Lich Paragon Path

[lwelyk]

Lich Paragon Path
“I am a master of undeath, a mighty spellcaster of unspeakable power.”

Prerequisites: Non-Good alignment, Arcane power source, Completion of Lich ritual

You have gone through great trouble and trials to become a member of the undead and master the necrotic arts.
You have created a phylactery, a magical receptacle containing your life force. When you are reduced to 0 hit points or fewer, you and your possessions crumble to dust. Unless your phylactery is located and destroyed, your body will reappear in a space adjacent to the phylactery after 1d10 days at the component cost of 5,000 gp.

If your phylactery is destroyed, you can build a new one; the process takes 10 days and costs 50,000 gp.


Lich Path Features
Spell Master (11th level):
You can spend an action point to regain one encounter power that you have already used instead of taking an extra action.
Undead (11th level)
You +5 to all saving throws for disease and poison, have a necrotic resistance of 5, and a radiant weakness of 5. You also gain the undead keyword.
Lesser Necromatic Aura (16th level)
When an enemy hits you with a melee or reach attack, it takes 1d4 + charisma modifier damage.




Lich Path Powers

 

[RangerWickett]

Cool idea, and the powers look pretty balanced. If not for the whole "you cannot ever die" thing, it would be a great paragon path. Do you feel the need to balance out the character's nigh-invulnerability? Maybe make the 'create a new body' power be a bit limited somewhat?

Like, if you fail 3 death saving throws but still have healing surges, you act as if you'd rolled a 20 on a death save, and you pop back up. So you could still be killed by running you out of surges?

Or perhaps let you expend 5000 gp in ritual components to prepare a new body. You're basically paying in advance for a resurrection spell. Each time you die, you have to spend components again to prepare this spare body. And you have to store your phylactery near wherever the body is.

 

[El Coro]

This is super awesome. The only problem I see is what Wickett has already pointed out. Another possibility for balancing the immorality could be some caveat where you're not a full lich, and to retain your immortality you have to keep your phylactery on you at all times (maybe it has to be close to you for it to bring you back), and when you die, you can spend X healing surges to pop back up, but weakens the phylactery for a while (until, say, you've had an extended rest).

Resurrecting could even be a daily utility power.

I know it's not 100% in the spirit of the Lich Immortality, but not being able to die (or undie) will take some awesome tension out of the game, I feel.

 

[lwelyk]

Cool idea, and the powers look pretty balanced. If not for the whole "you cannot ever die" thing, it would be a great paragon path. Do you feel the need to balance out the character's nigh-invulnerability? Maybe make the 'create a new body' power be a bit limited somewhat?

Like, if you fail 3 death saving throws but still have healing surges, you act as if you'd rolled a 20 on a death save, and you pop back up. So you could still be killed by running you out of surges?

Or perhaps let you expend 5000 gp in ritual components to prepare a new body. You're basically paying in advance for a resurrection spell. Each time you die, you have to spend components again to prepare this spare body. And you have to store your phylactery near wherever the body is.

I think I might go with that for balancing the immortality. Good idea. Thanks for the compliments guys.

 

[lwelyk]

Updated the pictures, added component cost to coming back to life, and rebalanced some of the features, completely removed one of them. This should hopefully make it more balanced.