Mountain giants a very weak CR 26?

[Darkness]

I mean, look at the Jovoc and Spellgaunt, and tell me that they're not there for the sole purpose of screwing PCs.

Rust monster. Mimic. Ethereal Filcher. It's not a new thing. (I tend to detest such monsters when I DM, BTW.)

... 153,600 xp each. Enough to hit 20th level or go epic depending on the level caps of your campaign .

Yeah, but unless you house-rule that as well, you can't gain more XP for an adventure than (enough to hit minimum for [current level +2] -1).

 

[Darkness]

Am I the only one who read the 'taking us by surprise' bit and got the image of a 100-foot tall, extremely smelly, giant in a ninja outfit sneaking up on the party?

Munchkin Fu has the card, "Mecha Ninja (the 60-ton master of stealth)."

 

[ruleslawyer]

I don't think so, just bad judgement. Most monsters in the Monster Manual 2 have a relatively high CR as opposed to similar strength monsters in the Monster Manual 1. The Monster Manual 3 went in the other direction, having relatively low CR's for the monsters' actual strength.

Weeellll, I was trying to be nice about the designers...

But yes. There are a number of monsters that aren't CR-ed very sensibly, and this is hardly limited to MMII, although, IMHO, it has the worst offenders. My favorites are the fiendwurm (as you pointed out), the hellfire wyrm (CR 26???), and the various creatures whose spellcasting ability, measured in spellcasting class level, substantially exceeds their CR (the abeil queen, bone naga, elemental weird, immoth, and spellweaver).

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Rust monster. Mimic. Ethereal Filcher. It's not a new thing. (I tend to detest such monsters when I DM, BTW.)

Ah. Yes. The short list of monsters that are so dumb they make the Beholder look clever. Their one commonality is their only true ecological niche is a random monster chart for creating insipid dungeon crawls.

I have to say that the doggy that scares its intended victims by peeling its face back took stupid to an entirely new level IMO. It pains me to even think about it.

 

[Ravellion]

Hey, don't forget that your Mountain Giant can have CR 26 treasure worth of magic items.

Those items could be pretty significant (flying, SR, etc.) if you wanted to make them so.

But what if I just assigned a storm giant with CR 26? At what point are you fighting the magic items and not the creature?

Rav

 

[Al]

Hey, don't forget that your Mountain Giant can have CR 26 treasure worth of magic items.

Most of the CR 26 treasure will be gold, a the magic items will be rolled randomly.

But, the whole point behind the Mountain Giant is that it is far more powerful than the equivalent level 26 NPC fighter. Greater Strength, Crush, etc.. The NPC fighter can have a few more items, but the really important items are within both the NPC fighter and the Mountain Giant's buying capability.

I don't buy this argument. The 26th level NPC fighter in the ELH isn't a proper CR 26 either, IMO. A CR 26 encounter should use up one-quarter of the resources of a 26th level party. It is quite clear that the mountain giant does not.

Finally, the Story is more important than the rules, and the idea of fighting a Mountain Giant is more impressive than fighting a fighter level X.

This argument doesn't make any sense at all. Fighting the tarrasque is "more impressive" than fighting a Mountain Giant, but it's only a CR 20.

 

[Darkness]

The 26th level NPC fighter in the ELH isn't a proper CR 26 either, IMO.

ELH, p.111 suggests CR 24 for a level 26 NPC fighter. Which may or may not be still too high, but it's a start.