Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on November 07, 2021, 11:25:59 AMWhat do think of animarium? From Latin anima "soul" + -arium "container."

I think every setting with liches should have their own thing for phylactery. But phylactery has become so synonymous in any setting that uses them that its not exactly a problem for it to be phylactery.

Animarium isn't bad. I would have something like 'Mortality Pin' going off the russian stories. Because its a pin that keeps your soul on the mortal plane.

Koshei is a persons name, its like calling a Witch a 'Baba Yaga'. If there are to be baba yagas its generally in satire.


(Skip to 11:05 if you want Baba Yagas).

Monster names don't really make sense and are largely arbitrary. I find trying to make them named proper is too...clinical?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on November 07, 2021, 12:12:06 PM
I always thought "zombie" was anachronistic in a European fantasy setting, since the monster itself is of Afro-Caribbean origin. Clark Ashton Smith called them liches. http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/short-stories/61/the-empire-of-the-necromancers

   Horror Hero seemed to pick up on this back in 1994 and called them "animated cadavers" in their Victorian setting. The Ravenloft novel I, Strahd: The War Against Azalin has Strahd actually learning the term 'zombie' from Azalin, whose background is from Greyhawk.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on November 07, 2021, 12:59:19 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on November 07, 2021, 11:25:59 AMWhat do think of animarium? From Latin anima "soul" + -arium "container."

I think every setting with liches should have their own thing for phylactery. But phylactery has become so synonymous in any setting that uses them that its not exactly a problem for it to be phylactery.

Animarium isn't bad. I would have something like 'Mortality Pin' going off the russian stories. Because its a pin that keeps your soul on the mortal plane.

Koshei is a persons name, its like calling a Witch a 'Baba Yaga'. If there are to be baba yagas its generally in satire.

(Skip to 11:05 if you want Baba Yagas).

Monster names don't really make sense and are largely arbitrary. I find trying to make them named proper is too...clinical?

I was trying to invent a generic name that apply regardless of the exact form the animarium took or what purpose it was used for. So a tefillin or "mortality pin" or death knight's sword or live snake or cursed ring or that cursed crown from Lodoss War would be examples of animarium objects. The term could also be applied to an object used to imprison the souls of victims. This lends an element of unpredictability to the animarium too, because they are not made equal.

I actually got the idea for using koschie from Grimm tv show, which uses it as a type of monster, and from wiktionary which claims "kostěj" (koschei) is a Czech translation of the D&D lich. Although I prefer something like voldemort because it's derived loosely from "La vol de la mort" or "the theft from death" referring to the ill-gotten immortality. Altho "heartless immortal" from Palladium works too. The ATU tale type "giant without a heart" might be slightly unwieldy.

Altho it's fairly common in mythology for some unique to lend them name to others like them, such as Lamia being a Queen of Libya and a race of monsters or Pegasus being a specific winged horse and the name for a whole breed of them. It's also common for D&D in particular to recycle of the names of unique mythical monsters for monster races cloned from them like the medusae and minotaurs. Even if names already existed (e.g. gorgons) or the recycled name doesn't make sense with the new lore (minotaur means "king's bull" or "bull of the king").

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on November 07, 2021, 04:53:38 PMI actually got the idea for using koschie from Grimm tv show, which uses it as a type of monster, and from wiktionary which claims "kostěj" (koschei) is a Czech translation of the D&D lich.

It comes more from eastern european folklore. Koshei the deathless, a Lich/Deathnight combo.

Anyway, I think Lich by itself is fine. Comes from Lichyard, and by itself refers to a Spellcaster with a specific soul-holding item that makes you evil. There are plenty of other evil types of undead, but I feel that Lich is pretty Iconic and cool.

Honestly I somewhat feel like we are trying to give a new name to something that was fine for the past 50 years or so. So what if its language roots no longer make perfect sense? Thats 95.99999997% of language anyway.

If I where to make original undead, I would make original undead. Liches by themselves are products of 'mass production' so their general similarity makes sense to me.

Please remember to keep this thread to the subject related to gaming.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on November 07, 2021, 05:38:13 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on November 07, 2021, 04:53:38 PMI actually got the idea for using koschie from Grimm tv show, which uses it as a type of monster, and from wiktionary which claims "kostěj" (koschei) is a Czech translation of the D&D lich.

It comes more from eastern european folklore. Koshei the deathless, a Lich/Deathnight combo.

Anyway, I think Lich by itself is fine. Comes from Lichyard, and by itself refers to a Spellcaster with a specific soul-holding item that makes you evil. There are plenty of other evil types of undead, but I feel that Lich is pretty Iconic and cool.

Honestly I somewhat feel like we are trying to give a new name to something that was fine for the past 50 years or so. So what if its language roots no longer make perfect sense? Thats 95.99999997% of language anyway.

If I where to make original undead, I would make original undead. Liches by themselves are products of 'mass production' so their general similarity makes sense to me.

I would have suggested that the type of person willing to essentially sacrifice their own life to gain undead immortality would more then likely have been evil to start with and then adding the negative energy taint on top of that would finish off the rest.

Quote from: Shasarak on November 07, 2021, 06:07:30 PMI would have suggested that the type of person willing to essentially sacrifice their own life to gain undead immortality would more then likely have been evil to start with and then adding the negative energy taint on top of that would finish off the rest.

Not exactly. Arrogance (phah, the dangers of undeath must be overstated), ignorance (undeath makes you evil?), a desire to accomplish something else (I need to protect my grandchildren), or just a general human fear of death.

I had always thought the insistence that Necromancy was evil was due to two things:

1: You're going against the natural order.

2: You're messing with corpses, and a lot of cultures have serious respect for the dead.

Also, I was under the impression that the requirements to be a lich involved some INCREDIBLY evil things. Like sacrificing an infant or a bunch of virgins. The idea that killing something solely for your own benefit is the epitome of evil. Like becoming a Dragon in Dark Sun (which involves mass murder on top of sucking the life out of the world for 20 something levels), it's just unavoidable.

D&D has always had this thing about making immortality (in the biological sense) incredibly difficult to achieve or impossible, not to mention almost always evil. I remember there was a potion in 2nd that would reduce your age, and if tested would have diminished effect.

I think they should just remove liches entirely because liches are offensive to dead people.

Greetings!

You know, I don't understand this constant, deep need on the part of many people in the gaming hobby to *insist* that traditionally evil, wicked, savage and terrifying villains like vampires and liches should somehow not be EVIL.

The artistic interpretation or "reimagining* of them is that they are somehow an exception, or thy are misunderstood, or they experienced trauma in their childhood or early adult years, and blah, blah, blah.

NO. They are evil, terrifying and EVIL monsters. Some things, like Halflings, or Gnomes, or Minotaurs even, can be reinterpreted to an extent, and everything is fine, and even interesting and fun.

Reinterpreting some other things though...just comes off as stupid to me. Instead of having a terrifying, evil villain opposing the adventurers, somehow the vampire or lich is a tragic, misunderstood figure that the adventurers should cry over and seek to "understand them".

Fireball them all. Again, and again, and again.

I think it makes for better game and adventure design to maintain particular standards, and a campaign that keeps such traditional icons of villainy makes for a stronger, more vivid, and memorable campaign.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on November 07, 2021, 09:54:38 AM
Horcrux is a dull name. It only sounds cool if your a HP fan.

It would be like wanting to call the phylactery now... Midichloeians!

It beyond stupid to try and shoehorn in a word from a totally unrelated work.

Though this does bring up the question.

Just where did Gary or whomever came up with it get the term and useage? Another one of those odd medieval re-uses of names like the Gorgon?

Also. D&D has bounced around on what exactly the thing is called anyhow? Soul Gem is an early one. Assuming one even exists.
In the AD&D MM there is no mention at all of any such item.
Looks like the term and item appeared first apparently in the 2e MM?

Quote from: SHARK on November 07, 2021, 09:25:03 PM
Greetings!

You know, I don't understand this constant, deep need on the part of many people in the gaming hobby to *insist* that traditionally evil, wicked, savage and terrifying villains like vampires and liches should somehow not be EVIL.

Its nothing new really and movies have been doing this for ages. And stage plays have been doing the opposite, portraying heroes as villains for centuries.

Also keep in mind that in BX and AD&D that alignment listed was a general guideline. Not set in stone. The AD&D entry for a Liche is Neutral (evil) meaning that they are predominantly neutral and tend to be evil. But as the MM says, alignment is only the characteristic bent of such creatures. Not how all are, as shown in various modules.

The problem is that players keep wanting to read alignments as an absolute. When it was not. Not helped by later writers who could not see past this either and so perpetuate and magnify the problem.
Though 3e had a good approach in that the listed alignment had an append to it to  indicate how often a creature example cleaved to its listed alignment, so an elf was usually chaotic good, a drow was usually neutral evil. And so on.

And the DM can always do whatever with the monsters.

IMO, Vampires and Liches have a similar idea behind them; those who'd drain life from others to make their own richer.

I think you can get a lot of mileage with that concept.

Quote from: PsyXypher on November 08, 2021, 12:59:15 AM
IMO, Vampires and Liches have a similar idea behind them; those who'd drain life from others to make their own richer.

I think you can get a lot of mileage with that concept.

Except if they are sparkly angst ridden vampires. Then they are useless.

Quote from: PsyXypher on November 07, 2021, 08:11:24 PMAlso, I was under the impression that the requirements to be a lich involved some INCREDIBLY evil things. Like sacrificing an infant or a bunch of virgins. The idea that killing something solely for your own benefit is the epitome of evil. Like becoming a Dragon in Dark Sun (which involves mass murder on top of sucking the life out of the world for 20 something levels), it's just unavoidable.

I personally believe the greatest evil one is capable of is convincing yourself of your moral infalibility, but there is space for different kinds of interpretation of liches.