Dire Wolf Mount - why does every single Rogue not have one ??

[Istar]

I just had a look at mounts for my Rogue, as the enemy we defeated just had one, and my Rogue is just a small fellow.

And I stumbled accross Dire Wolf providing the Rider (at the expense of the mounted combat feat) with CA whenever another ally is adjacent to the the same large base of the wolf.

Now thats pretty much CA all day long in my books.

I just have never had it mentioned before by anyone ever, and it looks almost like a compulsory thing to do.

Plus you can take a mount magic item that lets you use either your mounts or your initiative roll.
Which is a bonus to get the free CA on the first round of every battle.

I guess the drawbacks are trying to keep it alive, feeding it, and healing it.
As well as maybe the wolf which is large, having to squeeze through some space now and then.
And how keen to go into dungeons a wolf is I am not sure.

But is their any guide on mounts, I found one guilde but the last post was the author saying he didnt want to keep it up to date, as a lot of it was wrong now due to errata and other changed.

So how do you know what the rules on having a mount actually are now ??

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

The rules for having a mount are confusing and perhaps conflicting and unbalanced.

The rules for having a mount attack, or the PC attack, seem to differ from the rules for an NPC. That's fine, but it's not clear. Also, if you can't attack and have the mount attack at the same time, you're probably better off just having the mount fight beside you. No, don't ride the expensive horse you bought, just have it act like a meatshield.

There's no good rules for "owning" a mount. You can theoretically own a mount more powerful than you, but you might not get all the benefits even with the Mounted Combat feat. Money is not a good way to balance mounts. They're not magic items, they're action boosters. In theory, a PC could buy dozens of war dogs, assuming there's stats for them anywhere (I haven't seen any in 4e, sadly).

A mount normally only has one healing surge (1/tier, anyway). Even if the mount has more hit points than you, it can quickly be crippled. Also, this makes them poor meatshields. Companion rules might work better.

Even better is (I shudder to say this, since it involves everyone's favorite drow [tradesnark]), but Guenhwyvar makes a pretty good design for a mount. Not that G is a mount herself, but a similar creature could be. She isn't an independent creature, she just has 50 hit points (she's a 21st-level ... no role, no XP, essentially a magic item, I guess) and no healing surges, but Drizzt can give her extra hit points; naturally Drizzt's hit point donation means he needs to sack his own healing surges, so in effect they use the same pool of healing surges. As a 21st-level NPC, not a companion, Drizzt has 3 surges, but each surge is worth 191 hp. For some reason, he gives 200 hp instead, probably because it's a round number that makes the math easier. (Apparently NPCs can still heal surges during short rests. If you want to kill Drizzt, wait for him to wake up and donate hp as part of his morning "rituals", then attack before he gets a short rest.)

IMO, this would make a great baseline for a paladin mount. Obviously you would need to nerf their hit points for below epic mounts. Unfortunately, she still has independent attacks, including opportunity attacks, unlike a druid's animal companion (which might work even better).

Another good idea is using the companion rules, which finally nixes the healing surge problem. However, companions, while probably being balanced in the sense that any two 8th-level strikers are balanced with each other and with an 8th-level controller, are adding power to a party that might not need it, and it's even worse if a companion is a henchman (or mount) beholden to an individual PC. Suppose the DM decides that everyone gets one companion of the same level - then ironically, a "cavalier" warlord might have to "buy" a horse companion, while the far less charismatic slayer gets a leader companion instead.

Similar rules could work for long-term summoned monsters, at least before you get the Adjure ritual.

Earlier editions of D&D supported each PC group having loads of companions, hirelings, etc, but balance issues were less discussed, and there's various issues about complexity, especially on the DM side of things. (The monsters eating the help makes sense, but what if the PCs and help are hanging out and monsters attack. Unless the monsters can pick out the PCs quickly, they're "wasting" attacks on the help. And if there's a lot of help, the DM needs some kind of mass combat system.)

***ROGUES***

If you're a rogue, and want combat advantage all the time, play the Essentials thief build. An enemy adjacent to any ally grants combat advantage to you, as long as you use Tactical Trick, and why wouldn't you. (Also, as long as you're adjacent to an ally, you don't provoke an opportunity attack for moving.)

 

[S'mon]

I see no problem with having a dire wolf mount, if you can get one. As Psi says, the power is no more than what Essentials Thieves can get anyway; thanks to the 'Tricks' my Thief almost never faced a situation where he had to attack without CA, and that was as a Ranged attacker. Your wolf-riding halfling has to risk going into melee, considerably weaker than (eg) Tactical Trick.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Dire Wolf Mount - why does every single Rogue not have one ??

1) housebreaker's harnesses for dire wolves are very expensive, and are frustratingly difficult to get the wolf into.

2) they are difficult to control while pickpocketing in the market square

3) they whine too much on rooftop or treetop ambushes & stakeouts

4) they have difficulty using balance poles on tightropes

5) they like the taste of weaponblack

 

[Holy Bovine]

Dire Wolf Mount - why does every single Rogue not have one ??

Because your character shouldn't be just a collection of stats and powers?

 

[Istar]

Okay yes, that SURGE issue, I completely forgot about.

Definitely the curse of death, the DM would have him for Dinner.
So where is the rules on surges ????

 

[Mirtek]

(at the expense of the mounted combat feat)

Actually you no longer need the MC feat. After it's stealth errata it now only removes the -2 penalty on the mount's attacks, it's no longer needed for the rider to access the mount's special traits

 

[darkdragoon]

It was popular when it first came out, but now there are so many ways to gain combat advantage it's rather moot.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It was popular when it first came out, but now there are so many ways to gain combat advantage it's rather moot.

This. With one feat you can get automatic CA against any enemy that isn't adjacent to anyone else, and with another feat you can get CA against an enemy when you and they are both adjacent to an ally, etc etc etc. By 6th level at this point any competent rogue should have CA with virtually 100% certainty every round. I know the one in my current game does!

@PSI I am not sure why you say the rules are unclear. They're actually pretty clear if you go through it all.

A mount doesn't count for XP budget, but it is also only a MOUNT, not a party member. Your horse won't fight as a 'meat shield'. It might conveniently get in the way of the enemy and will probably defend itself, but it is also just as likely once you dismount to simply hightail it out of the line of danger. It is in any case ENTIRELY under the control of the DM.

A companion character is a party member. It counts in XP budget. It also will generally act as a party member, though. The DM might subject it to some sort of morale check in dire circumstances, etc, but usually it will operate as a full party member. You could of course ride a CC, (or a PC for that matter). Sometimes this will be tactically advantageous, but not often.

You can of course 'hire' as many spear chuckers or guard dogs or whatever as you care to. They'll have to be fed, trained, wrangled, etc. Again, like mounts they're probably not going to just fight on command as you like. They'll try to earn their pay, but they're clearly interested in earning money, not dying. In the case of trained animals they're probably reasonably loyal but again not suicidal. I would insist on CHA checks and social skill checks to insure that they act at full effectiveness. Again, if you want someone REALLY dedicated you need either a CC or an actual companion granted by a class feature. CC's aren't something you can automatically acquire, but you can always hope!

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

A mount doesn't count for XP budget, but it is also only a MOUNT, not a party member. Your horse won't fight as a 'meat shield'. It might conveniently get in the way of the enemy and will probably defend itself, but it is also just as likely once you dismount to simply hightail it out of the line of danger. It is in any case ENTIRELY under the control of the DM.

I haven't allowed such mounts IMC because the players insist that knight's horses played a valuable role in combat other than carrying knights faster and letting them hit harder. (In other words, they wanted the horse to fight too.) There's nothing in the rules preventing that, and there's no easy way to account for a mount's power, even if it's not attacking. (The horse is still boosting your speed and giving you bonus damage with charge attacks.)

In the example where my PC was dismounted and using the horse as a meatshield, I had only done that because my PC was by himself and was going to die! I had actually told the DM (when convincing them to give me a horse) that I'd only use it the way it was meant to (eg use it for charging attacks) but got stuck in a situation where that was useless. That's not something I would want to deal with as a DM if I were running that game.

Companion rules are almost good, but a horse "companion" is effectively under the rider's control, making that PC more powerful than others (unless they all have mounts, which I don't want to have to deal with).

You can of course 'hire' as many spear chuckers or guard dogs or whatever as you care to. They'll have to be fed, trained, wrangled, etc. Again, like mounts they're probably not going to just fight on command as you like. They'll try to earn their pay, but they're clearly interested in earning money, not dying. In the case of trained animals they're probably reasonably loyal but again not suicidal. I would insist on CHA checks and social skill checks to insure that they act at full effectiveness. Again, if you want someone REALLY dedicated you need either a CC or an actual companion granted by a class feature. CC's aren't something you can automatically acquire, but you can always hope!

There's a logistics angle, but I was mostly interested in something easy. It's a lot easier to do this on the DM's side. If a group of goblins riding dire wolves attack the PCs, the dire wolves aren't just "knight carriers" but active combatants, so they're worth their full XP along with the goblins. Their healing surges are pretty pointless; either they win, escape or die. If you're dealing with the PCs buying mounts, there's lots of logistics you always have to take into account, there's XP budget issues (or not), training issues (or not - I've never ridden a warhorse and don't know how vicious or fearless they are), etc.