Commands should have a longer range than conversation

[PALU]

So, once again I've had the frustration of battling robbers and most of the hirelings just twiddle their thumbs when the one they fought was killed, while the last of them is fighting a 1:1 battle against one of the robbers.
The refusal to follow orders in this situation has thankfully been fixed, but I still have the problem that the order range is the same as the conversation range, i.e. about 10 meters. As the robbers tend to come towards you in a string, there can be some distance between your character battling the first one and the hirelings battling the others.

My suggestion is that you should be able to shout commands to hirelings (and dogs) at a considerably larger range, probably about 30 meters (15 tiles), although maximum visual range probably wouldn't be excessive. Instead of the infuriating message that I have to get closer while the abandoned hireling gets hacked to death, only commands should be available if the distance is too large for conversation, with the rest being greyed out. Non hirelings should continue to behave as they do currently (i.e. no reply, "get closer"), as you can't order them around.

In the same vein, dogs ought to hear you at a considerably larger distance than is currently the case, both because you're presumably shouting to increase the range, and because dogs have a better hearing than humans. If the dog is sufficiently far away you may not hear its reply bark, though (range based on character hearing?).