Nikkok's page

I could swear, that I saw somewhere in the rules, that you can make a heal check to find out, how much hp someone currently has, and maybe other details of their health (diseases, poisoning, etc).
But now I can't find anything related to it.

So, if DM says "You see an unconsious wounded man", which check and with which DC should the party take and which action should it be, if they want to know more about his state? How quickly can somebody understand mid-combat how soon will die a friendly NPC that is bleeding out?

I understand, that DM always can rule something on the spot, but prefer to have some RAW, to now the base, from which it should start.

Let's suppose you are riding a very fast mount. Naturally fast creature, like a cat, or buffed with something like Cheetah's sprint. The speed of the mount allows it to make very long and very high jumps, because it gains enormous Acrobatics bonuses on running jump checks.
The problem is, that you will not be able to stay on it's back. As the Ride skills says, when you make the mount jump, you either make an Acrobatics check for the mount, or the Ride check yourself, whichever is lower, the DC is equal to the jump DC.
A usual +5 bonus from the saddle isn't gonna help. Is there any special equipment to work with this, and if you would design something yourself, how would you balance it?
I thought about some kind of saddle, that takes about a minute to strap in, but allows you to autopass all checks to stay mounted. Of course, it prohibits you from dismounting (maybe, a full-round action to unstrap) and creates a danger of mount falling on top of you, if it is falling prone.

What do you think?

P.S. This should also be usable for riding something like a giant spider, crawling on the seiling. Or staying on the flying mount without appropriate Ride skill.

So, imagine this:
A charecter fights the Yeth Hound. He tries to move away from it, provoking an AoO. AoO hits and the hound trips him -> he falls prone instead of stepping away. He uses his standart action to stand up.
The question - can he now take a 5 ft. step? The rules say "You can't take a 5 ft. step if you moved any distance this round". He didn't move, but he tried. Does it count?

P.S. If you wonder, why didn't he start with 5 ft. step - he needed to provoke that AoO.

So, my party has just started the River into Darkness.
They have encountered two capoacinth rogues (lvl 2), which attacked them on the river during the storm. They knocked down the male one and threw him overboard, then slew his girlfriend and threw the corpse into the river too.
So, I decided to have the male gargoile survived. He retrieved the corpse and decided to avenge her death, following the party up the river.
This is going to be an encounter a few weeks later and I want to ramp up his toughness and add some drama. Maybe, take some levels in the new class and give him powerful gear or effects.
I have sketched a few ideas, but would be glad to hear some advice from more experienced GMs!

I'm bulding my gnome hunter and ran into a few unclear parts in the rules:

1) Hunter favored class bonus for gnomes. It has some weird phrasing: "Add DR 1/magic to the hunter’s animal companion. Each time the hunter gains another level, the DR increases by ½ (maximum DR 10/magic). ".
What does it actually mean?
a) When you take it on for the first time, it grants DR 1, when you take it again later - +1/2 to DR each time you take it. Seems legit, but the wording is too different from bonuses for other races, that work this way.
b) Once you take it once, it grows as you level up, without investing favored class points in it. Seems strong.
c) Each time you take it, it grants DR 1+1/2 hunter lvl. Seems insanely strong and probably wrong.

2) Lightning lash spell. Looks like fun - my hunter is small, so traditional weapons are not so strong on him. But a few mechanics of the spell are unclear.

Lightning lash

a) Duration. Do I effectively lose 1 round of duration each time, because I cast it as a standart action and can't attack at the same round?
b) Is it considered a whip for the rules? Description says "flashes in your hands like a whip", but the description of "Whip of spiders" states similar moment in a more strict way, for example ("You can wield this object as if it were an actual whip, except you make a melee touch attack with it").
So, is it finessable, or do I add only my Str bonus to it's touch attack? Does it provoke an AoO? Does it have a threat range? Does it work with the whip feats?

Greetings, guys.

Me and my friends have just started our first Pathfinder campaign. I've decided to build a small, dinosaur mounted warrior with some nature magic abilities.
So I chose the Gnome race and the Hunter class. Took Velociraptor as my AC, he will become mountable at level 7. I plan to give him Int 3, so we wouldn't have to worry about tricks and training much.

The plan is to use Dex-based build, utilizing Weapon Finesse, to avoid Str penalty of the small race. We play with 15-point buy, so the final stats are (race mods included):

Str 10
Dex 15
Con 12
Int 10
Wiz 16
Cha 9

General playing strategy is to utilise shared teamwork feats to boost hit chance and damage. Planned feats:
Lvl
1 Weapon Finesse
2 Outflank (hunter bonus)
3 Dirty Fighting, Pack Flanking (hunter bonus)
4 -
5 Improved Trip
6 Paired Opportunists (hunter bonus)
7 Precise Strike or Combat Reflexes (I don't know yet, what will I need more, additional damage or more AoOs to utilize Outflank)
8 -
9 Greater Trip and some bonus Teamwork feat
...
Finesse allows to use Dex modifier on trip attempts, so we end up with + 9(+Dex+BAB) on trip attempts after charge (+4 Outflank, +4 Trip feats, +2 charge, -1 size). And after opponent falls prone, he recieves 2 AoOs and five attacks frome the raptor's Pounce, all at +10 bonus (+4 Outflank, +4 prone, +2 charge).
I also consider using Scimitar with Dervish Dance in this build - one feat will give me a nice boost to damage and a lot more crits for Outflank's AoOs.

Now a few questions:
What are some nice additional feats to consider? Maybe another useful combat ones to work with pouncing mount, instead of tripping? Or some feats, that give me or my mount an AoO, to get another one from Paired Opportunists?

Are there useful Mounted Combat feats for such build? I don't think, that such character would be an effective lance charger. And I read, that I can't Pounce with my mount and Ride by Attack at the same time, thats why I chose tripping.

What are some useful spells for this build? I consider different buffs, and temporary Improved Spell Sharing, to buff before combat, and then swap the feat to fighting one.

Would really love to hear your opinions on this concept, as I have mostly theoretical experience and don't really know yet, how all of this stuff would work in real fight.