Ghirrash

A ghirrash was one of the shadow beasts, a class of outsider native to the Plane of Shadow. It was a savage four-armed feline.

Description
A ghirrash resembled a humanoid tiger or panther, but with six powerful limbs. It could creep or run swiftly on all six legs, but to fight it stood upright on its hind legs, with the first two pairs of legs also serving as arms. Erect, it stood 7 feet (2.1 meters) high and weighed 500 pounds (227 kilograms). Its coat was gray-black. Its face combined the features of a humanoid and a big cat, but always malevolent.

Abilities
Hideously strong, a ghirrash's six arms gave it many options in battle or movement. Its thick hide protected it against blows, was resilient to mundane weaponry, and was highly resistant to acid, cold, electricity, and fire damage. It was also immune to poisons and resistant to spells.

A ghirrash's unnatural bite could paralyze a victim, keeping them immobile for up to half a minute. Elves were immune to this effect.

A ghirrash was surrounded by a glamer that bent light around it. Though not invisible, it was hard to discern its true location and hard to attack it accurately with sight alone. True seeing was required to see its terrible form clearly.

Combat
To stalk its foe, a ghirrash moved on six legs, but in combat it stood upright to use more of its many sharp claws. All six limbs were hideously strong and their claws were deadly sharp; the hind claws were used in a devastating pounce and for delivering raking attacks. It would also bite its prey. The ghirrash shredded flesh with glee.

Society
Ghirrashes and other shadow beasts happily served powerful Shadow Plane warlords, such as cloakers, dread wraiths, nightshades, and those humanoids who settled there. They also came to the Material Plane to serve as mercenaries or soldiers for evil lords who hired them.

The three breeds of shadow beast had an uneasy relationship with one another. Although they did not war against each other, they also would not fight together in the same troop. Nevertheless, they occasionally cooperated when on the Material Plane. Khumats were better able to cooperate with ghirrashes and with thaskors, than ghirrashes and thaskors would with each other.

They usually hunted alone, but in armies they might be found in squads of two to four.

All of them spoke the Abyssal, Infernal, and Common languages.

Notable Ghirrashes
In the Year of Lightning Storms, 1374 DR, a ghirrash named Jherremor served cultists of Shar as a guardian of one side of the Dusk Lord's Passage portal at the Shadow Citadel in the Plane of Shadow.

Appearances

 * Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave