Mount Rules

[Saagael]

So last session the fighter in my group decides he doesn't like fighting beasties that can fly. So he went out and bought a Drakkensteed with some leftover cash that hadn't been spent. Now I'm not against this, in fact I thought it was an awesome idea and would be fun to try out.

Well the first combat with the new flying mount and there were several situations and rules that had me concerned, so I thought I'd ask the lovely community what it thought.

1) If the rider starts their turn mounted, the rider and mount share an action pool. If the rider is not mounted at the start of their turn, both get separate actions. Would I control the unmounetd steed, or would the player, and would the mount be able to do things like attack on its own?

To complicate this, its unclear how action pools change when a player mounts a steed. If, for example, the dragon moves next to the fighter, and the fighter uses his move action to mount, do the two combined have a standard action left? Or did mounting cause the two prior move actions to act as a the move and standard action.

2) I was running into some trouble with status conditions on the rider. For example, the fighter is dazed, and not mounted, but adjacent to the drake. He mounts the drake as his single move, but uses the drakes movement and attack instead of his own, arguing that he's dazed, but his drake isn't, so he can move and attack, even though there's a combined action pool.

Along with this, say the fighter is flying on his mount and ends up immobilized. He can no longer move. Can his mount still drag him along? The player cannot move except for forced movement and teleports, but is his mount dragging him along forced movement?

What about in the case of restrained, where forced movement is impossible?

3) I know that the flying rules were changed in an errata at some point, but the compendium doesn't seem to have updated with that, or I'm misremembering. From what I remember, a flying creature that falls prone crashes, taking falling damage. Is that correct, or is there still that fiddly bit with descending safely when you fall prone, and if you do then you don't take the damage?

Those were the big ones that came up, so if anyone can shed light on the situation I'd appreciate it. For now I'm thinking its a DM's call, and so advice how you fine gentlement would rule such things would be awesome.

 

[Lancelot]

Generally speaking, the rules for "other creatures" (companions, summons, mounts, etc) is that your PC may use one of his/her actions to give the "other creature" an action. Exceptions are usually specified.

So, to go through your examples...

1) The unmounted steed generally doesn't do anything unless its under the control of the player. If it's attacked, it stands still (assumed to be defending itself)... or perhaps it might run away (at the DM's discretion).

1a) A companion creature doesn't really have its own action pool in a combat situation. It doesn't "lose" a move action if the PC jumps on it, because it never had a move action to begin with. The PC can give it a move action, either by riding it or perhaps commanding it to move. Compare to shaman spirits or companion animals: they move at the same time as the PC uses a move action. Or compare to a summoning: it moves when a PC uses his move action to command it to move.

2) Again, the mount doesn't really have an action pool. If the fighter is dazed, and uses his only action to mount the animal, that's it.

There's a key exception here. Some companion creatures / summons / etc have specific actions that will occur, even if they're not being "commanded". For example, a summoned wolf might have a default action to attack the nearest opponent, even if the summoner doesn't explicitly use a standard action to command it. However, these default actions generally don't apply to mounts.

2a) Forced movement and conditions, I'm unclear on. Common sense would suggest that if the mount suffers a condition (e.g. immobilize), the rider can still move... and vice versa. Restrained is another issue. A rider that is restrained cannot be moved, which suggests that they will be dismounted if the creature moves without them.

3) Check the errata docs for updates to the flying rules. As I understand, though, prone = crashing. I'm not aware of any "descending safely" issues, unless it's specifically identified in a power or property.


The key point, though, is this: mounts don't have their own action pools. This is consistent across all "companion creatures" (whether they're a shaman spirit, familiar, summoned elemental, animal companion, whatever). Any actions they perform are due to PCs using their own actions, or at the DM's discretion. Hence, a warhorse with a stunned rider won't perform any actions - unless the creature specifically has an automated response listed (i.e. attacks nearest creature, even if given no commands) or the DM chooses to make an exception. Note the balancing effect of the latter, however. It may be more "realistic", but it strictly increases the power and utility of mounts if they can act freely - when virtually all other companion creatures cannot.

 

[El Mahdi]

So last session the fighter in my group decides he doesn't like fighting beasties that can fly. So he went out and bought a Drakkensteed with some leftover cash that hadn't been spent...

Did he go to his local DragonMax, or somewhere else.

It's okay if he did go somewhere else, as long as checked the DragonFax on the mount he bought...

 

[Saagael]

Generally speaking, the rules for "other creatures" (companions, summons, mounts, etc) is that your PC may use one of his/her actions to give the "other creature" an action. Exceptions are usually specified.

I know that it is that way with companions and summoned creatures, but as per the compendium, it says that if a mount is not being ridden, it has a separate action pool. To quote the compendium:

"An adventurer and his or her mount have one combined set of actions: a standard action, a move action, and a minor action. The player chooses how the two creatures use the actions on the adventurer’s turn. Most commonly, the mount takes a move action to walk or fly, and the adventurer takes a standard action to attack. The adventurer and the mount also share a single immediate action each round and a single opportunity action each turn. If the adventurer dismounts, the two still share one set of actions on that turn, but have separate sets of actions thereafter."

I bolded the relevant part. That indicates that if the rider is dismounted at the start of their turn then they both have separate action pools.

 

[Saagael]

Did he go to his local DragonMax, or somewhere else.

It's okay if he did go somewhere else, as long as checked the DragonFax on the mount he bought...

There was some down time where all the character spent several weeks between levels 17 and 18, and each player decided what they wanted their characters to do. The fighter used party resources to travel to the Shadowfell and tame one. By "bought" I mean that instead of finding a level 21 magic in a treasure parcel (worth 225,000 gold), he did this, since that's the rough value for a level 16 mount.

Oh, and don't worry, I get that you're joking

 

[Lancelot]

That indicates that if the rider is dismounted at the start of their turn then they both have separate action pools.

True. However, your original post asked how other groups were doing it, and for "DM Ruling" advice. That's how we're doing it in our group - there's a consistent mechanism for all other companion creatures, so why not use it?

It makes things very simple. No issues with mount/dismount, clarity on when (or if) the mount gets an attack, and it avoids the whole argument around: "So his horse gets a full action pool and can do what it likes... but my trained animal companion can't? ...or my summoned demon? ...or my imp familiar? ...or my figurine of wondrous power?"

You've correctly identified that the "separate pools" creates some headaches in actual play. Assume five players, all with mounts... that none of them are currently riding. For every combat, they're now either adding five more creatures that the DM has to run, until they're mounted... or they're gaining another set of actions each. That's a huge slow-down for the game. Mechanically, it's also pretty nonsensical. Every PC benefits from buying a mount... which they simply use for a free set of attacks each turn. In fact, for many PCs, they're strictly better off buying the animal and never riding it, if they get to control its actions independently.

For clarity, simplicity and balance, I'd still recommend going with the "common" approach for such creatures.

 

[Saagael]

For clarity, simplicity and balance, I'd still recommend going with the "common" approach for such creatures.

Thanks, that's precisely what I was looking for. Just making sure that my initial reaction (same as yours) wasn't completely off-base. Thanks for the input.

 

[Aulirophile]

Not really an issue since mounts don't level and all the things you share actions with do (since they scale with you). You can buy, expensive, higher level mounts of course.