D&D 5E (2024) The Price of a Soul (Lich Path problems)

[SkidAce]

It has been discussed before that assassins need to have some way to block resurrection.

But this ain’t easy to get - NPCs don’t get feats.

And, of course, whilst you only need four PC class levels to qualify for this, you might want to hold off, lest the being who was expecting those souls sends an agent to ask where they are. Non-mechanical fluff has non-mechanical consequences.

Emphasis mine.

Jhereg - Wikipedia (spoilers for plot of story)

https://dragaera.fandom.com/wiki/Morganti (resurrection proof weapons)

 

[Kobold Stew]

NB, from the text for the magic item Blackrazor:

This is helpful, and sets a benchmark -- yes, a legendary item should be able to do this within the game, and it becomes horrific when it does.

 

[pemerton]

I also think part of the problem here is that D&D has never sat down and figured out how death, souls and the afterlife work. There's a bunch of largely disconnected stuff that touches on it, but to my knowledge, there's never been a coherent thought process, which means that when you add new stuff like this, it sometimes logically falls apart.

Well, 4e D&D did work through this pretty carefully (in Worlds & Monsters and Open Grave). It seemed like a coherent thought process!

 

[Paul Farquhar]

This is helpful, and sets a benchmark -- yes, a legendary item should be able to do this within the game, and it becomes horrific when it does.

It’s not a particularly powerful in the hands of the PCs though, since monsters rarely get resurrected. And as pointed out, D&D is asymmetric. NPCs don’t get the same stuff.

As for horrific - great, makes for a good story. It’s based on Stormbringer. Which Elric has from early on in his adventuring career, he uses it even though he knows what he does, and then he feels sad about it afterwards.

Remember, 5e is fantasy superheroes. Characters are strong from the start, they don’t start as farmers with pointy sticks.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Well, 4e D&D did work through this pretty carefully (in Worlds & Monsters and Open Grave). It seemed like a coherent thought process!

Oh, 4E did it? Well ...

 

[Blue]

I believe options that force a player and a DM to actually think about who they are as a character and what they are doing within the world is a good thing. Otherwise... you might as well just remove all flavor text from abilities and instead say "You can do X in the board game" if the flavor text has little to no meaning.

I'm perfectly with player and DM coming up with meaning instead of being straight-jacketted into a single WotC-approved flavor text. Easy example, was in an Ancient Greek inspired 2014!5e campaign and I ran a satyr hunter. Mechanically it was a rogue. Great perception, could sneak up on prey, take a shot from hiding that could drop them (sneak attack), etc. But zero flavor about stealing or assassination. Worked great, and fit the concept better than the ranger class with it's built-in casting would have. But if I war required to play to roguely flavor I wouldn't have been able to do that.

There are an incredible number of concepts for characters, and honestly plenty of ones from stories or movies that don't align the best with D&D mechanically. If we then limited D&D mechanics only to an "allowed flavor", we'd be making a whole lot more of them unable to be realized in the game.

All of that said, I actually support what you said specifically for this feat. Everyone has a class, they need to be broad. Even a class like paladin has been loosened from "chivalric lawful stupid" as an architype from early D&D to allow a much broader spectrum. But there are a lot of feats, and having some options chosen from a large list to have meaning and implications isn't nearly the limitation of everything being fettered to flavor text.

What's the point of letting a player "become a Lich" within the story of the campaign world if there's nothing for that player to actually think about in terms of actually being a lich in that campaign world? If "becoming a Lich" is merely just a couple game mechanics you take at certain levels... it's no different than any other game mechanic you could take instead. You are no longer becoming a Lich... you just have a couple additional game mechanics to use during the tactical miniatures board game.

Like I said I agree with this particular feat having flavor. But as a more general issue this seems to be mistakenly conflating "not using WotC's flavor text" with "has no flavor text" which is just incorrect. Players and DMs can and do flavor mechanics all the time. It's fundamentally incorrect to think that if the rule book does not impose a specific flavor that there is no flavor and apply the rhetoric of calling it a "tactical miniatures board game". Heck, we even have official rulings like the one in Tasha's to feel free to reskin spells to fit your character's flavor. So officially, publishing in the rules, there's an example that ignoring WotC flavor is fine, and that player/DM flavor absolutely exists.

 

[M_Natas]

It's a little odd that the little "initiate" wannabe lich is arguably much more evil than the full-on lich. I mean devouring souls to prolong your foul simulacrum of life is one thing, but consuming them just for a minor benefit on your next attack (and I guess "for practice") is kind of cartoonishly evil.

Maybe that is what makes you a Lich: Being a conscious consumer of souls, not wasting them like the beginner Proto-Wannabe-Lich, who is so inept, that he wastes whole souls that could give him hundreds of years of Unlive to just power one small attack.
It is like the apprentice smith who wastes a lot of raw material to create a medicore sword, while the master smith doesn't waste anything, uses half the materials and creates a master piece.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Maybe that is what makes you a Lich: Being a conscious consumer of souls, not wasting them like the beginner Proto-Wannabe-Lich, who is so inept, that he wastes whole souls that could give him hundreds of years of Unlive to just power one small attack.
It is like the apprentice smith who wastes a lot of raw material to create a medicore sword, while the master smith doesn't waste anything, uses half the materials and creates a master piece.

That is a very good way to think about it! I would also add that there's another way one could look at it, which is that one's morality doesn't change as you get "better" at a thing, but rather that your morality has been set by just doing a thing at all in the first place.

If you as a PC make the decision in the game world to transform yourself into a lich... your morality has pretty much been set and determined. And thus you need not worry about "counting points" on the "evil" scale based on what game mechanics you get and at what levels and how much those mechanics are "worth". It doesn't matter if your 4th level mechanic is "more evil" than your 8th level one or whatever, because the fact is you are becoming a lich! That right there is all the "evil" scale we need.

As another example, if you are an assassin, you are an assassin. And thus there's no point in making sure the design of the abilities of the assassin become progressively "more assassiny", as though your morality is on a fluctuating scale.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Maybe they are considering a 5e version of the Book of Vile Darkness.

To balance how overpowered one bad design in the original was, they're giving some weak designs in this one?

 

[MonsterEnvy]

It has been discussed before that assassins need to have some way to block resurrection.

No they don't. Resurrection is rare and expensive. Cutting the targets head off basically means only the strongest clerics could revive someone.