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I'm currently in a campaign that involves Geb, and one of our main opponents is going to be Arazni. She's out to get us because one of the Bloodstones of Arazni (her lung) recently came into our possession, and we used it without knowing that doing so apparently signals her as to its location.
So an incredibly powerful undead demigod queen is gunning for us so she can have her lung back, and we don't want that to happen. A Legend Lore spell allowed the GM to reveal to us what the drippy thing in the jar actually is and what it does, as well as offer some cryptic hints as to where the others might be found. It's also been very strongly hinted to us that the Bloodstones are collectively Arazni's phylactery (if it's ever been revealed what her phylactery is in the setting I'm unaware of it, but in this campaign at least it's the Bloodstones). So we Gotta Catch 'Em All and destroy the lich queen for good, before she gets her hands on us.
But! While discussing our gameplan between sessions, an interesting idea occurred to us. These organs are still alive; they are specifically described as such in "Artifacts and Legends". This is a piece of Arazni's living body. So...would it work as the material component to a Clone spell?
Our next session is tomorrow, and we're hoping to propose a change of plans to the GM; we'll find all the other Bloodstones alright, but not to destroy them. We're going to use them to grow Arazni a new body and then kill her old one, so instead of regenerating lich-style like she expects, she will wake up as a mortal woman.
After that we're not sure what happens. It's entirely possible that after spending centuries as an undead monstrosity she's irredeemably evil at this point, so we'll just have to kill her again. But at least this time when she dies it will be as a mortal, and she won't come back.
But it's also possible that this will redeem her; unlike most liches, Arazni was transformed against her will, after she had already died. Liches can't help being evil, but returning to life might undo her corruption and gain us a powerful ally, one who knows all of Geb's secrets.
Do any of you know if there's any reason this plan can't work? If there's some aspect of the rules or the canon that we'd be violating? Even if there is, the GM might think this is an awesome enough concept to let us do it, but it's still good to be aware of any potential complications so we can martial our arguments in favor if it.
I'd definitely say it's up to the GM. While her soul may be tainted by undeath, it's certainly possible that it can recover from it by being put into a living body. However, doing what you propose will most certainly anger Geb, and cause him to come after you with a vengeance, which is not good when it's in the case of a man who can reanimate a city made of bones to serve him.
The alternative is killing her, and I'm pretty sure that will anger Geb just as much. At this point we've already made enemies who are way out of our league; making one of them a possible ally may be the closest we can get to leveling the playing field.
But yeah, this is destined to end pretty badly if our luck doesn't hold out. Note to self: next time you find a squishy thing in a jar and the GM is grinning, do not start playing around with it.
Why don't you just give her the lung?
I know, I know, evil or whatever. But still.
You said you've made several "out of your league" enemies, so why not truly make her your ally?
Besides, being super awesome friends with the Harlot Queen?
Pretty cool!
Edit: just read you don't want her to get her lung back. Why not?
We're already assisting a rebel group of Iomedae worshiping knights to ferry refugees out of the country, have burned down several businesses using zombies as labor, killed a few mid-ranking undead aristocrats, and been generally terrible guests during our stay in Geb.
Also one of the aristocrat killings involved my wizard and the party druid using Command Undead and Fire Seeds to make some zombies into suicide bombers. The Iomedians made us promise not to do that again (spoilsports!), but I bet when the report arrived on the Harlot Queen's desk it made for an interesting read.
So I sincerely doubt Arazni is interested in being besties with us at this point even if we do hand over her lung.
Destroying her phylactery while cloning her living body is a really cute solution. I like it.
But your biggest hitch is going to be "killing her lich body."
Arazni is powerful (like, one of the most dangerous people in the world powerful), and she is going to melt you if you engage her directly.
Though on the other hand, if you're actually good enough to take down Arazni down in a fight, you're probably strong enough to directly engage Geb. Geb's estimated CR is only a point higher than hers.
Go try and get the nights of Ozem to help? Getting her parts back together is kinda their thing, iirc.
Due to the caster-martial disparity, the Knights of Ozem will be insufficient. You're going to have to go on a quest to enlist the aid of . . .
If her soul was tainted by undeath there's a place you can get a fragment of it/echo of who she was before undeath.
Herald's Lament.
Should be interesting, good luck on this one, I'm doing something similar in my current campaign and that's where my plan is heading at the moment.
Your plan doesn't work.
You will have to destroy her phylactery for it to remotely work.
I believe when you destroy a lich's body, they are not dead so they will not be manifested in the clone. Rather the phylactery does it's job and begins creating a new physical body for the lich.
If however you create a clone. Destroy the phylactery, and then destroy her physical body I believe it would work. The hard part is going to be getting a cubic inch of flesh though, it will be up to your GM whether or not the organs satisfy.
Does a phylactery create a new host, or does it house the lich's essence until it comes within range of a suitable new body? Of course, that means Arazni would still have her lich abilities AND a fresh new body.
Interesting questions in this thread.