Agianst the Giants

[Chaldfont]

I ran this one about a year ago in my 3.5 campaign. I think we had 3 12th level PCs with an NPC hireling. The players, knowing this was an "old school" adventure got really cagey. I've never seen them plan so much. They did hit and run tactics, assassinating lone giants and leaving their bodies as warnings to strike fear into their foes. They made multi-pronged attacks. They did strategic retreats to set up killing grounds. They dropped an avalanche spell on them. It was a blast!

But it was not completely one-sided. The giants tracked the party back to their instant fortress. They sent in a pack of gnolls while a number of giants rained boulders down on the magical fortress, doing it serious damange (which I think scared the PCs more than losing HP, do you realize how HARD it is to repair an instant fortess?).

 

[Garnfellow]

Seriously? Almost every group I have ever DM'd always storms the Great Hall. They all try crazy tactics and such when they do, but inevitably they always do.

Converting the Great Hall into 3e was a big dilemna for me. Was this encounter meant to be a winnable, if difficult room for the PCs? Or was this encounter designed to be an over the top trap to wipe out the foolhardy?

In the end, I elected to convert the hall as the latter -- I was gearing the whole Steading for an 8th level party, and in the end my conversion of the Great Hall was EL 16, or total suicide.

Upon further reflection, I think that Gygax's original intention was for the PCs to be able to successfully attack the Great Hall. In The Dragon 19 there is an interesting account from the players in the original G1-2-3 tournament, and they were able to beat down all the giants with a bit of luck and clever play. Based on this and Henry's report, I would convert that room differently if I were to do it today -- a few less hill giants, probably no cloud giant, maybe a lot less ogres. I'd aim for something 4 EL above the party's level: very, very, difficult, but not hopeless.

 

[Crothian]

The PCs did a masterful job getting into the Hall without raising an alarm.

I think my players would cry if they read that. There was a single powerful giant out front and they engaged him with normal loud spells and that warned the place they were coming. They snuck in, found the giant hiding and fought him but not quietly. A few giants came in to reinforce it and sounded the horn. The King talked to them some and then set off another alarm and the giants came in hoardes. THe king watched from his thrown, many many giants and hell hounds died but the group took big hits. They are well above the level they should be to go in here being 14-15th level. Their tactics though tend to be rush the danger which works for them.

 

[D'karr]

hello hounds

New Hasbro toy line to compete against Hello Kitty...

 

[Garnfellow]

I think my players would cry if they read that. There was a single powerful giant out front and they engaged him with normal loud spells and that warned the place they were coming. They snuck in, found the giant hiding and fought him but not quietly. A few giants came in to reinforce it and sounded the horn. The King talked to them some and then set off another alarm and the giants came in hoardes. THe king watched from his thrown, many many giants and hello hounds died but the group took big hits. They are well above the level they should be to go in here being 14-15th level. Their tactics though tend to be rush the danger which works for them.

Well, this was after what felt like 8 million sessions of my PCs banging their heads against the Glacial Rift of the Frost Giant Jarl. I just could not seem to get them to adopt any other tactics beyond a straight-up, head-on assault, right through the main entrance, followed by a series of cave to cave fights until they couldn't fight anymore, and then the inevitable retreat. Every time they went back into the Rift through the main entrance I added more giants and more traps. But every time the PCs did the same thing, each time maybe pushing 1 additional room in before having to retreat. Needless to say, progress was very slow.

I had to start bringing the interesting monsters to them. Eventually I had the white dragons waiting in ambush at the entrance of the Rift, but even that didn't make the PCs do anything different. But their slow slog began taking its toll, though. The Jarl started running out of reinforcements and ordered an evacation of most of the non-combatants via the secrat exit tunnel. His wife and the fire giant visitors were sent on to Snurre's Hall with most of the frost giant loot.

I swear it was like 5 or 6 session before the PCs finally got to the lower levels of the Rift. I tried dropping all sorts of hints, I even sent them a JPG overview shot of the Glacial Rift, found on the back of the original module, in the hope that they would start considering finding an alternate way down in there. Some rope and a few Survival checks, and they easily could have avoided a lot of trouble. But nooooooo.

So I was very pleasantly surprised to see them play so well in the fire giant hall. I think I put the fear of Hextor into them by having their patron (actually a disguised drow priestess of Lolth) give them a stern warning that the fire giants were going to be much larger, tougher, and smarter than any they had fought before.

 

[zoroaster100]

Was there a 3.0 or 3.5 conversion or conversion notes floating around on the internet (maybe even on this site) a way back? I seem to remember downloading such a thing to run my old classics with the new rules, but I can't remember where I saved it. Is it still floating about somewhere that someone could point me to?

 

[Garnfellow]

Was there a 3.0 or 3.5 conversion or conversion notes floating around on the internet (maybe even on this site) a way back? I seem to remember downloading such a thing to run my old classics with the new rules, but I can't remember where I saved it. Is it still floating about somewhere that someone could point me to?

Yup, Daniel R. Collins had a really nice 3.0 conversion that I believe is still in the EnWorld conversion library. I used his work as a basis for a 3.5 conversion with regressed true giants.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Interesting former experiences.

My 2e party (Rgr9/Rog11 dual-class, Rgr10, Wiz(Ill)10, Wiz(Evo)9, Ftr11, and Clr9) wiped the floor with the giants. It's called spells, people. When a bunch of improved invisible spellcasting ranged attackers starts hitting you, and you're stupid giants, it doesn't matter how many of you there are, especially when the attacks consist of fireballs, insect plagues, and cloudkills.

 

[Cthulhu's Librarian]

Ask Cthulhu's Librarian, Corlon, Templetroll, and Der Kluge - they were there. Der Kluge, unfortunately, got stuck fighting a gnoll and missed half of the fun.

Yeah, we ROCKED the giants that day. Little bitty things never knew what hit them. We drank from their skulls and relaxed in hammocks made from their flesh.