This game is surprisingly bad at telling you very specific things and, to my knowledge, you can't 'aid another' (along with many other helpful default maneuvers and skill attempts). In addition to those middling issues, I found myself on numerous occasion cursing aloud because my archer took off in a dead sprint to stand next to an enemy that I wanted them to shoot at, while spamming every button I could think of to get him to stop. No undo on Daring difficulty and up. OH - and hilariously, these types of antics saw me using negative abilities on the caster themself.
So far it's kid of fun, it's just hard to ignore the intense BS. Also don't waste your background and feats on persuasion, because it only shows up in very limited instances (at least in the first hour or two of the game....I'm not too far in, just far in enough to have met like 14 named NPCs that I have had no option to improve their attitudes towards me. The only time it's mattered is when I negotiated a higher fee for escorting the noble, unless he screws me over later, we'll see.
TL;DR kind of a cluster F.
[updated review following this:]
I've since played dozens more hours of this game, and while all the above issues are still more or less in play, I've seen a lot more of the upside of this game. It was worth it for me to get on sale. The game has a ridiculous amount of content, seems to have legit branching story paths where choices actually matter, and not some KOTOR/Jade Empire nonsense where there's 3 endings and you can just choose which one you want before you fight the last boss. The various builds you can pull off are quite amusing, but I am left sorely wanting a way to respec my characters in a way that doesn't burn them to the ground back to lvl 1 - like maybe I just wanted to change up ONE feat selection, not the whole damn character. I probably would've like the story arc for kingmaker much better than this one, but it ends up being decent. Army management is a little jank, and breaks up progress in an irritating way, but it's not a deal-breaker. One last thing: early (and even mid) game Grease spell is just absurd. Use it. Love it. Win with it.

This game is surprisingly bad at telling you very specific things and, to my knowledge, you can't 'aid another' (along with many other helpful default maneuvers and skill attempts). In addition to those middling issues, I found myself on numerous occasion cursing aloud because my archer took off in a dead sprint to stand next to an enemy that I wanted them to shoot at, while spamming every button I could think of to get him to stop. No undo on Daring difficulty and up. OH - and hilariously, these types of antics saw me using negative abilities on the caster themself. So far it's kid of fun, it's just hard to ignore the intense BS. Also don't waste your background and feats on persuasion, because it only shows up in very limited instances (at least in the first hour or two of the game....I'm not too far in, just far in enough to have met like 14 named NPCs that I have had no option to improve their attitudes towards me. The only time it's mattered is when I negotiated a higher fee for escorting the noble, unless he screws me over later, we'll see. TL;DR kind of a cluster F. [updated review following this:] I've since played dozens more hours of this game, and while all the above issues are still more or less in play, I've seen a lot more of the upside of this game. It was worth it for me to get on sale. The game has a ridiculous amount of content, seems to have legit branching story paths where choices actually matter, and not some KOTOR/Jade Empire nonsense where there's 3 endings and you can just choose which one you want before you fight the last boss. The various builds you can pull off are quite amusing, but I am left sorely wanting a way to respec my characters in a way that doesn't burn them to the ground back to lvl 1 - like maybe I just wanted to change up ONE feat selection, not the whole damn character. I probably would've like the story arc for kingmaker much better than this one, but it ends up being decent. Army management is a little jank, and breaks up progress in an irritating way, but it's not a deal-breaker. One last thing: early (and even mid) game Grease spell is just absurd. Use it. Love it. Win with it.