Lichdom: some questions

[cIV_khanh93]

1) liches retain all promotions, right?
2) does Death III have another spell?
3) do Liches get a free promotion (via the mage upgrading mechanic)
4) national limit on Liches, is it 3 or 4?
5) can they get twincast if liched from hero archmages? and hero archmages start with a free promotion?
6) why lich vampire lords? they lose 2 :str: and immortality, and there arent 11 promotions that melee units get that help mages (only combat 5 and mobility)

 

[Kyroshill]

1. Yes

2. Summon wraith

3. I think so LOL

4. 4 I believe

5. IIRC...yes

6. :shrug:

 

[popejubal]

Liches do have everything that they had before the transition, but now they are undead too. As far as I'm concerned, Liches are mostly useful for bypassing the national limit of 4 Archmages.

In my last game, I popped Arcane Lore out of a hut, researched the Level III Priest tech and got the Archmage tech out of the Infernal Book of Getting A Free Tech. Because I had hit all of my level II Priests with Govannon to teach them how to use Death and Mind magic, I had 4 Profanes with Dominate and Death III, 4 Archmages with Dominate and Death III and 4 former Archmagi with Dominate and Death III who had made the move to Lichdom.

Watching 12 units with Dominate wander up to a city was pretty spiffy as far as I was concerned. A couple of Assassins took out the weakest units that I didn't want bother Dominating, I dominate up to 12 enormous units and then no units are left in the city. Govannon teaches all of the weenie units a bunch of Level I spells and next turn, we move into the undefended city. (Possibly killing/dominating one or two units that moved into the city between turns.)

Sure, 4 units that each have Dominate would have been enough to take out most Civs, but having 12!?! Wow.

Edit: One major downside to Liches is that they don't seem to get any more XP. Not sure if this is deliberate or a bug, but they keep all of their old promotions, so they're good enough for me.

 

[cIV_khanh93]

they dont get any more exp as in, free from channelling III, or from combat? they have 7 str, so killing weakened units in the field shouldn't be a problem with the plan im stirring up in my head. also, what does IIRC mean?

 

[Kyroshill]

IIRC = if I recall correctly

 

[odalrick]

Liches are basically four extra archmages, with all the normal archmage advantages and disadvantages. They're also undead if that matters to you.

If you have some way to grant priests Death III, they retain all their religious spells and won't abandon you on state religion switch. I think Govannon is the only way to do that right now though.

And the reason to lich vampire lords is, that liches are unitcombat arcane, not melee, so they can gain new spell spheres.

You might also want eight archmages but don't have enough mages to promote.

 

[cIV_khanh93]

ok, i guess it would also mean tha the calabim can get archamges with divine essence instead of strenght of will, even if they'd need A LOT of feasting to gain new spell spheres.

 

[odalrick]

Also, I don't think there is any block for liches to gain extra experience, either from combat or channeling. However, by the time they get to liches, they probably already got all the experience they are going to get from passive experience.

Remember to give them Valor before liching them, although if they're vampires combat experience isn't very important.


Doesn't Divine Essence require Strength of Will? Regardless, Strength of Will is a lot cheaper than Divine Essence , so it's more of a minor bonus than an alternate way to get archmages.

 

[cIV_khanh93]

Also, I don't think there is any block for liches to gain extra experience, either from combat or channeling. However, by the time they get to liches, they probably already got all the experience they are going to get from passive experience.

Remember to give them Valor before liching them, although if they're vampires combat experience isn't very important.


Doesn't Divine Essence require Strength of Will? Regardless, Strength of Will is a lot cheaper than Divine Essence , so it's more of a minor bonus than an alternate way to get archmages.

IIRC its theology, but the calabim would benefit alotmore form the melee line than the arcane line.

 

[cabbagemeister]

3) do Liches get a free promotion (via the mage upgrading mechanic)

I'm almost sure that they do not. I know because I once accidentally upgraded my archmages to liches BEFORE using the archmages' free promotion (I had so many death nodes that I got Death III for free), and I lost that promotion because it was archmage-based, not xp-based.

As far as XP gains go, I don't know if liches still get free XP (I think they do), but in any event you should be able to rack up the XP pretty easily using Wraiths, who have the ability to "pass back" xp from their combat wins to their summoner.

 

[cIV_khanh93]

I'm almost sure that they do not. I know because I once accidentally upgraded my archmages to liches BEFORE using the archmages' free promotion (I had so many death nodes that I got Death III for free), and I lost that promotion because it was archmage-based, not xp-based.

As far as XP gains go, I don't know if liches still get free XP (I think they do), but in any event you should be able to rack up the XP pretty easily using Wraiths, who have the ability to "pass back" xp from their combat wins to their summoner.

0.0 the wraith thing is epic. Now I have the final link in my quest to rape everybody with twincasting corlindale liches.
EDIT: I guess i cant really rush anybody, because i cant research fanaticism with a great prophet until getting almost the same amount of beakers in other techs. but hveing 4 or 5 hero archmages is gonna be epic.

 

[odalrick]

World units cant cast lichdom anymore...

 

[cIV_khanh93]

World units cant cast lichdom anymore...

oh well. I say they shoulda only removed it from govannon and corlindale. Liching hemah or gibbon might still have advantages (not exploitative ones anyway)

 

[odalrick]

In a way, but is it really appropriate to lich Hemah or Govannon so they stay after switching religions?

 

[Tyrs]

As far as XP gains go, I don't know if liches still get free XP (I think they do), but in any event you should be able to rack up the XP pretty easily using Wraiths, who have the ability to "pass back" xp from their combat wins to their summoner.

Since when have wraith been able to do THAT?

 

[Valkrionn]

That was removed in 040, so they can't.

 

[Zechnophobe]

I think the wraith xp steal effect existed for basically 0 patches. It was listed on the .34 changelog (IIRC) and got such a negative reaction it was removed. Could mis-remember exactly, but something like that. (Seriously, it would have made the death line even more bursting with power).

 

[Iguanna]

It would be good if the 'pedia said that world units can't cast lichdom - then you wouldn't have people like me letting out their 'necro' on forum threads they find while trying to work out why the damn thing won't cast.

(BTW, it was Hemah I was trying to make a lich so I still had the good spells after changing religion, and it all looked good to go except the button was disabled. I looked in the game and also the pdf manual and couldn't find any explanation for this.
I'm not sure where to see what patch version I'm using, I didn't see 'patch z' or anything like that where I looked, which made me think it was telling me the civ version instead. I think I downloaded the patch it a week or two back though.)

 

[WarKirby]

Liches are undead. This can actually be pretty cool.


Most notably, being Not Alive makes liches immune to quite a few things.Spells like Wither, Dominate, etc. Undead also have 50% unholy resistance, which makes fighting against AV less of a worry. It's much more useful in FF though, as being undead makes you immune to poison (the archos are toast) and all the wold demons make unholy resistance much more useful.

In addition, Undead units can learn Cannibalize, one of the most awesome things in existence. anywhere. ever. In FF, undead can also learn Implacable. Which is basically march, but twice as good (it's incredible), and gives some first strikes too. Undead units can't learn march, but if you're amurites, you can upgrade a lich from a high priest who learned March in life, and he'll keep that after lichdom.

There are, unfortunately, some downsides, though. Being undead makes you vulnerable to that Undead Slaying promotion. Although who ever uses that? It also makes you immune to quite a few positive spells, as well as the negative ones. Courage/Valor/Haste/Regeneration/Bless. The loss of haste really hurts, as a lich will just slow down your army. Although FF has that problem covered by the Force I spell Accelerate, which is basically haste for undead/demons/siege weapons. really useful for khazad too.

Lastly, being undead gives you a significant weakness to holy damage. So using liches in direct combat against mercurians isn't a good idea. And anyone running Order can bless their troops for a nasty sting against you. Also, Crown of Brilliance, already horribly powerful, is a Holy damage spell. It tears undead to pieces.On the subject of spells actually, there's also Destroy undead, whichyou become vulnerable to. Much more acessible, it can be used to attack you even while hidden deep within a stack.


All in all though, I would say that being a lich has some interesting uses, and is in many ways preferable to a living archmage. Many, but not ALL ways. Each is best for different situations.

Oddly, given the resistance to unholy damage, and the fact that most spells which damage you are in good spheres/religions, it seems that liches are actually better off being made by good nations, rather than evil ones. If you're on the side of good, your lih is going to be strong against the things you'll be facing, rather than facing against things designed specifically to kill you.

Bannor Liches for the win!

 

[Onionsoilder]

Oddly, given the resistance to unholy damage, and the fact that most spells which damage you are in good spheres/religions, it seems that liches are actually better off being made by good nations, rather than evil ones. If you're on the side of good, your lih is going to be strong against the things you'll be facing, rather than facing against things designed specifically to kill you.

Bannor Liches for the win!

That seems wrong to me... It seems that being undead is an inherently evil trait, and as such undead/liches shouldn't be available to good nations... neutral maybe, but certainly not good. Oh well.