Okay, so I have this big sexy hook for my D&D story, and I want to know if there is a way that I can do this while still following the rules.
The history for this is that 100 years ago in my campaign's past, there was a powerful wizard named Egan. He ruled over a group of pure evil named The Black Hand, and was stopped in the past by the five glorious heroes (my party's old heroes).
I want Egan to make a return as a form of lich. Is there a possible way? I would base it around the idea that some of the descendants of the original Black Hand were trying to bring the 100-year-old corpse of their former leader back to life in a form of ritual or other legal mechanism.
The group that is attempting this is level 8, with a few members at level 10. However, they have enough gold/resources to be able to fund anything they require that they don't currently have. Egan was not originally a lich, but I would like to see if there is a way to bring him back and then turn him into a lich.
Best Answer
By the rules, becoming a lich is a willful and voluntary action on the part of the would-be lich. You can’t do it for someone, and you can’t have it done to you. You cannot even be forced or tricked or mind-controlled into it:
Furthermore, the rules also state that
Which means that raising him as some other form of undead isn’t useful.
Thus, you are left with resurrection or similar; resurrection is a 7th-level spell, so the caster has a minimum of Caster Level 13th, which means anyone who died in the last 130 years, minimum, is a valid target. That includes your guy. He could then become a lich through the usual process.
A 10th-level cleric could cast resurrection from a staff, or from a scroll with an easy Caster Level check (DC 14 and he’s got a minimum of +10).
If the body is unavailable, you need true resurrection, a 9th-level spell (minimum Caster Level 17th), and that’s a somewhat more difficult DC 18 Caster Level check (still a 65% chance to succeed)
Narratively, though, that might fall a bit flat. I know of no direct raise-as-a-lich spell. However, depending on the details of the afterlife in your setting, there may be another option. A character must be humanoid to become a lich, and must create his own phylactery. Nothing says he has to be humanoid when he creates his phylactery. Perhaps his spirit creates the phylactery, before being raised, and then there’s a combination ritual: a cleric casts resurrection on him as he performs the ritual to become a lich. This seems more interesting and dramatic. He’ll still briefly return to life, but only briefly. Easily explained as trying to limit his vulnerability (I imagine a scroll of resurrection is a bit tricky to come by).