I've been looking into creating a melee-orientated Oracle with the Lunar Mystery. I settled on making a half-elf for the FCB, and the alternate racial trait to gain Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Fauchard) to have reach and a large crit-threat range. What I'm curious about is if it would be PFS legal to ride the Wolf Companion, as it functions as a druid companion, and at 7th level Wolf Companions become Large. My feats are going into crit-fishing with the Fauchard and Mounted Combat chain, so I'd rather not spend another feat on getting "Undersized Mount", plus the flavor of an elven oracle speaking in tongues as she twirls a menacing pole-arm atop a large wolf is just too awesome. I also like that the wolf has a decent natural attack that comes with a trip, so if someone tries to five-foot-step to be adjacent with the character while their reach-weapon is out, they have to deal with being bitten by the wolf.
Below is the text for the Primal Companion Revelation:
Primal Companion (Ex): You gain the service of a faithful animal of the night. You can select from a bear, boar, crocodile, shark, tiger, or wolf. This animal functions as a druid's animal companion, using your oracle level as your effective druid level.
So long story short: Can a lunar oracle ride their animal companion?
Secondary Question, can druids/rangers ride their non-horse/pony animal companions?
Yes.
There is a difference between mount (something you ride), and mount (the class feature)
Alright, so to clarify, I'd be able to ride the animal companion, and avoid penalties by having an exotic saddle or Trick Riding, yes?
Alright, so to clarify, I'd be able to ride the animal companion, and avoid penalties by having an exotic saddle or Trick Riding, yes?
Good question.
A while back mike brock made some confusing posts about exotic saddles and magical saddles and belt(saddle slots).
Linky
I believe you're ok with just an exotic saddle. You may hit a small amount of table variance with it.
Eh, table variance is okay, as even if I'm unmounted, I can simply fight alongside my wolf, and use "Gift of the Claw and Horn" to deal with enemies that step right next to me instead. I've got options with this build, and I stick to the same place for PFS.
So it's looking like this:
Half Elf taking the alternate Racial Trait for the Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat.
STR: 16
DEX: 7
CON: 14
INT: 12
WIS: 10
CHA: 17
Lvl 1: Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Fauchard), Noble Scion (Scion of War), Prophetic Armor
Level 2: --
Level 3: Great Fortitude
Level 4: +1 CHA
Level 5: Mounted Combat (in preparation for Level 7)
Level 6:
Level 7: Primal Companion (Wolf)
Level 8: +1 STR
Level 9: Weapon Focus (Fauchard)
Level 10: --
Level 11: Eye of the Moon/Moonlit Script/Form of The Beast, Dazzling Display
Level 12: +1 STR
From there I have room to improve fauchard use, intimidating prowess, and some "Extra Revelations" to round things out.
I'd get headbands for charisma and belts for strength, while I could also simply swap out the improved critical with purchasing a "Keen" fauchard.
Good melee, good casting as long as it doesn't need a ranged attack, decent saves, and hot damn if I don't love the backstory for this character!
Only thing to remember is that the FCB for the +1/2 to Oracle Revelation has been given a practical ceiling in PFS for increasing animal companion relative level.
Just lately, I made a little calculation about that. Basically, at 4th level and every 3 levels thereafter, you'll want to use your FCB for either 1 HP, 1 skill rank, or a boost to a different revelation.
What do you mean halfling cavalier 3/Sacred huntmaster of the animal domain10 with animal ally, syvan heritage, horse lord and a dog companion isn't viable? Garsh
Dont you have to have the revelation to apply your FCB to it? So you would want to take the "Primal Companion (Wolf)" before level 7. Even if the mount is only medium, I would imagine having it at level 1 would be extremely helpful.
Only thing to remember is that the FCB for the +1/2 to Oracle Revelation has been given a practical ceiling in PFS for increasing animal companion relative level.
I'm talking about the FCB that grants additional spells known by the oracle. I even just looked over the physical copy of the ARG I have three feet from my desk to confirm that it reads that way, and yes:
Oracle Add one spell known from the oracle spell list. This spell must be at least one level below the highest spell level the oracle can cast.
And you'll also note I'm taking Primal Companion at 7th level, which is the point where a Wolf Companion becomes large according to standard druid progression. Which is what the Lunar Oracle's Primal Companion progresses as.
Primal Companion (Ex): You gain the service of a faithful animal of the night. You can select from a bear, boar, crocodile, shark, tiger, or wolf. This animal functions as a druid's animal companion, using your oracle level as your effective druid level.
Yeesh, no offense to you guys but you must be smoking some really potent stuff. d20PFSRD, physical copy and the Pathfinder PRD are all listing the Half-Elves' FCB as getting another spell known, but must be at least one level below the highest spell level the oracle can cast.
Half elves qualify for the elf FCB and that one increases your revelation by .5 a level. Since this is "better" than the half-elf or human option, people assume you'll take it instead of the others. So you could have your mount as your lv1 revelation, FCB it and have it be lv7 when you're lv5.
Yea, what Chess Pwn said.
So the regular elf does have that. While I can see the viability I also know that if I don't take Prophetic Armor as a first revelation, then I'm very much going to have among the worst ACs of a melee character possible. Furthermore, having options for my spellcasting choices is nice. Spontaneous Divine Casting and a decent array of spells known, these are things I like.
The point of the build isn't so much to reach things early as to be competent in both casting and melee, focusing on self-buffing, buffing others, and debuffing enemies with debuff spells that won't be impacted by a low dexterity before wading into melee.
Now I just need to decide if I want to go Dual-cursed Wolfscarred and Deaf, or Lame and Legalistic, or maybe just one of those four.
First 2 levels of PFS are easy and you can play them with an NPC class and still survive. You can grab Prophetic armor at 3 and be ok.
I would take the companion first and apply my first 3 favorite class bonuses to it. Then probably start alternating every other level with extra spell or bump the pet.
First 2 levels of PFS are easy and you can play them with an NPC class and still survive. You can grab Prophetic armor at 3 and be ok.
I would take the companion first and apply my first 3 favorite class bonuses to it. Then probably start alternating every other level with extra spell or bump the pet.
AC 20, DR Cold Iron and Silver, Fast Healing, Flying negative energy channel. My first PFS boss ever, but that lies outside this discussion.
I have what I need for developing such a character. I've been turned off multiclassing already from previous attempts, so getting an animal companion just +1 from my character level isn't really worth it compared to extra spells/skills/HP.