Draft:Lich

Omega 0.90.4

A lich is an undead spellcaster with life-draining melee attacks, displayed as an L. A lich can be encountered peacefully in Rampart's cemetery, but its standard hostile form is a substantial threat even to a character who can survive its physical damage.

Encounter	Level	HP	Attack strength	Armor class	Base damage	Kill XP
Ordinary lich	6	100	15	20	50	300
Fixed arena lich	6	160	30	20	75	300

Generation

Each of the cemetery's four greater-undead positions chooses equally between a lich and a vampire lord. These occupants start asleep and nonhostile. Ordinary hostile liches can occur in sufficiently strong random-monster pools, wilderness encounters, the Astral Plane and summons.

The Coliseum supplies a named, strengthened lich after the bandersnatch in its fixed sequence. Its HP, attack strength and damage differ as shown above. A lich named ... in a residence or random encounter can instead be a deceased historical adventurer of recorded level 12 or above, with a different mixture of retained and historical abilities.

An ordinary generated lich carries zero to four random items, not five guaranteed items. The fixed arena challenger is constructed separately and receives the arena's disposable garage-door opener instead of that ordinary random-inventory allocation.

Combat

The ordinary lich has three attacks and two defensive actions. A successful spirit touch first deals ordinary damage, then attempts to drain life with strength 6. Without negative-energy immunity, the drain either removes six current Strength and Constitution or removes six character levels and associated HP. Either result can kill; blocking physical damage alone does not prevent the drain.

A hostile lich can also cast spells while it has a line of sight to you. Its normal level allows physical and elemental attacks, self-healing, slowing, disease, curses and equipment loss, poison, sleep and dispelling. The normal level-6 spell selection does not include the higher-level Disintegration or spell-based level-drain outcomes. Its melee drain remains dangerous regardless.

Liches are immune to fire, poison, fear and sleep. They are not inherently immune to physical damage, cold or electricity. They use ordinary intelligent movement rather than the obstacle-crossing spirit movement of a vampire lord.

Strategy

Leave cemetery liches unprovoked unless you have a reason and the protections to fight them. For a required arena battle, negative-energy immunity is especially valuable, while magic resistance addresses the separate spellcasting threat. It does not turn the preceding physical attacks into harmless contact.

Distance avoids melee drain, but an unobstructed ranged duel still exposes you to spells. Breaking line of sight can interrupt that pressure while you retreat. Avoid fire, poison, fear and sleep as your main offense against this particular opponent.

A lich's skeleton is not food and has no alchemical transformation. Its possible carried items and the arena's formal rewards are separate from the skeleton itself. Surrender to an evil-speaking lich is unreliable and can leave it stronger after taking your possessions.