Mounts in 4e...?

[Amra]

I was browsing through the Monster Manual and read this:

"Hippogriffs, on the other hand, are easily ridden, even in combat. For that reason, they are the most common flying mount among the civilised races of the world."

and

"Hippogriffs are expensive mounts, so the theft and smuggling of young hippogriffs is a lucrative criminal industry."

and

"Hippogriffs are often encountered as mounts,"

So I thought I'd see how much a hippogriff actually costs. Where is it? I genuinely don't believe that the cost isn't *anywhere*, but I can't find it. Then I thought I'd look up the rules for mounted combat. Good grief.

One of the first things I noticed was that the pain goes on for Small characters and bad guys; you can't use any creature as a mount unless it's "larger than you" AND "Large or larger". So that sucks.

The next thing I noticed was that you and your mount share all of your actions in combat; you get a minor, a move, a standard and an immediate split between you, even if you separate. Ouch. There are more crazy ways than I care to contemplate in which this could work out completely screwed up, particularly given the huge number of essentially-the-same ways in which you could end up inadvertently dismounting.

On that subject, how many ranged effects are there - I'm talking mainly NPC/monster abilities here - that can knock a target prone? Because it seems to me that there are really rather a lot, and any of those that hits you is going to knock you right out of the sky; inflicting the "prone" status on a flying creature automatically forces it to land (or fall out of the sky if it's more than its fly speed away from the ground).

Does it fall its safe distance and take falling damage from that point, or take falling damage for the entire fall if it can't get to the ground with a single move? You might assume either way, but nobody knows. Can it use its "overland flight" speed, if it has one, to determine its safe distance if it hasn't already acted? Nobody knows.

Meh. I'm sure I had a point here somewhere, but what was it? Nobody knows.

Oh yeah, that was it; a Hippogriff is a level 5 mount, but can a PC afford one at 5th level? How might PC's tame a Hippogriff - or anything else for that matter - and train it for riding? The only hint I've found is in the Nature skill, under which "Handle Animal" is listed but there aren't any DC's or limits set on what you might do with it other than to indicate that 'handling' a natural beast is usually part of a skill challenge.

Thoughts? References?

[virgil]

For the Large+ part, I'm certain they plan on accounting for it by creating medium-sized mounts that have an ability...
Reduced Mount: A player character of smaller size can ride this creature as a mount.

And because specific overrules general, we can still have riding dogs; they just happen to have the 'reduced mount' ability so halflings can ride out. Granted, halflings can still ride Large mounts, but you get the idea.

[MartinHarper]

The rules do explicitly say to the DM "you can allow the PCs and the creatures they ride to get their own set of actions". Also, NPCs and Monsters with mounts don't share actions. So sharing actions is really only if some PCs have mounts and some don't, and you want them to be on a level playing field.
I don't know why they presented the sharing actions as the common case, when it will rarely apply.

[randyshipp]

Thoughts? References?

In addition, how on Earth do monsters get to ride mounts? I can't find anything that suggests that my Hobgoblin Commander gets to actually ride the Dire Wolf he seems to keep around for that purpose. Weird. DMG suggests that Mounted Combat requires a feat, and monsters don't seem to have them...

Randy...

[Judging__Eagle]

Exception Based Design.

Meaning, you have to bullshit the ability and fuck the rules. Because the designers decided to pull an Oberroni fallacy when they designed the really poorly written 4e riding rules.

The 3.5 riding rules were a huge improvement over 2e's almost non-rules, or rules that appeared in special books. You actually saw mounted combat in 3.5, not often, but it did happen and that was a good thing imo.

[Amra]

Yeah... and somewhat unusually, the 3.5 riding rules weren't too complicated to actually see use in session!

[RandomCasualty2]

In addition, how on Earth do monsters get to ride mounts? I can't find anything that suggests that my Hobgoblin Commander gets to actually ride the Dire Wolf he seems to keep around for that purpose. Weird. DMG suggests that Mounted Combat requires a feat, and monsters don't seem to have them...

The same way monsters do anything, arbitrary abilities.

Monsters aren't built like PCs anymore, so don't think in PC terms.

A monster has whatever abilities the DM wants it to have.

[Username17]

Monsters aren't built like PCs anymore, so don't think in PC terms.

A monster has whatever abilities the DM wants it to have.

This has interesting effects when the monsters become player equipment - to the extent that the 4e authors actually printed up essays about how the "economy of actions" means that they don't even know how to balance the heroes even having a mount.

So when it comes down to it: James Wyatt says that he does not know what should be done to "Afford" a player having a hippogriff or even a horse. And the game is set up such that players probably should be trading their mounts in every level for an entirely new creature that is currently level appropriate.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty2]

This has interesting effects when the monsters become player equipment - to the extent that the 4e authors actually printed up essays about how the "economy of actions" means that they don't even know how to balance the heroes even having a mount.

I didn't really see the problem with how 4E set up mounted combat. The mount gives you a bonus to move and if youv'e got the feat, it gives some other minor bonus. And that's it.

I mean, I'm alright with that. I'm not sure why everyone expects the mount to attack and everything. They could have used a mounted trample power or something, but that's all I see missing. I certainly don't want to go back to 3.5 mounted combat where having a mount was the best thing ever.

4E mounted combat is pretty good, but it's not godly the way 3rd edition mounts were.

So when it comes down to it: James Wyatt says that he does not know what should be done to "Afford" a player having a hippogriff or even a horse. And the game is set up such that players probably should be trading their mounts in every level for an entirely new creature that is currently level appropriate.

PCs can have horses just fine, the hippogriff is a big problem but that's because ti confers flight, not because of the mounted combat rules. As we all know, 4E isn't set up to handle flying PCs well at all. Neither was 3.5 for that matter, but 3.5 let you break the game freely, while 4E just removed all ability to use broken tactics.

[virgil]

I see the problem with 4E mounted combat just fine. We have NO guidelines for how to obtain a mount other than DM-fiat. The Large size requirement is non-sensical. Horses and griffons apparently get antsy and suffer penalties from being within 40' of a wall in the middle of a field. There's more, and I believe they mention it here already, and you seem to be marginalizing the problems.

Also, flight wasn't really the broken game-breaker in 3.5; no matter how much you thought so back in that old thread (random dire bears just aren't that intimidating unless you're in a cave).

[Amra]

Some - if not all - mounts explicitly can attack in 4E, there's just no way of knowing how to get one or how much it would cost.

And hippogriff mounts likewise explicitly exist - they're a level 5 mount as I said in the original post - with rules for flying mounted combat and everything; but again, nobody knows how to obtain one in the first place.

[Username17]

RC, you obviously have not read the mounts in the game. If you are riding a Manticore and you are 10th level, it gets a bonus to spike sniping. If you are 10th level and riding a Blade Spider, then the spider gets to make a free claw attack every time you attack.

Riding a mount gives you extra actions. However because of the economy of actions the game authors couldn't find anything that would be worth sacrificing to get those extra actions, so there's nothing in the entire game that is listed as being exchangeable for having these mounts in the first place.

---

But of course you only get your blade spider mount bonus if you are 10th level, you only get your Nightmare mount bonus if you are 13th level, and so on and so forth. So actually people are supposed to trade in their mounts fairly frequently. It's just that the 4e economy fucks if you if you ever trade anything in, and of course the 4e economy literally can't set a price on getting a mount in the first place.

-Username17

[randyshipp]

My problem has nothing at all to do with problems having PCs mounted in combat. I think the rules are fairly clear on that, and I'm confident in my ability to handwave my way through getting (or not getting) PC mounts in a way that everyone at my table will find fun.

No, my problem is that I'm running an encounter that lists among the enemies a monster that is a Mount and has special abilities that its rider can trigger. Additionally, per the encounter description, I have an NPC mob who, I think, clearly keeps the thing as a war animal, and it makes perfect sense that he'd ride it. The problem is that the only way I see to trigger the mount's abilities is to have the Mounted Combat feat, and this NPC doesn't seem to have that. Should I assume he can fight mounted? In general terms, how do we handle goblin warg riders, or even mounted human bandits, if it becomes necessary?

Randy...

[MartinHarper]

Should I assume he can fight mounted?

He can certainly fight mounted, and both he and his mount get their full actions. I don't know whether he gets the benefit of "Mount" abilities, though.

[Username17]

Since the ✦ Mount abilities only trigger if the rider has a the mounted combat feat, and NPCs do not have feats, NPCs do not get the special mount abilities of the mounts that they ride. One of the few things about this system that is in fact clear - even if it's almost certainly exactly what they don't want to happen.

-Username17

[JonSetanta]

Expensive mounts?

Wouldn't supply/demand mechanic of economy increase the number of hippogriffs in the market, by virtue of natural greed on the part of breeders and vendors looking for a way to get rich quick, and eventually there would be a surplus of hippogriffs?

Regular griffins are better. They're part cat.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Wouldn't supply/demand mechanic of economy increase the number of hippogriffs in the market, by virtue of natural greed on the part of breeders and vendors looking for a way to get rich quick, and eventually there would be a surplus of hippogriffs?

THERE IS NO ECONOMY.

[Tydanosaurus]

Wouldn't supply/demand mechanic of economy increase the number of hippogriffs in the market, by virtue of natural greed on the part of breeders and vendors looking for a way to get rich quick, and eventually there would be a surplus of hippogriffs?

THERE IS NO ECONOMY.

Except for the PC's, of course, who should boycott it as much as possible.

[JonSetanta]

THERE IS NO ECONOMY.

Ah. Case closed then. Everything is bought from the NPC vendors for a permanent set price like in an MMO.

[RandomCasualty2]

THERE IS NO ECONOMY.

Honestly though, there wasn't really a true economy in 3.5 either. 3.5 didn't obey the law of supply and demand either, it just had fixed prices.

Case in point.

Casting a raise dead requires 5000 gp worth of diamonds.

Now lets say, I go to the plane of gems and effectively make diamonds really common. However, because I did that, the price of diamonds actually goes down, so the same 5000 gp worth of diamonds that I had before has lost value, so that it's no longer 5000 gp worth of diamonds, but may only be 100 gp worth.

If indeed, the economy behaved as the real economy would, and you made diamonds common, then it may well take a mountain of diamonds to cast raise dead. You literally might need several bags of holding to carry 5000 gp worth.

Of course 3.5 didn't work like that, because ti didn't have an economy either.

[CatharzGodfoot]

THERE IS NO ECONOMY.

Honestly though, there wasn't really a true economy in 3.5 either. 3.5 didn't obey the law of supply and demand either, it just had fixed prices.

Case in point.

Casting a raise dead requires 5000 gp worth of diamonds.

Now lets say, I go to the plane of gems and effectively make diamonds really common. However, because I did that, the price of diamonds actually goes down, so the same 5000 gp worth of diamonds that I had before has lost value, so that it's no longer 5000 gp worth of diamonds, but may only be 100 gp worth.

If indeed, the economy behaved as the real economy would, and you made diamonds common, then it may well take a mountain of diamonds to cast raise dead. You literally might need several bags of holding to carry 5000 gp worth.

Of course 3.5 didn't work like that, because ti didn't have an economy either.

The idea that a spell doesn't require some fixed amount of something, but rather some amount of that something as valued in a currency is pretty amazing.

First, go to an elemental plane and get a fuckton of gold. Then grab your diamonds. Flood the local market with gold, then perform a bunch of true resurrections with your now (relatively) overvalued gems.

[Talisman]

I got around that (mentally) by assuming items had an "inherent value." A given diamond may have an inherent value of, say, 5,000 gp, and can thus be used for raising the dead. If you manage to acquire one for only 4,000 gp, you just saved 1,000 gp - the diamond still has the same inherent value.

[JonSetanta]

Or you can just go hunt down people that own diamonds. Costs you, what, time and some of your special attacks? Time = money, though.
Go mug somewhat-rich merchants; it's free.

[RandomCasualty2]

Or you can just go hunt down people that own diamonds. Costs you, what, time and some of your special attacks? Time = money, though.
Go mug somewhat-rich merchants; it's free.

Well you could die. Anyone who has that kind of money also likely has the defenses to protect it.