Jungle Giant
Jungle Giants are, as the name suggests, a species of giant indigenous to the tropical jungle regions of the worlds of Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder. They are characterized by being tall and lean, with green-colored flesh and hair that helps them to blend in. Debuting in the Al-Qadim Appendix for the Monstrous Compendium, we don't know much about them because they are secondary tier giants and both D&D and PF are notorious for relying on quantity over quality when it comes to giant lore. In Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, it's noted that female jungle giants are much taller than males, which PF used as an excuse to portray them as a race of giant jungle amazons on Golarion.
They have not appeared in D&D since 2nd edition AD&D, unfortunately.
The D&D jungle giant is tall and lanky; 18' tall and 3,000 pounds on average, with females being taller than the menfolk. With pale green, wavy hair hair and a rich, muddy yellow skintone, they are naturally camouflaged in their tropical forest environments. Many groups of jungle giants use ritual tattooing, colorful feather headdresses, and even filed teeth to show their fierceness. Like the humanoids of those regions, they care little for clothing, wearing only what's necessary to help carry around their essential tools, fire-starters, tinder, and weapons, particularly a bow and a quiver of arrows. Jungle giants are famous as bow masters, wielding enormous longbows outfitted with massive, 6' long arrows whose heads are smeared in paralytic toxins harvested from the forest environment, and are experts in ambushing foes, mastering the arts of camouflage from a young age. If forced into melee, they typically use daggers, hand-wield their arrows as shortspears, or just grab a suitably hefty tree-branch and swing it like a club...
C'mon, they're fucking giants, you knew there was gonna be clubs in here somewhere.
Whilst not evil or even as stupid as Hill Giants, jungle giants are still regarded with mixed attitudes by most peoples who reside nearby, because they have voracious appetites for flesh and consider anything that isn't a jungle giant to be a potential meal. They are among the friendlier giant species, and often cooperate with native human tribes on hunting, but jungle giants will strip the land of literally anything made of meat. They harvest eggs, young animals and grown adults indiscriminately, devouring any mammal, reptile, amphibian, avian or fish they can get their hands on; they can devastate the ecology if their numbers grow too great, and so they are culled by any powerful creature with an interest in preserving nature, such as druid enclaves or dragons. Only creatures respected as fellow hunters are safe from their appetites. Jungle giant villages are described as resembling open-air slaughter-houses, with copious amounts of meat being hung up to smoke or air-dry for later consumption, and with the plethora of blood and scraps attracting insectile scavengers, often including giant specimens.
Because of this, jungle giants are also frequently found on the savannah, either forced to migrate there due to food issues or just launching a hunting campaign. They don't like the savannah very much, but sometimes it's all they have.
If their appetites aren't enough of a problem, according to Dragon Magazine #266, jungle giants are particularly susceptible to the curse of the therianthrope; any werebeast found in a jungle environment can infect a jungle giant, such as a werebaboon, werebat, werefox, weresnake or werespider. Werecats are especially common amongst jungle giant tribes, although precisely which breed of feline therianthropy is a little more ambiguous. The article itself would have been referring to weretigers, but wereleopards, werejaguars and werepanthers would all make sense in the jungle environment too, whilst werelions and werecheetahs could be found roaming the savannah.
Pathfinder[edit]
The Golarion jungle giant is visually distinguished from its AD&D counterpart by its bark-like skin. These jungle giants lean into the Amazon archetype; females are hunters and warriors, specializing in the use of the bow, whilst males defend the village, gather food, tend to livestock and raise children. They are described as distrustful of civilization and actively hostile to non-tribal ways of life, with a mention that many deep jungle ruins are the remnants of cities that angered jungle giant tribes. Their bows are sacred instruments that are passed down from mother to daughter; touching a jungle giant's bow without permission is a mortal insult.
Gallery[edit]
The Giants of Dungeons & Dragons | |
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Giants | Beasthead Giant - Cloud Giant - Crag Giant - Cyclops - Desert Giant - Ettin - Firbolg - Fire Giant - Fog Giant - Fomorian - Forest Giant - Frost Giant - Half-Giant - Hephaeston - Hill Giant - Ice Giant - Jungle Giant - Mountain Giant - Ogre - Plains Giant - Reef Giant - Sea Giant - Spacesea Giant - Stone Giant - Storm Giant - Titan - Verbeeg - Voadkyn |