Liches Touching Themselves

[airwalkrr]

A lich can deal 1d8+5 points of negative energy damage with his touch. This is not explicitly stated in the description, but it can be inferred that since negative energy has the opposite effect on undead that the touch would heal undead. Additionally, the dread necromancer from Heroes of Horror has an ability called Charnel Touch that is clearly modeled after the lich's touch (indeed the dread necromancer becomes a lich at 20th level) which does clearly state that it heals undead. This could be seen as also clarifying the way a lich's touch works although I am not necessarily making that case.

This makes the lich some kind of infinite repository of negative energy. Do you think a lich can heal undead with touch or not?

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Of course when I saw the phrase "Liches Touching Themselves" I immediately thought of Michael Jackson. The vomit stains will clean off but I think I need therapy.

 

[frankthedm]

The minis game has the same effect for the lich.

It falls under the Undead type...

- Cannot heal damage on its own if it has no Intelligence score, although it can be healed. Negative energy (such as an inflict spell) can heal undead creatures. The fast healing special quality works regardless of the creature’s Intelligence score.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I wouldn't allow it to heal itself -- a river can't make itself wetter -- but I would allow it to heal other undead. And a smart lich might keep around a wight or something to heal it as needed.

 

[FireLance]

Positive energy can heal living creatures, but I wouldn't allow disrupt undead to restore hit points.

Even with the dread necromancer's charnel touch, the damage healed to undead creatures is not the same as the damage dealt to living creatures.

Hence, positive energy that damages undead creatures does not necessarily heal living creatures, and negative energy that damages living creatures does not necessarily heal undead creatures.

That said, in my campaigns, I would allow the lich's ability to work like the dread necromancer's.

 

[airwalkrr]

I wouldn't allow it to heal itself -- a river can't make itself wetter -- but I would allow it to heal other undead. And a smart lich might keep around a wight or something to heal it as needed.

That begs the question, why can it heal other undead and not itself? Is there a rational explanation for such a ruling? It certainly makes for a silly situation when a wight can heal a lich with touch and a lich can heal a wight with touch but neither can heal each other.

 

[Li Shenron]

That begs the question, why can it heal other undead and not itself? Is there a rational explanation for such a ruling? It certainly makes for a silly situation when a wight can heal a lich with touch and a lich can heal a wight with touch but neither can heal each other.

Why can you scratch someone else's back but you cannot scratch your own?

But then I don't know what I would rule in this case.
The negative energy touch does not cost anything to the Lich, so it's not that threre is something necessarily transferring from the Lich to the target: if there was a flow of something, then he clearly couldn't heal himself this way, but there isn't.

There are many ways to describe it. It could be that simply the damage to any living thing touching a lich is a bit like touching a flame (except that by the rules it's lich who needs to actively touch you, just touching him doesn't deal you damage). You get burned but the flame doesn't diminish (although technically it probably does, but at least the effect is negligible).

If he can normally heal other undead, at the moment I would probably rule that he can heal himself too. It's like casting a spell (a Cleric can cast Cure Light Wounds on himself right?), so no problem.

Maybe someone is scared that he can do this at will but then it's only a matter of balance, not of explanation! And even as a matter of balance I'm not too much concerned because 1d8+5 is the equivalent of Cure Light Wounds, and it will not be very useful once per round (although I'm not sure there is a restriction to this).

Eventually this would be my only concern: how fast can the lich heal himself? If it's 1/round I'm ok with it, if he could technically heal 1/attack I'd be more concerned (but then maybe a lich won't likely have more than 2 attacks per round).

 

[roushguy]

it willl. in a game i play, i made an evil cleric, turned about 4 morghs, then healed them with inflict spells.

 

[glass]

it willl. in a game i play, i made an evil cleric, turned about 4 morghs, then healed them with inflict spells.

Inflict spells say 'Since undead are powered by negative energy, this spell cures such a creature of a like amount of damage, rather than harming it.' They heal undead because the specifically say they do.

The lich's touch attack and paralysing touch ability have no such text. No healing there.

I voted 'no'.


glass.

 

[lukelightning]

Personally, I feel that if a lich comes to using a standard action to heal itself a paltry 1d8+5 hit points instead of empowered chain lightning-ing the PCs then it has probably already lost the battle.