Gith
From 1d4chan
Gith is the name of the legendary "founder" of
the various races that inherited her name, all
originating as far back as 1st edition AD&D.
Since that time, they have proven to be one of
the most remarkably well-developed races and
story arcs for D&D, with almost every edition
either providing additional background for the
race, or progressing their story in some way.
The only place they do not really appear much
(if at all) is in BECMI D&D, which mostly also
means they do not appear in the Mystara
campaign setting.
None of this is to be confused with the Giff,
who might sound almost the same, but who are
entirely unrelated.
Contents
1 Literary Background
2 1st Edition
3 2nd Edition
3.1 Basic "Core" Stuff
3.2 Athasian Gith (Dark Sun)
3.3 Pirates of Gith (Spelljammer)
3.4 A Guide To The Astral Plane (Planescape)
4 3rd Edition
4.1 Eberron
5 4th Edition
6 5th Edition
7 Gallery
Literary Background
The actual creation of the githyanki owes, apparently, to no less than George R. R. Martin himself, in his very
first novel, "Dying of the Light". (It should come as no shocker that the book is pretty fucking grimdark: it's set
in the final days of a dying world where almost every single character dies. Yes, it seems GRRM never met any
characters he didn't like killing off before the end of his books...) Anyway, a guy named Charles "Charlie"
Stross, a British author who was into space opera and Lovecraftian horror (considerably later, better-known for
his excellent Laundry Files series), borrowed the name of the race from GRRM's book, and no shit, he retooled
it for his own homebrew AD&D campaign. He submitted it to the ancient White Dwarf magazine as part of
their "Fiend Factory" articles for new monsters, and it was selected among other monsters for inclusion in the
brand new Fiend Folio. In fact, the githyanki was even selected to be the monster depicted on the cover.
These origins give seem to give some perspective to why gith-folk are consistently one of the better-loved
"quirk" races in D&D, both among neckbeards (who love the weird blend of literature, homebrew, and back-
porting that made them an official part of the game) and even the newbies (who seem to like having something
that breaks a lot of generic fantasy molds, like elves and orcs, which may get overused). Even when fans of
D&D hate psionics, it's really not hard at all to simply switch out psionics with magic and keep the rest mostly
intact.
1st Edition
The first mention of Gith in the Fiend Folio tells the basic story of her race. According to the story there, the
illithids - known at that time only as mind flayers - conquered a population of evil humans "millennia ago"
(subjective to whatever the start date of a given game setting is), using them both as slaves and as food. The
humans were unable to free themselves for centuries, until they developed their unique powers and strength. At
a certain point, a supreme leader named Gith led the rebellion against their captors and freed their people.
The entries in Fiend Folio note that the githyanki and githzerai races split, but doesn't say why or exactly when.
Both had mostly full access to the early, very nascent psionics rules (githyanki only lacked Defense Mode J),
which is pretty interesting: mind flayers, as listed in the 1st edition Monster Manual, actually had less psionic
ability than the gith-folk eventually developed.
The githyanki were established in the Fiend Folio and Manual of the Planes with what would become their
fundamental lore for the rest of time:
They largely live and fight from strongholds in the Astral Plane, with scouting and raiding into other
planes, including the Material Plane, to look for their hated enemies (illithids and githzerai) and take
supplies they need. Though they have Material Plane lairs, these are more like outposts than real
settlements.
They have a lich-queen of higher level who destroys any githyanki that levels up to a certain point. In
theory, this is to prevent any of them from becoming too powerful to overthrow the lich-queen.
They use "baroque" armaments of very unusual and alien manufacture. Their signature gear is the silver
swords they use in astral combat to sever someone's silver cord (ideally killing someone instantly). There
usually two grades of these swords, and they are usually two-handed swords.
They have a pact with red dragons, which allows them to work together, both for protection and raiding.
They can have class levels as fighters, magic-users, or "anti-paladins" (basically evil cavaliers). The only
multi-class option they can have are as fighter/magic-users called "gish" (which became the origin of the
term for fighter/wizard hybrids in future online discussions of such builds).
The githzerai, a splinter faction, isn't given a reason from their split from the githyanki, and are also given a
basic background:
They live in Limbo, in fortress-monasteries they build of various pieces of chaos matter from the plane.
They have a metropolis called the Floating City, or the Citadel of Gith. Their Prime Material strongholds
are apparently fucking adamantine-walled towers, so... yeah.
They are ruled by an immortal wizard-king, Zaerith Menyar-Ag-Gith (the Great Githzerai) who also
prevents his people from getting too high of a level.
They use the lesser silver swords, but all their stuff is manufactured pretty plain in construction.
They have no pact with red dragons, but make up for it with better inherent psionic abilities.
They also favor fighters and magic-users, but also have a few monks. Their multi-class fighter/magic-
users are called "zerths" at this point.
There's not much else from this edition, though Tales from the Outer Planes offers an adventure and a couple of
lairs involving the githyanki and githzerai.
2nd Edition
This was the edition when the gith really took off, as this was when TSR started fully exploring the planes and
thusly crafted the Great Wheel.
Basic "Core" Stuff
They appear first in the Monstrous Compendium Outer Planes Appendix (these extras were printed with hole-
punched pages so you could add them to a fuckhuge binder with all your Monstrous Compendium stuff in one
place), and they get a bit of a concise facelift that reprints a very slightly expands on the previous material.
Everything was reprinted in the later Monster Manual (since TSR realized that loose-leaf sheets could get run
through a copying machine, and gamers never needed the internet to pirate intellectual property).
The term "githyanki" is noted in 2nd edition to specifically mean "sons of Gith", and it is noted here that while
the githyanki gladly fuck with other races and beings, they do not quarrel among themselves. It also lists a
number of special groups or castes among them who perform specific tasks: g'lathk (farmers who tend artificial
chambers used to grow fungi, plants that don't need sunlight, and aquatic plants in water-gardens); mlar (the
mages who use their magic for construction instead of combat); hr'a'cknir (craftsmen who harness astral psychic
energy to perform unspecified jobs). Because the cavalier didn't really make the cut to 2nd edition, githyanki
"knights" were paladins that used evil-version abilities (detect good, command undead, etc.).
The githzerai got similar details. Their capital city was called Shra'kt'lor here, and the entry provides us with the
Legend of Zerthimon. After Gith defeated the mind flayers, Zerthimon opposed her on the grounds that she was
a mean, evil bitch. That went about as well as you could expect, leading to actual fighting between those who
remained loyal to Gith, and those who felt she was an evil bitch. Zerthimon died, but his faction got away. The
githzerai believe that Zerthimon is a divine figure now, and when he comes back like Jesus he's going to gather
up the "zerths" (their term for fighter/mages) and lead his people to paradise. Apparently, the wizard-king is not
happy with this legend or the religious fervor it creates, since it challenges his authority, but he hasn't been able
to get rid of it.
Another tidbit in this early material for githzerai is that while the githyanki are generally militaristic and
aggressive, the githzerai prefer to keep to themselves. They do, however, get a nice party together called a
"rrakkma", which spends 3 months scouring the planes for illithids to kill; githzerai consider it an honor to
participate in these little excursions.
They are noted for having Prime Material strongholds, but no mention of adamantine walls (and seriously, who
wouldn't massacre these guys for that much delicious building material), though it does mention that the
stronghold's presence destroys the landscape for miles around, possibly due to the extra-planar nature of the
building material, or just mages fucking shit up to keep out trespassers. They aren't trying to deliberate mess
shit up, though; the strongholds are, apparently, simply to give them a place to stage raids on any githyanki they
find on the Prime Material.
Oh, and 2nd edition also notes here that neither gith-folk give a shit about the Blood War; they got illithids and
each other to fuck up, no time for messing about with an eternal war involving a bunch of bloodthirsty, lying-
ass fiends.
Athasian Gith (Dark Sun)
Later on in the Dark Sun setting, they added a strangely-familiar race called the gith, who were mostly savages
with more psionics than magic, and no artificial limit on their levels (i.e. nothing killing them for getting a
certain level). The adventure Black Spine gives us the gory details. The githyanki were on Athas thousands of
years ago to create a fortress, Yathazor, which would act as a base of operations for their usual raiding and such.
They had an advantage, because their plane shift ability was pretty scot-free transport in and out of a generally
impregnable area; they even set up a magic barrier that took planar-style keys to get in an out of, making their
little stronghold pretty impregnable.
Until, apparently, a githzerai force infiltrated the area, and set off a "psionic devastator" which mind-fucked the
githyanki into barbaric idiocy... who became the ancestors of the Athasian gith. (The adventure even offers
speculation that this event could have been a trigger for the development of psionics on Athas overall.)
Pirates of Gith (Spelljammer)
The Spelljammer setting gives us one final offshoot of the Gith-folk, the Pirates of Gith. Nothing too fancy
here: they're just githyanki that headed for arcane space instead of the Astral Plane. Unfortunately for other
space-sailors in the setting, the Pirates of Gith are pretty brutal: they actually have clerics, and all of them can
get to level 11 without worrying about some undead bitch destroying them. The way they're described is that
they seem a bit more brutal and/or savage than their githyanki cousins, but they know how to fly ships with
helms, and their innate magic abilities allow them to do some weird stuff: they can shift elven-crafted
spelljamming ships into the Astral Plane. Yes, the whole ship, passengers, and cargo, all at once. They can't fly
their ships through the phlogiston with their abilities, though, and they can only plane-hop an elven ship of 50
tons or less. Oh, also, these fuckers are carnivores, and even cannibals as needed, so they're like the Reavers
from Firefly only intelligent (have fun introducing your players to that little tidbit).
A Guide To The Astral Plane (Planescape)
Planescape came along and really got down to the brass tacks with a concise history of the Gith-folk. A book in
the setting called "A Glimpse Through the Mists" tells that in really ancient times (as in before most Prime
Material Plane worlds had been created), the illithids had an empire that covered many Prime worlds (and,
given what was mentioned in Spelljammer, most of the crystalline spheres of arcane space) and even had spread
into the planes themselves; the illithids were such a threat that it is even the devils and demons of the Blood
War stopped a moment to take a hard look at the tentacled assholes. The humans they had enslaved were twisted
after an uncounted time into different beings, who had begun to develop psionic powers and martial strength.
That's when Gith, the paragon of her kind, rose up a rebellion double-quick and after the fighting was done,
there was no more illithid empire to threaten anything on the planes or the Prime Material.
Unfortunately, Gith decided that this meant it was her and her people's time to forge an empire built on
conquest. Zerthimon, who had his own following that felt otherwise, challenged her plans and leadership,
calling Gith out for being as evil as the bastards that had enslaved them. The civil war killed Zerthimon, saw the
githzerai flee to Limbo, and managed to shatter Gith's plans for conquest due to her losses. She withdrew the
githyanki ("the children of Gith") to the Astral Plane and set up shop. Eventually, one of her advisers, named
Vlaakith, said that they needed allies. They tried and failed to get the slaadi to turn on the githzerai, and then
Vlaakith suggested meeting with Tiamat. Supposedly, the only people who know what happened or was said at
the meeting are Gith, Tiamat, and one of Tiamat's consorts, the red wyrm Ephelomon. What is known is that
Gith never came back: Ephelomon went to the Astral, informed Vlaakith that she was now Gith's successor, and
told the githyanki that they had red dragons ready to help them fuck shit up.
This sourcebook gives a huge amount of additional detail after the creation legend. There are notes that allude
to a very slight reptilian physiology (tying back to the Athasian gith); additional catch-words in their language;
more details on their professions; and stats and background for Vlaakith CLVII, the Lich-Queen herself. This
book basically established much of the lore that got reused in 3rd Edition, and if you want a good look at the
githyanki as a society and whatnot, this is the place to do it.
This was also the edition of Planescape: Torment, and its githzerai party member, Dak'kon the Pariah, is a
vitally-important milestone in the history of that race's development, for reasons listed on that page.
3rd Edition
The 3.0e Manual of the Planes and 3.5e Monster Manual I describes the Githyanki as follows:
"Githyanki are an ancient line of humanlike beings residing on the Astral Plane, filling their armories for
their next skirmish, raid, or war.
They are gaunt, averaging 6 feet 3 inches tall and typically weighing around 170 pounds. They possess
rough, yellow skin and black hair that is often pulled into one or more topknots. Their eyes gleam darkly,
and their ears are pointed and serrated in back. They enjoy elaborate dress and baroque armor. In fact,
they revere weapons and armor, and it is not uncommon for githyanki to show more regard for their
panoply than for a mate.
Githyanki speak their own secret tongue, but most also know Common and Draconic. Like dwarves,
githyanki are craftmasters, although they focus exclusively on items of warfare. Their items are
distinctive, and nongithyanki who acquire them run the risk of immediate retribution should they
encounter githyanki."
"In eons past, the mind flayers enslaved entire races, including the forerunners of the githyanki. Centuries
of captivity bred hatred, nurtured resolve, and finally instilled psionic powers into these slaves. With
mental armaments of their own and a powerful leader to rally behind (the legendary Gith), the slaves
instigated a cross-planar struggle that, in the end, threw down the mind flayer empire, bringing freedom
to the surviving slaves. However, these survivors soon split into the racially distinct githyanki and their
mortal enemies, the githzerai (see the Githzerai entry, below). Each constantly attempts the extinction of
the other. This animosity has burned through the centuries, warping the githyanki into the evil, militaristic
creatures they are today. Both creatures’ hatred of mind flayers knows no bounds, though, and they will
break off hostilities to slay illithids if the opportunity presents itself.
Githyanki live within massive fortresses adrift in the Astral Plane. Here they conduct commerce,
manufacture goods, grow food, and live out their lives. Family dwellings are nonexistent, since most
githyanki prefer their own abode; however, githyanki are often found in groups, honing their fighting
skills. A fortress contains noncombatants (mostly children) equal to 20% of the fighting population.
Githyanki males and females may be found in almost any role or class.
The githyanki have no deity but instead pay homage to a lich-queen. A jealous and paranoid overlord, she
devours the essence of any githyanki that rises above 16th level. In addition to eliminating a potential
rival, the lich-queen enhances her power with the stolen life essence"
Githzerai are described as follows:
Githzerai are a hard-hearted, humanlike people who dwell on the plane of Limbo, secure in the protection
of their hidden monasteries.
They are thinner and taller than humans, with sharp features, long faces, and eyes of gray or yellow.
Severe and serious, the githzerai tend toward somberness both in dress and personality.
As a rule, githzerai are closed-mouthed, keep their own counsel, and trust few outside their own kind.
They speak their own language (similar enough to the tongue of the githyanki that either could
understand the other if they chose to speak instead of fight), but many also speak Common."
"The githzerai forerunners united under the command of the rebel Gith (see the Githyanki entry, above)
and threw down the plane-spanning empire of the mind flayers. Once free, the former slaves split
ideologically and eventually racially, becoming the githzerai and their foes, the githyanki. The githzerai’s
history of imprisonment was the foundation of their monastic lifestyle, in which all githzerai learn from
childhood how to eradicate potential oppressors and enemies (anyone not a githzerai).
Githzerai live within self-contained, fortresslike monasteries hidden deep in the swirling chaos of Limbo.
While disorder rules outside, stability holds sway inside. Each monastery is ultimately under the control
of a sensei, a monk of at least 16th level, and follows a strict schedule of chants, meals, martial arts
training, and devotions, according to a particular sensei’s philosophy. A monastery contains
noncombatants (mostly children) equal to 15% of the fighting population. Githzerai males and females
may be found in almost any role or class."
There are minor differences between the MotP and MMI versions of these descriptions but about 90% of the
words were copy-pasted from the former to the latter. The biggest changes were the omission of the Githyanki
language section and a shortening of the physical descriptions of both races. The Githyanki's favored class is
fighter, and the Githzerai's favored class is monk. Both have 1 racial hit die and a +2 level adjustment, in both
3.0e and 3.5e.
"The Lich Queen's Beloved," an adventure in Dungeon Magazine #100, introduced the Sha'sal Khou, a
renegade organization of githzerai and githyanki attempting to collaborate to mend their divided race, which
operated mostly covertly for obvious reasons, and was unfortunately penetrated by outside political influences;
their highest ranking leader is a githyanki warlord, Zetch'r'r, who, while legitimately sympathetic to his group's
actual aims, hoped to lead the reunified race on a path of planar conquest, just as Gith tried to do long ago.
Eberron
According to Player's Guide to Eberron, the two types of Gith in Eberron were separately created by the Mind
Flayers ~9000 years ago as slaves. They revolted when the Giants blew up one of Eberron's moons to stop the
Daelkyr, but could never get along with eachother. Gith herself is absent (or at least not mentioned) in this
version.
Setting creator Keith Baker prefers a much cooler alternative: The Gith are refugees of a world previously
invaded by the Daelkyr (who created most of Eberron's aberrations, including Mind Flayers) that didn't have
gatekeepers around to save it. Gith herself led the refugees before the two split. This results in two bits of world
building, first that of this is that Eberron isn't unique in being targeted by the daelkyr, the second being that
Eberron, via Xoriat, is connected to other planets or other realities.
4th Edition
Despite the reputation 4e has for changing lore immensely, even going so far as to replace Limbo and the
Elemental Planes and Energy Planes with the Elemental Chaos, the lore for the gith-races ultimately didn't
change that much in 4e. Perhaps the biggest tweak to the overall story is that 4e asserts the ultimate reason for
the civil was that Gith basically turned out to be a lousy peace-time leader, running the now-free gith like a great
military army and ultimately keeping them as little freer than they had been under the illithids. Whatever the
reason, the races split and went their separate ways, with Gith leading her githyanki followers to the Astral Sea,
where they founded a loosely-knit empire of raiders, centered on their capital city of Tu'narath. In comparison,
the githzerai moved to the Elemental Chaos, although they also maintain hidden communes in remote areas of
the mortal world.
4th edition also provided the most concrete answer to Gith's fate so far. In "Secrets of the Astral Sea", it's stated
that Gith bartered away her soul, and the souls of Vlaakith and all future githyanki leaders, in exchange for the
Red Dragon Pact. It also notes that nobody is sure what Tiamat has actually gained from the pact; the three most
common theories are that she mistakenly believed the githyanki would ultimately become her personal
dedicated race of humanoid worshippers (only to be backstabbed by their psycho-atheist beliefs), that she has
manipulated the contract so she can call in one fucking huge debt when the githyanki finally end their Crusade
by killing off the illithids, or that the souls of the githyanki leaders hold sufficient magical power that she can
ultimately use to force the githyanki to serve her.
Further details would be provided in Dragon Magazine #377; initially, Gith had reluctantly sought alliances
with other deities, but was rejected either due to being too evil, too warlike, too weak, or simply because she
refused to let the githyanki worship a god. The closest thing she had to a success was in Baator, with Dispater,
and even then they couldn't close the deal because Gith wisely refused to sell the souls of all githyanki in
perpetuity to the archdevil. Instead, Dispater ended up arranging for the meeting between Gith, Vlaakith and
Ephelomon, with himself as mediator and observer, of course. It was Dispater who suggested that he be allowed
to "host" Gith's soul in his own "care" for the duration of the pact. Curiously, he did not speak up against Gith
making one of the terms of the contract that the githyanki would be free to pursue their own destinies and never
be required to be subservient to Tiamat - a part of the bargain that Ephelomon agreed to and which probably put
him in Tiamat's bad books for centuries.
In the 4e adventure path, Scales of War, because Tiamat breaks the pact between herself and the githyanki,
Gith's soul is ultimately freed from Baator. Returning to Tu'narath, she possesses a githyanki woman and claims
to be Vlaakith reborn, ultimately aiding the party in defeating Emperor Zetch'r'r before taking rulership over the
githyanki once again. Her ultimate plans are left to the DM from there.
5th Edition
In 5e, the Gith retain their historic traits, such as the githyanki being raiders and conquerors and the githzerai
being monks who hang around in Limbo, and them both hating each other and hating the illithids more. There
have been some individual reworks, but those are better-outlined on their own individual pages.
Gallery
The very first depiction Now slightly harder to The definitive model, or The Githyanki as they
of a githyanki. confuse for an undead so it seems. appear in 4e. Notably
creature. more muscular than in
their earlier depictions.
Arrogant, haughty Can you believe this is Nope, color doesn't Now we're talking.
raiders of the Astral. how they used to look? make it any less stupid.
(And the pink
underpants definitely
don't help.)
And they're the good Mysterious monks from The degenerate gith of
guys, who could guess? otherworldly realms. Dark Sun
4e's depiction of The Gith Pirates of
Athasian Gith Spelljammer.
Vlaakith CLVII
The Gith of Dungeons & Dragons
Races: Duthka'gith - Gith - Githyanki - Githzerai - Half-Githzerai
Undead: Kr'y'izoth - Tl'a'ikith
Individuals: Vlaakith CLVII - Zaerith Menyar-Ag-Gith - Zerthimon
Places: Shra'kt'lor - Tu'narath
NPC Classes: Mlar
Prestige Classes: Blackweave Warlock - Ghustil - Gish Mindslayer - Holocaust Warrior - Sword Stalker
Adventures: Incursion - Scales of War
Miscellaneous: Crown of Corruption - Gish - Scepter of Ephelomon
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