PF Cavalier: Thoughts?

[TheFamilarRaven]

Sooo I've been looking through some of the Pathfinder books and happen'd across the Cavalier. Now the fluff of the class works great for the campaign world of the DM I am currently playing with. But i'm stuck wondering if they've got any/enough goodies to outweigh the clear and defined niche of mounted combat. Or if one would be better off with simply being a Fighter who happens to also be a knight (not that cavalier = knight mind you but you get the gist.)

In other words, I'm curious as to what the playground thinks about the class in general.

[Iwasforger03]

There are some cavalier archetypes that would fix that mounted combat issue for you. Or you could just go mounted combat, they can be stupidly good at it.

I think the class is fairly good even when not mounted (though it means you're wasting a couple levels), but you can definelty do good things with the class as is or archetyped, and it's decent.

Challenge is solid if not fantastic, and its order abilities are always a nice bonus. Challenge works best if the party tends to face number equal to or less than their own (or there's a particular enemy that really stands head and shoulders above the rest in a given encounter). The right order helps you shore up or improve abilities where you need them, and you can really lay the hurt with some of them.

[magwaaf]

cavaliers are fantastic and really fun. had one in a group that would literally just run down enemies and do massive damage, i've seen people make builds that literally do hundreds of straight physical damage to a target per turn not to mention the crit builds. then you get access to all the mounted combat feats which just make you an absolute combat monster

[stack]

They can do mounted melee and that's about it. Medium cavaliers are too limited since they often must leave their mounts behind. Even mounted they can only do damage, basically. They are fine npc knights and the orders have world building potential. Luring archetype could make for an interesting encounter in the right terrain.

[Corvino]

The primary issue with Cavaliers is ensuring that they can function when not mounted. Unlike fighters they don't get the bonus feats to be able to pursue multiple feat chains effectively. Taking Mounted Combat, Spirited Charge, Trick Riding and Mounted Skirmisher is great, but that's a huge feat investment on a class with no general bonus feats, and gets you nothing if Sparkles the Wonder Horse has to wait outside. It's a lot easier for small Cavaliers, who can bring their dog or wolf with them into the dungeon.

It is possible to take a different path, with feats that are more applicable both mounted and dismounted. There are also ways (like the Beast Rider archetype or Beast Rider Half-Orc racial feat) that allow you to get a variety of tough alternative mounts, so even dismounted you just have a badass Animal Companion.

They also suffer from the system-wide martial malaise, in that they don't get spells and thus scale far less well than casters.