Alright, so I just got it today and I've been playing, and my question is if a character leaves my party do they take the equipment I put on them with them? I just got Sten and loaded him up with scale armor that I bought for a pretty penny, and the fellow is none to amiable. I am concerned about his rapid departure, and if his exit is inevitable for me I don't want him to have my nice stuff on him when he does. Since I bought the goods and equiped him, do I get them back, or does he just leave with everything on him?

I'm not sure....I'm on my second playthrough and have never had someone leave the party...If I don't like them I don't play them so they stop "disliking" you more.  I used Morrigan, Alistair, and Leliana for the most part....also Shale (the rock golem you can download).  Just take him out of the party and leave him with no equipment or use him to "hold on to gear" that you don't want to sell but don't want you to weigh you down.

I never had a "true" character leave so I dont really know but scale armor would become useless pretty soon. I wont worry about it too much. Your average darkspawn drops those. Also, if use stuff like the infinite gold glitch, you can buy whatever lol

Also a great way to level up!  I just donate 30 sovereigns over and over to get experience points...that's how I'm getting my level 20 trophies for rogue and mage.

where do you donate money for experience? the only way I know of is to duplicate tomes but I already used them all up so its too late for me in this playthrough. I think I've already beat all the toughies though so any more stat boosting on my part would be overkill anyway.

According to Penny Arcade they do. Their Alistair left towards the end with some really amazing gear, the one they get from the DLC.

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After you save the arl and his Redcliffe troops join your cause, you can donate money at camp.  If you donate enough you can level up quickly..especially if you pump 5,000-6,000 gold into the boxes.  That's enough to get you from level 16 to level 20 prolly.  Prolly takes around 10,000 gold to get you from level 10-20 I'd guess.  Just duplicate one of the really expensive items like the dagger in the Dwarf land....28 gold everytime.  Prolly take a couple hours, but a LOT quicker than playing through the game 2 more times for the trophies.

next question, how badly does somebody have to hate you to leave? Sten is a douche bag and any time I do anything remotely nice he's all like "Really? Again?" and loses points. I will probably replace him with my dog shortly.

I never had someone that actually hated me on my first playthrough, but now on my second, Alistair is already at -10 :P I think when it falls into somewhat -50 they have a high possibility of leaving your party.

At the end of the “Urn of Sacred Ashes” quest, you have the option of destroying the ashes. If you choose to do this, Leliana will turn against you (as will Wynne if she is in the party).

Through dialogue choices, you can make Oghren so angry that he will try to leave, if his approval has dropped low enough. When this occurs, you can try to convince him to stay, you can engage him in combat (Oghren will surrender before the end of the combat, and you can choose to kill him, threaten him back into line, or send him away), or you can just let him go. This can happen twice.

If you travel to the Urn of Sacred Ashes, Sten will question your commitment to destroying the archdemon. If you are a bit too lippy with him, he’ll challenge you for control of the party. If you beat him, he’ll want to leave.

In the “Urn of Sacred Ashes” quest, Wynne will turn against you if you decide to destroy the ashes, just as Leliana will. You will have to fight them and kill them if they are in the party. During the “Broken Circle” quest, on the fourth floor of the tower, Cullen will suggest that killing all the mages in the tower is the only way to fix things. If you side with Cullen, Wynne will leave the party for good and fight you to the death. Later, if you reveal that you are a blood mage (or accepted the blood mage specialization from the desire demon in the Fade), Wynne will also turn against you.

During the first random encounter, Zevran can be killed before you ever talk to him, or at any time during the first conversation before he is recruited. Shame on you.
Based on poor approval rating, you can make Zevran so angry that he will try to leave. You can try to convince him to stay, or you can engage him in combat (thereby killing him), or you can just let him go. This can happen twice; the second time there is no more convincing.
Just before the Landsmeet, Zevran’s old friend Taliesin will ambush you in a back alley random encounter with a number of Antivan Crows. If Zevran likes you a lot, he’ll stay and fight them, though your dialogue choices in this encounter can cause him to leave even if he likes you enough to stay. If he really doesn’t like you, he’ll join them to fight against you. If he’s somewhere in between, he’ll leave during the fight but stay in the party afterward.