Psionic lich?

[Belzyk]

Is there such a thing? I was watching Dr who and it got me thinking about creatures of pure concousness. To me that's what a Psionic lich would sound like. So anyone ever make a template for one? Or could maybe help me make one?

[Ashtagon]

It's not actually undead, but the unbodied (XPH) sounds like what you're looking for.

[Belzyk]

It's not actually undead, but the unbodied (XPH) sounds like what you're looking for.

Edit: OK that sucks. It has racial hitdie and it's not a template

[ExLibrisMortis]

There is the spectral savant, a really bad (well, annoying) template, from Complete Psionic. It's pretty clearly intended to be an incorporeal psionic lich variant, but it's nearly unplayable in many campaigns, because you lose the ability to recover PP from resting, and to recover PP, you have to drain psionic creatures with your special melee touch attack, which automatically makes you evil, even if the template doesn't.

If you can work around the PP issue, the forced alignment change, and the +4 LA, it's pretty good, especially if you can expand your stock of drainable creatures beyond the usual daily PP allotment for your class. It just doesn't make you all that much better at being a psion, which annoys me about lich-like templates in general.

[Belzyk]

There is the spectral savant, a really bad (well, annoying) template, from Complete Psionic. It's pretty clearly intended to be an incorporeal psionic lich variant, but it's nearly unplayable in many campaigns, because you lose the ability to recover PP from resting, and to recover PP, you have to drain psionic creatures with your special melee touch attack, which automatically makes you evil, even if the template doesn't.

If you can work around the PP issue, the forced alignment change, and the +4 LA, it's pretty good, especially if you can expand your stock of drainable creatures beyond the usual daily PP allotment for your class. It just doesn't make you all that much better at being a psion, which annoys me about lich-like templates in general.

So in other words rewrite them template and just remove that stupid rule? OK that's easy and I'm sure my dm would approve and in the game I run I'd let it slide.

[ShurikVch]

Do you familiar with Grim Psion (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20030628b)?

[torrasque666]

There is the spectral savant, a really bad (well, annoying) template, from Complete Psionic. It's pretty clearly intended to be an incorporeal psionic lich variant, but it's nearly unplayable in many campaigns, because you lose the ability to recover PP from resting, and to recover PP, you have to drain psionic creatures with your special melee touch attack, which automatically makes you evil, even if the template doesn't.

If you can work around the PP issue, the forced alignment change, and the +4 LA, it's pretty good, especially if you can expand your stock of drainable creatures beyond the usual daily PP allotment for your class. It just doesn't make you all that much better at being a psion, which annoys me about lich-like templates in general.

All you need is to dip a level of Thrallherd. Get a psionic thrall, and have them follow you around. You may not be able to regen PP, but they can. Use them like a psionic battery. Even better, have a Psiforged and have them literally be a psionic battery.

[Belzyk]

All you need is to dip a level of Thrallherd. Get a psionic thrall, and have them follow you around. You may not be able to regen PP, but they can. Use them like a psionic battery. Even better, have a Psiforged and have them literally be a psionic battery.

Thats evil lol

[Psyren]

Edit: OK that sucks. It has racial hitdie and it's not a template

It stacks with telepath though. Just buy off the LA. And unlike a lich, you don't have to wait until ECL 11 for the defenses.

[Kish]

For a psionic lich, I'd just rewrite the base lich template to sub "manifester" for "caster" (and make other substitutions as necessary/appropriate). That is not a being of pure consciousness, however.

[BWR]

DS had a psionic lich.
Just like a regular lich, only psionic.

[Belzyk]

DS had a psionic lich.
Just like a regular lich, only psionic.

OK bear with me what book is DS idk that acronym

[frogglesmash]

Hyperconscious is a third party psionics book by Monte Cook, and it has exactly what you're looking.

[Ramza00]

OK bear with me what book is DS idk that acronym

DS stands for the 3rd party provider Dreamscarred Press. Even though it is not WOTC or Pazio it is well respected in the community for being balanced and often more consistent than the other two companies.


Hyperconscious is a third party psionics book by Monte Cook, and it has exactly what you're looking.
The author of the 3rd party expansion for 3.5 psionics Hyperconscious is Bruce Cordell and not Monte Cook (Cook did wrote much of the original D&D 3.0 ruleset, he then did third party where he did things like Arcana Unearthed ). Now since Bruce Cordell also wrote the expanded psionics handbook, aka the "core psionic rules" for 3.5 him later on doing a 3rd party expansion for the rules and powers he made cause some people to see Hyperconscious and Untapped Potential as unofficial expansions to the official canon psionic repertoire even though they were not made by WOTC.

[Belzyk]

DS stands for the 3rd party provider Dreamscarred Press. Even though it is not WOTC or Pazio it is well respected in the community for being balanced and often more consistent than the other two companies.


The author of the 3rd party expansion for 3.5 psionics Hyperconscious is Bruce Cordell and not Monte Cook (Cook did wrote much of the original D&D 3.0 ruleset, he then did third party where he did things like Arcana Unearthed ). Now since Bruce Cordell also wrote the expanded psionics handbook, aka the "core psionic rules" for 3.5 him later on doing a 3rd party expansion for the rules and powers he made cause some people to see Hyperconscious and Untapped Potential as unofficial expansions to the official canon psionic repertoire even though they were not made by WOTC.

Thanks a ton. The Psionic lich looks amazing I just downloaded hyperconcious

[frogglesmash]

The author of the 3rd party expansion for 3.5 psionics Hyperconscious is Bruce Cordell and not Monte Cook (Cook did wrote much of the original D&D 3.0 ruleset, he then did third party where he did things like Arcana Unearthed ). Now since Bruce Cordell also wrote the expanded psionics handbook, aka the "core psionic rules" for 3.5 him later on doing a 3rd party expansion for the rules and powers he made cause some people to see Hyperconscious and Untapped Potential as unofficial expansions to the official canon psionic repertoire even though they were not made by WOTC.

Huh, I have no idea why I assumed Monte cook wrote Hyperconscious.

[Belzyk]

OMG and it has no level adjustment sweet

[Pyromancer999]

While the Mindborn is good, if your DM doesn't allow it, the Psion Uncarnate prc is first party, and the capstone makes you a creature of pure psionic consciousness, like the Unbodied. The downside is you lose 4 manifester levels worth of powers and powerpoints, though that's not much different than the Mindborn, which lets you keep your Manifester level up to par at least, although still a +4 LA template. If you can find a way around that though(I think there was something about Ardent and Practiced Manifester Shenanigans?), that would give you what you're looking for in a first party context, along with 9th level powers if that Ardent Workaround works.

If there is an actual template in there called Psionic Lich, just ignore that then.

[Buufreak]

OMG and it has no level adjustment sweet

Be careful with that. Is the level adjustment 0 or -, because they imply completely different things, 0 being your ECL will not change, and - meaning that it is unsuitable for regular PC usage.

[Belzyk]

Be careful with that. Is the level adjustment 0 or -, because they imply completely different things, 0 being your ECL will not change, and - meaning that it is unsuitable for regular PC usage.

It has no la and it has a section right below explaining the process PC's must go through to become one. So idk if it was a mess up or not. I mean it prolly should be a la4 the template gives you bonus pp equal to your ML when you aquire it and fast healing 3 along with all the other lich benefits.

[Pyromancer999]

It has no la and it has a section right below explaining the process PC's must go through to become one. So idk if it was a mess up or not. I mean it prolly should be a la4 the template gives you bonus pp equal to your ML when you aquire it and fast healing 3 along with all the other lich benefits.

I know that here, it says the template is +4. Don't know if there was errata or just what's up of the DSP SRD

[Belzyk]

I know that here, it says the template is +4. Don't know if there was errata or just what's up of the DSP SRD

I downloaded the actual book. And the book just do sent have a la adjustment printed in it . Id still tack on a 4 level adjustment.

[BWR]

DS stands for the 3rd party provider Dreamscarred Press. Even though it is not WOTC or Pazio it is well respected in the community for being balanced and often more consistent than the other two companies.

DS = Dark Sun
Dreamscarred Press is generally abbreviated to DSP

[Belzyk]

DS = Dark Sun
Dreamscarred Press is generally abbreviated to DSP

Well let's download dark sun to. YOLO ( unless your captian jack harkness)

[ExLibrisMortis]

All you need is to dip a level of Thrallherd. Get a psionic thrall, and have them follow you around. You may not be able to regen PP, but they can. Use them like a psionic battery. Even better, have a Psiforged and have them literally be a psionic battery.
It's misleading to say that a thrallherd can compensate for the template, because you still don't regenerate your own PP, you just get more PP some other way, which a non-spectral savant could have spent more usefully.

For example, a psion 6/thrallherd 10 spectral savant is ECL 20, having two thralls, at level 15 and 14. This psion has 37 intelligence (18 base + 2 racial + 2 template + 4 level increase + 5 wish + 6 item), a power point reserve of 292 points, a manifester level of 14 (or 16 with Practiced Manifester), and knows 7th-level powers. The thralls are both straight psions, but with only 31 intelligence (since they use the elite array's 15 for INT, do not have the +2 from the template, and just miss out on the level 16 ability increase). That gives them 240 and 270 power points respectively. You'd say that's a net gain for the psion: you get over 200 extra PP to spend! However, here's where the argument gets misleading. If you didn't have the template, your thralls would still provide you with PP (with bestow power or metaconcert), and you would be getting your own PP to spend daily.

In addition, the LA is crippling your manifesting, as LA usually does. To illustrate the problem, let's compare the psion 6/thrallherd 20/LA +4 to a psion 20. This straight psion has 36 intelligence (the same as the above, with an extra level increase, but without the template), for a power point reserve of 473, and knows ninth-level powers. In addition, they've got five additional feats (three from psion levels, one from the extra 4 HD, one from not having to qualify for thrallherd), and a manifester level of 20, rather than 14 or 16. They could give up some feats to set up some more Incarnum power-saving tricks, or to get better at manifesting; they could enter a nice PrC, rather than rushing for thrallherd just to get PP, and they could still dip thrallherd 1 to get an extra 364 PP (in exchange for 39 of their own PP lost).

In short, spectral savant is no good.

[Flickerdart]

It stacks with telepath though. Just buy off the LA. And unlike a lich, you don't have to wait until ECL 11 for the defenses.
Easier said than done - the first time you can buy off LA when your LA is +4 is when you have 12 character levels. Which, for an unbodied, means when you're level 20. The next time he can buy off LA is level 29, then 33, then 36, so...better hope the campaign gets deep into Epic levels, I guess?

[ATHATH]

Actually, have you checked out the Body Leech PrC (from the free, online Mind's Eye articles)? It's first party (I think), too.

[Flickerdart]

Actually, have you checked out the Body Leech PrC (from the free, online Mind's Eye articles)? It's first party (I think), too.

Yes, Mind's Eye is first party content.

The body leech is lich-ish - if you are killed by damage, you get to make a Will save, and transport your consciousness into the trapped body if you succeed. Once per day. If you're conscious. And if your Cheat Death host is within 125 miles, on the same plane.

[Psyren]

I personally recommend one of the following:

1) Use the Pathfinder Unbodied (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/psionic-bestiary/unbodied) with the Monsters as PCs rules. (It may be under-CR'ed though - more below.)
2) Use the Pathfinder Psion Uncarnate (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/psionic-prestige-classes/psion-uncarnate), which can Shed Body fully right off the bat without stripping naked first.
3) If you want to stick with 3.5, and care more about the "lich" aspect of this than you do about the "bodiless" aspect, I would suggest the Body Leech PrC (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040925a), which lets you kidnap hapless victims and turn them into living phylacteries.

PF Unbodied PC progression:


ECL 5: Unbodied
ECL 6: Unbodied Telepath 1
Bonus 1: Unbodied Telepath 2
ECL 7: Unbodied Telepath 3
ECL 8: Unbodied Telepath 4
Bonus 2: Unbodied Telepath 5
ECL 9: Unbodied Telepath 6
ECL 10: Unbodied Telepath 7
ECL 11: Unbodied Telepath 8
ECL 12: Unbodied Telepath 9
ECL 13: Unbodied Telepath 10
ECL 14: Unbodied Telepath 11
ECL 15: Unbodied Telepath 12
ECL 16: Unbodied Telepath 13
ECL 17: Unbodied Telepath 14
ECL 18: Unbodied Telepath 15
ECL 19: Unbodied Telepath 16
ECL 20: Unbodied Telepath 17

At level 20, actually ends up manifesting as a Psion 21 if the rules aren't modified. (Your GM may require that last level to be in something else.)


Yes, Mind's Eye is first party content.

The body leech is lich-ish - if you are killed by damage, you get to make a Will save, and transport your consciousness into the trapped body if you succeed. Once per day. If you're conscious. And if your Cheat Death host is within 125 miles, on the same plane.

It's decent as a safety net since you can have a more general-purpose phylactery (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/astralSeed.htm) for any other causes of death, not to mention the Save Game Trick for literally any other eventuality like being imprisoned, pulling the Void card from a DoMT etc.


Easier said than done - the first time you can buy off LA when your LA is +4 is when you have 12 character levels. Which, for an unbodied, means when you're level 20. The next time he can buy off LA is level 29, then 33, then 36, so...better hope the campaign gets deep into Epic levels, I guess?

No epic needed - a single LA bought off gets you to Telepath 17, i.e. 9th-level powers, by 20.

[Flickerdart]

No epic needed - a single LA bought off gets you to Telepath 17, i.e. 9th-level powers, by 20.
While your allies have had nines for 4 levels already? Yawn.

[Psyren]

While your allies have had nines for 4 levels already? Yawn.

And you've had a constant 8th-level defenses for your entire career, so what's your point?