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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jeremy" data-source="post: 265645" data-attributes="member: 4036">Quick question, then a different way of looking at things.First, the question.  If you began a campaign at level 5 and one of the characters wanted to play a lich with all the benefits would you assign an ECL to his character to balance out the starting PC's?Second, an analogy.  To those of you who don't think this tranformation constitutes enough increase in power to warrant slower advancement for the character here is an interesting view point.A balanced party encounters an artifact.  One of the party (the guy who is mainly concerned with power and doesn't really stick to any particular role-playing concept) lunges for the item before knowing what it does.This character is suddenly infused with energy gaining a permanent +7 increase to base attack, 50 hit points, +3 to all his saves, and gains both uncanny dodge and the ability to rage 2/day like a barbarian.  This was from an item.Deck of Many Things gave 10,000 XP or Dice of Oli Darma or what have you.  Regardless, an item just granted 7 levels of barbarian.  Do you keep the character at the same level and just give him all the abilities, or is he now a higher level character?  He's a higher level character.  He is more powerful, he learns less from unchallenging opponents, he is capable of enduring tougher challenges, and he has more power at his disposal than the typical example of a character his former level.Regardless of how you implement the change, the fact of the matter is, a character who becomes a lich becomes more powerful than other characters of his level.  He is effectively no longer what level he was.  Every purpose that the level system serves is now changed.  The amount of ability his character brings to the party, the challenge of foes, the amount of XP his character should obtain, every bit.  If he walks, talks, and acts like a 16th level character, then he's a 16th level character.Now you can deal with that in any way your DM sees fit, but Artoomis's suggestion allows the PC to:1) keep playing alongside the party as his powers develop2) still gain powers with levels (just really powerful immunities and the ability to respawn, and all the hit points up front instead of gaining base attack and saves)3) doesn't unbalance the game (this doesn't seem particularly important to some of you, but the DM who apparently is not being told of this thread I'm sure will appreciate this benefit of the plan)4) slows down advancement without making the player play 10 games with no change in his character's abilities5) ends up giving you an ECL character (which is what a lich is, period) without sidelining the PC for 120 days while he crafts the phylacteryFor those of you who advise just letting him shoot up 5 effective levels, can I play in your games?  Can my character spontaneously acquire levels with an investment of gold and some XP that I'm about to recoup x10?  Really, this is getting silly now.Is a lich an ECL character?  Yes.  He is effectively higher level than a core race because he is dramatically more powerful than them.Is there a way to deal with ECL midgame for this transformation without shooting up 5 levels or having 50,000 XP to gain inbetween 12th and 13th levels?  Yes.  Artoomis came up with it.Is there any better suggestion out on the floor?  Not that I've seen so far.</blockquote>

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