Which Lich?

[slexlollar89]

Does anybody see a downside to a warlock lich? They meet casting reqs, and easily can make a phylactery... Plus the lich abilities add to their one man coolness...

Any thoughts? Basically I'm thinking of particular things like feats to take for this particular guy/girl because I plan on making one.

[Tor the Fallen]

You lose 4 levels.

[slexlollar89]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that this is an NPC idea, not a player idea.

[martyboy74]

It's a warlock. There's yer problem. :smallamused:

Maybe if you make all warlock levels count as non-associated?

[Sornjss Lichdom]

It sounds.. ok.. its just that it's so untraditional. Maybe it the idea of flamboent waving arms or demonic sounding verbal components. Just shooting beams from your hands is so.. different, it's not like it wont work, in fact it may become the new "thing" but until I see a lay out on baisc char blow up it just sounds so foriegn.

[Starsinger]

It sounds.. ok.. its just that it's so untraditional. Maybe it the idea of flamboent waving arms or demonic sounding verbal components. Just shooting beams from your hands is so.. different, it's not like it wont work, in fact it may become the new "thing" but until I see a lay out on baisc char blow up it just sounds so foriegn.

Hands? Refluff it! Shoot the eldritch blasts from your EYES! Laser Eye Beams FTW! :smallwink: Yeah I think a warlock lich would be cool.

[Tor the Fallen]

It's also, mechanically, not feasible. Liches have to make their own phylacteries, and as far as I know, that requires a craft wondrous item feat that warlocks don't meet the prerequisites for (able to cast 3rd level spells). Also, isn't there a caster level req for the lich? Like 11 or 13?

But as far as a charismatic, undead, blaster, I say go for it! It works quite well, especially if you want to throw the awesomeness that is Lich at your party without having to pull the punches of a 13th level caster.

[Starsinger]

It's also, mechanically, not feasible. Liches have to make their own phylacteries, and as far as I know, that requires a craft wondrous item feat that warlocks don't meet the prerequisites for (able to cast 3rd level spells). Also, isn't there a caster level req for the lich? Like 11 or 13?

Warlocks can craft as if they could cast spells, due to their Decieve Item class feature. And Warlocks can qualify for things with a Caster Level, they cannot qualify for things that require specific spells or the ability to cast spells of a certain level, with the exception of Crafting Items.

[Tor the Fallen]

Warlocks can craft as if they could cast spells, due to their Decieve Item class feature. And Warlocks can qualify for things with a Caster Level, they cannot qualify for things that require specific spells or the ability to cast spells of a certain level, with the exception of Crafting Items.

Oh cool, did not know that (obviously).

[Nerd-o-rama]

I say go for it. It's an awesome and flavor-sensible idea, especially for an NPC who doesn't have to worry about Level Adjustment. And even then, it doesn't make as big a deal to a Warlock as it does to a Wizard, as a 'lock's power-gain is linear like a fighter's, rather than exponential like a caster's.

[Mr. Moogle]

It's a warlock. There's yer problem. :smallamused:

Maybe if you make all warlock levels count as non-associated?

OBJECTION!: WARLOCKS ARE NOT UNDERPOWERED....Wait *rereeads class*. Thanks you just crushed my worldview.

[martyboy74]

OBJECTION!: WARLOCKS ARE NOT UNDERPOWERED

OBJECTION DENIED!: WARLOCKS ARE UNDERPOWERED

Really, they're underpowered as a PC, where they get to use their main advantage (inexhaustible power supply). As a BBEG, they'll suck even more, because they can only really become equal in a war of attrition; something that will not happen.

[Nerd-o-rama]

HOLD IT!

A Warlock's effectiveness is not on trial here.

[Tor the Fallen]

OBJECTION DENIED!: WARLOCKS ARE UNDERPOWERED

Really, they're underpowered as a PC, where they get to use their main advantage (inexhaustible power supply). As a BBEG, they'll suck even more, because they can only really become equal in a war of attrition; something that will not happen.

You mean when 4 jerks come bumbling into this guy's home, which happens to be a well trapped dungeon, lurking with undead, which he is intimately familiar, and has spent the last 300 years planning for just such an occasion?

[Drider]

You mean when 4 jerks come bumbling into this guy's home, which happens to be a well trapped dungeon, lurking with undead, which he is intimately familiar, and has spent the last 300 years planning for just such an occasion?

It requires the dm being a little responsible to play him/her/it smart.

[Tor the Fallen]

It requires the dm being a little responsible to play him/her/it smart.

What DM wouldn't play a lich smart?

Err, well, I like the warlock lich because it means you can play your lich smart, but not have it be an autokill for the players. A well played caster lich would wipe the floor with the party. Then bring them back to unlife and make them wipe up the mess they made when they wiped the floor the first time.

[dyslexicfaser]

OBJECTION DENIED!: WARLOCKS ARE UNDERPOWERED

Really, they're underpowered as a PC, where they get to use their main advantage (inexhaustible power supply). As a BBEG, they'll suck even more, because they can only really become equal in a war of attrition; something that will not happen.

I think it would be an entertaining way of running a dungeon, to have the lich pop in, throw off some pithy comment, blast them from way the hell away with eldritch spear, then take off.

[ocato]

Just make the Lich way higher level than those guys. Then when he starts eye-beaming them, it'll be scary and dangerous, but not Round 1 TPK that a high level Wizard can swing if played 'too well'.

[Collin152]

*facepalm*
Why diddn't I think of this? I want to steal it, but now it isn't as original. :smallfrown:

[Kurald Galain]

Rather than eye beams (which are at least slightly silly :smalltongue: ) I'd use something resembling Force Lightning. Let's face it, Palpatine does rather look like a lich...

Also, warlocks can do all sorts of nasty things (yes, that are underpowered yet flavorful) without using their eldritch blast.

[AKA_Bait]

Sounds pretty awesome. The Warlock Lich stalks them as they search the dungeon for his phylactery. I like it!

Things you might want to take:

Give him the monster feat 'quicken spell like ability' (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsterFeats.htm#quickenSpellLikeAbility) so he can pop off 2 eldrich blasts in a round three times a day.

Give him stuff that up's his dex, so that his blasts hit more. You can build that in backwards with Tomes if you don't want the PCs to get their gubby little paws on a pair of gloves.

Make liberal use of the Voracious Dispelling, Devour Magic, Flee the Scene and Retributive Invisibilty invocations for hit and run tactics.

EDIT:
Also, I could be more helpful with specific advice if you told me:
1) How many levels of warlock you want our lichy friend to be.
2) How badass your party is so I can suggest CR appropriate things.

[AslanCross]

Rather than eye beams (which are at least slightly silly :smalltongue: ) I'd use something resembling Force Lightning. Let's face it, Palpatine does rather look like a lich...


"Now witness the firepower of this FULLY ARMED and OPERATIONAL dank dungeon!"

Seriously, I don't see anything seriously gimped about a warlock BBEG, let alone a lich. I think it's a cool idea. The dude gets to wear armor, too. Wouldn't it be cool for the PCs to realize that their lich isn't wearing robes, but elven chainmail?

[Belial_the_Leveler]

Noxious Blast. If they fail their save (and they probably will against a full charisma warlock lich with the same HD) they are nauseated (no actions) for 10 rounds.

Sort of like when you Force Lightning someone he's dazed and can't act?

Even better, the Warlock Lich can heal itself with the Forc...errr utterdark blast unlimited times per day. Flee the Scene while invisible, heal, blast, repeat.

[slexlollar89]

Yeah, I know the warlocks a little weak, but it's my favorite base class. Plus, a lich is a classic BBEG, and a warlock lich is a classic unorthodox BBEG.

plus, If I named him Palpetine, I would have to give him a homebrew lightning invocation.

"UNLIMITED POWEEEERRRR!!!"
"dude, why's that lich shouting at us?"
"dunno, wait, he just threw some pink crp at me?"
"oh he's so dead er... uh... deader"

[slexlollar89]

Plus, give the LockLich a cohort paladin of tyranny, slap Darth in front of his name, and give him some fighters in white breastplates, and you got an Empire.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Just remember to make the warlock an archlich if he's good. Archliches are the only good liches.

[Leon]

"We have found a Lich. May we burn her?"

[Edea]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that this is an NPC idea, not a player idea.

Create a lich specifically geared for invocation use. Monster cribbing time!

[dyslexicfaser]

Well, you know what the puritans say: "Thou shalt not suffer a lich to live."

[slexlollar89]

"well, you could try to burn me, but I have fire and lightning resistance from my class! sorry guys, god's not gonna smite me, and no burning today..."
(villigars collectively) "aaawwww"
"well, there is a group of nasty adventurers that I need to kill, maybe you could burn them? (mwa ha ha! cha rules!)
"yeah, the abomination against nature is right! lets all kill those snooping adventurers!"
(collective villiage) "yeaahh! BURN THEM!"

but seriously, what feats and stuff would be a good suggestion?

[Jack Mann]

First of all, don't tell your players that he's a warlock. Don't even tell them he's a lich until they've had a chance to get a good look at him (which you can put off for quite a while). This keeps them off balance. They don't know what to expect from the lich at first, which makes it hard for them to plan for it. It also makes the creature seem more exotic. He's not a simple warlock lich, he's a terrifying undead force of nature that comes and goes at it wills, and who knows what it will do to them next? They'll respect him a lot more if they don't know what he is at first.

And make the dungeon large. Maybe not World's Largest Dungeon huge, but someplace where they could spend a week or two in-game (and a few sessions out-of-game) exploring it as they try to find his phylactery. In fact, give them other goals in this dungeon. This gives you a chance to run a cat-and-mouse game with them, popping out of the shadows and then dancing back out of sight, and leading other creatures to them. The longer you can keep the game going, the better.

Possible scenarios:

Underdark-style cave system: The Underdark is basically a big dungeon. Close it off for a smaller cave system. The benefit here is that you can put a lot of different things in here and it makes some sense, in that it's a natural environment. This is their home. So you can put in a tribe of subterranean goblins, say, and maybe some mind flayers (depends on the level of your players, of course). You don't have to explain why they're there. They might have nothing to do with the lich, which gives you other things for the players to do while they're in there. Give 'em a few potential allies too, while you're at it. Remember, ally is another word for potential hostage in the DM Pocket Dictionary. The downside is that there will be a lot of areas the lich doesn't control. But that's not necessarily a bad thing, since your players are going to want a chance to get some downtime once in a while.

Tomb of the Ancients: Notice that that's ancients, plural. A vast necropolis with multiple tombs, all interconnected. Obviously, this area's going to be undead heavy. See about tossing the party rogue a greater truedeath crystal so he feels useful in combat. Crack open your Libris Mortis and have fun. There are a lot of weird undead out there, and this gives you a chance to toss some of them at your players and watch 'em squirm. You can also show what the undead do when they're not making brief mortals cower. What are the politics of the dead like? And don't forget to consider who put the undead there in the first place. They might not be too happy with the party for disturbing the tombs. And the undead might not be too happy with them, depending on how much of an honor it was in the first place.

The Labyrinth of McGuffin: This great maze was created for King Whasiscrown by the artisan Lady Ro'hzhee the Riveting to contain the fell beast Grawtveis. Since that time, many other creatures and prisoners have been locked away, including the players. They have to navigate the labyrinth to find their way out, while avoiding their fellow inmates, including the lich who's taken up leadership in this place.

[Aerlock]

Even better, the Warlock Lich can heal itself with the Forc...errr utterdark blast unlimited times per day. Flee the Scene while invisible, heal, blast, repeat.

Technically this won't work since a Lich, being undead, is immune to anything that requires a Fort Save. However a Lich has a touch attack that does 1d8+5 negative energy damage so in effect it is a CLW wand with unlimited uses per day. All the Lich has to do is touch itself, which brings to mind many unpleasant images.

Aerlock

[Leon]

given thats its evil, its the bad touch

[Aerlock]

Oooh...Give him a few ranks in Perform(Dance) and Perform(Singing), a bunch of zombie followers, a couple bard followers, a suit of red leather armor and you could have a musical encounter.

Aerlock

[slexlollar89]

"why does that lich insist on wearing a single silver glove? Is it a magical item?"
"no, he just loves to grab himself and shout a lot... we don't really understand it either"

The scen for this lichlock is as follows: He is a mighty being who mad a pact with a powerful Outsider long ago, but now seeks to kill the Outsider. The PCs work for said Outer Denizen and the lichlock has decided to vent his centuries of frustrated searching on them (the guy's undead becuse it enabled him to search the world forever, and be powerful enough to square off against the Outsider who is arch-devil like in power). He is going to command a vast army of humans and elves, as well as undead, and ge lives in an evil, huge, castle.

He's has to have quiken sp, and also empower or max sp, not sure which. He will also have supernatural transformation.

do you think I should concentrate on getting extra invocations? and do you guys think the ranged feats (pt blank shot, etc.) are worth taking?

[Aerlock]

Looking over the invocations for a Warlock I'll recommend a few and a couple tactics to use with em.

For your one and only Greater Invocation I recommend:
Eldritch Cone: Used in combination with a horde of undead and the Eldritch Essence invocations that have fort saves you can stand in the middle of or fly over your horde and blast away at groups of opponents without harming your undead minions since they are immune to Fort save effects.

For the Lesser Invocations I'll recommend (Pick three):
Beshadowed Blast: Fort save or blind for one round
Hellrime Blast: Fort save or -4 Dex penalty
Both of the above are good combos with Eldritch Cone

Flee the Scene: Dimension door is always handy
Fell Flight: Flight is also always handy
Walk Unseen: Invisibility again is something thats always handy
Hungry Darkness: This one requires a bit of pre-planning to use as its stationary but, a 40ft diameter globe that does 2d6 damage plus a 1hp/turn bleed damage is no laughing matter. Plus everyone that ends their turn in the effect taking another 1d6 damage in every square this covers. And it adds a (low) Fort save vs. Nausea which is a nice extra that might be useful every now and then. Oh and you're immune to its effects. Use this to hinder your enemies while blasting them with a Coned Hellrime, Beshadowed, or Sickening Blast
The Dead Walk: Gotta replenish your undead horde somehow. It's either this or UMD-ing your horde into existence.

And last but not Least (well actually they are) the Least Invocations (again choose 3):
Miasmic Cloud: 20ft diameter cloud centered on you that has a Fort save vs. fatigue. It lasts for a minute.
See the Unseen: 24 hour See Invisibility and Darkvision. A bit of overlap from the Lich template but See Invisibility is nice.
Devil Sight: See in darkness and magical darkness for 24 hours. Counters the 20% miss chance from the Darkness and Hungry Darkness Invocations.
Darkness: Concealment (20% miss chance) to everyone in a 40ft sphere. Use this to hinder your enemies while blasting them with a Coned Hellrime, Beshadowed, or Sickening Blast
Sickening Blast: Fort save vs. sickened. This is another good combo with Eldritch Cone when your opponents are mixed in with your undead horde.

I'm sure there are other combinations you can use but the Cone and all the Fort save effects in combination with the aformentioned(sp?) undead horde were the first thing that came to mind when I looked over the Lich and the benefits of being undead.

Aerlock

P.S. If you go to 12th level Warlock before you go Lich you'll have 3 feat slots that you could use for Extra Invocation to pick some of the others here if you want more than 3 of either least or lesser invocations.

[Callos_DeTerran]

"Now witness the firepower of this FULLY ARMED and OPERATIONAL dank dungeon!"

*Locklich holding it's soul-hidey-place (I can't spell phylactrecay for the life of me)* "This is what you want, yes?"


Seriously, I don't see anything seriously gimped about a warlock BBEG, let alone a lich. I think it's a cool idea. The dude gets to wear armor, too. Wouldn't it be cool for the PCs to realize that their lich isn't wearing robes, but elven chainmail?

Hehehehe specially when you use the one feat to bump up the allowable armor range to medium. Mithral full-plate (Artistically styled to be evil looking of course) then ensues as well as confusion about why the hell a full-plate wearing skeleton is shooting out force lightening or eye beams.

[Collin152]

...
You win. A Lich wearing fullplate?
SOmebody give that man a legal American *coughcoughcuban coughcough*cigar.

[AslanCross]

...
You win. A Lich wearing fullplate?


But it's not a Lich! It's a Death Knight! A Death Knight I tell you!

[slexlollar89]

No, sory, the Death Knight is his cohort, Darth Cohort.

[Zeal]

...Why does this have to be so cool? If only I weren't running an evil game!

[slexlollar89]

I can't help it if the warlock's semi-underpowerdness lets it be overshadowed by all those other arcanists... I just think outside the box... no! I was never in the box...

Maybe I could throw in Hellfire warlock... I don't have the PrC on me... can you use the helfire w/o con damage? (lich=no con)

[Draz74]

Behold (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20061207a&page=3) the Hellfire Warlock.

Unfortunately, no, you can't use Hellfire Blast if you don't have a Con score. The PrC shuts this loophole down specifically.

[Mewtarthio]

Maybe I could throw in Hellfire warlock... I don't have the PrC on me... can you use the helfire w/o con damage? (lich=no con)

Can't use Hellfire. The demonic forces of hellfire only work if you actually take Con damage.

[Collin152]

Shame that. Nothing quite like wielding the very forces of hell to crush your opponents with fire hotter then all mortal flame.

[tannish2]

Technically this won't work since a Lich, being undead, is immune to anything that requires a Fort Save. However a Lich has a touch attack that does 1d8+5 negative energy damage so in effect it is a CLW wand with unlimited uses per day. All the Lich has to do is touch itself, which brings to mind many unpleasant images.

Aerlock

um.... no, disentigrate works. as do a few other things that require fortitude saves. and no it doesnt, unless its a more zombie style lich(BTW TY for the images, ill have to stab my eyes out now), i prefer the more skeletony ones, they look cooler and without gear blend in perfectly with the normal skeletons

[Jack Mann]

Specifically, a lich (like all undead) is immune to anything that requires a fort save that doesn't affect objects. Disintegrate affects objects, so it works on undead.

[martyboy74]

Whereas it is immune to, say, a nauseating cloud.

[Feralgeist]

not EXACTLY like skeletons. their eye-light dances and such and skeletons are only pinpoints?

It'd be like trying to find the renegade robot in that movie, Irobot