Know Your Enemy: Frost Giants

[Tolero]

It's Monster Monday! Each wintry week in January we're focusing on a fearsome DDO foe, and today we're feeling fairly frozen learning about Frost Giants! Click here (http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Frost_Giant) to read more, and feel free to add your own tips, pictures, and guides about this week's featured monster!

[RTN]

You strangely forgot to mention they have permanent deathblock (ward?) and can't be charmed.

[KingOfCheese]

You strangely forgot to mention they have permanent deathblock (ward?) and can't be charmed.

Maybe you just aren't charming enough ;)

I haven't had the spell hit for me. But I firmly believe I've had at least several Refuge giants at least slightly impressed by me.

[MrCow]

You strangely forgot to mention they have permanent deathblock (ward?) and can't be charmed.

That is due to the fact that all current frost giants reside in the Reaver's Refuge storyline and have the Sorjek's Command effect (Immunity to compulsions, 90% attribute damage ward, deathblock). If frost giants were added outside of the story arc in other places these aspects wouldn't be likely to carry over.

[ArkoHighStar]

That is due to the fact that all current frost giants reside in the Reaver's Refuge storyline and have the Sorjek's Command effect (Immunity to compulsions, 90% attribute damage ward, deathblock). If frost giants were added outside of the story arc in other places these aspects wouldn't be likely to carry over.

you mean like Tempest Spine, where the fire caves are populated by fire giants and the ice caves are of course populated with hill giants:eek:

[Tolero]

you mean like Tempest Spine, where the fire caves are populated by fire giants and the ice caves are of course populated with hill giants:eek:

Pff those ice caves aren't nearly cold enough to suit a Frost Giant's tastes. Too close to that icky lava.

[KingOfCheese]

Pff those ice caves aren't nearly cold enough to suit a Frost Giant's tastes. Too close to that icky lava.

Now if we could just fashion a jacket for them made of ice mephits, we might be able to convince them to move in--and then charm the pants off of them.

[MrCow]

Now if we could just fashion a jacket for them made of ice mephits, we might be able to convince them to move in--and then charm the pants off of them.

If the jacket is made of ice mephits I shutter to think of what the pants are made of...

[Tolero]

That is due to the fact that all current frost giants reside in the Reaver's Refuge storyline and have the Sorjek's Command effect (Immunity to compulsions, 90% attribute damage ward, deathblock). If frost giants were added outside of the story arc in other places these aspects wouldn't be likely to carry over.

Correct, those sorts of things are very quest-specific, but I don't see the harm in adding a tip like that down under one of the other sub headings.

[RTN]

Maybe you just aren't charming enough ;)

I haven't had the spell hit for me. But I firmly believe I've had at least several Refuge giants at least slightly impressed by me.

That's because, like them, you rarely shower. They recognize your...aroma. :p


Oh, and +1 to Mr. Cow for his explanation.

[Coldin]

I like the little stories that go with these segments. Things like this are missing from the main game of DDO. :)

[Musouka]

I always thought Nimbus was a frost giant. You know the one who gives you the prison of the planes quest, and the one you have kill in Tor.

EDIT: I guess not... because the others in the GH area are called Sky Knights... must be implying Cloud Giants

[rest]

I always thought Nimbus was a frost giant. You know the one who gives you the prison of the planes quest, and the one you have kill in Tor.

I think he is a Storm Giant.

[MrCow]

I always thought Nimbus was a frost giant. You know the one who gives you the prison of the planes quest, and the one you have kill in Tor.

Nimbus ar'Yorg is a Cloud Giant (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/giant.htm#cloudGiant).

[badbob117]

"The Coin Lords assure citizens that snow and ice ramps of the Risia Ice Games are not capable of attracting Frost Giants into the city despite the Giant's affinity for the cold."


Ha. That gave me a chuckle. It would be pretty awesome if the harbor got invaded by them next ice games. Despite the reassurance from the Coin Lords. Imagine the chaos? :p

[az4a3l]

The coin lords warning its pretty funny maybe in the next risia games u could add a warning sign : "For ur safety this games are Frost Giant Free"

[Xenus_Paradox]

Now if we could just fashion a jacket for them made of ice mephits, we might be able to convince them to move in--and then charm the pants off of them.

Why are you trying to get the Frost Giant's pants off?

:D

[sirgog]

It also forgets to mention that these giants have e.x.t.r.e.m.e.l.y. . .s.l.o.w. attack speeds, yet so many hitpoints that fighting them takes a while. All of this combines to make combat with them feel like fighting in treacle, and the fact that they are immune to so many things leaves you few options.

Sorry, I *really* wanted to see Frost Giants in game, but IMO the actual implementation of them is just - dull. They'd be quite fun to fight if you gave them a permanent 40% melee and ranged alacrity and reduced their HP to compensate.

[vVAnjilaVv]

They are not immune to the Holy Aura blindness effect or Energy Drain/Ennervation........both help a lot when fighting them.

Learn a thing or two about hockey too...because while fighting these guys u will spend much of your time believing you are a puck.

[sirgog]

Learn a thing or two about hockey too...because while fighting these guys u will spend much of your time believing you are a puck.

Heh, that's probably why they a.t.t.a.c.k . s.o . s.l.o.w.l.y - perhaps instead of knocking back on every attack, they should knockback only on a critical threat or vorpal strike.

[knightgf]

90% attribute damage ward...

How exactly does this attribute ward work? Is it like a DR against ability damage or a % chance? Can it be bypassed if a monster fails their save on a poison or disease spell, per se, to do the normal ability damage it would do on a failed save?

[Angelus_dead]

It also forgets to mention that these giants have e.x.t.r.e.m.e.l.y. . .s.l.o.w. attack speeds, yet so many hitpoints that fighting them takes a while. All of this combines to make combat with them feel like fighting in treacle
The hitpoints of frost giants are totally fine in comparison with the DPS of level-appropriate characters when those monstesr were released. What makes it appear to be a problem is a bad design in the quest itself, where there is an inexplicably INFINITE quantity of Frost Giant enemies. If they weren't endless then the time spent killing them wouldn't seem excessive. Notice that fighting them in the boss and miniboss rooms isn't tough at all.

[MrCow]

How exactly does this attribute ward work? Is it like a DR against ability damage or a % chance? Can it be bypassed if a monster fails their save on a poison or disease spell, per se, to do the normal ability damage it would do on a failed save?

90% of the time any attribute damage is completely nullified. The other 10% of the time the attribute damage gets through and acts normally. It doesn't care what the source of attribute damage is.

[Memnir]

I like the little stories that go with these segments. Things like this are missing from the main game of DDO. :)Agreed.


I remember a long, long time ago. Module two, to be exact. No, not update... module. We had some great little Lore write ups leading to the release of the Titan raid. One in particular about the Gyroscopic Boots, and the lore behind them, was really cool.

I miss those bits of supplemental story telling.

[sephiroth1084]

Might be useful information to include their alignment, since aligned weapons play such a big part in DDO combat.

Also, why the note about sneaking? To say that they're susceptible to sneak attack? If a rogue sneaks up on a frost giant, the rogue is going to end up having a pretty bad day, after it pokes the thing for 1/100th of its HP and then gets knocked around for 40 minutes. And the ones we have so far are immune (I believe) to assassinate, so that's a no-go there.

Further, the ones in Prey are either required kills, so sneaking doesn't help, or in a location where you necessarily have to not be sneaking.

So, why the comment?

And I disagree with A_D here about their HP...they have too much. The fights are incredibly dull. Their HP is not scaled well to the DPS of characters in, or beyond, their level. The fact that they are infinite just exacerbates this problem; it is not in itself the issue.

[sirgog]

The hitpoints of frost giants are totally fine in comparison with the DPS of level-appropriate characters when those monstesr were released. What makes it appear to be a problem is a bad design in the quest itself, where there is an inexplicably INFINITE quantity of Frost Giant enemies. If they weren't endless then the time spent killing them wouldn't seem excessive. Notice that fighting them in the boss and miniboss rooms isn't tough at all.

I'd have to test it to find out, but IIRC the trash ones have around 10000hp in Elite Prey on the Hunter. Even when they are rendered autocrit (Enervation-Enervation-Enervation-Flesh to Stone back in the day), they still took a long time to kill. Prior to dungeon scaling I can confirm that the Frost Giant Hunters had ~3400hp on Normal.

For comparison, many mobs in Epics (epics get lots of complaints about 'overinflated HP') have under 4000hp, and the highest HP other non-epic mobs I can think of, the Elite versions of the quori in the Dreaming Dark chain (the ones that are aligned to one of three elements, can't think of their name) have about 5000hp.

Even with the significantly increased player DPS these days, many level 20 players run that quest frequently on Casual (sacrificing their chances at +2 tomes from the chests) just to reduce the Frost Giant HP. People don't run Monastery on casual for runes because (on Normal and Hard at least) the mobs die fast. In addition, players have access to Firewall which deals double damage and *still* find the frost giants take ages to kill.

[Shanadeus]

Keep these monster updates coming!

Am loving every bit of it

[The_Phenx]

But they are pretty much immune to the ancient vulkoorim dagger...regular and epic versions... which kinda sucks... :D

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Correct, those sorts of things are very quest-specific, but I don't see the harm in adding a tip like that down under one of the other sub headings.

I couldn't help noticing the suggestion to sneak by them, yet the terrain design that they are currently in pevents this. :(

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Correct, those sorts of things are very quest-specific, but I don't see the harm in adding a tip like that down under one of the other sub headings.

I would like to see more of a lot of monsters, that curently only exist in a limited number of quests. (except Wild Men who are supposed to only exist in the Restless Isles, yet somehow keep popping up elsewhere. :rolleyes: )

I wish Scrags still needed Fire and Acid to kill though.. :(

A few others that come to mind.

Frost Giants (since this is a thread about them)
Sprites! (real ones)
Illusions! (revisisited, fixed....and let us cast them too.)
Phase Spiders. (but tone down the phasing.....for all creatures with this ability)(actually, its ok if they phase often, but they need to reappear and stay corporeal a bit longer than they do....none of this in,out,in,out in less than a second stuff they do now.
Stone Giants
Water Elementals
Druids. (would like to see this all over Stormreach! :p)

That's all that come to mind right now.

Monsters I never want to see again:
Mephits!
Air Ellies
Earth Ellies (I'll let you slide a little here...especially with Stone Giants)
Ogres
Trolls
Gnolls.


Love these Monster Manual entries though. Thx.
Would like to see more details that will help non-D&D experts fight them effectively.

[Ganolyn]

I couldn't help noticing the suggestion to sneak by them, yet the terrain design that they are currently in pevents this. :(

You can sneak by them in the valley. Maybe that's what they meant.



I always thought Nimbus was a frost giant.

A Frost Giant with the name Nimbus? :p;)



I found this interesting:

■Many frost giants are clumsy, sporting a Dexterity of 9. A combination of Exhaustion effects and Dexterity damage can swiftly render them helpless.


Does this mean Maladroit/Bonebreaking weapons work normally on them?

[Heronous]

Does this mean Maladroit/Bonebreaking weapons work normally on them?

Sure!

10% of the time.

[Angelus_dead]

I'd have to test it to find out, but IIRC the trash ones have around 10000hp in Elite Prey on the Hunter.
It would be a mistake to talk about elite versions of monsters from a dungeon with zero motivation to run on elite.



For comparison, many mobs in Epics (epics get lots of complaints about 'overinflated HP') have under 4000hp
1. Those are not big monsters, 2. those are damaging monsters.

3400 hp on a big monster means that the party kills it in only a couple seconds. Three players doing 300 DPS = 3.8 seconds (and many players have more DPS than that), or enough time for the giant to make 1-2 attacks. Allowing a big monster to be killed any faster than that would've been a design mistake, similar to the problems in the original version when you could Finger them.

Now that Dungeon Scaling and Casual mode are in, the Frost Giants often die before they finish even one axe swing.

As explained above, what makes combat in Prey on the Hunter seem tedious is not the design of the monster stats, but the quest design that has big monsters respawn rapidly and endlessly. For the majority of the Prey frost giants to attack them is a tactical error.

[krissonofpark]

Is it only me who thinks that Frost Giants are a extremely random choice for the second Monster detailed?

When Sahuagin were the first Monster it made a lot of sense, a Sahuagin been the first Monster you kill in the Game and then you fight through an island of them, therefore Sahuagin first. So I was expecting Spiders, Ice Mephits or Kobolds next. Most likely Kobolds, due to the large numbers of these you kill in the Harbour. But no it's Frost Giants, very unlikely to be the first kind of Giant you meet In-Game.

So in preparation for next week I shall be opening the Monster Manual at a random page for what to expect.

[tgun]

Dwarves also stand a much better chance in battle against Frost Giants, with their natural dwarven armor class bonus against giant-kind.


I'm glad that this was mentioned since, you know, AC is so relevant in high level quests.

[sirgog]

I'm glad that this was mentioned since, you know, AC is so relevant in high level quests.

Even the AC a casual player can attain (i.e. no raid loot) is enough to make a big difference in Normal difficulty Prey. An AC in the low 60s will only be reliably hit by Kalijarne and the two dragons (and maybe Roskilde).




3400 hp on a big monster means that the party kills it in only a couple seconds. Three players doing 300 DPS = 3.8 seconds (and many players have more DPS than that), or enough time for the giant to make 1-2 attacks. Allowing a big monster to be killed any faster than that would've been a design mistake, similar to the problems in the original version when you could Finger them.

Noone does 300 DPS against Frost Giants that knock you around, except for arcane casters (and they cannot sustain that level of SP use). And they have always been able to be instakilled by Trap the Soul, which targets a weaker save than Finger of Death does. (TTS was almost required to beat the quest on Normal on the first day it was released due to the insanely low hitpoints Aussiercaex had during the Frost Giant/Kalijarne fight at the end).

Plus in most situations we fight 4 or 5 of the giants at a time. 2000 hp would have them last long enough to get attacks off (as long as their attack speed isn't in slow motion)



Now that Dungeon Scaling and Casual mode are in, the Frost Giants often die before they finish even one axe swing.

Since the rune changes, running Prey without a full group of six people is just stupid, unless you only need the essence, so scaling isn't a factor. As for Casual - well, what other quests do level 20 highly geared players run on Casual?

[quest]As explained above, what makes combat in Prey on the Hunter seem tedious is not the design of the monster stats, but the quest design that has big monsters respawn rapidly and endlessly. For the majority of the Prey frost giants to attack them is a tactical error.[/QUOTE]

That's not the main factor. If they never respawned, people would still zerg past them, because fighting them would still be a waste of time. Some groups that currently kite giants at the shrine might kill them there instead, but I prefer to kill them with the respawns anyway.



Edit: Oh and do people remember when this came out, and strength-based TWF characters put away the Shroud weapons and pulled out WoPs for these giants, or (if they didn't own WoPs) they used plain wounders? Even with the stat damage partial ward these mobs had, it was STILL quicker to stat damage them with mediocre stat damage weapons than it was to use the best DPS weapons in the game.

I wanted to see Frost Giants in the game for a long time, but the current implementation of them has made them the most dull and boring mobs to fight in the entire game.

[MrkGrismer]

Every time I run Prey it bothers me that I am supposed to run like crazy and not attack the bad guys. It just seems wrong (I run it with my Paladin).

I really wish the quest was different such that you could kill the giants and have an effect, maybe even reduce the number you face in the final fight if you kill enough. The entire quest could be timed if urgency is the idea, but having it be pointless to kill the 2,000+ hp behemoths really annoys me.

[doomboy]

"The Coin Lords assure citizens that snow and ice ramps of the Risia Ice Games are not capable of attracting Frost Giants into the city despite the Giant's affinity for the cold."


Ha. That gave me a chuckle. It would be pretty awesome if the harbor got invaded by them next ice games. Despite the reassurance from the Coin Lords. Imagine the chaos? :p

fun fun fun!

[fco-karatekid]

If the jacket is made of ice mephits I shutter to think of what the pants are made of...

ooze mephits :|

[Ponza69]

oops