Gaia The Fierce Knight (Two Lance Charger)

[holbita]

https://www.pngitem.com/pimgs/m/591-5911063_gaia-the-fierce-knight-art-hd-png-download.png

So I've been into making mounted characters lately, I started with the more common ones (Cavalier, Bowman Charger...) just to have a few characters sheets in store for future games and then I went down the rabbit hole with stuff like a Iaijustsu Soulknife or a Shugenja, usually I have no problem making decisions but I would like to hear some opinios in this case.

The idea is simple Spirited Charge + Oversized Two-Weapon Fighting and a way to attack with both lances on a mounted charge for what would basically be a x6 damage. There are two feats that allow me to do this, the first one is "Two-Weapon Pounce" and the second one "Dual Strike", I will end up taking the prerrequisites for both either way so "Dual Strike" needing "Improved Two-Weapon Fighting" over "Two-Weapon Pounce" is not an issue for me, I will most likely be playing a Ranger so I get them for free and in both cases I get the feat at 6th level so that is not helping me decide either.

Here is the pros and cons:
- "Dual Strike" will give me a -4 to attack, but it would allow me to still make 2 attacks whenever a charge or a full-attack are not possible. Also it would be one attack instead of two which means good for things like True Strike, but bad for stuff like Criticals or precision damage.
- "Two-Weapon Pounce" will not give me any attack penalty when performing the charge but I will lose on versatility and it would be two separate attacks with all that entails.

I'm planning to make this a playable character, which means I am not planning to go overboard by adding too many other sources of extra damage to this basic combo, I believe that a x6 damage on a charge should be enough to make the character viable whithout overshadowing the rest of my fellow players, so here is my question to you guys: which option do you think is the best here?

[PoeticallyPsyco]

I don't think Dual Strike will actually work on a charge, which is the main time you'd be wanting it, so definitely Two-Weapon Pounce between the two.

Have you considered a level of Barbarian for Pounce (using the Spirit Totem (lion) variant from Complete Champion)? Depending on the optimization level of your party, it could be too strong, but it is much better than either feat at what it does, letting you make a full attack at the end of a charge. If you go that route, it might still be worth picking up Dual Strike to cover times where you need to move and attack but can't charge. (Side note, you can also trade Rage for another Favored Enemy if you'd like with another ACF (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm)).

[holbita]

Correct me if I'm wrong but from my understanding of mounted charge "If your mount charges, you also take the AC penalty associated with a charge. If you make an attack at the end of the charge, you receive the bonus gained from the charge. When charging on horseback, you deal double damage with a lance" from here I get that it is your mount that is charging and that you receive the benefits (and AC penalties) of it, but nothing there is forcing you to do an attack so I could use my actions to do anything from casting a spell to perform total defense.

I may be incorrect, but I was under the understanding that I could use a mounted charge and then use my action to use any tipe of attack, as long as it's not a full-attack, only my mount would be restricted to a single melee attack since it is the one charging. Is this wrong?

And yeah... I've thought about Lion Totem Barbarian, that one is always lurking in my mind whenever I do melee characters, but it would a bit too ridicolous if I were to bring it to one of the games I regularly play if combined with this, we try to keep a few notches below that level. And also we are in disagreement about wether you can mix the two since pounce allows you to use a full-attack when you make the charge, but in this case it's your mount the one doing it and you are just getting the benefits of it.

Please let me know if my understanding of the rule is falty for charging and then using a standard action while benefitting from the mount's charge because I've been theorizing a few mounted characters lately and if I am wrong there that would make me have to rethink some of them.