Jamey

Or, perhaps add a pack-mule type creation which has an inventory, a lot of HP (so it doesn't die all the time), and cannot fight worth a darn.

That would avoid a lot of complications.

A more Geneforge appropriate way of handling the encumberance would be to have two inventories - the one carried by your character (which is accessible in combat) and the other carried by your minions. Use their combined strength to calculate an encumberance limit for the minion inventory.