Lich

Liches (from Leiche, German for "corpse") are spellcasters, typically necromancers who have managed to master their self proclaimed 'art' to cross the line between life and death, becoming undead creatures of immense mystical power. After decades of research, practice, gathering of rare-materials, spell components and forbidden dark-lore, an aspirant to-be performs a ritual that extracts the soul/'life force' from it's body and places it in a phylactery. This object, often in narrative is usually an ornament of value to the Lich in it's past life, barring that- it's usually appearance-wise on par with the like of a reliquary, a small sealed box with bindings on it with varied iconography, sometimes with an item inside. This transformation process in tabletop tradition is left vague but given implication it is an evil act- though many sources have gone on to explain and detail the likes of such a transformation.

After culminating the ritual with the caster's death and subsequent reanimation, that sometimes follows a brief period of inactivity- the Lich comes to be. The Lich features the unique benefits that the undead are privy too, and should the lich's physical body is ever destroyed, It will reform at the phylactery- though in older works- this has been limited to the concept of possessing actively present corpses to return to unlife, and this is possible so long as the phylactery remains intact. This makes liches nice persistent foes for a DM to throw at an adventuring party. Other benefits of lichdom include the ability to (un)live without eating or sleeping, giving the lich that much more time to 'get things done', though in some cases there is a type of maintenance that must be performed by the Lich for it to retain it's hold on the world of the living, and in addition the Phylactery offers protection against various magics and effects that could be used to harm the soul.

The ritual/ceremony for becoming a lich (and many other applications of necromancy) tend to involve sacrificing innocents, trafficking with evil outsiders, using a freshly cut out heart of a sentient being, desecrating holy ground to perform the 'art', abusing the souls of the dead, worshiping evil gods, and generally being a bigger dickhead version of Prometheus in the grand cosmic scale- often with all of these examples playing into one another, so it's a given that over various mediums liches are generally of evil alignment, especially certain since the proceeds to this state of being also accommodate the fact that turning into an undead creature tends to erase mortal trappings and turns it's subject into something more akin to an unfeeling uncaring machine, but a person who neither eats nor sleeps and reforms after being destroyed can certainly do a lot of good given the idea it is part of a fantasy genre where magic can benefit people and one has all the time in the world to continuously develop it in a state of pure academia; depending on the setting, it may be possible to become a lich without doing anything irredeemably evil (or even mean-spirited) for the good of all. And even in some settings where Lichdom is in the general standing of- if the local citizens hear of it, an army is raised to combat it- because it is that much of a social taboo, there do exist good variants of this Undead creature.

To note- Phylactery use does not explicitly mean or make a Lich- a Lich- as this is fiction and at the most strained view of the concept, a Lich is fundamentally an undead/undead-like spellcaster who has extended it's lifespan via unnatural means. Extended from this, unnatural may constitute unholiness or otherwise, something about the being that clearly earns it it's name, due to it being a walking withered corpse missing it's eyes, in place, unnatural glowing pinpoint lights presenting to an onlooker clear negative visual stimuli.

Liches in Dungeons and Dragons

A rare example of a female lich.

Liches have always been a staple of Dungeons and Dragons, following through the tabletop system and it's settings and editions continuously up to the 5th edition as a part of the lore as deities, adversaries, characters in novels, and more with later editions featured as playable options for players seeking means to retire his/her characters ingame- through OD&D-AD&D to 2e, and 3.5, Liches have followed a progressive evolution in form, functionality and inclusion, peaking at 3.5 before 4e came in and returned the state of this creature to it's older rules and regulations in the first edition, as an evil undead creature that maintains it's imperfect immortality through the consumption of souls.

Back in 2e D&D, liches came in multiple types depending on what kind of magic was used to create them. Your common lich was a former wizard, with separate stats in other splats for clerical, bardic and psionic liches.

Liches in Warcraft and World of Warcraft

The first Lich of the setting is the Lich King, created by kil'jaeden after merging the tortured soul of the former Warchief and shaman Ner'zhul into a set of armor and the runeblade Frostmourne, then encasing it inside a magical ice-crystal.

Other Lich like Kel'thuzard, a former necromancer was created by Arthas after he invaded warcraft elf-land and dump the said necromancer's ashes into the magical waters of the Sunwell (with a bit help from a burning legion dreadlord Tichondrius). They go on to create more liches, both from orcs amd humans, but this process is rather unclear. A few bit of information states that one has to commit suicide, and the involvement of a higher being (Lich King or Kel'thuzad for example) is neccessary for their ascension. Liches are seen as evil by both the Horde and the Alliance. It should also be noted that the first sentient undeads of the setting were the Death Knights created by Gul'dan, which shared a similar process of creation with the mainstray lich. The soul of an orc warlock was sealed within a gem, and that gem was then placed on the body of a slain human knight. The process was fuelled by the sacrifice of a few dozen orc necrolytes.

Liches in Mythology

Russian mythology brings us Koschei the deathless, an archetypal lich with a rather original way of storing his phylactery. Koschei's soul is hidden in a needle, which is hidden in an egg, which is hidden in a hare, which is hidden in a duck; all of this in a locked chest buried under a tree on the Russian equivalent of Atlantis. Aside from his original fusion of magical, culinary, and geographic defenses, he also differs from most liches in that he kidnaps princesses instead of studying magic all the time like a fucking nerd. Is the namesake for Kostchtchie.

Lich Variants

Archlich

A lich who took longer to become a lich, and has a diminished spellcasting capacity (some spell-like abilities and 9 spells from their original spellbook) but isn't evil in the trade-off. Introduced in Spelljammer, but mostly ignored by later settings and editions, up until it got to be an Epic Destiny in 4e.

Baelnorn

A good-aligned elf lich, created willingly from an elf who wants to be undead only to guard something very important or who wants to stick around beyond death to keep watch over their family.

Boneclaw

The result of a failed attempt to become a lich. If the soul fails to go into the phylactery, it instead binds to a random evil humanoid, whom the boneclaw becomes enslaved to. The boneclaw is permanently destroyed only when the humanoid it is bonded with dies or stops being evil.

Death Knight

Essentially the gish version of a lich, an undead warrior-wizard. Originally just the next step up from the skeleton warrior by gaining some increased HD and spell-like abilities, they got more lich-like in 4th edition, complete with their chosen weapons doubling as their phylacteries. In 5th, a Death Knight is what happens when an evil paladin dies. Everytime they die, they come back again until they atone for their sins. Which is completely optional.

Deathless

A race of goodly lich-like undead created in 3rd edition for the Eberron setting. They're fueled by Positive Energy rather than Negative Energy and are basically "reverse liches".

Demilich/Demi-Lich

A lich who derped around for so long that his body is just a flying bit of skeleton (usually a skull) full of soul gems. Despite their small size, they're much nastier than a normal lich; their spellcasting is even stronger, they have oodles of opportunities to cast Soul Trap and bone you, and they like to fly juuuust out of players' easy reach. They are also immune to most spells and magical effects, except for a few holy-powered ones and one derpy second-level spell called shatter that screws them something fierce by blowing out their soul gems. Their lore's flipflopped between editions, going from the next step in lichly evolution to a weakened form caused when a lich either gets too bored with existence (Pathfinder), or fails to eat enough souls. Fifth edition goes both ways, stating that most liches eventually become demiliches after a long time, but that some like the infamous Acererak prepare for this by fitting their skulls with gems that devour souls while their spirits cruise through different planes of existence in search of greater knowledge.

Dracolich

Lichified dragons, mostly associated with the crazy Cult of the Dragon from Forgotten Realms who want to create dracoliches to rule the world. They still have phylacteries, but need to possess a dragon's physical remains to come back rather than just regenerating.

Drow

Drow and Driders got their own lichly variants back in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, due to that ruleset not being able to handle slapping templates on existing creatures.

Dry Lich

Basically a mummy lich, and the ultimate result of the "walker in the waste" prestige class. Can't be good aligned, but doesn't have to be evil aligned either. They also get some cute Con-draining and desiccating attacks liches don't, and five phylacteries in the form of canoptic jars containing their organs, all on top of getting the template for free as part of their advancement.

Fireliches

They come from the Spelljammer setting and are what happens when an idiot wizard undergoing the lich transition ritual casts a fire spell in the Phlogiston... which is, essentially, an entire dimension full of flammable gas. The result is a cursed undead who basically exists as a giant free-floating sapient fireball with a skull in its center. Said skull is perpetually screaming in pain, as their existence is one of endless burning torment from the fire engulfing their very soul. They have the bad habit of crashing into spelljammers like sapient missiles in a futile attempt to end their tortured unlife.

Grey Shivers

Spiders that take up residence inside the skulls of destroyed liches, and absorb fragments of the lich's soul, turning them into sapient, spell-casting monsters. Whilst still being little spiders hiding inside skulls.

Illithiliches

Sometimes synonymous with Alhoons. These are Mind Flayer liches, and the inevitable result of any illithid that chooses to abandon the Elder Brain, as they're all terrified of the idea of ceasing to exist after death. 5e distinguishes them from alhoons, with them being the much-more-powerful and dangerous version.

Inheritor Liches

Hailing from the Birthright setting, they are what happens when one of the local Inheritors turns into a lich.

Master Liches

Another Spelljammer creation, they were turned into liches by pacts with Demon Princes or Arch-Devils, but then betrayed their master and fled into Wildspace to avoid paying their debt. The big difference is that they don't have a phylactery, but have a fairly potent regeneration ability.

Power Liches

In the world of Might and Magic, they were the long skirted bone dudes, who were the only shooters of the Necropolis town. And they were such badass shooters. They appeared in Might and magic 7 as well.

Suel Liches

Originally from Greyhawk, they are a sort of lich-wraith hybrid; in their natural state, they're immaterial beings of pure Negative Energy, the twisted souls of wizards slain by the Rain of Colorless Fire, so they possess living hosts to interact with the world around them. But, said body decays at a rapid pace, until eventually it crumbles into nothing and they gotta grab a new one.

Vassalich

A lesser form of lich introduced in the Ravenloft setting - mages who couldn't get the mojo to transform themselves, so they sold themselves as slaves to existing liches and became weaker knock-offs. They can turn into real liches, in time, but it's not easy and their masters keep a tight grip on them.

List of Famous Liches

• Acererak: Creator of the Tomb of Horrors/Tomb of Annihilation.
• Erandis Vol: Probably better known as Lady Vol or The Lich Queen (to us at least. Not a lot of people know about her in her setting). She is an NPC in Eberron and is the leader of both the Blood of Vol and the Emerald Claw.
• Koschei: A character from Slavic folklore who is much older than the concept of a lich but matches the description of one. His phylactery is a needle inside an egg inside a duck inside a hare inside a chest under a tree on a mythical teleporting island. Good luck finding it.
• The Lich: An absolutely terrifying villain from the goofy world of Adventure Time. Is the personification of a nuclear bomb who seeks the extinction of all life.
• Momonga/Ainz Ooal Gown: Villain protagonist of the anime Overlord. Was a gaming nerd who got trapped in the body of his character and sent to another world with all of his treasures and loyal minions.
• Nagash: Villain of Warhammer Fantasy
• Vlaakith: Lich-queen of the Githyanki
• Vecna: Lich who became a god.
• Voldemort: Villain of Harry Potter. Although he is never called a lich, he is barely human because of how he split his soul into pieces which are placed in seven objects to keep him alive.
• Xykon: The big bad of the web comic The Order of the Stick, or at least thinks he is. Is an epic level sorcerer planning to take control of a god killing monster. Charming psychopath who missing being able to drink bad coffee.

Monstergirls

The MGE's take on the lich-as-monstergirl.

This article or section is about Monstergirls (or a monster that is frequently depicted as a Monstergirl), something that /tg/ widely considers to be the purest form of awesome. Expect PROMOTIONS! and /d/elight in equal measure, often with drawfaggotry or writefaggotry to match.

Whilst being one of the two most famous free-willed undead - the other being the vampire, unlike their fellow "willful dead", liches are almost never seen in a sexified light. This probably has to do with the fact that, whilst the vampire has both obvious monster traits and a long history of being presented in a darkly eroticized light anyway, a lich is hard to define as anything more than an undead wizard. Not helping is that whilst even non-monstergirl vampires are traditionally portrayed as sexy, voluptuous women with red eyes and elongated canines clad in gothic dresses that flatter their figures, the traditional depiction of a lich is... a skeleton clad in moldering ragged robes. Worse yet, liches are usually depicted as being indifferent to their physical form - even Osterneth, one of the few named female liches of D&D, has her vanity end at plating her bones in bronze and studding them with gemstones.

This, then, presents a would-be monstergirl maker with quite the dilemma: how to actually make a female lich look sexy? Preferably without going the copout of either "they look just like sexy living women, but that's an illusion to disguise that they're skeletons" or "they just look like sexy living women and their lichdom manifests in their powers". Many ultimately go with routes similar to the Flesh Golem or Zombie, relying on a "sexy preserved corpse" or "artifical" theme for the lich's body, representing how the lich's physical form is a shell that it can wear and discard as it likes.

In the Monster Girl Encyclopedia, the lich is presented as just a dead-eyed human woman with corpse-grey skin and an ominous-yet-sexy "wizardly" robe. They are described as being, essentially, pervy female nerds who turned themselves into undead so they could better study and master the diffuse array of perverse applications of magic in their world.

That being said, the titular Magical Girls from Puella Magi Madoka Magica are sometimes jokingly referred to as liches outside of the show. But there are some non trivial differences between them and D&D liches. For example if a D&D lich were to have his phylactery destroyed he would be fine until personally destroyed (and would fail to regenerate as a lich with a functional phylactery would). Magical girls from Madoka Magica on the other hand die instantly if their soul gem is destroyed. Also it's perfectly possible that Magical Girls might continue to age as humans do, despite Sayaka's claims of zombie-hood.

See Also

• Drew the Lich, a Quest where /tg/ played a lich.
• The Millennial King, a story and setting inspired by /tg/ speculating on what a good necromancer would be like. To make a long story short: he becomes a lich and leads his kingdom to an era of prosperity with a skeleton-powered industrial revolution.
• Deep Rot, a skeletal supercomputer constructed by a mad lich.
• Dreadnought, which, when a Librarian is entombed within, is basically a mecha-lich.
• Nagash, everyone's favourite Warhammer lich.
• The Bank of Liches, what happens when a bunch of liches decide to pool their phylacteries in a safe and secure location.
• Vecna, a god that is a lich.