Tribal nomads of the mountains, strong as the rock and proud as the peak
AW at-will · ENC encounter · DLY daily |
Fields: Req requirement · Trig trigger · Tgt target · Atk attack · Hit/Miss/Eff · 1°/2° primary/secondary · Sust sustain · After aftereffect · Spec special |
Shorthand: Str/Dex/Con/Wis/Int/Cha = ability mod · EONT/SONT = end/start of your next turn · sq = square(s) · CA combat advantage · OA opp. attack · MBA/RBA melee/ranged basic attack · HP hit points · tgt target · [W] weapon dice
| ENC | Stone’s EnduranceGoliath Racial PowerMinor Pers | Your foes’ attacks bounce off your stony hide. Eff You gain resist 5 to all dmg until EONT. Level 11 Resist 10 to all dmg. · Level 21 Resist 15 to all dmg. |
Goliaths are mountain-dwelling nomads who see life as a grand competition. Their scattered bands have never been major players in the politics of the lowland world, but they have wandered the mountain ranges of the world since the primordials first shaped the peaks and valleys. Tall and massive, goliaths revere the primal power of nature and use it to enhance their own strength.
Goliaths tower over even dragonborn, standing between 7 and 8 feet tall. Their skin is gray or brown, mottled with darker patches that they believe hint at some aspect of each goliath’s fate or destiny. Their skin is speckled with lithoderms, coin-sized growths of bone that appear like pebbles studding their arms, shoulders, torso, and head. A bony ridge juts over their gleaming blue or green eyes. Male goliaths are bald, and females have dark hair they typically grow long and wear in braids.
Goliaths have life spans comparable to those of humans.
Goliaths are driven by a fierce love of competition. Anything that can be conceived as a challenge invites goliaths to keep score, tracking their progress against both their comrades and themselves. A goliath fighter might remark on how many times he has drawn first blood in battle within a particular dungeon compared to the party’s rogue, and he’s certainly mentally tracking his own performance against his last adventure. This competitiveness takes the form of good-natured rivalry among goliaths. As a race they have no patience for cheaters, gloaters, or sore losers, but goliaths can be very hard on themselves when they fail to measure up to their own past accomplishments.
Daring that borders on foolhardiness is also a common trait among goliaths. They have no fear of heights, climbing sheer mountain cliffs and leaping great chasms with ease. Their nomadic lifestyle of hunting and gathering instills in them an inquisitive interest in whatever lies over the next ridge or at the head of a canyon. To a wandering hunter’s mind, that curiosity can lead to better hunting grounds or a good water source that would otherwise go undiscovered. Goliaths respect and revere the natural world, and goliath adventurers commonly draw on the primal power source. Druids and shamans are more common among them than clerics, and goliath priests—called skywatchers—invoke the spirits of nature and their ancestors far more often than they call on the distant gods of the Astral Sea. Some goliath tribes also honor Kord, Melora, and Avandra, particularly those tribes that have frequent contact with other races. Tribes that regularly trade with dwarves sometimes offer sacrifices to Moradin as well.
Three sample goliath adventurers are described below.
Kavaki was injured in an avalanche as a young man and exiled from his tribe because he was unable to walk with them when they moved to a new hunting ground. His tribe lamented his loss, celebrated his accomplishments, and then left him for dead. However, a ram spirit sheltered him through blizzards and storms until his injury healed, and he now evokes the power of that ram spirit to fuel his barbarian rage. Still cut off from his tribe, Kavaki has found a new family—a group of adventurers—and is determined never again to be in a position where he cannot carry his own weight.
Nalla was a tent-mother for her tribe, caring for infants and toddlers while their parents performed their own tasks on the tribe’s behalf. When her own child died in an orc raid, however, Nalla felt that she could no longer bear to care for children, and she soon exiled herself. As a fighter, she has fallen in with a band of adventurers she now guards with her life, almost as if they were the children of her tribe. Lo-Kag was a trader for his tribe, interacting regularly with a nearby dwarf clan. As a warden, he was interested in the traditions of the dwarven defenders—determined fighters and paladins sworn to the defense of their clanhold—and learned much from a mentor trained in their ways. On his last trip to the dwarf clanhold, however, he found it deserted. Corpses lay strewn around the citadel, but he saw no sign of violence or looting. Instead of returning to his tribe, Lo-Kag set out into the world to investigate the mystery of the dwarves’ demise.
“There are secrets in the peaks, mysteries I have unraveled and embraced.”
There can be no understating the kinship that goliaths share with their mountain homes. Like the mountains, goliaths stand tall despite the hardship of life amid the wind, snow, and ice of the highest crags. Most goliaths are proud merely to draw strength from their upbringing amid the towering peaks, but a rare few come to embody the spirit of the mountains. You are such a hero, a stoneblessed goliath who has an uncommon connection to stone and earth. Rock beneath your feet emboldens you, and the elements nourish you, until you become the personification of your homeland’s peaks. As a stoneblessed, you draw power from the stone itself, allowing you to transcend the bounds of your mortal form and achieve astonishing acts of strength. Your attacks strike with the weight of the mountain behind them. When you reach the pinnacle of this path, you can transform yourself into an entity of stone, crushing those who stand against you.
When you take the first step on this path, your features and form begin a slow transformation, revealing the depth of your mountain connection. Your skin gains the texture of sandstone, thickening to protect you from harm. Your eyes lose their moisture until they eventually shine like diamonds, reflecting light in a rainbow. The lithoderms that stud your shoulders and elbows transform into crystalline growths. Among goliaths, these features mark you as a true champion, a chosen hero of your kind.
| ENC | Mountain SweepStoneblessed Attack 11Std Melee wpnWeaponTgt One or two creatures | You sweep your weapon in a terrible arc, slicing through your foes as if they were wheat before the scythe. Atk Str vs AC · Hit 2[W] + Str + Con dmg. |
| ENC | Summit AdvantageStoneblessed Utility 12Minor Pers | Focusing your awareness, you ready yourself to lash out at any enemy in reach that gives you an opening. Eff Until EONT, you have threatening reach. |
| DLY | Avalanche AssaultStoneblessed Attack 20Std Melee wpnStance, WeaponTgt One creature | With the power of an avalanche, you rain blows on your enemy. The strength of the mountains lingers in your limbs while you remain in this stance. Atk Str vs Fortitude · Hit 4[W] + Str dmg. Eff You assume the stance of the avalanche. Until the stance ends, you can move through an enemy’s space if that enemy is your size or smaller, and you gain a bonus to the dmg rolls of your at-will attacks = Con. Miss Half dmg. |