I'm working on a Cavalier build for Pathfinder Society to try out and because of the more stringent use of rules I'm trying to figure out some of the wording for Cavalier mounts.
1) Does a Cavalier's mount come with combat riding under the handle animal skill?
It's easy enough to assume this is the case, however if we are supposed to go with the rules for animal companions under the Druid entry, then an animal companion only recieves one "trick". Combat Riding however is categorized as a "general purpose" and not just a single trick.
Unfortunately, between the handle animal skill and the ride skill the terminology starts to become more vague. In the ride skill it talks of "combat training" rather than "combat riding". It's easy enough to assume they mean the same thing, but when you're trying to build up all of the rules via their terminology the fuzziness starts to cause problems.
A DM could get very fussy and say that a Cavalier stats with a mount which only knows one trick, and then the player needs to give it the attack trick. However it is still considered untrained for combat and so DC 20 Ride checks need to happen every round just to get it to do something useful.
So I guess as just part of the playtest feedback, making it explicit that the Cavalier Mount is combat trained and has the combat riding general purpose would help to clear up RAW issues.
2) Are there any animal companions which are not suitable as a mount? Once again, RAW is a bit vague on this. Under the ride skill it states that mounts unsuitable for riding confer a -5 penalty to ride checks, however it doesn't explain what is unsuitable, leaving it up to common sense. That's fine to a degree, but in situations like Pathfinder Society, clear RAW is very handy to have.
With the cavalier entry, it seems that suitability is just built around the size of the creature, with the assumption that you have to have a mount one size bigger than the cavalier to be able to ride it.
Looking over the animal companions from the core book and bestiary, I guess other ones assumed to be unsuitable would be:
Ape (biped)
Snakes, Octopus, Squid, Eels (weird shapes)
3) Flying Mounts - Assuming that Cavalier mounts are combat trained/combat riding ready from the outset, it seems as if you can have a flying mount if you start with a small cavalier and then team them up with a Roc, Dire Bat or Pteranodon.
Is this the intent? Can I have my first encounter with a Halfling cavalier riding a Roc to be a divebomb onto opponents with a lance?
