Liches Lore with the Teachings of an Archmage
Crit Academy discusses lore of one of Dungeons and Dragons most terrifying monsters, Liches. They are joined by Johm Gemstone, host of the Teachings of an Archemage Podcast. Johm shares with us the details and lore on how a Lich comes to be, who was the first to take the dark step into lichdom and much more.
Unearthed Tips and Tricks! We bring you new and reusable content for you to bring on your next adventure!
Character Concept: Grave Master
Clerics are thought of as beacons burning with hope, yet they do more than just fight off evil. Granting the most beautiful moments such as the God-King and Queen’s wedding to the pitiful rites a squelch earns after his body has grown algid. Johm took is goliath cleric and hunched his proud back with years of gracing the dead with lovely rooms 5 feet under. His god Jergal took notice of how well Heroma kept track of the recently departed and his personal judgments on their actions and how their afterlife may look.
Monster Variant: A Lock’d Chest
Origin: Mimic:
Intelligent Chests? - Everyone I know loves large and handy chests. While reading a book call “Morningwood. Everyone loves large chests volume 1” by Nevin Ilieve. I got the idea to bring his idea to life for the smartest, largest, most hady chest! Meet Mr. Morningwood he is a mimic with 3 lvls into the warlock class! With the pact of the blade this Intelligent creature can not only shoot spells but also swing a well aimed blade! Base Mimic then added 3 lvls worth of warlock spells still being decided upon but definitely has the eldritch blast cantrip.
Encounter: The river of molten and frozen treasures
A river of sloshing golden trinkets run underground in a long-forgotten area off the sword coast. It slinks its way under an ornate bridge. If a player reaches to pull an item from the stream of glistening treasures they must make a Strength check (DC 20) to pull an item from the river. If it is upstream of a bridge take 6D6 fire damage even on success, if downstream of the bridge take 6D6 cold damage. On a success give them a rare magic weapon or trinket that is made of Imperial Gold. In my game, I used a +3 Long sword that can turn into a coin.
Magic Item: Moradin’s Bracers
Bracers found deep in a dwarven vault. These bracers are made of the purest mithril, dotted with rubies that holds the fires of Gauntlgrym, and finally, a diamond that has been shaped to total perfection betweens Moradin’s hammer and anvil.
Moradin’s Bracers require attunement. Once attune a wearer learns of if any (DM choice if any are there) and is able to summon these weapons as a bonus action. Able to store 4 simple and 2 martial weapons, Moradin’s Bracers are designed for that weapon hoarder in every party. To add a new weapon to the bracers, the character must take 3 hours of using the weapon while concentrating on their attack patterns. Once finished with bonding this new weapon into Moradin’s bracers the weapon can now be stored within, along with gain the proficiency bonus if they currently do not. If the bracers are full the player may swap out one of the weapons but they lose proficiency if their charter does not naturally have it.
(Special feature, Dwarves attune to Moradin’s Bracers only)-Moradin’s Armory- Once every 30 days, a dwarf attune to Moradin’s Bracers calls to his creator for the strength of a true dwarf *cough Bruenor Battlehammer* Once this ability is active, the dwarf shines as bright as Moradin’s forge.
All weapons now on hit do max damage and count as magic damage (for overcoming resistances) for 1 min.
Dungeon Master Tip: Master your craft
We are storytellers, myth weavers and vagabonds. No matter how long we do it there is always more to learn but sometimes we skip the base of learning how to tell a story. We learn rules spells world-building all in the DMG but we do not learn from it the basic principles of beats, scenes, and story in whole. I love the book “Story Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting” By Robert Mckee (get copy at audibletrial.com/critacademy)
Player Tip: Do not be afraid to interrupt your DM-
Long cuts scenes, wordy explanations, filler words to allow time for us DMs to think. These can cause problems when you want to do something for the dm might narrate you somewhere before ya can get a word in. So stop the Dm when the story starts down a rabbit hole when you wanted to just sit on your pillow while sleeping under the willow.
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