Ask the Loremaster: Liches

[EdTheKet]

On Liches
  Over the last couple of months, we’ve had some inquiries on what it would take for somebody to become a lich.
  Other than the fact that we want to have the lich creature in the  world (and already have, see NPCs such as Drezneb), we never defined how  it would actually work and if it would be player attainable.

 Liches, Death, Soul Strands and Soul Vessels.
  In Layonara, and the way death works with soul strands, an aspiring  lich would have to successfully be able to attach his soul strands to  something other than his body. This “something other” is what is usually  called a phylactery, but which we will call a Soul Vessel.
  Before being able to do so, the aspiring lich would have to undertake  certain rituals. The final ritual would mean the death of the body of  the aspiring lich, re-attachment of any remaining soul strands to the  Soul Vessel and the soul of the aspiring lich then possessing the  now-dead body.
  This way, the soul would possess and control the body, but not be  attached to it through soul strands. It’d be attached to the phylactery  object (which can be any object).
 
  Because of the way the bindstones work (see LORE: Bindstones  ), the link to the bindstones will be severed at the time of successful  completion of the attachment of the Soul Strands to the Soul Vessel.
  This way, when the lich’s body  is destroyed, the soul would then  return to the Soul Vessel  and not the bindstone. It would then take  7-14 days for the lich’s corporeal form to manifest again.
 ·         If  the Soul Vessel is destroyed while soul is in the Soul Vessel, the lich  dies for real and the soul makes its way towards the Thread as normal  (see LORE: Death )
 ·         If  the Soul Vessel is destroyed while the soul is controlling the body,  the lich will continue to “survive” until the body is destroyed. At that  point, the soul makes its way towards the Thread as normal.

 Why would you want to be a lich?
 ·         [FONT="]if  you're bound to the bindstone, you will eventually die of old age. If  you're a lich, your body is already dead so you won't die of old age[/FONT]
 ·         you will not die of old age, so you have more time to practice your craft/research/magic/etc
  Anyone pursuing lichdom would have a loose grip on his sanity though.

 Lichdom for PCs?
  Player characters are able to attempt lichdom however, when successful  after several CDQs and a WLDQ, the consequence would be that the  character would become an NPC.
  This is for the following reasons:
  1)      We are not keen on making a new death system that would deal with the Soul Vessel, respawning and the like.
  2)      We don’t want to make a new class as that is too much work. We  could make a subrace skin for a lich, but that’d mean it’d make the  character classified as “undead” which could have all kinds of  consequences with spells.
  3)      We don’t want something like a "kind, misunderstood lich" RP.  To pursue lichdom, you aren’t an entirely sane person, and very likely  have Chaotic Evil tendencies. CE has always been grounds for  NPCification. Of course, there may be plausible stories to get around  the CE tendency, but that won’t overcome the other reasons.
  4)      The character would be undead. From a practical point of view,  the character would not be allowed to enter cities, craft halls, other  public spaces with a good chance of looking under the hood (literally),  which is not practical to check without permanent GM presence.
  5)      The character would also be almost impossible to play on  quests, bar potential Corath ones. We as GMs would most certainly NOT  allow the lich in a party when other party members would know IC it's a  lich, but would tolerate him because the players don't want to be mean  to the player that plays the lich.
  6)      The Soul Vessel would have to be in game. Many undead  abhorring players could/would/should go look for it and destroy it as  that would be something their character would do. This would then mean  players would actively seek the perma-death of another. You can then say  “Well, let’s not take it that far then” but that would not be realistic.


Questions? Ask!

[Gulnyr]

This way, when the lich’s body  is destroyed, the soul would then  return to the Soul Vessel  and not the bindstone. It would then take  7-14 days for the lich’s corporeal form to manifest again.

How does it manifest again?  If the body is destroyed, how is it undestroyed?  Is it part of the magic involved with becoming a lich?  Does it reform in a certain place, maybe beside the soul vessel?  Or does it reform wherever it was destroyed?  Do the old pieces need to be gathered, or do they magically poof to the place of reformation, or do new bits magically poof from nowhere to form a brand new deteriorating body?

Is "soul walking" something anyone can do, or just liches?  For any of our characters, the soul is tied to the body by the soul strands.  If they die, the magic of the bindstones hooks the souls and bodies together again, as long as there are intact strands.  When a lich's body is destroyed, the soul goes to the soul vessel, from which it apparently goes "walking" to get back into its body.  Is there some magic between the two that make that possible, and that is actually the only "movement" permitted?  So it would effectively teleport from the soul vessel to the body?

I'm curious because without some sort of magical restrictions, why bother with the old body at all (assuming the guy didn't have really pretty bones or something)?  If the soul can exist outside the soul vessel and outside its old body, it can go wherever and be pretty well undetectable.  Maybe that PKE meter from Ghostbusters could find one, but those aren't available around Layonara.  And if there's no special affinity for the old body, why not possess any corpse whenever a body is needed?

I'm also curious because the answers to some of these questions could affect lich hunting.  Where and how the body reforms could be pretty important.  If it needs the old pieces of its body to reform it, for example, but some of the pieces can be placed in an anti-magic area before they can poof away, would the lich be able to reform at all?  If it doesn't need the pieces of its old, destroyed body, doesn't that make lich magic more powerful than bindstones since it would be creating a new body?

"Brand new deteriorating body" sounds silly.

[Spike]

To pursue lichdom, you aren’t an entirely sane person

Maybe not the weak sanity your foolish, pathetic morals would dictate, but a true sanity where the human condition has no place! Mawhahaha! MAWHAHA! *cough cough* Anyway... nicely written. Its a shame this isn't a viable option for PCs though.

[Dorganath]

Maybe not the weak sanity your foolish, pathetic morals would dictate, but a true sanity where the human condition has no place! Mawhahaha! MAWHAHA! *cough cough* Anyway... nicely written. Its a shame this isn't a viable option for PCs though.

While most or all of the technical limitations can be overcome, the intended gameplay environment of Layonara kind of excludes liches as PCs, for the reasons that Ed outlined.

[geloooo]

What's the difference between a lich and a palemaster? Since palemaster is a purely NWN class, how might we call a person that has palemaster levels?

[lonnarin]

how might we call a person that has palemaster levels?

"Dread Lord Ramanon or Master Vensk, sir."

[Stephen_Zuckerman]

Pale Masters are not liches... They are still fundamentally mortal - tied to their bodies even as they take on the aspect of undeath. They may stop aging, and perhaps their thirst and hunger wane, but the central concept of the Lich is that it is divorced from its mortal shell, and uses it only as a vessel for its plans. The Pale Master has not taken that step. He has not truly cast off from life by cutting loose of the Bindstones and silencing his heart.

So... Y'know. In short, the Pale Master might one day grow up big and strong and get his own soul vessel, but for now, he's still just a super-necromancer.

[EdTheKet]

How does it manifest again?  If the body is destroyed, how is it undestroyed?  Is it part of the magic involved with becoming a lich?  Does it reform in a certain place, maybe beside the soul vessel?  Or does it reform wherever it was destroyed?  Do the old pieces need to be gathered, or do they magically poof to the place of reformation, or do new bits magically poof from nowhere to form a brand new deteriorating body?

The body will reform next to the Soul Vessel and does not need pieces to be gathered.
The rituals that the aspiring lich needs to go through ultimately make this process work in a similar way to a bindstone reconstitution / resurrection. (Resurrection is not really an appropriate term for an undead body)

Of course a Soul Vessel is not a bindstone, but the pulling back the soul and body is similar.

So how would it go?
Lich is killed, the soul returns to the soul vessel, lich's remains also disappear (just like a dead body of a stone bound would) and will eventually reconstitute at the Soul Vessel. This reconstitution is not instantaneous because this magic is far weaker (and slightly different, yet similar) from what bindstones do. Soul takes control of the body after it has reconstituted.

If for some obscure reason (e.g. adventurers hunting for a lich putting it there!)  there would be another dead body next to the Soul Vessel, the soul would not be able to take control of that while waiting for the lich's own remains to reconstitute. Soul, body and vessel were linked together in the rituals leading up to becoming a lich, which allows for the soul to take control of its body again, it can't do that with other bodies, it needs to be its own.

Is "soul walking" something anyone can do, or just liches?  For any of our characters, the soul is tied to the body by the soul strands.  If they die, the magic of the bindstones hooks the souls and bodies together again, as long as there are intact strands.  When a lich's body is destroyed, the soul goes to the soul vessel, from which it apparently goes "walking" to get back into its body.  Is there some magic between the two that make that possible, and that is actually the only "movement" permitted?  So it would effectively teleport from the soul vessel to the body?

Since the body reconstitutes next to the Soul Vessel, there isn't really a big distance to travel/walk. When it reconstitutes, the magics involved in the past rituals forces soul and body together.

So no voluntary wandering, or the soul leaving the body empty and actively deciding to move over when it wants. Once the body reconstitutes, body and soul are rejoined (like with a bindstone, but then delayed).

I'm curious because without some sort of magical restrictions, why bother with the old body at all (assuming the guy didn't have really pretty bones or something)?  If the soul can exist outside the soul vessel and outside its old body, it can go wherever and be pretty well undetectable.  Maybe that PKE meter from Ghostbusters could find one, but those aren't available around Layonara.  And if there's no special affinity for the old body, why not possess any corpse whenever a body is needed?

I think I covered this now.

I'm also curious because the answers to some of these questions could affect lich hunting.  Where and how the body reforms could be pretty important.  If it needs the old pieces of its body to reform it, for example, but some of the pieces can be placed in an anti-magic area before they can poof away, would the lich be able to reform at all?  If it doesn't need the pieces of its old, destroyed body, doesn't that make lich magic more powerful than bindstones since it would be creating a new body?

I think I covered this too now, if not I'm sure you'll let me know

What's the difference between a lich and a palemaster?

A palemaster is still alive and is "just" a necromancer. A lich is unliving, has undertaken some rituals in order to attach his soul to a soul vessel instead of his body.


Pale masters probably give themselves all kinds of twisted, mad and megalomaniac titles, after all, there's something not quite sane about grafting remains onto your body!