Hill Giant 5e: Stats, Tactics and the 2024 Tree Club

A hill giant is a CR 5 Huge Giant with AC 13, 105 hit points, a 40-foot speed and an Intelligence of 5. It swings a club twice a turn for 18 damage a hit at +8 with 10 feet of reach, and it can throw something heavy out to 240 feet. That's the whole kit: no spells, no saving throw proficiencies, no resistances, just a huge sack of hit points behind two very big hits. The 2024 rules keep the numbers and add riders that change how the fight plays: the Tree Club knocks targets Prone, the Trash Lob leaves them Poisoned, and the giant can throw twice a turn instead of once.

Table of Contents

• •Hill Giant Stat Block (2014)
• •The 2024 Hill Giant: Tree Club and Trash Lob
• •How Hill Giants Fight
• •How Many Hill Giants for a Level 5 Party?
• •How Players Beat Hill Giants
• •The Hill Giant Among the Giants
• •Hill Giant Encounter Ideas
• •Frequently Asked Questions

Hill Giant Stat Block (2014)

The 2014 hill giant (SRD 5.1) is the same creature as the 2014 Monster Manual entry.

Read it as three facts. 105 hit points behind AC 13 means most martial characters hit it on a 6 or 7, but at 10 or so damage a hit the party still needs about ten hits to drop it. Two greatclub swings at +8 average 36 damage if both land, enough to take a level 5 wizard from full to 0. Reach 10 feet on a Huge body means the giant threatens a huge area: it occupies a 15-by-15-foot square and can hit anything within 10 feet of any edge of it.

The 2014 version can only throw one rock per action, because its Multiattack covers greatclub attacks only. At range it's a 21-damage single shot; up close it's a 36-damage double hit. That gap tells the giant what it wants: close the distance.

The 2024 Hill Giant: Tree Club and Trash Lob

The 2024 hill giant (SRD 5.2.1) has the same AC, hit points, speed, ability scores, CR and XP. The attacks are what changed.

What that means at the table:

• •Every melee hit knocks a character down. Prone gives the target Disadvantage on its own attacks and forces it to spend half its Speed to stand. A fighter who gets clubbed spends 15 of their 30 feet of movement just getting up.
• •Ranged damage per turn goes up. Two Trash Lobs average 32 damage if both hit, against one 21-damage rock in 2014. The giant no longer has to walk up to you to be dangerous.
• •Poison shuts down attackers. A Poisoned creature has Disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks. A lob that lands on the party's archer or warlock right before their turn costs them most of that turn's damage. Spell save DCs are untouched, so save-based casters shrug it off.

How Hill Giants Fight

Hill giants are greedy and not clever. Play them like a hungry animal with a club: they go for whatever is closest, loudest or most edible-looking, and they don't plan beyond the next swing. That doesn't make them easy. Their stat block is built so that the simple plan works.

The damage math. Against AC 16, the giant's +8 hits on an 8 or higher, 65% of the time.

The last two rows look odd until you check the Prone rule. An attack roll against a Prone creature has Advantage only if the attacker is within 5 feet. From farther away it has Disadvantage. If the 2024 giant's first swing flattens a character standing 10 feet away, its second swing at that same character is at Disadvantage (hit chance drops to about 42%). If the character is adjacent, the second swing is at Advantage (about 88%). A smart DM moves the giant up to its target first. A hill giant played as written might not, and that's a fair place to let its Intelligence of 5 show.

Split the swings. The 2024 Tree Club knocks down two different characters just as easily as one. Two front-liners on the ground means both spend half their movement standing, or attack at Disadvantage from the floor. Its 10-foot reach lets it club a character who just stood up without taking a step.

Lob first, club later. A 2024 hill giant 60 feet away should throw two Trash Lobs at whoever is shooting it, then walk 40 feet toward the party. Next turn it's in reach. In 2014 it has less reason to wait: one rock is worse than closing to melee, so it charges.

Throw what's around. The 2014 rock and the 2024 Trash Lob both work best when there's obvious ammunition: boulders on a hillside, a farmer's cart, a dead cow. Describe it. A giant that pulls up a fence post and hurls it at the cleric is the same +8 attack, and the players remember it.

When it runs. A hill giant isn't brave, just big. Below about 30 hit points, or once it takes a nasty surprise (a fireball, a fall, a friend dying), have it try to grab a sheep and leave. Speed 40 means characters on foot can't catch it.

How Many Hill Giants for a Level 5 Party?

A single hill giant is 1,800 XP. Under the 2024 rules (SRD 5.2.1 budgets per character), a party of four characters has:

The 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide guidelines, which our encounter difficulty calculator uses, rate one hill giant as Easy for four level 5 characters (1,800 XP against a Medium threshold of 2,000). Add a second giant and the ×1.5 multiplier makes it 5,400 adjusted XP, which is past the Deadly line of 4,400. That swing from Easy to Deadly is real. A lone giant has one turn per round against four or five party turns, so it gets surrounded and worn down. Two giants double the damage while the party still splits its focus.

Rules of thumb:

• •One hill giant against a level 5 party is a good solo set piece if you give it terrain: a slope to throw from, a ravine, a collapsing barn.
• •Hill giants pair well with smaller brutes. Make two or three ogres its hangers-on and the fight feels like a gang rather than a boss with sidekicks.
• •At level 3 a single hill giant is over the High budget for four characters (1,800 XP against 1,600). Expect someone to drop. Two Tree Club hits average 36, more than a level 3 fighter with 14 Constitution has (28).

How Players Beat Hill Giants

The hill giant has no saving throw proficiencies, so every save uses its raw modifier: Strength +5, Constitution +4, Dexterity −1, Wisdom −1, Charisma −2, Intelligence −3. Target the bottom of that list.

• •Wisdom and Dexterity saves. Against a typical level 5 spell save DC of 15, the giant fails a Wisdom or Dexterity save 75% of the time. Fireball usually lands for the full 8d6.
• •Stay out of club range in 2014. The 2014 giant throws only one rock a turn, so a party that keeps it at range takes about 14 damage a round instead of 23. The 2024 giant throws two Trash Lobs, so range buys less. Use cover instead: three-quarters cover adds +5 to AC and drops its hit chance against AC 16 from 65% to 40%.
• •Stand up before you swing. A Prone character attacks with Disadvantage. Standing costs half your Speed, so spend it first, then attack.
• •Reduce it. Enlarge/Reduce shrinks it to Large, cuts 1d4 off each club hit and gives it Disadvantage on Strength saves and checks. It also makes it small enough for a Medium character to grapple. It resists with a Constitution save (+4), so expect it to work about half the time.
• •Check your rules version before casting enchantments. In the 2014 rules, Command and Suggestion fail unless the giant understands your language, and hill giants speak only Giant. The 2024 Command has no language requirement, so "Drop" (it lets go of its club and ends its turn) works on any hill giant that fails a Wisdom save. Hold Person never works: giants aren't Humanoids.
• •Put it on the ground. A Prone giant takes attacks with Advantage from anyone within 5 feet. Command's "Grovel" option does it on a failed Wisdom save, and so does a fall.

The Hill Giant Among the Giants

Hill giants are the lowest-CR of the six SRD true giants and the simplest to run: no immunities, no spells and no special traits. Here's how they stack up (2014 / 2024 hit points where they differ):

Frost giants are the natural next step up. They're three CRs higher, armored, and carry real weapons: an axe that adds cold damage and, in 2024, a bow with a 150-foot normal range. A frost giant raid is a planned attack. A hill giant raid is a giant who got hungry.

Below the hill giant sit the Large giants: the ogre (CR 2), the two-headed ettin (CR 4) and the troll (CR 5). The troll has the same CR and XP as the hill giant but a completely different problem to solve: it regenerates unless you burn it.

Hill Giant Encounter Ideas

The orchard. A hill giant has been eating a village's orchard one tree at a time, roots and all, and the 2024 Tree Club is a literal tree. The villagers want it gone before harvest. The giant sleeps in the orchard every afternoon, and it's surrounded by fallen apple trees (difficult terrain) that it also uses as throwing ammunition. A party that brings it a wagon of food instead might get it to move along, for now.

The cart road. A giant has learned that wagons on the valley road carry food, so it sits on the hilltop above the switchbacks and lobs rubbish at anything that passes. It has a 240-foot long range from high ground, and the road below has no cover for 200 feet. The party can climb the back of the hill (an Athletics check and an hour) or try to run the gauntlet.

The giant's dinner guests. A hill giant has captured three travelers and is keeping them in a sheep pen "for later." It's also bored. It will trade one prisoner for something more interesting to eat, and it's dim enough to accept a sack of rocks covered in honey once. The second time, it remembers.

If the giant gets away with a prisoner, that's a thread worth keeping. Loreify can record the session and keep notes on the NPCs and monsters the party met so nobody forgets who's still in the sheep pen.

Frequently Asked Questions

What CR is a hill giant in 5e?

A hill giant is CR 5 and worth 1,800 XP in both the 2014 and 2024 rules. It has AC 13, 105 hit points and a 40-foot speed.

How much damage does a hill giant do?

It makes two attacks per turn at +8. In 2014 that's two greatclub hits of 18 (3d8 + 5) each, 36 if both land, or one rock for 21. In 2024 it's any two of Tree Club (18, knocks Large or smaller targets Prone) and Trash Lob (16, Poisons the target until the end of its next turn).

What changed for the hill giant in the 2024 rules?

The stats and CR stayed the same. The greatclub became the Tree Club and now knocks targets Prone, the rock became the Trash Lob and now Poisons, and Multiattack lets the giant mix melee and ranged attacks, so it can throw twice in one turn.

What are hill giants weak to?

They have no vulnerabilities, but they have no resistances or immunities either, and no saving throw proficiencies. Their worst saves are Intelligence (−3) and Charisma (−2), and they fail Wisdom and Dexterity saves often (−1 each).

What's the difference between a hill giant and an ogre?

The ogre is a CR 2 Large giant with one 13-damage club swing per turn and 59 (2014) or 68 (2024) hit points. The hill giant is CR 5, Huge, has 105 hit points, and attacks twice for 18 each with 10-foot reach. Both are Giants with Intelligence 5, so they mix naturally in one encounter.

Stat blocks: System Reference Document 5.1 (2014) and 5.2.1 (2024), Wizards of the Coast, CC-BY-4.0. Tactics, encounter math and ideas are Loreify's own.