Sooo this might sound like a stupid question but what happens let's say to a wizard that becomes a lich ( Supposing he did make it happen ). Does he play with the lich stat block gaining his stats or does he gain some basic staff like AC, resistances immunities legendary actions etc. I am kind of confused because the monster manual says that liches are the remains of great wizards... Then why liches don't have things like signature spells or a school of magic... So this is the question I am posing what changes a player that becomes a lich have to make to his character sheet?
The rules normally require that a Player Character who becomes a Lich becomes an NPC. Every single thing you wish a Player Character Lich to be able to do will require adding it to the character sheet if they cannot do it normally.
If you want your player to become a lich, this magical item will give them all of the relevant powers and abilities. It also details a ritual to create it.
Bear in mind that the path to lichdom is inherently evil. You should not have "good" liches roaming around. To ensure this, I make the ritual to become a lich fundamentally require the deaths of innocents by your own hand.
A Lich is significantly stronger than a single 20th level PC. It is not in the rules for this path to be available, both for balance reasons and the fact that Lichdom is both unnatural and irredeemably evil. Any path forward would be a homebrew; Sanvaels version more or less works as a potential way to do this
I would say that if a PC wanted to become a lich, that would be the big campaign-ending event the story would be building up to. Besides, what do you do after you become a lich? Spend the rest of eternity probing the weave to study hidden arcane secrets?
I don't think the "evil" argument is very meaningful or persuasive (evil PCs are a thing, good liches are a thing, and what's so evil about personal body modification?), but the game balance is the driving force here. The 5E system as a whole, and the specific considerations that go into party balance and challenges and adventuring around the world, don't really work with immortal monstrous demigods in the mix.
If you do want them to play as a Lich, I'd recommend reskinning an existing Race or Lineage, or even creating a new homebrew race. Perhaps it gives them some racial spells, perhaps it changes their creature type to Undead rather than Humanoid, perhaps they don't need to eat, breath, or sleep.... but try not to make it fundamentally change too many base assumptions about how player characters operate, or give them too many powers, or it's just going to be disruptive to the party.
I don't think the "evil" argument is very meaningful or persuasive (evil PCs are a thing, good liches are a thing, and what's so evil about personal body modification?), but the game balance is the driving force here. The 5E system as a whole, and the specific considerations that go into party balance and challenges and adventuring around the world, don't really work with immortal monstrous demigods in the mix.
If you do want them to play as a Lich, I'd recommend reskinning an existing Race or Lineage, or even creating a new homebrew race. Perhaps it gives them some racial spells, perhaps it changes their creature type to Undead rather than Humanoid, perhaps they don't need to eat, breath, or sleep.... but try not to make it fundamentally change too many base assumptions about how player characters operate, or give them too many powers, or it's just going to be disruptive to the party.
I don't think that playing as Evil should be something that prevents lichdom for a PC, since as you say there are evil PCs. But there are no good lichs that follow the basics of what a lich is in D&D. Becoming a lich should require a massive amount of time and energy to achieve - reskinning classes/races to be lichs makes no sense, as they are always extremely powerful even to attempt the ritual.
Remember that a lich has to feed souls into its phylactery in order to maintain its existence. To create a Monster Manual lich: "With its phylactery prepared, the future lich drinks a potion of transformation — a vile concoction of poison mixed with the blood of a sentient creature whose soul is sacrificed to the phylactery."
"A lich must periodically feed souls to its phylactery to sustain the magic preserving its body and consciousness."
"Wizards that seek lichdom must make bargains with fiends, evil gods, or other foul entities. Many turn to Orcus, Demon Prince of Undeath, whose power has created countless liches. However, those that control the power of lichdom always demand fealty and service for their knowledge."
But hey, it's your game. If you want good lichs, or just have any "undead wizards" named lichs, then it's entirely up to you. Do whatever seems most fun for your table.
I've played in a game with a guy who was playing an evil sorcerer whose ultimate goal was to become a lich in order to escape a revenant. It was a really good plot progression - he ultimately failed, but it was a cool arc.
Know what else fuels their abilities with enemy souls? Hexblades.
I think it's the Eberron setting, where one of the two Elven factions is led by a cabal of good-aligned Liches. Fluff about whether lichdom is the result of pact with an evil god, a demon, the caster's own research and ingenuity, an innocent interaction with an ancient artifact, a deal with a good god, a Spawn-type situation where a good PC is using an evil power to fight evil, etc etc.... that's all roleplaying, not a mechanical justification for why PC's can't be liches. The reason that PC's cant be liches is, lich (just like every other Monster in the MM) isn't a class or a player race, period.
I don't really see how you can have a good aligned character who feeds souls into a phylactery in order to prolong their own life, but anyone can always change that in their own campaign.
It's basically the same as Twilight, Buffy and Blade (most vampire fiction these days) having "good" vampires, and those are pretty popular. I prefer my creatures of evil to be evil, but that's just me. Anything can be anything in D&D, but I wouldn't consider a level 3 Wizard who additionally had undead creature type to be a lich, anymore than they would be considered an Archmage. Lich implies vast and terrible magic, and the choice to put one's own undeath ahead of everything else.
Know what else fuels their abilities with enemy souls? Hexblades.
The 1 feature that involves souls only catches them temporarily. Pretty much every PC ability that utilizes souls does not destroy the soul because they don't want alignment altering features.
I don't really see how you can have a good aligned character who feeds souls into a phylactery in order to prolong their own life, but anyone can always change that in their own campaign.
There have been rare good aligned liches in D&D history. They only consumed the minimal number of souls from volunteers or evil humans. I don't think WotC wants them in 5e though.
It's ironic. There have been multiple threads about a Cleric turning into a Lich. The trouble is, using divine power to turn into something that is Unholy is effectively impossible. Liches are powerful evil wizards. So what can a Cleric who wants to become Undead become? A Mummy or a Revenant.
Way back when there were planes of Positive and Negative energy. Positive energy was the essence of Life, and Negative was the essence of Death. A Mummy was pretty much the only kind of Undead that was powered by Positive energy. The idea goes back to the Egyptians. They wanted people to be able to return to life, so they preserved the bodies by Mummification. That's a very Cleric sort of thing, only usually they can't do it to themselves. I don't have a problem with a Cleric praying to their deity to become a Mummy.
A Revenant is someone who comes back from the Dead for a special purpose. Usually, it's to get revenge, and I can't think of a better example than in the movie "The Crow." Eric Draven as a classic Revenant.
Have the Cleric set up a Ritual where they die and come back. It could be as easy as lying down on a stone slab that looks like an Altar, and taking a poison that makes them sleep, and eventually die without pain. Then they rise as whatever they like, as whatever Alignment they want, depending on what Domain their deity had control over. If that's not something a Grave domain deity wouldn't do, I can't imagine what deity would. Revenants tend to be focused on their purpose, I would call that Lawful, and a Mummy can pretty much do as they like.
In curse of strahd chapter 13 area 42 there is this:
South Sarcophagus. The vestige within this sarcophagus offers “the dark gift of Tenebrous” to any humanoid creature of evil alignment that can cast 9th-level wizard spells. Tenebrous’s gift is the secret of lichdom. This dark gift grants its beneficiary the knowledge needed to perform the following tasks:
Craft a phylactery and imbue it with the power to contain the beneficiary’s soul
Concoct a potion of transformation that turns the beneficiary into a lich
Construction of the phylactery takes 10 days. Concocting the potion takes 3 days. The two items can’t be crafted concurrently. When the beneficiary drinks the potion, he or she instantly transforms into a lich under the Dungeon Master’s control (use the stat block in the Monster Manual, altering the lich’s prepared spells as desired).
The beneficiary of this dark gift gains the following flaw: “All I care about is acquiring new magic and arcane knowledge.”
In curse of strahd chapter 13 area 42 there is this:
South Sarcophagus. The vestige within this sarcophagus offers “the dark gift of Tenebrous” to any humanoid creature of evil alignment that can cast 9th-level wizard spells. Tenebrous’s gift is the secret of lichdom. This dark gift grants its beneficiary the knowledge needed to perform the following tasks:
Craft a phylactery and imbue it with the power to contain the beneficiary’s soul
Concoct a potion of transformation that turns the beneficiary into a lich
Construction of the phylactery takes 10 days. Concocting the potion takes 3 days. The two items can’t be crafted concurrently. When the beneficiary drinks the potion, he or she instantly transforms into a lich under the Dungeon Master’s control (use the stat block in the Monster Manual, altering the lich’s prepared spells as desired).
The beneficiary of this dark gift gains the following flaw: “All I care about is acquiring new magic and arcane knowledge.”
I Thought it might help.
Interesting. Does it say what is required to make said items other than time? The MM describes what the phylactery is, and mentions the potion contains a poison and the blood of a sentient creature, but says nothing about materials to make, cost, or anything else.
In curse of strahd chapter 13 area 42 there is this:
South Sarcophagus. The vestige within this sarcophagus offers “the dark gift of Tenebrous” to any humanoid creature of evil alignment that can cast 9th-level wizard spells. Tenebrous’s gift is the secret of lichdom. This dark gift grants its beneficiary the knowledge needed to perform the following tasks:
Craft a phylactery and imbue it with the power to contain the beneficiary’s soul
Concoct a potion of transformation that turns the beneficiary into a lich
Construction of the phylactery takes 10 days. Concocting the potion takes 3 days. The two items can’t be crafted concurrently. When the beneficiary drinks the potion, he or she instantly transforms into a lich under the Dungeon Master’s control (use the stat block in the Monster Manual, altering the lich’s prepared spells as desired).
The beneficiary of this dark gift gains the following flaw: “All I care about is acquiring new magic and arcane knowledge.”
I Thought it might help.
I enjoy little weird things like this in modules that will literally never come into play. Curse of Strahd has a few things like this which are basically never going to happen.
Curse of Strahd spoiler below:
There is almost no possibility of a PC able to cast 9th level Wizard spells being around in CoS - any caster that can cast spells of that level can probably solo Strahd as he's really not that tough. The only character likely able to accept this gift is Mordenkainen, who the PCs can bafflingly gain as an ally, only if they can cast greater restoration - but that requires them to have a level 9 character on hand who is able to cast it...
But firstly, Mordenkainen will simply attack them: Believing that the characters aim to kill him, the Mad Mage unleashes his destructive magic. As he tears into them, he shouts, “You think my magic has grown weak? Think again!” If he is reduced to 50 hit points or fewer, he shouts, “Tell your dark masters they can break my body, but never my spirit!” He then tries to escape.
How the PCs are supposed to be able to capture or stop an insane CR12 spellcaster with cone of cold and time stop available isn't clear. They can use social interactions to try to persuade him why Greater Restoration failed, but only if they have already tried Greater Restoration - which they almost certainly don't have anyway, as by the time they're level 9 they are hardly likely to be roaming the northern edge of the map, and have probably gone to Ravenloft to kill Strahd (which they should easily accomplish).
If they somehow do manage to gain Mordenkainen as an ally, the PCs may as well go straight for Strahd in Ravenloft, since Mordenkainen backed by a few PCs can take Strahd down in a couple of turns.
I think it was a plant for future returns and or lore building. I also would allow a lower level pc to accept the gift but be unable to use it until later in the game. and at the very least we have "A" method of becoming a lich explained for 5e. there may be others but at least we have one.
It's ironic. There have been multiple threads about a Cleric turning into a Lich. The trouble is, using divine power to turn into something that is Unholy is effectively impossible. Liches are powerful evil wizards. So what can a Cleric who wants to become Undead become? A Mummy or a Revenant....
Again, this is really just conflating Forgotten Realms fluff with 5E mechanics. In 5E, see Eberron, where Aerenal is an elven nation with positive-energy-fueled undead wizards (dare I say, Liches?) rule the nation. A detailed description of the nation and its "Undying Court" are here in E:RFTLW, or there's a blurb in the racial entry.
Elves of Aerenal
Aerenal is ruled by the Undying Court, a council of undead elves sustained by positive energy. The Undying Court wields godlike power and has protected your island home for thousands of years. The greatest heroes of your people join the Undying Court after death; if you achieve great things in your life, you too could achieve this immortality.
Liches gonna lich, and there's nothing inherent about their mechanical nature in 5E that makes them any more or less suitable as protagonists than any other monster, apart from the fact that the imbalance (and confusion) caused by treating Monsters as Races only gets worse the more powerful the Monster is and the more innate special abilities it possesses.
If you want your player to become a lich, this magical item will give them all of the relevant powers and abilities. It also details a ritual to create it.
Bear in mind that the path to lichdom is inherently evil. You should not have "good" liches roaming around. To ensure this, I make the ritual to become a lich fundamentally require the deaths of innocents by your own hand.
This is much better than how I attempted to create this in DND Beyond... I tried to create a lich race and it got... messy.
One thing I would add is that according to the lore, liches need to feed souls to their phylactery* (how often, what kind, etc. is undefined).
And one final note: Because the word phylactery refers to a real life religious item in Judaism, I think it would be best to retire it. "Soul Jar" or something would be better.
yes there are, you have the elven protector liches (forgot the exact name) that guard elven sites most of the time and on't consume souls, then you have archliches which are good liches
Sooo this might sound like a stupid question but what happens let's say to a wizard that becomes a lich ( Supposing he did make it happen ). Does he play with the lich stat block gaining his stats or does he gain some basic staff like AC, resistances immunities legendary actions etc. I am kind of confused because the monster manual says that liches are the remains of great wizards... Then why liches don't have things like signature spells or a school of magic... So this is the question I am posing what changes a player that becomes a lich have to make to his character sheet?
The rules normally require that a Player Character who becomes a Lich becomes an NPC. Every single thing you wish a Player Character Lich to be able to do will require adding it to the character sheet if they cannot do it normally.
<Insert clever signature here>
If you want your player to become a lich, this magical item will give them all of the relevant powers and abilities. It also details a ritual to create it.
Bear in mind that the path to lichdom is inherently evil. You should not have "good" liches roaming around. To ensure this, I make the ritual to become a lich fundamentally require the deaths of innocents by your own hand.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/magic-items/3712871-lichs-phylactery
A Lich is significantly stronger than a single 20th level PC. It is not in the rules for this path to be available, both for balance reasons and the fact that Lichdom is both unnatural and irredeemably evil. Any path forward would be a homebrew; Sanvaels version more or less works as a potential way to do this
Thank you very much this was exactly what I was looking for
I would say that if a PC wanted to become a lich, that would be the big campaign-ending event the story would be building up to. Besides, what do you do after you become a lich? Spend the rest of eternity probing the weave to study hidden arcane secrets?
"Not all those who wander are lost"
I don't think the "evil" argument is very meaningful or persuasive (evil PCs are a thing, good liches are a thing, and what's so evil about personal body modification?), but the game balance is the driving force here. The 5E system as a whole, and the specific considerations that go into party balance and challenges and adventuring around the world, don't really work with immortal monstrous demigods in the mix.
If you do want them to play as a Lich, I'd recommend reskinning an existing Race or Lineage, or even creating a new homebrew race. Perhaps it gives them some racial spells, perhaps it changes their creature type to Undead rather than Humanoid, perhaps they don't need to eat, breath, or sleep.... but try not to make it fundamentally change too many base assumptions about how player characters operate, or give them too many powers, or it's just going to be disruptive to the party.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
I don't think that playing as Evil should be something that prevents lichdom for a PC, since as you say there are evil PCs. But there are no good lichs that follow the basics of what a lich is in D&D. Becoming a lich should require a massive amount of time and energy to achieve - reskinning classes/races to be lichs makes no sense, as they are always extremely powerful even to attempt the ritual.
Remember that a lich has to feed souls into its phylactery in order to maintain its existence. To create a Monster Manual lich: "With its phylactery prepared, the future lich drinks a potion of transformation — a vile concoction of poison mixed with the blood of a sentient creature whose soul is sacrificed to the phylactery."
"A lich must periodically feed souls to its phylactery to sustain the magic preserving its body and consciousness."
"Wizards that seek lichdom must make bargains with fiends, evil gods, or other foul entities. Many turn to Orcus, Demon Prince of Undeath, whose power has created countless liches. However, those that control the power of lichdom always demand fealty and service for their knowledge."
But hey, it's your game. If you want good lichs, or just have any "undead wizards" named lichs, then it's entirely up to you. Do whatever seems most fun for your table.
I've played in a game with a guy who was playing an evil sorcerer whose ultimate goal was to become a lich in order to escape a revenant. It was a really good plot progression - he ultimately failed, but it was a cool arc.
Know what else fuels their abilities with enemy souls? Hexblades.
I think it's the Eberron setting, where one of the two Elven factions is led by a cabal of good-aligned Liches. Fluff about whether lichdom is the result of pact with an evil god, a demon, the caster's own research and ingenuity, an innocent interaction with an ancient artifact, a deal with a good god, a Spawn-type situation where a good PC is using an evil power to fight evil, etc etc.... that's all roleplaying, not a mechanical justification for why PC's can't be liches. The reason that PC's cant be liches is, lich (just like every other Monster in the MM) isn't a class or a player race, period.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
I don't really see how you can have a good aligned character who feeds souls into a phylactery in order to prolong their own life, but anyone can always change that in their own campaign.
It's basically the same as Twilight, Buffy and Blade (most vampire fiction these days) having "good" vampires, and those are pretty popular. I prefer my creatures of evil to be evil, but that's just me. Anything can be anything in D&D, but I wouldn't consider a level 3 Wizard who additionally had undead creature type to be a lich, anymore than they would be considered an Archmage. Lich implies vast and terrible magic, and the choice to put one's own undeath ahead of everything else.
The 1 feature that involves souls only catches them temporarily. Pretty much every PC ability that utilizes souls does not destroy the soul because they don't want alignment altering features.
There have been rare good aligned liches in D&D history. They only consumed the minimal number of souls from volunteers or evil humans. I don't think WotC wants them in 5e though.
It's ironic. There have been multiple threads about a Cleric turning into a Lich. The trouble is, using divine power to turn into something that is Unholy is effectively impossible. Liches are powerful evil wizards. So what can a Cleric who wants to become Undead become? A Mummy or a Revenant.
Way back when there were planes of Positive and Negative energy. Positive energy was the essence of Life, and Negative was the essence of Death. A Mummy was pretty much the only kind of Undead that was powered by Positive energy. The idea goes back to the Egyptians. They wanted people to be able to return to life, so they preserved the bodies by Mummification. That's a very Cleric sort of thing, only usually they can't do it to themselves. I don't have a problem with a Cleric praying to their deity to become a Mummy.
A Revenant is someone who comes back from the Dead for a special purpose. Usually, it's to get revenge, and I can't think of a better example than in the movie "The Crow." Eric Draven as a classic Revenant.
Have the Cleric set up a Ritual where they die and come back. It could be as easy as lying down on a stone slab that looks like an Altar, and taking a poison that makes them sleep, and eventually die without pain. Then they rise as whatever they like, as whatever Alignment they want, depending on what Domain their deity had control over. If that's not something a Grave domain deity wouldn't do, I can't imagine what deity would. Revenants tend to be focused on their purpose, I would call that Lawful, and a Mummy can pretty much do as they like.
<Insert clever signature here>
In curse of strahd chapter 13 area 42 there is this:
South Sarcophagus. The vestige within this sarcophagus offers “the dark gift of Tenebrous” to any humanoid creature of evil alignment that can cast 9th-level wizard spells. Tenebrous’s gift is the secret of lichdom. This dark gift grants its beneficiary the knowledge needed to perform the following tasks:
Construction of the phylactery takes 10 days. Concocting the potion takes 3 days. The two items can’t be crafted concurrently. When the beneficiary drinks the potion, he or she instantly transforms into a lich under the Dungeon Master’s control (use the stat block in the Monster Manual, altering the lich’s prepared spells as desired).
The beneficiary of this dark gift gains the following flaw: “All I care about is acquiring new magic and arcane knowledge.”
I Thought it might help.
Interesting. Does it say what is required to make said items other than time? The MM describes what the phylactery is, and mentions the potion contains a poison and the blood of a sentient creature, but says nothing about materials to make, cost, or anything else.
...I guess the DM just fills in the gaps
I enjoy little weird things like this in modules that will literally never come into play. Curse of Strahd has a few things like this which are basically never going to happen.
Curse of Strahd spoiler below:
There is almost no possibility of a PC able to cast 9th level Wizard spells being around in CoS - any caster that can cast spells of that level can probably solo Strahd as he's really not that tough. The only character likely able to accept this gift is Mordenkainen, who the PCs can bafflingly gain as an ally, only if they can cast greater restoration - but that requires them to have a level 9 character on hand who is able to cast it...
But firstly, Mordenkainen will simply attack them: Believing that the characters aim to kill him, the Mad Mage unleashes his destructive magic. As he tears into them, he shouts, “You think my magic has grown weak? Think again!” If he is reduced to 50 hit points or fewer, he shouts, “Tell your dark masters they can break my body, but never my spirit!” He then tries to escape.
How the PCs are supposed to be able to capture or stop an insane CR12 spellcaster with cone of cold and time stop available isn't clear. They can use social interactions to try to persuade him why Greater Restoration failed, but only if they have already tried Greater Restoration - which they almost certainly don't have anyway, as by the time they're level 9 they are hardly likely to be roaming the northern edge of the map, and have probably gone to Ravenloft to kill Strahd (which they should easily accomplish).
If they somehow do manage to gain Mordenkainen as an ally, the PCs may as well go straight for Strahd in Ravenloft, since Mordenkainen backed by a few PCs can take Strahd down in a couple of turns.
Baffling adventure design, but there it is.
I think it was a plant for future returns and or lore building. I also would allow a lower level pc to accept the gift but be unable to use it until later in the game. and at the very least we have "A" method of becoming a lich explained for 5e. there may be others but at least we have one.
Again, this is really just conflating Forgotten Realms fluff with 5E mechanics. In 5E, see Eberron, where Aerenal is an elven nation with positive-energy-fueled undead wizards (dare I say, Liches?) rule the nation. A detailed description of the nation and its "Undying Court" are here in E:RFTLW, or there's a blurb in the racial entry.
Liches gonna lich, and there's nothing inherent about their mechanical nature in 5E that makes them any more or less suitable as protagonists than any other monster, apart from the fact that the imbalance (and confusion) caused by treating Monsters as Races only gets worse the more powerful the Monster is and the more innate special abilities it possesses.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
This is much better than how I attempted to create this in DND Beyond... I tried to create a lich race and it got... messy.
One thing I would add is that according to the lore, liches need to feed souls to their phylactery* (how often, what kind, etc. is undefined).
And one final note: Because the word phylactery refers to a real life religious item in Judaism, I think it would be best to retire it. "Soul Jar" or something would be better.
yes there are, you have the elven protector liches (forgot the exact name) that guard elven sites most of the time and on't consume souls, then you have archliches which are good liches
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Baelnorn