Halp!

[Sparky McDibben]

Context:

Level 4 single-player, single-DM game, player playing a rogue (Mastermind)

Player had find familiar from Magic Initiate, and reskinned it to be a weird mind-flayer psionic thing named Squidward

I am a total wimp as a DM

Situation:

Last session, character died. Because I am a total wimp as a DM, I allowed her to come back to life at 1 hp....by having Squidward burrow into her unconscious skull and implant itself as an illithid tadpole, supercharging her healing factor for a moment because it didn't want the host to die. That was four in-game days ago.

Options:

Player really, really wants this thing out of her head. So my original idea of "long quest to remove it" is nixed because I told her the other option is having someone cut off her head, burn it, and then cast true resurrection on her. I explicitly told her at the start of the game that she should avoid someone because they could cast 9th-level cleric spells. So now she's going to beg a clerical lich to fix her problem.

Question:

What the hell should the lich demand in return? Her soul is off the table, but I'm thinking 50,000 gp in payments with monthly installments with a 5% interest rate as a minimum.

[Kane0]

Money isnt of much use to a lich, unless they need it for something specific. What theyre more likely to be interested in is rare magical reagents, obscure bits of lore or a competent lackey to do grunt work where it is inconcenient for them to do so.

[Seekergeek]

Well, as someone who deals with that sort of amortization schedule in my work life, I'd really find it un-fun to work with in DND but YMMV. I'd say, though, that there are probably certain places that a clerical lich can't get at. I'd say payment would be the retrival of some artifact or other kept inside a hallowed tomb/church archive/what have you. Give your player an opportunity to get a fun heist out of the deal and everyone wins.

[Wizard_Lizard]

probably some sort of rare artifact.

[Sparky McDibben]

Money isnt of much use to a lich, unless they need it for something specific. What theyre more likely to be interested in is rare magical reagents, obscure bits of lore or a competent lackey to do grunt work where it is inconcenient for them to do so.

Yep, I'm thinking the money keeps her in debt peonage (company store mentality), but what kind of favors could this lich ask of a level four character? I mean, the lich might need all kind of stuff, but what could this rogue reasonably and specifically provide? I was thinking "other people's souls" and having her be kind of like fantasy Grubhub for the lich, but that seemed a bit dark...


Well, as someone who deals with that sort of amortization schedule in my work life, I'd really find it un-fun to work with in DND but YMMV. I'd say, though, that there are probably certain places that a clerical lich can't get at. I'd say payment would be the retrival of some artifact or other kept inside a hallowed tomb/church archive/what have you. Give your player an opportunity to get a fun heist out of the deal and everyone wins.

*Gasp!* How dare you; amortization tables are amazing and everyone should love them. :smallsmile: So my question here is, what could a level 4 rogue reasonably provide a lich that the lich couldn't obtain for herself with extremely minimal effort?

[Seekergeek]

*Gasp!* How dare you; amortization tables are amazing and everyone should love them. :smallsmile: So my question here is, what could a level 4 rogue reasonably provide a lich that the lich couldn't obtain for herself with extremely minimal effort?

The attendance of an NPC at some place the Lich can get access to? Maybe some NPC that is otherwise warded against this Lich's machinations but can be conceivably lured out into the open under the right circumstances? If you're worried about going too dark with it, this could be a rival who is equally despicable.

[Yakmala]

You don't want the character in debt to the Lich for the rest of the campaign.

You also want the player to feel personally motivated to do whatever is asked, not as a threat, but as something worthwhile and exciting.

With that in mind...

The Lich will help the player in return for carrying out a single specific quest.

Doing the quest, be it the recovery of an artifact, the removal of a rival, or whatever, will give the Lich power, but the Lich is willing to either 1: Share a portion of that power or 2: Give the player an item/boon in return.

If the player completes the task, they are not only saved, but come out of it more powerful than before and their debt to the Lich is paid.

[Lavaeolus]

Could make it something relatively innocuous and trivial. Something that no reasonable person would object to. A ridiculous bargain, really. Deliver this letter for me (please don't read the contents, I'll know if you do). I need you to give this nonmagical locket to someone in town. Relay some words for me.

This is, of course, suspicious. Why would a lich ask anything like that?

Up to you, then, if you go through with it being actually suspicious or not. Maybe upon being opened, the letter turns out to be an apology to an old elf friend he once knew, or perhaps a love letter. Showing this lich really does have a heart!

And upon closer inspection, maybe that 'love letter' is actually a coded message relaying sensitive and important details to some of his minions. Something that, if followed blindly, will result in death and destruction.

But be a bit careful with this. Manipulating players can be a tricky thing, especially if they feel the twist was unfair / unknowable. And you do need a reason why this lich would go to all this effort over, say, casting Sending or whathaveyou.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

From the Find Familiar spell:


As an action, you can temporarily dismiss your familiar. It disappears into a pocket dimension where it awaits your summons. Alternatively, you can dismiss it forever. As an action while it is temporarily dismissed, you can cause it to reappear in any unoccupied space within 30 feet of you.

So just dismiss it into a pocket dimension as an action, and it disappears out of her head. Then use another action to cause it to reappear not in her head in any unoccupied space within 30 feet.

If she's worried about it trying that again, "If you cast this spell while you already have a familiar, you instead cause it to adopt a new form."

[Galithar]

From the Find Familiar spell:



So just dismiss it into a pocket dimension as an action, and it disappears out of her head. Then use another action to cause it to reappear not in her head in any unoccupied space within 30 feet.

If she's worried about it trying that again, "If you cast this spell while you already have a familiar, you instead cause it to adopt a new form."

I don't think pointing it RAW is helpful when it is clear HomeBrew that got the situation started. A familiar can't normally crawl in your brain and make you Wolverine, but that's what happened.

I would definitely advocate for NOT putting the character in debt the Lich for the whole campaign. Let the debt be paid in a mission or two. Alternatively, let the player think that they will be in debt forever, but you know that in the back ground the Lich had picked a fight with an Ancient Dragon. The Dragon and it's minions track down and destroy the Lich while the player is off doing a job. They come back to find the Lich dead and they are suddenly free.

You've already avoided a campaign end with DM fiat, it's perfectly acceptable to me to get it back in track by doing the same. Just do it in a fun and interesting way. The Lich doesn't HAVE to die that was just one way to instantly release someone from a contract with a creature way more powerful than them. You could also simply have some NPC Paladins track down the Lich and do the same thing. That of course than puts high level NPC Paladins in your world.

[Sparky McDibben]

The attendance of an NPC at some place the Lich can get access to? Maybe some NPC that is otherwise warded against this Lich's machinations but can be conceivably lured out into the open under the right circumstances? If you're worried about going too dark with it, this could be a rival who is equally despicable.

This is quite useful - thanks!


You don't want the character in debt to the Lich for the rest of the campaign.

You also want the player to feel personally motivated to do whatever is asked, not as a threat, but as something worthwhile and exciting.

With that in mind...

The Lich will help the player in return for carrying out a single specific quest.

Doing the quest, be it the recovery of an artifact, the removal of a rival, or whatever, will give the Lich power, but the Lich is willing to either 1: Share a portion of that power or 2: Give the player an item/boon in return.

If the player completes the task, they are not only saved, but come out of it more powerful than before and their debt to the Lich is paid.

Thanks! This is one of the lines I was thinking along, but I couldn't really operationalize it. Can you give me any examples?

Also, while I'm not planning on having it be for the rest of the campaign, it will probably be a significant amount. It's 25 grand in diamonds; this is not going to be an easy debt to get out from under.


Could make it something relatively innocuous and trivial. Something that no reasonable person would object to. A ridiculous bargain, really. Deliver this letter for me (please don't read the contents, I'll know if you do). I need you to give this nonmagical locket to someone in town. Relay some words for me.

This is, of course, suspicious. Why would a lich ask anything like that?

Up to you, then, if you go through with it being actually suspicious or not. Maybe upon being opened, the letter turns out to be an apology to an old elf friend he once knew, or perhaps a love letter. Showing this lich really does have a heart!

And upon closer inspection, maybe that 'love letter' is actually a coded message relaying sensitive and important details to some of his minions. Something that, if followed blindly, will result in death and destruction.

But be a bit careful with this. Manipulating players can be a tricky thing, especially if they feel the twist was unfair / unknowable. And you do need a reason why this lich would go to all this effort over, say, casting Sending or whathaveyou.

OK, this is an interesting first mission - a loyalty test! If you open it, you pass! (because seriously, who wouldn't open it?) But if you just do your job competently, the lich keeps testing you to see what it would take to get you to flip. Hmm...


From the Find Familiar spell:



So just dismiss it into a pocket dimension as an action, and it disappears out of her head. Then use another action to cause it to reappear not in her head in any unoccupied space within 30 feet.

If she's worried about it trying that again, "If you cast this spell while you already have a familiar, you instead cause it to adopt a new form."

I had her cross the spell off - she no longer has it. She came back to life, man, I wasn't going to make that a total freebie. :smallsmile:

[MaxWilson]

What the ---- should the lich demand in return? Her soul is off the table, but I'm thinking 50,000 gp in payments with monthly installments with a 5% interest rate as a minimum.

Three favors to be named at a later date. No repercussions from the lich for turning down a request but that makes it not count as a favor. Until all three favors are repaid, lich has the legal right to cast Scrying on or Sending/Project at her as much as it wants to and she isn't allowed to complain.

[Yakmala]

Thanks! This is one of the lines I was thinking along, but I couldn't really operationalize it. Can you give me any examples? :

The Lich wants the character to retrieve something that was stolen from them, or that was lost to them when they transitioned to Lichdom. What this is should depend on the character class.

For Wizards: "Retrieve my old spell book. If you do so, I'll let you copy some knowledge from it into your own spell book. Don't even think of keeping it for yourself. Anyone trying to read it without my permission will be cursed!"

For melee types: "The soul of my Husband/Wife/Friend was trapped in a magical weapon [of a type useful to character]. Bring me the weapon so that I can release their soul [to keep with them or send onto the afterlife] and the weapon is yours once the soul is removed."

Other caster types: "In life, I wielded the [caster useful item] but it was stolen while I was recovering from my transformation. It's taken more than a century, but I have discovered its location. I no longer need it as my power has grown beyond such trivial objects, but I want you to enact my vengeance on the thieves. Do so, and the [magic item] is yours!"

For any class: "Recover my stolen Phylactery and I will grant you a small portion of its power." [epic boon from the DM's Guide].

Hope that helps!

[Sparky McDibben]

Three favors to be named at a later date. No repercussions from the lich for turning down a request but that makes it not count as a favor. Until all three favors are repaid, lich has the legal right to cast Scrying on or Sending/Project at her as much as it wants to and she isn't allowed to complain.

I'm digging the Dresden-and-Mab vibe here, but the at-will scrying is...a bit too Orwellian for me? I might include some hint that she's being scried upon, or just have Player automatically count as a "location within 500 miles" for the lich's Project Image.

OOH!!! She might be used as a courier to allow the lich to interface with people they want to talk to in a face-to-face meeting, while giving the lich a highly-trained operative on the ground for espionage shenanigans!! That is gold, Mr. Wilson!


The Lich wants the character to retrieve something that was stolen from them, or that was lost to them when they transitioned to Lichdom. What this is should depend on the character class.

For Wizards: "Retrieve my old spell book. If you do so, I'll let you copy some knowledge from it into your own spell book. Don't even think of keeping it for yourself. Anyone trying to read it without my permission will be cursed!"

For melee types: "The soul of my Husband/Wife/Friend was trapped in a magical weapon [of a type useful to character]. Bring me the weapon so that I can release their soul [to keep with them or send onto the afterlife] and the weapon is yours once the soul is removed."

Other caster types: "In life, I wielded the [caster useful item] but it was stolen while I was recovering from my transformation. It's taken more than a century, but I have discovered its location. I no longer need it as my power has grown beyond such trivial objects, but I want you to enact my vengeance on the thieves. Do so, and the [magic item] is yours!"

For any class: "Recover my stolen Phylactery and I will grant you a small portion of its power." [epic boon from the DM's Guide].

Hope that helps!

I dig it! I think I can combo this with some of the other options and give her other class features from subclasses neither of us would ever use (like the Undying Warlock). God, I love this community! Keep 'em coming, y'all!!!

[Sorinth]

A quest is definitely better then a gold debt.

In terms of what can a level 4 character do that a lich couldn't just do itself the obvious answer is go to a place warded against undead entry. So here's a crazy idea, the Lich tasks the player to travel to some distant city and bury/place an urn with his dead wife's ashes in some place. Maybe it's a Druid's grove or maybe it's the some grand church, etc... The place should be heavily warded against undead so that getting inside is impossible for an undead creature.

The trick of course is that the urn is actually his phylactery, once in place the Lich destroys his current body respawns in the holy place and lays waste to it. He would never have been able to attack the place head on due to the wards preventing his entry but the phylactery trick bypasses them.

[MaxWilson]

I'm digging the Dresden-and-Mab vibe here, but the at-will scrying is...a bit too Orwellian for me? I might include some hint that she's being scried upon, or just have Player automatically count as a "location within 500 miles" for the lich's Project Image.

OOH!!! She might be used as a courier to allow the lich to interface with people they want to talk to in a face-to-face meeting, while giving the lich a highly-trained operative on the ground for espionage shenanigans!! That is gold, Mr. Wilson!

Yep, Dresden and Mab is exactly what I had in mind. : ) You can leave the scrying out of the legal contract if you want--it's not like she has the power to stop the lich from doing whatever it wants anyway.

Note how Mab's favors have actually functioned in the novels. They are:

(1) a source of unresolved tension hanging over Dresden's head, until Jim Butcher can give Dresden even bigger problems like hideous burns and the Winter Mantle, and

(2) a source of adventure hooks a.k.a. problems.

Using the lich as a similar source of adventure hooks seems ideal to me, especially since it doesn't really cost the lich anything to fix this player's problem: cut off her head, then Wish (Resurrection) her back to life, and now you've got three favors from a convenient mortal who will soon be growing in power. Cheap at the price.

Try to make the adventure hooks look deceptively simple, e.g. "orally deliver a coded message to [name] who lives in [place]", but when you get there it turns out that [place] has been conquered by Mind Flayers and [name] has been taken to their underground slave pits, and oh by the way this place is desperately in need of someone to lead the resistance and won't you please step up to the plate Ms. PC? And when you find [name] and break them out of the slave pits, the coded message turns out to contain directions to powerful anti-Mind Flayer weapons (or Intellect Devourer detectors!) usable by the rebellion, meaning that the lich obviously anticipated the invasion and the rebellion and is trying for reasons of its own to level the playing field between humans and aberrations.

[Lupine]

someone mentioned find familiar earlier, specifically in dismissing it. That is important. Anti-magic would stop that cold, and her character would die again, whereupon revival is an option.

Another option, darker. (Bit of a text wall, but this is a great “personal quest”)

Another option is having a thing where the familiar slowly takes over the player’s mind. First, give her a very limited telepathy ten feet (only basic emotions, like a pseudodragon) make it clear that this is from the “symbiont” (yes, start calling it that). Adv on insight.
Nightmares make resting harder. Now all long rests take 1.5 times as long (if you really want to tune it up, short rests fo to)
Then, she start making wisdom saving throws at the end of long rests. On a success, nightmares as aforementioned. On a failure, regular resting time, but the symbiont gets more control. Don’t tell the player success or failure, just results. After five failures, the character no longer wants to remove the symbiont. In fact, the character now has an overwhelming desire to protect the symbiont. (Like a cursed item)

After the symbiont has secured it's survival, it will start to work on taking control, transforming its host.
Nightmares end

Basic telepathy now has range 20 feet. Within 5 feet, uncontrolled telepathy (you detect all emotions, whether you wanted to or not). If more than one creature is within this range at the end of the player’s turn, player must succeed a wisdom saving throw, DC 13+N, where N is the number of creatures in that range. On a failure player is incapacitated until only one creature remains, and takes 1d10 physic damage at the beginning of each turn while incapacitated. On a successful save, half damage, and no incapacitation.

Let the player sit here for a while, but record every time they use that uncontrolled telepathy. When they reach some point of your choosing, advance the story.
By their choice as mastermind, they’ll probably be into this, and use it a lot I’d set the number at 25 uses.
After this point, a new compulsion: the player wants to know all the emotions or people around them. Range increases to 10 feet, and they are no longer limited by creature counts.
Tally another 25 uses, then advance.
The symbiont has determined that they could extract all that information, and more, if it could consume another creature’s brain. Add new compulsion to do so.

After doing so, the symbiont is now ready to assume control. Final fight is player sucking the party members into their mind, and whole party fights al elder brain (nerfed as needed)
Victorious? Symbiont excised, player dies (but the players should have resurrection magic at this point
Defeated? Players returned to their bodies. Symbiont assumes control, and player is dead only a wish spell can return them. Body becomes an elder brain to-be, leaves the players.

[Sparky McDibben]

A quest is definitely better then a gold debt.

A fair assessment of a poorly worded statement. I meant that until she pays off the gold debt, she's sort of under the lich's thumb - they've got a line on her and can send pretty much any spell right through her defenses. In essence, the gold debt is a motivator to get around a serious power imbalance. In order to get around it, you've got to get 25 to 50 grand...sounds like some great motivation to (a) not piss off her patron, and (b) get to adventuring! But thank you for helping me work through what I meant to say. I appreciate it!


Note how Mab's favors have actually functioned in the novels. They are:

(1) a source of unresolved tension hanging over Dresden's head, until Jim Butcher can give Dresden even bigger problems like hideous burns and the Winter Mantle, and

(2) a source of adventure hooks a.k.a. problems.

Yep! I'm thinking I use the gold debt to put her on the wrong side of leverage (under the lich's thumb) and then start using these to have her run favors and start accomplishing her ends without anything that leads back to the lich.


someone mentioned find familiar earlier, specifically in dismissing it. That is important. Anti-magic would stop that cold, and her character would die again, whereupon revival is an option.

At this point, the tadpole is no longer magical, it's psionic and it's in there. :smallsmile:


Another option, darker. [...] Another option is having a thing where the familiar slowly takes over the player’s mind.

I had actually thought about that. I had a whole system with Catastrophe Dice for certain powers to let her dig her own grave. Unfortunately, Player's reaction was something between "No, no, nononono nopettynope" and "BURN IT WITH FIRE!!!!!"

Good call, though!!

You guys are all throwing out really great ideas; thanks so much and keep 'em coming!

Does anyone have any ideas about how I can have the lich give her powers she can use that will slowly pull her further into its control?