Mounted Combat - Useful?

[BelXiror]

A halfling or gnome on a wardog, or better yet, a warlizard make decent mounted guys. You have the same face as a if you were off the mount.

Specially the lizard, as they can swim, and climb. You may need a something to keep them warm though.

As for medium sized PCs, giant cats can make good mounts. Nice and mobile, and handy to have around even when your not mounted.

 

[Timely Drought]

You can get some awesome mounts with animal handling. Like the spider eater. Too bad vermin have int-.

 

[tarchon]

It does work better for overland adventuring, but our barbarian used it a lot. It's especially good if you have a bard buddy who can conjure you a Phantom Steed with a 200 move. There's also no reason why you can't go all the way through the dungeon and conjure a steed inside the lich's throne room, or whatever. It's a very underappreciated spell.

 

[Darklone]

Spirited Charge with some extra damage stuff... and Cleave.

3d8+27 damage at level 3 is nothing to sneer at (human fighter2/bbn1 with str 18 and level 2 fighter for Power Attack and Cleave). Kills two enemies with each charge pretty reliably.

Halflings on wardogs are weaker... but there are some nice possible mounts which may be able to run along walls and ceilings... for indoor fights.

Edit: Rangers animal companions are relatively tough mounts and can be easily replaced.

 

[DragonLancer]

I've never had a player take the feat, nor engage in mounted combat. When I have played, I've never felt the desire to take it either.

I don't think its a viable feat unless the campaign you play in is less dungeons & ruins, and more large scale battles and epicness.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

I don't think its a viable feat unless the campaign you play in is less dungeons & ruins, and more large scale battles and epicness.

I'm not so sure about this. I'm currently playing in what I'd consider a "standard" game, and there have been plenty of outdoor encounters. Many of them take place while traveling to-and-from a dungeon, but they still make up a good 1/3 of encounters or so. 1/3 of encounters isn't so bad that I'd consider a feat chain useless. Cleave and Whirlwind Attack aren't useful in every encounter either.

There's also no reason why you can't go all the way through the dungeon and conjure a steed inside the lich's throne room, or whatever.

I agree. This is the main reason I'm starting to warm to the pokemount. Now if only they'd slap the Celestial creature template on it, so it'd make as much sense flavor-wise as it does mechanically.

 

[DragonLancer]

I'm not so sure about this. I'm currently playing in what I'd consider a "standard" game, and there have been plenty of outdoor encounters. Many of them take place while traveling to-and-from a dungeon, but they still make up a good 1/3 of encounters or so. 1/3 of encounters isn't so bad that I'd consider a feat chain useless. Cleave and Whirlwind Attack aren't useful in every encounter either.

Different games, different groups, I guess.

In my games I have run more than a few wilderness scenarios, and had the players travel overland, and no one - not even a character playing a Knight - bothered with the feat. I don't know why, I never asked, but I would guess that the players feel it to be a waste of a feat.

Great Cleave & WhirlWind Attack, are fine till about 9th/10th level when basically you will rarely drop anything to make it worthwhile. My players have said the same thing there.

As I say, different views from different groups.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

We use mounted combat extensively, along with different types of mounts.

From dragons (The 14th level Blackguard [it's a core class in my setting] PC has an intelligent red dragon skeleton mount) to horses, to war-lizards, to created creatures (abberations/constructs) and more.

It's weird, many people think that you can "waste" a feat, but I guess that's probably...

You know, that's a better topic for a different thread...

 

[Schmoe]

Well the paladin in my group has made limited use of the mounted feat chain, but it has definitely been useful. Mounted Combat, specifically, is a very good feat for keeping your mount alive against typical attacks. The paladin manages to negate at least one attack on his mount every combat. There have been several combats where the paladin negated every single attack directed at his mount

A special mount's improved evasion is also very good against area effect spells, but it's easy to see where that solution does not work for regular mounts. Other than for historical "flavor" reasons, I'm not sure that there needs to be a solution for regular mounts. After all, there are a lot of magical or exotic mounts available that will be much stronger, or even immune, against area effects. Any class with some sort of companion should also have an advantage in this area.

The later feats in the chain are also very strong. The paladin in my group has Ride-by-Attack and Spirited Charge. In the last session, astride his griffon, he practically single-handedly defeated the ambush party of demons sent to destroy the PC's. Without the mounted paladin, the party would have been toast. Instead there wasn't a single casualty. The adventure before that he had another great opportunity to use his mount, and the adventure before that his griffon was very helpful, as well. It seems that the uses of mounted combat are generally limited to just a few times per adventure, but when the paladin is able to be mounted, he seriously kicks some tail.

So I guess my opinion is that Mounted Combat is definitely useful, just not always so. It seems very likely that, in an open area, a mounted combatant is more effective than an unmounted one. So in general if a fighter wants to be flexible and be the most effective he can in any situation, he should pick up Mounted Combat for those times when he can use it.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

In my games about 40% of combat is actually in dungeons or places where a mount would be unuseable. I think mounted combat is very useful. One of my players and myself at one point played characters who focused on mounted combat. And just last game I had a couple of minor villains (drow elves riding wyverns) who avoided getting killed and prolonged the battle by evading attacks with mounted combat.