Cavalier/Samurai Orders
Description Source:
Advanced Player's Guide
At 1st level, a cavalier must pledge himself to a specific order. The order grants the cavalier a number of bonuses, class skills, and special abilities. In addition, each order includes a number of edicts that the cavalier must follow. If he violates any of these edicts, he loses the benefits from his order's challenge ability for 24 hours. The violation of an edict is subject to GM interpretation.
A cavalier cannot change his order without undertaking a lengthy process to dedicate himself to a new cause. When this choice is made, he immediately loses all of the benefits from his old order. He must then follow the edicts of his new order for one entire level without gaining any benefits from that order. Once accomplished, he gains all of the bonuses from his new order. Note that the names of these orders might vary depending upon the campaign setting or GM's preference.
Description Source:
Ultimate Combat
The following orders can be chosen by both samurai and cavaliers, although the former are far more likely to do so. Samurai can also select any of the cavalier orders presented in the
Pathfinder RPG Advanced Player's Guide.
 Order of the Hero
Source Monster Hunter's Handbook pg. 13
A cavalier belonging to this order specializes in hunting down large monsters and protecting communities from them. Cavaliers of this order tend to value bravery, dedication, and single-minded determination.
Edicts: The cavalier must choose an area, whether it’s a settlement or nation, and vows to slay any monster threatening that area. He must fulfill any pledge he makes to slay a beast, tracking it to its lair if necessary, and forsaking any new quarry until his current target is slain. The cavalier must attempt to ensure that no lasting damage is dealt to his domain in the pursuit of his prey.
Challenge: Whenever an order of the hero cavalier issues a challenge, he receives a +1 morale bonus on melee damage rolls against the target of his challenge if it is at least one size category larger than he is. This bonus increases by 1 for every 4 cavalier levels he has.
Skills: An order of the hero cavalier adds Knowledge (arcana) (Int) and Knowledge (nature) (Int) to his list of class skills. In addition, whenever an order of the hero cavalier uses a Knowledge check to identify a monster, he gains a bonus on this check equal to half his cavalier level (minimum +1).
Order Abilities: A cavalier who belongs to the order of the hero gains the following abilities as he increases in level.
Monster Expert (Ex): At 2nd level, the cavalier learns how to dodge the attacks of his monstrous foes and the traps in their lairs. He gains a bonus equal to his Charisma bonus on Fortitude and Reflex saves against abilities and spells that have an area of effect.
Resist Energy (Su): At 8th level, the cavalier can steel himself against harmful energies. Once per day as a move action, he chooses one of the following: acid, cold, electricity, or fire. He gains energy resistance 5 against the chosen type for 1 minute. At 12th, 16th, and 20th levels, the resistance increases by 5, and the cavalier gains an additional daily use of this ability.
Counterstriking Challenge (Ex): At 15th level, once per day when he challenges a Large or larger creature, the cavalier can also prepare to interrupt the creature’s special attacks. The challenged target provokes an attack of opportunity from the cavalier whenever it activates an extraordinary or a supernatural attack (such as a breath weapon or gaze attack). If the cavalier deals damage with this attack, the creature must succeed at a Will save (DC = 10 + half the cavalier’s level + his Charisma modifier) or it fails to activate the special attack and loses the action it took to do so. The cavalier can perform three such attacks of opportunity over the course of a counterstriking challenge.
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