Complete Guide to Liches
Complete Guide to Liches
3.5
Dracolich: Like a lich, a dracolich must possess a phylactery for its soul to survive the transition to undeath. Though the dragon itself need not craft its own phylactery, the fiercely magical nature of dragons requires that the dragon must possess some spellcasting ability for its soul to endure in a phylactery, putting a certain age limit on which dragons can become dracoliches. Either the dragon must have spellcaster class levels, or it must be of a sufficient age to naturally have a caster level.
A dracolich’s phylactery costs a minimum of 190,000 gp and 7,700 XP to create, and possesses a caster level equal to the caster level of the spellcaster who created it.
Should the dragon so desire, a more elaborate and expensive phylactery can be created; as with a standard lich, this extra expense in creating a phylactery aids in the process of successfully creating a dracolich.
Drowlich : The creation
process for a drowlich is no different than that of a standard lich; however, the drow’s affinity for evil and its long years of existence in the underdark somehow serve to enhance the necromantic power that gives the drowlich its undead existence.
Novalich: A spellcaster cannot turn another creature into a novalich, so all novaliches are necessarily spellcasters themselves. Otherwise, novalich phylacteries are identical to those of normal liches.
Philolich: When a lich desires to keep cherished family or servants with him through eternity, he creates a philolich, a lesser lich whose spirit is bound to his own.
Philoliches can only be created by another lich; the philolich cannot be created by a living spellcaster.
The only requirements to become a philolich are to be willing, and to have a lich capable and willing to transform the character. Because much of the essence of the philolich’s soul is bound to the original lich’s phylactery, a philolich’s phylactery is easier to make, costing a minimum of 2,000 gp and 80 XP. It has a caster level equal to that of the lich that created it.
Failed rituals to create a philolich instead create a semi-lich.
Semi-Lich: The result of a failed attempt to become a lich.
Sometimes the process of lichdom is not successful, and with such complicated spells and rituals involved, it is almost surprising there are so few tales of lichdom gone awry. For example, most drinkers of the potion of undead life let themselves die, but if the subject resists the poison after letting his soul be bonded to the phylactery, the subject may rise as a creature known as a semi-lich.
If a creature dies while its soul is partially in a phylactery due to the join the soul spell, it rises as a semilich within 1d10 days unless the victim is brought back from the dead before that.
Failed rituals to create aphilolich instead create a semi-lich.
It is a creature that attempted to become a lich and was mostly unsuccessful. This failure stems from its phylactery. While the physical form of the creature became imbued with necromantic force in order to animate it in an undead state, the semi-lich’s original life force – its soul – was never successfully captured and bonded to the prepared phylactery. Without the phylactery, the creature’s original life force dissipated into nothingness, leaving behind only a ghastly undead monster inhabiting the creature’s original body.
Warlich: Spellcasters cannot turn themselves into warliches; they can only change others into this undead monster. The spellcaster turning a warrior into a warlich can either be living or undead.
Lichling: Imbued with the essence of a lich.
Lichlings are undead servitors that are created by their lich masters. Mortal wizards are unable to create lichlings; only those who have crafted a phylactery and stored their soul in it understand the magic necessary to create lichlings. Lichlings are skeletal undead created from piles of bones that are infused with a fragment of a soul.
Animate Lichling spell.
Lichwarg: Lichwargs are undead hunters created by liches to track down living prey for their masters. The lich who creates a lichwarg binds a bit of his soul to it, allowing him to see through its eyes and direct it from a distance.
Any lich can create a lichwarg with create undead or create greater undead.
Demi-Lich: The second possibility is that the lich’s body breaks apart and shatters, turning it into little more than fine powder and a skull. In this state, the skull still houses the remaining fragments of the lich’s still-living mind. With only its demented mind left intact, the lich finally reaches its ultimate state of purest evil – the demi-lich.
Lich: To become one, an evil spellcaster must knowingly consume a potion that will end his life only to resurrect him as an unliving vessel of pure evil.
Liches are powerful undead creatures – mortal wizards, warriors, and other beings of might who use the dark necromantic arts to make their spirits immortal.
No one knows for certain how the first liches came to be.
Sages say that the necromantic arts of lichdom came from failed sorcerous attempts to find immortality, or even godhood.
The creation of a lich requires a willing, living subject.
The process of becoming a lich is a dark and arduous one. The secrets and spells that must be learned in order to create a lich are numerous and difficult – it can take a lifetime alone just to learn all that is required.
In order to create a lich or a lich variant, two simple elements are essential above all others: a skilled spellcaster to create the lich, and a willing subject to become the lich.
The spellcaster can be any high-level spellcaster, including epic-level paladins and rangers.
Spellcasting: Caster level 11
Feats: Craft Wondrous Item
The subject must be a willing subject. Should the subject not truly desire to become a lich, or understand and object to the fact that becoming a lich involves actually dying and being reborn as an undead creature, the subject will never become a lich or lich variant. Suggestion, charm, or any other sorts of magic spells and psionics used to convince a subject that becoming a lich is a good idea are not enough, nor is misleading the subject about what the lich creation process entails. Only a subject that chooses to be a lich of his own free will can ever successfully become a lich.
Once both the spellcaster and the subject are ready and willing, a phylactery must be created to begin the process of lichdom.
Creating the phylactery requires the Craft Wondrous Item feat. This phylactery costs a minimum of 120,000 gp and 4,800 XP to create, and possesses a caster level equal to that of its creator when it is made.
With the phylactery (and, optionally, the vessel) in place, a ritual is required to bind the soul to the phylactery. Different cultures and magical traditions have developed slightly different rituals for spellcasters who wish to become liches.
The Potion of Undead Life: A potion of undead life slays the drinker unless he succeeds a Fortitude save (DC 20). A creature so slain cannot be brought back from the dead by anything short of a wish or miracle. If a creature has undergone the necessary ritual to bind its soul to a phylactery (and optionally, its mind to a vessel), the potion of undead life does not immediately slay the drinker; instead, it causes the creature’s physical body to rapidly decompose, turning into little more than dust and ash in less than two days. This is often to the horror of the lich, who cannot be certain the ritual was effective. But 1d10 days after the subject’s body drops dead from drinking a potion of undead life, he returns as a lich, looking very similar to the way he did in life.
Binding the Twin Winds: For this ritual, the prospective lich must find a windy cave, which acts as his phylactery. A ritual binds his soul to the cave, but to make the bonding permanent, he must die amid the cries of both mourning friends
and victorious foes – the twin winds of the ritual. After the prospective lich takes its last living breath, his body is suffused with a black miasma of negative energy that slowly dissolves his body. Only once there are no breathing creatures within a hundred feet will the lich be reanimated. Though a difficult ritual to perform, the benefit is that the lich’s phylactery is nearly impossible to steal or destroy. Though the cave only has hardness 8, it has tens of thousands of hit points.
The Sultan’s Curse: A thousand years ago, the sultan of a desert nation was blessed by a djinni to be able to invoke a curse of his choice once during his reign. That curse was lain upon a foreigner who defiled the holiest city of the land, and he was struck down by a bolt from the heavens. But the foreigner’s magic allowed him to steal a bit of the divine essence of the lightning bolt, bonding his soul with the twisted glass created when the lightning seared the desert sands. His body reformed from the sands of where he died, and he lives to this day seeking revenge. Similarly, if a mage prepares the proper ritual, and if he is slain by a spell channeling positive energy, he can corrupt that energy and use it to propel himself into the undeath of lichdom.
The Diary of Riddles: Many loremasters, feeling their pursuit of knowledge is yet incomplete, craft textual phylacteries, recording in extreme detail the events of their lives, typically in a well-bound tome. The mage seeking to become immortal must include at least one mystery he seeks to solve in his undeath, though additional mysteries may later be added to the book. He then writes an account of his own death into the tome, at which point he dies, his soul binding with the pages.
Skeleton: Dragons who undergo a failed ritual of lichdom do not become semi-liches, instead tending to rise as wights or skeletal dragons.
Puppets of Death spell.
Wight: Dragons who undergo a failed ritual of lichdom do not become semi-liches, instead tending to rise as wights or skeletal dragons.
Zombie: Puppets of Death spell.
Animate Lichling
Necromancy [Evil]
Level: Clr 4, Sor/Wiz 5
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Touch
Targets: 1 or more pile of bones touched
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
This spell functions as animate dead, except that you create a type of undead known as a lichling. The limit for the total hit dice of undead you can control applies to lichlings as well as normal zombies and skeletons created with animate dead.
Animate lichling can only be cast by a spellcaster who has successfully created a phylactery.
Material Components: A diamond worth 100 gp and a withered goat’s heart for each lichling you create, both of which must be placed in a pile of bones. The bones become the lichling, and the components are consumed in the casting.
Join the Soul
Necromancy [Evil]
Level: Brd 4, Clr 6, Drd 6, Sor/Wiz 6
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 30 minutes
Range: Touch
Target: Personal or creature touched, and
prepared phylactery
Duration: Instantaneous then 1 round/level
Saving Throw: Will negates
Spell Resistance: Yes
This spell is used in many rituals of lichdom to bind the life essence of the caster or another creature into a prepared phylactery. Willing creatures voluntarily fail their save to resist. If cast upon an unwilling target, the spell traps the life essence of that target in the phylactery for 1 round per caster level. The target suffers a penalty to all his ability scores equal to 2d4 for the spell’s duration, although this cannot reduce an ability below 1. If the creature dies while its soul is partially in the phylactery, it rises as a semilich within 1d10 days unless the victim is brought back from the dead before that.
A successful Will save by an unwilling target only means that the target feels slightly nauseous, but otherwise is able to function normally.
If, after receiving this spell, the ritual to become a lich is not completed within 1 hour, the subject’s body dies, and the subject’s life essence is trapped within the phylactery for the rest of eternity.
Puppets of Death
Necromancy [Evil]
Level: Clr 6, Death 6, Sor/Wiz 7
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: 50 ft.
Area: 50 ft. radius emanation, centered on the caster
Duration: 1 round/level
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
This spell functions like animate dead, except that the skeletons or zombies animated this way only remain animated until the end of the spell’s duration, and that the spell animates all dead bodies in the area of effect. The caster may control up to 2 Hit Dice of undead per caster level with this spell, in addition to the normal limit of animate dead spells. Material Components: Powder from a crushed skull.