Could a Stone Giant take on a Hill Giant and win? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Could a Stone Giant take on a Hill Giant and win? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Velocity
03-09-06, 03:15 AM Their stats seem pretty close, but to me the Hill Giant looks larger and more imposing. Which one would come out the winner if a territorial dispute came to blows?
runestar
03-09-06, 04:31 AM The stone giant has a higher cr and superior stats as compared to the hill giant. Number crunching alone dictates that the stone giant would win. ;)
dok
03-09-06, 11:18 AM Odds are, the stone Giant wins. Not some of the time, not every now and then, but most of the time. Almost all of the time, probably

Let's look at if they were just standing next to one another, bashing away with Greatclubs.

The Stone Giant has a better AC (25 versus 20) and a better attack bonus. (+17 versus +16) That means the Stone Giant hits 90% of the time with his first attack, and 65% of the time with his second, the Hill Giant only hits 60% of the time with his first attack, and 35% of the time with his second attack. The Stone Giant also deals 2 more damage with each hit. That means the average damage per round for the Stone Giant is (21 * .9) + (21 * .65) = 32.55, while the Hill Giant averages (19 * .6) + (19 * .35) = 18.05 damage.
The Hill Giant has 102 hit points, while the Stone Giant has 119. Even if we assume the Hill Giant won initiative (not a sure thing, since the stone giant has +2 while the Hill giant has -1) then after four rounds, the Stone Giant kills the hill giant dead (well below -10 hp) while still standing (with about 46 hit points left)

So the Stone Giant will hit more, and hit harder.

The Hill Giant could try to Sunder the Stone Giant's club. (the Hill Giant has Improved Sunder, the Stone Giant doesn't) This reduces the average damage per round of the Stone giant to (10.5 * .9 * 2) 18.9 damage. If we assume that the Hill Giant wins initiative, and successfully Sunders the stone giant's club with his first attack (winning the opposed roll and dealing enough damage to Sunder the Greatclub), then it will take the Stone Giant six rounds to render the Hill Giant dead using his Slam attacks (6*18.9 = 113 damage versus the Hill Giant's 102 hit points); in that time, the Hill Giant will deal 6.65 damage in the first round (average, because his first attack was used to Sunder) and (5*18.05) in the remaining rounds, for a final damage of 97 damage, still not enough to kill the Stone Giant.

But wait. What if they weren't using melee combat, but throwing rocks?

The rocks are throw two-handed, so each only gets one throw a round, and can't move more than 5 ft. The ACs are the same, but the Stone Giant has a +11 bonus and deals 2d8+12 while the Hill Giant has a +8 bonus and deals only 2d6+7. The Stone Giant has a range incriment of 180 ft., while the Hill Giant has a smaller range incriment of 120 ft. so already we can see the Stone Giant has a sizable advantage. But it gets worse: the Stone Giant has a 75% chance to catch the Hill Giant's boulders, while the Hill Giant has only a 40% chance to catch the Stone Giant's boulders.

So if we start at 120 ft. distant (unlikely, but what the heck) and each giant takes turns throwing at each other, the Stone Giant has an 60% chance of hitting (+11 vs AC 20) and a 60% chance of the hill giant not catching his attack, which deals 21 damage on average. That means the Stone Giant's average per-round damage would be (0.6 * 0.6 * 21) 7.5 damage each round.

The Hill Giant has 20% chance of hitting (+8 bonus versus AC 25), a 25% chance of the stone giant not catching the attack, and his attack deals 14 damage on average. So each round, he'd average (0.2 * 0.25 * 14) 0.7 damage a round, or less than 1 point. I don't think I need to run any more numbers to show who would win here, eh? I'll also point out that this scenario favors the Hill Giant; if we started at the maximum range for the stone giant throwing boulders (900 ft.) and made the Hill Giant run forward until he could start throwing boulders, (600 ft) that's three rounds of damage the Stone Giant could rack up. Even at that distance (600 ft.) the Hill Giant would have virtually no chance of hitting (-8 range penalty) while the Stone Giant would have much better odds. (only a -4 range penalty)

To put it in the parlance of our times, the Stone giant would "p0wn" the Hill Giant.
Raven Dark
03-09-06, 11:43 AM If it really came down to it the Stone Giant could grapple the Hill Giant too. He has a higher grapple check, higher damage output, AND more hit points than the hill giant does.

Although not an optimal form of attack it may be worthwhile if the Hill Giant somehow got a hold of a +5 greatsword or something.
Lord_Canius
03-09-06, 11:51 AM Although, even with number crunching, it all comes down to the luck of the dice. No matter how far superior the Stone Giant is, if he rolls a 1, he fails his action. No matter how inferior the Hill Giant is, if he rolls a 20, he succedes. Thats all there is.
(Psi)SeveredHead
03-09-06, 01:03 PM What if the hill giant has barbarian levels?

Using just the base, unmodified monsters, the hill giant should win more than 90% of the time. It's statistically superior in nearly every way.
dok
03-09-06, 01:07 PM Although, even with number crunching, it all comes down to the luck of the dice. No matter how far superior the Stone Giant is, if he rolls a 1, he fails his action. No matter how inferior the Hill Giant is, if he rolls a 20, he succedes. Thats all there is.

Actually, the statement that "the luck of the dice is all there is" is both ignorant and embarassing. When you have the opportunity, take a nice 200-level college course in Statistics and Probability. Ideally before you take a vacation to Vegas.

The Stone Giant has a 90% chance of hitting with its first attack. That number -90%- didn't just appear out of nothing. It's based on probability. It means that 90% of the time, the die roll is irrelevant, because it didn't roll a '1' or a '2'. The higher a bonus is (compared to the DC), the less relevant the die roll. The same is true of damage: the higher the damage bonus, the less meaningful the die roll is. When you're doing 2d8+14 damage, is it really a meaninful loss to do 2d6+14 instead?

While any one die roll could come up a '20' or a '1', this fight lasted between 4 & 6 rounds, which means between sixteen and twenty-five attack rolls in total. While one roll might be unlikely, not all of them will be. In fact, the odds of having even one natural 20 appear in the fight are only around 50/50. (don't take my word for it; do a Google Search on Binomial Distributions, and look at the frequency of events with a probability of 5% in 25 trials)

In the "average" fight, the Stone Giant doesn't just win, he wins by a lot; in both of the melee fights, he has between 25 and 45 hit points remaining. Which means even if one or two die rolls go against him, he still has enough hit points that it won't change the outcome.

If the averages had one side winning with less hit points than the opposition's average damage, it would be tougher to call. If the stone giant won with 10 hit points remaining, and the Hill Giant's average damage is 19 points per hit, you could argue that the randomness of combat makes the fight pretty much even. Certainly, there's enough randomness to make it impossible to ssay that every combat will always end with the Stone Giant winning.

While it's possible for a Hill Giant to beat a Stone Giant in a fight, it's not probable. Could you stage a fight between the two and see the Hill Giant win? Sure. Will that happen every time? No. Will it happen most of the time? No.

In the ranged combat, this is even more true, because a.) the probabilities are more extreme, and b.) there are even more die rolls, which means the impact of a single unlikely event is even less.

edit1:
Using just the base, unmodified monsters, the hill giant should win more than 90% of the time. It's statistically superior in nearly every way.

I'm sorry, what? The Stone Giant has a better Armor Class, better Attack bonus, higher Damage bonus, and more Hit Points than the Hill Giant. How is the Hill Giant "statisically superior in nearly every way" when it's weaker, easier to hit, and not as good at hitting targets?

edit2:
The real driver in this fight is AC. If the Hill Giant switched from Hide armor (+3 armor bonus) to Full Plate (+8), then the fight would be too close to call. If the Hill Giant went from Hide Armor to a Breastplate, and the Stone Giant dtched its Hide armor, then again, the fight would probably be too close to call.
Salty_Boy
03-09-06, 01:41 PM Even if the crunch was exactly the same between the two and the statistics became irrelevant (very impressive statistics, too, kudos to all you human calculators out there) it can be further boiled down to this...

Hill Giant = Int 6 Wis 10
Stone Giant = Int 10 Wis 12

To put it in perspective: when's the last time you saw an Ogre outsmart the average Human Paladin?
Wolf72
03-09-06, 06:30 PM stone giant: Str 27, Dex 15, Con 19, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 11

hill giant: Str 25, Dex 8, Con 19, Int 6, Wis 10, Cha 7

the two are only equivalent on con ... mental and physical, the Stone giant is superior.
runestar
03-09-06, 09:39 PM What if the hill giant has barbarian levels?
Depends on what its final cr is. Though rage would arguably negate the only advantage the stone giant has over the hill giant. ;)
(Psi)SeveredHead
03-09-06, 10:08 PM [QUOTE=dok]
I'm sorry, what? The Stone Giant has a better Armor Class, better Attack bonus, higher Damage bonus, and more Hit Points than the Hill Giant. How is the Hill Giant "statisically superior in nearly every way" when it's weaker, easier to hit, and not as good at hitting targets?[/quoite]

No, the explanation is that I'm an idiot. Or just inattentive. I meant to say the stone giant should win. (I used to abuse it with polymorph.)
Velocity
03-10-06, 01:40 AM This is a most cool and far-out discussion, and DOK, dude! Your ability to analyze and sum up situational combat is staggering! You really know your stuff. :) I wish i knew the game half that well.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Velocity 03-09-06, 03:15 AM	Their stats seem pretty close, but to me the Hill Giant looks larger and more imposing. Which one would come out the winner if a territorial dispute came to blows?
runestar 03-09-06, 04:31 AM	The stone giant has a higher cr and superior stats as compared to the hill giant. Number crunching alone dictates that the stone giant would win. ;)
dok 03-09-06, 11:18 AM	Odds are, the stone Giant wins. Not some of the time, not every now and then, but most of the time. Almost all of the time, probably Let's look at if they were just standing next to one another, bashing away with Greatclubs. The Stone Giant has a better AC (25 versus 20) and a better attack bonus. (+17 versus +16) That means the Stone Giant hits 90% of the time with his first attack, and 65% of the time with his second, the Hill Giant only hits 60% of the time with his first attack, and 35% of the time with his second attack. The Stone Giant also deals 2 more damage with each hit. That means the average damage per round for the Stone Giant is (21 * .9) + (21 * .65) = 32.55, while the Hill Giant averages (19 * .6) + (19 * .35) = 18.05 damage. The Hill Giant has 102 hit points, while the Stone Giant has 119. Even if we assume the Hill Giant won initiative (not a sure thing, since the stone giant has +2 while the Hill giant has -1) then after four rounds, the Stone Giant kills the hill giant dead (well below -10 hp) while still standing (with about 46 hit points left) So the Stone Giant will hit more, and hit harder. The Hill Giant could try to Sunder the Stone Giant's club. (the Hill Giant has Improved Sunder, the Stone Giant doesn't) This reduces the average damage per round of the Stone giant to (10.5 * .9 * 2) 18.9 damage. If we assume that the Hill Giant wins initiative, and successfully Sunders the stone giant's club with his first attack (winning the opposed roll and dealing enough damage to Sunder the Greatclub), then it will take the Stone Giant six rounds to render the Hill Giant dead using his Slam attacks (618.9 = 113 damage versus the Hill Giant's 102 hit points); in that time, the Hill Giant will deal 6.65 damage in the first round (average, because his first attack was used to Sunder) and (518.05) in the remaining rounds, for a final damage of 97 damage, still not enough to kill the Stone Giant. But wait. What if they weren't using melee combat, but throwing rocks? The rocks are throw two-handed, so each only gets one throw a round, and can't move more than 5 ft. The ACs are the same, but the Stone Giant has a +11 bonus and deals 2d8+12 while the Hill Giant has a +8 bonus and deals only 2d6+7. The Stone Giant has a range incriment of 180 ft., while the Hill Giant has a smaller range incriment of 120 ft. so already we can see the Stone Giant has a sizable advantage. But it gets worse: the Stone Giant has a 75% chance to catch the Hill Giant's boulders, while the Hill Giant has only a 40% chance to catch the Stone Giant's boulders. So if we start at 120 ft. distant (unlikely, but what the heck) and each giant takes turns throwing at each other, the Stone Giant has an 60% chance of hitting (+11 vs AC 20) and a 60% chance of the hill giant not catching his attack, which deals 21 damage on average. That means the Stone Giant's average per-round damage would be (0.6 * 0.6 * 21) 7.5 damage each round. The Hill Giant has 20% chance of hitting (+8 bonus versus AC 25), a 25% chance of the stone giant not catching the attack, and his attack deals 14 damage on average. So each round, he'd average (0.2 * 0.25 * 14) 0.7 damage a round, or less than 1 point. I don't think I need to run any more numbers to show who would win here, eh? I'll also point out that this scenario favors the Hill Giant; if we started at the maximum range for the stone giant throwing boulders (900 ft.) and made the Hill Giant run forward until he could start throwing boulders, (600 ft) that's three rounds of damage the Stone Giant could rack up. Even at that distance (600 ft.) the Hill Giant would have virtually no chance of hitting (-8 range penalty) while the Stone Giant would have much better odds. (only a -4 range penalty) To put it in the parlance of our times, the Stone giant would "p0wn" the Hill Giant.
Raven Dark 03-09-06, 11:43 AM	If it really came down to it the Stone Giant could grapple the Hill Giant too. He has a higher grapple check, higher damage output, AND more hit points than the hill giant does. Although not an optimal form of attack it may be worthwhile if the Hill Giant somehow got a hold of a +5 greatsword or something.
Lord_Canius 03-09-06, 11:51 AM	Although, even with number crunching, it all comes down to the luck of the dice. No matter how far superior the Stone Giant is, if he rolls a 1, he fails his action. No matter how inferior the Hill Giant is, if he rolls a 20, he succedes. Thats all there is.
(Psi)SeveredHead 03-09-06, 01:03 PM	What if the hill giant has barbarian levels? Using just the base, unmodified monsters, the hill giant should win more than 90% of the time. It's statistically superior in nearly every way.
dok 03-09-06, 01:07 PM	Although, even with number crunching, it all comes down to the luck of the dice. No matter how far superior the Stone Giant is, if he rolls a 1, he fails his action. No matter how inferior the Hill Giant is, if he rolls a 20, he succedes. Thats all there is. Actually, the statement that "the luck of the dice is all there is" is both ignorant and embarassing. When you have the opportunity, take a nice 200-level college course in Statistics and Probability. Ideally before you take a vacation to Vegas. The Stone Giant has a 90% chance of hitting with its first attack. That number -90%- didn't just appear out of nothing. It's based on probability. It means that 90% of the time, the die roll is irrelevant, because it didn't roll a '1' or a '2'. The higher a bonus is (compared to the DC), the less relevant the die roll. The same is true of damage: the higher the damage bonus, the less meaningful the die roll is. When you're doing 2d8+14 damage, is it really a meaninful loss to do 2d6+14 instead? While any one die roll could come up a '20' or a '1', this fight lasted between 4 & 6 rounds, which means between sixteen and twenty-five attack rolls in total. While one roll might be unlikely, not all of them will be. In fact, the odds of having even one natural 20 appear in the fight are only around 50/50. (don't take my word for it; do a Google Search on Binomial Distributions, and look at the frequency of events with a probability of 5% in 25 trials) In the "average" fight, the Stone Giant doesn't just win, he wins by a lot; in both of the melee fights, he has between 25 and 45 hit points remaining. Which means even if one or two die rolls go against him, he still has enough hit points that it won't change the outcome. If the averages had one side winning with less hit points than the opposition's average damage, it would be tougher to call. If the stone giant won with 10 hit points remaining, and the Hill Giant's average damage is 19 points per hit, you could argue that the randomness of combat makes the fight pretty much even. Certainly, there's enough randomness to make it impossible to ssay that every combat will always end with the Stone Giant winning. While it's possible for a Hill Giant to beat a Stone Giant in a fight, it's not probable. Could you stage a fight between the two and see the Hill Giant win? Sure. Will that happen every time? No. Will it happen most of the time? No. In the ranged combat, this is even more true, because a.) the probabilities are more extreme, and b.) there are even more die rolls, which means the impact of a single unlikely event is even less. edit1: Using just the base, unmodified monsters, the hill giant should win more than 90% of the time. It's statistically superior in nearly every way. I'm sorry, what? The Stone Giant has a better Armor Class, better Attack bonus, higher Damage bonus, and more Hit Points than the Hill Giant. How is the Hill Giant "statisically superior in nearly every way" when it's weaker, easier to hit, and not as good at hitting targets? edit2: The real driver in this fight is AC. If the Hill Giant switched from Hide armor (+3 armor bonus) to Full Plate (+8), then the fight would be too close to call. If the Hill Giant went from Hide Armor to a Breastplate, and the Stone Giant dtched its Hide armor, then again, the fight would probably be too close to call.
Salty_Boy 03-09-06, 01:41 PM	Even if the crunch was exactly the same between the two and the statistics became irrelevant (very impressive statistics, too, kudos to all you human calculators out there) it can be further boiled down to this... Hill Giant = Int 6 Wis 10 Stone Giant = Int 10 Wis 12 To put it in perspective: when's the last time you saw an Ogre outsmart the average Human Paladin?
Wolf72 03-09-06, 06:30 PM	stone giant: Str 27, Dex 15, Con 19, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 11 hill giant: Str 25, Dex 8, Con 19, Int 6, Wis 10, Cha 7 the two are only equivalent on con ... mental and physical, the Stone giant is superior.
runestar 03-09-06, 09:39 PM	What if the hill giant has barbarian levels? Depends on what its final cr is. Though rage would arguably negate the only advantage the stone giant has over the hill giant. ;)
(Psi)SeveredHead 03-09-06, 10:08 PM	[QUOTE=dok] I'm sorry, what? The Stone Giant has a better Armor Class, better Attack bonus, higher Damage bonus, and more Hit Points than the Hill Giant. How is the Hill Giant "statisically superior in nearly every way" when it's weaker, easier to hit, and not as good at hitting targets?[/quoite] No, the explanation is that I'm an idiot. Or just inattentive. I meant to say the stone giant should win. (I used to abuse it with polymorph.)
Velocity 03-10-06, 01:40 AM	This is a most cool and far-out discussion, and DOK, dude! Your ability to analyze and sum up situational combat is staggering! You really know your stuff. :) I wish i knew the game half that well.