Very fun game, unique in that no one has copied it successfully.
In fact, the only way to "control" them is to set bounties and hope they go for them! The bigger the bounty the better chance!
Back to what you as a player can do however, you have to recruit the heroes in the first place, you can rename them, build bazaars and blacksmiths for items. Although the heroes decide themselves if they want to shop, hunt for monsters, raid a lair, research new spells, or go after a bounty. Heroes need gold to buy items, so if you have a favorite, be sure to give him some gold via bounty, or just dump an explore bounty right next to him!
There are monster lairs that monsters will come out of, and lairs will appear over time, mostly sewers in your base in which rats, and giant rats come out of. Also enemies can come from the sides of the level based on your settings. There is a wide variety of heroes and they all do different things and have different personalities.
For example: Gnomes mostly level up by building things for you, they are horrible fighters, dwarves on the other hand, can help build, and are great at fighting. Wizards are the most damaging but most fragile of the heroes, they tend to flee or die a lot... Warriors are very stupid, they get themselves killed a lot, and rogues are always looting lairs and the sort!!!
This game is great multiplayer, you are at peace with who ever is with you... unless you put bounties on them! A complete war will start, and you will be throwing spells at each other like mad! Depending on what temples you make, it is what spells you get, you can reanimate, burn them with the sun, zap em with lightning and more! However using the spells uses your money... you get money via your tax collectors and guilds. The rogues guild is a nice amount of cash... low on cash and don't want to wait? EXTORT THEM!!! Yes you can do that.
I need my sleep and am too tired to explain more of this wonderful game... my point of this is... GET IT! You will have a lot of fun. I recommend it to any fan of rts/rpgs or just find it intriguing.