The influence of other games on how I view them in Dragonbane RPG.

By far one of my favorite encounters in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1E came from Book of Lairs. A well prepared, well equipped lich can wipe a party with little effort. Summons aside, these guys have been around for a long time and accumulate tons of spells, magic items, and henchmen. They are the epitome of BBEGs. The worst part is, I ran this encounter for more than one party of adventurers who all wiped every time.

Azalin and so many other canon liches in D&D have been among my favorite Ravenloft villains over the years, next to Lord Soth of course. In my opinion, 5E did themselves a disservice by not playing up Ravenloft as more of a full continent sub-plane with Azalin rivaling Soth and Strahd at every turn. Big surprise they botched it, but what can we do?

Still, there’s been a lich in almost every canonical official D&D setting. It’s one of the first thing I look for in any new setting because they’re one of my default bad guys. Demons, dragons, beholders, and mind flayers also come up, but I look for undead, especially liches in every campaign book. They’re just such awesome bad guys.

Another example of this sort of thing comes up in World of Warcraft, which I played for a very long time. While liches are slightly more common in Azeroth, making them end bosses and mini-bosses but still powerful regardless. There is a TTRPG version of Warcraft and World of Warcraft in which liches play a crucial role in story development. I actually dug the books out the other day and went down memory lane for a bit.  

One place I always thought we needed a lich but technically never got one (except Leoric) was Diablo 1-3. (I don’t own/haven’t played 4 yet.) I hear Diablo: Immortal did a WoW crossover, so maybe liches are canon now? I don’t know. But hordes and masses of undead deserve a powerful overlord, and liches fit that bill quite nicely.

My use of the lich.

Another character I always thought deserved lichdom was Venger from the old Dungeons & Dragons cartoon series. This prompted me to write a human character who is about as evil, just not as powerful, for my Dragonbane adventures. I don’t want to spoil too much, but he’s building power, arcane research, necromancy, dependable minions (including one or more groups of PCs he intends to betray) and all kinds of hideouts, lairs, libraries to use as his eventual stronghold(s.) He will achieve his dream of immortality unless the people he has screwed over in the past catch onto him.

He’s not wearing a one horned cowl and flying through the skies on a nightmare raining hexed magic down upon the party just yet though. Every good lich has to start somewhere. This one actually started out as a demonologist and moved to necromancy. Learning two magic disciplines is tough. So is building an empire and becoming a lich in Dragonbane.

Speaking of Dragonbane…

There’s only one true lich in Dragonbane official canon so far, and his name is Dakoth. You’ll find him whispered about in Path of Glory, though never comfortably. Even the gods seem uneasy when his name comes up. That says a lot in a world where dragons sleep under mountains and demons still walk the ruins of empires.

Anyone who can give old Sathmog a run for his money is worthy of respect. I’ve seen Dakoth’s stats. Three schools of magic, of which Necromancy is only one of them. More Willpower than he knows what to do with. Skills in the 18s. Dakoth should never be taken lightly, and other bad guys should aspire to his level of badass-ness. Oh, and all of that is without his many henchmen.

Dakoth provides inspiration and a bit of a template.

If/when I have to stat the final version of my Venger, I hope he comes close to filling Dakoth’s shoes. The main difference is my guy is more warlock with necromantic tendencies where Dakoth is Necromancer first and everything else second.

If we keep it all in the Misty Vale, my guy, (Sorry, I really can’t say the name without spoiling it or the NPC might not survive.) might even be working with/for Sathmog. Unfortunately that means Azrahel Koth might get a little jealous. That guy’s about the next closest thing to a lich Dragonbane has. (According to the Dragonbane Adventures Book from the core boxed set.) He might not take too well to someone else sucking up to “his” boss. Should be quite a show even if I work it out solo.

Taking from a collage of fantasy TTRPG sources.

My primary goal with the lich and other monsters going forward in Dragonbane is to draw from a massive plethora of sources without directly copying from them. There is a lot of uncharted territory in Dragonbane in terms of monsters. With no Monsterboken 2 in sight yet, I think we’re all going to be winging it for a while to come.

I’m going to borrow liberally from D&D in every era, Pathfinder 2E, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Shadowdark, Old School Essentials, Rolemaster, Hackmaster (yes, comedy value,) Cypher System, W.O.I.N. and anything else what ain’t nailed down. Anywhere I can find an ability, spell, or effect to copy onto a monster with modifications, it’s going in. I love making monsters and it’s such a cool bonus to have over 50 years to borrow material from.