The Mounted Combat feat reads as follows,
You are adept at guiding your mount through combat.
Prerequisite: Ride 1 rank.
Benefit: Once per round when your mount is hit in combat, you may attempt a Ride check (as an immediate action) to negate the hit. The hit is negated if your Ride check result is greater than the opponent's attack roll.
Now personally this is amongst one of my hated feats out there. Now here is my question.
Would using this feat actually require you to draw rein on your mount, there fore moving it so that it isn't injured in the attack. An if so, would this be an action taken, since it would be doing something that you chose to do?
It would be an immediate action, just like it says. Immediate actions don't count as a standard, move, or swift action, they occur instantly even when it is not your turn.
Out of curiosity, why the hate?
Mounts are kind of easy to kill. This feat in turn is kind of important.
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Moving your shield or blocking with your weapon (just as you would on foot)Moving you and your mount slightly out of the way (ducking or dodging the blow just as you would on foot.) The skill and feat are that you and your mount are both working as one and you have learned new fighting style to take the appropriate action.
Mounts are kind of easy to kill. This feat in turn is kind of important.
And it goes so very nicely with my mounted Summoner and his Eidolon...
As you guys have pointed out, yes Mounts are easy to kill and/or wound. So in the midst of combat with just a skill check, a rider can evade an attack on his/her mount, and immediately retaliate with no detrimental effects.
It just seems to much for so simple a feat. Yes its a game, but for even a bit of realism, it makes no since. Your doing something that's saving your mount yes, but there should be some cost in time.
With it the way it is anyone with a mount just dumps a bunch of skill points in to Ride, an then wade into the fray without a thought in the world. There's no risk, no sacrifice.
There is a cost. They can't use a swift action on their next turn. And they can only do it once per round. If you really want to kill their mount, just attack it twice.
But also keep in mind that for most classes with mounts, there are serious consequences to losing them:
Should the paladin's mount die, the paladin may not summon another mount for 30 days or until she gains a paladin level, whichever comes first. During this 30-day period, the paladin takes a –1 penalty on attack and weapon damage rolls.
Should a cavalier's mount die, the cavalier may find another mount to serve him after 1 week of mourning. This new mount does not gain the link, evasion, devotion, or improved evasion special abilities until the next time the cavalier gains a level.
In most situations, it usually makes more sense to target the character anyway, since they're the one doing all the damage.
Swift actions are huge. If you're a wizard, that's a quickened spell you're not casting. If you're a bard, that's a bardic performance you're not starting. If you're a paladin, that's a smite you're not declaring. If you're an inquisitor, you're leaving somebody un-judged. If you fall into a pit -- whoops, you can't activate your feather fall. Especially important, there are characters with the feat Coordinated charge who can pounce as a swift action that are really, really inconvenienced by having to burn their swift actions.
Sure, a vanilla fighter may not have that much to spend his swift actions on (maybe if he takes Style feats?), but then, he only gets to buy a Bestiary horse with perhaps 13 hit points and has no built-in access to a companion that makes him better at what he does -- only a companion that allows him to use the mounted combat system. They really depend on this feat to make a reasonable character concept viable, and even then, it only negates one attack -- you don't get to 'wade into combat' with more than perhaps one enemy without risk.
So in answer to your question: It costs an Immediate action. It makes no mention of needing to move. If you can Guide With Knees, you even do it without drawing the reins.
With it the way it is anyone with a mount just dumps a bunch of skill points in to Ride, an then wade into the fray without a thought in the world. There's no risk, no sacrifice.
Yes... assuming that your mount will only be subject to 1 attack each round.
Gotta say, its been a long, long time since I engaged in a battle where a frontliner was only subject to 1 attack a round...
If you think that Mounted Combat makes no sense you should check out the Trick Riding feat, which allows a character to use the Ride skill to defend a mount twice each round. That is tough to explain since usually a character only gets one immediate action per round. Trick Riding really makes no sense from a rules perspective, but I suspect most groups let it slide. One thing which is easy to forget but should be enforced is that hiding behind the mount to gain +4 AC from cover is also an immediate action. Therefore it can't be done in the same round where Mounted Combat is used to defend the mount.