misted's page

I've played about 8 total sessions of Pathfinder so please forgive any poor reasoning/assumptions.

I'm playing a ranger mounted archer. When it came time to get my animal companion, my GM ruled that my current heavy-horse could become my animal companion. Both of us realized that the HEAVY horse was not on the official companion list, but he allowed it because the horse and I had been through a lot together. HOWEVER: he ruled the first two animal companion feats for the horse would be Endurance and Run instead of anything I might otherwise pick. So I got to pick my first feat (Power Attack) at companion level 5.

I'm now about to hit level 7 (I have boon companion so my companion's level is also 7). Eventually I would like to use improved/greater overrun to get myself into the thick of it and use snapshot, combat reflexes, improved snapshot to do lots of AoO damage. Almost everyone online (including this forum) seems to recommend wolf animal companion, but I'm wondering if that's just because they don't have heavy horse as an option. What do you think, keep the horse or swap him out?

Stats as of level 7, include advancement and animal companion bonus (hopefully I did this right):
Standard Companion Horse: STR 20, DEX 13, CON 19, natural armor 8; bite 1d4 + 2 hooves 1d6
.......................Heavy Horse: STR 24, DEX 18, CON 25, natural armor 6; bite 1d4 + 2 hooves 1d6
....................................Wolf: STR 23, DEX 13, CON 21, natural armor 8; bite 1d6 + trip

Hi. First time playing an RPG and I'm confused about animal companions and their feats. I'm playing a mounted archery ranger, currently level 5, and have been roughly following Lastoths Guide to Archery Rangers which I found on this board's 'Guide to the Class Guides' sticky post. One notable exception: I am planning to take boon companion at level 7.

One of the build's strengths is getting AoOs, thus giving my mount feats like Improved Overrun and Greater Overrun is valuable.

My confusion is how early the online builds (and some posts from other players) are granting these feats to their companions. The way I read the rules, Greater Overrun requires BAB of +6, which the wolf doesn't get until companion HD 8 which happens at druid level 9.

Yet Lasthoths says: "level by level... 6-9: Now you can fire into cover. Once you have snap shot remember to put an arrow in anyone your mount overruns, assuming you have Greater Overrun." ... and the craziest part is that his build doesn't have boon companion, meaning at ranger level 9 that looks to me like a druid level 6 and thus a companion BAB of only +4.

And another popular build suggests taking boon companion at level 7 and suggests Wolf Feat Selections: 7) Power Attack, Improved Overrun, Greater Overrun;. But again, at level 7 with boon that means druid level 7 means companion BAB of only +4.

Additionally, I've seen a few posts of players talking about their companions and feats and they have given their companions some feats even though I can't see how their companions could have met the feat prerequisites.

What am I missing here? Do feat prerequisites not apply to animal companions? I see that the rules say Animal companions with an Intelligence of 3 or higher can select any feat they are physically capable of using. GMs might expand this list to include feats from other sources. but i didn't read that to mean that they get to bypass the feat's requirements...

Thanks in advance.