This was probably talked about at some point in time, and i do apologize if this is in the wrong section. But heres my gripe.
At level 7 on Very Hard/hardcoe, i found my first companion in ED-E. As awesome a companion he is, i quickly realized how EASY the game became with his Over aggression, Incredible Perception, and Lasers that seem to burn down victims in two hits. Because of how much thunder ED-E was taking out of combat fun, i decided to let him go.
ED-E really got a big time buff with the patch.
Yesterday, after reinstalling the patch(which I don't really like for a certain nerfing decision), I went on with an early save at lvl 8, and started my skill book collection tour again.
Went northwest from the Mojave outpost, when all of a sudden I was surrounded by 3 giant radscorps.
'Oops, I smell a reload', was the thing that came into my mind. but to my surprise, before I was even finished making up my mind how to solve this issue, 2 of them were already set on fire, by the formerly -combatwise- useless ED-E, WTF? :ahhh:
Still, there are many occasions were you'll find yourself protecting your companions or simply having them wait outside certain locations.
I'd rather not taking them to the quarry junction, as an example. And like others said already, it's always better to have them a little bit too strong than a little bit too weak. Nothing is more annoying than always having to pamper and micromanage fragile companions. I wouldn't bother using them, if they were like that.