Best feats for a Unicorn Animal Companion?

[Talya]

ignoring VOP (which was shot down), what are some good feats for a unicorn mount/companion?

[Gavinfoxx]

Why would you want your animal companion to get vow of poverty? Just equip it with gear....

And definitely remove alertness and skill focus survival.

Will s/he be a mount? What do you want her party role to be? Melee combat?

[Talya]

Why would you want your animal companion to get vow of poverty? Just equip it with gear....

And definitely remove alertness and skill focus survival.

Will s/he be a mount? What do you want her party role to be? Melee combat?

VOP would fit wonderfully (and is a great companion feat, if they can qualify). Besides, my druid has VOP. But it was ixnayed from the beginning.

Role: Mount and melee combat, yes.

I didn't get to completely retrain her existing feats, sadly.

Sticking with the exalted theme, Touch of Golden Ice isn't terrible, nor is Sanctify Natural Attack, I suppose, but...not sure they're the best ideas.

[Boci]

If the DM is okay with it some feats from ToB to get maneuvres are generally quite nice. You could maneuver that gives allies a +4 attack bonus on a hit and the stance grants bonus damage on a charge or a bonus on will saves.

[Emperor Tippy]

How many feats does your unicorn have?

EDIT: And what are your weaknesses, your parties weaknesses, and the role you want you unicorn to fill?

[Talya]

If the DM is okay with it some feats from ToB to get maneuvres are generally quite nice. You could maneuver that gives allies a +4 attack bonus on a hit and the stance grants bonus damage on a charge or a bonus on will saves.

I was just thinking...leveraging that 24 charisma a unicorn gets, Avenging Strike (feat) from TOB looks awesome. 7x a day, a swift action and her next attack gets +7 to hit and damage?

[Gavinfoxx]

Well, do you want effective stuff or exalted themed stuff? Its usually a choice of one or the other -- most exalted stuff is crap... the only exalted feat my druids ever take is Exalted Wild Shape... and hmmm. Vow of Poverty on your druid, that makes keeping the mount alive more difficult, since you can't equip the animal companion...

Think you might be able to retrain VoP and only keep Exalted Wild Shape? If you want a special, intelligent animal companion, the Phynxkin Companion is an okay option.

It sucks not being able to get a flying mount, though. Especially when you can fly and your mount can't. Hmm...

Were you taking Vow of Poverty to lower your power? What is your target power level? If you want to lower your power level, is there any particular reason you are asking for advice on increasing it back up here?

[Talya]

Well, do you want effective stuff or exalted themed stuff? Its usually a choice of one or the other -- most exalted stuff is crap... the only exalted feat my druids ever take is Exalted Wild Shape... and hmmm. Vow of Poverty on your druid, that makes keeping the mount alive more difficult, since you can't equip the animal companion...

Think you might be able to retrain VoP and only keep Exalted Wild Shape? If you want a special, intelligent animal companion, the Phynxkin Companion is an okay option.

It sucks not being able to get a flying mount, though. Especially when you can fly and your mount can't. Hmm...

Were you taking Vow of Poverty to lower your power? What is your target power level? If you want to lower your power level, is there any particular reason you are asking for advice here?

Mount won't have any trouble staying alive, and I want to keep VoP. A druid with VOP remains tier 1, becomes an insanely good wildshaper, even though it's still an overall reduction in utility and power, and besides I'm not playing with a bunch of optimizers.

I got the unicorn at -3 (yes, I know) and then took Natural Bond. She's a tough girl. 8d10 hit dice and full BAB at party level 6. We'll catch up to her, even surpass her, but not for a while yet.

As for being able to fly, I have a custom spell to give my mount wings for 10 minutes/level, and can wildshape myself if I am not with my unicorn.


Edit: Party is currently an elf generalist wizard (first time playing a spellcaster, he's doing alright, but he's not batman), a rogue, and a swordsage.

Hmm. To further keep me from having to memorize emergency heals (the unicorn has those cure SLAs), perhaps I could send her into Devoted Spirit maneuvers/stances...

[Coidzor]

Can you grab improved unarmed strike for it? IUS > SUS + Snap Kick could be of interest.

Dragontouched + Shape Soulmeld (Claws of the Wyrm (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20060912a&page=4)) can get you the dragonblood subtype and the ability to get claws without binding to the Totem chakra which is pretty good for 2 feats, maybe. Then again, mourning mutate + inhuman reach + deepspawn would get you two tentacles and +5 feet of reach for the unicorn, and wouldn't interfere with the hooves, come to think of it...

Since it is intelligent, I suppose it's also possible that you could use those gauntlets or gloves from either Savage Species or the Magic Item Compendium (sorry, don't recall their names offhand, though I believe the MIC ones are a relic of bahamut for LG and maybe NG/CG) to get the unicorn claw attacks as well. Horned Helmet might technically work since it's classified as a "horn" attack rather than a "gore" attack, but that's a bit far-fetched.

It has a +21 Wild Empathy check right now, +23 if it has 5 ranks in Handle Animal to take advantage of the synergy bonus, when you should be rocking around 8 to 11 or so, and with its +6 racial bonus, there's a fair chance you can just pass that job off to him even when you overtake him in HD. It can't fail to make unfriendly wild animals or magical beasts friendly. I'm sure there's some feats that could be used to take advantage of that, though I don't recall offhand what they are. I had thought Person_Man might have made a thread on the subject. Or Person Man, one of the two. But I can't find it... :/

If Pathfinder can be finagled, this (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/greater-wild-empathy)might be of interest.