if you had to make a character with a mount, how would you build it?

[EisenKreutzer]

Your GM unveils their newest homebrew campaign, and it almost exclusively involves riding!
Roughly 80% of all combat encounters will involve mounted combat, and mounts will play a huge part in this hypothetical campaign.

Whats your character? Which class(es) do you pick, and what feats and spells are essential to your build?
What mount do you pick?

[Morphic tide]

I defeat the entire point of the campaign by going Synthesist+Beastmorph Alchemist, keeping up with everyone using the glory of Wings and various speed buffs to increase the flight speed. Swoop in and attack with, like, 5 natural attacks.

Essentially, the Mount is the Eidolon and the Beastmorph stuff. Which Synthesist conveniently fuses to the character, skipping the need for a bundle of mutations to get the Eidolon ridable. If this is considered unfair cheating, teach them the true meaning of unfair cheating by cheesing the **** out of Summon Monster and a more regular Eidolon, always focusing on knocking people off of mounts with every means available.

[EisenKreutzer]

I defeat the entire point of the campaign by going Synthesist+Beastmorph Alchemist, keeping up with everyone using the glory of Wings and various speed buffs to increase the flight speed. Swoop in and attack with, like, 5 natural attacks.

Essentially, the Mount is the Eidolon and the Beastmorph stuff. Which Synthesist conveniently fuses to the character, skipping the need for a bundle of mutations to get the Eidolon ridable. If this is considered unfair cheating, teach them the true meaning of unfair cheating by cheesing the **** out of Summon Monster and a more regular Eidolon, always focusing on knocking people off of mounts with every means available.

While thats definitely a fun idea, avoiding the whole point of the thread feels kind of pointless.
So, if summoner was off the table and you weren't interested in derailing the campaign concept and leaving the GM a broken man in tears, what character would you build?

[Honest Tiefling]

Druid or ranger, so the mounts don't try to eat each other and to forage enough food to feed everything. The druid spell list seems like it would be quite useful, as you could 'charm' an enemy mount and order it to start eating away from the battlefield. I think there would be few mounts that would prefer food to fighting.

Through the temptation to try to play a centaur and double as a mount probably isn't optimized, but amusing to say the least.

[Amphetryon]

I'd crack open Sandstorm and make a Paladin/Crusader/Ashworm Dragoon

[Ellrin]

If I wanted to stay as highly optimized as possible while still having fun with it, I'd play a Small caster, get a familiar, take the Possessed Hand line of feats up till Hand's Detachment, and then make that my familiar (with a mauler archetype). Now my hand is my mount, and I can reattach it (at its usual size) for those situations where having a mount is a bad idea.

Share spells and giant form, form of the dragon, or beast shape will let me turn my hand into pretty much whatever I want, too.

And who needs Ride checks when your mount is an intelligent familiar that will regenerate without penalty in 2d4 days if it ever dies?

[Florian]

I favor the simple things - so Fetchling Barbarian (Mounted Fury/Superstitious). Since the Spirited Charge nerf, I´d favor Celestial Totem over Beast Totem for this, offers a bit more utility.

[Kurald Galain]

What level(s) are you playing at?

Hunter is a good pick since you can use your animal companion as a mount, and share teamwork feats with him. Magus is interesting since it can one-hand a reach weapon (lance) on a mount. Or, play a wizard with academae graduate, and start spamming Communal Mount spells.

[Thunder999]

Centaur Cavalier with the charger archetype, I am the mount and the rider, it's not amazing, but it seems like a fun and novel concept I'm unlikely to ever play otherwise.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I second cavalier in general, as long as they stay mounted on their full level animal companion they're good. Plays a bit like a paladin light, depending on the vows you choose. (Paladin itself is of course also an option, with their celestial mount). If that's completely not your thing the druids or (even) the rangers animal companion is a good alternative, they just offer a little less synergy with your character. Or there is the obscure ambu-lancer from "April Augmented" 2016. Yes, that's a joke book. Nonetheless, the ambu-lancer (get it, get it?) is an archetype for the medic, with its own animal companion and several mounted features. Since the book is pay what you want (http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/179672/April-Augmented) (no minimum), it might be worth a look. You may want to switch out the supernatural siren ability for something less setting breaking though...

Alternatively, any class you like, plus a mount.



EDIT: O wait, I read this as an advice thread. Oops. Let's just say I'd be tempted by all of these options.

Also, I'm taking the monstrous mount and the monstrous mount mastery feats. I'm sure there's an extended list of creatures somewhere.

[noob]

Wizard familiar.

[stanprollyright]

Antipaldin with a Fiendish Servant. Get your choice of mount from the Summon Monster list (at the same level as a Wizard) that you can change every time you level up. So flight, SLAs, whatever. At level 15 it gets the Advanced Template. It says it functions like Summon Monster except the duration is permanent and you're limited to evil stuff, so it should work with Augment Summoning as well. Conductive lance + Touch of Corruption + Spirited Charge for massive burst damage.