Can a Lich be Good in D&D?

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Can a Lich be Good in dungeons and dragons?

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[SteelySam]

My prediction for this comment section:

"SO YOU'RE TELLING ME THERE'S A CHANCE?"

[raonair]

So, basically.
Possible: yes.
Likely: hell no.

[satanic_panic]

There are actually good liches in D&D lore called "archliches". Archliches don't create phylacteries and instead use practical magical items that could serve as more than just a repository for their souls.
It's a really interesting read! You should make a video about them!
Consider this day 1 of asking for Archlich

[onionknight]

The only reason I became a lich was to annoy my elf neighbors and their descendants.

[Lg__]

I made a good lich in a campaign and his reason was that a few centuries before he was born the Lord of his town sold the souls of everyone from the town for the rest of time to a devil for power. The lich found out about it and studied arcane magic to try and break the deal and in that time he converted himself into a lich to prevent the towns folk from being sent to hell as well as reanimating corpse snd skeletons to do menial tasks like working fields and protecting the town. He also brings in tourism with his "Evil lair" where adventures can "fight" him and then get "i defeated a lich t-shirts" from the gift shop and he pays taxes on everything as well

[starbomber]

Brings new meaning to the phrase "live long enough to see yourself become the villain"

[Morethanannoyed]

dont forget baelnorn - good elven liches raised with the blessings of the Seldarine

[heysamuelhere]

Perhaps a high magic kingdom could have a lich royal mage that doubles as the local executioner. Feeding his phylactery that way. Definitely and idea I'll keep in mind for a high magic setting.

[IzzyOrnitier]

Obligatory message: Baelnorns are basically the equivalent of a good lich

[Sdogofdoom]

Had a neat idea for an npc in our dnd setting. A lich who had become so solely through defeating bandits/evil people, who is seen by the population at large as a "good guy". He sets up orphanages with his vast wealth, these orphanages teach the children how to become adventurers with a kind of do-good boyscouty feel. He helps kingdoms settle disputes, but otherwise roams the world with his horde of followers/undead running almost an eternal carnival. There are games and prizes but also the largest magic item emporium. For all his "good reputation" however, he is actually what i would call "practical evil", in that he does not care for the lives of others and would kill anyone without any real hesitation, but he has a goal. He wants to absorb all of the knowledge of the cosmos, and to become as powerful as possible in the process. He realized that, as both a single entity and an immortal, two things were true. One, he couldn't be everywhere and do everything on his own, and two, he had plenty of time to achieve his goals. And so he realized that if he were to maintain an almost holy reputation while also being incredibly generous, he could invite people to sell him whatever rare books or scrolls they found. He could pay them handsomely, let them go, and over time his money would always return to him. The orphanages teach the children to adventure so that they will delve into dungeons and seek out knowledge for him, his deals with kingdoms inevitably result in access to their libraries and records. So in the end, everything he does is for the selfish and evil goal of becoming some kind of god, and yet all the practical effects of his existence are good.

[austa]

Good Litch idea:
A grand wizard feels desperate to conduct the ritual, giving him the power to do good. It turns him into a Litch but has major reprocussions to others. Casting himself out of society, he does good deeds in the shadows while only taking willing souls for favors in order to keep himself alive.

[timseyer]

I just realized that your videos are so enchanting in part to the fact that your lighting setup gives your eyes a kind of special glow. Kind of like galadriel in LOTR.

[diogoteixeira]

I had this idea about a Lich that is the emperor of a country that uses the souls of the criminals that would be executed to fill his Phylactery

[Jmetclaf]

I have a good lich in my homebrew campaign. He was part of an adventuring party that saved the world like a thousand years ago, and since the evil they faced was never completely destroyed, he decided to become a lich so that he could ensure the world would be prepared when it returned. He’s partners with an Ancient Silver Dragon and an Enlightened Tortle Monk. My players loved these guys.

[eldritch-tailedfeydeer]

A good lich is one thing. Now imagine a lawful good Tarrasque king. That’s an idea I have for one of my own campaigns that I would like to run someday.

[ZamboniZone]

3.5 had a good litch template as well as the Ilthid-litch. In the forgotten realms handbook, it was stated that occasionally a wizard may want to further master a school of magic or perserve some manner of knowledge. Also, in 3.5 phalacteries did not need to be fed souls, they just needed to be hidden and be near a corps

[pieboygames]

I've always had an idea for a revenant knight who is on a quest to slay the wizard who cursed him with undeath. The finale of his story would be confronting the Wizard, now lich, and finding out that he is indeed the Lich's philachtery. The moral conundrum for the party would be, do we let our friend destroy himself to end the lich, or do we find another way?

[nightxsabbath]

I know I'm older editions there used to be what were known as Baelnorn, a type of elven undead that were similar to a lich but generally did not require the use of a phylactery. They were generally made by a High Magic or divine ritual, and they often did so to serve or safeguard their families, communities, or important places, and acted as keepers and protectors of elven clans and holdings far beyond the lifespan of a living elf.

[oneleghendo]

We had the approximation of a super hero in one campaign who turned out to be a lich. He was an adventurer(the DM’s old PC) from a previous campaign who’s family was killed by a sociopathic leader of a crime syndicate(who was an elf disguised as a human) while he was out saving the world from whatever. He devoted what was left of his life to planning his revenge, and 300 years later he was dismantling the crime syndicate, brutally. After the BBRG was ended, he willfully handed us his phylactery to destroy.

[talinpeacy]

This reminds me of one of my favorite TBS games "battle for westeros" where a guy becomes a lich in one of the campaigns to send undead armies at the orcs who would constantly attack his homeland and raze cities. He ends up waging an "eternal war" against them while "heros" of the "good" races keep sending armies to try and eradicate him for being evil. The stories in that game are incredible and I wish it got more love these days but it's stayed pretty niche despite all the mods and custom games people have made for it.