Anyone have a good feat progression for a halfling lancer paladin. I will be starting at level 1 and going to roughly level 15. The one issue I am having is that paladin's do not receive their mount until level 5 but something like spirited charge requires decent feat investment. Should I invest from the beginning in mounted feats that I won't use until level 5 or invest in other useful feats at lvl 1 and 3 and start on mounted feats at 5? Thanks for the advice, especially if you have a good progression you wish to share.
If you're not averse to level dipping, 1 level of genderme Cavalier will add some versatility with challenge when you're not facing evil creatures, and a bonus mounted combat feat, and a mount that follows full druid progression. You can use boon companion to keep his level up. Then you can start being mounted combatant from level 1 and you don't waste feats on a different fighting style. Then, when you reach 5th level as a paladin, you have a couple options. You can just stick with your 5th level Cavalier mount, who won't advance, but that's fairly decent, and you can do weapon divine bond. If you find your mount weak, take advantage of your presumably high charisma and take leadership, and ride your cohort. Alternately, you can go with the paladin mount, at which point boon companion becomes a wasted feat.
Also 1 level of dragoon fighter will get you some nice bonus mounted feats.
That was what I was thinking of doing when I mentioned putting off the mounted combat feat (and it's follow ups) until lvl 5. Although, since I will be playing a halfling, I would probably grab Power attack and either furious focus or risky striker. That would give me feats I could use while not mounted and I wouldn't have to rely upon a one hit wonder mount until I reached level 5.
personally ive found that radiant charge builds are feat intensive because if you want to still be able to heal, go with extra channeling (because RAW you can't use those LoH charges to do anything but channel energy, so you basically get an extra pool of heals) and selective channeling will help you not heal the bad guys, and since you have high CHA, your selective channeling will, in theory, be better than most clerics
if you wanna do all that AND throw in radiant charge, you're looking at your character build not being mature until way after 10th level, which is usually a bad thing, unless you get to start out at that level
assuming theres only one enemy to hit.... or that your going into a 15 work day
best saved for a 'last boss of the AP' fight, which overall makes it a bad feat tree to look at because you will want something that is always useful, and not just a one shot wonder
In regards to your original question, I would just buy a riding dog or pony and use it until you hit lvl 5. Dipping is simply not worth it with the build above as you lose spells and smite damage. At level 9 take radiant charge. An interesting spell to look at is Litany of Righteousness as it doubles damage. At lvl 9 with say 7 uses of lay on hands and litany of rigteousness + smite you could theoretically do, using the character stats in the above example with a 16 cha, the following damage:
4d6 + 24 x4 = 152 + 7d6(from radiant charge). Avg damage of 198.
Basically 200 damage without a crit and with mediocre gear(only a belt of giant str and +2 lance) and no buffs other than litany. Have a bard in the party adding more damage? Have a piece of gear that gives more cha? Rhino hide armor? More str? You are simply one shotting everything. And you're a tiny gnome named Tippy Mcfizzlepot.
Litany of Righteousness is something that the Paladin can not utilize themselves without metamagic. The spell effect only lasts for 1 round, so it is over by your next turn. Either a paladin has to quicken or extend it and then charge or have party members who can use it.
im just saying that your damage isnt consistent, and you can't always count on being able to do that much damage, because you only get it OPD
generally speaking its bad because of that, or what happens when you waste it on something that you thought was the big bad boss and later you find yourself in either need of another radiant charge, or in need of more heals?
personally i would love radiant charge and would call it a staple for pallys if they let you allocate the number of uses as a resource, so you could use it more often, but that might make it OP
true, very true, which is why a lancer build is very effective
radiant charge as a feat however is the issue with being a one shot wonder
im saying there are better ways to spend your feats
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You can always buy a war pony/riding dog/?? at level two when you have the money. At level five you can get/skin your mount into a paladin mount at that point. People do ride mounts who don't have specific mount class abilities.
You're going to be investing in the ride skill anyway, so might as well use a non-class mount until you get a class mount.
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Also, just throwing this out there,the rules for multiplying say two doubles equal a triple, a triple and a double equal a quadruple, etc., so I don't think Litany of Righteousness would go off after everything, it'd just raise your multiplier. So you should be looking at (1d6+(STRx1.5)+enhancement+Smite+Power Attack)x4.
Crits don't work like that. You would be multiplying the damage dice twice. The x3 already becomes factored into the fact that you are rolling 3d6.
From the Core Rulebook:
A critical hit means that you roll your damage more than once, with all your usual bonuses, and add the rolls together. Unless otherwise specified, the threat range for a critical hit on an attack roll is 20, and the multiplier is ×2.So your damage is actually:
(1d6+21)+(1d6+21)+(1d6+21)Which simplifies to:
3d6+63As I said, the x3 is already factored in.
This is correct
x2 ...lance charge
x2 ...Spirited Charge
x2 ...Deadly Stroke
x2 ...Litany of Righteousness= x5 by multiplier rules
Yes, this often gets forgotten.