Summon Mount other options?

[Delta_tea]

Mount spell summons a light horse, which is nice for world traveling. But what happens if you find yourself rolling initiative and still in the saddle?

1) Does the Mount spell - Light Horse, work like a Summon Monster animal? They do as commanded and don't think about if things are dangerous. Or does it act like a living horse and requires a Control Mount in Battle (Ride DC 20) roll?

2) Anyway to summon a Warhorse or Heavy Warhorse? My Cleric wears plate and its really annoying being limited to 20 ft per turn movement speed. I'm decent at staying out of the melee, but it's nice to have movement options. Plus, Cover sounds like it would be useful.

3) If I took the Holy Steed feat, would I owe the 30-day penalty if the "special mount" died?

Thanks for the help!

[Darg]

It's a light horse not trained as a warhorse so you have to use a move action to control it in combat. You don't control creatures summoned through Summon Monster, but you can tell it who to or not to attack if you can communicate with it. And you use the mount's speed, not your own. At medium or heavy encumbrance the light horse's 60ft becomes 40ft, not 20ft.

Spider domain gets phantom mount at level 3. spending the move action won't hurt that much because you get 20ft/cl movement up to 240ft.

Take levels in the paladin prestige class and use the holy mount feat from dragon. Yes, as it is a class feature from a class it follows all the rules for that class feature.

Another option if you were creating a character from the start would have been taking the No Turning ACF as a shaman to get an animal companion at half class level that could be combat trained.

[ShurikVch]

There is the optimized Mount

Mount
Champion Light Horse
Size/Type: Large Animal (Cold, Evil, Extraplanar)
Hit Dice: 11d8+44+22 (154 hp)
Initiative: +3
Speed: 60 ft. (12 squares)
Armor Class: 26 (-1 size, +3 deflection, +1 Dex, +13 natural), touch 13, flat-footed 25
Base Attack/Grapple: +2/+10
Attack: Hoof +9 melee (1d4+3*+2 plus 1d6 cold)
Full Attack: 2 hooves +9 melee (1d4+3*+2 plus 1d6 cold)
Space/Reach: 10 ft./5 ft.
Special Attacks: —
Special Qualities: Low-light vision, fast healing 5, scent
Saves: Fort +11, Ref +8, Will +4
Abilities: Str 22, Dex 14, Con 19, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 6
Skills: Listen +8, Spot +8
Feats: Endurance, Run
Alignment: Neutral evil

Components of optimization:
Augment Summoning feat
Beckon the Frozen feat (Frostburn)
Corrupt Summoning [vile] feat (Dragon #347)
Superior Summons [ceremonial] feat (Dragon #311)
Malconvoker PrC (Complete Scoundrel) 4 levels - infernal fury
Paragnostic Apostle PrC (Complete Champion) 1 level - Call of Worlds
Windrider PrC (Masters of the Wild) 10 levels