Why would you bother with lichdom?

[Tvtyrant]

There are certain sorts of horror or epic settings were "parasite gods" are a perfect fit.

Outside those specific settings, it makes a lot more sense to go with "force of nature", "symbiotic exchange", or "bargain with a monster".

In a setting with "parasite gods", everyone should be striving to become some sort of immortal, intelligent undead or otherwise. Everyone. Cut the gods off and let them starve to death.

I've been writing a story sort of like that. Bodies are like jars that fill up with soul-ink over a beings lifetime, and when they die the stopper comes ou5 and the gods can draw new material things using the ink. The entire universe is a result of them slowly growing the universe to have more and more ink jars so they can make more and more universe, the gods being essentially the crazed artist type writ large.

The side effect of having too much ink for your container/body? Aging.

Magic is what occurs when someone figures out how to punch a straw in their own stopper, and then draws on reality themselves. It has the side effect of stopping aging in the wizard, but also draws the irate attention of thr gods.

Ink can't be taken out of someone living by force. They have to either do it themselves or you have to kill them and grab as much ink as possible at the moment of death. That effectively splits wizards into good and evil groups, both of whom have to watch out for angels and other god-sent entities.

Demons are a kind of corruption of the whole process. Self-aware ink without a jar, they can rewrite reality by using up their bodies, and kill living beings to drink their ink and add it to themselves. Some wizards make deals with demons but they can neither be trusted nor controlled.

[Quertus]

I've been writing a story sort of like that. Bodies are like jars that fill up with soul-ink over a beings lifetime, and when they die the stopper comes ou5 and the gods can draw new material things using the ink. The entire universe is a result of them slowly growing the universe to have more and more ink jars so they can make more and more universe, the gods being essentially the crazed artist type writ large.

The side effect of having too much ink for your container/body? Aging.

Magic is what occurs when someone figures out how to punch a straw in their own stopper, and then draws on reality themselves. It has the side effect of stopping aging in the wizard, but also draws the irate attention of thr gods.

Ink can't be taken out of someone living by force. They have to either do it themselves or you have to kill them and grab as much ink as possible at the moment of death. That effectively splits wizards into good and evil groups, both of whom have to watch out for angels and other god-sent entities.

Demons are a kind of corruption of the whole process. Self-aware ink without a jar, they can rewrite reality by using up their bodies, and kill living beings to drink their ink and add it to themselves. Some wizards make deals with demons but they can neither be trusted nor controlled.

Insert me a) trying to research ways to simultaneously reverse aging and draw out ink safely; b) trying to outdo the gods, creating custom creatures that gain ink faster / reproduce faster / require less resources to live. Basically, "don't hate me, in the grand scheme of things, I'm helping you out".

Of course, I'd still prefer to topple the old gods in the end.

[Tvtyrant]

Insert me a) trying to research ways to simultaneously reverse aging and draw out ink safely; b) trying to outdo the gods, creating custom creatures that gain ink faster / reproduce faster / require less resources to live. Basically, "don't hate me, in the grand scheme of things, I'm helping you out".

Of course, I'd still prefer to topple the old gods in the end.

That is the point of the setting :)

Creatures created by none-gods (ie demons and wizards) are constructs and no one has successfully made one that produces ink.

Spoiler

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The universe was originally just a void full of demons, and a group of them made the first god out of boredom and loneliness. It turned on its creators, using them to create the other gods and then begin making the first worlds.

The gods are actually technically extremely powerful constructs, they are neither demons nor alive. It turns out the secret to making life is making a construct then allowing it to kill you and use your ink to create life.

[Max_Killjoy]

That is the point of the setting :)

Creatures created by none-gods (ie demons and wizards) are constructs and no one has successfully made one that produces ink.

Spoiler

Show

The universe was originally just a void full of demons, and a group of them made the first god out of boredom and loneliness. It turned on its creators, using them to create the other gods and then begin making the first worlds.

The gods are actually technically extremely powerful constructs, they are neither demons nor alive. It turns out the secret to making life is making a construct then allowing it to kill you and use your ink to create life.

Spoiler: Reminds me a bit of how the universe was created in one of my settings...

Show

...one of the original "old gods" in my 4th BCE / Greco-Sumerian setting created (accidentally?) the entire physical universe in what amounts to a mad science lab incident resulting in the "collapse" of their timeless, spaceless, limitless reality dominated by imagination, into a physical, temporal, reality dominated by causality and "laws" and finite boundaries. She was completely obliterated, and all reality is infused with the remnants of her infinite self, which is what makes life and spirits and so on possible in this setting.

One of the other "old gods" used to rant at mortals that their reality was a corpse and they were all worms wriggling about in it, which everyone took as just the insane gibbering of a god gone mad, or a macabre metaphor about mortality.

The remaining "old gods" are still effectively the "souls of reality", immense forces of nature, but bound by finite limits, and other than one who is at least nominally sane, they're not right in the head, possessed of great intellect but pathologically obsessed with getting back what they lost... while always just barely unable to remember what it was, like that word on the tip of your tongue, or the song you can hum the tune of but not recall the lyrics or name.... they'd tear apart an entire world if they thought the answer, the key, was buried at the center...

[Tvtyrant]

Spoiler: Reminds me a bit of how the universe was created in one of my settings...

Show

...one of the original "old gods" in my 4th BCE / Greco-Sumerian setting created (accidentally?) the entire physical universe in what amounts to a mad science lab incident resulting in the "collapse" of their timeless, spaceless, limitless reality dominated by imagination, into a physical, temporal, reality dominated by causality and "laws" and finite boundaries. She was completely obliterated, and all reality is infused with the remnants of her infinite self, which is what makes life and spirits and so on possible in this setting.

One of the other "old gods" used to rant at mortals that their reality was a corpse and they were all worms wriggling about in it, which everyone took as just the insane gibbering of a god gone mad, or a macabre metaphor about mortality.

The remaining "old gods" are still effectively the "souls of reality", immense forces of nature, but bound by finite limits, and other than one who is at least nominally sane, they're not right in the head, possessed of great intellect but pathologically obsessed with getting back what they lost... while always just barely unable to remember what it was, like that word on the tip of your tongue, or the song you can hum the tune of but not recall the lyrics or name.... they'd tear apart an entire world if they thought the answer, the key, was buried at the center...

That is super cool as far as settings go, like Aboleths/Obyriths scaled up to 11. What if Yog-Sothoth didn't especially like time and space existing?

Spoiler

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The other part that makes my setting function is that the more ink an object or construct has the more real it is. So a fire made with very little ink is super weak, to the point where it wouldn't really hurt you. A wall made of small amounts of ink would break like balsa wood and while it would be normal weight it would be easy to lift.

It is noticeable in some indescribable way how real something is, so very low ink (ie illusions) aren't transparent or flickery, but they are still visibly less real then the world. An angel is visibly much more real than the world and is a lot like superman, the whole world is cardboard to them.

Gods were made with so much ink they cut through reality by simply interacting with it, their breath is like a hurricane.

Wizards have access to a limited stock of ink (unless they sacrifice a lot of people) so they tend to use thin inks to make weak temporary versions of things. A wizard wrought dragon is huge, breaths 300 degree flames and can be killed by a few stray arrows.

[gkathellar]

I don't think this has been mentioned yet, but it appears in at least some sources: when a lich exhausts their avenues of research and learning in the material world, they have the option of using astral projection spells to wander the planes in spirit. The result is a demilich - most of the body is abandoned, and what remains serves principally as an anchor and port-of-call for the undying wizard's spirit. If your main interest is arcane lore, there's some appeal to this progression, and lichdom becomes attractive not just as a way of avoiding death but as a route to tremendous knowledge.

[Honest Tiefling]

I don't think this has been mentioned yet, but it appears in at least some sources: when a lich exhausts their avenues of research and learning in the material world, they have the option of using astral projection spells to wander the planes in spirit. The result is a demilich - most of the body is abandoned, and what remains serves principally as an anchor and port-of-call for the undying wizard's spirit. If your main interest is arcane lore, there's some appeal to this progression, and lichdom becomes attractive not just as a way of avoiding death but as a route to tremendous knowledge.

So they basically become some sort of interdimensional Snowbird. Still a better fate than oblivion.

Can someone tell me why the afterlife in DnD sucks so much? Or if ANY published DnD setting has a better option than 'lol, sucks to be you, non-lich!'?

[gkathellar]

Can someone tell me why the afterlife in DnD sucks so much? Or if ANY published DnD setting has a better option than 'lol, sucks to be you, non-lich!'?

It doesn't, exactly, or at least it depends on your perspective. The Great Wheel doesn't have punishments or rewards. It has ... like attracts like, I guess would the best way to put it? In theory, at least, there's a process of becoming one's ideal self. The worshipers of a god go to be with that god, and as petitioners they contemplate their chosen deity and mold themselves in its image until, at last, they become an equal participant in its divinity. Non-worshipers find their way to a plane appropriate to their nature (read: alignment, with some minor variation), and with labor and comprehension of the plane's ultimate reality can either merge with the fabric of the plane or else learn to exemplify it (read: become an outsider).

This may seem a lot less desirable for evil-aligned people, but the Lower Planes can be paradise for those who have power, and the opportunity to achieve power is there - remember, Orcus was once a lowly mane. The big exception to all this is the Nine Hells, which are ruled by an occupying army (the baatezu) that reproduces by grinding up mortal souls for raw materials. But if you're really clever and really lawful evil, it's possible to work something out with the baatezu beforehand and avoid such a fate. So, again: it can be a paradise for people of the right inclinations.

D&D is strange (and I think, sort of accidentally, profoundly moving) in that it has an afterlife, but in many ways death is still the end, the ultimate loss of self: knowledge, power, and identity all fade away as one becomes integrated into a higher reality. If losing all that terrifies a person, it's understandable that they might be willing to take the road of lichdom. But fear - of loss, of change, of becoming something else - is the central thing. The lich cannot stomach the thought that all the fruits of their labors will be taken away, and that all of their knowledge is ultimately self-knowledge. Death is so abhorrent to them that they choose to shun life.

[Honest Tiefling]

gkathellar, I do think your post was good and well written and does explain a bit of the great wheel and the ideas behind it. I just...Don't know if many people are going to be on board the oblivion train even if it is a neat concept when it will happen to them personally.

Especially to followers of certain gods, like a god of knowledge. I'm sorry, you want me to give up my what now? That knowledge I worshiped you for!? Worst rewards program ever!

[Anymage]

gkathellar, I do think your post was good and well written and does explain a bit of the great wheel and the ideas behind it. I just...Don't know if many people are going to be on board the oblivion train even if it is a neat concept when it will happen to them personally.

Especially to followers of certain gods, like a god of knowledge. I'm sorry, you want me to give up my what now? That knowledge I worshiped you for!? Worst rewards program ever!

How much of it is oblivion, vs. how much is growth when having a discrete physical body is unnecessary? If Durkon's thoughts, memories, personality, and experiences merged into the composite entity that is Thor, how would becoming part of a greater collective whole mean oblivion?

It's not the only way to look at things. But becoming part of a collective is something that many people could see the appeal of, as opposed to seeing it as being rendered down to god food.

[Max_Killjoy]

How much of it is oblivion, vs. how much is growth when having a discrete physical body is unnecessary? If Durkon's thoughts, memories, personality, and experiences merged into the composite entity that is Thor, how would becoming part of a greater collective whole mean oblivion?

It's not the only way to look at things. But becoming part of a collective is something that many people could see the appeal of, as opposed to seeing it as being rendered down to god food.

Being subsumed into a collective whole is oblivion. There is no functional difference.

[gkathellar]

gkathellar, I do think your post was good and well written and does explain a bit of the great wheel and the ideas behind it. I just...Don't know if many people are going to be on board the oblivion train even if it is a neat concept when it will happen to them personally.

Especially to followers of certain gods, like a god of knowledge. I'm sorry, you want me to give up my what now? That knowledge I worshiped you for!? Worst rewards program ever!

Definitely. I think it's rational, knowing all this (and most people in Great Wheel settings don't know all this), for death to still be fearful in settings where it applies. It's not annihilation or oblivion, per se, but it is the certainty that you will become someone and something else, and that's an absolutely terrifying notion, especially for someone who devotes their life to self-improvement. "You'll gradually forget who you are and all of your works will be lost to you, but you can move on to a life of infinite evil and cruelty," is not a very appealing proposition for an evil spellcaster who has left ruin in their wake in the pursuit of power and knowledge.

Being subsumed into a collective whole is oblivion. There is no functional difference.

The trick is that it's less like being eaten, and more like ... a merger of consciousness? Like, let's say you worship Kord. As a petitioner, you labor and meditate to understand Kord's might, glory, righteous spirit, and perfection, hoping to be more like the god who is everything you idealize and look up to. When the day comes that you achieve that goal ... well, there's only one Kord. To be exactly like Kord is to be Kord, to be one with him and participate in his existence as a Power.

Mind, this may sound like a bit of logical trickery to you. That's totally reasonable, and the whole thing hinges on the Powers being near-platonic entities. But it is coherent.

[Tvtyrant]

Being subsumed into a collective whole is oblivion. There is no functional difference.

That is a matter of perspective, several major religions are focused on achieving the destruction of the self and merger with something greater. Singular conciousness is not a universal good or goal.

[icefractal]

And depending on the cosmology, it might be as much "oblivion" for Kord as for you, except that Kord never considered itself a single unchanging mind to begin with. If gods are made of souls, then each soul that gets merged in changes them a tiny bit; just like the fact that you are currently exerting gravity on the earth just as much as vice-versa.

[Lemmy]

Well... If your undead body really craves some ice cream and bedtime fun, there's always Alter Self. Become humanoid for a few hours and go to town!

[Millstone85]

Being subsumed into a collective whole is oblivion. There is no functional difference.

The trick is that it's less like being eaten, and more like ... a merger of consciousness?

But see, while illithids believe this is what awaits them within the elder brain, a communion of knowledge and intellect so full that the illithid effectively becomes the elder, the truth is clearly stated to be exactly what it looks like: the elder eating illithid brains in much the same way that illithids eat human and demihuman/humanoid brains.

So really, those few illithids who pursue the path of the alhoon, they are the sane ones.

Wait... We weren't talking about illithids? Oh my Ilsensine!

[Kami2awa]

The path of the lich gives you indestructibility, if you hide your phylactery well enough. Other forms of immortality don't.

And there are disadvantages to most of the other options. Vampirism traditionally makes you the slave of the infecting vampire. Other types of undead either lose a lot of their original personality, or can't be created reliably (eg Death Knights, who seem to arise from a curse that's hard to replicate). Other routes, like the BoVD spell that allows you to swap bodies with someone younger, still leave you vulnerable to mortal wounds or disease. Potions of longevity will bite you in the butt eventually. Apotheosis is hard, and you can always do it after you become a lich.

And hey, you can always research spells that give you access to the pleasures of the flesh, if you really want. Or Magic Jar yourself into other bodies, allowing you to indulge in whatever awful fantasies liches have these days.

Plus you get a paralysing touch, immunity to practically everything, bigger hit dice, and a really cool evil laugh.

[snowblizz]

And hey, you can always research spells that give you access to the pleasures of the flesh, if you really want.

If this is something that's important to you I don't see that person turning to lichdom.

and a really cool evil laugh.

Xykon would disagree.

[Honest Tiefling]

Being subsumed into a collective whole is oblivion. There is no functional difference.

'We are the Borg. Resistance is futile.'

Yeah, I don't think that many people would be embracing the borg with open arms and willingly joining the collective to make sure they get that cool laser eye.

[LibraryOgre]

This seems appropriate, here.

In my view, the afterlife doesn't "suck" for evil people, per se... they're not sent there to be punished, after all. Rather, the afterlife is where the things you believed are real. If you're Lawful and Good, society will help people and people will help society. If you're Chaotic Evil, everyone is out for themselves and you're only as strong as you can keep.

The problem comes in when someone is a 1st level commoner and dies. A LG commoner goes to a place where helping people is its own reward and society rewards you for it anyway. A CE commoner goes to a place where he's slightly more valuable than a pile of warm crap, and that's only because he can be eaten and turned into a pile of warm crap. A 20th level character who goes to either place? They're still THEM, at least at first, and can affect changes on the world they find themselves in... moreso if you note my bit about the value of grave goods.

[Max_Killjoy]

'We are the Borg. Resistance is futile.'

Yeah, I don't think that many people would be embracing the borg with open arms and willingly joining the collective to make sure they get that cool laser eye.

Yeah. The end distinct and autonomous, memories, thoughts, feelings, etc, is the end of the individual. It's oblivion. Doesn't matter if it's becoming one with some deity, or "shedding the self" ascension, or reincarnation (of some types, at least), or "uploading to the collective", or anything else -- all of those afterlives might as well be death.

[Quertus]

So, let's look at this backwards (as I've been thinking about making a campaign setting like this anyway).

What if, originally, we were all one person? Or, for D&D's sake, X people? Then those people kinda had their soul, their self, exploded, thus creating Life.

What if, when we die, our soul shard rejoins with the rest of itself?

Is that really that bad?

[The Jack]

There are real world religions and philosophies like gnosticism that deal with stuff like that.


But somehow, i imagine the hell of undeath being worse than the hell of life, unless of course the hell of unlife was life, which is why those animated skeletons are so ticked off.

[gkathellar]

Yeah. The end distinct and autonomous, memories, thoughts, feelings, etc, is the end of the individual. It's oblivion. Doesn't matter if it's becoming one with some deity, or "shedding the self" ascension, or reincarnation (of some types, at least), or "uploading to the collective", or anything else -- all of those afterlives might as well be death.

Oblivion strikes me as implying the end of continuity, and that’s very much the opposite of what happens. A petitioner doesn’t become a part of the Power or its embodiment so much as they become the Power in its entire. Given that it’s the culmination of a lengthy process of imitation, nothing has really changed. The final culmination of trying to be like Gruumsh is being Gruumsh.

To me, the potentially unnerving part is actually being a petitioner, a process of shedding everything that’s not in tune with the deity. Our Gruumsh-worshipper slowly forgets everything about themselves that isn’t a whirlwind of spite and fury clothed in ancient subtlety and will to dominate. Only once everything not-Gruumsh is gone do they become the Power.

On the one hand, there’s an argument to be made that what I’m describing is just life - the process of constantly becoming something else in imitation of an imagined self. But on the other hand, even if you buy that, it’s usually not literal. And if all this freaks you out, immortality starts to look extremely attractive.

[Honest Tiefling]

What if, originally, we were all one person? Or, for D&D's sake, X people? Then those people kinda had their soul, their self, exploded, thus creating Life.

What if, when we die, our soul shard rejoins with the rest of itself?

Is that really that bad?

Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few if the needs of the few are immense powerful beings outside of the scope of those many? Life was created by no fault of the mortals. And yet, that little spark of what was lost means so much to the mortals that they will do whatever it takes to keep it. Who is to say that the mortals are worthless than these primordial beings?

On the one hand, there’s an argument to be made that what I’m describing is just life - the process of constantly becoming something else in imitation of an imagined self. But on the other hand, even if you buy that, it’s usually not literal. And if all this freaks you out, immortality starts to look extremely attractive.

And that's why some people desire to look the grim reaper in the face and say 'nah, I'm good'. Even if it is a natural part of life, many natural parts of life are terrifying. Doesn't mean everyone is on board to just yanno...Let it happen. That's loser talk for loser people who don't have immense knowledge.

[Max_Killjoy]

Oblivion strikes me as implying the end of continuity, and that’s very much the opposite of what happens. A petitioner doesn’t become a part of the Power or its embodiment so much as they become the Power in its entire. Given that it’s the culmination of a lengthy process of imitation, nothing has really changed. The final culmination of trying to be like Gruumsh is being Gruumsh.

To me, the potentially unnerving part is actually being a petitioner, a process of shedding everything that’s not in tune with the deity. Our Gruumsh-worshipper slowly forgets everything about themselves that isn’t a whirlwind of spite and fury clothed in ancient subtlety and will to dominate. Only once everything not-Gruumsh is gone do they become the Power.

And that's the point I'm trying to make -- the loss of all that "other stuff" is the loss of what made the individual that individual. You are literally describing oblivion.

Maybe I'm not getting it because I've never wanted or even been able to imagine wanting to be someone else, or just like someone else, or whatever.

[Millstone85]

So, let's look at this backwards (as I've been thinking about making a campaign setting like this anyway).

What if, originally, we were all one person? Or, for D&D's sake, X people? Then those people kinda had their soul, their self, exploded, thus creating Life.

What if, when we die, our soul shard rejoins with the rest of itself?

Is that really that bad?

There is a Marvel character named Jamie "Multiple Man" Madrox. He has the power to create and absorb duplicates of himself. They have all his memories up to the split, while he gains their memories when he absorbs them.

Now, some of his duplicates make major life choices, such as joining the S.H.I.EL.D. or getting married. And they all know that while Jamie "prime" regards them as pieces of his soul, he will not abide by their choices. They see him as their very personal reaper, who will fully negate who they became.

[Honest Tiefling]

At this rate, I wonder how many liches just figure that committing an evil act towards an evil soul is no big deal. Most of those are headed to oblivion either by being eaten by the plane itself or aren't going to be lucky enough to even become a mane/lemure. You're not really destroying anything that wouldn't be destroyed anyway and this way, you are stopping them from either powering the plane, or adding to it.

[Xasten]

On the afterlife topic, I haven't seen it mentioned yet, so here goes. I once ran a campaign where the Great Wheel afterlife was as blasé as it seems to be here. The real Afterlife was the 7th level of Celestia that functioned as a great filter for those who had really "earned it." The rest were on an endless cycle of birth, death, become and outsider/whatever, and then rebirth if they're lucky until they hopefully, one day, found The Way.

[Anymage]

And that's the point I'm trying to make -- the loss of all that "other stuff" is the loss of what made the individual that individual. You are literally describing oblivion.

Maybe I'm not getting it because I've never wanted or even been able to imagine wanting to be someone else, or just like someone else, or whatever.

To someone who does aspire to become part of a greater whole, using blood magic to ensure that you stay as you are now would be analogous to your sixteen year old self using blood magic to ensure that you never changed or sold out. Over a long enough span of time, you're going to change into something quite different from you as you are now. Doubly so if a discrete physical body becomes more of a suggestion than a mandate for you.

Plus, let's take your position as it stands (that becoming part of something other than your self necessarily means dissolution of yourself, and therefore oblivion), and add another assumption. Biological immortality cannot be achieved by simply combining the right items and spells, and requires some deep metaphysical costs. Undead externalize most of the costs, and have some unpleasant side effects they personally face as well. (E.G: vampires and sun, or liches and withering.) Internalizing the costs puts severe limits on you, like requiring treatments that put a big dent in a kingdom's treasury, being at the beck and call of some god, or having to stay in the monastery with the right balance of forces and never leaving. Dying will hasten the process of you being transformed into something unrecognizable to you as you are now.

If cheap immortality were off the table, which option would you chose?