Mounted Combat Tricks

[LokiDR]

Halfings and Gnomes. Their meduim-sized mounts can go just about anywhere.

For maximum mobility, the half-celestial riding dog is hard to beat. Movement:

50 (walk) 100 (fly).

Pretty cool, eh?

That is cool. I did some major damage with a pack of hobgoblins mounted on griffins. Do the spirited charge, mounted, and dive multipliers all work together, or has dive been changed/clearified in 3.5 to not work for the rider?

 

[Artoomis]

Do the spirited charge, mounted, and dive multipliers all work together, or has dive been changed/clearified in 3.5 to not work for the rider?

I don't know for sure.

A creature that flies can make dive attacks. A dive attack works just like a charge, but the diving creature must move a minimum of 30 feet and descend at least 10 feet. It can make only claw or talon attacks, but these deal double damage. A creature can use the run action while flying, provided it flies in a straight line.

So what about a rider on a diving creature? I'm not sure.

1. It works just like charge, so that measn you'd have to stop when you attack, except with Ride-By Attack.

2. With Ride-By Attack, you still have to continue the straight line, so, for a land-bound target, there is no place to go but the ground.

It looks to me like diving with Ride-By Attack is pretty much only for air-to-air combat.\

If you allow a dive to multiply a rider's damage with, say, a lance, then it should stack with charging since it is "works just like a charge" but is not a charge.

 

[Seule]

The double-post-monster strikes!

 

[Seule]

Who uses mounted combat? My character does.
Let me do up the math:

Lance: 1d8 damage
Str 18 bonus x1.5 (2hand): +6
Power Attack for 10 x2 (2hand): +20
Triple damage for Spirited Charge: 3d8+78
On a critical: 3d8+130
That guarantees a Massive Damage check against most things.

That also leaves out other feats, items, and circumstance bonuses (like the +1/hit for higher ground).
Sure, you can only do it once a round, but you can do it every round, and if you are a paladin (I'm not, but I can wish) you can summon your mount anywhere. Plus, with an advanced or buffed mount and Trample, your target is likely to be down and vulnerable after you go by.

Mounted combat is a tradeoff: It take specialization to do it well, and it's frequently useless, but when it kicks in it can be very deadly.

--Seule

 

[LokiDR]

Who uses mounted combat? My character does.
Let me do up the math:

Lance: 1d8 damage
Str 18 bonus x1.5 (2hand): +6
Power Attack for 10 x2 (2hand): +20
Triple damage for Spirited Charge: 3d8+78
On a critical: 3d8+130

The critical should be 5d8+130 or 3d8+78 depending on mounted or not. You only get double power attack if you choose to wield the lance in two hands instead of the normal one handed while mounted.

Mounted combat is a tradeoff: It take specialization to do it well, and it's frequently useless, but when it kicks in it can be very deadly.

--Seule

A fighter of that level (10) has 10 feats. It takes at least 3 to get spirited charge, more if you specialize in lance (focus, specialization) That is a full half of your feats. Are you willing to have half your feats be useless frequently? I wouldn't.

 

[Artoomis]

A fighter of that level (10) has 10 feats. It takes at least 3 to get spirited charge, more if you specialize in lance (focus, specialization) That is a full half of your feats. Are you willing to have half your feats be useless frequently? I wouldn't.

But if you're a halfling...

And if youre a halfling mounted on a half-celestial riding dog... well, in word, yikes!! Now if only you could keep the dog alive ... paladins can, maybe, but's it pretty tough for a fighter to do so. You need a feat like Mounted Combat that lets you substitute your Ride check more than once/round. Even that only protects the mount from direct comabt, but that's better than nothing.

Improved Mounted Combat, anyone? Limited to number of times per round equal to dex bonus, perhaps?

Okay, this should go to House Rules, but:

IMPROVED MOUNTED COMBAT [GENERAL]
Prerequisite: Mounted Combat, Ride 8 ranks.
Benefit: When your mount is hit in combat, you may attempt a Ride check (as a reaction) to negate the hit. The hit is negated if your Ride check result is greater than the opponent’s attack roll. (Essentially, the Ride check result becomes the mount’s Armor Class if it’s higher than the mount’s regular AC.)
You may attempt this manuever a anumber of times per round equal to your dexterity bonus.
Special: A fighter may select Improved Mounted Combat as one of his fighter bonus feats.

That's not bad. I've been looking for another feat related to mounted combat and mount survival.

 

[LokiDR]

But if you're a halfling...

I only see this as viable for this kind of "alternative" mounted character.

I have yet to see any good rules for advancing animals, or finding advance animals. Masters of the wild has something, but that is pretty thin. You could always get an equine golem

 

[Artoomis]

I only see this as viable for this kind of "alternative" mounted character...

Surely you are not proposing that mounted combat is only viable for characters wuth an alternate lifestyle...

 

[LokiDR]

Surely you are not proposing that mounted combat is only viable for characters wuth an alternate lifestyle...

That depends on how much you need to love your mount to make mounted combat work

 

[Artoomis]

That depends on how much you need to love your mount to make mounted combat work

Why did I just KNOW that was coming next?