Is there any way to change pawn formation or get them to hang back a bit? They have a bad habit of walking right in front of my Arisen and getting in the way.
When we walk into a building to talk to someone, they start wandering all over the place in a comical fashion, getting up in between my Arisen and whoever he's trying to talk to. They're just so annoying. Like being followed by an over-excited, poorly-behaved pack of dogs. Or like a cat sitting on your keyboard, if that makes it easier to imagine.

Just get out of the bloody way.

omg how i wish thems really REALLY need to be 2 inches in front of you at all times
im always like seriously running here dude back off

Can't say that mine are the touchy-feely kind. My own pawn has a penchant for wading in Gran Soren's marketplace fountain, though, then complaining about getting wet.

You can issue basic commands to your pawns with the d-pad. There's Go (Up), Help Group (left, will cause the pawns to start buffing if they can), Help Me (right) and Come (down). Doing so will shift inclinations on your main pawn, though.

The pioneer inclination means that the pawn will scout away from the party, while the guardian inclination results in a pawn that will stick close to the arisen.

There's a pretty in-depth article on the wiki here:
http://dragonsdogma.wikia.com/wiki/Pawn_Inclination

yes, i agree, if they jump into water one more time and then whine about getting wet im going to throw them off the cliff. that or running up to crowd me when gathering loot tho they dont help out gathering themselves. generally just getting in the way. battling its nice to have them but i for one am ready to just go as solo as possible

I ditched the Three Stooges after a few story quests in Gran Soren and my Ranger/Assassin is up to the Gutter of Misery in Bitterblack Isle.

So far the game works pretty well without them. So well, in fact, that I wouldn't be surprised if they were just crowbared in by upper management because the game "needed" online features.