Where is shield proficiency? What's the point of medium armor proficiency if I have to take a feat or multiclass for shield proficiency anyway?
you can use an invocation to get shield proficiency, take Lessons of the First Ones to pick up Lightly Armoured. However, why would you want a shield proficiency? If you're using pact weapon you've got one hand taken up already and you want a free hand for somantic components. If you're using pact familiar or book of shadows, you're probably not front-lining anyway so your AC should be less relevant overall and may also end out in situations where you want a free hand; for example if you get a staff of defence but want to cast a spell with a semantic component but no material component.
Medium armour still makes sense for Pact of the Blade tho, since it's basically free AC compared to light armour as your Dexterity is unlikely to be above 14, you'll get a fair AC and you have access to shield spell now.
Using an invocation to get lightly armored basically makes the existing medium armor proficiency pointless. Might as well only have light armor proficiency and pick the feat.
While Pactblade currently can't use shield and still expect to cast, there's a good chance there'll be an option to make pactblade into a focus later on. Graned, that's speculation but if that happens we're lacking a shield suddenly. Having a shield is great, and you're more often than not *not* in need of the hand holding a shield. Even backliners profit from +2 to AC.
Where is shield proficiency? What's the point of medium armor proficiency if I have to take a feat or multiclass for shield proficiency anyway?
The same could be said of Why the Medium Armor proficiency? What's the point of Armor of Shadows Invocation if you get better AC by default?
Swords Bard gets Medium Armor proficiency and no shield proficiency and that takes a subclass. Maybe shield proficiency could be added to a subclass option?
Warlock is the only Half Caster now without shield proficiency. It seems the idea is for Warlocks to be slightly tankier casters, at least in 5e they already had more intrinsic defense.
Bard is a full caster, so I'm not sure it's a fair comparison. Granted, Cleric exists, but they have a different spell list.
Armor of Shadows is just part of the bigger problem of Invocations just being bad. I don't really want to get into it here, but Invocations as a class feature are broadly lacking and WotC should rework most of them to make up for no longer being full casters.
Overall it seems to me that Medium Armor prof was added without much thought? If you want to go tanky/durable on a non-heavy character, Medium+Shield was a staple because it didn't take a high investment of stats. With the new lightly armored feat, even full casters can easily get that baseline of defense. Only having medium armor prof is weirdly inbetween "better than light armor" and "saving a feat". Did WotC just scale the armor profs of the arcane casters from 5e up by one step?
The answer is that Action Surge, Arcane Recovery, and other lingering shirt rest abilities are not critical core-functionality pieces of their class. And no, Action Surge is not *critical* to fighters being able to fighter. It's a sweet bonus, but especially in this UA that's all it is.
Spellcasting is critical core functionality to a warlock, but with Pact Magic? You don't get to cast spells and be a spellcaster at all unless your DM and party are magnanimous (and bored) enough to give you 5+ short rests per day. Yes, Eldritch Blast is really good. It is not "carry the entire class alone forever" good. Warlocks are Mage class characters, they should be able to cast spells. Pact Magic doesn't allow them to do so.
Why isn't Wizards allowed to correct this?
Because "unique". As in, uniquely impeded. Why address the source of the problem when you can just add crutches? It's so much easier than trying something new.
And beyond the short rest yes, short rest no. Damn, now you have more variety of magic. Because let's face it, who spent a spell slot on a level 1 spell beyond hex or Armor of Agathys?
But it is a matter of taste. I understand that there are people who are already fine with casting only armor of agathys and hex for their entire career. And it's OK. It is a matter of taste. That is why a survey is carried out to see the general opinion of the players.
And beyond the short rest yes, short rest no. Damn, now you have more variety of magic. Because let's face it, who spent a spell slot on a level 1 spell beyond hex or Armor of Agathys?
But it is a matter of taste. I understand that there are people who are already fine with casting only armor of agathys and hex for their entire career. And it's OK. It is a matter of taste. That is why a survey is carried out to see the general opinion of the players.
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
as a complication that might favor melee locks i'd add that if you fell to 0hp while your max health was reduced by half or more, then something abominable takes over. your body gains 1hp, an eerie grey pallor, and some number of temp hp. you fight on immune to fear or charm, a direct pawn of your patron. roleplay it or don't, but the dm might decide this is the moment your patron finally breaks that seal you keep in your pocket or whatever. effect lasts a minute whereupon the warlock gains two levels of UA exhaustion and falls unconscious. additionally, for every level over 9th you fight alongside one more spontaneously conjured fiend/mephit/flying sword/thing/etc which disappear when the warlock becomes unconscious.
That would be fine for a subclass feature -- Undead already gets something similar at 10th
In addition, when you would be reduced to 0 hit points, you can use your reaction to drop to 1 hit point instead and cause your body to erupt with deathly energy. Each creature of your choice that is within 30 feet of you takes necrotic damage equal to 2d10 + your warlock level. You then gain 1 level of exhaustion. Once you use this reaction, you can’t do so again until you finish 1d4 long rests.
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Why address the source of the problem when you can just add crutches? It's so much easier than trying something new.
I love that y'all's idea of "try something new" is "the same old thing every other caster class gets"
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
It's a difference of degrees, not a contradiction. Pact Magic is a bigger deal than Action Surge. It's more versatile, and it carries a larger portion of the Warlock's power budget than Action Surge does for Fighter. In other words, it's not super important to ensure that Fighter gets the right number of Action Surges in a day, but it is super important to make sure Warlock gets the right number of spell slots in a day.
I don't *like* this logic necessarily, but that's a different story.
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
They gave you the reason.
"One of the most common and highly requested pieces of feedback we receive about warlocks is that they want to cast more spells, more often." ~Jeremy Crawford, talking to Todd Kenreck on the YouTubes.
Everybody bellowing "You can cast PLENTY, Pact Magic is FINE! Just short rest more often you stupid ****s!" is missing that clearly this is not the case. Most common, highly requested feedback - more spells. Pact Magic is clearly not "FINE". The question is whether or not Wizards is allowed to fix this, or whether warlocks will be stuck with the same garbage-ass casting system they've been coping with since 2014 that doesn't allow them to actually be spellcasters. Because the way all of you use Pact Magic, they could very easily replace it with "Eldritch Burst: deal your level in d6 Force damage to every creature within twenty feet of a point you select within 150 feet of you, 2x/short rest" and none of you would notice the difference.
If the only actual thing you want is just max-level magic blasting with no ability to be a god damned spellcaster? Keep playing the 2014 warlock. It'll be there. The rest of us would like a mage for our Mage group, please.
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
They gave you the reason.
"One of the most common and highly requested pieces of feedback we receive about warlocks is that they want to cast more spells, more often." ~Jeremy Crawford, talking to Todd Kenreck on the YouTubes.
Everybody bellowing "You can cast PLENTY, Pact Magic is FINE! Just short rest more often you stupid ****s!" is missing that clearly this is not the case. Most common, highly requested feedback - more spells. Pact Magic is clearly not "FINE".
But most of us are instead saying “fine, make Pact Magic a long rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. Fix Pact Magic, don’t kill it.”
One lousy stinking garbage-ass extra Pact Magic slot is not going to magically repair Pact Magic, Sposta. ****, according to all of the "you should be getting NO FEWER than two short rests every last single day and any table/DM that doesn't let you do that, no matter what the reason is, is a horrible table/DM that you should abandon forever", you would need to triple the number of Pact Magic slots just to catch up to "Where the Class Already Is", let alone "Where The Class Should Be."
Do you foresee a future in which Wizards triples the number of Pact Magic slots? Yeah, neither do I. Neither does anybody. Nobody with a brain in their head is saying "sure, Wizards'll absolutely give us 12 fifth-level spell slots!" It's not going to happen.
As Yurei says, Jeremy Crawford already said that they had done it because people were asking for more magic for the warlock.
And before someone says "give him more spell slot with pact magic". It doesn't work like that. As I have already said many times, being all the spell slots of the highest level, if you give him too many spell slots, you are making him too powerful. And if you don't give him many, we are in the same situation: You have little magic, although it is very powerful.
For me the warlock halfcaster is a good solution. I do think it could use a little more magic, but as it stands now it works. It has worked quite well for me in what I have played in playtest.
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
They gave you the reason.
"One of the most common and highly requested pieces of feedback we receive about warlocks is that they want to cast more spells, more often." ~Jeremy Crawford, talking to Todd Kenreck on the YouTubes.
Everybody bellowing "You can cast PLENTY, Pact Magic is FINE! Just short rest more often you stupid ****s!" is missing that clearly this is not the case. Most common, highly requested feedback - more spells. Pact Magic is clearly not "FINE". The question is whether or not Wizards is allowed to fix this, or whether warlocks will be stuck with the same garbage-ass casting system they've been coping with since 2014 that doesn't allow them to actually be spellcasters. Because the way all of you use Pact Magic, they could very easily replace it with "Eldritch Burst: deal your level in d6 Force damage to every creature within twenty feet of a point you select within 150 feet of you, 2x/short rest" and none of you would notice the difference.
If the only actual thing you want is just max-level magic blasting with no ability to be a god damned spellcaster? Keep playing the 2014 warlock. It'll be there. The rest of us would like a mage for our Mage group, please.
I get that. I want Warlocks to be able to cast more spells too, but I'm not happy with the way they playtest material made Warlocks into half-casters.
So now what I'm trying to do is understand the logic behind making Warlocks into half-casters and getting rid of Pact Magic, so I can suggest ways to fix the issue. If the logic is "most players' games don't allow for enough short rests for the Warlocks to feel like they are performing to the full extent of their abilities, so we got rid of their short rest recharge abilities", the developers can't then go "other classes' short rest abilities are fine lmao". If the logic is not consistent, we can't give any proper suggestions.
I love that y'all's idea of "try something new" is "the same old thing every other caster class gets"
What are you talking about, the artificer was the only kind of arcane half-caster, and even that one worked in a weird way, with cleric-like spellcasting and less than a half of arcane spells available. The new warlock is the first actual arcane half-caster in game.
And beyond the short rest yes, short rest no. Damn, now you have more variety of magic. Because let's face it, who spent a spell slot on a level 1 spell beyond hex or Armor of Agathys?
But it is a matter of taste. I understand that there are people who are already fine with casting only armor of agathys and hex for their entire career. And it's OK. It is a matter of taste. That is why a survey is carried out to see the general opinion of the players.
whether or not pact magic is reinstalled, i'll be surprised if there isn't a new lock feature around lvl3 or so along the lines of "Hex is now a cantrip for you. Improves at 11th and 17th level."
it wouldn't hurt my feelings much to see a similar invocation or sub-class feature for at-will armor of agathys (limited to once every hour or something) as well. actually, yeah i think i'd prefer this to having spell slots for Shield just because Shield feels like wiz/sorc territory.
I get that. I want Warlocks to be able to cast more spells too, but I'm not happy with the way they playtest material made Warlocks into half-casters.
So now what I'm trying to do is understand the logic behind making Warlocks into half-casters and getting rid of Pact Magic, so I can suggest ways to fix the issue. If the logic is "most players' games don't allow for enough short rests for the Warlocks to feel like they are performing to the full extent of their abilities, so we got rid of their short rest recharge abilities", the developers can't then go "other classes' short rest abilities are fine lmao". If the logic is not consistent, we can't give any proper suggestions.
Do you understand my point?
First of all, trim your quote chains. This thread is already agonizing with multiple examples of utterly unreadable billion-post quote chains. Thank you.
Second of all, I explained that too. Action Surge is not core to the fighter's functionality. A fighter can go all day without Action Surging and not really care. It's hella nice when you need that extra push, but the fighter's core functionality is not impacted by Action Surge. They can swing their weapon and use their masteries and wear their heavy armor and have their d10 hit die and such without needing to Action Surge.
Arcane Recovery is not core to the wizard's functionality. A wizard can go all day without Arcane Recovering and not really care. They had the spell slots to burn in the first place, getting some back if the table finds a rare opportunity to take a breather is a bonus, not a requirement. Any wizard worth their pointy hat is going to meter their spellcasting anyways, if your wizard is frequently out of ammo and you're not in Tier 1 you need to have a sit-down with that wizard and explain the concept of resource economy to them. Don't Orion Acaba, folks - not every situation merits a Fireball.
Warlocks? Spellcasting is a core functionality. The class is in the Mage group - magic is its whole deal. Gating the warlock's ability to be a spellcaster behind a mechanic that is not widely utilized by the community is Not Okay, regardless of what your opinion of people not using the mechanic is. Warlocks are missing a critical piece of their class and they need it back. Or rather, they need to get that piece given to them in the first place since they never had it.
Hell, you want the spiciest take? Here's something I'd legit investigate: keep the warlock a half-caster, give it Expertise, and switch it into the Expert group instead, swapping with the bard. The warlock is a "delver into secrets" after all, an occultist skilled enough to forge multiple bargains with extraplanar entities for pieces of power. Why not make it an Expert? I know, I know, the bard already has Expertise so it has to be an Expert. Excuse: no. You can have spellcasting without being a Mage, you can have Extra Attack without being a Warrior - you can have Expertise without being an Expert. Swapping the arcane half-caster with a bunch of interesting tech/utility into the Expert group and enthiccenning its Invocation/Expertise game to match while shoving the full caster without much else going on into the Mage group is worth considering.
What is not worth considering is keeping Pact Magic and denying warlocks their spellcasting altogether. Just stop that. It's not okay.
In my experience people just more often forget about short rests rather than disallowing them. It's something to do with the momentum of sessions. When the action is intense you just want to keep going and not interrupt it with a kind of artificial speed bump. And when the action lulls, it usually slows enough for a long rest. I've seen plenty of Warlock players just never use their pact magic slots. Or they use them both in the first encounter and don't have any more spells for the rest of the day.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
But most of us are instead saying “fine, make Pact Magic a long rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. Fix Pact Magic, don’t kill it.”
Or "switch Pact Magic to long rest if you must, but then give warlocks another method of getting slots back along the lines of sorcery points or Arcane Recovery"
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
They gave you the reason.
"One of the most common and highly requested pieces of feedback we receive about warlocks is that they want to cast more spells, more often." ~Jeremy Crawford, talking to Todd Kenreck on the YouTubes.
Everybody bellowing "You can cast PLENTY, Pact Magic is FINE! Just short rest more often you stupid ****s!" is missing that clearly this is not the case. Most common, highly requested feedback - more spells. Pact Magic is clearly not "FINE".
But most of us are instead saying “fine, make Pact Magic a long rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. Fix Pact Magic, don’t kill it.”
I'm saying keep Pact Magic a short rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. The new Monster Manual monsters seem like they're going to be doing more damage, which will make short rests more useful as well.
I get that. I want Warlocks to be able to cast more spells too, but I'm not happy with the way they playtest material made Warlocks into half-casters.
So now what I'm trying to do is understand the logic behind making Warlocks into half-casters and getting rid of Pact Magic, so I can suggest ways to fix the issue. If the logic is "most players' games don't allow for enough short rests for the Warlocks to feel like they are performing to the full extent of their abilities, so we got rid of their short rest recharge abilities", the developers can't then go "other classes' short rest abilities are fine lmao". If the logic is not consistent, we can't give any proper suggestions.
Do you understand my point?
First of all, trim your quote chains. This thread is already agonizing with multiple examples of utterly unreadable billion-post quote chains. Thank you.
Second of all, I explained that too. Action Surge is not core to the fighter's functionality. A fighter can go all day without Action Surging and not really care. It's hella nice when you need that extra push, but the fighter's core functionality is not impacted by Action Surge. They can swing their weapon and use their masteries and wear their heavy armor and have their d10 hit die and such without needing to Action Surge.
Arcane Recovery is not core to the wizard's functionality. A wizard can go all day without Arcane Recovering and not really care. They had the spell slots to burn in the first place, getting some back if the table finds a rare opportunity to take a breather is a bonus, not a requirement. Any wizard worth their pointy hat is going to meter their spellcasting anyways, if your wizard is frequently out of ammo and you're not in Tier 1 you need to have a sit-down with that wizard and explain the concept of resource economy to them. Don't Orion Acaba, folks - not every situation merits a Fireball.
Warlocks? Spellcasting is a core functionality. The class is in the Mage group - magic is its whole deal. Gating the warlock's ability to be a spellcaster behind a mechanic that is not widely utilized by the community is Not Okay, regardless of what your opinion of people not using the mechanic is. Warlocks are missing a critical piece of their class and they need it back. Or rather, they need to get that piece given to them in the first place since they never had it.
Hell, you want the spiciest take? Here's something I'd legit investigate: keep the warlock a half-caster, give it Expertise, and switch it into the Expert group instead, swapping with the bard. The warlock is a "delver into secrets" after all, an occultist skilled enough to forge multiple bargains with extraplanar entities for pieces of power. Why not make it an Expert? I know, I know, the bard already has Expertise so it has to be an Expert. Excuse: no. You can have spellcasting without being a Mage, you can have Extra Attack without being a Warrior - you can have Expertise without being an Expert. Swapping the arcane half-caster with a bunch of interesting tech/utility into the Expert group and enthiccenning its Invocation/Expertise game to match while shoving the full caster without much else going on into the Mage group is worth considering.
What is not worth considering is keeping Pact Magic and denying warlocks their spellcasting altogether. Just stop that. It's not okay.
Stop putting words into my mouth.
I don't care if the core spellcasting format for Warlocks gets changed into half-caster. What I care about is gutting the spell slot level progression in half. Mystic Arcanum being extended downwards in levels doesn't cut it as it doesn't let you upcast. I want Warlocks to retain the ability to upcast spells at the same level progression pace as before. If Warlocks are made into half-casters, their scaling with the following spells is stunted:
Armor of Agathys
Arms of Hadar
Cause Fear
Charm Person
Distort Value
Hellish Rebuke
Witch Bolt
Cloud of Daggers
Hold Person
Invisibility
Mind Spike
Shadow Blade
Shatter
Counterspell
Dispel Magic
Fly
Intellect Fortress
Magic Circle
Major Image
Spirit Shroud
Summon Fey
Summon Lesser Demons
Summon Shadowspawn
Summon Undead
Thunderstep
Vampiric Touch
Banishment
Blight
Charm Monster
Elemental Bane
Raulothim's Psychic Lance
Summon Aberration
Summon Greater Demon
But sure, Invocations, +CHA on Eldritch Blast, and a handful of low level spellslots are supposed to compensate for that.
Again, I don't care about Pact Magic as a concept, I care about Wizards being better at casting iconic Warlock spells than Warlocks.
Using an invocation to get lightly armored basically makes the existing medium armor proficiency pointless. Might as well only have light armor proficiency and pick the feat.
While Pactblade currently can't use shield and still expect to cast, there's a good chance there'll be an option to make pactblade into a focus later on. Graned, that's speculation but if that happens we're lacking a shield suddenly. Having a shield is great, and you're more often than not *not* in need of the hand holding a shield. Even backliners profit from +2 to AC.
Warlock is the only Half Caster now without shield proficiency. It seems the idea is for Warlocks to be slightly tankier casters, at least in 5e they already had more intrinsic defense.
Bard is a full caster, so I'm not sure it's a fair comparison. Granted, Cleric exists, but they have a different spell list.
Armor of Shadows is just part of the bigger problem of Invocations just being bad. I don't really want to get into it here, but Invocations as a class feature are broadly lacking and WotC should rework most of them to make up for no longer being full casters.
Overall it seems to me that Medium Armor prof was added without much thought? If you want to go tanky/durable on a non-heavy character, Medium+Shield was a staple because it didn't take a high investment of stats. With the new lightly armored feat, even full casters can easily get that baseline of defense. Only having medium armor prof is weirdly inbetween "better than light armor" and "saving a feat". Did WotC just scale the armor profs of the arcane casters from 5e up by one step?
Because "unique". As in, uniquely impeded. Why address the source of the problem when you can just add crutches? It's so much easier than trying something new.
And beyond the short rest yes, short rest no. Damn, now you have more variety of magic. Because let's face it, who spent a spell slot on a level 1 spell beyond hex or Armor of Agathys?
But it is a matter of taste. I understand that there are people who are already fine with casting only armor of agathys and hex for their entire career. And it's OK. It is a matter of taste. That is why a survey is carried out to see the general opinion of the players.
Whether it is a matter of choice or not is not really the issue. It is trying to understand the reasoning behind getting rid of Pact Magic. If the reasoning is "well we want to get rid of short rest recharge abilities because most people don't get to short rest in their games", you can't just leave, or straight up make more of, short rest abilities for other classes.
That would be fine for a subclass feature -- Undead already gets something similar at 10th
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
I love that y'all's idea of "try something new" is "the same old thing every other caster class gets"
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
It's a difference of degrees, not a contradiction. Pact Magic is a bigger deal than Action Surge. It's more versatile, and it carries a larger portion of the Warlock's power budget than Action Surge does for Fighter. In other words, it's not super important to ensure that Fighter gets the right number of Action Surges in a day, but it is super important to make sure Warlock gets the right number of spell slots in a day.
I don't *like* this logic necessarily, but that's a different story.
They gave you the reason.
"One of the most common and highly requested pieces of feedback we receive about warlocks is that they want to cast more spells, more often." ~Jeremy Crawford, talking to Todd Kenreck on the YouTubes.
Everybody bellowing "You can cast PLENTY, Pact Magic is FINE! Just short rest more often you stupid ****s!" is missing that clearly this is not the case. Most common, highly requested feedback - more spells. Pact Magic is clearly not "FINE". The question is whether or not Wizards is allowed to fix this, or whether warlocks will be stuck with the same garbage-ass casting system they've been coping with since 2014 that doesn't allow them to actually be spellcasters. Because the way all of you use Pact Magic, they could very easily replace it with "Eldritch Burst: deal your level in d6 Force damage to every creature within twenty feet of a point you select within 150 feet of you, 2x/short rest" and none of you would notice the difference.
If the only actual thing you want is just max-level magic blasting with no ability to be a god damned spellcaster? Keep playing the 2014 warlock. It'll be there. The rest of us would like a mage for our Mage group, please.
Please do not contact or message me.
But most of us are instead saying “fine, make Pact Magic a long rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. Fix Pact Magic, don’t kill it.”
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One lousy stinking garbage-ass extra Pact Magic slot is not going to magically repair Pact Magic, Sposta. ****, according to all of the "you should be getting NO FEWER than two short rests every last single day and any table/DM that doesn't let you do that, no matter what the reason is, is a horrible table/DM that you should abandon forever", you would need to triple the number of Pact Magic slots just to catch up to "Where the Class Already Is", let alone "Where The Class Should Be."
Do you foresee a future in which Wizards triples the number of Pact Magic slots? Yeah, neither do I. Neither does anybody. Nobody with a brain in their head is saying "sure, Wizards'll absolutely give us 12 fifth-level spell slots!" It's not going to happen.
So why keep asking for it?
Please do not contact or message me.
As Yurei says, Jeremy Crawford already said that they had done it because people were asking for more magic for the warlock.
And before someone says "give him more spell slot with pact magic". It doesn't work like that. As I have already said many times, being all the spell slots of the highest level, if you give him too many spell slots, you are making him too powerful. And if you don't give him many, we are in the same situation: You have little magic, although it is very powerful.
For me the warlock halfcaster is a good solution. I do think it could use a little more magic, but as it stands now it works. It has worked quite well for me in what I have played in playtest.
I get that. I want Warlocks to be able to cast more spells too, but I'm not happy with the way they playtest material made Warlocks into half-casters.
So now what I'm trying to do is understand the logic behind making Warlocks into half-casters and getting rid of Pact Magic, so I can suggest ways to fix the issue. If the logic is "most players' games don't allow for enough short rests for the Warlocks to feel like they are performing to the full extent of their abilities, so we got rid of their short rest recharge abilities", the developers can't then go "other classes' short rest abilities are fine lmao". If the logic is not consistent, we can't give any proper suggestions.
Do you understand my point?
What are you talking about, the artificer was the only kind of arcane half-caster, and even that one worked in a weird way, with cleric-like spellcasting and less than a half of arcane spells available. The new warlock is the first actual arcane half-caster in game.
Mystic Arcanum invocation got you covered. Also, can't kill what was stillborn.
whether or not pact magic is reinstalled, i'll be surprised if there isn't a new lock feature around lvl3 or so along the lines of "Hex is now a cantrip for you. Improves at 11th and 17th level."
it wouldn't hurt my feelings much to see a similar invocation or sub-class feature for at-will armor of agathys (limited to once every hour or something) as well. actually, yeah i think i'd prefer this to having spell slots for Shield just because Shield feels like wiz/sorc territory.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
First of all, trim your quote chains. This thread is already agonizing with multiple examples of utterly unreadable billion-post quote chains. Thank you.
Second of all, I explained that too. Action Surge is not core to the fighter's functionality. A fighter can go all day without Action Surging and not really care. It's hella nice when you need that extra push, but the fighter's core functionality is not impacted by Action Surge. They can swing their weapon and use their masteries and wear their heavy armor and have their d10 hit die and such without needing to Action Surge.
Arcane Recovery is not core to the wizard's functionality. A wizard can go all day without Arcane Recovering and not really care. They had the spell slots to burn in the first place, getting some back if the table finds a rare opportunity to take a breather is a bonus, not a requirement. Any wizard worth their pointy hat is going to meter their spellcasting anyways, if your wizard is frequently out of ammo and you're not in Tier 1 you need to have a sit-down with that wizard and explain the concept of resource economy to them. Don't Orion Acaba, folks - not every situation merits a Fireball.
Warlocks? Spellcasting is a core functionality. The class is in the Mage group - magic is its whole deal. Gating the warlock's ability to be a spellcaster behind a mechanic that is not widely utilized by the community is Not Okay, regardless of what your opinion of people not using the mechanic is. Warlocks are missing a critical piece of their class and they need it back. Or rather, they need to get that piece given to them in the first place since they never had it.
Hell, you want the spiciest take? Here's something I'd legit investigate: keep the warlock a half-caster, give it Expertise, and switch it into the Expert group instead, swapping with the bard. The warlock is a "delver into secrets" after all, an occultist skilled enough to forge multiple bargains with extraplanar entities for pieces of power. Why not make it an Expert? I know, I know, the bard already has Expertise so it has to be an Expert. Excuse: no. You can have spellcasting without being a Mage, you can have Extra Attack without being a Warrior - you can have Expertise without being an Expert. Swapping the arcane half-caster with a bunch of interesting tech/utility into the Expert group and enthiccenning its Invocation/Expertise game to match while shoving the full caster without much else going on into the Mage group is worth considering.
What is not worth considering is keeping Pact Magic and denying warlocks their spellcasting altogether. Just stop that. It's not okay.
Please do not contact or message me.
In my experience people just more often forget about short rests rather than disallowing them. It's something to do with the momentum of sessions. When the action is intense you just want to keep going and not interrupt it with a kind of artificial speed bump. And when the action lulls, it usually slows enough for a long rest. I've seen plenty of Warlock players just never use their pact magic slots. Or they use them both in the first encounter and don't have any more spells for the rest of the day.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Or "switch Pact Magic to long rest if you must, but then give warlocks another method of getting slots back along the lines of sorcery points or Arcane Recovery"
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
I'm saying keep Pact Magic a short rest feature and give them more Pact Magic slots. The new Monster Manual monsters seem like they're going to be doing more damage, which will make short rests more useful as well.
Stop putting words into my mouth.
I don't care if the core spellcasting format for Warlocks gets changed into half-caster. What I care about is gutting the spell slot level progression in half. Mystic Arcanum being extended downwards in levels doesn't cut it as it doesn't let you upcast. I want Warlocks to retain the ability to upcast spells at the same level progression pace as before. If Warlocks are made into half-casters, their scaling with the following spells is stunted:
But sure, Invocations, +CHA on Eldritch Blast, and a handful of low level spellslots are supposed to compensate for that.
Again, I don't care about Pact Magic as a concept, I care about Wizards being better at casting iconic Warlock spells than Warlocks.