Gruul Clans
jACE HAD NEVER SEEN. OR FOR THAT MATTER SMELLED, A
Gruul war party at all. Their armor was made from animal
hides and bones. and their weaponry was heavy pieces of
scavenged city rubbish. Their skin was alive with tattoos.
etched with a combination of magic, ink, and, face sup-
posed. a considerable amount of pain. Each of them was a
hulk of muscle. and Ruric Thar was the largest and mighti-
est of them all.- Doug Beyer. Return to Ravnica: The Secretist
The Gruul Clans are a wild people in a civilized land,
a loose affiliation of bands that squat on the fringes of
Ravnican society. They shun the centers of civilization.
which they see as a source of oppression and weakness,
a nd ins tead haunt Ravnica's alleyways, abandoned
zones, and ruins. They want to see th e edifice of civi-
lization torn down so the world can revert to the pure
wilderness that thrived before the city grew to cover
everything. Then the true order of nature can be re-
stored-an unbridled and brutal state in which only the
strong survive and the strongest rule.
In a world covered with city streets and towering
buildings, the Gruul are the most out of place. the
most ill a t ease, and the most eager to topple it all and
start fresh. Constant ritualistic warfare reverberates
a mong th e clans, every s kirmis h reinforcing their doc-
trine of the survival of the fittest. They frequently send
sorties into civilized areas to secure goods-and to
wreak havoc.
The first leader of the Gruul was Cisarzim, a cyclops
who was purportedly the ancestor of Borborygmos, the
current guildmaster. Cisarzim was called the Lord of
Chaos, and his guild's original function as maintainers
of Ravnica's natural places meant keeping his faction as
remote as possible from the civilized parts of the world.
The gradual expansion of the city, however, has drive n
the Gruul into smaller and smaller refuges.58 C.H \P'l IR 2 l,l ll Os O~ RA\ 11;( '\
INSIDE THE CLANS
As a collection of disparate clans, the Gruul have no s in -
gle leader and no headquarters. But the Gruul respect
strength and are willing to follow a strong individual
who points them in a direction th ey want to go anyway.
For seve ra l decades, that pos ition has been held by t he
mighty cyclops Borborygmos, chief of the Burning Tree
clan. His nihilistic anger inspires the rest of the Gruul,
so when he calls on the other clans to join a raid, they
usually agree. Even the fractious Gruul can see the ben-
efit of banding together. The clans sometimes gather at
Skarrg, a ruined palace in the rubblebelt adjoining the
Tenth District. He re are descriptions of the clans:
Burning Tree Clan. The Burning Tree clan is the most
fearsome of the Gruul Clans, as well as the largest
a nd most diverse, with branc hes in seve ral districts of
Ravnica. The fear a nd awe inspired by Borborygmos
unifies its diverse members hip. The Ravnican popu-
lace regards the symbol of the Burning Tree clan as
the symbol for the entire Gruul guild.
Ghor Ciao. The Ghor clan is led by an ettin named Ru-
ric Thar (or, perhaps more properly, Ruric and Thar,
since the heads claim separate names). Of all the
clans, the Ghor carry out the most frequent and s av-
age assaults on Ravnica's citi zenry. The clan is known
for its audacity in forging e ncampments close to heav-
ily populated districts.
S cab Clan. Members of the Scab clan display scars and
body modifications, whic h they view as expressions of
the powerful rage they harbor within themselves. The
clan has grown in influence by engulfing or destroying
several smaller clans in recent years, but the leader of
the Scabs, a corpulent giant known as Narbulg Nine
Fingers, has not gone so far as to challenge the Burn-
ing Tree clan.
S lizt Clan. The Slizt clan is a clutch of sly, skittish war-
riors, consisting largely of reptilian humanoids called
viashino (use the lizardfolk stat block in the Monster
Manual to represent the m), along with a few wily hu-
mans. This clan survives in the rubble belts by taking
up hiding places in high ground and ambushing its
enemies with ranged attacks from above. Other Gruul
regard the Slizt as skulkers and cowards, but nonethe-
less all are cautious when entering a reas with elevated
ruins. The home ground of the Slizt clan is the Hus k,
an area at the center of a vast rubblebelt featuring
many large, ancient structures that have remained
standing for generations.