Gith

This is a new player character race for use in both original and revised Dark·Sun game editions. Below you will find everything you need to begin your sojourn across the desolate desert wastes of Athas. Enjoy...

Gith are a race of grotesque humanoids that appear to be a form of reptile with long gangly arms and spindly legs. They have scaly skin tones of gray coloration, which add to their gaunt appearance. Gith are able to wield weapons with three fingered thumb-less hands. Gith also have sharp claws on their hands and feet which they use to good effect in unarmed combat. The way gith stands hunched over at the shoulders give it the height of five feet, if they stood fully erect they would measure over seven feet.

Gith have weak muscles in their back, which they usually protect with armour. Only light armour types can be worn the most commonly worn is inix hide armour (AC 6).

Due to possessing strong lean legs a gith can leap up to twenty feet to close the distance with enemies. This gives gith PC’s a +2 Thac0 bonus in the first round of combat the leap special ability is used.

Gith tribes travel throughout the tablelands following animal herds, which the tribe needs for food and tools. Occasionally gith do attack merchant caravans or desert travelers when the need arises which is more often than not.

Gith live in tribal organizations of 25 to 300 with either a defiler wizard or a mindbender psionicist as the tribes leader or shaman, these leaders determine all social positions within the tribe. Warriors do challenge for the tribe’s leadership but a warrior leader never lasts long, with the cunning defilers or the mind shattering mindbenders quick to challenge the warrior for their position.

Life in the tribe is not easy as most days are spent scavenging for food for the tribe or being sent on a raid by the tribal shaman. The mortality rate for a typical tribe member is high some gith live until their seventies but in truth most die at a young age.

The diet of a gith is mainly meat, which they can eat raw or cooked most prefer it to be cooked. Gith are also the only of the PC races, which can drink the blood of herd animals in the place of water and receive all of the benefits water provides to all other humanoid races with regards to dehydration and re-hydration.

Role-playing: A gith is more at home with his or her tribe but sometimes a gith yearns for more and becomes an adventurer. Tribes feel that they need to have defilers and mindbenders and send tribal members off to learn these skills for the benefit of the tribe. Many of the humanoid races see gith as carrion and thus are they are treated that way and when they seek education they are chased off or in some cases slain. Gith are free to leave the tribe at any time providing when they do return a suitable gift is given to the tribes shaman. Some gith seek to be famed gladiators and warriors most gith who seek to be gladiators get what they wish for, if they do well in the arena they are often forced into slavery for a rich patron or find themselves chained in a cities gladiatorial stable. The training they receive there is poor and the lack of support the arena fans give these gladiators do give gith gladiators problems. As yet no known gith has ever reached gladiatorial champion status.

Merchant houses hire gith mercenaries to help them protect their caravans for they see the uses gith have in combat and also in tactical aid when facing a raid by a fellow gith tribe.

Most defilers and psionic gith have good positions within the tribe, but occasionally some do leave due to internal tribal conflict or to search for more powerful training in their chosen profession.

On the whole the gith character race is a hard race to play but with good role-playing I’m sure the chance to play a gith character in the Dark× Sun setting should be rewarding and fun but only if it is played in the right hands.

Racial Class & Level Limits

Defiler	8
Fighter	12
Gladiator	10
Psionicist	U

Racial Ability Requirements
STR	5 / 20
DEX	8 / 20
CON	6 / 20
INT	3 / 16
WIS	5 / 20
CHA	1 / 12

Starting Age

Base + Variable

15 + 2d6

Maximum Age

Base + Variable

60 + 1d10

Race	Middle Age*	Old Age**	Venerable Age***
Gith	35	50	60

Cost	Weight	Size	Type	Speed	Dam SM/L*
3 c.p.	6	M	P/S	5	1d6-1/1d6-1

* Gutt’as are always made of obsidian which incur a -2 Thac0 penalty as well as a -1 to damage.

Gutt’as: Making these weapons require lashing a crudely cut head of obsidian onto a four foot long shaft of bone of wood. Gutt’as are the favored weapon of all gith warriors and are made within the tribe and all gith spend much of his or her childhood learning how to use a gutt’as. To a non-gith these primitive looking two handed weapons look more like thrusting weapons but most gith use them to chop or to slash enemies or to bring down prey.

Due to the brittle nature of obsidian most gith warriors carry at least one spare spearhead in their traveling equipment. To replace a damaged spearhead takes 2 rounds, a Dex check is required to complete the task if the check fails another round is needed until replacement is successful.