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For my setting, in which some human societies heavily rely on working dogs, I have been making a few different homebrew dog animal companions, based on the various jobs working dogs have in the real world. I wanted to include a guide dog* animal companion. I am not visually impaired myself, however, so wanted to ask for some guidance on what abilities to give them.
I had been considering giving them the ability to negate the 'all terrain is difficult terrain' rule from the blinded condition, however, the rulebook's guidance for characters with blindness mentions that they will have adapted to living with the condition, and leaves out the difficult terrain rule, as well as the -4 penalty on perception checks that don't require vision.
Another possibility is to have it grant the player the Blind-Fight feat if it is near them, however, the guidance in the rulebooks suggests you should be granted the blind-fight feat anyway.
So a final option that I can think of is to have it's support action be to reduce the flat check to target hidden creatures by a further 5 on top of what blind-fight does, removing the need for a flat check.
That is basically just giving you the ability a sighted character has to target creatures without a flat check. But maybe that's ok beacause blind characters are differently abled - being immune to visual effects, dazzled and the full blinded condition? Should the guide dog have precise scent so it can help you target creatures that are invisible/hidden to other players?
And I'm not sure what a good advanced maneuver would be. Maybe just keep Takedown from the wolf companion?
It should probably be a rare animal companion, with access limited to characters with visual impairments due to the specilised training the dogs have been given. For other people who want a dog that can help them detect hidden or concealed creatures, I will probably make a scenthound companion.
*In my country, the association that trains them defines them as follows: "A Guide Dog is a Working Dog that is trained to assist you in independently navigating the world if you are a person with a visual impairment." I know other names are used for them in other countries.
Beyond blindness negation, I would explore the guide dog's role as an ever watchful guardian extremely in tune with their person. Some ideas:
-a reaction when their person is targeted by a harmful effect to boost their AC or saving throw.
-the dog could react to other people's body language, removing penalties to sense motive from visual impairment
-an effect that lets the dog override confusion or domination. For instance, if their person wants to attack an ally because of a mind-affecting effect, the guide dog could recognize it and mislead them away from the target.
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TBH I'm unsure why a guide dog needs different stats from a normal dog. PF2E has done a pretty good job letting any character with a disability participate on equal footing with other adventurers, either through easily accessible, well, accessibility items, or through good ol' handwavium. Needing a "special" dog to get around, furthermore one that other people just can't get, feels like a step back in that regard. I for sure can't speak for anyone else on this topic but, as a blind person, it strikes me as similar to the practices of some other games of giving you bonus character points or whatever for being unsighted.
If you're really set on making a guide animal though, I like your idea of their support benefit reducing flat checks, though I might not have it reduce them by the full 5 just as a balance concern. If you don't make the reduction as extreme then that also means you can offer the companion to anyone who wants one and explain it as a simple benefit of their alternative training; you get a new companion, and visually impaired characters haven't got an option they have to take that makes them stand apart from all other characters, or at least, stand out more than they already might.
Thank you very much for the feedback, I was viewing it from the perspective of guide dogs having special training in the real world, but 'training' is probably more the territory of skills than of being a dog.
Instead, I think you are right, and it would be better for me to stick to specific dog families that are easier to train for specific tasks. Dogs like pointers and scenthounds would help with locating/tracking people via sight or scent regardless of who their owner is, and anyone could take one and take a class that grants blind-fight at level 8. The dog could reduce the check by 2-3 rather than 5.
They would fit well alongside mastiffs for fighting, shepherds for guarding, spaniels for flushing creatures out of hiding and so on.