[Paladin mount questions] But the Lone Ranger never killed off Silver...

Lord Pendragon · Mar 26, 2003

Okay, so that was a cheap trick, but I'm getting desperate. 83 views and only 1 reply? Surely someone can help me out here!

Say a paladin waits until 6th-level and per Defenders of the Faith takes a celestial heavy warhorse as his enhanced mount.

1. A heavy warhorse has 4 HD, but as a paladin's mount, this is raised to 6HD. With regards to the bonuses of the celestial template, how many HD does the mount have?

2. As the paladin gains levels, the mount continues to gain bonus HD. Do its celestial bonuses continue to grow stronger as a result of this?

3. How survivable is this mount? Is it feasible for a paladin with a maxed out ride score and Mounted Combat to go into battle with it and expect the mount to live?

4. Looking at the chart on Special Mounts in Defenders of the Faith, which mount do you feel has the best chance to survive into high levels? Why? (Obviously dragons are good, but I'm ignoring them since they can't be acquired until high levels anyway.)

Title edited by Piratecat to something vaguely on-topic

Greybar · Mar 26, 2003

As the paladin gains levels, the mount continues to gain bonus HD. Do its celestial bonuses continue to grow stronger as a result of this?

If you mean the celestial advancing into higher DR and such, I'd say yes. And yes, that will make it more survivable.

I don't have experience with high level mounts, so I'll leave that commentary to others. I am interested in this, as we may have some griffon mounts/companions be joining the heroes in the game I GM.

John

Lord Pendragon · Mar 26, 2003

*bump*

Apologies again for the cheap trick in the subject line, but this topic was sinking like a fighter in full plate without a single rank in Swim!

Piratecat · Mar 26, 2003

I'm putting back the proper subject line and moving it to Rules - where it should have been in the first place!

DerianCypher · Mar 26, 2003

I played a multiclass fighter/paladin and he had a Dire Wolf mount and to be perfectly honest, the thing was damn good and didn't die until the BBEM targetted it and squashed it for like 300 points of dmg.

Lord Pendragon · Mar 26, 2003

Piratecat,

Just wanted to say that when I wrote the original post, I seriously considered whether Rules or General would have been more appropriate. I figured that since I wanted an opinion (is this survivable? Which mounts have a better chance to survive) that General was more appropriate, in spite of the additional rules questions. Sorry I apparently chose incorrectly.

As for the subject line, I apologize. The act of a desperate man!

Artoomis · Mar 26, 2003

Paladin's mounts have hit die that improves as the Paladin advances.

There is no question that the celestial template is based upon hit die, and thus you re-calculate the effects of the template as the hit die improve.

As for survivability. My paladin has a celestial war dog (he's a halfling) and it does very well for survival. Of course, I have done two things that help:

1. Convinced myself and my DM that paladin's mounts "advance" as Magical Beasts per the monster manual - so that they get skill points and feats. It makes a small difference. I chose saving throw boosting feats, which helps survival.

2. Spent about 1/2 of the character's funds on celestial armor and other goodies for the mount to help in survivability. The mount has signifcantly better armor class than the paladin.

The biggest weakness has proved to be Will saving throws - having the mount stopped in his tracks by mising Will save is not a good thing!

Rackhir · Mar 26, 2003

A lot of the survivability question comes down to the type of opposition the char are facing, but once into the upper levels (Say 13+) the survivability of even a substantially boosted mount starts becoming dicey without some MAJOR magic defenses. However high level combat in general is extremly lethal irregardless of the target, but any efforts focused on killing a mount are probably going to succeed at those levels.

Personally from what I have seen a dire animal of some sort is a substantially better mount than any horse is going to be even with a template. They should also scale well to higher HD.

Griffons are fairly weak at first, but if bumped up a few dice which increase them in size category, they start becoming much better. They also offer extra movement capabilities that can be enhanced quite well. As a result they are also spared most melee combat threats. I am somewhat dubious as to how well they will work for a melee focused character though. Personally I think they are also substantially overated as to their cohort level of 9 for a CR4 creature.

In general, mounts actually work better with missile weapons than melee weapons, simply because you can get off a full attack while moving and can stay at a distance. The one exception might be a character optimized for a lance charge, but I suspect situations where one can take repeated advantage of that are going to be relatively rare.

Lord Pendragon · Mar 27, 2003

DerianCypher writes:
I played a multiclass fighter/paladin and he had a Dire Wolf mount and to be perfectly honest, the thing was damn good and didn't die until the BBEM targetted it and squashed it for like 300 points of dmg.

This makes me feel good. I don't mind if the mount dies like this. Even a PC would die after taking 300 points of damage, and if the paladin survives, he should have the resources to raise his mount.

Artoomis writes:
1. Convinced myself and my DM that paladin's mounts "advance" as Magical Beasts per the monster manual - so that they get skill points and feats. It makes a small difference. I chose saving throw boosting feats, which helps survival.

I like the advancement as a magical beast. So did your mount have its original HD as animal plus the extras from being a Paladin's Mount as magical beast, or all as magical beast? Also, I believe that the paladin and mount share base saves depending on which is higher. Would the paladin's "base save" for this purpose include the bonus from Divine Grace, or not?

2. Spent about 1/2 of the character's funds on celestial armor and other goodies for the mount to help in survivability. The mount has signifcantly better armor class than the paladin.

Did you have the Mounted Combat feat? If so, how did that work out? It didn't seem too impressive at low levels, but I can see how its usefulness would increase at higher levels. Especially if the paladin got himself a +20 to Ride checks item...

Rackhir writes:
Personally from what I have seen a dire animal of some sort is a substantially better mount than any horse is going to be even with a template. They should also scale well to higher HD.

Griffons are fairly weak at first, but if bumped up a few dice which increase them in size category, they start becoming much better. They also offer extra movement capabilities that can be enhanced quite well. As a result they are also spared most melee combat threats. I am somewhat dubious as to how well they will work for a melee focused character though. Personally I think they are also substantially overated as to their cohort level of 9 for a CR4 creature.

I looked over the dire animals, but the thing that sold me on celestial was the energy resistance and damage reduction that scales with level. Especially at higher levels with area effect spells, I figured that Improved Evasion plus energy resistance would protect the mount fairly well. This is all in theory, though...

I also considered trying for a flying mount. But the hippogriff looked woefully fragile, and the griffon did as well, when compared with the other mounts attainable at its level. I'd love to have a flying mount, but not if it's going to die on me, particularly while I'm airborne!

I'd welcome any and all comments / experiences / advice regarding paladin's mounts. How can they be kept alive? How are they most useful? What are their weaknesses? Are there any tricks to making effective use of them?