Talk:Lich

message: While the term Lich is p  --Rob W. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.159.192.9  (talk • contribs) 10:04, 16 September 2004
:not an expert at all, but I was paging through an Anglo-Saxon dictionary earlier, and I believe the term lich may come from the uninflected word for 'corpse': līc — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.172.60.250  (talk • contribs) 07:45, 10 October 2006
:Despite all this gaming nonsense, the legends of the lich are quite real (in that the legends absolutely exist) and there are a great many of them.  The fictional portrayal of liches are fairly true to the idea as it stands.  Whoever linked to The Golden Bough did the right thing -- there are several historical lich legends in there.  We should really focus on that instead of the gaming nonsense and that "wonderful" picture that someone put up.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.109.248.206 (talk) 12:15, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Origins

message: Is it Lieber's "Gods of Lankhmar" that are being referred to here? --L. 15:22, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: References

message: As far as I can see, this is an article about Dungeons & Dragons, not about Liches.  Look I played my AD&D when I was young, but I really think this article is way too much about AD&D then someone stuck in some historical context as an afterthought.  I think I can make this a better article, more useful to people who have never even heard of Dungeons & Dragons.  I am going to work on clarifying and reorganizing this article tonight. GestaltG 00:36, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Hang on there. The reason this article is about Dungeons & Dragons is because D&D invented the Lich. The "Historical background" section deals with things that are not liches, but merely similar to them and possible inspirations for the idea. If you know of some generic accepted term for "lich-like undead wizards" that the rest of that historical background information could be grouped under then splitting some of it off into a new article on that subject might be good, but reducing the D&D content of this article is definitely not the way to go. Bryan 00:47, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok then, so assuming for a moment that Dungeons & Dragons "invented" the lich.  The editorial point I am trying to make here is why not just put in a sentence or paragraph saying that Dungeons & Dragons invented the modern lich (I notice now that it has been clarified) rather than having half the article be about all of the different Dungeons & Dragons games, references, and related computer games?  A simple sentence would have sufficed to make that point, rather than several paragraphs. GestaltG 03:06, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I notice that you have now deleted the entire reference to Robert E. Howard's Sand Lich?  Robert E. Howard died in 1936.  I highly doubt that Dungeons & Dragons invented the Lich if it appears in a story by Robert E. Howard.  I think you are trying way too hard to "rewrite" history so that Dungeons & Dragons somehow invented the Lich.  At the very least, I would consider J.R.R. Tolkein's ringwraiths a kind of Lich. Why did you remove the Robert E. Howard reference?  Next thing we know, you are going to try to tell us that Dungeons & Dragons invented sword and sorcery? GestaltG 02:00, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe you have me mistaken for somebody else. The last time I made a substantial change to this article (other than fiddling with the capitalization and pluralization of headers) was a little over a year ago, when I added non-D&D-related material. Here's the diff: . Prior to that my only other contributions were to add a category and to add a paragraph mentioning demiliches . As for calling ringwraiths "a kind of lich", that strikes me as being revisionist. Ringwraiths get their own article, which as it happens doesn't mention "Liches" at all. Bryan 02:23, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

text: The Conan reference was moved up to the list of liches in fantasy fiction. "Conan and the Sorcerer" is a pastiche, not an original Robert E Howard story, and was published in 1978, after D&D debuted its own liches.   -Sean Curtin 02:03, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think there is a problem with using the word "pastiche" and that is part of my confusion here.  According to the dictionary, a "pastiche" is either 1) a work that imitates the style of a previous work or 2) a composition made up of selections from different works.  Clearly by pastiche you meant the former; it may well be that Conan and the Sorcerer is an "imitative" pastiche published in 1978.  My confusion comes from Conan the Conquerer, which is an original Robert E. Howard work, but is a novel pieced together from various original Howard writings.  This work could also be called a "pastiche" of the second sort.  Knowing a bit about how Robert E. Howard's works have been published, I thought the 1978 Conan and the Sorcerer (which I have never read) might also be a cobbled collection of Howard writings.  At the least, this suggests that you should clarify the reference in the article to the 1978 work. GestaltG 02:36, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: What is this article really about?

message: Ignoring the fact that Skeletor's physique is muscular and non-rotting and the fact that he is actually a living, breathing (fictional) person. His origin story (according to the original books sold with the action figures) is that he came from a planet of blue-skinned, skull-faced living people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.139.169.236  (talk • contribs) 19:00, 28 August 2006
:But then again, Prince Adam was not a part of the original He-Man mythos, either, and yet all the iterations of He-Man after the Filmation cartoon include him.  In the 2002 cartoon series, Skeletor was a living person whose facial flesh was burned off by poison.  About to die, he then made a bargain with the demonic Hordak to save his life.  The process stripped the remaining flesh from his face, changing him into Skeletor.  This process could be considered a form of undeath, and Hordak states later in the series that Skeletor's continued existence depends on this magic.  But whether this makes Skeletor a true lich is debatable. 24.116.226.59 (talk) 18:32, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Removed Skeletor from Lich entry.

message: Whoever wrote the article seems to be under the impression that the term 'necromancer' is applied to all magic-users specialising in the undead, and that the term 'lich' is reserved for the most powerful; as far as I know (unless there are definite GW sources to disprove this), necromancers are living undead-specialist wizards whereas liches are their actual undead counterparts- the before and after pictures, to look at it another way. I'll rewrite the passage if wanted, if noone has any objecion? Naturally if there's new GW source material that elaborates on this stuff then go with that, as I'm not totally up to date on new Warhammer stuff. 172.188.214.14 02:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Factual inaccuracy concerning liches in Warhammer

message: I've moved the "Fictional Works" section to the bottom of the article because it is the least pertinent to an encyclopedic article on Lich.  I'm not volunteering to do it right now, but the "Fantasy Works" section also needs to be cleaned up and probably pared down.  The Fictional Works section should adhere to the general purpose and feel of an encyclopedia.  Beatdown 17:54, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm a bit impatient, so I took the liberty of cleaning up the Fantasy Works section.  There is simply no need to post every obscure reference to lich that pops up in fictional works. Beatdown 18:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Fictional Works Section Moved

message: In AD&D, a demi-lich is not "half Lich and half god".  Acererak from Gary Gygax' Tomb of Horrors represents the first use of the term and should be regarded as the very definition of a "demi-lich".  Acererak was actually far LESS powerful than a lich, having once been one himself.  Per Gygax: "Eventually even the undead life-force of Acererak began to wane..." (ToH, page 10).  Like a demigod, a demi-lich is a lesser version of the real thing. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Asat (talk • contribs) 08:58, 17 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps the etymology of the name has varied over the years, but the current standard references for version 3.5 Dungeons and Dragons are quite clear that a demilich is more powerful than a lich and I believe it has always been that way. See the SRD's entries for the lich template (found in the basic "monsters" listing) and the demilich template (found in the "epic monsters" listing) - the demilich template is applied to a lich and adds 6 to the challenge rating. Bryan Derksen 04:34, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would have to agree with Bryan. I just added an entry within this article for NetHack in which a demilich is more powerful than a lich. Perhaps this isn't how demilich was originally defined, but it certainly seems more widely used to mean more powerful, not less. ahpla 17:09, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

text: I agree.  Demi Moore is not a lich.124.176.5.96 (talk) 02:35, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Demi-lich = demi (less), not demi (more)

message: the word lich is not exclusive to dungeons and dragons. 
this article is about lich, not about d&d. there is an article about lich specific to d&d. 
this article should be focused on the word lich and all its uses throughout history.  it should not be biased towards d&d.
the use of the word lich in any media or other works can not be attributed to d&d without a proper citation. 
coincidences can and do exist. 
Drag-5 21:33, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: additional, please review the following. http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/omd?lich http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Lich http://dict.die.net/lich/ http://www.wordwebonline.com/en/LICH Drag-5 21:49, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Its there anything falling under reliable where the magical girls of Puella Magi Madoka Magica fall under "lich" as claimed by TV Trope's Our Liches are Different?--174.99.238.22 (talk) 11:44, 28 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Considering as how Puella Magi Madoka Magica never even once uses the terms "lich" or "undead" to describe either its magical girls, nor the witches they mature into, AND considering TVTrope's egregious notoriety in allowing personal analyses and really sloppy original research (i.e., that the "Our Liches Are Different" also claims that Jesus Christ is a lich), no, we should not mention the PMMM magical girls here, let alone say that they are an example of liches.--Mr Fink (talk) 13:32, 28 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title: please stop with the dungeons and dragons

message: Voldemort does not belong under Historical background. I feel this information (and examples in other important fiction) is better suitable in a section titled Fictional Works, Fantasy Works or In Fiction (the first two of which used to exist on the page by the looks of it). It is questionable whether Voldemort fits the description of a lich at all. I'll move the information on Voldemort to its own section in a few days unless someone objects. —121.209.186.16 (talk) 12:32, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Harry Potter

message: I'm sorry, but I don't think that's even remotely correct. The Nazgûl were wraiths, beings of no substance at all, who could interact with the physical world, and wore clothing or armor as needed; whereas Liches are powerful spellcasting (in some cases) corpses/skeletons. The difference might seem slight, but there is a difference. Call me crazy if you will, but I think the inclusion of Nazgûl in the list of Liches is a mistake -- and while we're at it, why are wraiths in the list as well? The two are not the same at all. Also, I belive the term originates with Old English "lic" meaning corpse or body, but I may be mistaken.192.44.136.113 (talk) 16:57, 9 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Nazgûl are not Liches

message: The description of a lich states that it is a "(...) who has used evil rituals to bind his intellect to his animated corpse and thereby achieve a perverse form of immortality."
Why is that perverse and immoral? There is no explanation of why that would be wrong. I would have done it, without much hesitation for example. Crakkpot (talk) 21:00, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Morality and perversity

message: Lich : this word is perfectly legitimate and indeed, like so many old words that have fallen into some disuse, should be revived. A recent example of its use in a work of fiction is in China Miéville's masterpiece : Perdido Street Station, where it is used in the modern meaning of 'an undead corpse'  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.243.230.57 (talk) 14:45, 11 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: China Mieville

message: Are liches alive or dead? I read a fantasy novel where the lich was a wizard who used a spell to prevent himself from dying. However, his body aged into a skeleton. In this way, the lich never really *died* but just aged horribly. I read another fantasy novel where the lich is a wizard who bound his soul to an object which, when he died, made sure he came back in a new body. This example shows a lich as being dead and then coming back as undead. In other words is a lich living but close to death or undead?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.54.11.235 (talk) 02:15, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Alive or Dead

message: An "original research?" note is attached to the sentence: "This image is consistent with the modern interpretation of the lich." If both the "modern interpretation" section and the Koschei section are substantiated, then the comparison is what the mathematician call "trivial"--it can be done "by inspection". If that is the kind of original research the Wikipedia abhors, then the Wikipedia is stupid. I will therefore delete the note.
If the Wikipedia is in fact stupid by my personal definition above--and since I have no authority whatever here, it is certainly free to be so!--it will be an easy fix to restore my change. But if this is done, I would very much appreciate knowing in what way the absence of the sentence can be considered an improvement for the reader compared to its presence. And if the argument is valid, then *I* will be, gratefully, less stupid! GeorgeTSLC (talk) 15:22, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: An OR tag doesn't mean the statement is wrong, only that it needs a reliable source to back it up. Wikipedia editors are not supposed to speculate and draw connections like this themselves; if this connection is drawn in a published source (which I imagine it has been) then that source should be cited. The tag doesn't mean anyone is asking for that paragraph to be removed; they're just asking for a source. rʨanaɢ (talk) 15:29, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Original Research--NOT!

message: After so much talk on this page, I'm surprised that the article is still so confused. We need to decide what the article is about and stick to that. First, wikipedia is not a dictionary so it shouldn't focus on the history of the word. I believe it should focus on the fantasy wizard-zombie monster, starting with the D&D version, since that is the version that most people are aware of, and then spread out so describe later version (other RPGs, computer games, etc) and the stories that D&D got inspiration from (pulp stories, older European folktales). Ashmoo (talk) 12:17, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. However, the D&D version has its own article, so that might be a problem. Also, I'll try to find a reliable source for the "Voldemort is a lich" claim. Edit: I took a look, and the only sources I could find are Reddit, SciFi.Stackexchange, TV Tropes, [arsmagisterii.blogspot.com/2017/02/voldemort-is-lich.html some] [thehogshead.org/is-voldemort-undead-or-how-to-lick-a-lich-2696/ blogs], and this article. RoninMacbeth (talk) 15:28, 2 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Still, what is this about? 

message: The article List of liches was becoming a mess of an article, so I started to try to clean it up but found that most of the entries don't really have any sources to justify inclusion, and there's already a small(er) list on this page, so I've redirected List of liches to Lich#In popular culture, and I plan on working on finding references for the entries, or removing the ones where a reliable source cannot be found. I wanted to place this on the talk page so that others can be aware of what I'm doing and to discuss if there are any issues. Consistent with WP:IPC, I'm going to try to find third-party sources that can show that an entry warrants inclusion; simply including a lich because it exists in a webcomic or game would bog down any article or list and give undue weight to entries that crowd out others that are supported by reliable third-party sources. - Aoidh (talk) 13:31, 26 June 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I got ill and had to take it very slow, but today I went and cleaned up the section as best I could. I removed entries that I couldn't find non-trivial sources for, and added sources to each entry. There are some of the entries that I don't really think warrant a mention here, but I didn't want to just completely gut the list (just mostly gut it). I went ahead and removed the "unreferenced section" and "in popular culture" tags because I feel like I put a good dent in those issues if not resolved them, but I wanted to at least get the section to a half respectable state. But given that the section is still larger than the entire rest of the article, I'm more than happy to see someone trim it further if they feel it necessary. - Aoidh (talk) 19:31, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  "In popular culture" cleanup 

message: In my opinion the split from the main Lich article was totally unnecessary given that the monster originated from D&D. There is pretty much nothing in the main article that cannot be incorporated into this one. I would suggest it be merged back, and the popular culture section mostly removed.  ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 06:17, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: For background, I split the D&D lich into its own article back in 2006, at a time when it had no sources.  Your Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lich (Dungeons & Dragons) was closed as keep (no one supported deletion, but some supported merge) although the closer noted that a merge discussion could take place. Since then, its independent sources have grown, thanks in part to additions from users such as User:Daranios and User:Sariel Xilo and others. I'm not seeing that a merge is necessary here, but if so that would help the main Lich article at the expense of the D&D article. BOZ (talk) 10:21, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

text: Oppose the merge since Lich (Dungeons & Dragons) pretty firmly stands on its own. Potentially, Lich could be merged into a section (Lich (Dungeons & Dragons)#In popular culture). I think it is important to keep Dungeons & Dragons in the article title especially when the focus of the article is Liches from that specific media. Sariel Xilo (talk) 16:10, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Im opposed as both articles are reasonably extensive with only some overlap.  I guess i could be convinced otherwise. Bonewah (talk) 17:01, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
replies: text:  The issue is that the main article directly states that the "lich" as a type of monster comes from D&D. The term was used before in relation to undead but not really as a clearly defined monster. The Historical background section is just a mass of WP:SYNTH while the rest is WP:OR and listcruft. In reality I think most of the current Lich article will need to be deleted, but perhaps a bit could be merged. Either way, it is clear that Liches originated from D&D in their widely used fantasy monster form.  ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 18:53, 8 April 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed merge of [[Lich (Dungeons & Dragons)]] into [[Lich]]