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cheesetriangles posted:Is there any rules on how to become a lich? Asking for a friend(no really). it depends on your setting. many settings leave the process to the imagination to let people come up with dark stuff that needs to be done. in my setting lich rituals(commonly known as lichuals) are a complicated process created by sacrificing a certain quantity of soul, something that can be done by hunting extremely powerful monsters, or far more easily by sacrificing a small populated village in its entirety
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Feb 22, 2021 13:54
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cheesetriangles posted:Is there any rules on how to become a lich? Asking for a friend(no really). you gotta break down a lich to its essentials. imo the two defining traits of a lich: -powerful wizard -soul kept outside of their physical body wotc keeps it pretty vague though, suggesting either a secret ritual or a bargain with orcus, and then drinking a potion; i believe in curse of strahd in the amber temple there is an option to become a lich with the one requirement being that the character has to be able to cast 9th level spells
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Feb 22, 2021 14:42
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cheesetriangles posted:Is there any rules on how to become a lich? Asking for a friend(no really).
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Feb 22, 2021 14:49
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Just hit level 7 in Frostmaiden and am about to roll into chapter 4, our party beat the poo poo out of Xardorock without him even getting to do too much, and the entire fortress without too much trouble even though our DM has been maxing enemies' HP for a while now. Next session is the dragon chase and barring some debating over whether or not to kill and raise our axe beaks as zombies so we can catch it, the big climatic mid-boss battle. I will say for anyone interested in running the module, maybe restrict the flow of level ups (our DM is going pretty strictly by the books but I feel like we're a bit over tuned at the moment), and for god's sake don't hand out the shield guardian. Even though it clogs up the hallways and creates a huge battlefield annoyance, it's pretty much impossible to kill.
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Feb 22, 2021 16:02
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Declan MacManus posted:you gotta break down a lich to its essentials. imo the two defining traits of a lich: I would add "undead" to this. As I understand it, part of the process of becoming a lich is killing yourself in a way that you raise yourself as a sentient undead. Perhaps that's just one of the methods of separating your soul from your body, but as far as I'm aware, all liches are undead, so you gotta die and reraise somehow.
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Feb 22, 2021 16:20
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Here are the AD&D 2E Lich rules from the Monstrous Compendium:quote:In order to become a lich, the wizard must prepare its phylactery by the use of the enchant an item, magic jar, permanency and reincarnation spells. The phylactery, which can be almost any manner of object, must be of the finest craftsmanship and materials with a value of not less than 1,500 gold pieces per level of the wizard. Once this object is created, the would-be lich must craft a potion of extreme toxicity, which is then enchanted with the following spells: wraithform, permanency, cone of cold, feign death, and animate dead. When next the moon is full, the potion is imbibed. Rather than death, the potion causes the wizard to undergo a transformation into its new state. A system shock survival throw is required, with failure indicating an error in the creation of the potion which kills the wizard and renders him forever dead.
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Feb 22, 2021 16:29
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I would add "undead" to this. As I understand it, part of the process of becoming a lich is killing yourself in a way that you raise yourself as a sentient undead. Perhaps that's just one of the methods of separating your soul from your body, but as far as I'm aware, all liches are undead, so you gotta die and reraise somehow. https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/unearthed-arcana/gothic-lineages Splicer fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Feb 22, 2021 |
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Feb 22, 2021 16:58
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I would add "undead" to this. As I understand it, part of the process of becoming a lich is killing yourself in a way that you raise yourself as a sentient undead. Perhaps that's just one of the methods of separating your soul from your body, but as far as I'm aware, all liches are undead, so you gotta die and reraise somehow. Oop, this is a good point I hadn't considered for the BBEG fight at the end of my group's current adventure. Previously it was "they stumble on the mindflayer in the catacombs thinking he hadn't completed the ritual to become an alhoon yet, then he reveals that it's too late," but I like "they think they arrived just in time, he encourages them to kick his teeth in, then phase II of the battle is him getting right back up as an undead" way more
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Feb 22, 2021 17:04
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Splicer posted:Oh good point. Making a phylactery as a magic item with a bunch of thematic buffs on it and changing their race to the reborn should cover it mechanically the idea of a phylactery requiring attunement is incredibly cool actually
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Feb 22, 2021 17:35
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https://twitter.com/Wizards_DnD/status/1363896392306065413 oh hey Ravenloft book.
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Feb 22, 2021 18:27
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Declan MacManus posted:you gotta break down a lich to its essentials. imo the two defining traits of a lich: Yeah reading the rules for lich in the monster manual apparently they need to cast imprison every so often to keep their lichness fresh so being able to cast 9th level arcane spells makes sense. I think a sorc would work just as well as a wizard so I assume you are using wizard in a generic way. My friend plays a warlock which get's imprison so that should be fine.
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Feb 22, 2021 18:32
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Dexo posted:https://twitter.com/Wizards_DnD/status/1363896392306065413 I'd bet fake money that it's a sequel to Curse of Strahd, levels 10-20, that cover Strahd and the Dark Lords and taking them out for good or something along those lines. Ugh.
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Feb 22, 2021 18:36
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Dexo posted:https://twitter.com/Wizards_DnD/status/1363896392306065413 Looks like gothic lineages are back on the menu, boys
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Feb 22, 2021 18:38
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Lucas Archer posted:I'd bet fake money that it's a sequel to Curse of Strahd, levels 10-20, that cover Strahd and the Dark Lords and taking them out for good or something along those lines. It's gonna just be the Grand Conjunction modules lightly updated for 5E. And I'm gonna be totally on board with that.
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Feb 22, 2021 18:57
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Would a fair description of devil's be the guy at the table buying ladders to sell as 10 foot poles.
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Feb 22, 2021 19:43
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cheesetriangles posted:Would a fair description of devil's be the guy at the table buying ladders to sell as 10 foot poles. Yes, but he's selling them twice and got paid four times.
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Feb 22, 2021 23:54
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pog boyfriend posted:the idea of a phylactery requiring attunement is incredibly cool actually
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Feb 23, 2021 00:01
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Splicer posted:5e has a lot of good ideas in it they're just underutilised and beside a lot of good ideas. Attunement is one of the good ideas, but e.g. giving martials extra attunement slots and providing a mild (but less good than common a magic item) benefit to unused attunement slots would help narrow the gap between classes and do a lot to make the "magic items optional" claim hold some weight. it is kind of sad really when you look at how much design space they have to work with that they do absolutely nothing with. the glacial drip feed of releases doesnt help either. it would be nice if they would put out less mediocre adventure books and just make some Content this year
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Feb 23, 2021 00:33
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pog boyfriend posted:it is kind of sad really when you look at how much design space they have to work with that they do absolutely nothing with. the glacial drip feed of releases doesnt help either. it would be nice if they would put out less mediocre adventure books and just make some Content this year Cool. Convince everyone to stop snapping up the garbage books for just 1 cycle. I'll wait.
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Feb 23, 2021 03:30
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Toshimo posted:Cool. Convince everyone to stop snapping up the garbage books for just 1 cycle. I'll wait. I’ll continue not buying them too. I’m striking for goddamn Dark Sun. I’ll cross the picket line for Spelljammer too.
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Feb 23, 2021 04:34
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This seems like a weird question, but...given how eagerly everything they put out is getting snapped up, why isn't Wizards shovelling more poo poo out the door? I mean, I'm not eager for them to release bad quality stuff, but it's not like what they're putting out is all part of some grand story they need to carefully curate. It really feels like they're leaving a lot of money on the table with their current pace. At the very least, more stuff like Tales from the Yawning Portal where they just adapt old modules whose overall story/concept they know works seems like a corporate no-brainer and I just don't understand why they're on the pace they're currently on.
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Feb 23, 2021 05:08
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Azathoth posted:This seems like a weird question, but...given how eagerly everything they put out is getting snapped up, why isn't Wizards shovelling more poo poo out the door? I assume the biggest reason is that its a tiny team of people doing any of the development and farming out a bunch of work to freelancers. Hasbro does not care about the product other than a license to farm out every now and again.
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Feb 23, 2021 05:31
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kingcom posted:I assume the biggest reason is that its a tiny team of people doing any of the development and farming out a bunch of work to freelancers. Hasbro does not care about the product other than a license to farm out every now and again. I think we would all be surprised by how few people are collectively making D&D.
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Feb 23, 2021 05:44
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Azathoth posted:This seems like a weird question, but...given how eagerly everything they put out is getting snapped up, why isn't Wizards shovelling more poo poo out the door? It's entirely deliberate. When they figured out they can milk every last drop out of each turd they drop, they decided that the margins were better doing that than making any effort whatsoever. And the balance sheets say they are right. Complete garbage like WDH get snapped up in record time AND, more importantly, even with 1000 people screaming at anyone who will listen that it's a total piece of poo poo not worth your money, people look to the nearest paid influencer instead and plunk down their money for years afterward. If you were a business and could fill entire money bins while putting forth the minimum effort and outlay, your investors would demand you do likewise.
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Feb 23, 2021 06:04
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kingcom posted:I assume the biggest reason is that its a tiny team of people doing any of the development and farming out a bunch of work to freelancers. Hasbro does not care about the product other than a license to farm out every now and again. The weird thing is, it's more the modules that can be farmed out that I'm surprised they don't do more. A disconnected module they doesn't have a wider metastory is something I'm surprised they don't just shovel out by the bucketful.
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Feb 23, 2021 06:04
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Toshimo posted:It's entirely deliberate. When they figured out they can milk every last drop out of each turd they drop, they decided that the margins were better doing that than making any effort whatsoever. And the balance sheets say they are right. Complete garbage like WDH get snapped up in record time AND, more importantly, even with 1000 people screaming at anyone who will listen that it's a total piece of poo poo not worth your money, people look to the nearest paid influencer instead and plunk down their money for years afterward. Okay yeah fair
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Feb 23, 2021 06:04
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There's probably some conventional wisdom about what doesn't sell and what happens when the market gets oversaturated based on 3.X and 4E experiences.
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Feb 23, 2021 06:07
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Just to put it in perspective, Every Single Thing from wizards for 5E is a "top seller" with an average customer rating of 5 Stars out of 5 on Amazon. Yes, even the spellcard decks that are still being printed full of errors that were brought to their attention 6 years ago and they don't feel the need to fix. They literally could print a book that set your house on fire and people would still rate it 5 Stars. I don't know that there's a fix possible at this point, because every article I've seen on the subject still suggests that the conversion rate for people who enter TTRPGs with D&D to any other system is dire. Hell, Roll20 is basically cutting support for PF2E because nobody plays it on there (which may or may not have something to do with the built-in character sheets still being incomplete, 2.5 years after release, among other issues). Like, everyone knows where there bread is buttered, and nobody wants to rock that boat, despite it being a garbage scow.
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Feb 23, 2021 06:22
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I'm sure there are hasbro corporate meetings that go like "call me crazy, but if this is working, what if we slowed down the D&D release schedule even more".
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Feb 23, 2021 06:36
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Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition is perfect in every way and any more books could only make it worse
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Feb 23, 2021 07:53
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Toshimo posted:Just to put it in perspective, Every Single Thing from wizards for 5E is a "top seller" with an average customer rating of 5 Stars out of 5 on Amazon. Yes, even the spellcard decks that are still being printed full of errors that were brought to their attention 6 years ago and they don't feel the need to fix. They literally could print a book that set your house on fire and people would still rate it 5 Stars. I don't know that there's a fix possible at this point, because every article I've seen on the subject still suggests that the conversion rate for people who enter TTRPGs with D&D to any other system is dire. Hell, Roll20 is basically cutting support for PF2E because nobody plays it on there (which may or may not have something to do with the built-in character sheets still being incomplete, 2.5 years after release, among other issues). Like, everyone knows where there bread is buttered, and nobody wants to rock that boat, despite it being a garbage scow.
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Feb 23, 2021 09:24
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DND has great vendor lockin. No way in hell i'm every going to convince my group to switch to a different system.
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Feb 23, 2021 09:41
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engessa posted:DND has great vendor lockin. No way in hell i'm every going to convince my group to switch to a different system. Why? Toshimo posted:Just to put it in perspective, Every Single Thing from wizards for 5E is a "top seller" with an average customer rating of 5 Stars out of 5 on Amazon. Yes, even the spellcard decks that are still being printed full of errors that were brought to their attention 6 years ago and they don't feel the need to fix. They literally could print a book that set your house on fire and people would still rate it 5 Stars. I don't know that there's a fix possible at this point, because every article I've seen on the subject still suggests that the conversion rate for people who enter TTRPGs with D&D to any other system is dire. Hell, Roll20 is basically cutting support for PF2E because nobody plays it on there (which may or may not have something to do with the built-in character sheets still being incomplete, 2.5 years after release, among other issues). Like, everyone knows where there bread is buttered, and nobody wants to rock that boat, despite it being a garbage scow. Yeah, this appears to be extremely true. I just hope that it falls off a cliff in the near future, or that any changes made are to the company itself. It's unlikely ofc, but I think no longer wanting to buy a single loving thing from this drat company is probably a good shout from here on out.
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Feb 23, 2021 09:55
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Josef bugman posted:Why? Not because of anything that Wizards did themselves, but because of the third parties that are the reason why D&D is so popular now. A lot of people* want to play D&D and D&D only because that's what they saw on Stranger Things or Critical Role or whatever. Not to knock these people; they're a lot more fun to actually play with than weird grognards in my experience. But they don't want to play anything else. I haven't even been able to sell the possibility of non-typical (for D&D) concepts like collaborative world building to my different player groups. *I don't know if anyone has done a proper study, and anecdotes are not proper data of course, but I've seen the same story as my experience from many people in a few different places including here, so there may be something to it.
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Feb 23, 2021 10:05
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Bogan Krkic posted:Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition is perfect in every way and any more books could only make it worse
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Feb 23, 2021 11:58
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If nothing else it's the sunk cost fallacy: time (learning/playing) and/or money. Whatever they might be labeled, new TTRPG players are probably going to want to start with D&D, and by default they're probably going to stick to their first unless/until peer pressured into trying other systems. And especially in a modern mid-'rona context where there's a great Discord bot that you can connect any of your characters on Beyond to and with some basic syntax quickly roll checks and such? I get it. also i just checked my receipts and i've spent about $400 on Beyond between books and monthlies since I started paying for things in March 2020 so welp lmao
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Feb 23, 2021 12:32
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like over a given week, between the game i run and the other five i play in, i'm probably spending too much time playing D&D tbh, but that's with a total of 19 other people with some player overlap between games and occasional dips into other TTRPGs.
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Feb 23, 2021 12:46
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Dexo posted:https://twitter.com/Wizards_DnD/status/1363896392306065413 Amazon posted:Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft (Dungeons & Dragons) Hardcover – May 18, 2021
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Feb 23, 2021 13:36
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I thought my playing in 5e, pf2e and Star Wars every week was a lot.
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Feb 23, 2021 13:37
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cheesetriangles posted:I thought my playing in 5e, pf2e and Star Wars every week was a lot. For instance: The last session I ran ended on a combat cliffhanger with a quartet of Bulettes (one dead, one currently Banished, remaining two at 32 and 64 damage from their 94 HP) and a Reduced-Threat Aboleth -- from whatever "Dead in Thay" is that someone else bought but since they did content sharing on at least of the campaigns we're both in I have access to it -- reskinned as a rock aboleth with a burrow speed instead of a swim speed. But between the villager torch-and-pitchfork posse that was convinced to join the party to hunt down whatever was killing/absconding with the cattle that are the source of the cheese that keeps this hamlet relevant and the rifledwarves they got to bring on this trip for other reasons, they're just truly starting to learn how swingy 5E can be after a few bulette Deadly Leaps. They've got one more round before the onset of night mechanically inflicts dim light everywhere except for where the owl familiar dropped a pebble with Light cast on it to mark the spot the Banished bulette disappeared from. Seven level sevens with a poo poo-ton of red shirts, no mercy is intended (but they'll probably still come out of this just fine -- the rifledwarves are also swingy since they've only got a +2 to hit but do 2d10 when they hit)
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Feb 23, 2021 14:09
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