Quote:
Originally Posted by Phantasm
My own lich is not necessarily skeletal, but a spirit bound to its phylactery and able to possess a corpse for as long as the corpse lasts, with magic to keep the corpse from decaying further. Should the body be destroyed, the lich retreats into the phylactery until it it brought close to a suitable dead body for it to possess.
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This is my preferred take on the lich as well. Just as vampires are defined, for me, as beings that must subsist on others - the lich is defined as an undead being that can change its possessed mortal form across minor undead, making it very hard to kill permanently.
The phylactery is the true house of the spirit force, and the incidental stiffs that it can possess are merely cannon fodder. Unless you find and destroy the soul box, it'll be back.
One single Ravenloft adventure, Roots of Evil, has a line from Azalin the lich, as he sends the PCs back in time to possess bodies in history. He says something to the effect of "know that this existence, of possessing body to body at whim, is the essence of being a lich".