3.5 Leadership + Paladins mount

[JohnStone]

I have a lvl 15 character with 2 levels of Prestige paladin.

I would like to make my mount usuable but im limited with feats, what would leadership do for me?

I have a 16 charisma.

on a side note how important are ride handle animal?

[Urpriest]

Handle Animal is irrelevant, since your mount has Int>2 so you can communicate with it normally. Ride is more important, you want to be able to make a DC 10 check reliably to fight on your mount, and DC 15 is nice if it dies.

Leadership is...arguable. The problem is that being a Paladin mount adds HD, which normally affects ECL and thus limits what you can pick up as a cohort. The writers should have written in an exception, and they seem to have assumed one existed when they wrote the Dragon Rider PrC in Dragonlance, but as is there isn't one.

Even resolving that, the rules for this are still quite poorly written. The rule say you can "combine your paladin mount and your cohort" and that this involves "at minimum" a +2 ECL.

One interpretation is that you can pick anything that qualifies as a cohort after the +2 ECL, and make it your Paladin mount, giving it full benefits (in your case, as a Paladin 5). So you're taking a cohort two levels lower than normal, but adding two bonus HD and the Paladin mount special abilities. (If the HD added by being a Paladin mount add to ECL, then your cohort is instead four levels lower than normal.)

Another interpretation is that you still have to choose a creature that would normally qualify as a Paladin mount, but then as a Cohort it gets to gain levels up to the cohort ECL limit. If it wouldn't normally have an LA, the LA +2 from being a Paladin mount might replace it...but then again, it might be you have to choose things that both qualify as a Paladin mount and are legal choices for cohorts.

Basically, it entirely depends on how your DM rules the ability to work, since this is something the designers never playtested or thought through to any extent whatsoever.

[Daishain]

Well, leadership will let you attract a cohort, and that cohort could conceivably be talked into being your mount. Catch is, how many intelligent creatures are going to be both suitable and willing to be your ride? Remember that the DM has final say on cohorts, and is encouraged to say no to anything that seems unlikely.

Without taking any feats at all, pegasi and gryphons are excellent flying mounts that you can get already. They're listed in the DMG as alternatives. Another good option from the same source would be giant spider if you spend a lot of time underground.

Dragon Steed feat lets you ride off with a very powerful dragonnel (basically a draconic pegasi) I might suggest that you ask to use images of a drakkensteed instead though, dragonnels themselves are ugly as all get out.

Celestial Mount feat lets you slap the celestial template onto your mount, which can be very powerful

In regards to Ride skill, it is a lot like balance. Not needed in most situations, but extremely painful to skip when it is. For example, it is entirely reasonable for the DM to force a Ride check if your pegasi is attacked while flying. Failure can mean plummeting to your death.