D&D MONSTER RANKINGS - GIANTS & BIG MONSTERS
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- čas přidán 23. 10. 2023
- Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants is a skinny bestiary that contains humongous creatures, namely giants, giants-turned-into-other-things, creatures that are almost giants, and creatures that are just big.
This book contains some new design approaches for 5e Dungeons & Dragons, but are they for the better? In this ranking I scrutinize the various monster entries and rate them accordingly. D&D is approaching its 50th anniversary, and are books like this one carrying it to its more glorious state yet, or dragging it down into the mire of over-commercialized pop sludge?
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I really hate how WotC hide behind "giving the DM creative freedom" as an excuse to be lazy. Nothing was stopping us from homebrewing before. But now, we *have* to homebrew because the official creators of the game refuse to put in more than the bare minimum effort.
I swear the suits are legitimately afraid people are too stupid to know that the referee can change any part of existing lore if they wish.
EXACTLY
Yeah, it's really bad. Funnily enough, I've started playing Pathfinder 1e, a game that affords a crazy amount of creative space to players and GMs alike, including rules on how to create your own races and monsters, while also giving a lot of rule support, advice, etc. heard PF2E has even more support for GMs.
@@The13thGhostBunnysavage worlds is superior
@@The13thGhostBunny 2E takes a lot from 5E and leans in to bounded accuracy and restricted player freedoms.
"Here, have some prone condition" is actually a pretty funny taunt to say to someone you're about to knock down.
Indeed i can see a cocky Giant Prince saying that as a taunt
@@LordDany "You dare come to MY court making demands? The only thing you shall have in here is the prone condition!"
@@Zarnagel yes 🤣🤣🤣 that is just perfect situational comedy
@@Zarnagel should i give you the prone condition or should i eat you.
Questions a hill giant
@@LordDany - not "eat you". Give you an "eaten" condition. "Eat you" would lay bad with vegetarians, I guess.
Book: you has prone condition.
Scroodge Mcduck: Bah!
I need to bring back the Scrooge clip.
@@esperthebard ye should, it's a classic!
@@MawsParasite2 I've gotten away from putting in little video clips these past several months. I felt like they sort of distracted from the focus or the tone. But maybe they were for the better after all.
So a small note, while doing research for the book bigby was accidentally crushed and while there wasn’t a cleric with revivify around there was a Druid with reincarnation available that’s why he’s a gnome now. It’s not a retcon it’s a small advancement in a classic character’s story that makes some sense.
It's weird when people demand change, but then immediately complain that change was made.
Some of these could have been beasts but they didn’t want Druids to wildshape into them because that would be to fun
I’ve been saying that for the longest time when it comes to fifth edition, there are far too many monstrosities that are just simple big insects.
That’s why I use monstrosity as a sub-tag, it just doesn’t work well otherwise for me.
I HATE FEY, I HATE FEY, I HATE FEY-
Clearly we need a class that can wildshape into things like giants.
@@julius9943 I don't hate fey but look at them and tell me wizard of the coast isn't calling them fey, so that players can't wild shape into them! If they wanted more fey (which they should because the amount is laughable). They should give us some true fey and not this cate keeping
With this book, the war between Rock & Roll Fantasy and Cocomelon Fantasy rages on.
I'm going to use the term Cocomelon fantasy somewhere 😂
@@esperthebard Thank you for standing up to Cocomelon DnD, Esper!
Please explain either. What exactly is "Rock & Roll Fantasy"? And what is "Cocomelon Fantasy" at all?
@@ismirdochegal4804 an example, monsters of the multiverse Minotaur vs Ravnica Minotaur race art.
One is overly goofy and cartoonish. Like clarabelle from Disney playing as a swashbuckler. The other is fierce, intimidating and intense. A depiction of a true Minotaur in all its glory. It’s like comparing a Siberian wolf to a miniature husky wearing a sweater.
Cocomelon fantasy is putting monocles on dragons and top hats on orcs and trying to take that seriously.
Rock and roll fantasy or old school fantasy is really how DnD or fantasy was up until they started making these artistic decisions. Surely there’s better titles for these style clashes. But so far they work.
The Dinosures make my monky brain light up.
I like that the Giant Ox is blue.
It's a nice lil reference to Paul Bunyan and his giant blue ox
The wording change comes from OneDnD, where everything is worded this way. "Gains X condition" instead of "target is X". I suppose GotG is a transition-phase book for them, so they already switched. I expect more of this new terminology in all future releases. Same for the new planescape book.
Yes. I think he knows that. But the wording is afwully bland.
I'm not gonna lie, if I found out a tick the size of a boar existed in our world, I think I would just end it right then and there because this would not be a world I want to live in.
It's called a wife.
Ha ha, very fun- wait, are you talking about ending the tick or the world?! 😐
@@haillobster7154 Myself.
Long time subscriber here. I LOVE your videos, Esper! They provided me a lot of entertainment and inspiration over the years. Listing to your monster rankings is truly a joy and a comfort. Hope you keep making videos, and your adventures are many!
Much love right back at ya!
When I hear people say "It's not too bad" I hear it as "It's just bad enough."
When you started the frostmourn segment, my initial thought was that it would be an undead frost giant who died from despair, suicide, or some similar tragedy. That gave me a really cool idea for a unique undead creature, more of an NPC than a monster. It would be some form of spirit similar to a ghost, formed from the tormented soul of an intelligent creature who committed suicide while there were still mortals who cared for them. Cursed for the pain and torment it brought to the people who loved it in life, the spirit must endure until there are none left alive who mourn its death, trying desperately to comfort or console them while being barred from allowing them to know the dead creature's spirit endures. The same curse would force the undead to suffer the pain of the living creatures it is spiritually bonded to. It seems like it would be a very compelling NPC that is rich with possible adventure hooks and plot lines, from why it chose death to how the party can ease the suffering of those who are unwittingly keeping it bound to its semblance of life.
My wife has been razzing me for years, saying that my “offense” taken from boring language was singular. Thank you for putting that pet in the episode.
A barrow is a burial hill or grave, so that is the hill giant connection to the name. Barrow wights not having more connection to their hills is the oddity, if anything.
I actually have a player that is planing on making a Firbolge Eldritch Knight for the next campign, and he wants to focus much more on the fact that his people are Giant Kin. So yeah, this video came on a good time, and while I sense that this book has it's flaws, I can't help but love some of it's ideas. I mean we haven't even gotten to the mutated troll and that thing had me do a double take; it was already badass enough that we had the Dire Troll!
Property late to this now buy have ypu told him about rune knights? I like the idea of using the runes to study the lost history of their kin. Idk just a thought
please never stop being mad about the new stupid corporate wording 👍
When you showed the altisaur art I suddenly remembered that this is the book that had the controversy of using AI-generated art.
That explains why only secondary art makes the dinosaurs not like garbage.
The one thing I was glad to see was the really high CR creatures, and it seems like they are finally understanding how massive enemies would have passive abilities and other obvious effects, however I really hate the no Legendary Actions
The no legendary actions thing is so weird to me. Like they saw the action oriented monster video of matt colville and their takeaway was : "yeah, legendary actions should be replaced with already existing mechanics we’ve been ignoring"
@@lechevalier-ns2pt I wouldn't be surprised if that was true!
I left 5e and I couldn't care less, but your videos are too good to be ignored so I'll watch it anyway!
Excellent. I'm on the edge of my seat waiting for part 2
I love these rankings so much I'm ruing the day he runs out of monsters
Great video bro. Always enjoy these rankings, even if I disagree on some. God bless, homie.
Love these vids and your commentary. Oh, and the heavy metal background music. Perfect!
Sorry, I was gone for a bit. I was so happy to see you made some new videos.
I have my hardcover on pre order. Thanks for the monsterous heroes update
"Good sir! The diagnosis came in and I regret to inform you, thatyou indeed have the prone condition"
Been wanting to get into D&D for so long but could never get my friend group to commit. Baldur's Gate 3 has been my outlet and your videos have been absolutely amazing. Keep up the great work!
"may i supply you with some more prone, good sir?"
"oh yes thank you, sir - top-up my prone"
i agree on the passive-voice critique lol
Been binge watching your monster ranking and make me want you to have your own monster making series or redesign monster or hell even another book i love the book you made
there's a lot of great DnD channels but this one is becoming my favorite
I love storm crab art. There is something enjoyable in dragonturtle running for its dear live.
Always enjoy your rankings, Esper. If I were to have designed a giant for this book, I would’ve made something based on Ultraman. I’m thinking of calling them Star Giants.
Woohoo! another banger of a video by Esper. I STILL havent played ONE game of D&D in my life but I enjoy so much the lore and how you break it down. Awesome you gave TMBG their due, but Stone Cold is a dull song imo... why not 'I'm Impressed', "Larger Than Life" or even "Boss of Me"?
Particle Man is an odd choice as well, when there is 'Snowball in Hell', "Reprehensible", "Take Out the Trash", or "Don't Let's Start!" to choose from!
Friendly reminder, never pull off a tick! It will end badly for you. Strike a match, blow out the flame, and prod the tick with it. The tick will release you of its own accord.
What are you complaining ... the Glory of the Giants references directly to the price tag.
A giant-sized dose of quality from The Bard.
"Has prone" sounds like some video-gameified language. D&D is much more than that, and this is coming from someone who plays video games and is learning about the D&D universe.
My man came out swinging today haha.
I’m using this video to determine whether I should buy this book. I value your opinions on DnD a lot!
I'm working on part 2, which will be even longer. It gets into some pretty cool monsters.
@@esperthebard looking forward to it!
Fun fact: all lions are spotted. It's just that their spots are really faint and only visible upon close examination or under certain light conditions
Like black panthers are really blue leopards.
@erroneous6947 Black panthers are actually _any_ member of the Panthera genus with melanism.
Altisaur is so cool, that was my favorite. It's so beautiful
I like Gigant being a bit of reference to Mothra. I wish they'd include more kaiju references in this book
So far, I'm liking this. The cycles are pretty cool and creatives. Using the Ixalan names for the dinosaurs is a little odd, but the monsters are conceptionally cool, and megafauna-sized mammals are always fun to me.
My only real gripe is that same "have the prone condition wording." It sounds too mechanical. Like it was written by a computer programmer instead of a writer.
Yayyyyy, it’s here
Glad to see the Maw of Yeenoghu, I was wondering how she was doing.
2 ideas off the top of my head for barrowghast:
1. Adventurers infiltrating a giant's fortress somehow get word of a Mouth of Grolantor being kept starved within a warded off chamber. Thoughts that they could deny their foe an ally or even secure themselves an ally by freeing them off they go to free the beast. Only when they finally open the chamber it is no living hill giant they find but a Barrowghast, starved past the point of death by the local giant chief's attempt to harness the Mouth and then sealed away when he reanimated.
2. Adventurers looking for aid against some great threat (lets call it a lich and his undead swarm) get word that there is a fortress of hill giants in some remote mountain valley. So off they go only to find there is a swarm of undead surrounding said fortress and the halls themselves are dark, yet the walls still stand strong. Thinking smartly the adventurers manage to sneak their way into the fortress only to find out the worst had happened, for while the undead swarm outside never managed to breach the walls they did deny the giants the ability to leave. So now the players are trapped in fortress of giant's filled with an entire clan's worth of Barrowghasts.
10:22 is the 3rd one. People wanted monsters to do more interesting things (and a little more damage), so they complied without making many of the weapons they use work as efficiently for the players. Players have their own items, after all.
I've been watching these rankings literally for years now. They're my only inroad to DnD beyond the Baldur's Gate games. I've never been too interested in actually playing tabletop, but these videos really get me into the setting and into tabletop design. I just wish wotc didn't try to homogenize and water down such a rich game.
Did you say "pray on a Dragon Turtle"? Dragon Turtles have predators? Omg
15:45 So it's like the Gray Philosopher undead, obsessed with one thing instead of retaining it's mind. Got it
Obviously this is going to get buried, but the "MAGIC WEAPONS" trait has been axed since monsters of the Multiverse
The "has the prone condition" sounds like they're avoiding the natural language of 5e and trying to crib the keyword centric style of older editions and pathfinder
That Altisaur is awesome. 🦕 🌋
2:09 - Your ratings... for this one... are They Might Be GIANTS songs?! Perfection.
5:40 Sensitivity reading/editing a.k.a. the death of fun
Regular lions don't have spots because they live in the Savannah - which is mostly brown with tall grasses. They are perfectly camouflaged for their environment. It wouldn't surprise me if the spots were to help it blend into mountainous redwood or pine forests that would provide it sufficient cover to perform ambush predation like most great cats prefer.
weird question, with the maw of yeeboghu if it hit's you with a ranged tooth attack does that count as being bit?
I don't mean for the purposes of a life drain like a vampire. This isn't a question of mechanics, this is a question of philosophy and what it means to be bit.
I can hear the "you have the prone" with Yoda's voice 😂 this phrasing sounds so silly
I’m curious, now that 5.1 is coming soon are you going to update your class rankings?
Probably so
I bequeath to you the condition of prone!
You know, I would like to see a video like this, but of your favorite book, weather it be some other DnD book or another system. Just so I can get some perspective on what the greatest is like.
Just wanna mention, esper the bard is such a cool name
A lot of the dinosaur monsters in here are named after MTG dinosaurs
They sure are. Tell me, O barbarian, what do you think of the lore about dinosaurs and giants living peacefully together as the best of friends?
@@esperthebard I hate when things live together in peace, it makes for such boring story telling.
I feel like the Aerosaur could do with a look closer to actual pterosaurs than it is the leathery, pointy-winged bird monsters of yestercentury. Not because I'm a stickler for scientific accuracy in depictions of prehistoric life - this is a fantasy game, afterall - but because I feel like the aesthetic could nicely slot into the role of a thunderbird without directly appropriating it from Native American belief.
I wonder how often Mouth's of Grolantor end up becoming Maw's of Yeenoghu
The writer in me find removing “knocked prone” a miss, but the former 5e Homebrewer in me out weighs it, celebrating a new ways to cut word count in the inefficient grammar of 5e stat block design.
I value efficiency quite a bit, but soul and strength are more important.
@@esperthebard soul is best served in the monster description and Strength in cramming in as many fun game mechanics in the limited space you have. It may feel strong at first, but monster stat blocks are not for the Player eyes, and fluff words lose appeal when franticly scanning through 2 to 5 different pages during encounters.
@@stephenlucas8836 Check out 4th edition. All the character classes and monsters had completely efficient, technical verbiage to their traits/powers, and it sucked the soul right out of the game and made it feel mechanical.
@@esperthebard looking at soul within competitors. By minimizing the space generic and repetitive ability’s take up, you get way more writing space to write more lore and new abilities that are actually interesting. You complain about 4e statblock but it had the problem of thinking too inside the box and other clunky game design problems while basic 5e attacks take up 2 lines to write. Me stealing from pathfinder 2e design, cutting down my repetitive word count gave me space to write about the things that matters. Ever bemoan having to cut a monster’s abilities because it takes up a page and a half? And have that problem reapeatly? Key wording reacuring abilities are a life saver when dealing with the hike of paper prices even if part of a mega corp that refuse to give you proper funding.
@@esperthebard clearing what i actually believe more: cut down and keyword recurring phrases. 5e is guilty of spelling out ablites too much and not trusting DMs with remembering more conditions. How great to free up more space to make monster feel less bland if we made a keyword for continuous damage or swallowing instead of 3 sentences of text
To explain the stone giant club, the bludgeoning damage is regular damage, and the thunder would be magical. As if the outer "crust" of the weapon is not magical, and the inner "core" is
Im so happy i stopped playing 5e when I did
Despite having moved to better grounds for a game, (pathfinder 2e at the moment) i really enjoy your videos and insights.
titanotheres are very similar to the brontotheres, a group of rhinos with 2 spade like horns that lived during the eocene period 56-33.9 million years ago, so right before the last ice age.
So overall how do you feel about the concept of giants being empowered by different magic sauces.
Torag survives in Pathfinder as the patron god of dwarves.
4:22 ( *notices Mammoth skull the size of it's paw* )
Only double, you say...
Wouldnt it make more sense for the Elemental Evil Frost Giant to be dedicated to Cryonax, the prince of cold. And Olhydra to have aquatic storm giants instead?
I don't like how the Hulks having a stronger connection to the elements makes them less of a Giant. They literally have their elements in their names! In Volo's it makes it sound like the Giants were originally crafted from the elements themselves!
For f tier that elk thing is pretty neat
6:23
So big it covered the rating icons. God damm.
I can already imagine running an Evangelion-style campaign where it’s one gargantuan monstrosity after another, and the only way to slay them is to carefully outmaneuver their unique defenses.
I do wish there would be some kinda rule that when a monster reaches such size that conventional attacks simply won’t work. You can’t just poke its foot until it dies; you need to attack a specific weak point or overcome a certain damage threshold.
Or get creative. Do stuff like attacking it from the inside, like with the gordiant (aka sir om nom nom) from lost planet 2.
The wording change likely has to do with their whole vtt. Think of it like programming, "x
Particle Man - should be the S tier song IMHO ...then again, you are the one with a successful CZcams channel so....
The songs aren't ranked, they're just flavor text. Particle Man, being so tiny and small and weak, is the lowest in a ranking of giants. But in terms of how much I enjoy the songs, yeah it's my favorite of the six.
have you seen chains of asmodeus?
Lol the giant ox gives me Paul bunyon vibes
I guess this book was writen by an AI.
I don’t care about the giants. I just want my own laser scythe.
22:04 - funny thing. In my native language, Polish, gigant means giant, so... When I first saw it, my brain lagged. XD
Yep, almost same thing in portuguese, only missing an E in the end
@@LeRodz gigant gigante ... que coisa hein?
I saw the giant ox and thought of Babe of Paul Bunyan
The KarenWhite looks like a hard time to deal with.🤪
on the undead hill giant, how about the name Hillghougheist
I can imagine a hill giant saying that.
Sending adventurers to take down a friend that was lost for a while but came back wrong.
Unlikely i know for a hill giant to give a quest, but still, the prospect of a hill giant owning a favor to the party has its benefits, i imagine a hill giant in serious despair losing his friend and having he turned into that
As far as i can remember hill giants don't have many friends, so i figure that would require an unorthodox aproach.
That sounds awesome. Also adds more depth to hill giants.
Good taste in heavy metal
hello, I can't preorder the digital version of Monstrous Heroes, only the physical version, is it normal ? I'm reeeeeally interested of your book
Are you looking at the preorder on Backerkit? There should be a pdf only option.
@@esperthebard do you have a link please, I'm actualy on kickstarter and don't find it in digital form
@@kira68200 On the kickstarter page there is a button that says "preorder", which takes you here: monstrous-heroes-5e-monster-classes.backerkit.com/hosted_preorders
This preorder site has the hardcover version, pdf version, and some other products of mine. Thank you very much!
@@esperthebard okay, I get the digital one now, thanks to you for that :)
@@kira68200 You're very welcome, thank you too!
I only buy 3rd party content, like yours, because WotC isn't worth supporting.
Instead of using the term evil earth wouldn't it be better to call it corrupted or tarnished earth? I agree with you Esper it feels as tho the writing was written from A.I
The reason why it's called that is because way back when the princes were revealed they called them Elemental Evils, why I don't know but they chose that. But also, I do agree that it is a dumb name
A CR11 Crab hunting down dragon turtles???????
Imma homebrew the dinosaurs
Me see new animals. Can't wait to wild shape into them... THEY AREN'T ANIMALS! Biggest let down. Would have made them so much more versitalie
Didn’t realize they completely changed Bigby… Now I’m definitely not buying the book.
To the seven seas, lads!
bigby okay I always thought biggby should have been especially if you was retcon to be a fat goblin jazz musician that this has a lot of crazy powerful spells that would have been a fun redcon not whatever they just showed.
The spot thing is due to were they hunt the only reason lions are golden is the color of the grass they hide in
I mean lore is cool and such. But as an experianced Game Master, I don't neet so much of it. I want to have the monster ready to use for their mechanics, so that I do not have to come up with and tweak a monster.
Lorewise a monster is whatever I say it is in my world.
E.G.: In my Ravnic Campaign there are no Dwarfs, no Duergar und no Gnolls. I use these monsters anyway for their mechanics.
The Duergar a Simic Hybrids that can use the enlarge spell stored upon them. The gnolls are minotaurs that gore and slam instead of bite and claw. Damage values and damage types stay the same. No work for me at all.
Wait so the hulk monsters..are giants that are exposed to the elemental planes.... ISNT THAT WHAT THEY WERE TO BEING WITH????