Liches

[nizrad]

So I have always kind of wondered about how to handle the liches Hit Dice, in the Greyhawk Supplement there are listed as having 10+ HD and minimum level of 12th but most often of 18th level. Now the main question I have is how do you guys handle liches HD? Is the + afterwards a variable number such as 10+8(for an 18th lvl caster), or does the + infer additional HD as in a 16 HD lich (at 18th level)?
If I were to make a 30th level lich would it be unfounded to give it 30 HD?

Another question is to phylacetry or not. I'm inclined to use them if only because liches have had them in the other editions. Yet I think that forgoing the phylacatry would give the player a sort of finality when defeating a lich instead of wondering where it is keeping it's life force and when the lich will seek its revenge.

[talysman]

Apr 19, 2012 2:43:34 GMT -6 nizrad said:

So I have always kind of wondered about how to handle the liches Hit Dice, in the Greyhawk Supplement there are listed as having 10+ HD and minimum level of 12th but most often of 18th level. Now the main question I have is how do you guys handle liches HD? Is the + afterwards a variable number such as 10+8(for an 18th lvl caster), or does the + infer additional HD as in a 16 HD lich (at 18th level)?
If I were to make a 30th level lich would it be unfounded to give it 30 HD?

Another question is to phylacetry or not. I'm inclined to use them if only because liches have had them in the other editions. Yet I think that forgoing the phylacatry would give the player a sort of finality when defeating a lich instead of wondering where it is keeping it's life force and when the lich will seek its revenge.

The phylactery is up to personal preference. I like it, although I wouldn't necessarily use a literal phylactery; I'd more likely use some kind of gem or cursed idol or something.

For hit dice, I'd base it on max spell level. Add 4 to max spell level to get HD, double max spell level to get caster level. After all, the main reason to have liches of different power levels is to distinguish what spells they can use...

[nizrad]

Thanks talysman, that method makes alot of sense. I too prefer to use phylacatries often as obviously valuble treasure that can be sold off to a wealthy noble/collector only to be put up on a mantle. That is until the lich reforms a few days or so later and blasts the noble's mansion to smitherines prior to seeking revenge on the fools who 'temporarily' dispatched it's physical form.

[kenmeister]

Apr 19, 2012 2:43:34 GMT -6 nizrad said:

So I have always kind of wondered about how to handle the liches Hit Dice, in the Greyhawk Supplement there are listed as having 10+ HD and minimum level of 12th but most often of 18th level. Now the main question I have is how do you guys handle liches HD? Is the + afterwards a variable number such as 10+8(for an 18th lvl caster), or does the + infer additional HD as in a 16 HD lich (at 18th level)?
If I were to make a 30th level lich would it be unfounded to give it 30 HD?

It's the former. The Monster Manual clears up any confusion about how lich hit dice are supposed to work, explaining that the magic-user's hit dice become 8-sided. So an 18th level magic-user has 11 4-sided hit dice + 7, and upon becoming a lich gets 11 8-sided hit dice + 7. (In AD&D, magic-users have up to 11 hit dice.)

[llenlleawg]

re: phylacteries

Odds are, you are not going to have that many liches in the campaign anyway, so I would ask the question in a different way, namely, does it make sense for this lich to have a phylactery, not whether all liches as such have them. You are not likely to have a large enough sample size, I suspect, for an answer to the second question to be worth deciding the question ahead of time. Just because this lich has one need not mean that they all do, and just because that lich does not have one does not mean it was not a singular exception.

[nizrad]

Apr 29, 2012 4:29:11 GMT -6 kenmeister said:

Apr 19, 2012 2:43:34 GMT -6 nizrad said:

So I have always kind of wondered about how to handle the liches Hit Dice, in the Greyhawk Supplement there are listed as having 10+ HD and minimum level of 12th but most often of 18th level. Now the main question I have is how do you guys handle liches HD? Is the + afterwards a variable number such as 10+8(for an 18th lvl caster), or does the + infer additional HD as in a 16 HD lich (at 18th level)?
If I were to make a 30th level lich would it be unfounded to give it 30 HD?

It's the former. The Monster Manual clears up any confusion about how lich hit dice are supposed to work, explaining that the magic-user's hit dice become 8-sided. So an 18th level magic-user has 11 4-sided hit dice + 7, and upon becoming a lich gets 11 8-sided hit dice + 7. (In AD&D, magic-users have up to 11 hit dice.)

Okay that all makes sense in the regard to using the alternate hit dice found in Greyhawk but I am sticking with the d6HD as is in M&M. Using only M&M advancement i.e the tables listed therein how would I dice such a lich of say 16th level? Thus I found Talysman's method quite intuitive. Either way I find both methods to work just as well as the next, I am just interested in how others ruled the dicing of their lich's hit points.