D&D 5E Mer-giants

[Blue]

I had a flooding world homebrew campaign I was going to run that went on pandemic hiatus right after Session 0. It's now many months later, two of the players have changed characters, and my initial thoughts for campaign arcs are no longer as shiny, especially with the character changes.

So we were having a informal and imprompt new session 0, all of us just brainstorming, and got to talking about merfolk. One of the players mentioned that they'd love to see ones of different sizes. Which got me thinking about instead of just scaling up and down, but actually making D&D giants (a rather unique bunch of tribes) into merfolk, with corresponding larger fish. (But no whales - they're mammals.)

Quick brainstorming had storm giants possibly as "Turbulence Merfolk" and Cloud Giants as "Whirlpool Merfolk", but what about the lesser giants? Steamfolk?

And equally as important, what cool D&D-specific fish (or other underwater dwellers) should each be paired with for their mer-half?

(As a side note, I'm already planning on Frost Giants on glaciers invading as a later campaign event, so while there could be a natural fit there, Frost Giant merfolk are the least interesting to me.)

 

[jmartkdr2]

Underwater lava vents are definitely a thing, so your fire mer-giants would probably live near those.

Are we definitely sticking with fish? Because that kinda limits you to sharks for really big fish.

Anyway, quick thoughts:
Hill giants - coral merfolk
Stone giants - cave merfolk
frost giants - iceberg merfolk
fire giants - steam/lava merfolk or: magmerfolk!

 

[Leatherhead]

No aquatic mammals? That puts a crimp on things.

The biggest one should be a Megalodon, but that also kind of looks just like a normal fish, but bigger.
So if you want some style you have:
Sunfish
Oarfish
Eels
And Mana Rays.

If you are willing to mess with the head, you can get some more "iconic" fish types like Sawfish, Marlins, Hammerheads, and Goblin Sharks.

It's also worth mentioning that Crab folk are giants, if you want to broaden up the "fish" theme, and you should cause then you get to mess with things like giant squid.

 

[jmartkdr2]

No aquatic mammals? That puts a crimp on things.

The biggest one should be a Megalodon, but that also kind of looks just like a normal fish, but bigger.
So if you want some style you have:
Sunfish
Oarfish
Eels
And Mana Rays.

If you are willing to mess with the head, you can get some more "iconic" fish types like Sawfish, Marlins, Hammerheads, and Goblin Sharks.

It's also worth mentioning that Crab folk are giants, if you want to broaden up the "fish" theme, and you should cause then you get to mess with things like giant squid.

The thing is, if you're only looking at the back half and are re-scaling1 anyways: those aren't going to look any different. You might as well just say they have "big fish tails" and leave it at that.

Not that that's a bad idea - going into depth about precisely what kind of fish tail they have isn't really adding any meaningful detail.

1 Both 'pun intended' and mean scale as in size and probably color.

 

[jgsugden]

Why Giants?

The iconic giant is known for their size and hurling boulders. You're not going to hurl boulders underwater, and many things can be that size, so why try to force the giant archetypes into play?

Storm Giants are the exception as they are amphibious, so they can fit right in as is and be the main gigantic threat for this role.

Outside of that, the 'role' of giants might be filled with Merrow, Marid, Sahauagin Barons, Water Elementals, or even just Undead zombies or skeletons.

 

[Richards]

The plesiogigan in Crossbreeding - Flesh and Blood (part of Mongoose's Encyclopaedia Arcane line back in the 3E/3.5 days)
has the upper torso of a storm giant and the lower body of an elasmosaurus. Not a fish, granted, but it might work for what you're looking to do.

Johnathan

 

[GMMichael]

The iconic giant is known for their size and hurling boulders. You're not going to hurl boulders underwater,

Spears and harpoons are a good alternative. Masts. Booms.

If dragons can fly, there's no reason why giants can't outswim sharks and whales.

 

[Blue]

Why Giants?

Outside of that, the 'role' of giants might be filled with Merrow, Marid, Sahauagin Barons, Water Elementals, or even just Undead zombies or skeletons.

Because the players have explicitly asked for this as something new and interesting in the Flooding World. It fits the setting and helps make it more unique. It has buy-in and engagement from the players from the get-go because they came up with it. Strong and incontestable reasons in my book.

As a side note, all of those creatures you mentioned and more are already in the world - the players have a write up from various viewpoints (land-based v.s aquatic-based on their race) from after the original Session 0.

This thread is about how to reimage the classic D&D giants as giant merfolk - how to do play proper homage to them, make them both recognizable yet definitely merfolk as well. I'd love suggestions on that, your list of sea creatures shows you know what you are talking about. An idea of "ignore what the players are asking for and use other creatures" however is a non-starter.

 

[Blue]

Spears and harpoons are a good alternative. Masts. Booms.

If dragons can fly, there's no reason why giants can't outswim sharks and whales.

Harpoons. Oh perfect. And remains of not just sunken ships like masts and booms but also sunken cities - the water levels have climbed like crazy the past two centuries or so.

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

Giant Sea Mertle

Brenna Metzger on Behance