Geriviars were rare and mighty giants who fought as living siege engines. They preferred their isolation in remote lands and had an irrational hatred of buildings.[1]
Description[]
A gigantic and imposing figure, a geriviar stood 25‒30 ft (7.6‒9.1 m) tall and was around 12 tons (11,000 kilograms) in weight. With a small amount of black body hair, its hide was various shades of gray, rough in texture, and ensconced with thick plates like armor. These plates bristled with spiky spherical nodules, not unlike huge caltrops and 1 to 2 feet (0.3 to 0.61 meters) wide, that could be broken off. The geriviar had six limbs in total: two legs and four arms, which had two elbow joints. It had a smooth and rolling gait, despite its massiveness, and could sprint by going to all six limbs. Its head was sunken below its bulky, hunchbacked shoulders.[1]
They wore a little clothing as necessary to keep warm, as they did not like the cold, and a few wore armor. They carried their possessions in a sack or portable container.[1]
Personality[]
Geriviars were characterized by a strange yet all-consuming loathing for permanent structures of any kind. Buildings provoked a pathological rage in them and practically offended them on a personal level, driving them to immediately destroy them and those who built them.[1]
Inflexible, stubborn, and utterly unyielding in almost anything they did, a geriviar that had started a task or set its mind on a course could not be stopped from finishing it, except through death or an equally forceful will.[1]
They were highly hostile and hateful to any being they saw as a threat—seemingly just about anything that moved. They were especially suspicious of any person or race that erected buildings to lay claim to land, as well as those who trespassed in their territory.[1]
Abilities[]
A geriviar battered structures and objects with special fierceness, damaging them more effectively than otherwise possible, even with their enormous strength. They also trained to more easily break the weapons and equipment their opponents carried.[1]
They were adept at throwing and even catching large rocks. A geriviar could hurl a rock weighing 60‒80 pounds (27‒36 kilograms) to a distance of 160 feet (49 meters). Furthermore, with four arms, they could throw two rocks at a time: picking them up or from a sack with two, and hurling them with the other two. In addition, an alert geriviar with good-enough reflexes could catch a rock or similar projectile about to hit it. And then probably throw it back[1]
If that weren't enough, geriviars came equipped with their own explosive projectiles. The spiky nodules that grew on their bodies contained a volatile fluid secreted through the skin and small fragments of their natural armor plating, forming natural grenades that exploded with fire and shrapnel over 10 feet (3 meters). The geriviar could break two off and throw them at a time. A healthy geriviar had twelve such nodules, and they grew back simultaneously in just three to eighteen minutes, or in two to three days if regeneration was prevented.[1]
Beyond this, geriviars were also capable of magic, producing effects like reverse gravity and telekinesis both thrice a day, and invisibility, shout, and stone shape each once a day. They were highly resistant to spells.[1]
These already incredibly robust creatures were also immune to disease and poison, fire, sonic effects, and mind-altering magic. Weapons did less injury to them; only a magical adamantine weapon could fully harm them. However, like trolls, they could regenerate injuries and even regrow limbs and body parts in three to eighteen minutes, or reattach them in an instant; acid and cold were needed to damage them permanently.[1]
Despite their massive bulk, geriviars could move shockingly swiftly, being faster than regular giants their size. This might've been due to their double-jointed limbs. They could walk 70 feet (21 meters) in several seconds, and by going down on all six limbs sprint six times faster. Moreover, they could jump with ease and if they leapt purposefully off a cliff or castle wall, they could absorb and ignore much of the impact. They were quite skilled in climbing, and expert in jumping.[1]
Combat[]
While some geriviars wielded weapons, the majority favored slamming with their arms, biting, or hurling their exploding nodules. They made full use of their awesome strength, using brute force, powerful swings, cleaving through ranks, and shoving foes, yet they were also quick to seize an opening. The one refined technique they had was to break an enemy's weapons.[1]
Given the opportunity, they tended to follow a set sequence of tactics. They started a fight invisible to surprise their enemy, and from as far away as possible to take advantage of range as long as they could. Then they bombarded their foe with rocks and exploding nodules to soften them up, favoring magic-users and archers who could return fire. They would keep their distance by running or leaping away, or using telekinesis or reverse gravity to move foes away and delay them. They did this despite their devastating capacity for melee combat, but when forced, they favored breaking enemy weapons or shoving them into hazardous terrain where possible.[1]
Society[]
They were a nomadic race, always on the move out of a paranoia that someone might be building something on some other piece of land they claimed, and intending to find it and tear it down. Fortunately for those who built, wherever geriviars went, they usually sought isolation in remote places, even from each other. The majority were solitary or paired wanderers who lingered in remote spots, patrolled their territory, and drove away so-called "invaders". Others roamed in small family groups, in bands of six to nine active members with one or two non-combatants. These geriviars were utterly dedicated to their family and fought to the death to defend a member who was attacked, but those very rare few who could not keep up because of age, injury, or sickness were just left behind.[1]
Some geriviars might've been found serving in military forces, whether voluntarily enlisted or forcibly conscripted. Either way, they acted as siege experts, or as living siege weapons, a task for which they were perfectly suited. Some even enjoyed this for the chance to destroy their hated buildings. However, commanders of geriviars had to be just as hard and uncompromising, and they would still struggle to order them to change tasks or retreat.[1]
In contrast to a lot of giants, geriviars seldom captured slaves.[1]
Homelands[]
Geriviars usually dwelled in marshes and rough mountainous areas, usually inhospitable and hostile to others. Here, they were unlikely to find buildings to offend them.[1]
In particular, in the mid–14th century DR, they were found in southern Chessenta, wandering the lands between the Maerthwatch range, the Chondalwood, and the Black Ash Plain. Family groups claimed the Black Ash Plain as territory, while others migrated further south over a strip of the Eastern Shaar, with some even going all the way to the Great Rift, but the peoples here defended their territory.[1]
History[]
Because of their strange habits and unique array of powers, geriviars were theorized by scholars to be an artificial race created for use by warlords as mobile siege engines in ancient times. Few could doubt this after witnessing them in battle.[1]
Appendix[]
External Links[]
Geriviar article at the Eberron Wiki, a wiki for the Eberron campaign setting.
References[]
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 1.21 1.22 Andrew Finch, Gwendolyn Kestrel, Chris Perkins (August 2004). Monster Manual III. (Wizards of the Coast), pp. 52–53. ISBN 0-7869-3430-1.