So, yeah. I'm sitting here trying to figure out a way to find a lich's phylactery, and I had a thought pertaining to Discern Location. Is a phylactery that houses a lich's soul entirely 100% a different object? Or could it be located by trying to locate the lich?
After all, his soul is stored in it. It's still linked to him. It's still PART of him. Even if the lich, himself, is under a Mind blank, could the phylactery be located indirectly by the fact that his soul isn't protected by the mind blank, being separate from him?
If he is under the effects of Mind Blank, every part of him is under the effects of Mind Blank. Including his soul, wherever it may be hidden.
Plus, there's always the Misdirection spell, he could have his soul appear to the people looking for it as a toilet in the house across the street.
If it was that easy to find, they wouldn't be immortal, and would probably just carry it with them so they can always guard it.
Can Discern Location detect things through lead? Lead lined boxes were brought up in your other thread. Yes it does, but it is divination, and Misdirection is specifically designed for such things.
I would wager that most phylacteries are found by complete accident and bad luck, by people not looking for liches or their souls. And most of those people seldom live to tell about it.
Mind blank essentially renders the lich nonexistent with respect to divination magic, at least so far as attempts to divine anything about the lich during a period in which it is protected by mind blank. This includes the lich's soul, but it does not include the lich's phylactery--that's an object, not a creature, and it wouldn't be protected any more than a wizard's bonded object would be.
The Lich and his phylactery are two separate potential targets for Discern Location. One is a creature the other an highly magical object. And please note the requirement of having seen the Lich himself, some item they possessed OR to have touched the phylactery depending on what is being targeted. If you've touched the phylactery the Lich has already seriously screwed up (or you've been exceedingly clever).
If you are targeting the Lich with Discern Location after having defeated him (hence seen him) and he is now reforming there is an excellent chance he is NOT protected by Mind Blank as Mind Blank lasts a flat 24 hours and the Lich should not be doing any casting until after the 1 to 10 day period while he is reforming. So wait 24+ hours, use Discern Location and shy of that 10% chance he has already reformed and recast Mind Blank you should 'ping' a location for his reforming corpse. The only real hitch there is if your DM rules the Lich won't properly 'ping' as a creature until fully reformed or something similar. Now that you know where the reforming body/corpse is hopefully you can get there and locate the phylactery via a thorough mundane search the for "nearby" phylactery.
Edit: "hopefully you can get there and fight through all the associated defenses to search the area for the phylactery" Improved that thought a wee tiny bit :)
Alright, Voodist, normally you have great information, but... No. To Discern Location, Misdirection would NOT do squat. Misdirection is a second level spell vs a spell meant to cut through "normal means of protection", and Discern Location EXPRESSLY states "nothing short of a Mind Blank spell or direct divine intervention." That includes Misdirection, Non-detection, and lead walls.
Kayerloth, the point of my question isn't the phylactery itself, but the lich's soul. Which, arguably, is just stored in the phylactery, since the ritual to make a lich is specifically to yank out it's soul and story it in a magical container. You do, however, have several excellent points.
Blaphers, as I previously pointed out to Kay, the whole point of the ritual is to separate the lich's soul from his body. It's not actually part of him any more, not really. To my thinking, though, it SHOULD still be able to be found because it's still CONNECTED to him, tenuous as that connection might be.
I had previously misread Misdirection and was citing it from memory. Misdirection is specific to countering divination magic, but only divination that detects auras.
That is my bad.
Killing the Lich and trying to discern its location as it reforms is a good call. It probably won't be under Mind Blank as it reforms, only question is if you can discern its location during its reforming process.
It can't be under mind blank as it reforms. :P New body means no previous protections carry over.
Until the lich's body is done reforming, I would think it is just an object, not a creature. I think it is questionable that touching the lich when it was alive counts as having touched the new body for discern location, although that is arguable.
Even if it works though it seems it would be of limited value.
Player: "I cast Discern Locaction on the Lich's body".
GM: "Discern location reveals that the Lich's Body is in The Secret Lich Sanctum, XXX community (if applicable), XXX county, country, continent, plane as applicable)".
Other than telling you if it is on another plane or not, it probably won't get you their unless the lich's phylactery is in a place you already know.
Dave Justus wrote: Until the lich's body is done reforming, I would think it is just an object, not a creature. I think it is questionable that touching the lich when it was alive counts as having touched the new body for discern location, although that is arguable.
Even if it works though it seems it would be of limited value.
Player: "I cast Discern Locaction on the Lich's body".
GM: "Discern location reveals that the Lich's Body is in The Secret Lich Sanctum, XXX community (if applicable), XXX county, country, continent, plane as applicable)".
Other than telling you if it is on another plane or not, it probably won't get you their unless the lich's phylactery is in a place you already know.
And that leads back to how the GM in question handles things. Is the Lich, when animated prior to destruction, an object? After all it lacks a soul or spirit within the corpse that being the whole point of the phylactery to contain said soul. If that's the case what makes the reforming body an object vs a creature since the soul is nearby within the phlylactery creating the body.
That said it is certainly possible the GM in question would rule in such a manner. As for limited value that is very much in the eye of beholder. Compared to knowing or learning nothing it is a great deal more. Might it require further research, asking more questions, casting more spells. I certainly would do so if I were the GM. And then there's the whole issue I eluded to in my post's edit. Knowing the location is far from knowing how to get in past all the defenses left to protect the phylactery and for the Lich his reforming body. The Lich knows if such is occurring he is in an undeniably more vulnerable position and would act accordingly. I would expect a second even more intense and dangerous quest would be ahead of such a party then the first round facing the Lich.
Zarius wrote: It can't be under mind blank as it reforms. :P New body means no previous protections carry over. Unless I missed a FAQ that by itself is a "home" ruling on an issue that's been around for a long long time. As in since PC's could die while spell durations still had time before expiring. Far as I know it's never been officially stated ... though missing (or forgetting) said FAQ could certainly be the case for me especially in the last decade or so. (Edit: And yes I get the new body point ... but if, as you suggest, the soul is part of the creature you get into why the new body would matter since the soul of the creature is not 'new' and might be protected by the previously cast spells as a result)
My point was that issue is missing in this case as the duration would expire regardless while the Lich is reforming so even if all his spells didn't 'die' with him that particular spell is unlikely to be a concern. Heck most of his spell that were on him when initially defeated would have expired. Even with Extend and a very high caster level anything less than permanent will have expired after 2 or 3 days if not much sooner. And you have a point where a new body is concerned. A new body most likely without a lot of equipment protections as well. Becomes a guess just how much corpse reforms to receive items and just how well mindless undead or golem servants can dress master in his new garb.
Personally and that's exactly what this is, how I would run it, I'd let you attempt to use Discern Location on either his body or soul. You'd just have to specify or I'd default to giving you the location of his animated corpse. Obviously all the prerequisites would have to be met which might make Discerning the soul a bit tricky ... have you ever seen it, particularly as a separate and distinct 'thing' (and yes that means I would treat a separated soul as a 'creature' vs an object)? If so I'll bet there are a few sages that would pay heavily for such a description.
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