One of my players has a level 6 warlock (soon to be 7), and he heavily relies on Eldritch Blast basically every round to do combat. For summary, this is used twice per turn, he has a +7 to hit, and it deals 1D10+4 (invocation to add Charisma mod).
He has asked for a magic item that can aid this cantrip, and I was thinking of giving him a ancient artifact of some description that makes it easier to hit. I'm thinking something of the lines of;
You focus solely on on eldritch blast, this creates a singular power beam with a +2 to hit. Giving a damage roll of 2D10+4.
This takes a small knock on overall damage as it misses out on what could be the additional +4 if both are fired separately, but in return it removes the risk of one missing. I'm thinking of having this be a once per short rest use, or could this be better to have as an always available option? Any thoughts or ideas for improvement?
To give context, he is amongst some hard hitters in the overall party, with a fighter who crits on 19 and deals an additional damage die, a ranger who can deal massive damage with hunters mark and fury of the small (he's a goblin, so medium creatures are bigger than him) or sharpshooter, and a druid (ridiculously flexible, either a healer or damage dealer).
Ummm ... I think the standard Rod of Pact Keeper (+1, +2 or +3) was designed for this situation.
"Rod, uncommon (+1), rare (+2), or very rare (+3) (requires attunement by a warlock)
While holding this rod, you gain a bonus to spell attack rolls and to the saving throw DCs of your warlock spells. This bonus is determined by the rod's rarity.
In addition, you can regain one warlock spell slot as an action while holding the rod. You can't use this property again until you finish a long rest."
The +1 is only uncommon, quite suitable at level 6, increases to hit by +1 while also increasing the spell DC AND allowing a 1/long rest recharge of a spell slot. All of these features may encourage the warlock to make more use of their spell slots while also making eldritch blast more effective.
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Your suggestion of increasing the base damage on one bolt while removing the extra bolts and only adding a +2 to hit is actually a nerf to the spell. They lost the extra +4 damage from the other bolt (which is almost 1/2 the damage since the average damage from a d10 is 5.5 - the +4 is significant) and they only gain a +2 to hit.
As an example, against an AC15 target
One bolt at 2d10+4 = 15 average damage with +9 to hit ... hits on 6+ ... 75% hit chance = 11.25 average damage in a round
One bolts at d10+4 = 9.5 average damage with +7 to hit ... hits on 8+ ... 65% hit chance = 6.175 x 2 (for two bolts) = 12.35
So the item with +2 to hit on a single bolt is actually significantly WORSE and if hex damage is added to the calculation it becomes a lot worse.
Personally, I would just go with Rod of the Pact Keeper and allow the character to enhance eldritch blast by picking up additional invocations (repelling blast is awesome for example).
A single bracer, looking suitably sinister, that allows a single use per long rest for advantage on an Eldritch Blast attack, while worn and attuned. If any Eldritch Blast crits it gains another use (of advantage) up to a Max of the PC's proficiency Bonus. It resets to 1 on a long or short rest.
Or
A single bracer, looking suitably sinister, that allows the acquisition of any level appropriate invocation while worn and attuned.
If you don't want him to be too far beyond what the rest of the party can do, then you want something that will just give + hit and not damage. You can upgrade the items over time to a rod of the pact keeper or the +2, +3 versions down the line.
Essentially summarized by the text given in its description,
"While wearing the bracers, whenever you cast a cantrip, you can use a bonus action on the same turn to cast that cantrip a second time."
Do not do this unless you want to break combat balance. It literally will double warlock damage.
Opening up the idea of one item, or more, can bring along a string of ideas on how to balance the item the OP wants to craft or otherwise work into giving their player. It is hardly "combat breaking" in my experiences since it utilizes a portion of action economy to operate. It's not just a free additional casting of the cantrip and doesn't guarantee a hit or hits, so it isn't "literally double damage" in most cases.
Yes, the Warlock might use it almost exclusively for Eldritch Blast, but not all beams may hit, and the magic item can be tuned to the campaign. With little context to the level of play which they're performing or the difficulty of combat encounters, there's no reason not to suggest it. Besides, there are certainly other interesting things that can be worked into the Illusionist's Bracers overall usefulness.
Essentially summarized by the text given in its description,
"While wearing the bracers, whenever you cast a cantrip, you can use a bonus action on the same turn to cast that cantrip a second time."
Do not do this unless you want to break combat balance. It literally will double warlock damage.
Opening up the idea of one item, or more, can bring along a string of ideas on how to balance the item the OP wants to craft or otherwise work into giving their player. It is hardly "combat breaking" in my experiences since it utilizes a portion of action economy to operate. It's not just a free additional casting of the cantrip and doesn't guarantee a hit or hits, so it isn't "literally double damage" in most cases.
Yes, the Warlock might use it almost exclusively for Eldritch Blast, but not all beams may hit, and the magic item can be tuned to the campaign. With little context to the level of play which they're performing or the difficulty of combat encounters, there's no reason not to suggest it. Besides, there are certainly other interesting things that can be worked into the Illusionist's Bracers overall usefulness.
It's not just not a good idea. Having 1 player doing that much more damage than any other player without using up any resources. It's a little like giving action surge every round for a bonus action.
This is the equivalent of the powergamer build of sorc/lock to get quicken spell so you can double on on eldritch blast, only you don't need to multiclass and you don't have limited sorc points. The level of play doesn't really matter as cantrips scale with the tier of play. Not all bolts are going to hit, but when you are shooting twice as many, that means that you are also going to hit twice as much on average.
There is a reason not to suggest it. That reason is that it's going to make him drastically more powerful in combat than the other PCs. If the DM things his players are ok with 1 guy being far more effective in combat then yeah, i guess it's fine.
Essentially summarized by the text given in its description,
"While wearing the bracers, whenever you cast a cantrip, you can use a bonus action on the same turn to cast that cantrip a second time."
Do not do this unless you want to break combat balance. It literally will double warlock damage.
Opening up the idea of one item, or more, can bring along a string of ideas on how to balance the item the OP wants to craft or otherwise work into giving their player. It is hardly "combat breaking" in my experiences since it utilizes a portion of action economy to operate. It's not just a free additional casting of the cantrip and doesn't guarantee a hit or hits, so it isn't "literally double damage" in most cases.
Yes, the Warlock might use it almost exclusively for Eldritch Blast, but not all beams may hit, and the magic item can be tuned to the campaign. With little context to the level of play which they're performing or the difficulty of combat encounters, there's no reason not to suggest it. Besides, there are certainly other interesting things that can be worked into the Illusionist's Bracers overall usefulness.
It's not just not a good idea. Having 1 player doing that much more damage than any other player without using up any resources. It's a little like giving action surge every round for a bonus action.
This is the equivalent of the powergamer build of sorc/lock to get quicken spell so you can double on on eldritch blast, only you don't need to multiclass and you don't have limited sorc points. The level of play doesn't really matter as cantrips scale with the tier of play. Not all bolts are going to hit, but when you are shooting twice as many, that means that you are also going to hit twice as much on average.
There is a reason not to suggest it. That reason is that it's going to make him drastically more powerful in combat than the other PCs. If the DM things his players are ok with 1 guy being far more effective in combat then yeah, i guess it's fine.
The resource is the cost of the bonus action, a part of the action economy which does not always have to be used on the cantrip, and sometimes shouldn't. If it were just a free cantrip use a second time every round with no other portion of action economy tied to it, I would agree. Plus, the level of play does matter because strategies mean more than just spamming Eldritch Blast, since there are also other cantrips available. By the sounds of the context given to us by the OP, the player wants to be brought up to par with the rest of the groups' "heavy hitters" so that they feel more damage-effective since Eldritch Blast is their primary means of damage, which is also perfectly fine.
With that in mind, it is clearly not as broken as it is being made out to be since it might barely accomplish bringing the Warlock up to pace considering the dpr of the other classes. If the Warlock outpaces them a time or two, there's nothing wrong with that either.
It surely will not make the Warlock drastically more powerful than the other PCs, lol. I personally have seen this item used in my campaigns, and have utilized it myself. On paper it looks a lot more powerful than it is, but there is a fairness to using it since Warlocks also have very limited spell slots, and melee is typically not their best method of dealing with encounters, sans Hexblade.
Again, also, it can be tweaked by the DM to suit the needs of the game, it is just an idea to proffer up a line of thinking for the OPs custom magic item. It simply is not as drastically overpowered as people assume.
One of my players has a level 6 warlock (soon to be 7), and he heavily relies on Eldritch Blast basically every round to do combat. For summary, this is used twice per turn, he has a +7 to hit, and it deals 1D10+4 (invocation to add Charisma mod).
He has asked for a magic item that can aid this cantrip, and I was thinking of giving him a ancient artifact of some description that makes it easier to hit. I'm thinking something of the lines of;
You focus solely on on eldritch blast, this creates a singular power beam with a +2 to hit. Giving a damage roll of 2D10+4.
This takes a small knock on overall damage as it misses out on what could be the additional +4 if both are fired separately, but in return it removes the risk of one missing. I'm thinking of having this be a once per short rest use, or could this be better to have as an always available option? Any thoughts or ideas for improvement?
To give context, he is amongst some hard hitters in the overall party, with a fighter who crits on 19 and deals an additional damage die, a ranger who can deal massive damage with hunters mark and fury of the small (he's a goblin, so medium creatures are bigger than him) or sharpshooter, and a druid (ridiculously flexible, either a healer or damage dealer).
What buff would give the player more satisfaction? more capability to blast, more capability to cast other spells another related capability.
Perhaps it would suit to be a purpose focussed blaster though items like the spell gem... might expand play.
Essentially summarized by the text given in its description,
"While wearing the bracers, whenever you cast a cantrip, you can use a bonus action on the same turn to cast that cantrip a second time."
Do not do this unless you want to break combat balance. It literally will double warlock damage.
Opening up the idea of one item, or more, can bring along a string of ideas on how to balance the item the OP wants to craft or otherwise work into giving their player. It is hardly "combat breaking" in my experiences since it utilizes a portion of action economy to operate. It's not just a free additional casting of the cantrip and doesn't guarantee a hit or hits, so it isn't "literally double damage" in most cases.
Yes, the Warlock might use it almost exclusively for Eldritch Blast, but not all beams may hit, and the magic item can be tuned to the campaign. With little context to the level of play which they're performing or the difficulty of combat encounters, there's no reason not to suggest it. Besides, there are certainly other interesting things that can be worked into the Illusionist's Bracers overall usefulness.
It's not just not a good idea. Having 1 player doing that much more damage than any other player without using up any resources. It's a little like giving action surge every round for a bonus action.
This is the equivalent of the powergamer build of sorc/lock to get quicken spell so you can double on on eldritch blast, only you don't need to multiclass and you don't have limited sorc points. The level of play doesn't really matter as cantrips scale with the tier of play. Not all bolts are going to hit, but when you are shooting twice as many, that means that you are also going to hit twice as much on average.
There is a reason not to suggest it. That reason is that it's going to make him drastically more powerful in combat than the other PCs. If the DM things his players are ok with 1 guy being far more effective in combat then yeah, i guess it's fine.
The resource is the cost of the bonus action, a part of the action economy which does not always have to be used on the cantrip, and sometimes shouldn't. If it were just a free cantrip use a second time every round with no other portion of action economy tied to it, I would agree. Plus, the level of play does matter because strategies mean more than just spamming Eldritch Blast, since there are also other cantrips available. By the sounds of the context given to us by the OP, the player wants to be brought up to par with the rest of the groups' "heavy hitters" so that they feel more damage-effective since Eldritch Blast is their primary means of damage, which is also perfectly fine.
With that in mind, it is clearly not as broken as it is being made out to be since it might barely accomplish bringing the Warlock up to pace considering the dpr of the other classes. If the Warlock outpaces them a time or two, there's nothing wrong with that either.
It surely will not make the Warlock drastically more powerful than the other PCs, lol. I personally have seen this item used in my campaigns, and have utilized it myself. On paper it looks a lot more powerful than it is, but there is a fairness to using it since Warlocks also have very limited spell slots, and melee is typically not their best method of dealing with encounters, sans Hexblade.
Again, also, it can be tweaked by the DM to suit the needs of the game, it is just an idea to proffer up a line of thinking for the OPs custom magic item. It simply is not as drastically overpowered as people assume.
I would also suggest - do NOT introduce Illusionist's Bracers into your game. It will break the damage produced by the warlock compared to other characters. The base damage from agonizing blast (possibly combined with the hex spell) already equals or exceeds that from most other characters without the use of feats.
One of the highest damage single target builds in 5e is the Sorcerer/warlock multiclass using Eldritch blast+quickened Eldritch blast (though a sorlock can do much more than that). This magical item gives the character the ability to do that EVERY single turn with no resource cost except the bonus action. Despite the comments above, it is game breaking unless the other characters also have epic magic items.
At 5th level the warlock has the possibility of doing 4d10+16 damage (assuming 18 charisma) every turn. By level 11 this goes to 6d10+30. Even the highest damage builds using CB/SS or GWM/PAM would have 4 attacks at level 11 - they do have more potential damage but the -5 to hit means that most of the time they will do less damage than the warlock with one magic item.
Clearly, the illusionist's bracers FAR exceed the damage from either CB/SS or GWM/PAM. What if the PAM/GWM or CB/SS have legendary +3 weapons?
CB/SS +3 = 4d6+40+20+12 = 86 * 0.5 = 43
PAM/GWM +3 = 3d10+d4 +40 +20+12 = 91 * 0.5 = 45.5
So with legendary +3 weapons the PAM/GWN and SS/CB will slightly exceed the average damage of the warlock with illusionist's bracers. However, in a high magic game the warlock probably has a +3 Rod of the Pact Keeper (they could also have a +3 Wand of the War Mage since they stack but I won't go there).
Warlock+bracers with +3 to hit = 6d10+30 = 63 * 0.75 = 47.25
So once again a warlock with illusionist bracers comes out on top - ahead of characters with multiple feats and +3 magical weapons - all due to one magic item.
In addition, against a single high hit point target, the warlock could drop hex before the fight or as part of the first round. Every subsequent round the damage goes to 6d10+6d6+30. Is that worth it? Lost initial round damage would max at 30.5 ... extra possible damage/round is 21 ... so if the fight is going to last more than 3 rounds against a single target then casting hex in the first round makes sense and it always makes sense (for maximum damage) if it can be pre-cast.
The story is the same at tier 2 and at level 17 when Agonizing blast gets four bolts, there are no other builds I can think of (except a paladin using smites) that will outdamage this one magic item which has no cost except a bonus action.
In addition, if the warlock has Devil's sight and throws up a darkness spell - they can have advantage on all of these attacks every turn.
My suggestion ... just say NO to illusionist's bracers :)
P.S. Illusionist's bracers literally double the average damage of any cantrip using spell caster since they let you cast the cantrip twice. It might or might not hit every time but on average the total damage IS doubled.
I just want to chime in way after this is dead to say that it's bonkers to so drastically underestimate the power of illusionist's bracers. "It also costs a bonus action" does not equivocate them, bonus actions tend to be less useful than standard actions and when you have the most damaging ranged cantrip in the game you're going to want to cast it with your bonus action. There's a reason there is a whole ass feature of like... eldritch knight for instance to do a *weapon attack* on top of a cantrip at level 7, because doing a damaging cantrip and something else is powerful. Let alone a full other cast of the cantrip. Y'all saying it's not that good are crazy, it's a very powerful magic item and one poster has correctly identified (and it's also batshit that people are disagreeing with this) that it essentially doubles the warlock's damage. "It might not hit with all its beams" is a stupid pedantic nonsensical argument, you may not hit with the initial beams anyway and damage rolls are all variable. You'll never get exactly double the damage, but it effectively doubles your average damage output.
In terms of ideas, I've played around with a magic item that lets the warlock switch between invocations to buff eldritch blast. While using it, he can substitute one eldritch blast invocation for a different one. (Maybe have it cost a bonus action, to limit him doing it a little bit.)
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maybe "a singular gauntlet, looking suitably sinister" with a vial of sorcerer blood in it. this has a PREDETERMINED metamagic effect infused in it. maybe the gauntlet allows you to use seeking spell and give EB a higher chance of hitting, or transmuted spell to have an EB that can set things on fire. this would be like a 1,2/a day effect and might be cool. you could even allow multiple metamagic effects within 1 gauntlet, prehaps made by a rival sorcerer to destroy all sorcererous bloodlines exept his own,a nd trap a bit of their power
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The main troubles with Illusionist's Bracers is the fact that Agonizing Blast apply charisma modifier for EACH beam. If it only added the modifier to one beam it would be a lot more comparable to say Fire Bolt being duplicated. Ignoring that Fire Bolt is fire damage, which is more commonly resisted or outright immune, whilst Eldritch Blast is force damage which is the least resisted and immune damage type in the game.
At level 11, a Warlock would deal 3x 1d10+4 damage times 2 by the Bracers for an average of 57 damage. When compared to a 2-hander Fighter dealing 3x 2d6+4 damage for 33 damage (or 63 with GWM assuming all hit with the -5 penalty to attack). An equivalent level 11 Paladin would deal 2x 1d10+4+1d8 + 1d4+4+1d8 (with PAM) for an average of 39 damage.
Throwing in a Hex cast in the mix to apply +1d6 per beam would have the Illusionist's Bracers Warlock deal an additional 6d6 necrotic damage or 21 bonus damage for a total average of 78 damage, each and every turn. At range. And it can apply other effects through invocations like slow, push, get insane 300 ft. reach (although often not as applicable).
So yes, it is absolutely bonkers what Illusionist's Bracers can do for a Warlock. It is not recommended to give them one. (And just for flavor it is from the Ravnica rulebook - so depending on your setting it may be inappropriate).
TBF the Warlock class is a bit weird by being so limited in its spell casting, but neither are they a martial class, making it very attractive to multiclass into other classes. Picking up levels in a full caster class like Wizard/Cleric can give the Warlock access to additional spell slots which can be used to cast Warlock spells - for instance Hex. Picking up levels in a martial class or Cleric (with certain domains) can give access to heavier armor that allows you to fight on the frontlines without worrying too much about your limited health pool.
To give the "pure" Warlock some additional spell casting without necessarily breaking their damage, one could opt to give them a Ring of Spell Storing - and allow them to store spells at lower than max spell slot level (so they can actually store multiple low level spells and not be forced to up-cast when they store spells). Do keep in mind that Ring of Spell Storing is a rare item, so a Rod of the Pact Keeper +1 may be more appropriate for a character of level 6.
One of my players has a level 6 warlock (soon to be 7), and he heavily relies on Eldritch Blast basically every round to do combat. For summary, this is used twice per turn, he has a +7 to hit, and it deals 1D10+4 (invocation to add Charisma mod).
He has asked for a magic item that can aid this cantrip, and I was thinking of giving him a ancient artifact of some description that makes it easier to hit. I'm thinking something of the lines of;
You focus solely on on eldritch blast, this creates a singular power beam with a +2 to hit. Giving a damage roll of 2D10+4.
This takes a small knock on overall damage as it misses out on what could be the additional +4 if both are fired separately, but in return it removes the risk of one missing. I'm thinking of having this be a once per short rest use, or could this be better to have as an always available option? Any thoughts or ideas for improvement?
To give context, he is amongst some hard hitters in the overall party, with a fighter who crits on 19 and deals an additional damage die, a ranger who can deal massive damage with hunters mark and fury of the small (he's a goblin, so medium creatures are bigger than him) or sharpshooter, and a druid (ridiculously flexible, either a healer or damage dealer).
Ummm ... I think the standard Rod of Pact Keeper (+1, +2 or +3) was designed for this situation.
"Rod, uncommon (+1), rare (+2), or very rare (+3) (requires attunement by a warlock)
While holding this rod, you gain a bonus to spell attack rolls and to the saving throw DCs of your warlock spells. This bonus is determined by the rod's rarity.
In addition, you can regain one warlock spell slot as an action while holding the rod. You can't use this property again until you finish a long rest."
The +1 is only uncommon, quite suitable at level 6, increases to hit by +1 while also increasing the spell DC AND allowing a 1/long rest recharge of a spell slot. All of these features may encourage the warlock to make more use of their spell slots while also making eldritch blast more effective.
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Your suggestion of increasing the base damage on one bolt while removing the extra bolts and only adding a +2 to hit is actually a nerf to the spell. They lost the extra +4 damage from the other bolt (which is almost 1/2 the damage since the average damage from a d10 is 5.5 - the +4 is significant) and they only gain a +2 to hit.
As an example, against an AC15 target
One bolt at 2d10+4 = 15 average damage with +9 to hit ... hits on 6+ ... 75% hit chance = 11.25 average damage in a round
One bolts at d10+4 = 9.5 average damage with +7 to hit ... hits on 8+ ... 65% hit chance = 6.175 x 2 (for two bolts) = 12.35
So the item with +2 to hit on a single bolt is actually significantly WORSE and if hex damage is added to the calculation it becomes a lot worse.
Personally, I would just go with Rod of the Pact Keeper and allow the character to enhance eldritch blast by picking up additional invocations (repelling blast is awesome for example).
Try a Shavarran Birch Focus with the Rod of the Pact keeper.
The alternative is to homebrew something that will tickle his fancy. Perhaps:
Potion of Eldritch Extension
Or
A single bracer, looking suitably sinister, that allows a single use per long rest for advantage on an Eldritch Blast attack, while worn and attuned. If any Eldritch Blast crits it gains another use (of advantage) up to a Max of the PC's proficiency Bonus. It resets to 1 on a long or short rest.
Or
A single bracer, looking suitably sinister, that allows the acquisition of any level appropriate invocation while worn and attuned.
Illusionist's Bracers
Essentially summarized by the text given in its description,
"While wearing the bracers, whenever you cast a cantrip, you can use a bonus action on the same turn to cast that cantrip a second time."
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Do not do this unless you want to break combat balance. It literally will double warlock damage.
Look at wand of the warmage
If you don't want him to be too far beyond what the rest of the party can do, then you want something that will just give + hit and not damage. You can upgrade the items over time to a rod of the pact keeper or the +2, +3 versions down the line.
Opening up the idea of one item, or more, can bring along a string of ideas on how to balance the item the OP wants to craft or otherwise work into giving their player. It is hardly "combat breaking" in my experiences since it utilizes a portion of action economy to operate. It's not just a free additional casting of the cantrip and doesn't guarantee a hit or hits, so it isn't "literally double damage" in most cases.
Yes, the Warlock might use it almost exclusively for Eldritch Blast, but not all beams may hit, and the magic item can be tuned to the campaign. With little context to the level of play which they're performing or the difficulty of combat encounters, there's no reason not to suggest it. Besides, there are certainly other interesting things that can be worked into the Illusionist's Bracers overall usefulness.
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It's not just not a good idea. Having 1 player doing that much more damage than any other player without using up any resources. It's a little like giving action surge every round for a bonus action.
This is the equivalent of the powergamer build of sorc/lock to get quicken spell so you can double on on eldritch blast, only you don't need to multiclass and you don't have limited sorc points.
The level of play doesn't really matter as cantrips scale with the tier of play.
Not all bolts are going to hit, but when you are shooting twice as many, that means that you are also going to hit twice as much on average.
There is a reason not to suggest it. That reason is that it's going to make him drastically more powerful in combat than the other PCs. If the DM things his players are ok with 1 guy being far more effective in combat then yeah, i guess it's fine.
The resource is the cost of the bonus action, a part of the action economy which does not always have to be used on the cantrip, and sometimes shouldn't. If it were just a free cantrip use a second time every round with no other portion of action economy tied to it, I would agree. Plus, the level of play does matter because strategies mean more than just spamming Eldritch Blast, since there are also other cantrips available. By the sounds of the context given to us by the OP, the player wants to be brought up to par with the rest of the groups' "heavy hitters" so that they feel more damage-effective since Eldritch Blast is their primary means of damage, which is also perfectly fine.
With that in mind, it is clearly not as broken as it is being made out to be since it might barely accomplish bringing the Warlock up to pace considering the dpr of the other classes. If the Warlock outpaces them a time or two, there's nothing wrong with that either.
It surely will not make the Warlock drastically more powerful than the other PCs, lol. I personally have seen this item used in my campaigns, and have utilized it myself. On paper it looks a lot more powerful than it is, but there is a fairness to using it since Warlocks also have very limited spell slots, and melee is typically not their best method of dealing with encounters, sans Hexblade.
Again, also, it can be tweaked by the DM to suit the needs of the game, it is just an idea to proffer up a line of thinking for the OPs custom magic item. It simply is not as drastically overpowered as people assume.
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What buff would give the player more satisfaction?
more capability to blast,
more capability to cast other spells
another related capability.
Perhaps it would suit to be a purpose focussed blaster though items like the spell gem... might expand play.
I would also suggest - do NOT introduce Illusionist's Bracers into your game. It will break the damage produced by the warlock compared to other characters. The base damage from agonizing blast (possibly combined with the hex spell) already equals or exceeds that from most other characters without the use of feats.
One of the highest damage single target builds in 5e is the Sorcerer/warlock multiclass using Eldritch blast+quickened Eldritch blast (though a sorlock can do much more than that). This magical item gives the character the ability to do that EVERY single turn with no resource cost except the bonus action. Despite the comments above, it is game breaking unless the other characters also have epic magic items.
At 5th level the warlock has the possibility of doing 4d10+16 damage (assuming 18 charisma) every turn. By level 11 this goes to 6d10+30. Even the highest damage builds using CB/SS or GWM/PAM would have 4 attacks at level 11 - they do have more potential damage but the -5 to hit means that most of the time they will do less damage than the warlock with one magic item.
Example:
Level 11, +5 stat, target AC 18.
Base to hit = prof+stat = +9
Required base to hit = 9 = 60% = 0.6
With SS or GWM -5/+10 = 14 = 35% = 0.35
So how does damage stack up?
Warlock + illusionist's bracers = 6d10 + 30 = 63 * 0.6 = 37.8
CB/SS = 4d6+40+20 = 74 * 0.35 = 25.9
PAM/GWM = 3d10+d4 +40 +20 = 79 * 0.35 = 27.65
Clearly, the illusionist's bracers FAR exceed the damage from either CB/SS or GWM/PAM. What if the PAM/GWM or CB/SS have legendary +3 weapons?
CB/SS +3 = 4d6+40+20+12 = 86 * 0.5 = 43
PAM/GWM +3 = 3d10+d4 +40 +20+12 = 91 * 0.5 = 45.5
So with legendary +3 weapons the PAM/GWN and SS/CB will slightly exceed the average damage of the warlock with illusionist's bracers. However, in a high magic game the warlock probably has a +3 Rod of the Pact Keeper (they could also have a +3 Wand of the War Mage since they stack but I won't go there).
Warlock+bracers with +3 to hit = 6d10+30 = 63 * 0.75 = 47.25
So once again a warlock with illusionist bracers comes out on top - ahead of characters with multiple feats and +3 magical weapons - all due to one magic item.
In addition, against a single high hit point target, the warlock could drop hex before the fight or as part of the first round. Every subsequent round the damage goes to 6d10+6d6+30. Is that worth it? Lost initial round damage would max at 30.5 ... extra possible damage/round is 21 ... so if the fight is going to last more than 3 rounds against a single target then casting hex in the first round makes sense and it always makes sense (for maximum damage) if it can be pre-cast.
The story is the same at tier 2 and at level 17 when Agonizing blast gets four bolts, there are no other builds I can think of (except a paladin using smites) that will outdamage this one magic item which has no cost except a bonus action.
In addition, if the warlock has Devil's sight and throws up a darkness spell - they can have advantage on all of these attacks every turn.
My suggestion ... just say NO to illusionist's bracers :)
P.S. Illusionist's bracers literally double the average damage of any cantrip using spell caster since they let you cast the cantrip twice. It might or might not hit every time but on average the total damage IS doubled.
I just want to chime in way after this is dead to say that it's bonkers to so drastically underestimate the power of illusionist's bracers. "It also costs a bonus action" does not equivocate them, bonus actions tend to be less useful than standard actions and when you have the most damaging ranged cantrip in the game you're going to want to cast it with your bonus action. There's a reason there is a whole ass feature of like... eldritch knight for instance to do a *weapon attack* on top of a cantrip at level 7, because doing a damaging cantrip and something else is powerful. Let alone a full other cast of the cantrip. Y'all saying it's not that good are crazy, it's a very powerful magic item and one poster has correctly identified (and it's also batshit that people are disagreeing with this) that it essentially doubles the warlock's damage. "It might not hit with all its beams" is a stupid pedantic nonsensical argument, you may not hit with the initial beams anyway and damage rolls are all variable. You'll never get exactly double the damage, but it effectively doubles your average damage output.
Yeah, being able to cast EB twice a round without limit is absurdly overpowered.
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In terms of ideas, I've played around with a magic item that lets the warlock switch between invocations to buff eldritch blast. While using it, he can substitute one eldritch blast invocation for a different one. (Maybe have it cost a bonus action, to limit him doing it a little bit.)
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Also, suggestions for which monsters might be found together (for people tired of dungeons full of one humanoid race, and perhaps a few beasts and undead.)
maybe "a singular gauntlet, looking suitably sinister" with a vial of sorcerer blood in it. this has a PREDETERMINED metamagic effect infused in it. maybe the gauntlet allows you to use seeking spell and give EB a higher chance of hitting, or transmuted spell to have an EB that can set things on fire. this would be like a 1,2/a day effect and might be cool. you could even allow multiple metamagic effects within 1 gauntlet, prehaps made by a rival sorcerer to destroy all sorcererous bloodlines exept his own,a nd trap a bit of their power
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The main troubles with Illusionist's Bracers is the fact that Agonizing Blast apply charisma modifier for EACH beam. If it only added the modifier to one beam it would be a lot more comparable to say Fire Bolt being duplicated. Ignoring that Fire Bolt is fire damage, which is more commonly resisted or outright immune, whilst Eldritch Blast is force damage which is the least resisted and immune damage type in the game.
At level 11, a Warlock would deal 3x 1d10+4 damage times 2 by the Bracers for an average of 57 damage. When compared to a 2-hander Fighter dealing 3x 2d6+4 damage for 33 damage (or 63 with GWM assuming all hit with the -5 penalty to attack). An equivalent level 11 Paladin would deal 2x 1d10+4+1d8 + 1d4+4+1d8 (with PAM) for an average of 39 damage.
Throwing in a Hex cast in the mix to apply +1d6 per beam would have the Illusionist's Bracers Warlock deal an additional 6d6 necrotic damage or 21 bonus damage for a total average of 78 damage, each and every turn. At range. And it can apply other effects through invocations like slow, push, get insane 300 ft. reach (although often not as applicable).
So yes, it is absolutely bonkers what Illusionist's Bracers can do for a Warlock. It is not recommended to give them one. (And just for flavor it is from the Ravnica rulebook - so depending on your setting it may be inappropriate).
TBF the Warlock class is a bit weird by being so limited in its spell casting, but neither are they a martial class, making it very attractive to multiclass into other classes. Picking up levels in a full caster class like Wizard/Cleric can give the Warlock access to additional spell slots which can be used to cast Warlock spells - for instance Hex. Picking up levels in a martial class or Cleric (with certain domains) can give access to heavier armor that allows you to fight on the frontlines without worrying too much about your limited health pool.
To give the "pure" Warlock some additional spell casting without necessarily breaking their damage, one could opt to give them a Ring of Spell Storing - and allow them to store spells at lower than max spell slot level (so they can actually store multiple low level spells and not be forced to up-cast when they store spells). Do keep in mind that Ring of Spell Storing is a rare item, so a Rod of the Pact Keeper +1 may be more appropriate for a character of level 6.
This item is just detrimental. There is no reason to use it. Giving them a +2 to hit instead of a +7. And dealing less damage? What blasphemy is this?
Give him illusionists bracers and call it a day - tell him he owes you one for the next 10 sessions
Easy Peasy ---