Why aren't mounts/ride/handle animal/small size more important for optimization?

[randomhero00]

I'll see a few threads specifically about this type of optimization but rarely do I see it mixed in with normal optimization threads. It seems like it should be a standard for an optimized character, no? The things you can do with handle animal and mounts and such is pretty crazy, seems like every character should want to be good at it. Its almost as good (or maybe just as good) as leadership, but with less stigma.

[Saph]

It's fiddly and requires a reasonable amount of skill to get to work, so it's not widespread. Most D&D games tend to assume that each player gets one PC and that's it, with maybe an animal companion or familiar. There are also practical issues with taking other creatures with you wherever you go.

[tonberrian]

Another issue is that, without investment, mounts tend to be rather fragile. And any investment in a better mount is less investment in a single character, which tends to limit mounts to dedicated builds, which are generally more niche.

Ride and Handle Animal both have mostly low static DC's and relatively few bonuses from class features/items as compared to other skills like Hide and Move Silently.

And size is one of the myriad considerations for a decent race choice.

[Abd al-Azrad]

The practicality issue is really the one that strikes me most important. Yes, you can use a skill check (and possibly a large amount of money) to get yourself an extra, credible melee threat to deploy against your foes. But that creature often can't meaningfully participate in dungeon crawls due to size, consumes a fair amount of your resources to train, equip and field, and can be defeated instantly by a fair number of attacks. Animals are kind of the extreme end of min-maxed fighters: incredibly good at melee, able to soak a lot of damage, and stupendously vulnerable to anti-melee tactics (glitterdust, ray of stupidity, whatever).

Also, a large amount of what you can do with an animal, you can do with a summons. Cost of a spell, rather than a notable portion of your build.

[Ravens_cry]

I find the Wild Cohort feat is non magical way of getting past some of that fragility. They are still not going to be all that powerful, but they will at least have some hit points.

[PlzBreakMyCmpAn]

The things you can do with ... mounts and such is pretty crazy

Why thank you

I'm aware my creation is pretty nuts.

[Eldariel]

It's simply not a part of standard optimization; what you do with e.g. Handle Animal has little bearing on what you do with animals or such. Handle Animal Guide does exist as does Mount Handbook, but the idea is that people can mix-and-match if they want a character with animal friends.

And small-sized races tend to be default suggestion for sneaks; just, sneak optimization isn't really all that common a question. But yeah, they come up, just it's that in optimization, people tend to want to deal with the optimization question at hands and help Person X to gain the character they want, and the "Beastmaster" is a rare question indeed.