PDA

View Full Version : Hiding a Good phylactery



Swordgleam
2010-06-17, 10:58 PM
We all seem to love hiding phylacteries. But a lot of the more clever gambits - eg, turning it into the rib of a Good princess - rely on the assumption that you're evil and good people want to take you down.

So let's reverse it. You're a champion of righteousness and valor, and for some reason have a phylactery that functions the same as that of a lich except you don't need to commit an evil act to create it.

How can you hide your phylactery from all the evil people out for your blood? Remember, now you just might have allies you can trust.

For the sake of discussion, avoid 'neutral' solutions that just make your phylactery hard to get to regardless of who's after it. We've already had threads for those.

drengnikrafe
2010-06-17, 11:04 PM
I find it hard to believe that there is an inherently good solution involving the hiding of a phylactery. I mean, even clever things like "Make it the beating heart of your most dire foe" are still at least a little bit evil in nature. On the other hand, if someone does come up with one, I'll be all the more impressed.

Swordgleam
2010-06-17, 11:06 PM
Well, putting it in the temple of your good-aligned god surrounded by his warrior-priests is a fairly basic and fairly effective solution, if not especially clever.

dextercorvia
2010-06-17, 11:09 PM
As far as I can tell, the benefit of Good over Evil is trust. A lich would never hand his phylactery over to some demon lord and say "Would you watch this for me?" However, a champion of Good, could pick a celestial being and ask them to do just that. The thing is, so long as the exchange is protected from divination, a BBEG would never expect it.

omglolnub
2010-06-17, 11:10 PM
Well, since neutral solutions are out of the question (of which I feel are the best, if only because I've yet to find someone who can reliably beat my three teleportation circle method) I say contingency it to Gate in a Solar if anyone evil touches it.

drengnikrafe
2010-06-17, 11:10 PM
While that's a reasonable point, is it really good? You're taking a good deity who, for arguement's sake, stands for all that is holy and good. Then, you're taking the greatest of the followers of this selfless being of great power, and using them for your own personal protection. That strikes me as selfish, in a sense. Alternatively, I'm just looking at this whole thing the wrong way.

On the other hand, you could enchant it to seem nonmagical and then make it the cornerstone of a building that is good, like your temple example. Then it's actually useful for something else.

dextercorvia
2010-06-17, 11:15 PM
I find the entire notion of a Good phylactery to be somewhat troubling. Champions of Good are not terrified of dieing. There is a reward for them, unlike the proverbial lich, who needs to stay in the game (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0652.html).

Mando Knight
2010-06-17, 11:17 PM
While that's a reasonable point, is it really good? You're taking a good deity who, for arguement's sake, stands for all that is holy and good. Then, you're taking the greatest of the followers of this selfless being of great power, and using them for your own personal protection. That strikes me as selfish, in a sense. Alternatively, I'm just looking at this whole thing the wrong way.

But if you're also a divinely powered paragon of the deity's virtues, empowered by a long-forgotten ritual to fight for the god's cause indefinitely without needing continual use of longevity magics, protecting your phylactery would be as much a service to that god as watching over the health of its most powerful mortal paragon.

PId6
2010-06-17, 11:17 PM
Make it a minor magic item, and then give it to the PCs to carry around as a quest reward. Eventually, they'll sell it, and another adventuring party will pick it up for a while. Nobody ever bothers destroying minor magic items, and you're doing something good by giving items to good-aligned PCs. Just make sure it's acid immune first in case a PC gets swallowed whole.

DoodlesD
2010-06-17, 11:22 PM
This last point about not fearing death is a valid one, but i will contribute my idea anyway.

I think that the best way for a good character to protect his phylactery from evil beings is to make it something that is actually more valuable to the evil beings intact. Therefore, the evil beings will actually keep the phylactery safe for the good character because it is either useful to them, a magical item, etc. Should it ever become a problem that evil characters possess the phylactery, the good character could just hunt them down and get it back. The Evil characters would never destroy what they hope to protect =)

Swordgleam
2010-06-17, 11:34 PM
I find the entire notion of a Good phylactery to be somewhat troubling. Champions of Good are not terrified of dieing. There is a reward for them, unlike the proverbial lich, who needs to stay in the game (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0652.html).

There's plenty of reasons to live forever besides fear of death. The champion is selflessly sacrificing their eternal reward in order to continue serving their god on the mortal plane.


This last point about not fearing death is a valid one, but i will contribute my idea anyway.

I think that the best way for a good character to protect his phylactery from evil beings is to make it something that is actually more valuable to the evil beings intact. Therefore, the evil beings will actually keep the phylactery safe for the good character because it is either useful to them, a magical item, etc. Should it ever become a problem that evil characters possess the phylactery, the good character could just hunt them down and get it back. The Evil characters would never destroy what they hope to protect =)

I like this idea. Elaborate. How could it be useful to the evil beings without somehow aiding evil?

DoodlesD
2010-06-17, 11:38 PM
It could be something useful to either good or evil parties, like maybe a magical ring that lets a wearer use a divination spell at will x times a day. something that would be useful to the user, but not so useful that it becomes a hazard in the hands of villains. A ring or Amulet of detect invisible or alignment or lie or whatever at will x times a day would fall in to this category and would be useful enough that evil characters would probably try to get their hands on it and keep it safe from others.

Swordgleam
2010-06-17, 11:47 PM
I like it. Stuff like the One Ring is a huge temptation for good characters, and evil is much easier to tempt. Of course, it could compromise the champion's ability to go after that particular villain, if the villain knows what the artifact really is.

GoodbyeSoberDay
2010-06-18, 12:03 AM
You could do the standard Genesis/Forbiddance trick, but make it a good-aligned demiplane.

Which gets me to the (reiterated) point that most of the best phylactery guarding techniques are effective against foes of any alignment and could be enacted by lich-like beings of any alignment.

Abd al-Azrad
2010-06-18, 12:08 AM
Let's turn one of the better solutions from the other Phylactery thread around here: The minor magical item that slowly corrupts those who bear it, so their hearts turn to evil and their loyalties to your cause.

For a "good" version, make your phylactery into a vital component of a powerful evil artifact. Let's say, the pommel stone of the Sword of Kas. The usual protections from divination apply. Then you let the Sword out into the world, knowing full well that those of evil heart will seek it out, not knowing of your deception. When they defeat the previous owner, they take the Sword for themselves, as is their nature - Evil acts for the benefit of the self, at the expense of others, and slaying the owner of the Sword of Kas to take possession of said sword is a natural act for a villain. But your phylactery, and a portion of your soul, is now in constant proximity to this newest villain. Slowly but surely, your phylactery worms its way into their psyche, turning this villain into a stalwart champion of Good and using the Sword for goodness.

In so doing, you (a) turn an evil artifact to a noble cause, (b) turn a potentially endless series of villains to the cause of goodness, and (c) create a method of generating powerful, self-selecting defenders of your phylactery.

Dracons
2010-06-18, 12:19 AM
Let's turn one of the better solutions from the other Phylactery thread around here: The minor magical item that slowly corrupts those who bear it, so their hearts turn to evil and their loyalties to your cause.

For a "good" version, make your phylactery into a vital component of a powerful evil artifact. Let's say, the pommel stone of the Sword of Kas. The usual protections from divination apply. Then you let the Sword out into the world, knowing full well that those of evil heart will seek it out, not knowing of your deception. When they defeat the previous owner, they take the Sword for themselves, as is their nature - Evil acts for the benefit of the self, at the expense of others, and slaying the owner of the Sword of Kas to take possession of said sword is a natural act for a villain. But your phylactery, and a portion of your soul, is now in constant proximity to this newest villain. Slowly but surely, your phylactery worms its way into their psyche, turning this villain into a stalwart champion of Good and using the Sword for goodness.

In so doing, you (a) turn an evil artifact to a noble cause, (b) turn a potentially endless series of villains to the cause of goodness, and (c) create a method of generating powerful, self-selecting defenders of your phylactery.

Sorry. Good doesn't work that way. Your forcing someone to become good. That isn't a good act. Neutral. At best.

Abd al-Azrad
2010-06-18, 12:30 AM
Sorry. Good doesn't work that way. Your forcing someone to become good. That isn't a good act. Neutral. At best.

Wasn't this the topic of an entire series of threads a while back? Something about Mindrape being a Good act so long as it makes more Good people?

Okay, fine. I don't really care to get into an ethical debate on the Internet. I will concede that forcing people to turn to Goodness could be considered not-good, even though by any utilitarian argument it increases the overall level of goodness. We're not economists here, we like to define our goodness in a way that doesn't rely on consequences.

Your phylactery places you in direct contact with the wielder of the Sword.

Now they get to freely choose whether to discard the Sword of Kas, one of the most powerful weapons in existence, or put up with your perpetual influence as a highly ethical, Good-aligned diplomancer. You now effectively rely on your skill checks to browbeat people into conversion to Goodness rather than magic. And because they are evil, they cannot discard the Sword knowing full well that any other villain could take it and kill them. Their distrust of the rest of the world forces them to hold onto the weapon even as you turn them to a champion of Goodness. The hilarity here is that you are teaching them the values of trust and humility that will eventually allow them to shed themselves of the weapon.

P.S. "You're forcing someone to become good." You are.

Swordgleam
2010-06-18, 12:42 AM
In so doing, you (a) turn an evil artifact to a noble cause, (b) turn a potentially endless series of villains to the cause of goodness, and (c) create a method of generating powerful, self-selecting defenders of your phylactery.

I love it.


Sorry. Good doesn't work that way. Your forcing someone to become good. That isn't a good act. Neutral. At best.

I should've seen it coming, but let's try to avoid spending too much of this thread in an alignment discussion. :smallyuk: For the sake of argument, let's call anything that improves the world and isn't evil, good. Let's not think in terms of the nine alignments. You can have non standard non paladin types that still serve the cause of good, just in different ways.

Abd al-Azrad
2010-06-18, 12:44 AM
@Swordgleam: Thank you. Vindication!

@Others: I can make this work for any definition of Goodness you care to define. But as our OP asks, let us not get too far into the impossible debate that is alignment.

RelentlessImp
2010-06-18, 12:59 AM
Meh. Again, Phylactery into Bag of Holding A, enter AMF, Bag of Holding A into Bag of Holding B. You can't scry it (not on this plane), you can't use locate object on it (not on this plane), and so on.

Sell the Bag of Holding to a merchant. It gets sold to an adventurer. If you die, all you need is to Plane Shift out of the Bag of Holding and then back onto the Prime.

Alternately, dump it on the Positive Energy Plane. People will literally kill themselves trying to find it, what with the whole exploding from having too many hitpoints thing.

Swordgleam
2010-06-18, 01:17 AM
Meh. Again

That's exactly why I said to leave out neutral solutions - they're been done to death in other threads. :smalltongue:

I like the positive energy plane idea.

Morph Bark
2010-06-18, 01:55 AM
I guess I was one of the few to make a large and possibly convulated way of hiding a phylactery that can be applied regardless of alignment then. :smalltongue:

...in fact, I think my way would work better for a Good lich even.

Heliomance
2010-06-18, 02:55 AM
I'm impressed. Three separate phylactery threads on the front page.

Lapak
2010-06-18, 08:58 AM
Found an order of noble warriors to defend it by inspiring those around you through example. Recruit only the best, and the bravest, and the most skilled, to increase the prestige of membership. Make membership in your group available only through service and sacrifice to those less able or less fortunate. Personally oversee the group to ensure that this standard IS upheld - every member must spend X percent of their time in the field personally doing good works with no exceptions, that kind of thing. And make your phylactery the central relic of the group: new members swear their oaths on it, it rests in the heart of your organization's HQ, and so on.

On the protection side, you gain an incredibly heroic array of high-level defenders who will battle to the death to guard their order.

On the Good side, you've created a new organization that is based on principles of justice and mercy and compassion, where the vast majority of members spend the vast majority of their time going around doing Good deeds and battling the forces of evil.

Snake-Aes
2010-06-18, 09:14 AM
Found an order of noble warriors to defend it by inspiring those around you through example. Recruit only the best, and the bravest, and the most skilled, to increase the prestige of membership. Make membership in your group available only through service and sacrifice to those less able or less fortunate. Personally oversee the group to ensure that this standard IS upheld - every member must spend X percent of their time in the field personally doing good works with no exceptions, that kind of thing. And make your phylactery the central relic of the group: new members swear their oaths on it, it rests in the heart of your organization's HQ, and so on.

On the protection side, you gain an incredibly heroic array of high-level defenders who will battle to the death to guard their order.

On the Good side, you've created a new organization that is based on principles of justice and mercy and compassion, where the vast majority of members spend the vast majority of their time going around doing Good deeds and battling the forces of evil.

Now to truly make that actually protect the philactery, make it something innocuous but part of the place's scenario, like the frame of the portrait of the current Headmaster, or an altar where they gather to pray, and don't tell anyone about it.

Remember: The best way to keep people from trying to reach something is making that something unknown.

Optimystik
2010-06-18, 10:35 AM
I'm impressed. Three separate phylactery threads on the front page.

Welcome to the forums.


There's plenty of reasons to live forever besides fear of death. The champion is selflessly sacrificing their eternal reward in order to continue serving their god on the mortal plane.

This is the correct rationale, judging by Baelnorn fluff.

balistafreak
2010-06-18, 11:02 AM
I'm impressed. Three separate phylactery threads on the front page.

It used to be Monk and Tome of Battle threads. Surprisingly, I haven't seen one of those recently... yet.

Anonymouswizard
2010-06-18, 11:04 AM
As far as I can tell, the benefit of Good over Evil is trust. A lich would never hand his phylactery over to some demon lord and say "Would you watch this for me?" However, a champion of Good, could pick a celestial being and ask them to do just that. The thing is, so long as the exchange is protected from divination, a BBEG would never expect it.

Going back to an idea I had a while back (although in a non-evil form) that builds on this: make another "immortal paragon of good" your phylactery. There I worked becuse they wouldn't want to die just to kill you, but now, because of trust, your phylactery reforms in 1d10 days.

Lapak
2010-06-18, 12:03 PM
Now to truly make that actually protect the philactery, make it something innocuous but part of the place's scenario, like the frame of the portrait of the current Headmaster, or an altar where they gather to pray, and don't tell anyone about it.

Remember: The best way to keep people from trying to reach something is making that something unknown.It can go either way. Security-through-obscurity is a much weaker option in D&D than in many fantasy worlds, due to the existence of high-level divinations of various kinds. If you don't tell your order what object they're supposed to value, they may fail to protect it in the event of an attack just because it makes tactical sense to retreat from the altar or temporarily abandon the Great Hall where the portrait is.

Ravens_cry
2010-06-18, 12:39 PM
It can go either way. Security-through-obscurity is a much weaker option in D&D than in many fantasy worlds, due to the existence of high-level divinations of various kinds. If you don't tell your order what object they're supposed to value, they may fail to protect it in the event of an attack just because it makes tactical sense to retreat from the altar or temporarily abandon the Great Hall where the portrait is.
The most powerful divination spell for such a purpose in Core, Discern Location, requires you to have touched the object in question. Scry only works on creatures. Unless you were handing it out to everyone before you decided to sequester it, security through obscurity still works.

Lapak
2010-06-18, 01:11 PM
The most powerful divination spell for such a purpose in Core, Discern Location, requires you to have touched the object in question. Scry only works on creatures. Unless you were handing it out to everyone before you decided to sequester it, security through obscurity still works.Since Good phylacteries aren't in Core, I didn't assume we were operating there (:smallwink:) but even so, proper use of Vision (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/vision.htm) or patient and clever use of Commune (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commune.htm) could certainly guide your enemies to at least the right general area. If they know that such-and-so a room has your phylactery in it, and the defenders don't, that's a big leg up on wrecking it.

Ravens_cry
2010-06-18, 01:46 PM
Since Good phylacteries aren't in Core, I didn't assume we were operating there (:smallwink:) but even so, proper use of Vision (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/vision.htm) or patient and clever use of Commune (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commune.htm) could certainly guide your enemies to at least the right general area. If they know that such-and-so a room has your phylactery in it, and the defenders don't, that's a big leg up on wrecking it.
D&D deities are not omniscient. There is things they are not aware of.
It says so right there in the spell Commune. Hiding it in a time of active conflict between Good and Evil, would probably be the best time.
Visions still requires you to know of its existence. False items of which false rumours are spread, could lead that trail off, handedly.

Lapak
2010-06-18, 02:08 PM
D&D deities are not omniscient. There is things they are not aware of.
It says so right there in the spell Commune. Hiding it in a time of active conflict between Good and Evil, would probably be the best time.
Visions still requires you to know of its existence. False items of which false rumours are spread, could lead that trail off, handedly. Deities aren't omniscient, but they aren't fools, and if there's anyone they're going to keep tabs on it would be high-level folks of opposed alignment. And I wasn't thinking that you'd use Vision on the phylactery, but on the character, who is certainly legendary - and there could hardly be a more closely associated object to receive information about than your own phylactery and no deed more key to an undying champion than the act that led to them being "undying" in the first place. Since it doesn't have to be information that is generally known to come to you in a vision... a flash of you creating the object, or placing the object, even if the details are fuzzy, is all it would take to fatally derail the 'hide in plain sight' plan. Since divination IS so campaign/DM/interpretation based, I'd be hesitant to lean on it for protection if I was playing. :smallsmile:

For the same reason, I don't think either one of us can be said to be 'right' or 'wrong' here. In your game, it may well work just fine; in mine, it may lead to the phylactery being stolen right out from under the noses of the guardians.

Ravens_cry
2010-06-18, 02:27 PM
Deities aren't omniscient, but they aren't fools, and if there's anyone they're going to keep tabs on it would be high-level folks of opposed alignment. And I wasn't thinking that you'd use Vision on the phylactery, but on the character, who is certainly legendary - and there could hardly be a more closely associated object to receive information about than your own phylactery and no deed more key to an undying champion than the act that led to them being "undying" in the first place. Since it doesn't have to be information that is generally known to come to you in a vision... a flash of you creating the object, or placing the object, even if the details are fuzzy, is all it would take to fatally derail the 'hide in plain sight' plan. Since divination IS so campaign/DM/interpretation based, I'd be hesitant to lean on it for protection if I was playing. :smallsmile:

For the same reason, I don't think either one of us can be said to be 'right' or 'wrong' here. In your game, it may well work just fine; in mine, it may lead to the phylactery being stolen right out from under the noses of the guardians.
That's why you send in the Hobbits. Sure, they will be watching the Gandalf and Aragorn.The Hobbit (doesn't have to be a Hobbit, or even a halfling) dies,taking the secret with them, having hid the item somewhere wrapped, around a tree, hidden in their garden, somewhere, somewhere both hidden, not likely, and around similar places to the hiding place. The only kink is you giving the Hobbit the item, but spies everywhere have ways of handing things off even when being watched. And you could do it dozens of times, giving different Hobbits different fake items, only one of which is real. And that's on top of you hiding it yourself, it being more fake items, giving an item to a noble dragon telling them to protect it, all hush hush you understand, hiding it in a temple, wearing them around your neck, a quest to put a coin enchanted with magic in a evil dragons lair.
In fact, don't use Hobbits if you don't want to, use all the methods, just pick one to be real. You will drive anyone watching you crazy.
You are undying, you have time.
As for DM dickery, there's no avoiding that if it occurs, no more then you can change the scenario of DM who has firmly placed you on the choo-choo train to Rail-Road Land. It's futile.

Lapak
2010-06-18, 02:30 PM
That's why you send in the Hobbits. Sure, they will be watching the Gandalf and Aragorn.The Hobbit (doesn't have to be a Hobbit, or even a halfling) dies,taking the secret with them, having hid the item somewhere wrapped, around a tree, hidden in their garden, somewhere, somewhere both hidden not likely around similar places to the hiding place. The only kink is you giving the Hobbit the item, but spies everywhere have ways of handing things off even when being watched. And you could do it dozens of times, giving different Hobbits different fake items, only one of which is real. And that's on top of you hiding it yourself, it being more fake items, giving an item to a noble dragon telling them to protect it, all hush hush you understand, hiding it in a temple, wearing them around your neck, a quest to put a coin enchanted with magic in a evil dragons lair.
In fact, don't use Hobbits if you don't want to, use all the methods, just pick one to be real. You will drive anyone watching you crazy.
You are undying, you have time.
As for DM dickery, there's no avoiding that if it occurs, no more then you can change the scenario of DM who has firmly placed you on the choo-choo train to Rail-Road Land. It's futile.Well you have to admit that's going to a lot more trouble than just embedding it in a picture frame and hanging it on a wall. I didn't say obscurity was a completely hopeless mechanism, just both less useful and more difficult in D&D-land. And I wasn't talking 'DM dickery' as much as 'differing interpretations of how useful divinations are, which is something that has a pretty wide and legitimate variation.'

Ravens_cry
2010-06-18, 02:35 PM
Well you have to admit that's going to a lot more trouble than just embedding it in a picture frame and hanging it on a wall. I didn't say obscurity was a completely hopeless mechanism, just both less useful and more difficult in D&D-land. And I wasn't talking 'DM dickery' as much as 'differing interpretations of how useful divinations are, which is something that has a pretty wide and legitimate variation.'
More difficult, yes, but not impossible. In fact, as I already mentioned, using a multiplex of methods will result in drive anyone looking for it, even with magic, bonkers.

Swordgleam
2010-06-18, 11:33 PM
It used to be Monk and Tome of Battle threads. Surprisingly, I haven't seen one of those recently... yet.

It was the other two that inspired this one. I thought, "How can we find a new way to discuss how clever we all are?" :smallbiggrin:

Lord Vukodlak
2010-06-19, 12:24 AM
I did play a good aligned Lich once and here is how he actually hid his phylactery and it contained zero cheese, no made up rules or other such non-sense. Most of the ideas people come up with[on this topics] to protect a phylactery can't actually be done using the normal rules.

I started with a simple stone house created with wall of stone spells. My mini-stronghold.

Using the stronghold builders guide, I enchanted it with mobility the burrowing kind. I then added a zone of elemental immunity fire. This would make the stronghold and those within immune to fire from an outside source. Like lava. I then added the standard lead sheeting to block scrying, and made some cheesy decorations and furniture to spruce up the space.
Which would also make teleporting inside difficult as you wouldn't be able to have a reliable description of the place. I then sunk it deep beneath the earth's surface. The chamber would also continue to move at a slow rate of 1 mile perday I would return every so often to change the direction.

In so doing any enemy would have to locate a mobile room shielding from scrying that moved about fifty miles below the earths surface, and at times may pass through rivers of magma.

I of course kept my back up spellbook there.