Blueprint for a Lich

Recently James at the Underdark Gazette posted about Ed Greenwood's great articles on adventuring in Hell.  I love that illustration that begins that first article, but I never read them.  Because of that picture and the Paladin in Hell illustration in the PHB I had a craving for some adventure down below, so I had an arrangement with my DM not to read about Hell and learn all its secrets.

But it was just something James mentioned that sparked this post.  Speculating on why these great articles weren't included in the Best of the Dragon compilations:

"I can only suppose that the TSR policy of appeasing the Satanic Panic crowd, kept them from including the articles in one of their Best of compilations."

It's a good theory considering the times, but my mind immediately jumped to my favorite magazine Dragon ever put out: Best of Dragon Vol. II.  That was chock full of awesome possibilities as well as lots for evangelists to abhor.  There was the Antipaladin for one, the section on poisons, and actually an article on the politics of Hell by Alexander von Thorn.

But what I want to focus on was related to another thing I always wanted to achieve in D&D, and like venturing into Hell, never managed to do-- becoming a lich.

To cut to the chase, there was a little comic that ran under several articles depicting a mage in the process of becoming a lich.  It was drawn by Timothy Truman.  And the beauty of the design was the layout that had it running under relevant articles.  Two pages into an article about vampires, the strip starts with a mage entering the lair of a vampire (pg 57).  Then two pages later, under a different article about vampires we see the mage defeating the vampire.  Two pages later, under a page about lycanthropy, we see our hero killing two werewolves.  And finally, two pages later we're at the article on becoming a lich called Blueprint for a lich and our hero nestles into a coffin of his own.

I thought about presenting the comics here for you, but the beauty of it was how they went so perfectly with the reprinted articles.  Putting them in sequence won't recreate what I experienced first seeing them.  All I can recommend is that if you see it, snap it up.

I don't know who made the design decision to run the strip under the articles the way they did, but I'm thankful to whoever it was.  The credits at the front of the magazine list:

Edited by Kim Mohan

Design by Bryce Knorr

Production by Marilyn Mays & Gali Sanchez

It seems a shame, after all, to talk about this without you seeing any of it so here is the first section as a teaser:

Sivith the Beautiful

It is lost to history whether Sivith was male or female, cleric or mage. In fact, little is known of, what some call, the Jewelled Corpse but that the power it possesses is vast and its demeanor quiet.

Tall and thin almost to emaciation, its corpse of hard, dry flesh sits and moves with excellent posture. Portions of it are covered in ornament: gold leaf applied in delicate scroll-work, traceries of platinum, and gems set permanently into the ancient flesh.

Sivith is graceful, tasteful, never immediately hostile, and its desires difficult to discern.

2nd appearance
Some new portion of Sivith will be decorated, new lacquering, gilding, new lapis or pearls, new platinum wire work etc.

Roll or choose on the Body Part Decoration Table:

1. head
2. forehead
3. face
4. eyelids
5. eyes
6. cheeks
7. neck
8. pectorals
9. biceps
10. forearms
11. hands
12. fingers
13. stomach
14. pelvis
15. thighs
16. calves
17. shins
18. feet
19. toes
20. back

And revealed through player interaction:

Roll or choose from "Hidden Traits . . ." table.

3rd appearance
More decoration is apparent. Roll or choose on the Body Part Decoration Table.

And revealed through player interaction:

Roll or choose from the Traumatic Adolescent Background Generator.

4th appearance
Sivith is completely covered in tasteful, artistic ornament-- a vision of beautiful decoration.

And revealed through player interaction:

Roll or choose from the Traumatic Childhood Background Generator.

Note: this format comes from here, with great appreciation on my part.