TEXT: ~Credits~
  WRITING and Design:  
  Stephen Radney-MacFarland
  Development and Art Direction: Robert J. Schwalb
  editing and Proofreading: Jay Spight
  Graphic Design: Kara Hamilton and Hal Mangold
  LAYOUT: kara hamilton
  ILLUSTRATIONs: Kim VAn DEUN and JAck Kaiser
  Forces of Nature is ©2017 Schwalb Entertainment, LLC.  
  All rights reserved.
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  are trademarks of Schwalb Entertainment, LLC.
  Schwalb EntErtainmEnt, llc
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  Monstrous Pages for  
  Shadow of the Demon Lord
  Unthinking and uncaring, giants are more forces of 
  nature than villains. Birthed long ago in the time 
  of the Troll King, the consensus among the learned 
  is that giants were enslaved, bred, created, or 
  otherwise spawned to serve as war machines during 
  the Troll Wars. Untouched by the degradations of 
  their former masters, they trudge on, indulging in 
  their base desires.
    This installment of Monstrous Pages, Forces of 
  Nature, examines giants in all their menace. From 
  their uncertain origins to an overview of their 
  strange beliefs and behaviors, in these pages you 
  will find everything you need to let loose these 
  brutes to stomp across your campaign. This entry 
  also expands on giants by providing customization 
  options and abhorrent new breeds. Read on and 
  create nasty, brutish, and gigantic encounters your 
  players will soon not forget.
  
  2
  Legends abound describing the ancient Troll Wars, 
  fought against their hated foes, the faeries. The stories 
  are so old as to be rife with contradiction. Their events 
  predate the First People, handed down by faeries to 
  the people living in the Autumn Lands before the 
  Kingdom of Gog and the coming of the Kalasans. 
  Faeries are not the most consistent storytellers to 
  begin with, but those tales were often twisted into 
  allegories to serve the various ideals of the Old Faith, 
  or its poetry tortured into more contemporary forms 
  by minstrels, monks, and orators before finally being 
  written down. 
   In all the legends, giants fought for the trolls, but 
  in some they were merely enslaved by the trolls, and 
  in others they were created by them. One legend in 
  particular—an obscure jotun poem called the Saga 
  of Jarnsaxa—makes a more shocking claim. It speaks 
  of the people of Grimnir, before that god cursed 
  the dwarfs, describing them as majestically tall and 
  beautiful, proud and godlike. Nearly nonchalantly, it 
  claims that those who escaped the curse of Grimnir 
  were later warped by the trolls. It’s the blood of these 
  uncursed giants, rather than the crude and boorish 
  troll-created ones, that runs through the veins of 
  every jotun.
   No matter the particulars of giant genesis, what is 
  clear is that they were the thralls of the trolls during 
  the war against the faeries, and with the death of 
  Oberon, and the vengeful curse laid down by the 
  Summer Queen, the giants scattered for their lives. 
  Dull and stupid machines of war, they became 
  nothing more than base animals, either fighting for 
  existence or chasing their pleasures. With no troll 
  lash at their back, they wistfully slaughtered those 
  they encountered, and struggled under strange 
  superstitions and asinine beliefs. 
   Arrogant Ignorance: Giants are truly stupid beings. 
  Logic is seen as a form of trickery at best and vile 
  word-magic at worst. To a giant, everything in the 
  world fits in one of two categories: things the giant 
  likes, and things it does not. Even worse, a thing 
  can shift categories at a moment’s notice, without a 
  glimmer of thought. 
   A giant’s capricious and befuddled thinking does 
  have a sense of proportion. All giants believe that 
  the bigger creature is the only important creature. 
  Since giants are typically larger than anyone else, 
  this manifests as the giant doing whatever it wants, 
  however it wants, to most other creatures. Among 
  the rare conclave of giants, or in their rutting, 
  this belief takes on a surprising but not wholly 
  unexpected nuance. The smaller giant will submit to 
  the larger one until the other is killed by trickery, or 
  the submissive giant makes its escape. Larger, more 
  intelligent creatures can often manipulate giants for  
  a short period of time, as can some trolls.
   Hopelessly Lazy: Given an abundance of food, and 
  the occasion to rut, a giant would do nothing more 
  than look up at the sky and occasionally fiddle with 
  itself. Many giants make deals with local villages or 
  caravans traversing their territory. If the little folk 
  don’t want to get eaten, the little folk can give the 
  giant food. These arrangements eventually sprawl all 
  sideways, as the giant gets bored or forgets the details 
  of the deal.
   Disgusting Pleasures: Giants take childlike 
  pleasure in the horrific preparation of their food. 
  They love boiling little creatures alive in some 
  bubbling broth of blood and bile, and sucking them 
  down as the last laments issue from their throats. 
  They claim it tickles going down. They’ll slow-roast 
  children and other still-living morsels over a fire, 
  believing that the evacuation of their victim’s tears 
  and urine helps give the meat an even sweeter flavor. 
  They’ll tear open a creature to suck out the sweet 
  meats while rejoicing in the delicious freshness of  
  the vile snack.
    While giants love to eat, they love rutting even 
  more. Such rutting is sexually indiscriminant. It is 
  seen not only as a source of intense pleasure, but 
  a way to show dominance and wreak destruction. 
  Giants believe that rutting is best when it is done 
  amid a small settlement or atop the wagons of a 
  caravan. Rolling and energetic, their shows of sexual 
  athleticism often crush all those caught in the 
  frolicking. Luckily such coupling is rare, due to their 
  territorial nature and fear of submission. They also 
  frequently end in the murder of the weaker or slower 
  giant by their rutting mate. 
   Vile Superstitions: Giants are prone to magical 
  thinking and compulsive rituals. The specifics of 
  their beliefs and compulsions vary strangely, but they 
  often have a common theme involving the slaying of 
  a creature, and using its viscera as a salve, incense, 
  or communion-like host. Often these are done in the 
  name of Grimnir (or a thundering gurgle sounding 
  something like “Grim-NA”) or a vague “giant of giants” 
  pseudo-deity. Other times a giant will ape religious 
  rituals and beliefs of lesser creatures, often with a 
  kind of idiotic humor, but with the same compulsive 
  intensity as other giant rituals. 
    Unthinking Violence: When a giant is sated, and 
  any depraved personal ritual fulfilled, the existence 
  of smaller creatures goes largely unnoticed, or rather, 
  beneath notice. Any lesser creature unfortunate 
  enough to be in a giant’s path can survive if they 
  quickly get out of the way and hide. The giant will 
  likely pass them by… most of the time. One never 
  knows when a giant will decide it’s in the mood for 
  a little fun, or that it’s not that full after all. There’s 
  always room for blood pudding. 
  
  3
  Giant
  Most giants stand 15 feet tall and weigh about 2,000 
  pounds. Common giants look like enormous humans, 
  with slouched postures and exaggerated features: a 
  broad nose, drooping eyebrows, and a slack mouth 
  filled with stained teeth the size of small shields. Most 
  giants forgo clothing, though the more modest might 
  strap livestock, living or dead, to their nether regions. 
  Some make do with carnival tents, ship sails, or 
  balloons they have snatched from the air.
   Giants speak Trollish. Some rare intelligent giants 
  might also speak the Common Tongue.
  GIANT 
  DIFFICULTY 100
  Size 3 or larger giant
  Perception 10 (+0)
  Defense 15; Health 100; Insanity 1d3; Corruption 1d3
  Strength 17 (+7), Agility 11 (+1), Intellect 8 (–2), Will 13 (+3)
  Speed 12
  Stupidity A giant makes Intellect attack rolls and challenge 
  rolls with 1 bane. Creatures make attack rolls against the 
  giant’s Intellect with 1 boon.
  Crushing Footfalls When a giant moves into a space 
  occupied by a creature on the ground, the creature 
  must get a success on an Agility challenge roll or take 
  3d6 damage and fall prone. If the creature was already 
  prone, it takes 1d6 extra damage. A creature makes this 
  roll once per round regardless of how many times a giant 
  moves through its space.
  Giantfall When an effect knocks the giant prone, the giant’s 
  body covers an area on the ground that is as long as it is 
  tall (pick a number between 4 and 6 yards) and as wide 
  as its Size, starting at the end of its space and extending 
  from the source of the effect that knocked it prone. 
  Everything in the area takes damage equal to 2d6 × the 
  giant’s Size. A creature can make an Agility challenge 
  roll with a number of banes equal to half the giant’s Size. 
  On a success, the creature takes half the damage and 
  moves to the nearest open space outside the area. On a 
  failure, the creature becomes trapped under the giant’s 
  body. A creature trapped in this way is prone, blinded, 
  immobilized, and totally covered. It can use an action to 
  make an Agility challenge roll with a number of banes 
  equal to half the giant’s Size. On a success, the creature 
  moves half its normal Speed in a direction it chooses. 
  If it moves out of the area, it removes the afflictions. 
  Otherwise, the creature remains trapped.
  ATTACK OPTIONS 
  Fist (melee) +7 with 3 boons (5d6)
  Boulder (long range) +7 with 1 boon (3d6)
  Customizing Giants
  A giant’s greatest asset is its massive size, and its 
  ability to deal great damage to the scenery and its 
  surroundings, but they are also disgusting creatures 
  that are often fascinated by their own bodily 
  functions. Some have created incidental weapons by 
  way of their digestive system. You can customize the 
  basic giant into your own unique creation by applying 
  any of the following modifications to its statistics box.
  Massive
  Common giants might stand between 15 and 20 feet 
  tall, but giants can, and do, grow much larger. These 
  massive brutes are every bit as dull, venal, and cruel as 
  their smaller kin.
  INCREASE DIFFICULTY BY TWO STEPS
  Size 8 or larger frightening giant
  Health increase by 200
  Strength +2
  ATTACK OPTIONS 
  Fist (melee) +9 with 3 boons (6d6)
  Boulder (long range) +9 with 1 boon (4d6)
  Incidental Weapons
  Some giants excel at using weapons from the 
  landscape to terrifying effect. When lacking a suitable 
  boulder or tree, giants improvise with carts and parts 
  of buildings. 
  INCREASE DIFFICULTY BY ONE STEP
  SPECIAL ATTACKS 
  Two-Fisted Throw The giant picks up two boulders, or 
  objects of similar size and weight, and throws them both. 
  The giant makes each attack roll with 1 bane.
  Tree Club The giant swings a tree it is wielding in a wide 
  arc. Each creature within 6 yards of the giant must get a 
  success on an Agility challenge roll with 2 banes or take 
  4d6 damage and fall prone. Each time the giant uses 
  Tree Club, roll a d6. On an odd number, the tree breaks 
  apart and the giant cannot use Tree Club again until it 
  tears another tree out of the ground.
  Dung and Gas
  No one ever accused giants of being sophisticated, but 
  some can feature cunning of a kind. Fascinated with 
  the rumbles and run over of their digestive processes, 
  they have found that the production of digestive waste 
  can yield debilitating weaponry.
  INCREASE DIFFICULTY BY ONE STEP
  SPECIAL ATTACKS 
  Dung Bomb The giant throws a ball made from its own 
  dung to a point within long range. The ball’s exterior is 
  hardened, but the interior is warm and viscous. When 
  the ball reaches the target point or encounters a solid 
  surface before then, it explodes, dealing 4d6 damage 
  to everything within 6 yards of the point it struck. A 
  creature that would take this damage must make a 
  Strength challenge roll. A creature takes half the damage 
  on a success, or also becomes impaired for 1 round on a 
  failure.
  END OF THE ROUND 
  Choking Blast Roll a d6. On an even number, the giant lets 
  rip a disgusting blast of flatulence that spreads through a 
  6-yard cone originating from a point in the giant’s space. 
  Each breathing creature in the area must get a success 
  on a Strength challenge roll with 1 bane or become 
  impaired for 1 round.
  
  4
  Variant Giants
  The trolls modified or bred a few types of giants in the 
  efforts to perfect their war machines or to serve other 
  purposes. These variant giants tend to cling to remote 
  parts of the world, at least until they become hungry.
  More Giants
  Other Shadow of the Demon Lord supplements detail 
  giants beyond the ones described here. You can find 
  the dreaded mountain giant in A Glorious Death. 
  Beyond the World’s Edge describes the sea giant.
  Rune-Carved Giant
  It’s believed that trolls created these monstrosities during 
  the end of the Troll Wars. Bound, empowered, and 
  preserved with ancient troll rune-magic—thankfully  
  now lost to the world—most of these horrors wait in 
  forgotten caverns and caves, patient for their purpose  
  to be revealed. 
   Once roused, the troll runes that dot the giant’s entire 
  body glow like burning coals, at which point it moves 
  toward its goal: a single location designated on its rune  
  of ruin. Once there, the rune explodes, wreaking 
  devastating carnage.
   Standing nearly 60 feet tall, rune-carved giants look  
  like other giants, but are carved head to toe with numerous 
  troll runes. Before a rune-carved giant becomes active, its 
  runes appear to be merely carved into the flesh, but the 
  wounds do not bleed. Once activated, the runes glow like 
  embers but do not seem to cause the giant pain.
   Rune-Carved Giants understand Trollish but rarely 
  speak it.
  RUNE-CARVED GIANTS 
  DIFFICULTY 1,000
  Size 10+ frightening giant
  Perception 8 (–2)
  Defense 17; Health 500; Insanity 1d6; Corruption 1d3
  Strength 20 (+10), Agility 9 (–1), Intellect 8 (–2), Will 15 (+5)
  Speed 10
  Immune damage from fire
  Colossal A rune-carved giant takes half damage from  
  creatures half its Size or smaller. It cannot be charmed, 
  compelled, dazed, immobilized, slowed, or stunned by  
  effects originating from creatures half its Size or smaller.
  Stupidity A giant makes Intellect attack rolls and challenge  
  rolls with 1 bane. Creatures make attack rolls against the 
  giant’s Intellect with 1 boon.
  Crushing Footfalls When a giant moves into a space 
  occupied by a creature on the ground, the creature  
  must get a success on an Agility challenge roll or take 
  3d6 damage and fall prone. If the creature was already 
  prone, it takes 1d6 extra damage. A creature makes this 
  roll once per round regardless of how many times a giant 
  moves through its space.
  
  5
  Giantfall When an effect knocks the giant prone, the 
  giant’s body covers an area on the ground that is as long 
  as it is tall (pick a number between 20 and 30 yards) and 
  as wide as its Size, starting at the end of its space and 
  extending from the source of the effect that knocked 
  it prone. Everything in the area takes damage equal to 
  2d6 × the giant’s Size. A creature can make an Agility 
  challenge roll with a number of banes equal to half the 
  giant’s Size. On a success, the creature takes half the 
  damage and moves to the nearest open space outside 
  the area. On a failure, the creature becomes trapped 
  under the giant’s body. A creature trapped in this way 
  is prone, blinded, immobilized, and totally covered. It 
  can use an action to make an Agility challenge roll with 
  a number of banes equal to half the giant’s Size. On 
  a success, the creature moves half its normal Speed 
  in a direction it chooses. If it moves out of the area, it 
  removes the afflictions. Otherwise, the creature remains 
  trapped. Furthermore, when a giant is knocked prone, 
  roll a d6. On a 6, the giant’s rune of ruin is activated.
  ATTACK OPTIONS 
  Fist (melee) +10 with 3 boons (8d6 + 5 plus Smash Down)
  Boulder (extreme range) +10 with 1 boon (6d6)
  Smash Down A target half the giant’s Size or smaller must 
  get a success on a Strength challenge roll with 3 banes 
  or fall prone.
  END OF THE ROUND 
  Rune of Ruin Each rune-carved giant has a final destination 
  carved somewhere within their hide along with an 
  explosive rune. If the giant has reached its destination, 
  the fire energy bound within this rune activates causing 
  the giant to explode in fire, killing the giant instantly and 
  dealing 10d6 damage to everything within 100 yards 
  of the giant. A creature takes half the damage with a 
  success on an Agility challenge roll with 1 bane.
  Troll-Kin
  The trolls bred giants to serve in war, but obviously 
  some were used for other, more carnal, services. Rare 
  creatures that can only breed with members of their 
  own line or with a troll, they fuse some of the most 
  dangerous qualities of both races. While their giant 
  blood saved them from the Summer Queen’s curse, 
  their troll blood grants them regeneration.
   Standing at least 20 feet tall, and weighing nearly 
  2,50o pounds, these lurching, deformed things have 
  awkward, often melted features, and a hide as tough 
  as boiled leather. Drooling and stupid, they kill and 
  eat all they snatch in their clawed hands, tearing flesh 
  apart with their chisel like teeth. 
   Troll-kin speak Trollish.
  TROLL-KIN 
  DIFFICULTY 500
  Size 4 or larger giant
  Perception 13 (+3); darksight
  Defense 15; Health 160; Insanity 1d3; Corruption 1d6
  Strength 19 (+9), Agility 11 (+1), Intellect 8 (–2), Will 16 (+6)
  Speed 10
  Stupidity A troll-kin makes Intellect attack rolls and 
  challenge rolls with 1 bane. Creatures make attack rolls 
  against the troll-kin’s Intellect with 1 boon.
  Crushing Footfalls When a troll-kin moves into a space  
  on the ground occupied by a creature, the creature  
  must get a success on an Agility challenge roll or take 
  3d6 damage and fall prone. If the creature is already 
  prone, it takes 1d6 extra damage. A creature makes this 
  roll once per round, regardless of how many times a 
  troll-kin moves through its space.
  Giantfall When an effect knocks the troll-kin prone, the 
  troll-kin’s body covers an area on the ground that is 
  as long as it is tall (pick a number between 4 and 8 
  yards) and as wide as its Size, starting at the end of its 
  space and extending from the source of the effect that 
  knocked it prone. Everything in the area takes damage 
  equal to 2d6 × the troll-kin’s Size. A creature can make 
  an Agility challenge roll with a number of banes equal 
  to half the troll-kin’s Size. On a success, the creature 
  takes half the damage and moves to the nearest open 
  space outside the area. On a failure, the creature 
  becomes trapped under the troll-kin’s body. A creature 
  trapped in this way is prone, blinded, immobilized, and 
  totally covered. It can use an action to make an Agility 
  challenge roll with a number of banes equal to half the 
  troll-kin’s Size. On a success, the creature moves half its 
  normal Speed in a direction it chooses. If it moves out 
  of the area, it is no longer trapped and it removes the 
  afflictions. Otherwise, the creature remains trapped.
  ATTACK OPTIONS 
  Fist (melee) +9 with 3 boons (5d6 plus Smash Down)
  Teeth (melee) +9 with 3 boons (5d6 + 3)
  Smash Down A target half the troll-kin’s Size or smaller 
  must get a success on a Strength challenge roll with  
  2 banes or fall prone.
  END OF THE ROUND 
  Regeneration The troll-kin heals 1d6 damage if it is not 
  incapacitated. 
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Shadow of the Demon Lord/Monstrous Pages/SotDL - Monstrous Pages - Forces of Nature.pdf