Hiding my phylactery

[PlasticSoldier]

Basically I'm planning on becoming a lich I'm a Sorc 12/ Dread necro 4 (for the feats)

My current plan is to make it a gem make a sword put my phylactery in the mold when it's still molten and put the sword in a glass box get a wizard to scribe dozens of symbols of insanity on the glass set to go off if the glass is broken kill him trap his soul in the sword and then cast wards against scrying/divination and stuff and then donate it to a museum claiming it to be the sword of some BBEG my party vanguishes.

Edit: I could make it so that I would regenerate in the museum stand so that I won't have to explain a lich popping up in a crowded museum in the middle of the day and could just teleport out without making a scene.



Any advice or suggestions?

[Callix]

Make the whole thing invisible, behind a permanent Silent Image of a wall, with another Horrid Wilting trap as a backup. Since you're undead, the spell won't affect you. Everyone else is mad, taking heavy damage, and didn't realise it was there. Win.
EDIT: missed the museum part. How about a contingent (crafted) teleport to your stronghold if someone picks it up?

[squishycube]

I think one of the best methods is to keep it with you and make it unclear what it is. In that case, someone kills you and even if they are smart enough to go looking for your phylactery they will find nothing that looks like it could be it. They might even take your phylactery as treasure :D
Added on top of that, you should also carry something that looks very obviously like a phylactery.

[factotum]

You were suggesting making it as a gem--why not just stop there? What is any self-respecting party of adventurers going to do when they see a valuable gem--destroy it? Nope, they'll take it away with them and sell it to some poor sucker in town!

[PlasticSoldier]

I think one of the best methods is to keep it with you and make it unclear what it is. In that case, someone kills you and even if they are smart enough to go looking for your phylactery they will find nothing that looks like it could be it. They might even take your phylactery as treasure :D
Added on top of that, you should also carry something that looks very obviously like a phylactery.

But then I'm stuck next to their fighter unprepared and they find out eventually that the sword is it. If i do the museum idea My phylactery wont be moved and if it is they likely wont smash open the case but instead will just carry the whole thing to their place, and If anyone is trying to destroy it the town watch will swarm them and arrest them.

P.s. The horrid wilting and contingent teleport are great ideas.

P.P.s Is there any spell that can tell me if someone breaks into a building?



You were suggesting making it as a gem--why not just stop there? What is any self-respecting party of adventurers going to do when they see a valuable gem--destroy it? Nope, they'll take it away with them and sell it to some poor sucker in town!

If you find a valuable gem in a lich's horde oozing magic you might.

[crazedloon]

the best Idea I ever heard was making a immovable rod your phylactery then place it mid air invisible with non-detect and other anti divination spells on it. Then you may want to hide a platform or something with similar hidding spells so you don't fall if you ever reform :smallwink: the likelyhood that anyone will find it is extreamly small. If you put it in an area with few birds you don't even have the problem of random critters leaving visable marks or running into it. I would suggest at one of the poles prefferably one with extream temperatures.

[PlasticSoldier]

the best Idea I ever heard was making a immovable rod your phylactery then place it mid air invisible with non-detect and other anti divination spells on it. Then you may want to hide a platform or something with similar hidding spells so you don't fall if you ever reform :smallwink: the likelyhood that anyone will find it is extreamly small. If you put it in an area with few birds you don't even have the problem of random critters leaving visable marks or running into it. I would suggest at one of the poles prefferably one with extream temperatures.

But in the off chance that someone finds my phylactery even though i never tell anyone about it there's no way for me too defend it except popping there and fighting to the death which... wouldn't help... If I hide it in a museum an entire town gaurds it because after all with infinite amounts of time your bound to make some diplomacy checks when talking with the king.

[PlatinumJester]

Hide it in your up your butt. I know it sounds stupid but nobody will ever look there.

[PlasticSoldier]

Hide it in your up your butt. I know it sounds stupid but nobody will ever look there.

If that's not a joke it's a dumb idea if someone tried to kill me it's likely that they'll use meteor swarm or something similar destroying me AND my phylactery.

[PlatinumJester]

It's not a dumb idea sinc eth elast thing you do before you die is release your bowels so it would just come out :smallbiggrin:. Just stick it too far up otherwise it won't work.

[Inyssius Tor]

First off: who is the "you" in this scenario? What are your powers, assets, morals? Will you shy away from the desecration of innocents? Do you have access to genesis? Major creation? Polymorph any object? A wheelbarrow? A holocaust cloak?
What's your window of opportunity? Do you have three days for the ritual, and then it's back to adventuring? Three weeks? Two hundred years?
Who are your current enemies, and how often do you make new ones? What are your typical enemies like? Slavers, pirates, paladins, god-emperors, overdeities? How many enemies do you have at the moment? Do they know where you live?
Do you live in the default Great Wheel cosmology? Is the City of Doors open for business? How about the Positive Energy Plane? Are the Endless Layers of the Abyss really that endless? Are the gods actual entities, and if so how much do they interfere with reality? Do they know where you live?

[Malek]

Take Helm of Briliance. Use up one gem. Place your gem phylactery in the empty space. It won't remain hidden forever if they use the helm, but should stay long enough xP

[PlasticSoldier]

First off: who is the "you" in this scenario? What are your powers, assets, morals? 14th lvl sorcer lvl 4 dread necro TN but pretty close to LE a few hundred thousand gp in assets

Will you shy away from the desecration of innocents? I won't seek it out.
Do you have access to genesis? NO
Major creation? Yes
Polymorph any object? No
A wheelbarrow? Could probably steal one.
A holocaust cloak? I don't know what that is
What's your window of opportunity? Most of this can be done while adventuring the museum is in a town we might spend some loot at.
Maybe a week or so


Who are your current enemies, and how often do you make new ones? Rarely make new ones but am disliked by paladins for being Dread necro
typical enemies paladins some city-states. How many enemies do you have at the moment? about a dozen Do they know where you live? As an adventurer i don't live anywhere
Do you live in the default Great Wheel cosmology? Do you mean thesehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outer_plane then yes
How about the Positive Energy Plane? Never been there because im tomb-tainted
Are the Endless Layers of the Abyss really that endless? Demon-hunting is not a priority Are the gods actual entities, and if so how much do they interfere with reality? They just grant cleric spells

[Inyssius Tor]

Try looking through these sources, as a starting point:

The Best Place to Hide A Phylactery (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=41009) (Seven pages long!)

Hide my phylactery! (http://boards1.wizards.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-652718) (Wizards forum)

EDIT: Oh, hey, that was fast! Hold on a sec.

[Inyssius Tor]

Okay, so it's the standard cosmology, and you have seventh-level spells. Be aware that, under the standard rules, "liching" will launch you waaay down to the Evil end of the spectrum. The ritual is unspeakably evil, and one should never take that word lightly.

There are really three general approaches, here:

Quick and Dirty
Example:
1. Climb halfway up a mountain.
2. Cast passwall.
3. Repeat until you are far enough in.
4. Cast disintegrate for a ten foot cube chamber.
5. Place a copy of your spellbook and your phylactery in the centre of the chamber.
6. Cast a permanent prismatic sphere on the chamber.
7. Leave, dismissing the passwall spells.
8. Cast earthquake; the sphere will protect your phylactery and anyone other than you porting in will automatically be in contact with the sphere.

"They'll NEVER find it!"
Example:
Make your phylactery a grain of sand. Put it in a desert. Craft a magic item that casts Magic Aura on a random grain of sand anywhere in the desert, thrice per day, for the rest of eternity.

Xanatos Roulette (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosRoulette)
Example:

Zackerat, was a Necromancer who was evil as he was cunning. He was one of the founding Warlords of the evil Markian Empire.
Upon the free states Lungold, did he unleash his hordes of undead.
The high temple of Geron, (Lawful Good) uncovered a plot in which Zackerat was planning to unleash upon the world a great evil, and was making preparations for his summoning in is dark abode.
They sent the great paladin Brenton the Virtuous to stop him. Deep in the evil ritualistic chamber did they do battle. And Brenton smite Zackerat down, but at the cost of his own life. Zackerat and Brenton’s remains were nothing but ashes.

Brenton’s great sacrifice today is still heralded as example of true heroism to all Knights of Geron, and Brenton is considered a Saint to this day.
His Sword and Armor are considered great artifacts and are held in high place a reverence in the High temple of Geron.

If you haven’t seen it coming, Brenton’s Sword is the Phylactery, which is protected as a holy artifact by those who would see Zackerat destroyed.

And even if the players suspect it, the permanent Aura spells don't show anything other then whats expected, and lets see how far they get when they tell the Church they want to destroy the artifact..

[Iku Rex]

Key spell: Magic aura (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicAura.htm). You can pull some creative tricks with this spell by making your phylactery appear nonmagical and creating a fake with a strong aura of necromancy.

[factotum]

If you find a valuable gem in a lich's horde oozing magic you might.

You would have to explicitly cast a Detect Magic to determine that the gem was oozing magic, presumably, and again, it's fairly unlikely you'd do that if the item just looked like a gem. Alternatively, you could embed the gem into, say, the belt buckle of a Belt of Gender Changing or something similar--that way it detects as magic but nobody would be very interested in taking it away with them!

[ZeroNumerous]

Make it a plain, wooden ring. Give it to a wizard and get him to cast nondetection on it. Have him make that permanent. It's now a DC 35 caster level check to scry it, assuming a CL20 wizard. Now, hit it with misdirection(ring/cloak/necklace). Make that permanent. Finally, hit the afforementioned ring/cloak/necklace with magic aura(Strong Good and Lawful). Now wear that item constantly. Make the magic aura permanent as well. Find a temple of Heironous. Give it to them saying it was a ring carried by an ancient [race]* lord who fell in battle against the forces of Hextor.

You now have a crapload of paladins and clerics protecting your phylactery without ever knowing what it was.

*Whatever race happens to be the dominant one in the area of the Temple.

[martyboy74]

Make you phylactery a magic item of Force Box (SpC), then teleport it into the heart of some god. The only danger would be holy swords. :smallbiggrin:

[Thrivol]

Make the phylactery an invisible copper coin. Hide it in the couch of one of your rooms that is insignificant. Of course, apply all the spells to it to make it undetectable.

Here is the trick, make a fake phylactery. Make a cool orb, put it next to your throne (you do have a throne, right, RIGHT?), and make it radiate evil.

Hehe, adventurers would have a hard time killing you now.

[PinkysBrain]

Regardless of where it's hidden or how it's protected there are two ways to find a lich's phylactery ... with legend lore/vision or by getting the information out of the lich. The first can be safeguarded against by sequester, but that spell has to be renewed periodically ... which brings us back to the second way of finding it.

Ultimately the lich itself is the biggest weakpoint in hiding the phylactery.

PS. personally I'd just go with a well defended, well trapped dungeon with teleportation (forbiddance) and rudimentary scrying protection (lead). Put some undead minions in to warn you of trouble when adventurers come knocking.

[puppyavenger]

Make you phylactery a magic item of Force Box (SpC), then teleport it into the heart of some god. The only danger would be holy swords. :smallbiggrin:

and divine digestion

[Furin_Mirado]

A wheelbarrow? A holocaust cloak?

YOU WIN! I might have to watch that movie again soon. I can't believe I'm the only one that caught that too...

[EagleWiz]

Heres what you do: Wait till epic level, make an adamantene golem and have it swallow the psyclatry.
Or make a max hit die iorn golem.
Then get a sorcerer or bard and give them to lyres of building.
Build a dungeon.
Put undead there and the construct.
And a magical looking orb near the construct (Maby even make it magical)

P.S. I think the holocaust cloak was a joke.

[Leon]

If you find a valuable gem in a lich's horde oozing magic you might.

not if you find several valuable gems oozing magic


It's not a dumb idea sinc eth elast thing you do before you die is release your bowels so it would just come out :smallbiggrin:. Just stick it too far up otherwise it won't work.

i doubt a lich would have much to release and given how some spells work - there would be no time

[Wraithy]

i liked the idea of hiding it as a coin, although not as a copper, if it's a copper then you'll find that aftera few centuries of inflation, people do not take it seriously as currency, you will either find that someone has been playing knuckles with it (via the loss of your arms), or that you have been thrown onto a train track. try a gold piece, worth enough to take care of, but not as likely to draw suspicion as a platinum. also make one of your least suspicious followers spend it, its much harder to track like that

[Ranis]

Make it a random brick in the ceiling of some random abandoned ruins.

[the_tick_rules]

i thought i posted here. I'd think hiding it in a small hole in the door itself would work. Everyone checks the room, but who checks the door?

[Inyssius Tor]

i liked the idea of hiding it as a coin, although not as a copper, if it's a copper then you'll find that aftera few centuries of inflation, people do not take it seriously as currency, you will either find that someone has been playing knuckles with it (via the loss of your arms), or that you have been thrown onto a train track. try a gold piece, worth enough to take care of, but not as likely to draw suspicion as a platinum. also make one of your least suspicious followers spend it, its much harder to track like that
Ah, but gold gets melted down all the time! In fact, a half-goldpiece was actually a valid form of currency in [THE PAST], and surely that would break the enchantment...


not if you find several valuable gems oozing magic
"Oh, the lich had four valuable gems in his hoard that had Strong Necromantic auras. I guess none of them could possibly be his phylactery, then..."

[lukelightning]

If you're a wizard make sure you have a spare spellbook near your phylactery. It's no fun when you reform your body but are without any spells.

[Inyssius Tor]

Our P. Soldier is a sorcerer; he has no such crippling dependency on paper!

[SadisticFishing]

This is slightly off topic, but far more importantly, how does one kill a smart lich?

I'm DM'ing a campaign, and I have a lich Anima mage (1 immediate, silent, still spell a day) with 37 int... How exactly is my party going to outsmart him? They're not that intelligent as is, now they have to go against an NPC that smart, with me as the DM (I'm not nice)? ... Ack.

[GoblinJTHM]

you could have the entire campaign revolve around finding his phylactery which would turn out to be in the final dungeon as say, a tomb you have to destroy with blunt weapons

[SadisticFishing]

But he'd just put his phylactery on a different plane. A rock on the plane of earth with permanent nondetection, for example.

[Inyssius Tor]

This is slightly off topic, but far more importantly, how does one kill a smart lich?

I'm DM'ing a campaign, and I have a lich Anima mage (1 immediate, silent, still spell a day) with 37 int... How exactly is my party going to outsmart him? They're not that intelligent as is, now they have to go against an NPC that smart, with me as the DM (I'm not nice)? ... Ack.

37 Int. :smalleek:

If you want to play him intelligently... the gods dance to his tune. He can deduce the destiny of children ten generations hence, from the geometry of a yam.

Have a second, rival lich behind the other scenes. This second puppetmaster is just as intelligent as your lich, and it is through the clash of their titanic, uber-Machiavellian (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/XanatosRoulette) machinations that your party will have an opportunity.

[GoblinJTHM]

how about a magic device of lich smiting? see: rift device from BGII

[Inyssius Tor]

I believe you are underestimating Int 37. The smartest human being on earth, in reality, in the history of mankind, has at the very most 20 Int. Now, take a very thorough look-see over the internet, find the treatises on exactly how to thwart whatever plot it is that you're referencing (and believe you me, they do exist), and multiply their ingenuity and number by 3, and then by the number of months that the lich has been undead (because liches are paranoid, and normally spend some --if not most-- of their time coming up with contingency plans).

[PlasticSoldier]

Someone with 37 int would probably be trying to become a demilich so that could probably be a nice sidequest.

And thanks again for the advice.

P.S. If your lich becomes a demilich he adds 10 to his wisdom int and charisma skill points which would be a very big threat.

[Jorkens]

But he'd just put his phylactery on a different plane. A rock on the plane of earth with permanent nondetection, for example.
Looking at the srd (is there better information on the subject somewhere else?), they say that phylacteries are usually metal boxes but are sometimes other objects such as rings amulets etc... to me that reads like it was intended so that the DM can say "hey, I'll make the phylactery an ornate goblet instead of a metal box because it fits my flavour better" rather than so that the player (or the npc lich in character) can say "hey, I'll make my phylactery a grain of sand so I'm impossible to kill".

Do they clarify it anywhere?

[Delaney Gale]

I'd say brainwash a lackey (or heck, create an eidolon from the Epic Level Handbook), then sneak that lackey/eidolon into someplace truly suicidal, particularly for good little adventurers (you can do this! You're a lich!). Then, have it activate a scroll of imprisonment, target itself. After that, make a show of having a lot of things that could ostensibly be phylacteries hidden in your tower, on your person, in the hoard of about every dragon on the planet, etc.. After you've seen the good guys do that much schlepping about and fighting, you should have a very good idea of how to neutralize them when they finally face you in battle... and they still wouldn't know about the imprisoned phylactery. ^^

[Ranis]

Looking at the srd (is there better information on the subject somewhere else?), they say that phylacteries are usually metal boxes but are sometimes other objects such as rings amulets etc... to me that reads like it was intended so that the DM can say "hey, I'll make the phylactery an ornate goblet instead of a metal box because it fits my flavour better" rather than so that the player (or the npc lich in character) can say "hey, I'll make my phylactery a grain of sand so I'm impossible to kill".

Do they clarify it anywhere?

It's clarified in Libris Mortis under the section on Liches.

And just for the record, I made a thread about this a while ago, it grew to eightsomething pages. You might want to search for it.

[rollfrenzy]

My feelings are that powerful of a magic item would draw things to itself ala the one ring. So if it were the coin, tragedy would follow everyone who owned it. If it were the grain of sand, It would be made into a glass bead by a tribe of nomads and bring ill fortune to them. If it were in the sky, birds, or animals would be drawn to their deaths by running into it.

In short, If the Dm wants to find it, he will find it no matter how clever you hide it. So in my mind it would be better off being closer to your characters flavor than trying to make it impossible to find. Does your character like big gaudy fortressess or dungeons, there you go. Irony? go with your museum plan. (which is also good because it's YOURS). Whatever flavor you think. A DM will either find it or not based soley on whim (unless you broadcast it's location) so have fun with where you hide it. Make it personal and ironic.

[Inyssius Tor]

Looking at the srd (is there better information on the subject somewhere else?), they say that phylacteries are usually metal boxes but are sometimes other objects such as rings amulets etc... to me that reads like it was intended so that the DM can say "hey, I'll make the phylactery an ornate goblet instead of a metal box because it fits my flavour better" rather than so that the player (or the npc lich in character) can say "hey, I'll make my phylactery a grain of sand so I'm impossible to kill".

Do they clarify it anywhere?

There are additional rules in... Libris Mortis, I believe. I have not read them.

What you do in Core is: you make your little phylactery box. Then, you build a case for it, using Fabricate or some such, that looks somewhat akin to a giant grain of sand. Then, sprinkle it with your million enchantments to make it indestructible/undetectable, cast permanent shrink item, and you're good as gold. For good measure, make about a hundred exact duplicates.

EDIT: And Ranis, I already linked to your thread.

EDIT EDIT: Rollfrenzy, you are completely right. I'm just providing the extreme examples.

[Ranis]

My feelings are that powerful of a magic item would draw things to itself ala the one ring. So if it were the coin, tragedy would follow everyone who owned it. If it were the grain of sand, It would be made into a glass bead by a tribe of nomads and bring ill fortune to them. If it were in the sky, birds, or animals would be drawn to their deaths by running into it.

Once again, this is clarified in Libris Mortis. It explicitly states that it has to be ornate, and it must be worth 10,000GP(I think?). It also has to be something that you make. So your phycaltery can't be a mountain, or some such silliness. It has to be a certain size, like the size of a gem or a ring. So it can't be a grain of sand. Or a coin.

What are you talking about, in the air? Are you gonna make a cage of invisible Immovable Rods and just have them sit in the air or something?

EDIT:
@Inyssius Tor: Ah, I see now. Good man.

[lukelightning]

Personally I'd rule that a phylactery takes the form of, gasp, a phylactery. A metal box with magic symbols, etc. It's not just some random item you decide to enchant. Why? Because that's what the mystic ritual of lichiness demands.

[Inyssius Tor]

Well, can you cast shrink item on that box? If so, then this little thought-experiment-only exploit would still work just fine.

[Kizara]

For all those in the "put it somewhere unlikely and nondection and crap it" camp.
Discern Location is > you. "only the direct intervention of a diety..."
Although the misdirection with the 'obvious' phylactery is a good call.

Your museum idea, while somewhat inventive, is quite bad. Town guards and such are going to do exactly nothing to anyone powerful enough to defeat you.

Somehow making it part of a holy item to give to a temple of hieronius? Now that could work.
Also, see prismatic sphere in mountain trick, that's a good one.

[Inyssius Tor]

For all those in the "put it somewhere unlikely and nondection and crap it" camp.
Discern Location is > you. "only the direct intervention of a diety..."


Not to carp on or anything, but: you need to have touched the object (which you haven't, if the lich wasn't a complete idiot when he commenced his lichening).

[martyboy74]

The other funny place to put it is in your Safety Deposit Box.

[lukelightning]

Somehow making it part of a holy item to give to a temple of hieronius? Now that could work.

You don't think that some cleric-scholar or even Hieronius himself won't notice?

[PinkysBrain]

I'm DM'ing a campaign, and I have a lich Anima mage (1 immediate, silent, still spell a day) with 37 int... How exactly is my party going to outsmart him? They're not that intelligent as is, now they have to go against an NPC that smart, with me as the DM (I'm not nice)? ... Ack.
Hubris and bad intel. Or in other words, he thinks he can take them. Don't create a situation where they have to outsmart him, just create a situation where they have to outgun him.

Of course if they don't find his phylactery he will come back ... but liches aren't generally motivated by revenge and short term goals. If they have proven capable of besting him once he would probably simply leave them be after that, they will age and die after all. No reason to temp fate, maybe next time they will best him and trap his soul or find his phylactery.

PS. in Eberron putting a phylactery in a bank vault wouldn't be an entirely bad idea.

[lukelightning]

PS. in Eberron putting a phylactery in a bank vault wouldn't be an entirely bad idea.

Just make sure you keep up your vault rental payments, or the bank is liable to possess your soul.

[Fixer]

How about a tombstone protected from divinations?

Leave it in a graveyard, make certain the nearest corpse has a spellbook handy to memorize spells (if prep-spellcaster) and/or handy minor magic items (if not) and rest in peace.

[Jothki]

Just make sure you keep up your vault rental payments, or the bank is liable to possess your soul.

That might actually make for a good adventure.

If a hyper-intelligent lich is played correctly, the adventurers will probably have no way of even knowing that their foe is a lich, without having to do an enormous amount of research or track down someone who knows the lich's secret.

I would suggest making a magically controlled construct that looks human, and using that or one of its components as the phylactery. Have it appear to be a maiden that you're about to sacrifice to some dark god. The party will probably either free or attempt to kill her; in the latter case, they probably won't bother to disintegrate the body after it plays dead so you will likely still be fine.

[TheLogman]

A few ideas, as far as I can see, there are really only 4 choices when you think about it: Put it somewhere nobody can find, Put it in a really well guarded place, Put it somewhere that nobody would think to look, with it illusioned to be something insignificant, or just make it an important thing/part of something that is either impossible to destroy, or nobody will want to destroy.

Make sure your reserve spellbook is made with water-proof paper. Put that, and your phylactery in a realllllly far off part of the Water Plane, I'm talking like Plane Shift as far from everything, and then cast teleport with no clue where you are going, until who knows where you are. Sink both of said items in that place. How do the enemies find something that no one knows where it is?

Go to the most important city for Dwarves in the world. Find the most important building. Find the second or third most important brick in the building, structurally speaking. Disintegrate that brick, and then put your phylactery there, permanently Silent Imaged to be that Brick, or even put the brick back. Cast all the fun "You can't find this thing" spells all around it.

Go to Mechanus, that ever-boring Machine/law plane. Find the smithing plant for the smiths of Inevitables, toss in the phylactery, with anti-heat spells on it. Do your enemies want to kill you? Okay, fine. Walk the entire length of Mechanus, killing the smiths of very Lawful creatures, that don't really mind your existence, since you aren't chaotic, except maybe the ones that kill Liches.

[Kizara]

Not to carp on or anything, but: you need to have touched the object (which you haven't, if the lich wasn't a complete idiot when he commenced his lichening).

WHAT? WOW 3.5 nerfed the most random and cool things.

LAME...

Still, I'd imagine Legend Lore would work. Although probably is some BS reason now why that doesn't work anymore ethier...

Its true people, 3.5 ruined most of the good spellcasting cheese.

[lukelightning]

Go to Mechanus, that ever-boring Machine/law plane.

If I was a lich I'd be wary of putting my phylactery on a plane inhabited by creatures (Maruts) whose sole reason for existing is to obliterate those who have cheated death. They will find and destroy your phylactery.

[mikoto]

Get a portable hole. Put you phylactery in it with what ever else you need (continual flamed torch, spell book, scroll of teleport without error, etc.) fold the hole up. Coat it in adamantium. Use stone shape to make it for all appearances just another rock. Cast non-detection spells galore. Drop the "rock" into the water.

If you want make, a contignent teleport so that if the adamantium shell is damaged teleport the phylactery to another portable hole this one perhaps under a mountain.

The beauty of this idea is that you can use the traditional phylactery.

[PinkysBrain]

AFAICS the 3.0 discern location worked the same way. I guess if you abandon it in a featureless place even legend lore won't be much help.

So in the end we come back to the real weak spot ... the lich itself. If you can control the lich for a while (armor of undead controlling for instance) you can get him to take you there (or cast discern location for you if he doesn't know himself). Although at that point you could just use trap the soul on him too ...

[Dartonus]

My lich character's phylactery placement is evil. A grain of sand with nondetection, placed in the sand tombs of pyratheon during a sandstorm. plus, I had my character research how to make multiple phylacteries, so I have 39 more just as fiendishly hidden. My advice: make the sword, but sell it to a sword shop. It'll be in circulation long before your enemies try to hunt it down. the chain of ownership would look like this:
Sword shop owner
V
random adventurer
Pwned by tarrasque
V
found by merchant
Merchant slain, sword taken by bandits
V
Bandit loses sword in gambling, sword changes hands among bandits in more gambling
V
Bandits beaten by pirates.
V
Pirates take sword, give to captain
V
Pirate ship sinks.
V
Aboleth finds it
V
Etcetera ad infinitum. (And so on to infinity)

also, put an alarm on it so you know if it is being attacked, and place a scrying sensor on it to see who is using it.:smallwink:

[Neko]

Okay I know the book says you have to make your own phylactery... but why? Why couldn't a necromancer make them for his/her generals? In some non D&D but d20 books, like the Guide to Litchs... it talks about making them for others.. Personally I like the idea of being a living necromancer carrying about the phylactery of all your litch generals and threatening to destroy the phylactery if they betray you.

[Zeful]

An issue.

Where does it say in the CORE rules, that liches respawn near their phylactery? In the lich section of the Monster Manual, it makes mention of the time but not where. So according to CORE you can show up anywhere you want. No mention means the DM has to decide.

Now as for hiding one's phylactery it does matter where you put it. But where you place it is important. A sword, axe, or other weapon is a bad idea because it can be destroyed easily (even contingent or craft contingent make whole on it only repairs minor damage to magic items). Gems (if it's possible) aren't much better, they move to much. A brick in a building in a city is bad because if you do spawn near it you're A: in side a solid object (a no-go) or B: Spawning in public (a no-go).

So it has to be remote. The planet could have moon/s where you can build an open-air complex (read vacuum) on the dark side of the moon and then only deal with rival liches and their skeleton army. Any other orbiting body, say a small piece of debris in low orbit, could be used to hide it. Or you could use the epic spell Nail to the Sky to put it in orbit, leaving it out of the hands of the players/normal folk.

Besides space, which I admit is a cheap trick. You can also carve out a mountain like was suggested, but remember to put up walls of force to discourage etherial scouting, which foils most plans to hide phylacteries.

Or use the hide in plan sight thing, an old dungeon (preferably an abandoned library) use a PAO to change your spell book into a chunk of wood (closly related and therefore permanent) and then permanent enlarge item and Wood Shape to make it manageable in size and shape and use it to back a bookshelf or amuare (wardrobe). Rip a stone from the floor and use stone shape to make a hollow box of the exact same dimentions and place the properly warded (non-detection/magic aura/obcure object/screen etc.) phylactery in the box. Another stone shape seals the box and makes it a simple stone again, place back in the hole. Now watch as mortals can't even find your phylactery being in the same room with it. You have a spell book noone can steal and are away form people.

These do not work 100% of the time but are useful.

[martyboy74]

Cast Rope Trick. Cast another Rope Trick inside the first Rope Trick. Dismiss the first Rope Trick. Plane Shift out. Ask your DM where your Phylactery is. :smallwink:

It's like the Isla de Muerta, but where no one knows where it is!

[Leon]

Ultimate way to be a Lich and avoid worrying about a phylactery


Iron Lich

[NEO|Phyte]

You want a good place to hide your phylactery?
The Positive Energy Plane.


Positive-Dominant

An abundance of life characterizes planes with this trait. The two kinds of positive-dominant traits are minor positive-dominant and major positive-dominant. A minor positive-dominant plane is a riotous explosion of life in all its forms. Colors are brighter, fires are hotter, noises are louder, and sensations are more intense as a result of the positive energy swirling through the plane. All individuals in a positive-dominant plane gain fast healing 2 as an extraordinary ability.

Major positive-dominant planes go even further. A creature on a major positive-dominant plane must make a DC 15 Fortitude save to avoid being blinded for 10 rounds by the brilliance of the surroundings. Simply being on the plane grants fast healing 5 as an extraordinary ability. In addition, those at full hit points gain 5 additional temporary hit points per round. These temporary hit points fade 1d20 rounds after the creature leaves the major positive-dominant plane. However, a creature must make a DC 20 Fortitude save each round that its temporary hit points exceed its normal hit point total. Failing the saving throw results in the creature exploding in a riot of energy, killing it.
RAW, undead are not negatively affected there. Hell, since the instagib effect does not affect objects, they're immune to it, and can thus gain nigh-infinite temp HP. Just make it suitably complex to reach your phylactory, and they pop before getting to it. There is also no spells to protect against the effect, unlike the Negative Energy Plane.

Good luck getting it past a DM, though.

[Eldpollard]

You want a good place to hide your phylactery?
The Positive Energy Plane.


RAW, undead are not negatively affected there. Hell, since the instigib effect does not effect objects, they're immune to it, and can thus gain nigh-infinite temp HP. Just make it suitably complex to reach your phylactory, and they pop before getting to it. There is also no spells to protect against the effect, unlike the Negative Energy Plane.

Good luck getting it past a DM, though.

But positive energy harms undead anyway. That's why cure spells hurt them and harm spells cure them. I think if a lich were to enter there it would die quickly.

[NEO|Phyte]

But positive energy harms undead anyway. That's why cure spells hurt them and harm spells cure them. I think if a lich were to enter there it would die quickly.
You would think that, but the rules for a positive dominant plane make no such note. Similarly, a negative dominant plane, while it hurts living creatures, does nothing to undead. no fast healing, no extra turn resistance, nothing.

They are poorly thought out rules, but the rules nonetheless. As I said, good luck getting this past a DM.

[Jorkens]

On the basis of some of the suggestions in this thread, would people say that by RAW, phylacteries are a bit broken? I always got the impression that the idea behind them was that they'd be difficult to find in a 'hidden at the bottom of a huge trap filled dungeon' sort of way rather than in a 'one of several billion billion billion identical grains of sand in a desert' sort of way...

[Neek]

The idea is for them to be locked in a deep dungeon; else there wouldn't be a point for the campaign, you might as well take 20 on a Perform (Sepukku) or Perform (Emo) and end it right there. I gather the reason for the best place to hide it is to ensure the DM doesn't use the phylactery against the player himself, much like family is used against players (rather cheaply, too).

The best suggestions thus far:

Within the heart of a great mountain.
Within the Positive Material Plane (if your DM is cool with it; even if the DM says that you can't go there, get an Iron Lich to deliver it there).
A wooden ring; much like in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the simplest of items would be the least of suspicion except to the most clever.
Dark side of the moon; this is quite a cinematic idea, because it creates the most unusual of encounters. The DM says to make it interesting, how more interesting can it get? (The DM may also pull the plug on and you have the moon be inhabited, which poses problems of its own).
Hand maiden. Who'd expect that one coming?

Stuffing it up your bum is an immature comment. Now a Paladin's bum...

The problem with sand is that you can blast sand into glass. Give a mage a ring of sustenance and enough time, enough days with fireball, he'll be walking over a glass sheet examining the grains that aren't taking part of the Windows for Orphanages program.

One last suggestion, if you're going offworld with it: Hide it in the astral plane. 'Nuff said.

[Emperor Tippy]

You know Greater Teleport, correct?

If you can see it you can port to it. Look up in the sky at night.

Pick a random star. Port to it (you will miss by a smidge

Slowly zero in on some nice planet lacking in an atmosphere that can support life (mars like is good).

Use Plane Shift to go to the Etheral Plane.

Head straight down for about an hour and then wander about until you find a small cavern (you just have to be able to cram your body in it, use shrink person if necessary).

Use Disintegrate to blast out a chamber. Now fill the chamber with permanent Mage's Sanctum spells.

Now cast a permanent Prismatic Sphere.

Put your phylactery and any other objects you want safe in here.

Greater Teleport back to "Earth".

Make a dozen or so fake's, hidden in all the normal ways that have been suggested.

Congratulations, you are safe.


Mage's Sanctum blocks scrying by everything, up to an including deities.

Even if an enemy manages to find out that your phylactery is on another planet, which one? And then, how do they get there?

You chose a random star, a random planet, ported to a random location on its surface, where you randomly shifted anywhere from 5 to 500 miles away from that location, and then went over a mile under ground, and then secured your phylactery with normal methods.

[Delaney Gale]

Stuffing it up your bum is an immature comment. Now a Paladin's bum...


There wouldn't be room. There's already a stick there.

[Fishies]

The other funny place to put it is in your Safety Deposit Box.

With the locker combination being the Lich's birthday or phone number...

[SadisticFishing]

Hrm, you're making this harder and harder for my party.

My lich is proud of being a lich, and everyone knows he's a lich, but no one can deal with it (as he's on friendly-ish terms with the Queen, or at least since recently...)

On top of not being able to outsmart my lich, they can't outgun him - his DC on Wail of the Banshee is something obscene, like... 34, which even my tank only makes on a 12+. That one immediate, still, silent spell a day means he's virtually unkillable, and he can also quicken three spells a day at no cost... How can they possibly kill him without some rediculous deux ex machina?

Edit: Ooh maybe they'll be smart enough to cast Death Ward on the way in. Ha, yeah right... Damn it.

[Ghal Marak]

Sorry to butt in, but I have to ask. What is an Iron Lich? I've never heard of such a thing before.

As for the hiding of the Phylactery, I'm not sure. Under a Tavern? Nah, a Castle. Maybe under your own private castle, and through a portal to Limbo? Or would placing it in Limbo risk destruction of it? I dunno.

[Bauglir]

See if you can't hide it somewhere in such a way that you don't even know what it is. Do that whole rock in a lake thing. Only rather than throwing it in yourself, hand it off to a random henchman, give said henchman a horse and a sack of gold and tell him to head off in a random direction for some amount of time and chuck the thing in the second or third fast moving river he sees. Now you've got no idea where they even tossed the thing IN, and even if you did it would be so far downstream by now that it's probably in an ocean trench or something. Problem solved as far as the lich being the weak link. Either that or cover the thing in ice (either clear crystal phylactery or else make it opaque white ice) and chuck it through a Gate to a random place on Stygia. Close the Gate. Go eat some souls now that you know that your phylactery is only ever going to be found by maybe some Devil in thousands of years who is digging Levistus out. You may want to figure out where his dig teams are and arrange for the portal to be on the OTHER side of the glacier (so not totally random, but close). Nobody will be tossing magic capable of melting that nonmagical ice around for years, since there's no reason to (the glacier being immune to magic) and it's not like there's going to be anyone anyway. And shortly enough, it'll be covered by the super ice of the glacier.

Or if you're a real jerk, make your phylactery a gem worth over 1000 gp (no problem). Then have 10 levels of the Planeshifter prestige class from Manual of the Planes. Make your phylactery into a demiplane. Lets see your PCs beat that! It seems they'd have to develop a new spell (maybe even epic) to collapse a demiplane, since an antigenesis wave only kills everything in a radius. Heck, invite them over for tea (and poison, of course) if you feel like it, there's nothing they can do that will have any meaningful effect on your plans.

[Inyssius Tor]

Personally, my favourite method (after the Church of Zackerat) is:
I had a player lich himself once... He made his phylactery a gemstone, which I said, "That is kind of cliche, isn't it?" He grinned and said, "Yup." Then he started casting "trap the soul" a lot. He spent many hundreds of thousands of gp on gemstones (epic game) and stored them all in one place.
I asked him what the heck he was doing.
He said, "C'mon, dude. Think about it. A large pile of gems, all of which are necromantic magic and all of which have a soul in it. One of them is my phylactery. The other several dozen contain demons and other nasties. How many can they survive before finally guessing the right one?"

I liked it very much.

[Zeful]

Long quote-

You know Greater Teleport, correct?

If you can see it you can port to it. Look up in the sky at night.

Pick a random star. Port to it (you will miss by a smidge

Slowly zero in on some nice planet lacking in an atmosphere that can support life (mars like is good).

Use Plane Shift to go to the Etheral Plane.

Head straight down for about an hour and then wander about until you find a small cavern (you just have to be able to cram your body in it, use shrink person if necessary).

Use Disintegrate to blast out a chamber. Now fill the chamber with permanent Mage's Sanctum spells.

Now cast a permanent Prismatic Sphere.

Put your phylactery and any other objects you want safe in here.

Greater Teleport back to "Earth".

Make a dozen or so fake's, hidden in all the normal ways that have been suggested.

Congratulations, you are safe.


Mage's Sanctum blocks scrying by everything, up to an including deities.

Even if an enemy manages to find out that your phylactery is on another planet, which one? And then, how do they get there?

You chose a random star, a random planet, ported to a random location on its surface, where you randomly shifted anywhere from 5 to 500 miles away from that location, and then went over a mile under ground, and then secured your phylactery with normal methods.
Shrunk down for simplicity

You forgot one thing Tippy, even if they guess right and can get there and even get to the threshold of the Mage's Sanctum they can't get inside because they aren't one of the people selected to join you at the casting of the spell so it does them no good to even bother.

[lukelightning]

Ultimate way to be a Lich and avoid worrying about a phylactery


Iron Lich

Is that something like Iron Chef? Today's special material component: Unborn Fetus Souls!

[lukelightning]

On the basis of some of the suggestions in this thread, would people say that by RAW, phylacteries are a bit broken? I always got the impression that the idea behind them was that they'd be difficult to find in a 'hidden at the bottom of a huge trap filled dungeon' sort of way rather than in a 'one of several billion billion billion identical grains of sand in a desert' sort of way...

I certainly wouldn't let a player have a grain of sand as a phylactery. Then again, go ahead and do it...your phylactery will get eroded in the next big sandstorm.

[GoblinJTHM]

you could always house rule in the lich must stay within X distance of the soul box so they have some chance of finding it.

[Leon]

A Iron Lich is a Steam powered Undead Juggernaught that relies on captured souls to power his spells

one of the many undead that hail from the Iron Kingdoms

See also http://www.sulerin.com/creatures/creatures.asp?op=open&a=20021102180620

[Dartonus]

Yet another evil phylactery location
1. Make phylactery a box, like normal.
2.Head over to the infinitely deep crevice on the ninth layer of Baator, running from the infinite army of Max-HD, Max-HP advanced Pit fiends.
Throw it in.
3.Learn a reliable teleport spell (Like Greater plane shift from the spell compendium)
4.Laugh at your enemies' futile attempts to destroy the phlactery. given a minute or two, it'll be long out of range by the time they get past the Pit Fiend army. And seriously, who wants to take a -infinity shot while the party fights off an army of pit fiends and possibly asmodeus, lord of the nine hells himself? I certainly don't.

How many evil locations do I have? LOTS!
1. Make small black box.
2. Place in voidstone fields on negative energy plane (Small voidstones don't move towards life)
3. Done.

Want more from me? Ask me for more.

[Anxe]

I'd make phylactery out of an artifact. Artifacts can't easily be destroyed in the time it takes you to regenerate. Only problem is you have to find an artifact or make one for this to work.

[Anxe]

Cast Rope Trick. Cast another Rope Trick inside the first Rope Trick. Dismiss the first Rope Trick. Plane Shift out. Ask your DM where your Phylactery is. :smallwink:

It's like the Isla de Muerta, but where no one knows where it is!You'd either destroy it in a similar effect to a bag of holding in a portable hole or it would be shunted out of the rope trick when the duration ran out.

[TheLogman]

The thing with the Artifact is, that you have to make it. If you could make Artifacts, then why would you even bother being a Lich anyway?

[Anxe]

You could grab one that's already made for you. Just spend a few scrying spells and maybe a wish scroll or too to find the artifact that you want to use and then go in commando style to grab it.

[martyboy74]

You'd either destroy it in a similar effect to a bag of holding in a portable hole or it would be shunted out of the rope trick when the duration ran out.

Stacking Rope Tricks doesn't cause anything, according to RAW. Heck, neither stacking Portable Holes, nor Bags of Holding does anything. Also, When the first Rope Trick disappears, it leaves a rope, which isn't even in the D&D multiverse, leading into a portal, which is even father away. The only way to find it is if it tractor beams you in, like if a lich dies or something.

[Anxe]

Quote from the spell description, "Anything inside the extradimensional space drops out when the spell ends." Dismissing it means ending it. You'd have a rope in the sky on the material plane again. And then that one would dissapear too and drop the phylactery on the ground.

[bugsysservant]

"I wish that the phylactery would appear in my hand, and if this would cause any consequences I would consider to be adverse than have it return from whence it came before they can occur."

There, you've touched it. Now cast discern location and set about destroying it.

[Anxe]

That's a bit wordy for a wish spell. I wouldn't allow something that long.

[bugsysservant]

That's a bit wordy for a wish spell. I wouldn't allow something that long.

Well then, just drop the part about the adverse consequences and wait till you know that your party can take on the lich. In theory there is no logical repercussion from having a phylactery teleported to your hand other than having a lich appear with it. The point is that there are always ways to circumvent even the most carefully laid defenses, so you may as well keep it somewhere accessible to you so you can be there if it does.

[martyboy74]

"I wish that the phylactery would appear in my hand, and if this would cause any consequences I would consider to be adverse than have it return from whence it came before they can occur."

There, you've touched it. Now cast discern location and set about destroying it.

Why don't you just cast Disintegrate on it while it's in your frikin hand!

[Shades of Gray]

How about make the liche's phylactery a sock? use spells to make it unsscryable and undetectable and sneak an invisible minion into the players camp. switch the socks around. they wont know where it is :smalltongue:

[Zeful]

Putting the phylactery on the players has many problems, maily being you have no power when you respawn and the party could easily beat you to death everytime you respawn. You'd have to have a way to instantly teleport away the moment you respawn to keep them from killing you when you showed up again.

[bugsysservant]

Why don't you just cast Disintegrate on it while it's in your frikin hand!

You would if it were to remain in your hand. But if there are *Adverse Consequences* it would be better to get it back to where it came, then better prepare yourself for an unpleasant encounter. The trick is defining adverse consequences. If something bad (such as the lich showing up) could be surmounted, it could instead be viewed as positive since you could kill the lich and destroy his phylactery in one go. If however, the spell were to lead to a TPK, then that is undeniably "adverse", and is circumvented by the wish.

[Steelwraith]

Here's what I would do:

First, I would make it into something valuable, say a ring. Then, to be sure that anyone who found it wouldn't just sell it off, I would make it useful somehow, for example, have it make the user invisible... just make sure that it doesn't make the user invisible to you, so it can't be used against you. Include a geas-type of enchantment so the user will eventually seek you out and return the ring.

I would place a lot of strengthening enchantments on it, so even if someone wanted to destroy it they'd have to throw it in a volcano or something... and make sure your base in near the only volcano around. Now give it limited sentience, so even if you can't get to the ring, it can try to get to you...

...what do you mean, 'its been done'?

[Steelwraith]

Ok, seriously this time:

For the liche on a budget, I would suggest the following: Make it a gem of some sort (so it doesn't degrade over time). Place as many anti-detection spells as makes you comfortable, then hire a ship. Tell the captain to head out into the deep (charm him if you have to, or just tell him you know the existence of a secret island... as long as he doesn't know the heading). After a week or so at sea, go up to the deck at night, be sure that nobody sees you. Take your gem and cast some sort of mass-increasing enchantments (may require a custom spell), followed by permanency... this is so the gem won't move around on its own. Toss the gem overboard. Now wait a few days more, set fire to the ship, and teleport home.

You now have your phylactery buried in the sand a few miles beneath the ocean... the chances of it being discovered are nil, since nothing but the native critters can survive the pressure. The increased weight insures that it can't be moved by said critters or by the tide. Nobody knows where it is, including yourself... even if the ghosts of those sailors were found, they'd have no idea what a phylactery is, let alone where it might be.

For the liche who has everything (and by everything I mean greater teleport), I would go with the outer space idea... but forget the alien planet... just teleport into deep space, and toss your phylactery in a random location... away from any stellar bodies of course. With the proper anti-scrying enchantments on it, nobody is gonna find it without star trek-type sensors.

[Anxe]

It is pretty hard to get around that, "I wish I was holding the lich's phylactery thing," thing. Need some anti-wish things.

[PlasticSoldier]

It is pretty hard to get around that, "I wish I was holding the lich's phylactery thing," thing. Need some anti-wish things.

You could make your phylactery a symbol of death, then they die if they wish for it.

[SadisticFishing]

Or buy an actual Phylactery, and call it "My phylactery" (it's a small scroll), and don't put your soul in it. Nya nya.

[MaxKaladin]

I think the 2nd Pirates of the Carribean movie gives a good demonstration of some of the problems with hiding and finding a phylactery since that's basically what the macguffin was in that movie.

[Jothki]

Yet another evil phylactery location
1. Make phylactery a box, like normal.
2.Head over to the infinitely deep crevice on the ninth layer of Baator, running from the infinite army of Max-HD, Max-HP advanced Pit fiends.
Throw it in.
3.Learn a reliable teleport spell (Like Greater plane shift from the spell compendium)
4.Laugh at your enemies' futile attempts to destroy the phlactery. given a minute or two, it'll be long out of range by the time they get past the Pit Fiend army. And seriously, who wants to take a -infinity shot while the party fights off an army of pit fiends and possibly asmodeus, lord of the nine hells himself? I certainly don't.

How many evil locations do I have? LOTS!
1. Make small black box.
2. Place in voidstone fields on negative energy plane (Small voidstones don't move towards life)
3. Done.

Want more from me? Ask me for more.

Would you really want to hand your soul to a bunch of pit fiends? That's just asking for trouble.

As far as resisting a Wish spell goes, you'd probably just need to lay reasonably strong non-detection magic on it. A wish could probably just plow through the weaker stuff, but the stronger stuff would require that the Wish know exactly where to attack it, which by its nature would be difficult, and would require that the power of a dispel spell be integrated into the actions that the Wish is performing, thus weakening the other aspects. If the phylactery is both shielded from detection and shielded from teleportation, a single Wish might be too weak to search for and break everything while still having power left for the teleport.