Natalu's page

A commander needs a battle standard so their allies can locate them on the field. You start play with a custom banner that you can use to signal allies when using tactics (see below) or to deploy specific abilities. Your banner can be affixed to a weapon or shield you are wielding, or held in one hand and attached to a simple pole. Feats and abilities with the banner trait require you to be holding your banner or wielding a weapon or shield it is attached to.
As long as your banner is visible (such as by being affixed to your weapon or worn attached to a pole alongside your backpack), you and all allies in a 30-foot emanation gain a +1 status bonus to Will saves and DCs against fear effects. You pause or resume this effect as part of any action you would typically use to stow or retrieve your banner, such as Interacting to stow it. If your banner is destroyed or stolen, allies within 30 feet become frightened 1. This effect has the aura, commander, emotion, mental, and visual traits.
Some abilities allow you to place your banner in a specialized manner; as long as you have placed your banner in this way, any banner abilities originate from your banner’s space instead of your own.

By studying and practicing the strategic arts of war, you can guide your allies to victory. You begin play with a folio containing four tactics from the list on pages 6-7. These are combat techniques and coordinated maneuvers you can instruct your allies in, enabling them to respond to your signals in combat. As you increase in level, you gain the ability to learn more potent tactics. When you gain the expert tactician class feature, you gain the ability to add expert tactics to your folio, when you gain the master tactician class feature you can add master tactics to your folio, and when you gain the legendary tactician class feature you can add legendary tactics to your folio.

Preparing and Changing Tactics
Each day during your daily preparations, you prepare two tactics from your folio and drill in them alongside your allies, enabling you to use these tactics until your next daily preparations. When you drill, you can instruct a total number of allies equal to 2 plus your Intelligence modifier, enabling these allies to respond to your tactics in combat; these allies are referred to as your squadmates. A squadmate always has the option not to respond to your tactical signal if they do not wish to. The tactic trait is explained in more detail in the key terms sidebar on page 4.
You can change which tactics you have prepared from those in your folio by spending 10 minutes to drill, replacing all previously prepared tactics and allies. This does not prevent your allies from performing their own activities during this time frame.

Gaining New Tactics
You add additional tactics to your folio and increase the number of tactics you can prepare when you gain the expert tactician, master tactician, and legendary tactician class features. You can also add tactics to your folio with the Tactical Expansion feat though this does not change the number you can have prepared. Because tactics folios use shorthand and signals unique to each commander, there is typically no benefit to using (or stealing) another commander’s folio, though you can train with another commander to retrain one tactic in your folio to another that they know (if the tactic required a class feat to learn, you must retrain a class feat of at least that level to learn it, as normal).

Your time spent training with your allies allows them to respond quickly and instinctively to your commands. Once per round, when you use a tactic, you can grant one ally of your choice benefiting from that tactic an extra reaction. This reaction has to be used for that tactic, and is lost if not used.

Your knowledge of war and strategy grows and guides your decisions in battle. You gain expert proficiency in Warfare Lore. You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be
reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak. The GM can decide to allow additional questions to be answered when Recalling Knowledge with Warfare Lore as appropriate to the situation. In addition, as long as you are observing at least one opponent when initiative is rolled, you can use Warfare Lore for your initiative roll.

Requirements You and your allies currently outnumber enemies on the battlefield and you or a squadmate have reduced an enemy to 0 Hit Points since the start of your last turn.

At your proclamation that victory is already at hand, your allies march forward with an authoritative stomp, scattering your enemies in terror. Signal all squadmates affected by your commander’s banner; you and each ally can Step directly toward a hostile creature they are observing as a free action. Any hostile creatures within 10 feet of you or a squadmate after this movement must attempt a Will save against your class DC; on a failure they become fleeing for 1 round and on a critical failure they become fleeing for 1 round and frightened 2. This is an emotion, fear, and mental effect.

You signal an aggressive formation designed to exploit enemies’ vulnerabilities. Signal all squadmates affected by your commander’s banner; each can Step as a free action. If any of your allies end this movement adjacent to an opponent, that opponent is off-guard to melee attacks from you and all other squadmates who responded to Pincer Attack until the start of your next turn.

You command an ally to attack. Choose a squadmate who can see or hear your signal. That ally immediately attempts a Strike as a reaction.

Your command demands that endangered units fall back while rested units press the advantage. Signal all squadmates affected by your commander’s banner; each can swap positions with another willing ally adjacent to them as a free action that does not trigger reactions; an ally can’t swap into a space it can’t fit into, and if one of the allies occupies more squares than the other, the smaller ally can move into any part of the larger ally’s space as long as the two remain adjacent after the swap.

You gain the service of a young animal companion as a mount. See Animal Companions (Player Core 206). You can affix your banner to your mount’s saddle or barding, determining the effects of your commander’s banner and other abilities that use your banner from your mount’s space, even if you are not currently riding your mount. Typically, the steed is an animal companion with the mount ability (such as a horse).

Requirements You are wielding a ranged weapon.

Your ranged attack helps guide your allies into striking your enemy’s weak point. Attempt a Strike with the required weapon. If the Strike hits, the next creature other than you to attack the same target before the start of your next turn gains a +1 circumstance bonus to their roll, or a +2 circumstance bonus if your Strike was a critical hit.

You’ll see the following new key terms in many commander class features.
Tactic: Tactics are special abilities that involve you signaling your allies to perform predetermined maneuvers. To use a tactic ability, you must have one or more willing allies you have instructed beforehand during your daily preparations. Your squadmates must also be able to perceive your signal, either when you speak or shout it (in which case the tactic action gains the auditory trait), or by physically signaling them, typically by waving your banner (in which case it gains the visual trait). While you can use multiple tactic actions a round, a character cannot respond to more than one tactic per round, regardless of source.
Banner: The banner trait indicates an ability that involves you waving or otherwise actively displaying your banner. To use an ability that has the banner trait, you must be holding your banner in one hand or wielding a weapon it is attached to.
Flourish: Actions with this trait are special techniques that require too much exertion for you to perform frequently. You can use only one action with the flourish trait per round.
Squadmate: The allies whom you instruct when you prepare your tactics during your daily preparations are known as squadmates. Only you and your squadmates can benefit from your tactics.

Your companion is a terror bird, a large species of flightless carnivorous avian.
Size Large
Melee [one-action] beak +8, Damage 1d8+3 piercing
Melee [one-action] talon +8 (agile), Damage 1d6+3 piercing
Str +3, Dex +2, Con +2, Int -4, Wis +1, Cha +0
AC 17 Hit Points 32
Saves: Fort +7, Reflex +7, Will +6
Perception +6
Skills Acrobatics +7, Athletics +8, Survival +6
Senses low-light vision
Speed 40 feet
Special mount
Support Benefit Your terror bird screeches at your enemies when you create an opening. Until the start of your next turn, your Strikes that deal damage to a creature within your terror bird's reach make the target flat-footed until the start of your next turn.