Talk:Legendary Ape (3.5e Monster)

Summon
So, once per day he can summon an EL ~8 group, which is 2 higher than his actual CR, with no duration. That seems both excessive and easily exploitable. It basically turns an already CR 6 encounter into an ~EL 9 one. As there are no additional limits on the ability, the fight could just as easily start that way or substantially worse if you ran into an ape that had used it for a few days in a row. A limit on the summons (either can't be used again while they remain or a duration) as well as a CR boost to acknowledge the additional troops he's almost certain to have seems appropriate (though not a full CR boost to the EL, since they don't get to act immediately and he might not even get it off assuming it wasn't used to create an ambush). - Tarkisflux Talk 20:34, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


 * 2 Dire Apes = EL ~5. 4 Apes = EL ~ 4. Together still below 6. I should really reword it though. It isn't a summoning per-se. It is a recall. The Legendary Ape is the leader of a pack of apes. When he uses that ability, he is summoning some (or all) of his pack to come fight with him. I could always up the CR by one point, of course, if you think that would make it more appropriate. --Aarnott 20:39, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I changed it to be a teleportation. That is much more clear, I think. --Aarnott 20:44, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


 * DMG (pg 49) pretty clearly shows 4 CR 2 things is EL 6, and 2 CR 4 things could be 5 or 6. Two EL 6 groups roll into an EL 8 group, but I tossed in an approximate because there's going to be rounding error (downward) for building up to that with CR 2 creatures. Not that I really needed to go to the table, since each doubling of the number of creatures of any CR increases the EL of the encounter by +2, and it's really easy to do that here because you're using multiples of 2.


 * So unless you're using an alternate form of CR math, you're wrong. And if you are using an alternate form of CR math, that should be made clear somewhere as it affects expectations (and should probably pointed to so people can determine xp from them encounter appropriately). If they are only EL 4 and 5 in whatever CR math you're using, they add up to at least 6, which at least doubles the strength of the already CR 6 creature. So yes, I think a CR increase is appropriate. 7 if you're using funny CR math, 8 otherwise to account for the possibility of him not getting his crew in on time and not functioning like an ~EL 9


 * The teleport thing doesn't address my abuse concern though, I got how it worked. The flat-footed certainly helps, but just makes them less likely to use it in a fight IMO. There's nothing stopping the legendary ape from having the group when the encounter starts, or building up his crew over the course of a month and going on a rampage with 60 dire apes and 120 regular apes. If he's teleporting in all of his crew, then write into the ability that there's no daily limit on it, it just pulls all of his pack to him and that's that. If he uses it again, he just gets the same ones again. Useful for repositioning maybe, but he can't use it to stock up and using it multiple times in the same fight just means that his pack loses actions. - Tarkisflux Talk 21:05, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Edit - Actually, nevermind on the CR thing. If it just pulls existing crew in, and is written to actually mean that, then any extra creatures are there because the DM put them there to be used and the EL will sort itself out. Teleport is better than summoning in this case, so that does address some of my concern. Sorry I didn't see that a second ago. - Tarkisflux Talk 21:08, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the edit for the Call of the Wild ability. It is much more elegant now :). --Aarnott 23:24, 30 August 2011 (UTC)