Cavalier Orders (PFRPG) PDF

This pdf clocks in at 17 pages, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial/ToC, 1.5 pages of SRD, leaving us with 13.5 pages of content, so let's take a look!

All right, so without much ado, this pdf kicks off with the first order - and you'll notice something from the get-go: Each of the orders herein receives an absolutely gorgeous, high-quality original full-color artwork - with the respective cavaliers being represented together on the final page - this is an aesthetically pleasing pdf.

The first order would be the order of the Black Rose - and it is already a high-concept one, with challenge targets having their AC against melee attacks penalized. Second level nets undead-controlling 3+Cha-mod times per day, of up to cavalier levels in HD. 8th level provides a double-edged sword - being healed by negative energy and harmed by positive energy. At 15th level, the order can hamper the divine channeling of targets. Feat-wise, the order can get an undead mount. Solid take on the Death Knight-trope.

The order of the Claymore gets better Intimidate versus targets of his challenge and is all about strength and leaving no doubt about it - when using Spirited Charge in conjunction with Claymores, he deals triple damage and when battling higher CR foes, his challenge scales up to the HD of the target creature - interesting! Finally, whirlwind-like tricks complement the order. Also cool: There are two feats that help middle-aged and older cavaliers of this order retain their powers.

The Order of Cold Iron, as the name implies, is about defeating demons and challenge-wise, gets save-bonuses. The mount of the cavalier's natural attacks are treated as cold iron and at higher levels, may decrease DR of cold iron-susceptible foes with every crit. As a high-level ability, they can send creatures back to their home planes as per dismissal. (Which should be italicized, but that's a nitpicky complaint.) Feat-wise, they can have their mount/familiar's natural attacks count as silver and magic. There is also an interesting feat that turns DR against creatures that have them: Provided your weapon bypasses the DR, you deal bonus damage equal to the bypassed DR on a critical hit- which is BRUTAL. Sure, it is circumstantial, but ultimately, for the price of one feat, this exceeds the efficiency of quite a few class features. Seeing how quite a few creature have high DRs, this can be rather OP for crit-fishing builds. My advice is to implement a level-based scaling mechanism of DR-bypassing based bonus damage here.

The order of the Flagon is the Cayden/drunken master/dwarf-themed order, using Cha instead of Dex for Acrobatics and being rewarded via bonuses when chugging a drink prior to engaging in such activities. Challenges render the member of the order immune to fear (here scaling immunity for progressively more powerful fear-condition immunities would have been more balanced and nuanced) and the order can charge in crooked lines - not only with a 1-movement change caveat as per usual, but completely freely - which is VERY strong. 15th level provides the obligatory late cone of class level x d6 fire-breath, usable Con-mod times per day. The feats here are interesting - Drunken Strength allows for the target to down a strong drink to temporarily get +2 Str for Constitution "bonus" (should be "modifier") rounds, minimum 1. The feat can be taken multiple times, the Str-bonuses stacking - which is pretty nasty - particularly considering the lenient Con 13 prereqs - the lack of maximum times you can take this allows for some pretty nasty min-maxing. I'd take the Barb's rage progression as prerequisite minimum level guidelines and instead increase the rather low benefits (+1 Str) subsequent taking of the feat nets to determine when you can take this feat additional times to prevent that...though I do like the chance the use sickens you. The second feat allows for the combination of the order and feat-based Str-boost ability in one fell swoop.

The order of Fortune's challenge can use steal and dirty tricks instead of regular attacks in a challenge and gets Quick Draw and Quick Sheathe as bonus feats, the latter of which is reprinted here - though personally, I prefer Dreamscarred Press' version of the latter feat. At 8th level, weapon specific feats like Weapon Focus instead apply to Int-mod weapons, while 15th level provides another order's 2nd or 8th level ability. A new feat allows you to stack two magic items in a slot - which is problematic, considering the amount of combos the system doesn't account for - this just begs to create difficulties and is a prime example of playing rough and loose with the rules. This feat is not getting anywhere near my table.

The order of Luck must randomly choose the target of his challenge and gets a unique skill-based ability: Cha-mod times per day, he may flip a coin and either gain 1/2 class level as a bonus to the skill...or, if he loses, 1/4 class level as a penalty! Unique! Also interesting: The 2nd level ability is predicated on taking two approaches to a task: Either sneaking past a creature or fighting it, for example. The character flips a coin to determine which to take and receives a bonus - but failing to take either renders the cavalier shaken. At 8th level, the order gets a reroll and at high levels, he can even change natural 1s into 20s. There is also a new feat that lets you take a natural 1 and treat it as a 20...but as a consequence, your next 20 is treated as a 1. Now see, this one is UNIQUE, captivating and takes a classic trope and plays it in a unique way - two thumbs up!

The order of the Road gets AC-bonuses when moving at least 5 ft. in challenges, receives less penalty when fighting defensively and at 8th level, receives woodland stride and trackless step. 15th level duplicates blessing of fervor. (And should be designated as SP.) The order gets two new feats - one for an aurochs companion (with higher carrying capacity) and one for endure elements. Not that blown away here, though I like the visuals of the aurochs.

The order of the Scorpion receives better trip and disarm capacity in challenges and at 2nd level, gets whip proficiency as well as the option to combine whip-based combat maneuvers with mounted charges. Additionally, they may, at 8th level, execute attacks with the off-hand against a foe tripped or disarmed - I assume at full BAB, but I'm not sure here. Do two-hand penalties apply? What about quick sheathing with the primary hand? The ability requires some clarification. 15th level provides Quarry. The feats provided here, though, are solid: Better Diehard, penalties for foes trying to lie to you and blinding whip attacks make sense and work.

Cavaliers of the order of the Sea get challenge bonuses to atk while NOT astride a mount. 2nd level provides free movement through allies AND all types of difficult terrain and may freely charge while changing direction - again without a scaling mechanism or cap for turns -the combination of these is too soon at 2nd level - a scaling mechanism based on levels would help here. 8th level nets Cleave (or Greater Cleave if you already have it) and 15th nets Leadership. Okay, but none too interesting. The order is accompanied by 4 feats - 3 of which are pretty standard pirate/sea-themed ones, with the 4th providing teamwork grappling for easier enemy subduing.

The order of the Sun penalizes the attacks of damaged foes of the respective challenge and may perform a channel-less turn undead at 2nd level. 8th provides bonuses vs. death effects and 15th allows for the temporary suspension of channeling negative energy - yes, this pretty much is the mirror of the order of the Black Rose. The new feats allow for +50% healing efficiency at the expense of +25% negative energy damage received. Not a fan of the fractions here. That being said, the second feat is cool, allowing for the expenditure of turn undead uses of the order in favor of bonus damage vs. undead.

The order of Truth gets Will-save bonuses versus targets of his challenge and may not feint, dirty trick, etc. - a whole bunch of restrictions...for which he gain uncanny dodge and more Will-save bonuses. Not a big fan, as this takes active choice away for passive benefits, decreasing player agenda. At 8th level, this bonus extends to nearby allies and 15th level provides an EX-version of discern lies. The feats allow you to adhere to the order's edicts and get rerolls from foes and there is a feat that allows for retributive intimidation after Sense Motive-win and one that allows you to deal more damage versus deceivers.

Know how before I called the order of the Sun the opposite of the order of the Black Rose? Well, I was somewhat misleading you -Sun is the conceptual opposite; the honor, however, belongs visual-wise, to the order of the White Rose - -challenge nets dodge-bonuses to AC and is determined by a ward, through whose square he may charge and he also gains Saving Shield as a bonus feat (not capitalized properly in the text), gain better shield bonuses, shield other, and later, as an immediate action, take the effects of award's failed save. The feats allow for more wards and one that decreases the damage taken from protecting your wards.

The pdf closes with a new cavalier archetype - the Dual-Sworn cavalier. Instead of mounts and expert trainer, these guys receive a second order, whose edicts, benefits, challenge effects etc. STACK. That there is already the end for the archetype. Indiscriminate stacking of challenge-options, skills etc. just are not feasible within the frame of the class - they beg for conflicts galore, rules, falling apart and fringe-case-chaos, which is rather sad, for the foot-soldier charge-improvements the archetype otherwise gets are nice.

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are pretty decent, though I noticed hiccups in formatting of spells and the like. Layout adheres to a two-column full-color standard and the pdf comes with a second, more mobile-device friendly version. The artworks contained herein are superb and may be what excited me the most about some of these orders. The pdf comes fully bookmarked for your convenience.

Alex Abel and Tanner Wahlin have crafted some remarkable orders herein - while the concepts and visuals used, in many cases, hearken to classic tropes I've (and just about anyone else has) seen done before (sometimes time and again), the execution, for the most part, is solid and codifying e.g. drunken master as a cavalier hasn't been done before. The same general solid craftsmanship can be claimed about the majority of the rules-language and decisions herein. However, at the same time, this is a classic example of a pdf whose finer mechanics grind and stutter under the weight of proverbial sand - both in balancing and rules-language: I love the order of the scorpion, theme-wise, but it's execution with basically a hidden feat-tax to make one ability work and lack of damage-upgrade feels a bit weak.

The order of fortune is all over the place with its tricks and honestly, didn't feel particularly intriguing to me. However, we do get some damn cool ideas herein: the order of Luck's coin-toss mechanics are inspired and fun and the defensive order of the White Rose does a decent job as well. An interesting observation: Balancing of both orders and feats herein, feats in particular, is not that consistent, so you may want to be careful with particularly the latter. In fact, both archetype and feats are what dragged this pdf down a notch - sure, jaded ole' me has seen most of these order-concepts done as classes, archetypes, etc. and had no surprises apart from the order of luck and the cool order of the claymore herein - but ultimately, the orders themselves are on the positive side of things.

Let me state this clearly: Barring the few cases where the pdf plays fast and loose with rules and balancing, this is pretty much a fun book of orders with some great visuals to supplement it. I just wished the rough edges had been filed off and that the balancing of a few of these components had been tighter. Think of this as a delicious hamburger with a couple of gherkins on it, when you really can't stand them - consuming the broken bits is not an option and you can take them off and still eat a great burger, but a mild aftertaste remains. Similarly, you know how a hamburger tastes - it's not fancy or will get you truly novel sensations, but it does satisfy your craving. What I'm trying to say is that this is a mixed bag. Sans issues, it would have been a good file; with them, I can go no higher than 3.5 stars, rounded down for the purpose of this platform.

Endzeitgeist out.

Not only does this product offer twelve new orders, each comes equipped with one or more feats (available to anyone meeting the prerequisites, and available as bonus feats to particular orders), as well as a piece of artwork depicting a cavalier of the order, his mount (with the exception of the Orders of Fortune and the Sea), and his heraldry! What more could you want? Since this product has been reviewed in depth below, I'll summarize the orders presented within:

Black Rose: Undead-commanding slayer of positive energy channellers.
Claymore: Grizzled, greatsword-wielding challenge-seekers.
Cold Iron: Demon-hunters capable of banishing extraplanar creatures and removing damage reduction.
Flagon: Lucky drunks who don't need to charge in straight lines, and can belch fire on their foes.
Fortune: Mercenaries working for the highest bidder, able to swap weapons in the blink of an eye, get more out of his weapon-specific feats, and gain abilities from other orders.
Luck: A servent of Lady Luck, able to reroll, gain bonuses when randomly determining his actions, and even turn nat 1s into nat 20s.
Road: A trackless wanderer able to encourage his allies, gaining dodge bonuses as long as he keeps moving.
Scorpion: Whip-wielding protectors of sacred sites, skilled at hunting down those who would despoil them.
Sea: Able to dodge obstacles while charging, often foregoing a mount in favour of weaving and cleaving.
Sun: Undead-turning banes of negative energy-channellers.
Truth: Forbidden from lying & dishonorable combat, this knight gains uncanny dodge, a bonus to will saves, the ability to share these features with his allies, and at-will discern lies.
White Rose: Devoted to protecting a ward (often a romantic interest), this cavalier can occupy his ward's square without penalty, provide them cover, grant them an extra shield bonus when using his free saving shield feat against them, and suffer the negative effects of spells for them.

Some of the orders feel a bit lacking to me - in particular, Scorpion and Truth seem to be lacking in 'oomph', and Sea is too situational to see much use outside of a nautical campaign. However, there are plenty of great orders here as well (I love Fortune, Luck, White Rose, and Claymore!), and the feats give it just the extra push it needs. As a final bonus, the Dual-Sworn Knight archetype gives up a mount, but gains a second order (with delayed abilities) and extra-deadly charges. The archetype can even be applied to the samurai, as well!

This has to be one of my favourite third-party products to date - killer content, great art, and more goodies than you can shake a stick at. Whether you love cavaliers, or have been looking to play one but hadn't found the right special something, pick this up!

In case the title to this review seems a bit hyperbolic let me be clear. I love the cavalier class, I've loved it since it dropped in Advanced Players Guide and since I got to finally play my first character that wasn't one I ran from behind the screen. I've loved the whole concept of this more classic knight designed around the idea of a noble who is trained to lead his men as part of his education in becoming a king, queen, duke or what have you and finally I've loved how things like the tactician abilities and especially the orders help me as the player not only feel like a tactical commander (as opposed to the solo trained fighter or barbarian) and through the orders have a way to build a huge variety of cavaliers that supports this huge brevity of characters. From bastards of the Cockatrice order to nobly striving Blue Rose men who want to try to fix the world they live in. All that being said, the cavalier has had its problems and one of them is order options. Sure we have a lot, nearly 3 different hardbacks and likely over a half dozen softcovers all take a stab at adding new orders to the list for the wayward master of the mount and field but the overall quality we get amongst them can be middling in narrative uniqueness. We exist in a world where the diplomacy focused but hard trained diplomats of the Blue Rose exist beside the at least 2 different orders that focus on protecting peasants specifically and though that is cool we all know there is a lot more ground we can cover here and I'm happy to say this book does it in spades. Giving us 12 new orders and an archetype on the side, flaming crab games has managed to squeeze out what might be some of my favorite orders yet on page along with some great support for each.

To start we get the Order of The Black Rose or as it has come to be called amongst my peers the death knight order. Ever wanted to play that cavalier of Ugathoa who lauds the power of undead and seeks to slowly become one? You got it. The Black Rose gives it to you, focusing on improving your abilities to understand undead and even granting you the ability to command them with your raw magnetism a la the grave knight at 2nd level with command undead and from their it only gets worse. Your challenges flay peoples AC with a challenge and eventually your capstone power lets you smack the divinity out of your clerical foes, severing their ability to channel positive energy against you if they fail to fend off your might. On top of that the feat option they give you allows your mount to slowly become necrotic with you, gaining the ability to heal off negative energy as you do and best of all the feat can be picked up as one of your cavalier bonus feats (a pattern that gets repeated throughout the book).

Next we get the the order of the Claymore, these rough and tumble cavaliers who are all about physical prowess, never backing down from a challenge, and kicking the ever loving s%++ out whomever is dumb enough to challenge them with big two-handed weapons. At first sounding a bit redundant what makes these guys really stand out is not only their stellar abilities (including getting to treat a greatsword like a lance for damage when charging, boosting challenge damage vs. really tough opponents, and literally being able do a mounted cleaving charge like some demented set of battlefield hedge clippers) but the story that ends up getting told through both the art and the support feats they get access to. You see the Claymore cavalier presented in the art here isn't this young barbarian conan type you might expect but this old, weathered vet. The dude looks like Don Quixote in his mid 50's but he's still clutching this greatsword and riding off into combat, ready to take on any fool who's thinks they can unseat the old man. To top it off you get the feats Grizzled and Rugged, the former letting you add double your age bonuses to Sense Motive and Intimidate to mirror your decades of service and the latter allowing you have one of your physical stats IGNORE AGE PENALTIES. That's huge and what's better is as a Claymore Cavalier you can take it up to 3 times! Basically letting you play a 65+ year old vet martial character without worrying about having your Str, Dex, and Con be total crap. It turns the class into this haven of grizzled veterans in my mind, this group of cavaliers who've lived so long they've formed this fraternity of the best and baddest brawlers to ever trot the earth. They've managed to jokingly become known as the Liam Neeson order at my table but they are still so good that anyone interested in either combat focused 2 weapon cavaliers or playing that aged swordsman who's come back to fight that one last time should really take a look.

Next we get order of Cold Iron, likely the most metal order in the book. These guys are like paladins, dedicated to the complete destruction of demons and their friends but don't have to worry about being L or G to do it. They are unyielding and unwavering in their quest to put down every succubus, baubau, and cultist that allies with them and they are going to take a page out of the titular metal's play book to do it. To start they get flat bonuses against the spells and spell-like abilities of their challenge and bonuses at id'ing their favored foes but eventually they gain the power to dispel the DR of cold iron weak creatures they crit for a short time and eventually outright banish them back to the abyss with a swat. Heck the class is so metal their first ability lets their mounts natural attacks treat as cold iron for overcoming DR! and it only gets better once you start looking at the feat selection including Strike the Weakness, which allows you to add a monsters DR to your critical hit if you pulled off said crit with a weapon that overcomes that reduction.

And this level of cool and detail continues on with nearly each other order moving through this book. The order of the Flagon are a bunch of beer swilling partyers who get better in combat the more intoxicated they become. The order of Fortune are a bunch of mercenaries who focus on adopting wildly diverse tactics from other orders in order to win, going so far as being able to outright copy other order abilities as they go along, allowing you to create insane odd ball combos of powers and techniques you could never do otherwise. The order of Luck gives up all their tough decisions to random chance, trading in sure thing answers for big crazy boosts in combat. They aren't for the faint of heart but encourage this level of interesting and inspired play that is just unique, like being able to say I'm going to either attack this guy with my longsword or tumble around this other guy to give my buddy flanking, flip a coin, and now whichever one I got gets a nice bonus but if I choose to do something else I take a penalty (but am not forced to take the chosen option). It balances the risk of building a character around such chaos with a reward system and rules good enough to keep a player engaged. Order of the Road is this group of old souls who are tasked with roaming all that they can see and more, never staying in one place for long and helping weary travelers find their way. Not focused on combat for sure this option really shines in something like kingmaker where wilderness travel, survival, and the harsh realities of weather and season really matter. What's even cooler is one of their feats gives you an aurochs for free as a mount and (if you are like me and run games with more open mount options) also treats its Str as 10 higher for the purposes of carrying capacity. That might not sound as cool up front but as a GM who runs an open world survival game where roughing it is the norm that boon has lead more than one player to flirt with the idea of a buffalo riding nomad. Order of the Scorpion lets you live out your fantasy as a Medjai from the Mummy, protecting your chosen place with your horse and stinging whip and eventually letting you effectively wield the thing at no penalty alongside your other weapons. Being able to whip trip someone as a swift action and then charge them down with my lance sounds so good it hurts and I love that this gives me that option I never knew I wanted.

The final one I really want to gush about though is the order of the White Rose. Focused on the classic idea of chivalrous love, the White Rose cavalier devotes themselves to a singular individual and the protection of that person, going so far as to risk life and limb to make sure they are okay. Now this might sound like a recipe for trouble but the class executes it with such grace you just want to play one and makes it a joy to run. Your challenge grants passive AC to your charge, your 2nd level ability lets you share a square with your charge (even while mounted), give them cover while sharing it, and lets me charge through their square. Effectively I can select my monk, rogue, or other melee focused teammate as my charge (this bond doesn't have to be romantic but does represent a deep connection with this person), let them get into a fight, and just charge right to them. Now all of a sudden my partner has gained a free +4 AC bonus minimum just by having me gun in to save them and I'm still feeling like I get to be that protector character without hindering their ability to play the character they want. From their White Rose only gets better, giving you Saving Shield for free (with boosted effects on your charge), shield other 1/day on charge, and finally the ability to magically transpose an effect onto your cavalier that your charge has failed to save against, taking the full force of the spell but letting them walk out unscathed. I wait for a day I can get to roll up one of these guys.

Now not all of these orders are this spectacular. The order of the Sea is really niche and doesn't sing like the rest do and the order of Truth is really cool thematically but in execution falls a little flat of the judge dredd styled Inevitable of truth it's aiming for but on the whole are small misses when compared to the sheer awesomeness that is the rest of this book. In short, if you are into cavaliers and are looking for more order options that give you great options both mechanically and thematically to tell interesting stories this book is for you. Go out, get it, it's totally worth the $5 USD is asking for it.