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They're bad. What would make them good?
How about a point-adjustment to keep them in line with other monsters, a modified random attacks table to make them (a little) more reliable, and a small Scaly Skin save (5+?) to make them a little more resistant to small-arms fire?

Giants are difficult because so many armies have them. I don't want to ever see them auto-include. If they were T6 that would go a long way right there to making them about right.

They're supposed to be kind of funny and disruptive. Not real game-changers.

I definitely believe that Giants have been crap for so long because they're in so many books; it's really hard to change them.
Giants should be general, all-around sort of monsters. Nothing too specific, so it can't ever be part of some amazing synergy within a given book.
Of course, they should also be random.

Being Stubborn Ld10 should count for something, too. I feel getting rid of the Fall Down rule (and maybe the Headbutt attack) would go a long way. And downgrading Thump With Club.
...or making part of the table include having the Giant attack as normal. 5 attacks would lead to similar results as Swing/Thump With Club, with less outliers on either end.

T6.

The reason you don't ever see giants is that the 3 books that get them (orcs, chaos, beastmen) all have access to better monsters.

-Matt

Giants should be able to throw models at units. It wouldn't necessarily make them better, but if I could pick up a river troll, and throw it at clanrats. I would ALWAYS take a giant.

Matt, you missed out ogres

But in general, as said, better monsters exist all round.
As an ogres player, i can get a giant for 220.

Or, i can pay 30 more for a stone horn.
Damage wise it causes alot more in combat, has a ranged weapon (not great)
It also has a 4+, higher movement, higher toughness and halves multiple wounds.

All that for 30 points?
Even cannons on average need to hit it 3 times instead of 2 to kill it.
Also means that shooting and spells will do less than half as much damage to the stone horn (4+ and +1T)

The giant really is just outclassed.
Sad really since its a great model and they are fun, but as soon as you want something decent, there are better choices available.

 thedarkavenger wrote:
Giants should be able to throw models at units. It wouldn't necessarily make them better, but if I could pick up a river troll, and throw it at clanrats. I would ALWAYS take a giant.

"Inflict X hits at S X, where X is the toughness of the model thrown"

I'd be so keen on that

See, now that would make it interesting and amusing.
Might have to cap it at only being able to throw something with the same toughness or less than the giants strength.

However, watching a giant throw a dragon at teclis would have me chuckling for hours.

I'm all for keeping the Giant funny. But to make him funny and decent would be fantastic.

The standard "Swing With Club" attack is actually pretty solid; with WS3, that's like having 7 attacks. "Jump Up and Down" is awesome.
"Thump With Club" is, in all honesty, too good. 2d6 Wounds? If a cannonball doesn't do that, a Giant's club doesn't, either. I mean, the Initiative Test makes it a little iffy, but against most monsters, that's going to be 50-50 or more.

The "Pick Up And..." table is a little wonky for my tastes. The results that target one model only, like "Squish" and "Eat", should be combined into one (relatively rare) occurrence. I like the idea of throwing the model, but S5 seems more likely than S3.
I guess those results have some character-sniping ability, though. Maybe the thrown model takes D6 hits, and the unit takes D6 more? That way, your characters are still getting their armour and Ward saves, and there's no promise that it'll even do enough wounds to kill them, anyway.

T6 Unbreakable.

T6 I'm in full support of. Unbreakable feels like a big shift, though. I mean, a Giant only runs away 1 out of 12 times as-is, but getting to the 100% Guaranteed status that Unbreakable brings has always meant that the model is otherwise largely ineffective for its price.

I dunno. I can think of a number of other monsters that ought to be Unbreakble or even Stubborn before the Giant. Ld10 doesn't make much sense to me, either.

Theres a couple of cheap giants going on NZ's ebay... tempted to pick one up to go with the one I already have.

Are they *that* bad? I'd like my army to be reasonably 'competitive' but I do definitely trade away some power for fun stuff.

Then again, for 10% more I can get a Carnosaur to mount my warboss on. I don't even know what that could 'counts as' honest to god I just wanna do it!

I fully stand behind my suggestion of making it a stonethrower that can throw models into combat with other units.

Just imagine a giant throwing an arachnarok into combat with teclis' bunker on turn 1.

 Dakkamite wrote:
Are they *that* bad? I'd like my army to be reasonably 'competitive' but I do definitely trade away some power for fun stuff.

Then again, for 10% more I can get a Carnosaur to mount my warboss on. I don't even know what that could 'counts as' honest to god I just wanna do it!

Giants can get results. But with their price, their survivability, and their randomness, they're pretty much the least effective monster in the game.

Also, Carnosaur + Balrog Wings = a pretty awesome Wyvern.

 thedarkavenger wrote:
I fully stand behind my suggestion of making it a stonethrower that can throw models into combat with other units.

Just imagine a giant throwing an arachnarok into combat with teclis' bunker on turn 1.

Giants throwing boulders is a classic image. I think it's more than reasonable to give Giants the option to throw rocks or something. As funny as it'd be to huck other models into combat, though, I expect that would result in all sorts of unforeseen consequences.

Warpsolution wrote:

 thedarkavenger wrote:
I fully stand behind my suggestion of making it a stonethrower that can throw models into combat with other units.

Just imagine a giant throwing an arachnarok into combat with teclis' bunker on turn 1.

Giants throwing boulders is a classic image. I think it's more than reasonable to give Giants the option to throw rocks or something. As funny as it'd be to huck other models into combat, though, I expect that would result in all sorts of unforeseen consequences.

And unforeseen consequences doesn't fit a giant, how?

Heh. Fair enough. But since he's in 4 books (right?), chances of weird shenanigans are compounded. I'd ere on the side of keeping him not-that-great, rather than a must-have.

...though it would give a whole new meaning to the term "Monster Mash".

There's a couple of ranged monsters. But for the most part they are wastes. The uber #1 weakness of monsters is they are lone targets susceptible to shooting/spells/machines. Sitting off by yourself throwing rock just exacerbates their problems, they want to get into CC ASAP. If you make the boulder too good, they simply become a big war machine, which isn't remotely their job or their fluff. The guys have trouble standing up and they're going to be trebuchets? That doesn't make sense.

Their lack of defense is their big problem.

I never said make them stone throwers, I just said let them throw nearby models at other models, as it would be HILARIOUS.

No one can get closer than 1" and you'd have to have a unit hanging around a monster just to be thrown, increasing the cost of the unit by requiring it to have an ammo unit that it slowly kills. It's almost certainly going to be slower than the giant, unless they are expensive units, and then you don't want to waste them. It is of fairly negative value to giants.

Having a giant fart out dragons would also be funny (to me) but it wouldn't be very good.

I also never made any assertions to it being good, I just think it would improve the giant. I mean, if a giant could do that, I would take one any time I could.

The giant is specifically designed and fluffed to be a CC fighter. That's what he's always done. By changing him to some shooting variant you throw off all the armies who had him as a CC unit. For instance WoC.

You could make the giant a Wizard and it may be worthwhile, but it would be completely different. You need to just make it do what it's supposed to do a little better.

You're misinterpreting me there. I never said make him ranged, rather than than combat oriented. I just said to give him the ability to throw models at other models. What about a giant makes you think that them being angry enough to pick up the nearest thing and throwing it at the enemy whilst marching forward, is unfluffy?

Nothing that would stop a dragon or dragon ogre shaggoth or mutalith or greater daemon or any other ginormous model from doing the same thing. But they established some stuff as ranged and some stuff as CC. Giants are spread across multiple books. You can change his CC attributes or his results tables without having a big influence on what he is. It's a lot harder to add a model's ability to participate in a whole other phase of the game without it changing it significantly.

I'm wondering if I've been missing something in how the Giant works.

I run him into a block of 20 Boyz and a Warboss as a trial, and he gets massacred every time. T5 and no save isn't all that tough

I don't think anyone in this thread has said he's tough. Which is why a number of suggestions were to make him tougher...

Yeah, for 200pts he's like 10% of the durability of a boyz mob, not to mention less choppy as well

But that is the case with any monster vs. core. For 150 points you can buy gnoblars who have 1000% more wounds than a Star Dragon at 1/2th the cost.

Really? What do you use them for then?

Okay. How about this:

Giant

WS3 BS3 S6 T6 W6 I3 A (special) Ld 9
+1T, -1Ld. More durable, a little less reliable. Still more so than most monsters, though.

Troop Type: Monster
Special Rules: Large Target, Scaly Skin (5+), Stubborn, Terror
Scaly Skin gives him a little more protection than just T and W; hopefully enough to survive higher I low S attacks long enough to do some damage, at least. Also, he doesn't have to worry about Falling Down anymore. It's a funny idea, but taking a wound and losing the rest of his movement or attacks is too great a risk on a Monster.

Special Attacks: any hits caused by a Giant in close combat use the Giant's current Strength.

Big Things Chart
D6 Result
1 Yell and Bawl
2-4 Thump with Club
5-6 'Eadbutt

Smaller Things Chart
D6 Result
1 Yell and Bawl
2 Jump Up and Down
3 Pick Up and...
4-6 Swing with Club

Yell and Bawl: the Giant automatically wins combat. The enemy must roll their break test on 3D6 dice, ignoring the lowest die.
A little different, and a little better. Except against undead, I guess.

Thump With Club: the Giant inflicts an automatic hit with the Multiple Wounds (D6) rule, and that ignores armour saves.
Toned down a bit. No chance to escape, but much less likely to insta-kill other monsters. Still dangerous enough that he'll have the upper hand against most monsters. Just not Star Dragons and Greater Daemons.

'Eadbutt: the Giant inflicts an automatic hit that ignores armour saves. If the victim is wounded, it loses its attacks this round. If the victim has already attacked this round, it loses all of its attacks in the following round.
Maybe this should do D3 wounds?

Jump Up and Down: the Giant inflicts 2D6 automatic hits.
Without the chance to fall, this would have been too good. So now he just does it that one turn, and rolls his attacks again next turn, like the other attacks.

Pick Up and...:
D6 Result
1-2 Stuff into Bag
3-5 Hurl
6 Eat

Stuff into Bag: the Giant hurriedly stuffs the victim into his bag, then stoops down to grab another.
Remove the model as a casualty. The second victim makes a single attack as usual to avoid being picked up--if he fails, roll on this table to see what the Giant does with him.
Just combined Stuff into Bag and Pick Up Another. This might be too scary for characters, though. Chances of not wounding a T6 Giant for a character with S6 is 35%. Which means a 1 in 3 chance of insta-killing a (quite strong) General. Thoughts? Maybe they get a Look Out, Sir!, or something? Or maybe the odds of rolling Pick Up And..., then Stuff into Bag, then not hitting or wounding, is enough of a buffer.

Hurl: the victim is hurled like a living missile. Choose an enemy unit within 12" (including the unit the Giant is in close combat with). Both the model thrown and the unit take D6 hits. Regardless of the unit chosen, the wounds inflicted count towards the Giant's combat. If the victim survives, he hurries back to his comrades. Return the model to the unit it was in before the Giant picked him up.
Now you get to pick the unit you want to huck a guy into, and the thrown model gets a chance to survive, so it's not a super-efficient way to kill characters. But maybe that's not necessary (see above).

Squish: this doesn't really bear thinking about. The model is removed as a casualty.
See Stuff into Bag for concerns on this sort of insta-death attack.

Swing With Club: the Giant inflicts D6 automatic hits on the target unit.

This is based off the Orc and Goblin Giant. I know the Beastman one and the Ogre one have slightly different attacks, but I don't have those books at the moment.

So, he's tougher and a little more reliable. He's still bad at fighting Monstrous Infantry and such, though.
He'll usually dish out a fair number of wounds in combat (Swing with Club is the most likely, and Hurl is the most likely within Pick Up and...), can potentially bypass Steadfast (Yell and Bawl), and--I'm not sure about this--can take out characters (Stuff into Bag and Eat).
What would this guy cost?

I dunno. It's good, but there's no throwing models at other models...