Mercenary/NPC

I know I've seen talk about a mercenary and/or NPC system where players would be able to hire NPCs to help them fight. I would like to see this finished, but alittle differently than I've heard. I would like to see NPCs with very few skills(Maybe "Fight" and a single non-elemental set of skills? like Fire1-3, except non elemental), that players would be allowed to control in battle. I know this would be hard to program into the current game, but I also know it's very possible because I've created something similar before(except now Turn based programming kicks my ass, 3 years later.) Just a suggestion.

P.S.:It would be awesome to see the NPCs being Bartz, or the others from the cast of FF5, or even Fighter/blackmage from FF1.

P.P.S.: I think by adding mercenaries that players can control rather than AI controlled ones, it would give people the ability to take, say, a healer, and use its healing abilities when needed rather than hoping that the AI notices your near-dead HP, or in the case of a warrior, so the player can focus on one enemy rather than the AI attacking whatever. Also; I think a player-controlled mercenary would be easier to program than an AI-controlled one(That works efficiently.) It would be great for players because some people just don't want to party with anyone, and the NPCs would be great as a replacement for multi-keying.

A bit of a revision: I continue with the idea that I had before about allowing players to control "Mercenaries" that would fight alongside them, but I think that mercenaries should be able to be bought at several locations, each location offering a slightly different version. Say, Baron would offer the player a level 1 Warrior or Healing class(Probably made specifically for the mercenary), and Kaipo would offer, say a black mage type.

Now, while I'm saying offer different kinds, I think you should be able to only have one mercenary at a time, but be able to get rid of them if you want(If you start with one, you have to get rid of one to get a new one) and if you buy a new one, they start off at level 1 again, making the player have to make a choice of whether or not they want to keep their current one, or train a new one.

While I said I'd like to see FF1 Blackmage/fighter or FF5 characters, I think I'd like to change my mind. I think the mercenaries should have icons specific(and new) for each of their classes.

This may seem like a lot, but I don't think it would be too hard to program, though it might be tedious to put in how I want it exactly. The easiest(Yet most boring) solution would be to allow players to control the mercenary as if it were an extra turn(which is what I'd prefer to have.), rather than an AI controlled one, and to only make them available in one place(Though I would rather have more than one type available.)