
Goliath Species Details
Towering over most folk, goliaths are distant descendants of giants. Each goliath bears the favors of the first giants—favors that manifest in various supernatural boons, including the ability to quickly grow and temporarily approach the height of goliaths’ gigantic kin.
Goliaths have physical characteristics that are reminiscent of the giants in their family lines. For example, some goliaths look like stone giants, while others resemble fire giants. Whatever giants they count as kin, goliaths have forged their own path in the multiverse—unencumbered by the internecine conflicts that have ravaged giantkind for ages—and seek heights above those reached by their ancestors.
Goliath Traits
Creature Type: Humanoid
Size: Medium (about 7–8 feet tall)
Speed: 35 feet
Giant Ancestry
You are descended from Giants. Choose one of the following benefits—a supernatural boon from your ancestry; you can use the chosen benefit a number of times equal to your Proficiency Bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a Long Rest:
Cloud’s Jaunt (Cloud Giant). As a Bonus Action, you magically teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space you can see.
Fire’s Burn (Fire Giant). When you hit a target with an attack roll and deal damage to it, you can also deal 1d10 Fire damage to that target.
Frost’s Chill (Frost Giant). When you hit a target with an attack roll and deal damage to it, you can also deal 1d6 Cold damage to that target and reduce its Speed by 10 feet until the start of your next turn.
Hill’s Tumble (Hill Giant). When you hit a Large or smaller creature with an attack roll and deal damage to it, you can give that target the Prone condition.
Stone’s Endurance (Stone Giant). When you take damage, you can take a Reaction to roll 1d12. Add your Constitution modifier to the number rolled and reduce the damage by that total.
Storm’s Thunder (Storm Giant). When you take damage from a creature within 60 feet of you, you can take a Reaction to deal 1d8 Thunder damage to that creature.
Large Form
Starting at character level 5, you can change your size to Large as a Bonus Action if you’re in a big enough space. This transformation lasts for 10 minutes or until you end it (no action required). For that duration, you have Advantage on Strength checks, and your Speed increases by 10 feet. Once you use this trait, you can’t use it again until you finish a Long Rest.
Powerful Build
You have Advantage on any ability check you make to end the Grappled condition. You also count as one size larger when determining your carrying capacity.
Cool, WoTC got rid of resistance to cold damage and the thingy with large altitudes, great job, keep removeing interesting features
So they removed setting specific rules and gave them setting agnostic, all very thematic and all great combat related abilities? Damn people will just complain about anything these days
Oh no they took away setting specific abilities for a book that is meant to be setting agnostic AND gave the Goliaths unique abilities tied to their heritage, each of which are very useful, vs a resistance to cold damage and being unaffected by altitudes (Which is a hyper specific trait, that I'm pretty sure no one ever used). The Horror, how could they give Goliath's just straight up better abilities that lets them be diverse and interesting.....if you couldn't tell, this is just an overall better race.
So, for the Hill Giant-Goliath, for Large or smaller creatures, can they knock them Prone on every turn if they are landing their attacks?
I ask as it doesn't list a saving throw or anything... This seems pretty OP, but fun to try out!
It's limited by Proficiency Bonus times per long rest.
No, it isn’t better overall. Cold resistance allowed Goliaths to ignore freezing temperatures. This race had so much more flavor before. Now they are just fake giants. Replacing an ability with options is more flexible, but it isn’t better. I’ll be keeping my old Goliath since this new edition is backwards compatible after all.
I made a Goliath and on my sheet it gave me an advantage on every skill? and I clicked on every skill it say (to end the Grappled condition(Powerful Build)). Anyone else have this?https://imgur.com/a/qifEYNC
Should the Large Form be treated like the Enlarge spell and be given a plus d4 to damage? I am on the fence on whether or not to do it for a house rule or not.
Yes two of my players had this too. I hope its a bug
Yes! This is on my character sheet too. Its a little annoying. Hopefully they will fix this bug soon.
the Enlarge/Reduce spell also enlarges the weapons the spells target are holding or carrying, granting the bonus. The new Goliath trait doesn't appear to do that. Something to consider before making a house rule. Though unarmed strikes maybe, as those also received the bonus.
Thinking back to 3.5, where a lot was written on Goliaths, they now got no lore?
Is their lack of cold resistance because they no longer comes from the mountains?
They used to get proficiency in Athletics, which they no longer get (no longer living in the mountains makes you less athetic i guess)
In 3.5, they were practically concidered large, whenever it benefitted them, enabling them to wield large weapons, then they were able to carry, push, drag and lift twice as much.
But now, they are only good at grappling? They still have good garry capacity (very well when enlarged!), but they can no longer push, drag and lift as much.
And what did they gain for all of their lazyness? The option to change 'Stone’s Endurance' into something even more combat orientated (with the exception of Cloud’s Jaunt, which got out of combat uses aswell, even if it's questionable if it fits the lore)
This is a martial BEAST
It's been fixed now!
You know whats funny is that when I was in the middle of creating a better Goliath race that added more giant ancestry options, WoTC happens to pretty much create the exact same thing in the new PH... Silly Silly
they removed it because golilaths are large meaning it takes longer for them to get cold!
Or you could use the Oversized Weapons rulings...
neutral o0n the changes, like back when 2nd went to 3rd, 3 to 3.5, which wasnt a big deal, and you cant spell 4th without flop. lets just take this as 5.5th and carry on, thats what the old guys like us see it as
One of my characters is a Goliath barbarian, and the cold temperature and high altitude save me so many saving throws.
I really hope that this at least enlarges clothes and armor, or goliaths are gonna ruin a lot of shirts.