Need some ideas for warm/hot savannah terrain encounters

[NewJeffCT]

The players in my party (level 9/10) will soon be on a trek through a vast & dry savannah, and will eventually be arriving in a jungle.

I'm looking for a good encounter that will challenge the party - which is D&D 3.5. So, something that would be a CR: 11-13 range, maybe a bit higher. I could also use a few minor encounters as well - maybe just to give them a feel of the different terrain (they've come from a more temperate/forest-y type location)

The party makeup will be: human cleric, human rogue, elf fighter/paladin, dwarf fighter and halfling psion. All will be level 9 or 10 when they get there. There will be a 3rd level elf scout apprentice along as well, who may be 4th by then.

The territory that is inhabited that they will be traveling through is inhabited by nearly 20 or so warlords who are competing with each other for rulership of the region as a whole...the warlords are fairly hostile to outsiders, but some are good-hearted, and some are not. (Later on, I intend to have the players confront the most vicious warlord, a blackguard/anti-paladin type, but not just yet)

However, there are plenty of areas that are not inhabited and not civilized that could be home to a few good monsters.

Any ideas?

Thanks

 

[Gilladian]

There's a race of lion-centaurs; wemic I think. They might make an interesting possibly role-play based encounter.

I might also pick a theme and stick with it (plants, for example). Adapt other plants to the plains setting; sawgrass is a very likely candidate, or long, strangling vines instead of a hangman tree.

Something flying that could rise up out of a nearby hollow or swale, seemingly coming from nowhere, swoop down on them, and then fly away; perhaps a juvenile roc, or some souped-up wyverns. Manticores also strike me as a particularly savannah-appropriate monster.

And the other one that comes to mind is some sort of Mastodon/elephant/Bison type creature. Especially in large numbers a big, heedless, trampling monster like that is terrifying.

 

[NewJeffCT]

There's a race of lion-centaurs; wemic I think. They might make an interesting possibly role-play based encounter.

I might also pick a theme and stick with it (plants, for example). Adapt other plants to the plains setting; sawgrass is a very likely candidate, or long, strangling vines instead of a hangman tree.

Something flying that could rise up out of a nearby hollow or swale, seemingly coming from nowhere, swoop down on them, and then fly away; perhaps a juvenile roc, or some souped-up wyverns. Manticores also strike me as a particularly savannah-appropriate monster.

And the other one that comes to mind is some sort of Mastodon/elephant/Bison type creature. Especially in large numbers a big, heedless, trampling monster like that is terrifying.

thanks - some interesting ideas. I'd prefer not to go with the plants idea, as the party is heading through the savannahs on the way to a jungle, where there will be dangerous plants (and other things) galore.