Those NPCs are more like a group of PC heroes than a "single Player hero with followers". The "Followers" in the Sword, etc. slots are not built using the rules for Followers, but were usually much more in the way of "stripped-down" PCs with multiple keywords, etc. (we originally punted around the idea of including the "followers of the followers, but decided not to go down that route).
The "Cheap Six Pack" noted in Buthur Dog-Noses's description is much more along the lines of what HQ calls "Followers".
Should you really want to emulate one of the NPCs, you might try something we used to do in an old Pendragon Campaign, where each player ran his knight as normal, but also ran a squire for one of the other knights. We even had "Squire only" adventures, with none of the "major characters" involved. In a game like that, each player might run a "Primary hero" and one or more "secondary characters" - the Sword, Shield, etc. of someone else's Primary. Play can focus on one single hero and his (player-run) major followers, or get all the major heores together and relegate the followers back into "follower" status by simply noting their keyword values and any wildly out-of-whack ability ratings he might have.
RR
It is by my order and for the good of the state that the bearer of this has
done what he has done.
- Richelieu
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