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A couple of questions on the mortal herald dedication feat free action heal:

Relevant feat text from nethys: once per day, you can cast heal as a 6th-rank innate divine spell. You can only target yourself with the spell, but you gain the benefits of the 2-action version when you spend 1 action to cast it. In addition, if you would be reduced to 0 Hit Points but not immediately killed, you can cast the spell as a free action before you become unconscious. This spell is automatically heightened to a rank equal to half your level.

1) When does the heal spell occur? We've been playing it like final fantasy life 3, where the character is reduced to 0 and then healed however much. However, there's some argument that because the trigger is "if you would be reduced to zero" instead of "if you are reduced to 0" that it would happen before the damage is actually applied. The functional difference is if you have say 30 HP and take a 70 damage hit, are you going to end up at (healing roll) HP, or 30 + (healing roll) - 70 HP.

2) When and how do reactive strike or similar features factor in? First, am I missing a rule about whether free actions still trigger such reactions? As far as I can tell they're triggered normally, but if I missed something then the rest of this doesn't matter. If they trigger normally, how would the process unfold in event of a non-crit, and then for a crit where the spell is canceled?

Feat text from archives: Make a melee Strike with the required weapon. If the Strike is successful, you can immediately make a ranged Strike against the same target with a +2 circumstance bonus to the attack roll. This counts as two attacks toward your multiple attack penalty, but you don't apply the multiple attack penalty until after making both attacks.

If you stab and blast and miss, or otherwise choose not to use the second attack, does it count as one attack or two for MAP?

Another way, does "This" in the final sentence refer to the stab and blast action as a whole, or is the final sentence there to guide you through MAP application if you make the second attack?

I'm just starting up in PF2e and was looking at the cavalier archetype because I like that type of character. I might make a separate advice thread to figure a build, but first I wanted to clarify a number of things concerning how the character might work. There are threads addressing some of these points, but I wanted to try and get it all in one place and perhaps clear up some things. I'm going to put the question first followed by my current understanding.

Is there any way for a cavalier to benefit from their companion mount's support action while using the cavalier's charge feat?
-As I understand your companion gets two actions and you cannot trade your third action for another companion action as you might with a commanded regular animal, so there is no way to use mount support with cavalier's charge.
Caveat: Do you have to be mounted on your animal companion to use cavalier's charge? The dedication gives you a young animal companion that serves as your mount, and cavalier's charge states that you order your mount. If, however, your mount just refers to a creature you are riding you could mount a regular horse, order your animal companion to support you (also moving into position as second action for a riding drake or other animal with a positioning requirement), and then use cavalier's charge on the regular horse?

Trampling charge states that "you command your mount..." but doesn't use the phrase "you command an animal" like cavalier's charge or quick mount do to indicate that you are using that specific action. How many actions does trampling charge consume from your animal companion? If we had a level 20 cavalier with the legendary rider feat would you be able to use the command an animal action before or after using trampling charge? If so, would your animal companion mount have one or two actions available?
-I see no limit on the number of times command an animal can be used, so even if the feat counts as using it I think you could still command an animal again. However, the companion has used stride as one of two actions and would only have 1 action left. The feat makes no mentioned of performing a strike action, only using strike damage, so I believe the companion has used only one action.

What damage rolls do the horse support action and lance jousting bonus benefit?
-The lance benefits, including when wielding a lance with the horse support bonus as in that case it adds to the lance's trait, add circumstance damage based on the number of weapon dice, including striking weapon bonuses, deadly dice from a critical, and power attack (maybe, see next question). As the effect takes place if you moved 10ft or more on the action preceding your attack, this damage would apply if you were moved by another creature immediately before your attack (monster forced movement or something).
If you do not use a lance, the horse support damage bonus applies to all damage dice from an attack. This term doesn't seem as defined as weapon damage dice but seems to include spell damage, element dice from flaming or similar, and potentially precision damage. However, since the support benefit specifies an attack, you could only get the bonus on spells with the attack tag, which mainly seem to be rays like disintegrate.

Can you use the horse support benefit with feats like power attack?
-This question comes up because of an older thread here. As I follow the argument, feats like power attack are a subset of actions called activities. Activities have separate actions within the activity that do not require spending more actions, but do still count as actions. In relation to the horse support bonus, this means that if I command an animal to support and then move, then activate power attack my action chain would look like command->companion supports->companion moves->power attack->strike with bonus damage subordinate action. As the action before my strike was to activate power attack, I do not get the horse bonus. In cases where the activity has you move and then strike the horse bonus could apply, albeit in a strange way. Since the horse support doesn't have a positioning requirement, you would have the horse support, then use the activity to move->attack triggering the support benefit.

Following up, how would this work with activities that are tagged as attacks, such as forceful shot and harrying strike?
-I have no idea how this should resolve. It depends on whether the horse benefit applies to the whole attack activity action, including all subordinate actions, or only to the initial activation of the activity.

Thanks.

What ways are there for a PC to gain immunity to negative levels? From what I've seen there are a few classes that can give you the undead type, but that doesn't happen until level 20 typically. Other than that the best I can come up with is a continuous death ward item, which is going to be fairly pricey (112,000 gp I believe). Is there something like the old soulfire armor trait around in PF, or perhaps feats or class abilities that would activate somewhere closer to the 10-12 range? I ask because I'm trying to figure how to port an old character who used a lifedrinker axe (improved at higher levels).

If you have an oracle using UMD to emulate a mystery other than what the oracle actually has in order to use a ring of revelation, what is the oracle's effective level for using the revelation granted by the ring?

As I see it there are three options:
1) The oracle's level for the purpose of the revelation is UMD-20
2) The oracle is considered level 0 for the revelation
3) The oracle uses their normal oracle level for the ring's revelation

Mostly what's unclear to me is what is meant in the UMD emulate a class feature text regarding gaining an effective class level, and how far that extends into the use of the item.

When casting a spell like enlarge person do you follow the spell exactly no matter the starting size? For example if you had a huge humanoid would you still only take an additional -1 size penalty to to-hit and AC (total -3) when you increase to gargantuan, or do you follow the normal size adjustment of -2 (total -4)?

When you change size do you apply the size stat alterations in addition to the spell changes? My inclination, and the consensus in an older thread, is that you do not apply anything but what the spell says. Given this, what happens when you cast alter self as a huge creature? Do you just go directly to medium (or small), not passing any stat adjustments for size beyond the spell's +2 str (or dex)?

After a poster mentioned that one level in oracle of lore can get you CHA to AC and Ref instead of Dex it got me thinking about taking the dip for a Synthesist summoner.

First I have a couple of rules questions:
-Would this work at all? I'm assuming that since you retain your Cha and abilities nothing stops you from using the sidestep secret mystery when fused, but I know there's a lot of argument about what's going on with the synthesist.

- Could you effectively ignore some of the curses, namely clouded vision, deaf, and lame? You "perceive through [the eidolon's] senses" (UM 80) so I'd think your own bad eyes or ears wouldn't matter, and similarly if you're riding around in a ghost eidolon thing your legs don't matter probably.

The other big question- is it worth it? You lose casting (though the CL can be made up for with some money), a point of BAB about 2/3 of the time, an evolution point, an eidolon Str and Dex point about half the time, 2 eidolon AC again about half the time, and the rest of the slowed summoner stuff that I don't feel like picking out. The gains change depending on what you're doing with the eidolon, but your Cha should pretty much always be above the eidolon's Dex, and using the evolutions to feed into your Cha for casting now also benefits AC and Ref. Plus your summoner isn't quite as squishy without the eidolon. Just for an example at level 20 a biped eidolon would have 20 base Dex, while the summoner should probably have 26-30 base Cha (including an inherent bonus). I'm not positive, but I think there's going to be a 3-4 point gap pretty much over the summoner's entire career and it could be a good bit bigger if you use evolutions to feed into Cha or size up the eidolon.

What are your opinions about allowing the boon companion feat to be used for any buddy granting class feature. In particular I'm looking at the anti-paladin and the summoner. In the case of the former I personally don't see any real issues. It's really more the summoner that I worry about. I haven't played one, or seen one played, but it seems to me that the eidolon is a major component of the class, so I guess my question is would the feat become far too good for a summoner, and are there other buddy possessing classes where it could be a problem?

A possible solution for the summoner would be to allow the feat and have it grant everything but evolution pool. Then either tell the summoner to suck up the loss, or provide a second feat that raises effective summoner level for the evolution pool only, capped at character level. Thoughts?

There seems to be two slightly different tracks for natural attack size progression. One is found in the text of the improved natural attack feat, while the other is under the strong jaw spell. Is one more correct than the other? The INA progression is the same one used in 3.5, and it's the same progression that weapons use. The summoner's eidolon seems to follow the strongjaw progression, judging from the eidolon's slam. Both the eidolon and strongjaw are from the APG, meaning that they are more recent if it matters.

Digging through some threads on kingdom building I've seen a number of posters mention that in their campaigns each PC got their own city, and my group is planning to do the same. My question is how the PCs handled BP division. Were the players able to just kind of wing it turn to turn and be fair about it, or was there some sort of system set up to determine how much each city was given each turn? The best I've got is something like each city gets city economy bonus/5 BP per turn plus BP from item sales, with some set percentage going to the jointly controlled capital and kingdom expansion/improvement, or just kingdom expansion and improvement if the capital is considered the ruler's city. I'm not really sure how to factor a city's consumption into the tithe. Or just evenly divide whatever amount of BP they want to spend on cities in a given turn between the players/cities.

Tangent: What sort of pitfalls might appear if the players make multiple smaller kingdoms instead of a large unified one? Things that come to mind are overextending the NPC pool for leaders (easily fixed by the GM), making ruler upgrades harder or impossible, and possibly issues with army raising later. There's also a high possibility of war between the party members.

Unless I missed it in my search there doesn't seem to be a conversion lying around for this already, but if there is please point me to it.

Aside from updating the language a bit and pathfinderizing saves the only change I know I want to make is upping the will save track since the paladin now has that just like the cleric. Other than that what are your thoughts on what, if anything, needs balance updating?

Specific questions:

Should the entry skill reqs be reduced by 3 to continue to allow a paladin entry at level 5, or set at 5 so the 6th character level is the earliest is can be taken like most other PrCs?

Command Undead- required entry feat or bonus feat?

Have skeletal steed be fixed or offer a weapon bond?

Sneak Attack and critical hit immunity are no longer undead traits, and even fortification is reduced in effectiveness. Should the bonecraft armor stay the same regardless?

The big one:
Should this PrC be limited to paladins? As is I feel that taking this class on a PF paladin is a pretty bad idea- you lose smite, some auras, the capstone, a CL, and BAB in exchange for some necromancy abilities and a considerable amount of immunities and earlier DR. Overall I'd say you gain a little ground defensively, but lose a lot offensively, which is pretty weak sauce for the paladin. Paladins are already hard to kill but lacking in damage vs. non evil, and it seems to me that tipping the balance even more and removing the evil killing will give one of those characters that a DM tends to ignore because he is ridiculously hard to kill but has anemic damage. I will admit that I haven't looked into necromancy in PF yet so I don't know how much changes the equation, but with only the paladin's spells the bone knight would be very limited in what he could do in that regard.

The problem comes in when looking at the class from the cleric side; they already gain quite a bit while only losing a CL (which is pretty bad, but I think they can survive) and effective domain level. If anything else is added to make the PrC more attractive to paladins it would probably become pretty broken for clerics.

Easy solution: ignore the paladin stuff and consider a (pretty good) cleric PrC. The problem here is that the class was pretty clearly designed with the paladin as a front runner for the entry class, so some of the original flavor is lost. Moderate solution: add paladin specific entry reqs and go nuts. Hard solution: try to keep it open to both and figure out how to make it enticing, but balanced, to both.

Brainstorming on what to add for paladins:
-Full BAB
-Something like the cavalier's tactician ability for BK and his undead
-Retain Smite, possibly a more open but weaker version
-Channeled Smite bonus feat and DC/damage up when channeling through bonecraft

Are there particular rules for adding new natural attacks through abilities? Context is a beast totem barbarian with greater ferocious mount transferring the claws to his mount, so assume that's what's going on in the examples.

Questions:

1) Does a creature have to have appropriate limbs to gain the extra attacks? Example: a shark.

2) What if the creature already has the stated type of attack? Does it replace the old version, keep the old version, choose the better one, or gain the new natural weapons as entirely separate attacks? Example: Allosaurus (medium)- would it have 2 claws at 1d4 as secondary weapons, 2 claws at 1d6 as primary weapons, or four claw attacks with two at 1d4 as secondaries and 2 at 1d6 as primaries?

2a) What if the creature has a differently type of natural attack that takes the same limb as the new attack? Examples: a horse or a roc.

3) How is reach determined? Would a creature that only has reach 5's new natural weapons would also be reach 5, while a critter with reach 10's new weapons also have reach 10, or does it depend on the weapon being gained? Or is there a general rule applying to animal companions? Example: a camel vs. a t-rex (large).

My gut is saying that there are going to be the logical answers and the by the book answers, but it would be nice if there were some rules somewhere turning one into the other.

I have two inquisitor based builds I'm considering bringing into kingmaker and I'd like some help finishing them, mostly in the feat area. I figure whichever I don't use in kingmaker will go into a file and be saved for another opportunity. This will be my first pathfinder character, so I'm not super familiar with the good feats and such. Other players are a melee paladin and either a ranger, rogue, or ninja, ranged type regardless.

Stats (rolled): 17, 17, 15, 12, 10, 7

So yeah, mostly I'm looking for useful feats to fill up my later levels. As for which I'm going to play I honestly can't say. The archer is cool and generally more powerful, especially at later levels, but I might be kicking myself later if I pass the opportunity to play a mounted character in a campaign where he can actually use his mounted powers regularly. Plus the companion might mitigate some of the loss of personal power.

Thanks in advance for any help.

New to pathfinder, been learning the changes, and I have a few questions. I've dug through the old smite evil threads, and I'm not interested in rehashing that (though I understand that it may come up with regard to class design as a whole), but I'm curious about a few design choices with regard to the new paladin.

- Why did they get good will? If I were going to choose a 3.5 class to give a save boost too I can guarantee that it wouldn't be the one with divine grace, especially if I plan to give that class a few new immunities highly related to the save in question. If they had gone through and gave every melee class another good save I might understand, but it's only the paladin.

- Why improve the paladin's mount? Does it strike anyone else as odd that the paladin's mount is now inarguably better than the same animal type as a druid's animal companion? Alternatively, since the druid does tend to have wider options depending on DM, why does the paladin get a better mount than the dedicated mounted class (cavalier)? The other options that I'm aware of to break into animal companion stuff at levels past 1 (ranger, mounted fury barbarian, and animal domain) all have an effective druid level penalty.

Aside from those questions I have two others that fall more into rules questions, but I figure I'm already here. First, supernatural charms and compulsions can still affect a level 20 paladin, yes? Want to make sure there isn't some general rule that they now count as spell-like or something. Second, is there any way for an inquisitor to poach the paladin's saddle surge spell (aside from potions)?

It's listed in the pfsrd as an option, but in this thread one of the designers mentions that it's not an animal. Is there any other information on this?