Next level endgame meta Wish tactics and stratz

[No brains]

Thought experiment for worldbuilding using Wish rules: Assuming creatures in a game world are aware of the potency of the Wish spell and would work to foil it when able, what tactics would they use to enforce the cosmic status quo?


Why not just ban wish as a DM? This is a thought exercise from a diegetic perspective where creatures don't necessarily have a choice to ban Wish, but instead make lemons from cosmic lemonade.

Why get in the way of player agency? Because sometimes players don't make choices that work for long term fun. Also, sometimes the social contract of D&D agrees that the hornets' nest shall be kicked and the hornets have a right to respond in kind. Some may enjoy that drama.

Why do any of this? This is just one of the ways that my brain makes the game fun.

1. Anti-Wish Failsafe: Create a Helmed Horror that is immune to Wish. If possible, equip it with some means to detect if a Wish happened that otherwise would not affect it. Then, have the Horror use a Wish it has access to in order to wish to undo the last Wish. Numerous of these creatures may exist in pockets of the multiverse, ready to troubleshoot those who get too greedy with the cosmos.

2. Simulacrum Sniping: In AL rules, a Simulacrum of a creature counts as the creature for disabling the ability to cast Wish. Some creatures have the ability to create temporary Simulacra and grant wishes. For example: Have a Noble Dao join forces with a Granny Sea Hag in her lair. The creatures work together to gain knowledge of all creatures in the universe, create Simulacra of them, and grant them frivolous, but taxing wishes. All in the favor of perpetuating cosmic despair by pushing desire just a little farther away from everyone.

3. A Treaty Organization of Wish Regulation: When a creature becomes Wish-capable or near-Wish-capable, it gets a visit from representatives of other Wish casters in the cosmos. They are informed that there are many powerful and observantly interested parties who have mutually agreed to restrict Wish in ways that do not obstruct each other. These parties want the new Wish-capable creature to agree to these terms so that resources do not need to be expended to force them to comply. Compliance is not technically compulsory, but be aware that if the new creature seeks to use Wish in an inconsiderate manner, they need to be thorough in covering their tracks and tushy afterwards.

What are some ways you have thought of to incorporate Wish rules in your setting?

[LudicSavant]

Thought experiment for worldbuilding using Wish rules: Assuming creatures in a game world are aware of the potency of the Wish spell and would work to foil it when able, what tactics would they use to enforce the cosmic status quo?


Why not just ban wish as a DM? This is a thought exercise from a diegetic perspective where creatures don't necessarily have a choice to ban Wish, but instead make lemons from cosmic lemonade.

Why get in the way of player agency? Because sometimes players don't make choices that work for long term fun. Also, sometimes the social contract of D&D agrees that the hornets' nest shall be kicked and the hornets have a right to respond in kind. Some may enjoy that drama.

Why do any of this? This is just one of the ways that my brain makes the game fun.

1. Anti-Wish Failsafe: Create a Helmed Horror that is immune to Wish. If possible, equip it with some means to detect if a Wish happened that otherwise would not affect it. Then, have the Horror use a Wish it has access to in order to wish to undo the last Wish. Numerous of these creatures may exist in pockets of the multiverse, ready to troubleshoot those who get too greedy with the cosmos.

2. Simulacrum Sniping: In AL rules, a Simulacrum of a creature counts as the creature for disabling the ability to cast Wish. Some creatures have the ability to create temporary Simulacra and grant wishes. For example: Have a Noble Dao join forces with a Granny Sea Hag in her lair. The creatures work together to gain knowledge of all creatures in the universe, create Simulacra of them, and grant them frivolous, but taxing wishes. All in the favor of perpetuating cosmic despair by pushing desire just a little farther away from everyone.

3. A Treaty Organization of Wish Regulation: When a creature becomes Wish-capable or near-Wish-capable, it gets a visit from representatives of other Wish casters in the cosmos. They are informed that there are many powerful and observantly interested parties who have mutually agreed to restrict Wish in ways that do not obstruct each other. These parties want the new Wish-capable creature to agree to these terms so that resources do not need to be expended to force them to comply. Compliance is not technically compulsory, but be aware that if the new creature seeks to use Wish in an inconsiderate manner, they need to be thorough in covering their tracks and tushy afterwards.

What are some ways you have thought of to incorporate Wish rules in your setting?

3 reminds me of the setting in the (lovely, by the way) Legend of Ethshar novels, where all wizards (who could do stuff even more powerful than Wish in this setting) were very much required, by force to be members of the Wizard's Guild (and thus bound by their rites and practices and such), because other wizards wanted to minimize the amount of trouble they'd collectively have to deal with from epic spells going off the rails.

[kazaryu]

Thought experiment for worldbuilding using Wish rules: Assuming creatures in a game world are aware of the potency of the Wish spell and would work to foil it when able, what tactics would they use to enforce the cosmic status quo?


Why not just ban wish as a DM? This is a thought exercise from a diegetic perspective where creatures don't necessarily have a choice to ban Wish, but instead make lemons from cosmic lemonade.

Why get in the way of player agency? Because sometimes players don't make choices that work for long term fun. Also, sometimes the social contract of D&D agrees that the hornets' nest shall be kicked and the hornets have a right to respond in kind. Some may enjoy that drama.

Why do any of this? This is just one of the ways that my brain makes the game fun.

1. Anti-Wish Failsafe: Create a Helmed Horror that is immune to Wish. If possible, equip it with some means to detect if a Wish happened that otherwise would not affect it. Then, have the Horror use a Wish it has access to in order to wish to undo the last Wish. Numerous of these creatures may exist in pockets of the multiverse, ready to troubleshoot those who get too greedy with the cosmos.

2. Simulacrum Sniping: In AL rules, a Simulacrum of a creature counts as the creature for disabling the ability to cast Wish. Some creatures have the ability to create temporary Simulacra and grant wishes. For example: Have a Noble Dao join forces with a Granny Sea Hag in her lair. The creatures work together to gain knowledge of all creatures in the universe, create Simulacra of them, and grant them frivolous, but taxing wishes. All in the favor of perpetuating cosmic despair by pushing desire just a little farther away from everyone.

3. A Treaty Organization of Wish Regulation: When a creature becomes Wish-capable or near-Wish-capable, it gets a visit from representatives of other Wish casters in the cosmos. They are informed that there are many powerful and observantly interested parties who have mutually agreed to restrict Wish in ways that do not obstruct each other. These parties want the new Wish-capable creature to agree to these terms so that resources do not need to be expended to force them to comply. Compliance is not technically compulsory, but be aware that if the new creature seeks to use Wish in an inconsiderate manner, they need to be thorough in covering their tracks and tushy afterwards.

What are some ways you have thought of to incorporate Wish rules in your setting?

i mean...IMO the answer is to just...not treat wish as being stronger than it should be. In my setting wish is a hugely powerful spell....for a mortal. but on the cosmic scale? its like...watching an ant carry an oversized twig. impressive, in a sort of cute way. but other than that its like 'oh wow that mortal is stronger than most. how nice...anyway...'

this isn't to say that i treat wish as being terribly weak either. you can still do things that are significant with it...but i straight up just don't allow anything that i wouldn't consider to be in the general range of a 9th level spell. you're not reaching out and like...temporarily touching the power of divinity. you've just learned a magic that you can use to manifest whatever effect you want to at that time...but you yourself are still the source of that magic, its still limited by what your character can sustain. and on that scale it is nothing that cosmic level powers (i.e. gods) are worried about. its also important to note that even for the mortals that can wish, on average each of them can only do it 3 times in such a way that might be considered problematic.

as far as other mortals. if you're running a setting where high level magic is so ubiquitous that mortals would not only feel the need to regulate it...but are also capable of regulating it, then IMO there's no reason to try to stick as much as possible to the RaW. just homebrew. The rules aren't really written in a way thats meant to really cover world building.

for example: it could be that all mages are required to 'register'. and part of the 'registration' process, secretly attaches some kind of magical tracer to a young prospective caster that keeps track of how powerful of magic they're capable of casting. how that information is used is up to you. maybe if they get too powerful a group is dispatched to...dispatch them. or recruit them. or they're more closely monitored to ensure that they don't **** with things too much.

[GeneralVryth]

Here is how I would structure wish from another thread:


Casting Wish to do anything but emulate a spell of 8th level or below risks losing it. The only work-arounds are simulacrum or maybe a magic item. This is why I would restructure the backlash. Here is how I would do it. First chuck the random chance non-sense something this important shouldn't be left up to chance. Next, using Wish let's a caster briefly play with the fundamentals of reality around them, risking damage to their soul in the process. Before a caster casts wish the DM should inform them of what level soul burn they will incur.
Light Soul Burn: The caster can still cast Wish, but if they incur soul burn again their soul is destroyed, their dead, and they can't come back.
Heavy Soul Burn: If the caster casts Wish again regardless of effect their soul is destroyed, their dead, and they can't come back.
Soul Destruction: The caster's soul is destroyed, they are dead, and they can't come back.

Duplicating a spell of 8th level or lower doesn't risk soul burn.
Using one of the bullet point actions, risks light soul burn depending on the purity of their actions (basically a DM call if they are trying abuse something or it's a genuine need).
Anything else ranges from risking heavy soul burn to soul destruction depending on the scope of the desire and the DMs judgement.

Finally, as it's name suggests soul burn effects one's soul, the method of casting Wish (whether though item or simulacrum) doesn't matter. Dying, and coming back doesn't matter. The only way to cure the damage is through Wish or divine intervention.

That deals with some of the issues, the more powerful uses of wish are inherently more limited, especially when abusive. The back of my mind connection to all of this is Wish, is a mortals way of tapping a little bit in to the power of the gods. The gods therefor keep a close eye on on those doing it, making it harder or easier as they deem just. And ready to stop/weaken something that goes too far.

Hence the world-building answer of what keeps wishers in line? The entities that can truly wish without restriction, the gods.

[No brains]

3 reminds me of the setting in the (lovely, by the way) Legend of Ethshar novels, where all wizards (who could do stuff even more powerful than Wish in this setting) were very much required, by force to be members of the Wizard's Guild (and thus bound by their rites and practices and such), because other wizards wanted to minimize the amount of trouble they'd collectively have to deal with from epic spells going off the rails.

Thanks for the reply, LudicSavant. And thank you for saying my scenario is lovely! (Or at least has elements in common with something that is lovely) I'll have to investigate Legend of Ethshar and see how they do a high-level magic mafia. The reason why I surmised that the 'wish guild' would not be 'officially' compulsory is that some members of the wish guild are ready to rattle sabers and flex on (potentially as some galaxy-brained feint) other members by taking any chance they can to hunt down and outmaneuver any rogue wishers. Drama being about conflict and whatnot. Also, with the paranoia it takes to play 5-dimensional chess with aleph-null players, if even one person can just be intimidated out of playing altogether, possibly even with just a glimpse of what they're stepping in, it enforces the moral that sometimes it's just better to walk away.


i mean...IMO the answer is to just...not treat wish as being stronger than it should be. In my setting wish is a hugely powerful spell....for a mortal. but on the cosmic scale? its like...watching an ant carry an oversized twig. impressive, in a sort of cute way. but other than that its like 'oh wow that mortal is stronger than most. how nice...anyway...'

this isn't to say that i treat wish as being terribly weak either. you can still do things that are significant with it...but i straight up just don't allow anything that i wouldn't consider to be in the general range of a 9th level spell. you're not reaching out and like...temporarily touching the power of divinity. you've just learned a magic that you can use to manifest whatever effect you want to at that time...but you yourself are still the source of that magic, its still limited by what your character can sustain. and on that scale it is nothing that cosmic level powers (i.e. gods) are worried about. its also important to note that even for the mortals that can wish, on average each of them can only do it 3 times in such a way that might be considered problematic.

as far as other mortals. if you're running a setting where high level magic is so ubiquitous that mortals would not only feel the need to regulate it...but are also capable of regulating it, then IMO there's no reason to try to stick as much as possible to the RaW. just homebrew. The rules aren't really written in a way thats meant to really cover world building.

for example: it could be that all mages are required to 'register'. and part of the 'registration' process, secretly attaches some kind of magical tracer to a young prospective caster that keeps track of how powerful of magic they're capable of casting. how that information is used is up to you. maybe if they get too powerful a group is dispatched to...dispatch them. or recruit them. or they're more closely monitored to ensure that they don't **** with things too much.

I contend that there are spaces in the written rules for wish to be used in a worldbuilding manner. The existence of magic-elusive effects such as anti-magic, dead magic, and helmed horrors creates bunkers outside of wish space. But the restrictions on the timing, location, and hit points of these things means that while it is possible to endure and counter-wish, it is also possible to force those resources out of place of other individuals and checkmate one's will into existence. Why does the bad guy want to siege the ancient abbey? Because it's a dead magic zone where there's a helmed horror that can cast antimagic zone, commune, and wish. If the bad guy can destroy that construct (and repurpose its parts to their own ends) they're another step toward imposing their will on the universe. And they're taking that step in such a way that martials can step on their toes about it. Woo, go those guys.

And even if wish weren't able to do 'godly' things like wish a planet out of existence, Replicating 8th level spells as an action without material costs can still do devastating things. Importantly, devastating things on the scale that are important to other mortals who are also capable of wish and divination spells. Wishing forts into existence, preparing free clones for people, making earthquakes, controlling the weather, and taking steps to drive beings from the outer planes into one's service are goals worth noticing and worth playing against.

Also... and this is my personal baggage, it seems like 5e discussions are positively polluted with homebrew. It seems inelegant and presumptuous to assume that a new rule is somehow better than what came before. It's also a matter of personal philosophy about the nature of what the rules are and what it means to be able to obey, bend, or break them. Some people may view the rules as a cage that keeps them from walking beyond certain bounds, but what I believe the truly creative can see is that while a cage can not be walked through, it can be climbed. There are primates of astounding cleverness that turned their would-be enclosures into resources to express their mental freedom.

But out of curiosity, what are the limitations of Wish in your setting? Can it still undo turns? Grant immunity to specific attacks? Can it still make 300 cubic feet of grain*? Where do you see the cap of its power to be in line with other 9th-level spells?

*extrapolation off of wish being able to make 25,000gp worth of material and wheat costing 1cp a pound, with the assumption that more than a pound of wheat could fit into a cubic foot. Theoretically, if a wisher just wanted a big cube of material, the most useful thing they could get is a 300 foot cube of some grain that is inferior in quality to or just less spatially efficient than wheat. It's sad to think that phenomenal cosmic power can only partially fill a granary... and that's technically a use of wish that might never be used again.


Here is how I would structure wish from another thread:



That deals with some of the issues, the more powerful uses of wish are inherently more limited, especially when abusive. The back of my mind connection to all of this is Wish, is a mortals way of tapping a little bit in to the power of the gods. The gods therefor keep a close eye on on those doing it, making it harder or easier as they deem just. And ready to stop/weaken something that goes too far.

Hence the world-building answer of what keeps wishers in line? The entities that can truly wish without restriction, the gods.

I can't say I'm a fan of this soul burn proposal. Firstly, it's a judgement call as to what incurs what degree of soul burn. This introduces a moral meta where one has to get into a situation that would require a wish and then cunningly weasel in rider effects in the phrasing to incur more limited soul burn. Now wish is just like an emergency bill getting passed.

It also leaves open the loophole of using other creatures to wish for you. If wishing takes souls, then that introduces a market for soul-laundering. Of course, if that's the point, that's actually kind of brilliant. Devils, liches, and anything with an emphasis on mind control can set up cults and pyramid schemes wherein they fish for pliable enough individuals to waste their souls wishing on effects to other ends. Further, if the judgement of gods is the limiter on wishes, having the alignment of an evil god to approve a wish is a useful way to lobby for reality alteration.

It's also peculiar that wish damage to a soul can be fixed by wish. Is it a damaging use of wish to repair soul burn? Does it have to be a sacrifice, or does it just slow wish down to taking more wishes? Let's say that the unspoken cosmic force that deals out soul burn could burn the head of a wish pyramid scheme even if they didn't directly wish. If a lackey in that scheme were granted a wish to cure the head of soul burn, who takes the soul burn in that instance?

It's also funny to get back-to-back interpretations that wish both is and isn't divine power. This is why wish has to be democratized among a loose alliance of interested mortals who self-regulate in order to keep big divinity out of their affairs. :smalltongue: When they aren't doing magic atrocities, Tasha, Vlaakith, and noble Efreet are protecting your freedom. :smallbiggrin:

[KorvinStarmast]

Thought experiment for worldbuilding using Wish rules: Assuming creatures in a game world are aware of the potency of the Wish spell and would work to foil it when able, what tactics would they use to enforce the cosmic status quo? Kill all wizards would be a good first step. Number of wishes go way down.


3. A Treaty Organization of Wish Regulation: When a creature becomes Wish-capable or near-Wish-capable, it gets a visit from representatives of other Wish casters in the cosmos. They are informed that there are many powerful and observantly interested parties who have mutually agreed to restrict Wish in ways that do not obstruct each other. These parties want the new Wish-capable creature to agree to these terms so that resources do not need to be expended to force them to comply. Compliance is not technically compulsory, but be aware that if the new creature seeks to use Wish in an inconsiderate manner, they need to be thorough in covering their tracks and tushy afterwards. A poor idea. Impacts player agency too heavily. If the world were that well organized, or that heavily, micromanaged, there'd be no need for adventurers.

Here is how I would structure wish from another thread: Here is a simpler, less fiddly idea along the same lines.
Above and beyond the damage, the strength loss, and the rest requirements already in the PHB, add

"When you cast wish to do other than replicate a spell of level 8 or lower, roll a d6 and take that many levels of exhaustion."

Note that 6 levels of exhaustion equals dead.

There was an old meme / saying about "don't mess with mother nature" that IIRC made it into a Land O' Lakes margarine commercial.

Well, this fits similarly, sort of like a "don't mess with creation unless you are willing to accept the consequences" message. :smallbiggrin:

[Unoriginal]

I'll join what some others have said: Wish is powerful, but not status quo shaking.

Each Duke of Hell is able to offer the equivalent of Wish to several mortals. Each Noble Genie can do it too, if less frequently. Neither risk to suffer from blacklashes for it.

A mortal who tries to Wish for X, when X is something that shakes the status quo and as such upsets the bigger players, will find themselves confronted with dozens of entities that have Wished notX either in the past or in reaction. To say nothing of stronger divine or planar powers.

[GeneralVryth]

"When you cast wish to do other than replicate a spell of level 8 or lower, roll a d6 and take that many levels of exhaustion."

Note that 6 levels of exhaustion equals dead.

There was an old meme / saying about "don't mess with mother nature" that IIRC made it into a Land O' Lakes margarine commercial.

Well, this fits similarly, sort of like a "don't mess with creation unless you are willing to accept the consequences" message. :smallbiggrin:

Part of the point was to take the randomness out of it. Basically, wish is a drop godlike power attached intrinsically to the user. They should have a reasonable idea of when they are pushing the extent of their power and the potential consequences. Hence the slightly added fiddliness. Also, at those levels death is more of an inconvenience. So just making death a risk without the loss of wish or perma death isn't ideal.

Also, I really like the idea of someone that wants to burn it all for one glorious action (a perfect endgame hero move) being able to do just that and get spectacular results for their effort.

[kazaryu]

I contend that there are spaces in the written rules for wish to be used in a worldbuilding manner. The existence of magic-elusive effects such as anti-magic, dead magic, and helmed horrors creates bunkers outside of wish space. But the restrictions on the timing, location, and hit points of these things means that while it is possible to endure and counter-wish, it is also possible to force those resources out of place of other individuals and checkmate one's will into existence. Why does the bad guy want to siege the ancient abbey? Because it's a dead magic zone where there's a helmed horror that can cast antimagic zone, commune, and wish. If the bad guy can destroy that construct (and repurpose its parts to their own ends) they're another step toward imposing their will on the universe. And they're taking that step in such a way that martials can step on their toes about it. Woo, go those guys.

-snip-

Also... and this is my personal baggage, it seems like 5e discussions are positively polluted with homebrew. It seems inelegant and presumptuous to assume that a new rule is somehow better than what came before. It's also a matter of personal philosophy about the nature of what the rules are and what it means to be able to obey, bend, or break them. Some people may view the rules as a cage that keeps them from walking beyond certain bounds, but what I believe the truly creative can see is that while a cage can not be walked through, it can be climbed. There are primates of astounding cleverness that turned their would-be enclosures into resources to express their mental freedom.

Yes, there are some tools to deal with wish, but i'd argue that they're not really world-building tools. The number of ways to hide from a wish are few and far between. even your origninal proposal included some homebrew. "a helmed horror that is immune to wish (completely Raw) that has some means to detect if a Wish happened that otherwise would not affect it.
" afaik that doesn't exist. and thats what i mean by the rules aren't designed for world building. world building is a separate thing. which is why each of the new settings that come out have their own mechanics that come with them. spells, subclasses, magic items, but more than that the way many of the settings functions implies magic that simply doesn't exist as player options. This is something that i think is often overlooked by people that build their own setting. all official settings come with their own 'homebrew'...why shouldn't yours?



And even if wish weren't able to do 'godly' things like wish a planet out of existence, Replicating 8th level spells as an action without material costs can still do devastating things. Importantly, devastating things on the scale that are important to other mortals who are also capable of wish and divination spells. Wishing forts into existence, preparing free clones for people, making earthquakes, controlling the weather, and taking steps to drive beings from the outer planes into one's service are goals worth noticing and worth playing against. oh absolutely, as i said, wish is still a powerful spell for a mortal. it makes sense that mortals would care about it. I just don't think its something that so powerful that cosmic entities (the type that care about ensuring the laws of the universe remain) would care...because none of those things are things that can be bypassed by wish.

but even from a mortal perspective, i don't think the rules are really designed with the idea that wish, as a spell, is ubiquitous enough in the setting that people/places would really have coutner measures in place for it specifically. so if you're making a setting where it is going to be more ubiquitous among mortals. than you're going to want to consider just...making things up. it doesn't have to be much (for example, my suggestion was some kind of magical tracer that can be tapped into to check in on a casters power level. everything else, from there, could be vanilla.

as far as replicating a spell, I don't even view that as something that even mortals would care about wish, specifically, about. as players we consider even that aspect of wish to be REALLY strong. but thats mostly because it can bypass the time/material component requirement. it means that when you prepare wish, you have access to every single spell in the books (except 9th) as an action, for free. that gives a powerful amount of versatility. (i.e. walk into a liches lair and insta-cast hallow). But most actors in the world aren't under the same time restraints that players are. so for them, being able to cast wish for that is...convenient. it CAN help them. but most of the time they have the time to just...cast the spells they want to cast. and that gets even more true in a setting where high level casters are common enough for there to be an organization capable of imposing its will on wish users.




But out of curiosity, what are the limitations of Wish in your setting? Can it still undo turns? Grant immunity to specific attacks? Can it still make 300 cubic feet of grain*? Where do you see the cap of its power to be in line with other 9th-level spells?

*extrapolation off of wish being able to make 25,000gp worth of material and wheat costing 1cp a pound, with the assumption that more than a pound of wheat could fit into a cubic foot. Theoretically, if a wisher just wanted a big cube of material, the most useful thing they could get is a 300 foot cube of some grain that is inferior in quality to or just less spatially efficient than wheat. It's sad to think that phenomenal cosmic power can only partially fill a granary... and that's technically a use of wish that might never be used again. I don't see how that could be the most useful thing they could make. in a famine it might be the best they can do...but in that case its also SUPER useful. But I don't base my idea of power on its utility. power=utility is a purely player facing idea. I base my idea of 'power' in what you're actually doing...in this case straight up manifesting something from nothing. and...most likely ALOT of that something....25,000 gold worth of mithril or adamantine? steel? wood? thats a huge amount of power.

that said i don't really have a hard set of rules that i use. and i don't plan to develop any, specifically because of how flexible wish is. me deciding that I won't allow a player to use wish to like...turn turn a statue of a dragon into a real ancient dragon doesn't help if that player decides they want to cast wish to transmute the wooden structure that they had built for cheap into a structure of solid granite and marble. i'd rather make a decision on a case by case basis. I absolutely allow anything the wish spell explicitly says it does, and the examples that it gives. Although i will note that i don't monkey paw a player cast wish, and im always upfront about the potential risks. OTOH i don't stick exclusively to the downsides listed. depending on the wish, i may have them roll to withstand the effects and they may suffer deeper consequences than are listed in the spell. including permanent alterations. But i am up front about those risks, and i'd only impose them on particularly powerful wishes.

For example: i was preparing a short adventure with a group where they were going after a lich. unfortunately, things fell apart before we could conclude the adventure. But it was a big bad that i wanted to continue to use. So i collaborated with one of the players to elaborate on how the adventure failed. He decided that the group had found the the lich and their lair, but the lich has used wish to force the party out, and in specifically his characters case, inflict the punishment of turning him into a vampire. This is obviously a hugely powerful effect. specifically the xformation, its more than just true polymorph. So on the lich I imposed several direct harms to its body...but also to its mind. The desire to survive, or more specifically to keep that specific body alive, became imprinted as a core instinct. Thus weakening the lich while also explaining why it didn't just...kill itself to get a new, unafflicted body. This would, in turn, allow me to have a later party fight the lich while its weaker, while still being able to explain why during the final fight it was still able to hold its own, even though the part had gotten stronger.

now the mental imprint thing is...theoretically a risk. but its not likely to be one that i present to players, and its almost certainly not one i'd inflict. im a big fan of player autonomy. but yeah. idk thats the best way to explain that i can think of.

[KorvinStarmast]

Also, I really like the idea of someone that wants to burn it all for one glorious action (a perfect endgame hero move) being able to do just that and get spectacular results for their effort.
There is a certain appeal to that, yes.