Custom Mount

[Dafydd]

So my Hunter has some spare cash and I have Animal Archive and Beast 3. He has decided, he wants a cool mount, even if it will never be used in a scenario.

However, when he settled on a Elk, I did not realize there were no stats for an Elk he could ride.

Elk is on the list of riding animals available for purchase and the Beast 3 entry says this:

Elk Herd Animal wrote:

Some larger species can stand up to 6 feet tall at the shoulder and can be used as mounts by Medium humanoids; these elk have 3 Hit Dice and are Large. [snip river elk] All elk of this size are CR 2.

So I am now uncertain how to stat this mount, if I can even take it. Are they only available for small people? Is there an official stat block for the riding elk? Should I give it the 3rd HD and the Giant template? May I select a feat for it, since it has another feat now?

There may be better options, but I am not all that interested in those. Riding will be a rare thing for him to do anyway (18 games as a player, never once needed a mount), I just wanna be prepared for if I do get to.

Side question, would it be possible to purchase a river elk?

Thank you

[Nefreet]

Just whatever the Elk is that's available for purchase in Animal Archive.

[Harley Quinn X]

The river elk is statted out in AP #31, Kingmaker's "Rivers Run Red" and according to the additional resources, is available in its animal companion form, but not available for regular sale.

[The Masked Ferret]

There is nothing keeping you from buying an elk and calling it a river elk, as long as it mechanically works as a regular elk.

[Dragnmoon]

The Masked Ferret wrote:

There is nothing keeping you from buying an elk and calling it a river elk, as long as it mechanically works as a regular elk.

I don't know enough about the difference between an Elk and a River Elk, but here is the FAQ on Re-Skinning Animal Companions to be another one:

PFS FAQ wrote:

Can I re-skin or re-flavor an animal companion or item?

You may choose a specific type of animal companion from any of the base forms listed on pages 53–54 of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook or a legal Additional Resource but may not use stats for one base form with the flavor of another type of animal. Thus, a small cat could be a cheetah or leopard, as suggested, as well as a lynx, bobcat, puma, or other similar animal; it could not, however, be "re-skinned" to be a giant hairless swamp rat or a differently-statted wolf. If a GM feels that a re-skinning is inappropriate or could have mechanical implications in the specific adventure being played, he may require that the creature simply be considered its generic base form for the duration of the adventure. A player may not re-skin items to be something for which there are no specific rules, and any item a character uses for which there are no stats is considered an improvised weapon (see page 144 of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook).

[Dafydd]

The river elk I am referring to is the "Unusual breed of elk" mentioned in the Beast 3 entry, which basically just has a swim speed, on top of normal elk things. Did not know if they were available.

So my main question, Elk for normal riding from Animal Archive. Is it Medium with 2HD or Large with 3HD?

[Harley Quinn X]

Elk bought from animal archive is 2HD and medium. There's no price given to buy a river elk or a larger riding elk.

The statted river elk is more than just a base elk with a swim speed. It has more skills, higher skill bonuses, higher Strength than an elk would have if you just made it large, the Endurance feat, higher BAB, and so on.

[BigNorseWolf]

David Montgomery wrote:

Elk bought from animal archive is 2HD and medium.

*headscratch*

Mildly Sad non druid approved image

Those things are freaking huge. The antlers rate as a medium sized creature...

[Nefreet]

On a similar, off-topic note: I keep noticing that male deer in my area usually have weird-looking, uneven antlers. Nothing that would ever look pretty on a hunter's wall.

Chalk it up to unnatural selection, I suppose.

[BigNorseWolf]

Dafydd wrote:

The river elk I am referring to is the "Unusual breed of elk" mentioned in the Beast 3 entry, which basically just has a swim speed, on top of normal elk things. Did not know if they were available.

So my main question, Elk for normal riding from Animal Archive. Is it Medium with 2HD or Large with 3HD?

If the "river elk" had a particular fur pattern, its antlers were known to hold exceptional detail when carved, or was used locally to pull sleighs you could call your elk that. But swim speed is a pretty big mechanical effect, and you can't add that on to a creature by a name change.

A wolf can be a timber wolf, a mexican wolf, a great plains wolf, a rocky mountains wolf, a red wolf, etc. But not a direwolf, or a "Sea wolf" with a swim speed.

[Flutter]

Nefreet wrote:

On a similar, off-topic note: I keep noticing that male deer in my area usually have weird-looking, uneven antlers. Nothing that would ever look pretty on a hunter's wall.

Chalk it up to unnatural selection, I suppose.

Whistles innocently, wild empathies the animals over, prunes the antlers a bit and walks off

[The Masked Ferret]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Dafydd wrote:

The river elk I am referring to is the "Unusual breed of elk" mentioned in the Beast 3 entry, which basically just has a swim speed, on top of normal elk things. Did not know if they were available.

So my main question, Elk for normal riding from Animal Archive. Is it Medium with 2HD or Large with 3HD?

If the "river elk" had a particular fur pattern, its antlers were known to hold exceptional detail when carved, or was used locally to pull sleighs you could call your elk that. But swim speed is a pretty big mechanical effect, and you can't add that on to a creature by a name change.

A wolf can be a timber wolf, a mexican wolf, a great plains wolf, a rocky mountains wolf, a red wolf, etc. But not a direwolf, or a "Sea wolf" with a swim speed.

Can it be a big Norse wolf?

[Nebten]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

A wolf can be a timber wolf, a mexican wolf, a great plains wolf, a rocky mountains wolf, a red wolf, etc. But not a direwolf, or a "Sea wolf" with a swim speed.

I'm more of a fan of the Airwolf =v)

[Dafydd]

As I said in my first post, I have Beast 3 and Animal Archive. I do not have any other supplements that have Elk in them.

The Beast 3 elk is a medium creature with 2 HD as its stats. In the description it says that Elk for riding by medium creatures are large, have 3 HD and are CR 2.

The same entry says that there are river elk, and that they gain a swim speed. It lists no other benefits. No attempt to reflavor, just a question on the availability of something.

As the Animal Archive has the Elk listed on the Riding Animal table, I was asking what to do about this. The 2HD elk in Beast 3 is not a suitable mount for me and there are no official stats for the 3HD riding elk.

So it looks like Beast 3 says a riding Elk is X, normal Elk is Y. Animal Archive lists Y as what you can attempt to ride. Might as well toss the idea then cause Y is not really ride able, at least by a tengu and X is imaginary.

[BigNorseWolf]

As the Animal Archive has the Elk listed on the Riding Animal table, I was asking what to do about this. The 2HD elk in Beast 3 is not a suitable mount for me and there are no official stats for the 3HD riding elk.

What you do is don't buy it. The thing thats a legal purchase and the thing you need to be the legal purchase aren't the same thing.

[Sebastian Hirsch]

Nefreet wrote:

On a similar, off-topic note: I keep noticing that male deer in my area usually have weird-looking, uneven antlers. Nothing that would ever look pretty on a hunter's wall.

Chalk it up to unnatural selection, I suppose.

Actually some hunters tend to prize unusual trophies^^. The reason for the uneven look, could be anything from malnutrition to too much fighting in the mating season^^.