The Companions may have some powerful spells to start with, but they have the same number of Primary Attributes as the players have at that level, and a LOT fewer Ability Points (A level 3 PC would have 5 + 2*3 = 11 ability points, Madora has 5, Jahan has 3).
The Kickstarter mentioned that there would indeed be Henchmen who would be simpler, with a wide variety of builds and would be pretty disposable and you could just buy new ones if your old one got killed.
