Half-giants are by far my favorite reward race — the wiki lore on the subject was written just enough to leave rooms for players to interpret and imagine. The initial mechanical stats and limitations helped shaped the roleplay and associated builds to come. What the community did with it has been stellar majority of the time and this reward race should serve as a prime example of how reward races should be done.
In comparison, Firbolgs and Gloaming — no idea what to do with those races other than treating them as bigger humans or drow with wings, so dark Avariel. Maybe it’s a lack of understanding of them on my end, or it is also the lack in the direction or diction from which edition of which how they would be roleplayed.
With the latest changes to half-giants, I will say some of the changes weren’t necessary, other than what it feels like a slap on the face for those who enjoyed them for what they are to discourage players from playing half-giants because someone on the dev team has a beef with what half-giants may be from the lore perspective.
The size reduction make some of them smaller than Half-Orcs now, when they’ve always been smaller than firbolgs already so I don’t see why that was needed.
Alignment removal was alright, though the initial partial restriction did actually help with players interpreting the race and shape the roleplay, as minor as the mechanical thing may be.
Last but not least, if there’s a problem with the bloodline, renaming half-giant to giantblooded or Jotunbrud wouldn’t have been such a bad idea, given the reduction in size. Give them the same treatment as plane-touched if lore is such a concern.
Also can somebody make an executive decision on Firbolg lore already?