Felltower, the "Ape Gate," and the PCs

The PCs recently discovered the "jungle gate" actually is better described as the "Ape Gate."

Right now, the options facing the party for the "ape gate" are fairly limited:

- Trade with the apes.

- Fighting "savage" apes.

- Fighting the civilized apes.

Everything else they'd like to do - get a quest (by whatever name - a job, a request, a requirement for access, etc.), fighting in the arena (Mild Bruce's goal, and almost certainly Wyatt would do it to show off), explore the city, find out information about the kingdom (presumably without giving any back, a bedrock PC concern in many games, including mine for some reason) . . . they all require a first step by the apes. The PCs can show up and just hope someone with authority and interest gives them something to do.

So exploration-wise, it's at least momentarily a dead end . . . or is it?

What they know is the area with the gate is a "dead end" of wild jungle surrounded by a C-shape or U-shape of mountains the civilized apes deem impassible. Inside of that are the "savage" apes. What else is in that jungle? They don't know. Are the mountains impassible? They don't know. Why is the gate blocked off so far away from the gate itself?

So there is something to find out, if only if the civilized apes are telling the truth. That might not be a profitable delve, and would need some better outdoor skills to back up Galen.

Let's call that "fighting the 'savage' apes."

The other options?

Trading is possible. It's unlikely to be a source of XP. It's possibly a way to get money, depending on what's on offer this time. The PCs have a personal coin from a merchant of some importance. They don't know what that means, though.

Fighting is also possible. It'll definitely be a way to get loot - assuming they could haul away the gear from the big ape guards, they'd have some unique weapons to sell. They might only get scrap prices from them unless someone has ogres to arm, though. The apes clearly use money and the more important ones wore jewelry of some value (they saw some gold or at least gold-colored jewelry.) They have wizards, so it wouldn't be a walkover no matter how much they buff up their best fighters. But it would be a very PC move.

Developing this into a larger adventure location is going to take some effort by the PCs - either repeated contact or just getting in there and doing something. We'll see which one it is, or if they're distracted by their need to "complete" the Lost City, or by other events in the main dungeon. But the apes will be an element in the future for sure.