Githzerai Anarch

(From Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes - 2018):

The most powerful of the githzerai, anarchs lead communities and maintain the adamantine citadels that serve as strong points in planes beyond Limbo. They have formidable psionic capabilities, able to manipulate the unformed substance of their adopted plane with a thought. These rare githzerai are sages and mystics, and their word is law. 

An Anarch's Lair:

In Limbo, githzerai anarchs create islands of tranquility in the otherwise turbulent plane. By directing its psionic power, an anarch can give form to formless substance, creating mountains, lakes, and structures of any composition to serve as a foundation for a githzerai community. 

Lair Actions. An anarch can use lair actions. On initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties), the anarch can take a lair action to cause one of the following effects; the anarch can't use the same effect two rounds in a row: 

• The anarch casts the lightning bolt spell (at 5th level), but the anarch can change the damage type from lightning to cold, fire, psychic, radiant, or thunder. If the spell deals damage other than fire or lightning, it doesn't ignite flammable objects. 

• The anarch casts the creation spell (as a 9th-level spell) using the unformed substance of Limbo instead of shadow material. If used in Limbo, the object remains until the anarch's concentration is broken, regardless of its composition. If the anarch moves more than 120 feet from the object, its concentration breaks. 

• The anarch can magically move an object it can see within 150 feet of it by making a Wisdom check with advantage. The DC depends on the object's size: DC 5 for Tiny, DC 10 for Small, DC 15 for Medium, DC 20 for Large, and DC 25 for Huge or larger. 

Regional Effects:

The region containing an anarch's lair is warped by its presence, which creates one or more of the following effects: 

• In Limbo, the anarch can spend 10 minutes stabilizing a 5-mile area centered on it, causing the unformed substance to take whatever inanimate form the anarch chooses. During that process, the anarch determines the shape and composition of the forms created. 

• The anarch stabilizes any object created in Limbo and brought to the Material Plane for as long as the anarch remains within 1 mile of it (no action required). If the anarch dies, these effects end after ld6 rounds. All formed substance becomes a chaotic churn of energy and matter, unraveling into unformed substance that dissipates ld6 rounds later.

Anarchs:

A githzerai community works constantly to maintain a stable base of operations protected from the wilds of Limbo. The mental energy of the collective that keeps the plane's forces of chaos at bay is funneled through the exceptional githzerai known as anarchs. One or more anarchs maintain each community by serving as both the receptacle for the psychic power of other githzerai and the means by which that power is employed. 

Anarchs have a special gift for stabilizing and controlling the chaos-stuff of Limbo. In their communities on Limbo, they can create matter and energy out of nothingness with a thought. They can control the direction of gravity. The environment around them can be whatever they want it to be. 

Anarchs are exceedingly rare among githzerai. When a githzerai in an existing community demonstrates the ability to become an anarch, that individual might leave the community to found a new colony or might remain where it is and ascend to a leadership position.

Fortress Cities:

The monasteries of the githzerai are massive outposts of stability that sail through the chaos of Limbo. Githzerai anarchs keep the fortresses stable and control their interior design, opening portals to the outside only as needed. Most fortresses drift through Limbo at random, but none of them are ever isolated. When Menyar-Ag sends out a call to them, the anarchs of the other communities can instantly communicate with him. 

Aside from its inhabitants, the most well-defended element of a githzerai fortress is its food supply. Because Limbo provides no sustenance, the githzerai rely on crops and livestock they appropriate from elsewhere. Plants are grown in hydroponic chambers, and livestock are raised in pens where light, temperature, and other conditions are tailored to their needs. 

A community's activity is overseen by monks who assign duties to each occupant. Everyone participates in mock combats and ongoing academic instruction, and each fortress allocates personnel and resources as needed. Every fortress is designed to be self-sufficient, even though no two of them are ever out of psychic contact.

Shrak'kt'lor:

 Shra'kt'lor is a fortress city that houses the largest concentration of githzerai. It serves as both the capital of the civilization and the headquarters of the githzerai military forces. The greatest generals, spellcasters, and zerths of the race meet here to plan or refine their strategy for battling the githyanki and the mind flayers. 

Shra'kt'lor is the most well defended of the githzerai outposts- no force in Limbo could readily threaten the city or its inhabitants. Teleportation circles are barred except on the fringes of the place, at always-guarded locations beyond the city's outermost defenses. Those who use plane-shifting magic to arrive at these sites or who approach through the chaos of Limbo aren't admitted to the city without the approval of an anarch. 

Beyond the entrance to the city wait six layers of nested defenses. Each one is dominated by a fortress maintained by a powerful anarch chosen by Zaerith Menyar-Ag-Gith, who dwells at the heart of it all.

Adamantine Citadels:

When githzerai travel, they sometimes bring a sliver of Limbo along. Before they set out, a cadre of powerful anarchs craft a citadel of adamantine out of the chaos-stuff around them. Inside the structure is more of Limbo's essence, left in raw form until it's needed. Then, in an eruption of psionic and arcane power that only Menyar-Ag can produce, the citadel and its accompanying githzerai are transported to another plane. 

After the transfer is complete, at least one anarch must always attend the citadel to maintain its form and shape as well as to utilize the chaos-stuff within. When a citadel is ensconced on another plane, the githzerai create a teleportation circle inside it to facilitate travel between that plane and Limbo. 

The appearance of an adamantine citadel on another plane creates a blot on the natural world. Life, the one thing that can't be spontaneously created from the stuff of Limbo, is driven away from the location in a wave of dread. Depending on the size of the citadel, the affected area can have a radius of between several hundred feet and several miles. Birds avoid flying over or near it, other animals flee the area, and plants in the vicinity wither and die. Intelligent creatures can act normally, but being in the affected area is unnerving to them, and if they investigate, they soon identify the citadel as the cause. The githyanki, however, find it in their best interest to keep their citadels safe from discovery. Menyar-Ag prefers to plant them in desolate and rarely frequented places such as barren deserts or remote locations in the Underdark. 

The primary purpose of an adamantine citadel is to watch over the activity of some foe of the githzerai, such as an illithid colony, and to provide a base of operations for a possible attack. Citadels are also used to collect foodstuffs and other material goods for transport to Limbo. When the githzerai are finished with a citadel, they vacate it and return to Limbo. Immediately after the last anarch teleports away, the citadel vanishes, leaving only a scarred landscape to indicate where it once stood.