Scarskull is, unsurprisingly, shaped like a skull roughly 5 miles in height. A narrow valley, appearing as a scar, runs jaggedly down from above the eye to the upper jaw, giving the moon its name. The moon is solid stone, although appears somewhat like bone. The moon is really made of petrified bone, hinting that it once was the skull of a living creature many miles in height.
The gravity plane bisects the moon at about the mid-point of the eye-sockets and runs horizontally through the skull. The gravity plane extends to the edges of the air envelope and no further.
The interior of Scarskull is riddled with caverns great and small. Most are damaged, due to past battles, and their original purpose has been lost. Traps abound, and whole sections have been sealed off due to dangerous undead, constructs, monsters, or traps. Construction is of mind flayer styles, with carvings reminiscent of undersea life, creatures with many tentacles, and scenes born of nightmares and madness. Most have been defaced by Gith graffiti.
As an asteroid skull, Scarskull lacks the size to generate weather. The air is warm and moist, however, uncomfortably so for humans but ideal conditions for mind flayers. The asteroid has an atmosphere that is about 15 miles in diameter and is spherical. Its edges can be seen as a very dim outline of crimson red.
As its name implies, Scarskull appears as an enormous, gray-yellow skull hanging in space. Interlaced are several streaks of deep crimson red, appearing very much like veins. These are simply deposits of sulfur and rusted iron. An enormous scar-like valley runs from the forehead down across the nose socket, and ending just above the dagger-like teeth. The skull lacks a jawbone and has numerous craters blackened regions, evidence of great battles in the history of this moon.
Because of its small size and great distance, this moon is not visible from the planet it orbits. This makes it very difficult to find without a reliable star chart or magic.
There is a trio of caverns of note inside of Scarskull. The largest and most obvious is the large cavity that connects the two eye sockets into one large cavern. Piers jut into the gravity plane in this cavern, which serves as the primary docks for the city. Despite the fierce battle to claim this rock, the piers are in excellent shape. The Gith have extensively repaired the docks and adjacent buildings to serve their purposes. In addition to the piers, there are several wood buildings. These are warehouses, taverns, and even brothels. The brothels are home to the non-Gith residents, though their lives are short and brutal.
Near the base of the skull is a large, hemispherical cavern that was the heart of the mind flayer community. The seashell-like buildings have been torn down and replaced by an ugly collection of shacks and fortified compounds. The streets are a maze of cleared paths, toppled buildings, and iron gates meant to confuse and confound invaders. The Gith know well the back alleys and the secret ways and will use them to lay ambushes or escape from determined invaders.
Somewhere in the middle of the skull is the cavern where the elder brain resided. The elder brain is long dead and the pool drained, leaving the cavern to be claimed by the old red dragon Aradanceuntryr. No only a physically intimidating brute, Aradanceuntryr is a master of psionics. The beast has learned many psionics from both the Pirates of Gith as well as the Githyanki, and even has abilities known only to draconic masters of psionic abilities. He can hold his own with even the greatest Gith psion.
Because Scarskull was ruled for so long by the mind flayers, the creatures found on this moon reflect that legacy. In many caverns linger carrion crawlers, intellect devourers, a few gibbering mouthers, and many illithidaes. Most have been sealed away in deep cavern complexes by the Gith to slowly starve and perish. As such, they are extremely vicious and will attack anything that dares trespass in their territories. It is believed that somewhere, a Neothelid dwells, a survivor of the destruction of the brain-pool which slithered off and grew to gigantic proportions.
Prowling the edges of Scarskull's atmosphere are many packs of scavvers. At any given time, there are 5-8 packs of gray scavvers, 2-5 packs of brown scavvers, 1-2 packs of night scavvers, and a single pack of void scavvers. There is also a single Megamaw scavver that prowls the atmosphere, greedily devouring anything that it comes across. Most these monsters survive on garbage tossed out by the resident Gith, including corpses. The Gith have mastered psionics necessary to control these beasts, which they goad into feeding frenzies to distract and harass passing ships.
Pirates of Gith are the dominant humanoid inhabitants of Scarskull. There are about two dozen Gith clans, each numbering 20 to 80 warriors, with dependants equal to about 60% of the fighting adults. Females are taught to fight, as are children at a young age, so only the very youngest and very oldest (who are very, very few) are unable to fight. Adult males are of at least 2nd level fighters in ability, while females and juveniles are at least 1st level fighters in ability. Each clan lays claim to a series of caverns, docks, and buildings, with fierce competition and even street battles over territory. A clan is ruled by a fighter of at least 6th level fighter or magic-user in ability.
Holding the Gith clans together is a complex network of alliances between each clan, which routinely change. Murder and assassination is a common method of dealing with enemies. And every individual Gith has many, many enemies. Fortunately, the strong leadership of the Gith Pirate Scarskull III (NE Gith m F10/M-U10) keeps the place under control. He has a personal guard of no less than 20 "knights" (F9) and 10 warlocks (M-U9) who enforce the few laws of the city. He is the youngest son of the original Scarskull and seized power after murdering his brother. After a bloody coup, he ritually scarred his face took the name Scarskull, which seems to be a new tradition with this particular group of Gith.
Recently, the Lich-Queen of the Githyanki has decided that Scarskull would make an important outpost in the eternal war against the mind flayers. She has sent a platoon of 20 Githyanki warriors (F3) lead by a low-rank knight (F5) and a juvenile red dragon. The Githyanki dwell in a walled embassy and mostly collect information about the location and size of mind flayer outposts in wildspace. In time, they intend to spearhead an assault on a major mind flayer city. They only need to find the proper target.
The only other creatures that the Gith suffer are red dragons (a total of four, including the dragons listed above) and several dragon-like creatures. These include many "Crow's-nest" and "Mole" dragonets and Vandalraug drakes kept as a heavy cavalry of sorts.
Essentially a barren rock in space, Scarskull has few resources of its own. Its primary resource is being a solid piece of rock with a stable, breathable atmosphere and a gravity plane.
Previously, the mind flayers used Scarskull as the trade-hub Skull-Dripping-Blood. Countless slaves from a thousand worlds passed through the docks and markets. Word of the fall of the city has not quite reached all of the distant mind flayer outposts, so every few months a slave ship arrives, only to be ambushed and destroyed by the Gith. The fate of the slaves aboard is left to the mood of the Gith. They used to simply kill and eat any slave they find, but have since learned the fine art of ransoming. Those with high comeliness (or charisma) are spared, instead forced to work in the brothels. If a slave cannot deliver on a promise of ransom, he or she is doomed to stew-pot.
First the mind flayers, and then the Gith, have built up excellent docking facilities inside the cavernous eye sockets. There are piers and dry docks enough to rival even those of the Rock of Bral. At any given time, there are 12-15 (d4 +11) ships docked, and the Gith do not use even a third of the available space. Although there are dry docks and supplies enough to build as many as a dozen more ships, the Gith prefer to steal ships rather than build them.
There are at least a half-dozen hidden docks scattered throughout the rock. These were the private docks of the most powerful mind flayers, usually equipped to handle smaller ships such as lampreys and mind flayer lances. Such ships were used when secrecy was required, and in part to evacuate mind flayer nobles in the event of war. Some of these ships managed to escape, others did not. The Gith have left these docks to decay due to neglect.
It is not known how Scarskull began. There is some evidence that it was originally the head of a powerful humanoid creature of many miles in height, who was slain in a great battle long ago. Only his skull remained after the great battle.
The mind flayers claimed the skull by driving out a nation of drow who had taken up residence. The flayers greatly expanded the caverns they found, turning the gigantic skull into a major city of their kind. Up to two thousand of the monsters dwelled in the city, served by three times that in slaves. For an uncounted number of centuries the city of Skull-Dripping-Blood was a major force in wildspace.
In time, the mind flayers grew careless and lax in their security, such that the Pirates of Gith discovered the location of their city. Twenty years ago, the greatest of their lords, Scarskull of the Bloody Blade, assembled one of the greatest pirate fleets ever seen, and laid siege to the tiny moon. The battle lasted the better part of a week, until finally the mind flayer defenses broke and Scarskull claimed the moon for his own. In celebration of his victory, Scarskull used powerful explosives to carve a scar across the skull-like moon's surface to match his own, and arrogantly named the moon after himself.
Since then, the moon has remained in the hands of the Pirates of Gith. The initial outpost proved so successful that it has grown from a few simple buildings to a booming town. Given a few more decades of success, Scarskull could grow into a full-fledged city of Gith, much to the detriment to every nearby settlement and colony!
High above Scarskull is a remnant of the fierce battle that gave the Gith control of this moon, the nautili dreadnaught Brainrustler. Formally the flagship of the mind flayer navy, its smashed ruin was left in orbit above Scarskull after the Gith overran it and slaughtered its crew to the last flayer. The Gith left the ruined ship as a trophy, and as a trap for inquisitive interlopers. The ship is haunted by the ghosts of the mind flayers who were trapped on the helm with it was destroyed. The ghosts are terrors indeed, for they have the abilities of both a ghost and a mind flayer. Fortunately, they are limited to the air envelope of the Brainrustler. The Brainrustler is badly damaged, with only 10 of its 180 hull points left. In addition to the ghosts, there are numerous zombies and skeletons as well, former slaves of the flayers that were raised as undead, as well as many traps and cursed items.
While it is assumed that Scarskull will be used in a Spelljammer or a Hackjammer game, not everyone likes their games in space, so here is advice on adapting this article to other settings. Scarskull can easily be changed to a small, rocky, barren island in any sea not far from major trade routes with little to no changes to its history or inhabitants. For Greyhawk, the island is ideally placed off the coast of Hepmonaland or in the Woolly Bay. In the Forgotten Realms setting, Scarskull ideally suits the Nelanther Islands off of the coast of Tethyr. Though both the Gith and Mind Flayers are mostly unsuitable for the Dragonlance setting, the island could be adapted to be a pirate haven somewhere in the Blood Sea of Istar, perhaps the Gith being cursed survivors of that fallen empire.
