Monster Hunter Campaign: Mounting

[Perry Cox]

Hi Everyone,

So, I am running a campaign in the vein of Capcom's Monster Hunter. There isn't a very strong overarching plot right now. I'm laying little groundwork pieces here and there, but for the most part, the campaign focuses on hunting monsters back to back like in the game.

That being said, my players have attempted to mount monsters like you do in monster hunter and I handled it poorly.

Looking back on it, I'm thinking of making it a jump check to make it onto the monsters back followed by a CMB for a mount and then following the rules of a grapple to maintain hold/handle animal to try and stay mounted when it attempts to throw off.

Am I on the right track? Ideas or suggestions?

Edit: I will be posting Monster Hunter monsters we use in conversions later and will be creating some custom monsters for the campaign.

[Tyrant Lizard King]

Perhaps a Ride check each round at the beginning of the mounted player's turn to stay on, DC= Monster's CMD as a Move action(Gripping and stabbing). Maybe a more difficult DC Acrobatics check to stay on the Monster as a Swift action in order to make a Full Attack action("Surfing" the beast while whacking away).
Monster could act normally, making attacks against the rider at -5 or against other players normally. Grappling to mount might prove too difficult since most Monsters would be Gargantuan or Colossal and likely to have a very tough CMD. Here are some other ideas you could add.

-Player makes CMB vs Monster's opposed Sense Motive to mount as a Full-Round action, provokes attack of opportunity
-Successful Feint attempt to mount a Monster without provoking an attack of opportunity
-Homebrew feats for faster mounting or bonuses to mount
-If the rider takes damage from Monster he must make a successful Ride check or fall off, Acrobatics or Reflex save to avoid fall damage but still prone. (DC= damage received? Monster CMD?)
-Monster can make an opposed CMB vs rider's Ride, CMB or CMD to throw rider as a Move action (must be able to attack the same round or players will continue to mount while others attack and the Monster will never make any attacks)
-Riders automatically take damage equal to one of the Monster's natural attacks when the Monster successfully throws one off
-Monster denied DEX to AC/flat-footed vs rider attacks
-All allies get a Flanking bonus against a Monster with a rider regardless of position
-Spiky or extreme temperature Monsters that automatically deal damage to those adjacent/riding. Or slimy ones that leave players entangled with sticky resin after successful attacks or mount attempts

My idea with these is to make it challenging to accomplish and have major benefits as well as having extra dangers for attempting them.
High Risk, High Reward.

[Dave Justus]

Pathfinder has nothing in it that is going to be much help on this, so it will obviously require extensive house rules.

The first step, in my opinion, is to figure out what benefits you want to give players that succeed in mounting a monster. If the benefits are large, it should be difficult, if small, it should be much easier. Figuring out what the benefits are might also help in figuring out what existing mechanics to start from in making up the rules.

[Perry Cox]

Mounting

Mounting is a Combat Manouver against a creatures modified CMD that provokes an attack of opportunity. For mounting purposes, a Creatures size bonus chart for CMD is inverted. Characters can only mount creatures that are at least 2 size categories larger than themselves. While mounting, characters can make attacks with light weapons. Maintaining a mount is a move action and requires a ride check to maintain. The DC of the check is equal to the monsters Mounted CMD. This can be shortened to a swift action by increasing the DC of the mount. While mounted a monster can take actions normally. It can attempt a Combat Manoever to throw the character off of its back as a move action. Attacks against it's mounter are made at a -5. Additionally, mounters grant flanking to all allies adjacent to the monster, regardless of their position. A mounter that is hit with an attack from the creature they are mounting must make a successful ride check equal to the damage received or be thrown from the creature.

Feats:

Improved Mounting

Character gains a +2 to CMB when attempting to mount a creature(edited)

Vicious Mounter

The character is particularly skilled at finding a creatures weak points while mounted. Mounted creatures take an additional d6 damage from a mounted characters attacks

Greater Mounting
Prerequisite: Improved Mounting

Character gains an additional +2 to mounting attempts. They also no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when Mounting.

Shielded Mounter

The character has become adept at preventing attacks from the mounted creature. Gain an additional +2 to AC from the creature you have mounted.

[Perry Cox]

This is what we are going with right now. We have a couple of sessions where we will test it, and I'll let you know how it works out.