Does the Monster Manual list prices for beast mounts and pets?

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

Does the Monster Manual list prices for beast mounts and pets? It would be nice to know how much a war elephant costs.

[archaeo]

Does the Monster Manual list prices for beast mounts and pets? It would be nice to know how much a war elephant costs.

No, all the prices we've seen so far are in the PHB. And there aren't any stats for war elephants, either.

I'll note, however, that warhorses only have CR 1/2, while elephants have CR 4. Personally, I'd rule that elephants trained for battle would be more than the 200 gold they cost in the PHB. I would say that the price of a warhorse (400 gp) represents the serious training they've received, and given that riding horses are 75gp, said training represents a five-fold increase in price. I'd charge you 1,000 gp for an elephant willing to fight in battle without making animal handling checks every time you want it to do something dangerous. Seems pretty generous, too.

Want to outfit it in armor? Barding says x4 cost, presumably for horses; I might bump that up to x6 or something, just because there's a lot more of an elephant to cover.

[Chd]

No, all the prices we've seen so far are in the PHB. And there aren't any stats for war elephants, either.

I'll note, however, that warhorses only have CR 1/2, while elephants have CR 4. Personally, I'd rule that elephants trained for battle would be more than the 200 gold they cost in the PHB. I would say that the price of a warhorse (400 gp) represents the serious training they've received, and given that riding horses are 75gp, said training represents a five-fold increase in price. I'd charge you 1,000 gp for an elephant willing to fight in battle without making animal handling checks every time you want it to do something dangerous. Seems pretty generous, too.

Want to outfit it in armor? Barding says x4 cost, presumably for horses; I might bump that up to x6 or something, just because there's a lot more of an elephant to cover.

These Prices seem a but low. 400/75 = 5.333

Therefore the mechanically fair price of a war elephant would be (Base price = 200) x 5.333 which equals 1066.67 or 1070 gold.

But I'd double it because the training expertise is far rarer.

Horse-trainers are rare as it is, Elephants are exotic mounts, which would make the training rarer still.

Then the Barding base price would be 6x that of a war-horse + the master forged price penalties as it isn't off-the-shelf.

I personally had similar nightmares when my group tamed a Tyranosaurus (The Ranger raised it as a small hatchling so the training was free at least.) In the end, it was cheaper for the Warrior to buy a ****load of Silken Rope, pay a Carpenter to make a jig, then knot up a set of rope armor. It ended up only costing 1250G in rope, (Including the reagents for the Mage enchantments.

Only drawback was a -4 initiative, but the alternative was 30000gp.

[archaeo]

These Prices seem a but low. 400/75 = 5.333

Eh, like I said, it was a generous thing, and I was doing some rounding. 1,066 gp doesn't have a very good ring to it, eh?


the master forged price penalties as it isn't off-the-shelf.

Master forged price penalties? The only thing I can find in the 5e PHB is the short list of hireling prices. If I was giving players the option of buying a war elephant, it seems likely they'd be someplace where elephant barding is also around; otherwise, they'd have to get somebody to craft it, and at the 6x prices we've been throwing around, that'll take either a) ages or b) a ton of gold in skilled hirelings.

On the other hand, that sounds like a great way to spend all that gold the players have laying around!


I personally had similar nightmares when my group tamed a Tyranosaurus (The Ranger raised it as a small hatchling so the training was free at least.) In the end, it was cheaper for the Warrior to buy a ****load of Silken Rope, pay a Carpenter to make a jig, then knot up a set of rope armor. It ended up only costing 1250G in rope, (Including the reagents for the Mage enchantments.

Only drawback was a -4 initiative, but the alternative was 30000gp.

Huh, rope armor. That's one way to do it! Unfortunately for elephants, you need at least scale mail to get a better AC than the natural AC thanks to the elephant's lousy dex. It has the strength for heavy armor though, but then, yeah, you're running into increasingly high costs.

[toapat]

my question is, whats the CR of a Gryphon? Sure land beasts are mighty and all, but this is high fantasy.

[archaeo]

my question is, whats the CR of a Gryphon? Sure land beasts are mighty and all, but this is high fantasy.

CR 2, and the fluff includes a whole section on their excellence as mounts, though it also talks about how much care goes into training them. It says, "Expert trainers well versed in the griffon's legendary ferocity are typically the only ones able to raise these creatures safely," and also talks about how said trainers have to raise them from eggs.

But they've got a flying speed of 80 ft., so they'd be super worth it! Of course, their diet apparently requires lots of horseflesh, so, you know.

[Mr.Moron]

I'd suppose it depends on where you are relative to the supply of elephants, how commonly they're used, as well as what food and transportation is available.

I'm not sure there is a good way to peg a fixed price. Like my party is pretty far from any place where elephants are, most people around them wouldn't even know what an elephant is. Assuming they knew and could find a supplier, it'd probably cost them 2500gp to put in the order and another 1000gp if the elephant arrives alive - which is probably ~50/50 shot and would take 1 year.


If they lived in an area where elephants are everywhere, and they're commonly trained for those purposes it might cost as little has 800-1000gp.

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

CR 2, and the fluff includes a whole section on their excellence as mounts, though it also talks about how much care goes into training them. It says, "Expert trainers well versed in the griffon's legendary ferocity are typically the only ones able to raise these creatures safely," and also talks about how said trainers have to raise them from eggs.

I guess 5e expects players to go on quests for all their epic loot and epic mounts. Fair enough.

You can probably equate mounts/pets with magic item rarities. A gryphon or pegasus would obviously be Very Rare (the category of flight items).

[MustacheFart]

Forget all the talk about elephants and gryphons. What about dragons?

I know for a fact that my group will be encountering some dragon eggs next session in HOTDQ. Shouldn't I be able to train one of them bad boys to serve me? Fight the dragons with a dragon!

[Inevitability]

My players may as well end up with a bunch of rust monster eggs during the next session(s). :smalleek: