Why Hooves?

[Stabatha]

As a summoner who loves his kitty eidolon , Why take hooves over claws ? Is there a chain of abilities I don't know about.
I will admit I only skimmed the UM book ...

[Thanatos95]

Stabatha wrote:

As a summoner who loves his kitty eidolon , Why take hooves over claws ? Is there a chain of abilities I don't know about.

I will admit I only skimmed the UM book ...

I've kinda wondered that myself. They do less damage than claws, and they count as secondary attacks so they swing at -5. The only use I can see is for flavor. To make it stranger, they can only be take once, so you can't make a horse!

Maybe Ultimate Combat will have more to do with them.

EDIT: I have an idea: Why not make it so that hooves increase the base land speed of the eidolon by another 10ft? That would fit, and make them more useful.

[thepuregamer]

you can only have claws on your legs once. If you were a quadruped and you didn't want arms for whatever reason, then you would just use hooves.

Having limbs legs evolution already gives you a speed boost, so a hooves attacking eidolon would be pretty fast.

The advantage of an arms using eidolon is not that they can equip weapons. Claws are ok too and of the natural weapons, claws are one of the efficient ones. 3 evolution points for 2 attacks.

[obadiah]

Without looking to verify I'd imagine they do bludgeoning damage as well which, while situational, could be handy to overcome DR/Bludgeoning. I could also see a DM allowing the horseshoe magic items only being available to an eidolon with the hooves evolution. But I think the main reason to take it is for flavor.

[Pinky's Brain]

Stabatha wrote:

As a summoner who loves his kitty eidolon , Why take hooves over claws ? Is there a chain of abilities I don't know about.

I will admit I only skimmed the UM book ...

It's a trap option, all the secondary attacks are, unless you use a manufactured weapon using Eidolon ... and even then you might lose your weapons so why not pick the best natural attacks? Which are always limbs + claws.

[Daniel Mack]

If I recall from "Ultimate Magic" the Hooves act just like the Claws evolution (including damage), which on pg 60 of the APG state :
Claws (Ex): An eidolon has a pair of vicious claws at the
end of its limbs, giving it two claw attacks. These attacks
are primary attacks. The claws deal 1d4 points of damage
(1d6 if Large, 1d8 if Huge). The eidolon must have the
limbs evolution to take this evolution. This evolution can
only be applied to the limbs (legs) evolution once This
evolution can be selected more than once, but the eidolon
must possess an equal number of the limbs evolution.

if you notice the last sentence says you can take it twice but only if you have also taken "limbs" an equal amount of times too.

to answer the question I think its mainly flavor so that someone who wants a horse eidolon can have one with hooves and not claws or feet.

[Mnemaxa]

Last I checked, trample attacks require hooves.

[Mojorat]

it may surprise some, but people do build eidolons on themes. I had a ousted summoner with a flying peg acorn mount. I would have gone with the hooves I'n a heartbeat.

[Bomanz]

Wait what zomg gasps! Not everyone optimizes??? No wonder I have been having fun and not "only" winning encounters!

[Stynkk]

I want to make a Minotaur now :/

Bomanz wrote:

Wait what zomg gasps! Not everyone optimizes??? No wonder I have been having fun and not "only" winning encounters!

*buys Light Crossbow & a Longspear* I'll optimize next time.

[Magnu123]

Bomanz wrote:

Wait what zomg gasps! Not everyone optimizes??? No wonder I have been having fun and not "only" winning encounters!

+1

Break out the Monks of the Lotus, draconic bloodline sorcerers, and two-weapon front-liners.