"Giants" in the Dungeons

[oldkat]

For some reason a fond memory flashed before my eyes a few days ago. It involved the old D&D game, Eye of the Beholder 2, and a section where some trapped giants (frost? dunno; sure looked like'em)were wandering about ready to kill you. The point being, these beings were so large they had to literally crawl on hands and knees throughout the tunnels/corridors, and could only punch forward to attack; sneaking around behind them was the key to avoiding damage. I loved that part of the game.

This led me to ponder giant beings and giant-sized creatures within dungeons. According to M&T, from 1-8 of them can appear upon a random generation (as "wandering" types?); how many could there be when "placed" by the referee? The entire concept of this made me shudder, and wonder, about the principle (and amount) of hand-waving that is suggested within the 3 LBB, in order for this all to come about.

The smallest giant type, hill, is 12 feet tall; with stone at 15', frost at 18', fire at 12' and cloud at 20'. Add in the Greyhawk Storm Giants (at 24') and Titans, and it is easy to see the situation created by all this. Most everyone I am aware of uses the standard 10' wide hallway/tunnel as the default, with 5' defined as narrow, 20' as wide, and so on; ceiling heights for such tending to be on average 10' though variations are considered.

Dungeon building 101 dictates that access to and throughout must be reasonable enough to accommodate not only the residents (permanent or temporary) but the visitors as well. I recall, vaguely, a Dragon article about dungeon building titled, "Let there be a method to your madness". (Appearing in my BOD 1, p.15) But nowhere that I recall in the article does it address the reality of physical restraints upon monster placement due to dungeon design. Or even a heads-up like: Look, if you're gonna have giants and giant beasts roaming around in dungeons, at least make sure the halls, tunnels and chambers have appropriate dimensions to accommodate them. Uh-uh. Nadda. Its not in there.

So, there it is. Just hand-wave it. It's a game, for gosh sake, don't get all RW/RL about it!
Oh, but make sure you take rations with you, so you don't get hungry. And arrows/quarrels to keep track of so you don't run out. And water so you don't die of thirst. And...

To this day I am still, absolutely, stunned at how opposing the guidelines were about the principles that one was supposed to apply. I guess I just don't get it. And likely never will. Despite how much I enjoy the game.

So the question becomes, does anyone else ever wonder, what they were thinking?

[oakesspalding]

It could be magic, larger undiscovered access tunnels or shafts, or now blocked routes. Or perhaps they entered on their hands and knees, or by stooping, in the hopes of finding some easy treasure or delicious snacks. Then they got stuck or lost.

On a similar note, I think dragons can squidge up much smaller than one might think - small enough to crawl through a ten foot corridor. It seems dragonish to me that they might want to slither deep inside a "hole" to quasi-hibernate.

[Scott Anderson]

Make something up! Maybe they're stuck in the giant version of an oubliette. Maybe they were teleported there. Maybe they're spelunking. I consider ogres and trolls giant-types, and they would fit okay.

[coffee]

My copy of volume III says that Greyhawk Castle had "...a bowling alley for 20' high Giants..."

I think what "they" were thinking is that you'd make the dungeon you wanted, even if that meant areas (and entrances!) where Giants could come and go freely.

Also, if your players are smart enough to run back to the 10' corridors, they might escape the giants that are too big to follow them.

[archersix]

I'd handle it as:
If they are placed there purposefully by the DM as permanent residents then they probably built the dungeon and corridors etc would be big enough for them (and doors bigger, heavier, and harder for man sized dudes to open).
If they are rolled randomly then they are likely just there temporarily and they must be looking for something, right? So place an appropriate treasure or something for them. These are likely the guys who had to crawl on hands and knees to get in, unless the dungeon was built by some long forgotten gigantic pre-historic race of boogy men.

[rossik]

Amazing, indeed!
vonblubba.com/content/images/2016/05/eob2_01.jpg

[Porphyre]

Aug 7, 2017 13:55:45 GMT -6 Scott Anderson said:

Make something up! Maybe they're stuck in the giant version of an oubliette. Maybe they were teleported there. Maybe they're spelunking. I consider ogres and trolls giant-types, and they would fit okay.

Orrrr...

Similarly to what Gronan told us about Undead PC with "levels" , and considering the UW&WA "Giant type" table, p18, say that Giants are just high level humanoids: 
When kobolds kill adventurers and fellow monsters, they "level up" to goblins, when they kill enough more PC , they level up as orcs. The luckiest, more successful orcs then become Hobgoblins, etc. 

Then a troll levels up as a Giant, and finds out that he can't get out ... 

[hamurai]

Aye, if the table in M&T didn't show Kobolds and their like as extra entries I'd have said go with the UW&WA "Giant types" and use Kobolds and Orcs instead.
As it stands, though... I'd go with "make something up"! Maybe some wizard teleported/trapped them there, or they were polymorphed as lizards or something and just wandered in, when suddenly they hit a Dispel Magic field. Maybe they were a group of giant adventurers and fell into a trap which didn't kill them, just left them at some level (belonging to the dungeon above) which wasn't built for their size, but for the kobolds and orcs who are employed to tend to the traps...

[Starbeard]

Aug 10, 2017 15:02:29 GMT -6 Porphyre said:

Aug 7, 2017 13:55:45 GMT -6 Scott Anderson said:

Make something up! Maybe they're stuck in the giant version of an oubliette. Maybe they were teleported there. Maybe they're spelunking. I consider ogres and trolls giant-types, and they would fit okay.

Orrrr...

Similarly to what Gronan told us about Undead PC with "levels" , and considering the UW&WA "Giant type" table, p18, say that Giants are just high level humanoids: 
When kobolds kill adventurers and fellow monsters, they "level up" to goblins, when they kill enough more PC , they level up as orcs. The luckiest, more successful orcs then become Hobgoblins, etc. 

Then a troll levels up as a Giant, and finds out that he can't get out ... 

I was just reading that page yesterday and was pondering the same thing! I really like the idea of having 'Giant types' in place of 'Goblinoids', and organizing them roughly by HD like the undead. I usually call goblinoids 'beasties' because I think it's a word worth bringing back into the language, and I think giants would fit into that well.

Beastie Strain 1, 'imp giants':
Kobold (1/2 HD)
Goblin (1-1)
Orc (1)
Hobgoblin (2 to 3)
Ogre (4 to 7)
Giant (8), name level

Beastie Strain 2, 'fairy giants':
Gnome, dwarf or elf (1)
Gnoll (or droll or trelf?) (2 to 5)
Troll (6 to 7)
Ent (8), name level

[Scott Anderson]

In the first edition PHB, rangers do extra damage against giant-types. But giant-types includes most of what we would think of as goblinoids as well as orcs and kobolds! So maybe "giant" is a taxonomic term for all kinds of weird humanoids.

[Vile Traveller]

"Giant" types are basically any humanoid bigger than a human. IIRC the smallest are bugbears (which are "giant" goblins), followed by ogres, trolls, and then the true giants.

[sepulchre]

Scott Anderson wrote:

So maybe "giant" is a taxonomic term for all kinds of weird humanoids.

Gygax elaborates the description from the PHB in the U.A on page 22 to include kobolds and goblins alike.

[Starbeard]

I've been reading Jack Vance's Lyonesse and his treatment of fairies reminded me of this thread.

King Casmir keeps a small two-headed imp in a bottle, which is later identified as a Skak, with these footnotes:

"The least in the hierarchy of fairies. First in rank are fairies, then falloys, goblins, imps, finally skaks. In the nomenclature of Faerie, giants, ogres and trolls are also considered halflings, but of a different sort. In a third class are merrihews, willawen and hyslop, and also, by some reckonings, quists and darklings. Sandestins, most powerful of all, are in a class by themselves."

These fairy types maintain no specific size indefinitely, and may appear large or small, though usually small or even tiny if caught unawares.

Finally, there's this wonderful description:

"Fairies are halflings, like trolls, falloys, ogres and goblins, and unlike merrihews, sandestins, quists and darklings. Merrihews and sandestins both may manifest human semblance, but the occasion is one of caprice and always fugitive. Quists are always as they are, and darklings prefer only to hint of their presence.

"Fairies, like the other halflings, are functionally hybrids, with varying proportions of earth-stuff. With the passage of time the proportion of earth-stuff increases, if only through the ingestion of air and water, though occasional coition of man and halfling hastens the process. As the halfling becomes 'heavy' with earth-stuff it converges toward humanity and loses some or all of its magic.

"The 'heavy' fairy is abusively ejected from the shee [=Underdark] as a boor and lummox, to wander the countryside and eventually merge into the human community, where it lives disconsolately and only rarely exercises its fading magic. The offspring of these creatures are peculiarly sensitive to magic, and often become witches or wizards: so with all the magicians of the Elder Isles.

"Slowly, slowly the halflings dwindle; the shees grow dark, and the halfling life-stuff dissipates into the human race. Every person alive inherits more or less halfling-stuff from thousands of quiet infusions. In human inter-relationships the presence of this quality is a matter of general knowledge, but sensed subliminally and seldom accurately identified."

I think one can borrow from this to create a pretty neat interpretation of D&D's giant types that works right into the HD concept. The HD of a giant type is based on how "earth-heavy"* the being is: true giants are pure fairy/giant, while kobolds are so earth-heavy that they largely function like devilish and mercurial demihumans. If a kobold could cast off that earth (perhaps by gaining levels/HD?) then magic returns, size grows, hypothetically on up until it becomes a true giant.

Additionally: if you manage to take a giant-type by surprise, you cut its HD in half, and it is encountered as though it were that rank of the giant hierarchy instead!

*Edit: 'earth-heavy' makes especially good sense here; the lowest HD, and therefore most earthy, are kobolds, while the largest, and most airy-fairy, are cloud giants.