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:

 

[James Gasik]

As an experiment, I once, instead of having my players use point buy or rolling (rolling is the preferred method for most of the people I play with, though I do know DM's who prefer point buy because they think it's more "balanced"*), I offered players a choice of 4 arrays. I don't remember the actual numbers, but there was the "Ace", with one really good score, the "Paragon" with two high scores, the "All Rounder" with balanced scores, and the "Dump Stat", which had one especially low score, and higher scores all around (though none as high as The Ace).

What I assumed would happen is that people would take one of the first two; while I like being well rounded with no weak points, I've noticed most of my friends seem to like having really strong primary scores.

To my surprise, almost everyone took the dump stat array, even though it gave them a weakness (I only made it an option because sometimes you have a concept where a low score makes sense). I tried asking everyone why, and they couldn't really articulate an answer, they just felt it was the best array.

*I've debunked this more than once to them, but it hasn't changed their stance, even after agreeing with me, lol. Point Buy isn't really balanced, as some classes have more stringent ability score needs than others. 5e isn't really too bad about this (though I have argued that a small difference in ability scores isn't a big deal in 5e) but when we were playing Pathfinder and 3.5, 20 point buy did not mean the same thing if one was playing a Wizard/Sorcerer as if one was playing a Monk. Even the Fighter, who you would think just needs high Str/Con and can just go, will find themselves wanting (in 3.5/PF) 13 Dex, 13 Int, and as much Wisdom as they can afford due to their terrible Will save).

 

[Faolyn]

You apparently haven't been following my posts if you think I dragged them out to support me. I've said at least 3 times that they don't mean anything and there's no hard evidence to support point buy and array as being the majority. I'm just pointing out that they don't even support you guys who attribute meaning to them.

Dude, have you not even read what you have been posting? You were literally insisting your personal experience beats any sort of poll that was shown to you.

 

[Maxperson]

Dude, have you not even read what you have been posting? You were literally insisting your personal experience beats any sort of poll that was shown to you.

Nope. You need to follow the entire conversation if you're going to partake. I'm not responsible for your misinterpretations if you're going to jump into the middle without knowing what it's about.

 

[Mecheon]

My group definitely uses both rolling and point buy. I've never seen a live human use stat array. I'm always a bit boggled when I see someone say they prefer it.

I've seen a few larger groups bulk-doing stuff, like those various world ones, do stat array. Tends to be a simple "Pick one of these" compared to other options

 

[Faolyn]

Nope. You need to follow the entire conversation if you're going to partake. I'm not responsible for your misinterpretations if you're going to jump into the middle without knowing what it's about.

I have followed the entire conversation. I don't know why you're making stuff up now, but please, just own up to what you've actually said.

 

[Maxperson]

I have followed the entire conversation. I don't know why you're making stuff up now, but please, just own up to what you've actually said.

No. @Parmandur liked the posts where I told you what I was really talking about for a reason. You are wrong. End of story.

 

[Parmandur]

I have followed the entire conversation. I don't know why you're making stuff up now, but please, just own up to what you've actually said.

I feel like there is a basic miscommunication here?

 

[Maxperson]

I feel like there is a basic miscommunication here?

This has happened between her and I multiple times in the past. She hyper focuses on a few individual posts, rather than the context of the conversation and then argues tooth and nail that I am saying something other than what I am saying.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

This is a very long digression arguing about something for which there is no evidence. My personal experience leads me to believe that in 2022 the majority of players do not roll stats, but I have no evidence to support that so it's pointless arguing with the people who believe otherwise.

 

[cbwjm]

This is a very long digression arguing about something for which there is no evidence. My personal experience leads me to believe that in 2022 the majority of players do not roll stats, but I have no evidence to support that so it's pointless arguing with the people who believe otherwise.

Exactly this. Better to just say, I prefer X method and then move on. Some of the more heated circular arguments I tend to just scroll past everyone involved, not much point reading the same things written in a slightly different way.