I have seen in my own game, often crippling or even a few one-shot kills (especially on a 20). I often lead with the rogue - either with a sneak attack or in stealth, throw a grease bomb then maybe a fire bomb. Sometimes water and then mage uses electricity.