In last trailer we have seen our stardard Origin group in Baldur's gate ... all 5 of them ... It was said that developers see the city of Baldur's Gate as "big finale" ...
It may be just promotion materials ofcourse, with zero information value ... i know, i know ... still, doesnt that make one at least little hopefull that they reconcidered that whole "pick and let others go" theory?
I don't think that trailer footage points to anything - I doubts devs played through the entire act1 just to record footage for the video. I doubt footage shown has any bearings of what could be available in any single playthrough.
It seems, though, that Minsc and Jaheira will be act2 (?) companions, so Larian already might have chosen to provide us with more story companions past act1 than they did in D:OS2. On top of that, if hirilings are recruitable through Withers, assuming they become available in act1 (and not at the start of act2 as it was in D:OS2) players could potentially fill their party with hirings and unintentionally loose access to all story origin companions if the plan were to take them away. We will see
