I can't speak to Aranea as a follower as I've never taken her as one. I have taken J'zargo as a follower, though. He has no level cap(if you are level 150, so is he). At higher levels he has high to max heavy armor skill and will gladly equip some nice high quality heavy armor(well tempered and enchanted is best).
NPCs don't care about enchantments, they only care what a piece's armor rating can do for them. Also, most followers(maybe all) cannot take advantage of fortify skill enchants as only the player has a special hidden perk that allows you to use them. They can use resistances, stat increases and extra regen.
Skyrim Se Change Follower Armor
When I took J'zargo as a follower I gave him extra magicka on his gauntlets, extra regen on his armor and helmet, elemental resist on his boots and a combo of elemental and magic resists on his necklace and ring. He still only uses novice and apprentice destruction spells in combat, though. With heavy armor, he also isn't that great of a pack mule since he can't carry that much.
You can interact with permanent followers by talking with them (outside of combat). You will then be able to exchange items with them, or give a command, depending on their abilities. You can also start commanding your follower quickly, even from some distance away, by pointing at them and holding the activate/use control.
You can trade items with some of your followers to equip them with better items or store excess loot. Sometimes, they will refuse to equip the items you give them. Pickpocketing the items you wish them to replace with the improved items can help fix this. It can also allow you to do this with NPCs who will not trade their equipped items with you. However, it requires the Misdirection (for weapons) and Perfect Touch (for armor) perks to achieve this.
To avoid near death experiences, followers should be traded better armor in the skill type they prefer (either heavy or light armor.) The DamageResist variable can be increased by tempering the armor and shield. In addition, wearing armor pieces or shield awards a hidden 25 bonus points per item. The 125 possible hidden points are not reflected in the DamageResist variable, but are counted in combat. Providing equipment with magic resistance enchantments (ring, necklace, and shield) increases their MagicResist variable. The follower is less likely to be incapacitated if provided all of these enhancements.
Normally, you cannot take a follower's default apparel through "I need to trade some things with you..." dialogue. If they are killed in battle, then you can search their body, removing anything they were carrying, including their default items. You can also take their default equipment if you have the pickpocket perk Perfect Touch if they aren't currently following you, or even without that perk if you gave them better equipment to wear, dismissed them and started pickpocketing right away, without giving them time to go into another cell (since they would put on their default equipment when travelling between cells). There is one other exception to this rule: your spouse. After you get married, your follower spouse will open up a general goods store, in which your spouse will sell whatever items are not equipped in addition to what's in your spouse's merchant chest (if you're at home). If you get your spouse to wear something that isn't default apparel (normally you do this by giving your spouse an improved piece of armor) then the default apparel that isn't being worn will become available for sale. You can then purchase it, and then give your spouse anything to wear in that slot and your spouse will wear it while following you. There are two caveats with this approach: one, if you purchase all of your spouse's default apparel (or steal all default apparel from any follower, or, actually, steal all default apparel from any NPC), your spouse (or newly-naked follower or NPC) will respawn new default apparel, so you must leave at least one piece of default apparel in your spouse's inventory, and two, if your spouse is not following you, your spouse will not wear any custom apparel, but will only wear whatever default apparel is left in your spouse's inventory.
Followers who are also trainers can train you for "free". They will still charge you, but leave profit from training in their inventory. Simply request to see their inventory while they are an active follower, and take your gold back from any training sessions. Note that the follower's gold will reset to a low amount when you fast travel (possibly change zone), so get your money back from them quickly.
These followers wear robes as their default apparel, so they will accept any armor given to them; however, they will not equip any other robes, since all robes have an armor rating of "0". They will accept weapons and shields, but they will immediately switch back to dual-wielding spells when an enemy is encountered. Once their Magicka runs out, they will resort to using their bare hands until it recharges.
A subclass of followers is non-humanoid followers, such as dogs, armored trollsDG, rieklingsDR, Steadfast Dwarven SpiderDR, and Steadfast Dwarven Sphere.DR These followers can neither carry nor equip items, except in the case of rieklings. The interaction with these followers is limited to the wait/follow commands and dismissal, the only exception again being rieklings.
If patch 1.6 or later is not installed, followers, along with all other levelable characters, are locked at the level at which they first encountered the Dragonborn, and will not continue to level up. The only way to fix this leveling error is to use console commands on the PC (disable then enable the character while they are not active followers) or use the Wabbajack to turn them into an animal, then wait for them to change back. This resets their stats to the Dragonborn's current level. This does not appear to reset their inventory or quest scripting. Essential characters cannot be transformed, and one can therefore not reset their stats without using console commands.
Targeting a follower and typing setlevel 1000 0 1 81 will make that follower level up with the Dragonborn until they reach level 81. Replacing the last number in that command with a number other than 81 will change their level cap to the given number.
Each follower tends to have their own preference of armor. For example, Aela has no preference and will use heavy armor if she receives it, even though she is a marksman whose default armor is light. A Dark Brotherhood Initiate, however, strongly opposes the use of heavy armor unless it is significantly better than their current armor. This is because the initiate prefers light armor, matching their skills.
Ironically, the default equipment of many followers does not correspond to their actual combat skills. For example, Aela's default armor is Heavy Armor, despite her being skilled in Light Armor, and Erik the Slayer's default equipment is Iron Armor and a one-handed sword, despite his true skills lying in two-handed weapons and light armor.
Enchantments on weapons work normally, except Soul Trap and Fiery Soul Trap, since followers cannot fill soul gems, but followers will only benefit from the following enchantment effects on their apparel and armor:
I have downloaded some followers to test and see if I find one that I like, but some of them come without clothes / armor and trying to use the clothes / armor that I have installed, they are out of place, as expected. I know I can copy my body file to the follower's folder, but I would like to use the default follower body. Is there a method similar to what we do on our character on the bodyslide to adjust the clothes / armor with the body preset?
I have had this issue for nearly every custom follower I download (except mods like Dralora of Vivec, Alynna and "bunch of npcs" mods) and it involves knowing how to change custom follower bodies to cbbe. When they come with their own custom body like some mods just as the "Nell brat" follower mod on this site in particular or the Bjinn mods for vanilla npcs (which use UNP) I can't adjust anything to them.
i have been searching everywhere for an explanation for how to change the body shape of a custom follower via CBBE Bodyslide, and have had ZERO results for it. just mostly tutorials on how to change a follower's body from unp to cbbe or vice versa. So, since you guys almost always answer my questions always, i must ask, how do i do this?
I don't think you can directly change a follower's body shape using Bodyslide like you can with the player character, You may need to create the body the way you want for the follower using Bodyslide, then have it generate the femalebody_0.nif and femalebody_1.nif meshes.
Hello. I am currently using which adds a standalone follower. The issue I am experiencing is that her body type is "Wench Body" while the rest of the NPCs uses "CBBE BBB". I want her body type to be distinct from the other standard NPCs so I have used BodySlide to build CBBE BBB meshes of custom armors from other mods. Now, if I use armor or clothing from the follower's mod on her, her body type remains as "Wench Body". But if I use armor or clothing from other mods, her mesh turns to that of "CBBE BBB". Is it possible for the follower to have separate custom armor meshes from other generic NPCs? So I would want the follower to maintain her "Wench Body" type while she uses custom armors but for other NPCs or followers to use the "CBBE BBB" type with the same armor. I've tried building "Wench Body" meshes of the custom armors through BodySlide and copying them to the follower's folder. I also copied over the texture files but that did not work. Would I have to use Creation Kit for such a change or is there a easier method? If Creation Kit is needed, how will I do this? I have no prior experience with modding. Any help will be very much appreciated. Thanks. 2ff7e9595c