I always liked how Freespace have done this. Your wingman don’t get to have unique names nor plot armor but you could give them commands and they felt really useful. They were not permanent companions and yet you cared about them and felt something when they went down.

Would be cool to get an implementation of that system. Imagine defending the vehicles graveyard in Garbage with a squad of loners assigned by Bes for you to command.

Would probably kill the tension and break immersion when the ai does something weird (more likely to see since the companion is following you)