Anybody have any good ideas for an interesting Dracolich encounter?
>>43094790
A non-violent one.
Perhaps the draco-lich wishes to be entertained, immortality can get rather dull after all.
Or maybe he needs some new minions to run around doing tasks that he considers beneath him.
>>43095694
What kind of location would a non-violent draco-lich inhabit, assuming it's still evil and has dragon needs and all?
>>43094790
Simply try and comprehend what a dracolich would even want. Immortality? Check, got that through its mastery of necromancy. Wealth? Probably owns more than you have ever seen if it has lived long enough to gain aforementioned immortality. So... next has to be power, right? Dracolich attempts to become a deity and redesign the world as it sees fit. But you could always throw a twist in what it sees as perfect.
Or just maybe it already succeeded? What would its ideal reality look like?
The dragon was of a good type originally, and through its thousands of years of life, rather than appreciating this or coming to accept it, became more and more afraid of death, far more than you or I would ever have time to become.
Becoming a dracolich took more than a single sentient sacrifice. It took aeons of torture of innocent souls, disgusting, horrid acts.
So now the dracolich, disgusted by its form and full of regret, is on an endless rampage to show itself how easily life is lost, how none of it matters, essentially desperately clinging to nihilism as a way of suppressing mind-blowing amounts of guilt.
Of course, the party figures this out over time as it tracks the thing, which uses spells to keep itself from being found too easily, but doesn't do as good a job as it could because deep down it wants to be put out of its misery.
>>43095742
A Draco-lich is an ancient immortal being of immense magical power. It would probably live in its own custom demi-plane.
>>43094790
Dracolich has the person you came to rescue imprisoned in her rib cage
>>43095922
The party ain't rescuing anyone, they're there to make the dracolich submit to the rule of Szass Tam, Eternal Undying Emperor of Thay!
He holds dominion over all unliving things, dragons are no exception.
When a dracolich "dies", it can possess the corpse of any suitably large reptile that's within range of its phylactery.
Have the players fight a Dracolich that has figured out how to do so without its true body being destroyed, so that throughout its lair they're forced to fight it several times in the various bodies its collected, like a dire crocodile corpse, a wyvern skeleton, a mummified yuan-ti anathema, or a gray linnorm husk, and all the while taunting them until they finally reach its true dragon body.
You can even have it possess smaller reptile corpses between these larger battles, following and harassing the party and basically toying with them. Of course, after they've destroyed some of the more prized corpses in its collection, it will probably become somewhat enraged.
>>43096060
Help the draco-lich stage a coup.
>>43096113
>this isn't even my final form!
>>43096113
And have the dracolich totally geek out over the various corpses in its collection.
>>43094790
He want to start a heavy metal band.