In standard Morrowind this function appeared to be mostly broken, except for making an NPC quaff a potion.
I've tried making a NPC AiActivate a potion both from scripts and the console. The other uses of the function fixed in Tribunal like picking up items, pressing activators... work for me, but this doesn't. Even tried on clean re-installs of vanilla Morrowind, and Morrowind+Tr+BM, with no mods at all, and without patching the .exe with MCP. Here's what invariably happens:
If the NPC has a potion in their inventory, it returns an error saying the NPC / creature "potionID" wasn't found.
If the potion was placed in the cell beforehand (in the CS), they pick up the potion.
If the potion is placed in the cell ingame, they move to the potion, then Morrowind crashes.
Is this version-dependent?