D&D 5E Considering Bigby's Big Book of Giants: How much use did you get out of Fizban's Big Book of Dragons?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I remember enjoying a lot of the giant lore in Volo's.

It was new and interesting to me, too, although I'm told a lot of it was from 2E's Giantcraft.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Tasha?

I agree, though given the game's history, it's not a surprise. I hope they are seeding current books with just such lore, so they can do this in the future.

Yeah, she is who I refer to in that post, alongside The Xanathar as the monstrous titular character.

And it’s not like they couldn’t put other characters more and more into adventures and hire someone to write stories about them.

Vi the Inventor Gnome, for instance.

Or the Brimstone Angels tiefling character, or one of FR’s long list of hot adventurous magic users that have dated Elminster, or one or more of the famous female Planeswalkers from MTG.

They don’t have to be rooted in Gygax’s home games to be a titular character.

 

[Stormonu]

Bigby’s (weird choice. Is Bigby associated with giants?) I am excited for because giants are fairly interesting, and I’m curious what player options and new giantish stuff they’ll put in. What oddball stuff from D&D’s past will get spruced up for inclusion in the book? How will they tie giants to the larger multiverse, and what left field weirdness will they come up with that splits fans between excitement and rage?

Yeah, the choice of Bigby is frakking weird; I went through the Greyhawk Wiki and the couple Greyhawk adventures he’s mentioned in and there’s nothing tying him to giants (far from it - he’s a spindly little runt). I suspect its based on name recognition and that he has “big” in his name. Otto probably would have been the better choice for dissertations on giants. Or better yet, Elminster and his old “Ecology of” books.

I’m almost hoping there’s some sort of back and forth between Mordenkainen (Gary’s other character, and who charmed & reformed Bigby), Bigby and Rary (the traitor, who turned on the circle of 8 and almost killed Bigby in the process) in the book, though over what, I can’t imagine, but it’d be entertaining commentary.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Weren't they more "Bigby's [full in the blank] Hand" spells? Grasping hand, interposing hand? That sort of thing?

Interposing Hand, Grasping Hand, Clenched Fist.

I think it was a sensible decision to fold them into one.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Thinking about this more, I probably will pick up the player-facing elements piecemeal on D&D Beyond, as I've long pondered playing a half-ogre who's the runt of a warband and abused by everyone else, from the hill giants on down. I suspect the player-facing content and the Tasha's custom lineage rules will enable to make a character like that, especially one who found shelter in an abandoned stone giant lair and learned their rune lore there.

That said, as a DM, which I do 99% of the time, it's going to have to be pretty compelling for me to want to pick up to use in a game, since they've all got themes and content reasonably well locked down, and giants aren't a part of any of them now.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

I think I prefer the real title of the book to the fake title in this thread. Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants sounds fine but Bigby's Big Book just sounds like some genre of porn to me.

Is it just me?

Honestly Bigby's Big Book of Giants had me sold. The real title just feels like they wanted to do a Bigby name pun but chickened out.

 

[jasper]

I should just got the ebook. The hardcover is not getting any use. And only 1 person uses the dragonborn from the book.

 

[TravDoc42]

I am genuinely curious how they could make a full book solely about giants. Are there that many giants that haven't been brought forward yet? Is there a bunch of giant lore that I'm missing?

 

[Parmandur]

I am genuinely curious how they could make a full book solely about giants. Are there that many giants that haven't been brought forward yet? Is there a bunch of giant lore that I'm missing?

I mean, they can always make up more. But look at what they did with Dragons in Fizban's, it's easy enough to imagine replicating the table, lairs, etc. but now with giants.

 

[TravDoc42]

I mean, they can always make up more. But look at what they did with Dragons in Fizban's, it's easy enough to imagine replicating the table, lairs, etc. but now with giants.

This is true! There are a lot fewer giant types than dragon types, but I'm sure they could come up with some neat new ideas! I know the voadkyn/Wood giants could be brought back, possibly.