| Splendor |
The adventure path lists stone giants as per the Bestiary. The Bestiary lists giants as Neutral.
"... With these tactics, Mokmurian has turned his giants further and further toward evil..." -- Anniversary Edition p199
So are the stone giants neutral or are they neutral evil?
Makes a difference for spells.
| Gilarius |
The adventure path lists stone giants as per the Bestiary. The Bestiary lists giants as Neutral.
"... With these tactics, Mokmurian has turned his giants further and further toward evil..." -- Anniversary Edition p199
So are the stone giants neutral or are they neutral evil?
Makes a difference for spells.
It should also make a difference to the party's attitude towards the giants. They don't all need killing...
Otherwise, HangarFlying is correct.
| DM Under The Bridge |
My take is that as a group, they're not evil, they're just blinded by the charismatic exuberance of an evil individual.
War, in and of itself, is not evil. While the leader has evil intent to wage the war, to the common foot soldier, his people march to war, this he must go too.
Well there are philosophies that argue war is indeed evil, and that attempting to force the world into your image will only usher ruin and death. Not an entirely false claim when you think about it.
| Latrecis |
I don't know that there is a definitive answer to the question. Each DM will need to make a determination. I would suggest in most situations where the PC's will encounter them, the stone giants will be behaving in an evil fashion and should be treated as such.
Teraktinus is evil as is the dragon Longtooth. The attack on Sandpoint isn't war, at least the type that you might argue is not intrinsically evil - it's a raid, sheer banditry where the intent is to terrorize, maim, steal and kidnap. Those are evil behaviors.
All but one of the tribes surrounding Jorgenfist (A2a-g) have evil leaders. The giants inside Jorgenfist are closer to Mokmurian's inner circle and receive support from his evil allies - harpies, hill giants, frost giants, lamia priests of Lamashtu, Enga, ogre fighters, Lokansir, red dragons, rune slave giants and trolls. There's a functioning shrine to Lamashtu in the first level.
Stone giants encountered on patrol without their evil leaders may not be evil but otherwise in my view, fighting in direct support of evil is evil.
I would also call out two quotes from the AP (AE version):
p.198 - Deprived of the stabilizing influence of their elders, and with little but fear and awe to lead them, these giants have grown cruel and violent.
p.199 - With these tactics, Mokmurian has turned his giants further and further toward evil—and all his resources will soon be directed toward the utter destruction of all of Varisia.
Sure sounds like evil to me.
| NobodysHome |
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I took a far more nuanced stance -- as Latrecis says, the named leaders (with one notable exception) are all evil. I played most of the foot soldiers as neutral and redeemable. This made the game far more satisfying for my strongly good-aligned troop led by a paladin of Sarenrae as they figured out ways NOT to kill the giants, but to exterminate the leaders with extreme prejudice and negotiate treaties with the new leaders.
But that's my campaign and my group. You might say, "Now you get to negotiate a treaty," to your group and watch their awestruck looks of horror.
Have the giants' alignments match how you feel your group would want to play them.
If your group is an, "Enemies exist to give me XP and loot," kind of group, it's perfectly justifiable to make every single stone giant evil.
If your group is like mine (we're 8 sessions in post-AP and they're loving a whole 'political intrigue of Varisia' campaign with virtually no die-rolling because they're just too high-level to be challenged by anything), then make a lot of the stone giants neutral and willing to talk to PCs who demonstrate strength and honor by defeating their leaders in single combat.
(Yeah, nuking half a tribe from orbit and then telling the rest to "surrender and be good" is definitely a no-go.)
Play them the way you think your group would most enjoy having them played.
EDIT: As Latrecis indicates, the most loyal giants will definitely be evil. But the run-of-the-mill foot soldier is absolutely your call to make.
And I had a similar situation with the cloud and storm giants. Cloud giants can be good or evil, so I had 66% of them evil (determined by random die roll). Storm giants are good, so I had 100% of them good but dominated. Totally your call again. I did what I knew my group would enjoy.
Matthew Pittard
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We are about 2 sessions into the Fortress level and just had dealings with a 'Wise' Stone Giant Lady who told us about her husband AFTER the party ninja had been flayed. So far the battles have been fairly Brutal. Im playing a Samurai/Fighter (a pretty subpar combination tbh, but I am trying to revolt against my usual PFS confines.
We have a Warpriest of Irori in our group who is struggling with his spell selection and is alarmed that his uber good spells arnt doing much against the normally neutral stone giants.
The black raven
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I would say that the rank and file are just like any other creatures : most Neutral, a few Good and some Evil. Maybe even less Good and more Evil here, taking into account the comment about Mokmurian.
But the majority Neutral, definitely.
Nothing wrong/Evil about killing Neutral (and even Good) creatures in self defense though ;-)