Monday, 10 February 2014

Storm Giant



Among the most powerful giants are the storm giants. They rise over other giants both magically and in stature, and even the weakest of this kind can easily set itself up as a local deity. All storms giants can call down lightning and manipulate the weather in any terrain, but prefer to lead isolated lives on mountains. Storms giants are (usually) a peaceful race, preferring lonely lives and silence. Worship is sometimes forced upon them, since nearby settlements of lesser creatures may give them offerings in exchange for bountiful weather.

The description of storm giants in the Monster Manual is a bit confusing to me. For example, they're generally green skinned, with some of them being purple. I guess storm clouds can turn a weird shade of yellow sometimes, but I haven't seen any green ones. Though with some research I've learned that there are greenish storm clouds -- usually ones that contain hail or will produce severed thunder or tornadoes. Storm giants also have water breathing, but they're neither aquatic creatures or live in an aquatic environment (they live in warm mountains). Maybe it's because of floods?

I know the storm giants of D&D are largely inspired by Greco-Roman and Scandinavian mythology, but I've gone for a more Eastern look with this. It's ripped off of inspired by a group of oni-like people from the game Okaminden who live in the cloud-city of Thundercloud, who wear tiger-patterned robes and skirts. By the way, I love the Okami games. They just so pretty.

4 comments:

  1. The giants in D&D are like a weird, vague mix of Old Nordic jötnar (giants) and Japanese mythology. Specifically, I think they're inspired by Raijin and Fujin, which are the gods of thunderstorms and wind, respectively, that are also big scary ogres with magical powers. Both of them seem to have been depicted with green skin and wearing furs from big cats at one point or another. (n.b. This is pretty much what Wikipedia has to say about them, as I'm not really too far beyond passingly familiar with the Japanese side of things. Okami is really pretty fantastic, though.)

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  2. So, can we see a strictly Nordic-inspired storm giant now? You know. An actual storm giant.

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