Lich - Misunderstood or the monster they seem to be?

Overview

Liches are the remains of great wizards who embrace undeath as a means of preserving themselves. They further their own power at any cost, having no interest in the affairs of the living except where those affairs interfere with their own. Scheming and insane, they hunger for long-forgotten knowledge and the most terrible secrets. Because the shadow of death doesn’t hang over them, they can conceive plans that take years, decades, or centuries to come to fruition.
A lich’s aims are often obscured by multiple layers of misdirection, and it likely keeps a full picture of its goals from all but its most trusted servants. A random cultist captured in the first episode of the adventure will most likely not be privy to the entirety of the lich’s schemes, and may not even know the nature of their master. The party might spend several levels thwarting the lich’s followers before learning even a hint about their ultimate foe. Of course, cultists and minor undead would only form the rank and file of a lich’s following. Flesh golems, wights, ghouls, fiends, spectres, mummies, and other creatures would also surround a lich, as well as other, more exotic foes. A lich might command a slaad through its control gem, have an ooze it animated in some strange experiment, keep a bone naga it turned undead a century or two ago out of spite, and maybe even a corrupted paladin turned death knight.

Spellcasters

Magic isn’t just a tool to a lich, it’s their all-encompassing obsession, and their skills should reflect this. Watching a lich weave a spell is not just any old show. Van Gogh didn’t just brush some paint on a canvas. Michaelangelo didn’t just hack away at marble. Donatello didn’t just mold clay. The spells of a lich are more than words in a stat block, they’re testament to an arcane brilliance so great that it has successfully untangled itself from the mortal coil. Given their exceptional mastery of the arcane, a lich would certainly know that a party’s spellcaster has the potential to be their most significant rival. Fortunately, the lich has a fair chance of neutralizing the threat either with power word stun, which targets a saving throw in which spellcasters are generally weaker, or through the spell-neutralizing globe of invulnerability. If multiple opponents present themselves, the lich favours the latter, relying on mirror image to keep it safe from nonmagical attacks. A lich might even maintain mirror image on itself through the contingency spell, set to activate if the lich is physically attacked, since the doesn’t require concentration and therefore wouldn’t potentially disrupt another effect the lich is maintaining at the time.
Particularly troublesome martial foes, especially paladins, the lich would keep at bay through various measures. While the most effective is merely keeping a distance (potentially through dimension door), a lich would happily hurl a persistent individual away with thunderwave (ideally forcing them into a hazard). If not concentrating on another spell, a lich might opt to use dominate monster on a weak-willed attacker, such as a barbarian, who stands a good chance to fail their saving throw even with the advantage they would have as active combatants against the lich. A lich would sooner save its reaction for counterspell than shield, only using the latter when its efforts to find advantageous positioning are insufficient and it is exposed to multiple physical attacks.
It is important to remember that the lich doesn’t fear the destruction of its body, since it is certain to return near its well-hidden phylactery. Rather, it would prefer to avoid the loss of the equipment it carries and the period of inactivity it is forced into while it regenerates (up to 10 days), which might cause disruption in its plans.

Path to Lichdom

No wizard takes up the path to lichdom on a whim, and the process of becoming a lich is a well-guarded secret. Wizards that seek lichdom must make bargains with fiends, evil gods, or other foul entities. Many turn to Orcus, Demon Prince of Undeath, whose power has created countless liches. However, those that control the power of lichdom always demand fealty and service for their knowledge. A lich is created by an arcane ritual that traps the wizard’s soul within a phylactery. Doing so binds the soul to the mortal world, preventing it from traveling to the Outer Planes after death. A phylactery is traditionally an amulet in the shape of a small box, but it can take the form of any item possessing an interior space into which arcane sigils of naming, binding, immortality, and dark magic are scribed in silver.
With its phylactery prepared, the future lich drinks a potion of transformation — a vile concoction of poison mixed with the blood of a sentient creature whose soul is sacrificed to the phylactery. The wizard falls dead, then rises as a lich as its soul is drawn into the phylactery, where it forever remains.
Soul Sacrifices. A lich must periodically feed souls to its phylactery to sustain the magic preserving its body and consciousness. It does this using the imprisonment spell. Instead of choosing one of the normal options of the spell, the lich uses the spell to magically trap the target’s body and soul inside its phylactery. The phylactery must be on the same plane as the lich for the spell to work. A lich’s phylactery can hold only one creature at a time, and a dispel magic cast as a 9th-level spell upon the phylactery releases any creature imprisoned within it. A creature imprisoned in the phylactery for 24 hours is consumed and destroyed utterly, whereupon nothing short of divine intervention can restore it to life.
A lich that fails or forgets to maintain its body with sacrificed souls begins to physically fall apart, and might eventually become a demilich.

Phylactery

The process of achieving lichdom required that the spellcaster construct a powerful magical artifact, a phylactery, in which the lich stored its life essence. As long as this phylactery was unharmed, the lich was immortal and would attempt to reassemble if it was ever vanquished (this happened within 10 days after its apparent destruction). It did not, however, grant any of the normal benefits of a phylactery until it was fully completed. For these reasons, liches took great care in protecting their phylactery from harm, employing decoys, traps, and other defenses. The most common physical form for a phylactery was a sealed metal box containing strips of parchment on which magical phrases had been transcribed. Other forms of phylacteries existed, often small or tiny trinkets such as rings, amulets, or similar items. It could also take other shapes if the lich expended more gold and experience to make such alterations.
When the phylactery was created, the wizard transferred a bit of life force into the creation. While crafting the phylactery taxed the physical strength of the caster, the materials and components could easily exceed 120,000 gp. Overall, creating a phylactery was a very daunting task for anyone of arcane power.

Medium

Paper

Location

Candlekeep