TLDR: What spells, stats and actions would you remove from a lich to make them less powerful? Descending order from most to least powerful.
I'm a newish DM and I'm running a campaign for 4 5 level PCs. I know a party like this shouldn't even be in the same stratosphere as the WORD lich let alone the monster, but stick with me...
I'm planning the party's first actual delve into a dungeon in 6 months and I have an idea. The dungeon is a keep repurposed to be the penitentiary for an island nation. The warden of this brig is very cruel, very strict,a never leaves his quarters in the prison and is particularly suspicious of foreigners. And but also to, he be a fledgling lich. The lich feeds on the suffering of his captives and uses them to hone his necromantic arts.
I have planned a series of encounters, puzzles and plot hooks to free up some of, if not all of the island's prisoners. With each swathe of prisoners, filled with their delectable prioner misery, freed from the keep the lich loses more and more functionality (until he becomes a shell of his own expections and can be challenged by a lower level party like mine). I've set a narrative reason for freeing as many people as possible, with the intent to reveal the warden's true plans and form only once they reach him in his office.
What I'm looking to do is to prioritize in what ways I should change the encounter, removing the most powerful attributes first. I'm thinking about his.higher level spell slots, legendary actions and passives first but if anyone has some suggestions if appreciate the input!
Think I'd save the actual lich encounter till later. I'd have the players fight him in like a human form. Defeating that which is exactly what he wanted so that it could then become a lich. Like it needed to self sacrifice the human form to become the lich later. At that point have him hunting the players that took something from him during the loot phase. Rumors of places they go get attacked. Etc.
You can use the stats from a different monster of a similar type rather than rolling your own! That way you've got a preset CR and XP level so you know what level of challenge you're really creating.
An undead spellcaster of some sort... For example: a Deathlock is a CR4 undead spellcaster. Pretty easy to retheme him as a proto-lich. Deathlock Mastermind is CR8. You can take a Flameskull's stats (cr4) and make it not be tiny or flying and call it a protolich, or retheme a Banshee (CR4). Volo's has a "Necromancer" statblock (CR9) which you can retheme. And so on and so forth.
IMO, I'd recommend using one of those (or find a different creature whose statblock you like and is close to the CR you want, and make minor cosmetic changes to it to make it feel like the kind of monster you want) instead of trying to take a CR21 creature and lower its stats in a balanced way to a CR5. Too easy to either undershoot or overshoot the nerfing - and if the fight is too easy or too hard, you won't know whether that's your own fault or whether the players just got lucky/unlucky or planned well/poorly. Instead it's better to find a statblock you like and change around the name of the monster and maybe the theme of their basic attack and bam, you've got a protolich of whatever CR you picked out.
TLDR: What spells, stats and actions would you remove from a lich to make them less powerful? Descending order from most to least powerful.
I'm a newish DM and I'm running a campaign for 4 5 level PCs. I know a party like this shouldn't even be in the same stratosphere as the WORD lich let alone the monster, but stick with me...
I'm planning the party's first actual delve into a dungeon in 6 months and I have an idea. The dungeon is a keep repurposed to be the penitentiary for an island nation. The warden of this brig is very cruel, very strict,a never leaves his quarters in the prison and is particularly suspicious of foreigners. And but also to, he be a fledgling lich. The lich feeds on the suffering of his captives and uses them to hone his necromantic arts.
I have planned a series of encounters, puzzles and plot hooks to free up some of, if not all of the island's prisoners. With each swathe of prisoners, filled with their delectable prioner misery, freed from the keep the lich loses more and more functionality (until he becomes a shell of his own expections and can be challenged by a lower level party like mine). I've set a narrative reason for freeing as many people as possible, with the intent to reveal the warden's true plans and form only once they reach him in his office.
What I'm looking to do is to prioritize in what ways I should change the encounter, removing the most powerful attributes first. I'm thinking about his.higher level spell slots, legendary actions and passives first but if anyone has some suggestions if appreciate the input!
Drop everything by 1/4 to 1/2.
AC 16, 100 HP, +7 to attack and spell rolls, DC 13 on spell saves
Only up to lvl 4 or 5 spells.
Immunities and resistances same.
Have him liquify the bodies his own guards and prisoners to regain HP - Get the Prisoners Out!
Have him die and crumble to black smoking ash.
THEN save him for a comeback later in the campaign because they didn't destroy his phylactery.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Think I'd save the actual lich encounter till later. I'd have the players fight him in like a human form. Defeating that which is exactly what he wanted so that it could then become a lich. Like it needed to self sacrifice the human form to become the lich later. At that point have him hunting the players that took something from him during the loot phase. Rumors of places they go get attacked. Etc.
You can use the stats from a different monster of a similar type rather than rolling your own! That way you've got a preset CR and XP level so you know what level of challenge you're really creating.
An undead spellcaster of some sort... For example: a Deathlock is a CR4 undead spellcaster. Pretty easy to retheme him as a proto-lich. Deathlock Mastermind is CR8. You can take a Flameskull's stats (cr4) and make it not be tiny or flying and call it a protolich, or retheme a Banshee (CR4). Volo's has a "Necromancer" statblock (CR9) which you can retheme. And so on and so forth.
IMO, I'd recommend using one of those (or find a different creature whose statblock you like and is close to the CR you want, and make minor cosmetic changes to it to make it feel like the kind of monster you want) instead of trying to take a CR21 creature and lower its stats in a balanced way to a CR5. Too easy to either undershoot or overshoot the nerfing - and if the fight is too easy or too hard, you won't know whether that's your own fault or whether the players just got lucky/unlucky or planned well/poorly. Instead it's better to find a statblock you like and change around the name of the monster and maybe the theme of their basic attack and bam, you've got a protolich of whatever CR you picked out.
The Tomb of Horrors
The Lost Mine of Phandelver
The Dungeon of Lich Nerfing
"Not all those who wander are lost"