Do clockwork constructs follow the verbal commands of the their creator or keyholder? Or do they follow preset commands?
Thanks.
Either or, in this case. They will definitely follow the orders of their creater/keyholder, but they'll also follow any preset commands outside of those orders. Such as a creater telling the clockwork minion to sweep the floor of all the blood from his latest experiment. If the creater didn't state how to clean up the blood, the construct would simply follow it's programming on how to clean up the floor from previous attempts to do so.
EDIT: Though if the clockwork construct's creater was dead and the construct had the key, it would probably follow it's previous command such as "protect this hallway from intruders until I command you to do otherwise".