I'm DMing a game in the Realms that is based in the Heartlands...namely Sembia, Cormyr, the Dalelands and Myth Drannor, but which I suspect may take us to other parts of the Realms as it progresses.
I have allowed my players the opportunity to switch their characters if they wish to try out a PHB2 class. One of my players wants to switch to a Goliath Barbarian.
I was just wondering if any of you could give me an idea of where Goliaths would originate from in the Realms. They aren't mentioned in the FR Campaign or Player's guides so I'm assuming I'm going to have to work this in, but if there's canon that can answer this question then I would prefer to use that.
Thanks!
-Goliaths were introduced into the setting in the novel Depths of Madness. As such, the novel has information about Goliaths. They hail from (either) the Raurin Desert, or the Anauroch Desert. Given that the setting of the novel was a former Netherese enclave, I believe that I am mixing up Depths of Madness and Darkvision, the latter which featured Imaskari.
Anauroch Desert eh? Well that makes it fairly easy to have one just have crossed over from the Desertsmouth Mountains, being that's one of the geographic gateways from Anauroch to the Dalelands (Daggerdale specifically).
Which means Anauroch and Netheril, NOT Raurin and Imaskar.
Which is a shame, because I'm going to say in the K-T stuff that the Goliaths are the same as the Coombe Giants of the east (often just referred to as Kara-Turran Giants, Eastern Giants, or even 'Shou Giants'), for simplicity sake. After the ToT, a large number of them migated west for some unknown reason.
Suggestions include the Azirrhat Mountains, Chult, or a volcanic valley in the Spine of the World range.
Suggestions include the Azirrhat Mountains...
This sounds familiar, but I can't seem to find them.
Edit: Nevermind - they're in Anauroch (a place I don't 'fiddle with' much).
I still say that if you want Goliaths in a Dalelands area campaign, it's easy enough to have them come from nearby Anarauch.
In fact, accept for some ego-stroking, I'm still trying to figure-out what purpose they serve, given that FR/D&D already had around fifty giant races to choose from.
Just another case of someone wanting to leave their 'mark' on the game.
Take ALL the Goliath fluff and mechanics - and NOT that ridiculously stupid and uncreative name - and apply it to the Furbolgs - they have a Kingdome WAY up north, you know. ;)
I actually hated them outright when I first saw them (I didn't bother to buy that particular tome, mostly beecause they were in it), but I've since aquired a pdf and I must say the fluff is pretty darn good, and that just annoys me all the more that they felt the need to create an entire new race around it, rather then fleshing-out a pre-existing one.
Goliaths in Faerun:
http://www.candlekeep.com/downloads/tdom-part2.zip
firbolgs? I don't imagine them to be similar.
At MY table, the only thing that matters is what I imagine they are. ;)
I liked the fluff that came with the Goliaths, but I really, REALLY hate the way they look (did one of the designers stare at a potato for a long time looking for inspiration?)
Anyhow, since I love the way Firbolgs look, but we have little Realmslore on them (and what little we have is just plain WRONG - that author of the Moonshaes novel meant Fomorians, but instead typed 'Firbolgs' - poor research skills are the deathknell of FR), its easy enough for me to apply most of the Goliath Fluff to a widespread 'Kingdom' of Firbolgs living thoughout the Spine of the World and "parts North".
Edit:
Just looked at that download (thanks for the link), but it doesn't really interest me. I'm using all the core stuff and going my own way with it (which means Goliaths don't exist in MY Realms - the Firbolgs Killed them and took their Stuff). :P
as far as I remember the goliaths, they're stony and bald, firbolgs are fleshy and hairy, that's why
at my table/alternate FR, giants/titans are evolved or de-evolved humans (alchemy), stone giants appear in many sizes, no need for the goliaths
as far as I remember the goliaths, they're stony and bald, firbolgs are fleshy and hairy, that's why
Right ... they look ridiculous.
But their fluff is very cool, and thats why I stole it all for the Firbolgs. My Firbolgs LOOK like Firbolgs, but they do all that cool stuff from the ROS tome (including paying Goatball).
Also, the mechanics works as well. If I were to run a 4e game, I wouldn't allow someone to run a Goliath... but I would allow them to run a Firbolg using the Goliath's stats and abilites (and add-in the Firbolg size-changing thing).
So no lumpy potato-men at my table, but 10' tall Vikings are A-Okay. :D
And the name? Thats from the RW Bible!
Talk about Uber-deritive...
I'm surprised they weren't given a racial enemy called 'The Davies'.
FR is starting to remind me of the Pokémon World - if every last thing is intelligent and you can talk to it, just what the hell do people eat?
WAY too many intelligent species for one planet, even if it is Fantasy.
I'm just not seeing it.
Maybe because I approach things from a GM's point of view, rather then a Fantasy enthusiast, but I really don't need 45 flavors of Giant.
Hmmmm... perhaps I have that backwards... I prefer logic over 'Uber-Kewl', so a limited number of GREAT races is preferrable - to me - then a world FULL of barely fleshed-out ones.
Paizo did a book JUST on Goblinoids and Orcs, and it is fantastic. We don't need more critters, we need more lore about the ones we have.
Drawing pictures and creating stat-blocks is the providence of the untalented. I don't want a new types of Stone Giant - I want to know about the ones we have... and if someone wants to mention smaller off-shoot of that race, then fine. I'm good with that.
But don't just create more and more 'stuff' because you can - lets get a little detail for a change. The write-up for the Goliaths in the RoS tome was awesome; I would have just preferred it be applied to something we already have and know little about.
WORST case of this, IMHO, is the fact that we got both Voadkyn and Volodni in FR... What the HELL?!
They need to stop pushing 'new', stupid crap at us, and go back to basics - make the traditional monsters cool again. I want to be afraid of Orcs again.. not yawn when I encounter them.
WOTC has become a company that only knows how to produce rules, like TSR was WAY back in the beginning. Thirty years of evolution just thrown right out the window.
Then again.. pretty pictures with stat-blocks is how WotC got rich in the first place... no wonder they are going down that road with D&D.
Anyhow, since I love the way Firbolgs look, but we have little Realmslore on them (and what little we have is just plain WRONG - that author of the Moonshaes novel meant Fomorians, but instead typed 'Firbolgs' - poor research skills are the deathknell of FR), its easy enough for me to apply most of the Goliath Fluff to a widespread 'Kingdom' of Firbolgs living thoughout the Spine of the World and "parts North".
Incidentally, I don't think this is really a fair criticism. As I understand it, the Moonshaes were designed (not under that name) by the UK branch of TSR, who were trying to create a new campaign world to set their adventures in while Douglas Niles wrote novels around them. When TSR UK went bankrupt, Douglas Niles had a novel but no game world to set it in - so they placed it in the as-yet-unpublished Forgotten Realms campaign, changing the map and character of Ed Greenwood's original version of the Moonshae Isles to do so.
Now, being British, the game designers (I don't know who they were, but I imagine they were the same group that wrote the UK series of adventures: Graeme Morris, Jim Bambra, Phil Gallagher, etc.) were a bit closer to the actual legends some of the D&D monsters came from, so they knew what the Fir Bolg from Irish myth (pronounced "fear bollug") looked like (quite ugly), and made them look like that. Now, this was a new campaign world, so it could certainly have its own version of the firbolgs separate from the standard AD&D firbolg. And when the islands were moved to the Forgotten Realms, well, that was a new campaign setting too, and it hadn't been established what a Forgotten Realms firbolg looked like either. Forgotten Realms elves are different from standard AD&D elves, after all, and in first edition even Forgotten Realms dragons were different from standard Monster Manual dragons.
So if there was any poor research, it was on the part of subsequent Realms designers who didn't present firbolgs as they were in the Moonshaes. Honestly, though, I can't fault them for deciding to use the more standard version of the monster rather than confusing everyone with one kind of firbolg in the Monstrous Compendium Volume 2 and another kind statted up just for the 1% of the time someone's actually going to need them in a Forgotten Realms campaign.
As for the question of how many giant-kin are too many, that's a matter of personal taste. Verbeegs, cyclopskin, fomorians, voadkyn, and firbolgs (and let's not forget ogres): are goliaths the straw that broke the giant's back? Personally, I'd do away with verbeegs, and just make fomorians smarter (as they are in 4e). Races of Stone made the goliaths much more than a picture and a group of stats, but they weren't awesome enough for me to fall in love with them, personally. So I would ignore them entirely unless a player really liked them: then, whatever; there's nothing really wrong with them.
Another side note: with fomorians being radically redesigned in 4e, do you think the 2e origin myth with Othea and Ulutiu still applies? I guess it must, since there's no real contradiction; it just no longer seems very appropriate.
The fomorians, an evil race of giant-sized fey, easily overpower the native firbolg tribes, taking them as slaves. After a few generations of forced breeding, Moonshae firbolgs assume some of the disfigurements commonly associated with fomorians.
For me, Goliaths are akin to the Half-Giants, i.e. a mixture of human and Stone Giant (which explains their rough features and coloring). They best fit the Pathfinder setting, where I'll replace those viking rip-offs with them. The core of their culture remains the same. But I'll twist them a bit, giving them a mean and chaotic streak. They'd still have to be reavers, after all.
Maybe it was the craptastic artwork that turned me off - the one of them playing Goatball is stupid as all hell (same 'artist' that did those terrible illustrations in UE ... and I use the term 'artist' loosley).
Now that I think about, every single creature that artist ever drew I automatically detested. I thought the purpose of illustrating fantasy games was to keep people interested, not send them running.
I guess who ever hired him also approved the 4e map... no accounting for taste.
I guess who ever hired him also approved the 4e map... no accounting for taste.
Now *this* I definately agree with. That 4e FR map is horrid, lol.
As for Goliaths in the Spine of the World vs. other places: Yes, I'd imagine there are Goliath's in the Spine as well. I highly doubt they're confined to just one location. Anywhere there's mountains and/or desert are probably good places to look imo. Maybe not that many of them in any given location, but at least in my game they're widespread if not common.
Note the different color texture of that desert from both the Calim and Raurin on the official maps - its most certaily not the sandy type. Its more of a cross beteen the regular sandy texture and the 'badlands' terrain texture.
Lots of stuff live in the Anauroch... maybe too much. Everything from half-dwarves to Asabi to Beduines (errrr... bedines) to Creator races to Phaerimm and Golems with mouths in their abdomens... there's even a bunch of Dragonlance critters running around thanks to a gate to Krynn.
Not to mention an entire empire these days...
I know cities less crowded. :P
Very little of it is 'true desert' (or rather, what people usually think of when they think 'desert').
-Antarctica is a desert...
-Antarctica is a desert...
That is true!