Lich (monster class)
- For the monster, see Lich.
The lich is a monster class that appears in NetHack, and is represented by an uppercase L glyph (L). Liches are designated internally by the macro S_LICH.[1]
The monster class contains the following monsters:[2]
- L lich
- L demilich
- L master lich
- L arch-lich
Contents
Common traits
Liches are chaotic, humanoid undead spellcasters - they are breathless, poisonous, have enhanced regeneration and infravision, and the stronger liches (informally called "purple Ls") are also covetous. All liches possess a cold touch attack and the ability to cast mage monster spells once per round. Liches are slow-moving, and have resistance to cold, sleep and poison like most undead monsters; they also convey cold resistance when eaten, but lich corpses and tins do not exist.
If chatted to, a lich will "mumble incomprehensibly".
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (NetHack 3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that it is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate this information.
Liches that are not cancelled can now raise monsters killed by them as zombies of the corresponding type; if they have one, they will be raised 5-20 turns after they are initially killed. This also applies to you if you are polymorphed into a lich. Liches will also grudge living monsters that can be turned into zombies.
Monsters with digestion attacks can gain intrinsics from swallowing monsters whole, making it possible for them to gain cold resistance from a lich that is digested.Generation
Randomly-generated liches are always hostile, and never leave a corpse when killed - if killed by any method that ordinarily leaves a corpse, a message is printed about their body crumbling to dust.[3] The master lich and arch-lich are only randomly generated in Gehennom.
Random liches appear among the throne room monsters placed in the center of the Castle on level creation - the class-specific monster generation used here makes it possible for master liches and arch-liches to generate outside of Gehennom. A random lich is placed somewhere within the left side of the inner rooms of Asmodeus' Lair at level creation; two random liches are generated within Moloch's Sanctum at level creation; and three random liches are placed around the Astral Plane at level creation.
Strategy
Liches are generally annoying at best and incredibly lethal at worst: many of them will frequently cast curse items, use aggravate monster to awaken other hostiles, and severely weaken your defenses with destroy armor - the stronger covetous ones can freely warp towards you (including on no-teleport levels) and even use the touch of death on you. Liches are often the target of genocide by many players that are not observing genocideless conduct, and it is often considered worth a blessed scroll of genocide to remove them all from the game.
One of the best ways to deal with a lich in combat is to have a source of magic resistance to dampen the effects of its spells and prevent the higher-level ones from instantly ending your game: Magicbane in particular will absorb a mass majority of curses from the curse items spell. Even covetous liches will respect Elbereth and the scroll of scare monster, though the former does not allow you to fight while standing on it and will work in Gehennom; additionally, neither method prevents liches from casting certain ranged spells at you - one particular spell, summon nasties, may generate monsters that do not respect Elbereth, such as captains and Elvenkings.
All liches minus the arch-lich do not have shock resistance, making Mjollnir an excellent option to deal with most of them; similarly strong, non-elemental artifact weapons like Excalibur and Sunsword (which deals double damage against liches and other undead) also work quite well against them. Liches are especially vulnerable to stoning, disintegration and digestion attacks, all of which can reliably instakill them.
All types of lich can be pacified by reading the blessed Book of the Dead, and it is additionally possible to tame liches and demiliches this way if done as a chaotic character.
As pets
Liches are generally strong pets with some trade-offs that are quite inconvenient. Their solid AC and increasingly powerful MR score make them difficult for most other monsters to kill, but said MR score also makes them difficult to tame. Covetous liches in particular cannot be tamed magically, though a tame lich can grow up into a covetous one as normal, and an existing pet can also be polymorphed into a tame covetous lich. Liches are also quite slow, with demiliches and stronger forms reaching a peak speed of 12 after casting haste self.
Liches cannot cast spells against other monsters, forcing them to rely on their cold touch to deal damage. They cannot wield weapons to counteract this due to lacking a weapon attack, and their cold touch may destroy potions in the target's inventory and renders them unable to kill any cold-resistant monsters, such as winter wolves or zombies - this is applicable even to their stronger forms, and requires you to kill such monsters yourself. Fortunately, their AC, MR, and resistances combined with their regeneration and ability to cure self makes them difficult for monsters to kill, and liches gain more AC, MR and resistances as they grow up.
Master liches and arch-liches in particular will constantly warp towards your position, making them easier to keep nearby without a magic whistle and lowering the risk of abandoning one - unfortunately, this also makes it incredibly dangerous for them to be confused, so be sure to give any lich you tame a unicorn horn as soon as possible. The warping will also make it nearly impossible to keep them away from aligned priests and shopkeepers, and may make navigating around traps such as level teleporters difficult. A covetous lich will often warp away to the up stair at the slightest sign of damage, which can be annoying; they are also inediate, making it near-impossible to raise tameness. Most annoying of all is the fact that even the strongest liches are still vulnerable to various instadeaths: stoning, disintegration, digestion and sliming will all make short work of a pet lich.
Reflection is not as vital for a higher-level type of lich as it is for other pets, due to the amount of resistances it can gain, but it is still useful to protect against the breath attacks of black dragons in particular. Similarly, while a lich has nothing to fear from death magic, magic resistance is still good to protect against stronger magical attacks such as an Angel's melee-range magic missile.
The following information pertains to an upcoming version (3.7.0). If this version is now released, please verify that it is still accurate, then update the page to incorporate this information.
Monsters can gain intrinsics from eating corpses, making inediate liches slightly weaker pets, though a lich can still gain useful resistances from becoming an arch-lich; pets that are polymorphed into liches retain any intrinsics they gain from eating corpses as well.As a polyform
Lich polyforms can wear all armor, and have similar strengths and weaknesses to pet liches: you have at least a few useful intrinsics and your base AC is better the stronger the polyform chosen, but your base speed is lower, you cannot use your wielded weapon, and your only attack is a cold touch that does nothing against resistant monsters. Fortunately, you have access to several other forms of offense that can make up for this, and your defensive qualities (including a resistance to death magic) are more than enough to ensure survival against all but the most powerful monsters.
History
The base lich, demilich and master lich first appear in NetHack 3.0.0, and the arch-lich is added in NetHack 3.3.0.
Origin
Liches are powerful spellcasters, often magicians or kings, who seek to defy death by magical means. They are depicted as being clearly cadaverous, bodies desiccated or completely skeletal, with glowing lights in place of their eyes.
Lich means "corpse" or "body" in several Germanic languages (compare e.g. Dutch lichaam and German Leiche), and survives in Modern English in the word "lichgate" (or "lych-gate", etc.), a covered entrance to a churchyard.
Messages
- <The lich> mumbles incomprehensibly.
- You chatted to a lich.
- <The lich>'s body crumbles into dust.
- A lich was killed.[3]
Variants
SLASH'EM
SLASH'EM adds one new monster to the monster class:
- L Vecna
dNetHack
dNetHack adds several new monsters to the monster class:
- L lich:
- L baelnorn
- L death knight
- L dokkalfar eternal matriarch
- L Acererak
- L Lich, the Fiend of Earth
- Deferred monsters
- L Vecna
SpliceHack
SpliceHack adds two new monsters to the monster class:
EvilHack
EvilHack adds one new monster to the monster class:
- L Vecna
Players killed by any type of lich will arise as a revenant instead of a ghost in bones files.
Liches are much more dangerous compared to vanilla NetHack, since they have access to several new monster spells, including cancellation, reflection and stone to flesh. This also makes them much better pets and polyforms, with full access to their repertoire of monster spells when fighting other monsters.
SlashTHEM
SlashTHEM adds one new monster to the monster class:
Hack'EM
Hack'EM adds a few monsters to the monster class from other variants:
As in EvilHack, players killed by any type of lich will arise as a revenant instead of a ghost in bones files.
Encyclopedia entry
But on its heels ere the sunset faded, there came a second apparition, striding with incredible strides and halting when it loomed almost upon me in the red twilight-the monstrous mummy of some ancient king still crowned with untarnished gold but turning to my gaze a visage that more than time or the worm had wasted. Broken swathings flapped about the skeleton legs, and above the crown that was set with sapphires and orange rubies, a black something swayed and nodded horribly; but, for an instant, I did not dream what it was. Then, in its middle, two oblique and scarlet eyes opened and glowed like hellish coals, and two ophidian fangs glittered in an ape-like mouth. A squat, furless, shapeless head on a neck of disproportionate extent leaned unspeakably down and whispered in the mummy's ear. Then, with one stride, the titanic lich took half the distance between us, and from out the folds of the tattered sere-cloth a gaunt arm arose, and fleshless, taloned fingers laden with glowering gems, reached out and fumbled for my throat . . .
