Created Follower Only Offers Hire when I have someone

[Conanette]

I've followed the guides, and based this follower off of an existing hireling. His factions and relationships are set, he's ally, his disposition and all that are set, yada yada. I go to where I placed my him, with my current follower in tow, and he will offer his services for 500g but says I already have somebody. So at this point the game recognizes he is hireable. I get all the usual voice options (and again, didn't change from the hireling default- I'm using Marcurio's base). But as soon as I dismiss my current follower, my created one no longer offers to be hired- I just get "perhaps another time".
I looked around in CK at npcs listed under hireling faction, etc, and my creation is indeed listed there among the rest. And he offers his services- but only if I already have a follower. Any ideas?! He's such a tease :(

[bLaCkShAd0w]

How did you create your follower. Seems you missed something as it is sharing something with the vanilla follower and when you dismiss someone it takes the options away from your custom NPC.

https://youtu.be/tLgSYzOaTnA

[Conanette]

I used HirelingMarcurio, changed the ID, name, created new form. From there I imported a new face and went through the dispositions, factions, and relationships, verifying they were all there as per said video and tesnexus wiki. Placed him in the world. But you're right, I can only assume he's sharing something despite the new form, though the base form (HirelingMarcurio) has the same voice and hireling status. It'd be so much simpler to figure out if he just never offered his services at all :P

[bLaCkShAd0w]

Well i subbed to the thread. I can check my followers in like 2 hours from now to see if anything stands out. NPC's are horrible to edit.

[Conanette]

I took out the hireling option entirely and kept him just as follower, and he will happily follow me for free now! The other part of me still wonders at the WHY of the other problem though. It would be good to know for future reference. :/ I compared his factions with the vanilla Marcurio (and other hirelings), and they are the same. Regardless, I found a workaround. Thanks for responding and giving me things to consider!

[bLaCkShAd0w]

Ok I have some Ideas, Open your actor form in the CK, Under Factions,

Do you have CurrentFollowerFaction set to -1
If you highlight that line and click under the rank it will let you type there, Set it to -1
Potential follower faction set to 0

https://imgur.com/a/3m9nF

Under keyword you need JobHireling

Undere traits it gets a little tricky, Only certain voice types have the follower lines available, You can use the vanilla followers for reference in case you want to switch it up or make custom ones.

Thats about all you need I think, My guess is you were missing the -1?