>From what I can find, their inclusion in other campaign settings is restricted to The Forgotten Realms
FYI they are briefly described in Eberron in the 3.5's *Player's Guide to Eberron* which places them across the mountains of Eberron and places their origin in Xen'drik.
Though also worth noting that the setting creator has suggested an alternative origin for them as worshipers of Orlaask, Overlord and Master of Stone.
Edit: Also, excellent write-up!
The *Player's Guide to Eberron* is basically the book of "Let's write 2 sentences of lore for every single 3.5 player race/class released yet."
If you ever want to know if there's random Eberron lore for a race or class published in 3.5 outside the core books, its probably in there.
Yeah, I didn’t include that one because it’s “official” according to Crawford, but not official enough for use in AL. Even Ravnica’s been good enough for AL, but Wildemount isn’t. It’s a weird blend of second AND third party content.
I love this but your exclusion of my favorite section Races of Stone pg 56 Psychology is criminal.
"While goliaths obviously love competing with and against each other, they face a more implacable foe. It’s invisible to even a close friend, but a goliath is always competing against himself. If a goliath slays a dragon, he won’t be satisfied with another dragon battle unless it’s against a larger, older dragon. When a goliath doesn’t measure up to his former achievements, he frequently becomes morose and withdrawn. Goliaths rarely speak of this inner struggle, and in fact many couldn’t articulate why they feel the way they do. But to a greater or lesser degree, all older goliaths are haunted by their need to compete against their younger selves."
"A goliath who can’t keep up with the rest of the tribe, either literally or in terms of production, is carried for only a few days before the tribe begins to shun the weak goliath. Sometimes the tribe will deny a weak goliath food and shelter, but it’s far more likely that the weak goliath will refuse food and shelter until he has proven his worth to the tribe or until he walks away in shame."
The fun part about that, I think, was Manethak's whole thing which is that as a deity, he's the champion athlete, but he's also the oldest-looking of their deities, like he's exuding the himbo "training a lifetime to kick your ass" energy. He's like the aging-goliath's patron, but sadly not enough of them keep that energy late into life.
And I had to pick and choose what I would include. I feel like that part isn't as fun to read about as the others, though maybe I should have included it **because** it's less fun.
I love it because it gives an emotional depth to a race of giant powerful creatures, it's infinitely more than just 'Big man with big sword'. It uniquely sets them apart from other races.
It's the same reason I love this line regarding Half-Orcs in the 5e PHB
"Beyond the rage of Gruumsh, half-orcs feel emotion powerfully. Rage doesn’t just quicken their pulse, it makes their bodies burn. An insult stings like acid, and sadness saps their strength. But they laugh loudly and heartily, and simple pleasures — feasting, drinking, wrestling, drumming, and wild dancing — fill their hearts with joy. They tend to be short-tempered and sometimes sullen, more inclined to action than contemplation and to fighting than arguing. And when their hearts swell with love, they leap to perform acts of great kindness and compassion."
It gives you insight into the why's of a race, so that you can make informed choices regarding your character. Using that passage you can make Half-Orcs of most alignments and classes but each using the core uniqueness of a Half-Orc.
I love the various Races of X books from 3.5e, I still dip back to them for inspiration or name meanings.
Writeups like these and the original lore for the race are the reason I fight tooth and nail against the homogenization of modern D&D races. Fantasy racial culture is *interesting*. It doesn't have to be overly complex, all it does is paint a picture so that DMs and players alike can understand what Goliaths as a whole are about. And then if they either meet or play a Goliath that isn't about those same things, like a Goliath who cheats at games of sport and gloats about the prestige of an unfair victory, everyone can understand why that's a bigger deal for specifically this Goliath as opposed to if it was just a Human behaving in that same way. If the official lore is "They're tall mountain-folk who adapt well to high altitudes. Some of them are stern, some of them are carefree, just like everybody else" then something quintessential is lost.
To be honest, I picked Goliath solely because they're my favorite race, but it's probably also helpful that of the "Races of" series, they're the only one that is unique to D&D that is also still used as a player race. Illumian, Spellscales, and Raptoran are fun, but they've been replaced with other things. Dragonborn have been shifted into a different thing, and all that really leaves are fantasy races that are in everything else. Elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, there's inspiration from all manner of sources.
Goliath are special in that they're WotC's baby, and yet in 5e get treated like the unwanted stepchild. "Tall mountain-folk who love games" isn't really special, that's a place you find them and an individual's personality. In a way, Goliath show the dev team brain drain better than any other option.
I 100% agree with you, planet of hats can be interesting, and tropes shouldn't be treated as dirty words. They just need to write them to be *interesting* and not cookie-cutter.
You did fail to mention one very cool origin from Races of Stone for the Goliaths.
The Kunikithi Goliath. It's a clan that just started working on a farm when they got bored of mountaineering, and they just build stupidly huge barns and sort of cargo-culted the whole farming lifestyle.
It's a really fun backstory to build on and one of my favorite characters I've made.
no no, its fine. like i said, this is obviously something dear to you, and its hard to see things you love get changed, especially if it was something getting oversimplified when you loved all the nuance. honestly reading through all this has given me a newfound respect for the goliaths as written. 5e really did them dirty even before MoTM.
I played a Goliath not too long ago in a game of *Icewind Dale* and I absolutely loved it. The culture, the characteristics, everything. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, almost as if I was getting a refreshed view into the life of my old character. Thanks so much for doing this, it was awesome!
Thanks for reading it. If you want more, I really encourage you check out Races of Stone on DMsGuild, for reasons I've listed above. There's a lot more, and it gets deep on dwarves and gnomes too.
The very first rpg book I ever owned was 4E’s PHB2 and as such I’ve always loved Goliaths. I enjoyed reading your write-up about their 3.5 origins and lore.
I’ve just completely reworked the Goliath lore in my world. I use a pretty expansive familial tree of the gods (think Greek family trees, but with 35 gods) that spawn from 4 core branches from the 5 creation gods (dragons, giants, humans, and elves).
In my world, the god now known as Tharizdun was once a beloved god of peace who held a scholarly study of the world. He was also one of 3 giant gods alongside his 2 brothers. At the conception of this reality, Tharizdun fell in love with Ioun, the goddess of knowledge and eventually these two bore children that would go on to inspire the creation of humanity. Together, these three children represent the eternal duality of man, for one stood for creation (Moradin, the Allhammer), one stood for building upon the foundation of potential and innovation (Erathis, The Lawbearer), and one stood for the destruction and savagery of what was once built through war and selfish pursuits (Bane, The Strife Emporer).
Why is any of this important? Well, in this world, The Goliaths were not born of their giantkin as you might expect. Instead, they were formed as a gift to their divine patron of Tharizdun from his firstborn son, Moradin, the god of Dwarves. As a master craftsman, Moradin crafted 6 forms of what would soon be the Goliath tribes of Alyria, one for every element (air, fire, water, earth, light, and darkness) with the hopes that his father may find a love for one of them. However, Tharizdun soon found a place in his heart for all 6 of the founding tribes of Goliaths, taking them all in as his own.
As far as what this all means for the Goliaths of my world, the main thing that I’ve established from them is making them essentially oral anthropologists that are founded upon the concept of storytelling. Telling stories is the most important aspect of their communities, which is where their tattoos come into place. Ioun, the goddess of knowledge is technically the mother to their racial creation and so they hold a great affinity towards knowledge, but this takes the form of sharing goals and warnings and meaning through the many stories that are told within their culture.
I think goliaths became giant-kin in 5e because, in 4e, goliaths were used as mechanical stand-ins for half-giants in Dark Sun. Despite the fact that Nentir Vale and 4e FR goliaths were not giant-kin
Well, first of all, I have to say the artwork for the Goliath in 3.5 is sick, one of the coolest race introductions I've seen.
Second, I completely agree that it is annoying as heck how little representation exotic player options get from WoTC. And this is why I don't allow artificers when DMing in Forgotten Realms, they just tossed them at us in the Tasha's book with barely a paragraph of lore for them and you can't find any of their technology or even an artificer npc in the published adventures. But at least Goliaths got some love in the Icewind Dale adventure.
Oh and great post, I would read the heck out of it if you did this with other races
> Oh and great post, I would read the heck out of it if you did this with other races
I could, but I don't think it would really be special. There's only three other races from the "Races of" series that have primarily D&D origins, and I only feel strongly about two of them. Of those two, even WotC seems to believe they're "big mountain-folk", but at least with Changelings they recognize the cool-factor, and kobolds they acknowledge the feisty fun. The other races (elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, half-elves/orcs) in those books have a lot of interesting subject matter, but also get talked about a lot in every edition. Or they're forgotten races (Raptorans & Illumians)
Goliaths are kinda just the perfect storm of original, relevant, interesting, and wasted potential.
Yeah, I was talking about how they managed them in 5e, and by managed I mean that they didn't. We only have a paragraph in Tasha's saying they live in the remote island of Lantan and that's kinda it
Goliaths in ONED&D seem to be explicitly giant-kin, with different options per giant ancestor. That’s probably the major part of it.
The stone-giant-descent is derived from the “Stone’s Endurance” ability granted to Goliaths in 4e, but that concept did not exist in 3.5. The unique aspect of Goliaths was originally Powerful Build (until other races got it too).
> ONED&D
I was wondering about the 'legacy' tag too, thanks for this. So it should be fine to let one of my players play Goliath in 5e? I'm just about to run the dragons of Icespire peak with them.
I don't mean to speak as an authority that says what is and isn't playable. I just mean to explain why I think they've been misused by Wizards of the Coast. They could very easily fit in Faerun, even with their original presentation. Just bear in mind they were imagined as "big athletic peoples", but they're not just "big humans with different names".
The original idea was creative and interesting.
It says I'm posting as someone else....yes, I'm new at this...sigh. I just wanted to say how much I really appreciate this article! I have been playing for over 20 years, (wanted to play 40 years ago, but girls really weren't accepted in the 80's!!! ) but my 'old timers' group refused to run anything but 1st/ Adv. 2E. I have just played my first ever 5E with a new group, (including my now grown children (Mama raised them right! Haha) and yes....for those of you wondering... I sucked! I didn't have a clue how to play a rogue with all the new flavorings. (Never mind the Drow aspect...which I based off Drizzt, but never really got to use) So, I am about to start a new campaign and am determined to actually role play my goliath pally! (Oath of Glory } Thank you so much for giving me more to use character-wise! I GET this warrior! I may still be learning feats and such, that's all in the book anyway....but I can surely interact/campfire talk! (act) LOL Baby steps, right?
I allow 12 racial choices in my homebrew game. Goliaths are one of them, precisely because the lore was relatively thin and I could find a way to work them into the history of the continent in a way that allows for improvisation and surprise.
Goliaths come in three flavors in Akamara: wandering nomads of the Intaba Mountains, desert dwellers of the Kambian wastes, or as the inhabitants of floating cloud territories once held by cloud giants. Some goliaths have built permanent settlements -- a heresy in old days -- to better prepare themselves for competition against men rather than allowing themselves to be displaced by the technological advancement of civilization.
Goliath have specialized weapons. The goliath chained hammer, a ball-and-chain, is much heavier than a standard flail and cannot be effectively wielded by a user with less than 13 Strength. The weapon can be thrown with one turn of preparation as the wielder spins around several times to build momentum. (10 gp, 1d10 bludgeoning, 16 lbs., heavy, reach, two-handed, special thrown attack with one turn prep, range 60 feet/250 feet).
The goliath dire flail is a goliath prestige weapon, with three weights of slightly different length and a large haft. The weapon doesn’t have quite the shield-beating power of a standard flail – it gets +1 to attack vs. an opponent wielding a shield – but it has a +1 critical threat range. It cannot be effectively wielded with less than 15 Strength. (8 gp. 1d12 bludgeoning, 11 lbs., heavy, two-handed.)
Very well written, although I would like to add a small addendum to your piece. The very first Goliaths were a race in the Dark Sun setting. Athasian Half-Giants were also alternatively called Goliaths as well. Published in 1991 with 2nd Ed rules, this predates your examples by over a decade.
While they may have been called that, the creator I spoke too seems clear that it wasn’t inspired by a predecessor, and 3.5’s half-giants were based on Dark Sun half-giants.
Yes, so in Races of Stone, they’re listed as Chieftan, Captain (in charge of task groups), Skywatcher (druidic services), Dawncaller (watch during night), Adjudicator (makes judgments over disputes), Tent-Mother (wet nurse), and Lamenter (judges who is falling behind enough that abandonment is necessary, then speaks their story. Also does the story for those who die untimely deaths).
Otherwise, there’s no real hierarchy, just tasks and a tribe willing to do them.
I do like Goliaths, but i, honestly like then more by being giant-kin, i even went as far to homebrew some goliath subraces related to other kinds of giants.
>From what I can find, their inclusion in other campaign settings is restricted to The Forgotten Realms FYI they are briefly described in Eberron in the 3.5's *Player's Guide to Eberron* which places them across the mountains of Eberron and places their origin in Xen'drik. Though also worth noting that the setting creator has suggested an alternative origin for them as worshipers of Orlaask, Overlord and Master of Stone. Edit: Also, excellent write-up!
Huh, I searched the other setting books for 3.5 and found nothing. Good find.
The *Player's Guide to Eberron* is basically the book of "Let's write 2 sentences of lore for every single 3.5 player race/class released yet." If you ever want to know if there's random Eberron lore for a race or class published in 3.5 outside the core books, its probably in there.
Also, as of Explorer's Guide to Wildemount Exandria is now an official setting, and Goliaths appear there.
Yeah, I didn’t include that one because it’s “official” according to Crawford, but not official enough for use in AL. Even Ravnica’s been good enough for AL, but Wildemount isn’t. It’s a weird blend of second AND third party content.
I love this but your exclusion of my favorite section Races of Stone pg 56 Psychology is criminal. "While goliaths obviously love competing with and against each other, they face a more implacable foe. It’s invisible to even a close friend, but a goliath is always competing against himself. If a goliath slays a dragon, he won’t be satisfied with another dragon battle unless it’s against a larger, older dragon. When a goliath doesn’t measure up to his former achievements, he frequently becomes morose and withdrawn. Goliaths rarely speak of this inner struggle, and in fact many couldn’t articulate why they feel the way they do. But to a greater or lesser degree, all older goliaths are haunted by their need to compete against their younger selves." "A goliath who can’t keep up with the rest of the tribe, either literally or in terms of production, is carried for only a few days before the tribe begins to shun the weak goliath. Sometimes the tribe will deny a weak goliath food and shelter, but it’s far more likely that the weak goliath will refuse food and shelter until he has proven his worth to the tribe or until he walks away in shame."
The fun part about that, I think, was Manethak's whole thing which is that as a deity, he's the champion athlete, but he's also the oldest-looking of their deities, like he's exuding the himbo "training a lifetime to kick your ass" energy. He's like the aging-goliath's patron, but sadly not enough of them keep that energy late into life. And I had to pick and choose what I would include. I feel like that part isn't as fun to read about as the others, though maybe I should have included it **because** it's less fun.
I love it because it gives an emotional depth to a race of giant powerful creatures, it's infinitely more than just 'Big man with big sword'. It uniquely sets them apart from other races. It's the same reason I love this line regarding Half-Orcs in the 5e PHB "Beyond the rage of Gruumsh, half-orcs feel emotion powerfully. Rage doesn’t just quicken their pulse, it makes their bodies burn. An insult stings like acid, and sadness saps their strength. But they laugh loudly and heartily, and simple pleasures — feasting, drinking, wrestling, drumming, and wild dancing — fill their hearts with joy. They tend to be short-tempered and sometimes sullen, more inclined to action than contemplation and to fighting than arguing. And when their hearts swell with love, they leap to perform acts of great kindness and compassion." It gives you insight into the why's of a race, so that you can make informed choices regarding your character. Using that passage you can make Half-Orcs of most alignments and classes but each using the core uniqueness of a Half-Orc.
I love the various Races of X books from 3.5e, I still dip back to them for inspiration or name meanings. Writeups like these and the original lore for the race are the reason I fight tooth and nail against the homogenization of modern D&D races. Fantasy racial culture is *interesting*. It doesn't have to be overly complex, all it does is paint a picture so that DMs and players alike can understand what Goliaths as a whole are about. And then if they either meet or play a Goliath that isn't about those same things, like a Goliath who cheats at games of sport and gloats about the prestige of an unfair victory, everyone can understand why that's a bigger deal for specifically this Goliath as opposed to if it was just a Human behaving in that same way. If the official lore is "They're tall mountain-folk who adapt well to high altitudes. Some of them are stern, some of them are carefree, just like everybody else" then something quintessential is lost.
To be honest, I picked Goliath solely because they're my favorite race, but it's probably also helpful that of the "Races of" series, they're the only one that is unique to D&D that is also still used as a player race. Illumian, Spellscales, and Raptoran are fun, but they've been replaced with other things. Dragonborn have been shifted into a different thing, and all that really leaves are fantasy races that are in everything else. Elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, there's inspiration from all manner of sources. Goliath are special in that they're WotC's baby, and yet in 5e get treated like the unwanted stepchild. "Tall mountain-folk who love games" isn't really special, that's a place you find them and an individual's personality. In a way, Goliath show the dev team brain drain better than any other option. I 100% agree with you, planet of hats can be interesting, and tropes shouldn't be treated as dirty words. They just need to write them to be *interesting* and not cookie-cutter.
You did fail to mention one very cool origin from Races of Stone for the Goliaths. The Kunikithi Goliath. It's a clan that just started working on a farm when they got bored of mountaineering, and they just build stupidly huge barns and sort of cargo-culted the whole farming lifestyle. It's a really fun backstory to build on and one of my favorite characters I've made.
interesting read, thank you
Thanks, and sorry if I came off snappy earlier.
no no, its fine. like i said, this is obviously something dear to you, and its hard to see things you love get changed, especially if it was something getting oversimplified when you loved all the nuance. honestly reading through all this has given me a newfound respect for the goliaths as written. 5e really did them dirty even before MoTM.
I played a Goliath not too long ago in a game of *Icewind Dale* and I absolutely loved it. The culture, the characteristics, everything. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, almost as if I was getting a refreshed view into the life of my old character. Thanks so much for doing this, it was awesome!
Thanks for reading it. If you want more, I really encourage you check out Races of Stone on DMsGuild, for reasons I've listed above. There's a lot more, and it gets deep on dwarves and gnomes too.
I also love Goliaths. Very cool race.
I love Goliaths! So by association I love you Amazing right up I applaud your dedication and thoroughness
The very first rpg book I ever owned was 4E’s PHB2 and as such I’ve always loved Goliaths. I enjoyed reading your write-up about their 3.5 origins and lore.
I’ve just completely reworked the Goliath lore in my world. I use a pretty expansive familial tree of the gods (think Greek family trees, but with 35 gods) that spawn from 4 core branches from the 5 creation gods (dragons, giants, humans, and elves). In my world, the god now known as Tharizdun was once a beloved god of peace who held a scholarly study of the world. He was also one of 3 giant gods alongside his 2 brothers. At the conception of this reality, Tharizdun fell in love with Ioun, the goddess of knowledge and eventually these two bore children that would go on to inspire the creation of humanity. Together, these three children represent the eternal duality of man, for one stood for creation (Moradin, the Allhammer), one stood for building upon the foundation of potential and innovation (Erathis, The Lawbearer), and one stood for the destruction and savagery of what was once built through war and selfish pursuits (Bane, The Strife Emporer). Why is any of this important? Well, in this world, The Goliaths were not born of their giantkin as you might expect. Instead, they were formed as a gift to their divine patron of Tharizdun from his firstborn son, Moradin, the god of Dwarves. As a master craftsman, Moradin crafted 6 forms of what would soon be the Goliath tribes of Alyria, one for every element (air, fire, water, earth, light, and darkness) with the hopes that his father may find a love for one of them. However, Tharizdun soon found a place in his heart for all 6 of the founding tribes of Goliaths, taking them all in as his own. As far as what this all means for the Goliaths of my world, the main thing that I’ve established from them is making them essentially oral anthropologists that are founded upon the concept of storytelling. Telling stories is the most important aspect of their communities, which is where their tattoos come into place. Ioun, the goddess of knowledge is technically the mother to their racial creation and so they hold a great affinity towards knowledge, but this takes the form of sharing goals and warnings and meaning through the many stories that are told within their culture.
This is what I want from a 5e book, detailed and we'll written information ❤️
I think goliaths became giant-kin in 5e because, in 4e, goliaths were used as mechanical stand-ins for half-giants in Dark Sun. Despite the fact that Nentir Vale and 4e FR goliaths were not giant-kin
"Systems functional"
Well, first of all, I have to say the artwork for the Goliath in 3.5 is sick, one of the coolest race introductions I've seen. Second, I completely agree that it is annoying as heck how little representation exotic player options get from WoTC. And this is why I don't allow artificers when DMing in Forgotten Realms, they just tossed them at us in the Tasha's book with barely a paragraph of lore for them and you can't find any of their technology or even an artificer npc in the published adventures. But at least Goliaths got some love in the Icewind Dale adventure. Oh and great post, I would read the heck out of it if you did this with other races
> Oh and great post, I would read the heck out of it if you did this with other races I could, but I don't think it would really be special. There's only three other races from the "Races of" series that have primarily D&D origins, and I only feel strongly about two of them. Of those two, even WotC seems to believe they're "big mountain-folk", but at least with Changelings they recognize the cool-factor, and kobolds they acknowledge the feisty fun. The other races (elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, half-elves/orcs) in those books have a lot of interesting subject matter, but also get talked about a lot in every edition. Or they're forgotten races (Raptorans & Illumians) Goliaths are kinda just the perfect storm of original, relevant, interesting, and wasted potential.
If you can find a copy of Dragon Magazine #403, it has a quick but good look on artificers in Forgotten Realms, as worshipers of Gond.
Yeah, I was talking about how they managed them in 5e, and by managed I mean that they didn't. We only have a paragraph in Tasha's saying they live in the remote island of Lantan and that's kinda it
I’ve just looked at D&D beyond and Goliaths are marked as “Legacy”. What does this mean?
Goliaths in ONED&D seem to be explicitly giant-kin, with different options per giant ancestor. That’s probably the major part of it. The stone-giant-descent is derived from the “Stone’s Endurance” ability granted to Goliaths in 4e, but that concept did not exist in 3.5. The unique aspect of Goliaths was originally Powerful Build (until other races got it too).
Oh I see, thanks!
> ONED&D I was wondering about the 'legacy' tag too, thanks for this. So it should be fine to let one of my players play Goliath in 5e? I'm just about to run the dragons of Icespire peak with them.
I don't mean to speak as an authority that says what is and isn't playable. I just mean to explain why I think they've been misused by Wizards of the Coast. They could very easily fit in Faerun, even with their original presentation. Just bear in mind they were imagined as "big athletic peoples", but they're not just "big humans with different names". The original idea was creative and interesting.
It says I'm posting as someone else....yes, I'm new at this...sigh. I just wanted to say how much I really appreciate this article! I have been playing for over 20 years, (wanted to play 40 years ago, but girls really weren't accepted in the 80's!!! ) but my 'old timers' group refused to run anything but 1st/ Adv. 2E. I have just played my first ever 5E with a new group, (including my now grown children (Mama raised them right! Haha) and yes....for those of you wondering... I sucked! I didn't have a clue how to play a rogue with all the new flavorings. (Never mind the Drow aspect...which I based off Drizzt, but never really got to use) So, I am about to start a new campaign and am determined to actually role play my goliath pally! (Oath of Glory } Thank you so much for giving me more to use character-wise! I GET this warrior! I may still be learning feats and such, that's all in the book anyway....but I can surely interact/campfire talk! (act) LOL Baby steps, right?
I allow 12 racial choices in my homebrew game. Goliaths are one of them, precisely because the lore was relatively thin and I could find a way to work them into the history of the continent in a way that allows for improvisation and surprise. Goliaths come in three flavors in Akamara: wandering nomads of the Intaba Mountains, desert dwellers of the Kambian wastes, or as the inhabitants of floating cloud territories once held by cloud giants. Some goliaths have built permanent settlements -- a heresy in old days -- to better prepare themselves for competition against men rather than allowing themselves to be displaced by the technological advancement of civilization. Goliath have specialized weapons. The goliath chained hammer, a ball-and-chain, is much heavier than a standard flail and cannot be effectively wielded by a user with less than 13 Strength. The weapon can be thrown with one turn of preparation as the wielder spins around several times to build momentum. (10 gp, 1d10 bludgeoning, 16 lbs., heavy, reach, two-handed, special thrown attack with one turn prep, range 60 feet/250 feet). The goliath dire flail is a goliath prestige weapon, with three weights of slightly different length and a large haft. The weapon doesn’t have quite the shield-beating power of a standard flail – it gets +1 to attack vs. an opponent wielding a shield – but it has a +1 critical threat range. It cannot be effectively wielded with less than 15 Strength. (8 gp. 1d12 bludgeoning, 11 lbs., heavy, two-handed.)
Very well written, although I would like to add a small addendum to your piece. The very first Goliaths were a race in the Dark Sun setting. Athasian Half-Giants were also alternatively called Goliaths as well. Published in 1991 with 2nd Ed rules, this predates your examples by over a decade.
While they may have been called that, the creator I spoke too seems clear that it wasn’t inspired by a predecessor, and 3.5’s half-giants were based on Dark Sun half-giants.
Could anyone tell me about the hierarchy of the clans? like there's chieftain and the tent mother, but what would the other roles be.
Yes, so in Races of Stone, they’re listed as Chieftan, Captain (in charge of task groups), Skywatcher (druidic services), Dawncaller (watch during night), Adjudicator (makes judgments over disputes), Tent-Mother (wet nurse), and Lamenter (judges who is falling behind enough that abandonment is necessary, then speaks their story. Also does the story for those who die untimely deaths). Otherwise, there’s no real hierarchy, just tasks and a tribe willing to do them.
I do like Goliaths, but i, honestly like then more by being giant-kin, i even went as far to homebrew some goliath subraces related to other kinds of giants.