D&D 5E New Unearthed Arcana Today: Giant Themed Class Options and Feats

A new Unearthed Arcana dropped today, focusing on giant-themed player options. "In today’s Unearthed Arcana, we explore character options related to the magic and majesty of giants. This playtest document presents the Path of the Giant barbarian subclass, the Circle of the Primeval druid subclass, the Runecrafter wizard subclass, and a collection of new feats, all for use in Dungeons & Dragons."

Giant Options | Unearthed Arcana | Dungeons & Dragons

Explore character options related to the magic and majesty of giants! This playtest document presents new subclasses for the barbarian, druid, and wizard, and a collection of new feats, all for use in Dungeons & Dragons.

dnd.wizards.com

New Class options:

• Barbarian: Path of the Giant
• Druid: Circle of the Primeval
• Wizard: Runecrafter Tradition

New Feats:

• Elemental Touched
• Ember of the Fire Giant
• Fury of the Frost Giant
• Guile of the Cloud Giant
• Keeness of the Stone Giant
• Outsized Might
• Rune Carver Apprentice
• Rune Carvwr Adept
• Soul of the Storm Giant
• Vigor of the Hill Giant

WotC's Jeremy Crawford talks Barbarian Path of the Giant here:

 

[Tonguez]

This should be a good opportunity to flesh out the lacking Titan tag from the MM. We could have Empyrean based on various divine domains. Or Then we had elemental titans, who are pretty much the Giant equivalent of elder wyrms. Something like: Pyroclastic Lord, Thundering Warlord, Quake Shaman, Rimequeen etc, CR 20+ nearly divine elemental humanoids.

oh I like that

IMC the term ‘Storm Giant’ actually refers to a group of legendary Giant Elementalist who were powerful enough to battle gods and dragons (so Pyroclastic Titan and Thundering Warlord would work as names)

 

[Mecheon]

I think a lot of this purely giant-related theorising is missing that the Druid class is dinosaur/ice age critter themed. While giants would probably be a part, I doubt theyt're gonna 'Draconomicon but for giants' it. Moreso 'prehistoric world where giants play an important role but there's other stuff'

(I still want saurials. WotC please just give me the dinosaur people)

 

[Parmandur]

I think a lot of this purely giant-related theorising is missing that the Druid class is dinosaur/ice age critter themed. While giants would probably be a part, I doubt theyt're gonna 'Draconomicon but for giants' it. Moreso 'prehistoric world where giants play an important role but there's other stuff'

(I still want saurials. WotC please just give me the dinosaur people)

Dinosaurs and prehistoric Critters are part of D&D, and tying them to Primordials is logical.

 

[Tonguez]

I think a lot of this purely giant-related theorising is missing that the Druid class is dinosaur/ice age critter themed. While giants would probably be a part, I doubt theyt're gonna 'Draconomicon but for giants' it. Moreso 'prehistoric world where giants play an important role but there's other stuff'

(I still want saurials. WotC please just give me the dinosaur people)

i feel that if they were going to do a Prehistoric/Primordial world book then the UA would have given us Saurials or at least variant Lizardfolk. The fact that it was Giant themed plus giant beasts kinda suggest Prehistoric isnt the theming the wanted (or maybe we’re getting two different books from this) …

 

[SkidAce]

(I still want saurials. WotC please just give me the dinosaur people)

Yeah, I need a template for my Carnifex.

 

[Faolyn]

i feel that if they were going to do a Prehistoric/Primordial world book then the UA would have given us Saurials or at least variant Lizardfolk. The fact that it was Giant themed plus giant beasts kinda suggest Prehistoric isnt the theming the wanted (or maybe we’re getting two different books from this) …

What if we get another UA in a few weeks with saurials in it? Back before Xanathar's was published, we were getting UAs every week or so.

 

[Parmandur]

i feel that if they were going to do a Prehistoric/Primordial world book then the UA would have given us Saurials or at least variant Lizardfolk. The fact that it was Giant themed plus giant beasts kinda suggest Prehistoric isnt the theming the wanted (or maybe we’re getting two different books from this) …

I'd say it suggests that what we would call "Prehistoric" animals appropriate to a Loat World tripe are related to the Elemental Primordials, just like Druids or Giants.

 

[Parmandur]

What if we get another UA in a few weeks with saurials in it? Back before Xanathar's was published, we were getting UAs every week or so.

Or why not both...?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I think Undead are. Maybe even Aberrations or Fiends. A Demonomicon or Undead monster book would be really easy to fill up with ideas from previous editions. Aberrations would be easy to just invent even more alien creatures that are invading the Material Plane from the Far Realm.

None of those hold a candle to dragons. People love dragons.

Personally I find D&D dragons to be just about the most boring version of dragons I’ve ever seen, but still, even I have a few dragon types and dragon stories I really like using.


One of these days I’ll put in more work on my Islands World game, where dragons are only the mythic wyrms, and they’re big enough that fighting them is more like navigating a hazardous terrain while solving a physical puzzle, but you also gotta stab it.

Drakes and wyverns abound, but dragons are something you whisper about and hope to never encounter. Even the “good” dragons are “fear with no save” scary.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

You really seem to hate D&D. I mean, seriously hate, despise and loathe it. Like, this is passionate. Spending so much time talking about something you have nothing but rabid hate and contempt for might not be good for your mental well-beiung.

Mod Note:

Regardless of the accuracy of your point, this is right on the edge of making a discussion about the poster and not the posts. Let’s step back from this precipice, please.