A ranger is simply one who has learned to thrive in the wilds. They might have been born in the woods, raised by wolves, or been a city dweller forced into exile in the mountains, or a naturally curious type who simply loves exploring the remote areas of the world, or a thrill seeker who needs to climb the highest mountain simply because it is there.
etc...etc...
Always been blurry, but you'd be hard pressed to find a nature-hating ranger or ranger by accident.
Not really, I've personally DMed or played: a Gloomstalker Ranger who was an assassin that hated nature instead preferred dark dank city streets. a Drakewarden Ranger who was an academic obsessed with dragons who again hating roughing it in nature. a Hunter Ranger who just wanted to kill the most exotic and dangerous creatures they can. a Beastmaster Ranger who became a ranger because they were accidentally infected with Lycantrope and forced into exile.
Do you guys really have so little imagination that you constrain yourself to the fluff text?
...People build these threads to have echo chambers. Echo chambers are bad. Telling me to make a new poll is pointless. The only poll that will matter for this would be if WoTC did another one. Technically they already did one when play testing 5e and we know the put come of that one even if we never saw the results.
i don't think the thread was meant to confirm assumptions. honestly, i wish i had more to contribute regarding analysis of the data and i feel like it's for a worthy cause. all the echos came with us off topic posters.
Thank you rum. While I did have some inkling of where the answers might land in this poll, I was actually hoping to get more information so that I could better form my own opinion. As I have stated before and presented reasoning to back my view (in the other, previous thread), I generally find Charisma to be the most logical spellcasting ability score for Warlocks. Had it not been for some strong arguments I have heard for a flexible stat, I might have answered exclusively Charisma for my own vote in the poll. However, through that discussion I obtained a better understanding of why providing flexibility to choose Intelligence in particular is reasonable lore-wise and would probably be beneficial to the game. I was also curious how many people genuinely wanted Intelligence exclusively for the Warlock's casting ability, even though that is certainly not a position I support.
For Ain, going into a discussion assuming that the person that initiated the thread is acting in bad faith (myself in this case) is rather insulting. I would challenge you to find any evidence from my actions on this forum that points to me working solely to advance my own opinions while entirely discounting counter arguments.
Btw: I find it a bit sad to see that roughly one in three of the players vote for "my interpretation of the class is the only correct one", i.e., "CHA/INT/WIS exclusively". I mean who gets hurt if players get more choices? The issues with dips must be dealt with regardless (i.e., EB scaling with Warlock lvl, PotB giving less power on lvl 1, etc.). Once this is done, potential Wizlock, Druidlock, ..., *lock builds should not be a problem.
Part of that is the thread title asks one question, the poll another.
I find intelligence to be the most appropriate for the class as described, and by a large margin. I support a flexible stat option though. If I am answering the title I would give the first answer, if i am answering the poll question the second.
Edit well that quote attempt failed in editing.
You are correct that I could have worded the title and the poll better so that they were completely aligned. The fact is that I am interested in the answers to both questions, but decided against making two polls that would have been so similar (most logical attribute/peoples preferences for the attributes used). I am happy that you and others in the discussion thread have explained your views on both aspects (as I did for my opinions in the original post).
Bards and Sorcerers are more deserving of flexible casting than Warlock is.
I can see Bard being Int (the whole College thing), but Sorcerer? Nah.
Why not Int for a sorcerer?
A sorcerer that gets their powers from being infected by a Mindflayer tadpole, or coming into contact with Aboleth slime, or from travelling to the Astral Plane or Far Realms could absolutely be uber-nerd academics researching those places / creatures, who then learn to wield their powers through experimentation and research on themselves.
A draconic sorcerer could be a Dr. Jeckel-type character, who was a serious high-Int alchemist who was researching new formulae and tested those formulae on themselves and one of their new creations happens to mutate them into a part-dragon-like creature, they level up by discovering new formulae to increase their transformation, and their sorcery points are alchemical concoctions they have created that enhance their spellcasting.
An abberrant mind sorcerer could be an Intellect Devourer who has taken over a humanoid body and then magically sealed inside so is now trying to learn to live as a humanoid.
A wild magic sorcerer could be a former wizard who was investigating ancient ruins when a strange magical device latched onto them and now causes their magic to go haywire.
A shadow sorcerer could be an city investigator who was clearing out a mad mage's tower when they got sucked through a black mirror into a strange world that was a shadowy reflection of the material plane, luckily they managed to find a way back through the mirror but not alone... since that day they have cast 2 shadows instead of one, and discovered strange magical abilities, they are not obsessed with trying to learn about what happened to them and control their new powers.
Bards could be any casting stat really, they are gathers of lore and knowledge (Int), performers (Cha), and tell legends and myths filled with moral lessons (Wis).
A sorcerer that gets their powers from . . . travelling to the Astral Plane or Far Realms could absolutely be uber-nerd academics researching those places / creatures, who then learn to wield their powers through experimentation and research on themselves.
...would be a wizard. There is nothing "inherent" to the guy who visits a place of study to study and then utilizes the things they have learned.
A draconic sorcerer could be a Dr. Jeckel-type character, who was a serious high-Int alchemist who was researching new formulae and tested those formulae on themselves and one of their new creations happens to mutate them into a part-dragon-like creature, they level up by discovering new formulae to increase their transformation, and their sorcery points are alchemical concoctions they have created that enhance their spellcasting.
An abberrant mind sorcerer could be an Intellect Devourer who has taken over a humanoid body and then magically sealed inside so is now trying to learn to live as a humanoid.
All this is covered by the aberrant mind sorcerer. Hey, what if the concept is a sorcerer that gets magical abilities by being a rogue who is haunted by the spirit of a long dead cleric!?
This is getting truly silly.
At the core of it, the sorcerer's access to magic is innate, and their command over magical abilities is through sheer force of personality. That is their defining trait, always has been.
Warlock, on the other hand, got access to magic through a pact of some sort. No particular ability score is The One That Determines Your Ability To Make And Keep Pacts. Popular culture is *rotten* with characters that have made deals with devils and demons and whatnot, and then either found loopholes, played along, or entered into it with full knowledge of all the facts. Not hard to see how all of these might fit any of the ability scores, because the theme of "arcane power granted by a patrion through a pact" is retained.
Because the spellcasting is still supposed to be innate, i.e- they somehow manipulate the Weave (or gain psionics) as a result of a physiological feature.
A sorcerer that gets their powers from being infected by a Mindflayer tadpole, or coming into contact with Aboleth slime, or from travelling to the Astral Plane or Far Realms could absolutely be uber-nerd academics researching those places / creatures, who then learn to wield their powers through experimentation and research on themselves.
If the spellcasting is still innate rather than learned it doesn't matter if you did it on purpose or why; the key part is how the spells are actually cast, rather than how you figured out how to do so. That's why it's a spellcasting ability score. A character can use an intelligent, methodical way to learn what their powers are, or they can just have a go at random and see what works, but they'd both still be casting via the same basic physiological mechanism (parasite, mutation etc.).
Another way of thinking about it is learning to box; you can learn to punch through observation, repetition etc., but ultimately the actual act of doing it is a physical one. It doesn't matter how you learned to do it, because you'll ultimately doing the same basic thing.
A draconic sorcerer could be a Dr. Jeckel-type character, who was a serious high-Int alchemist who was researching new formulae and tested those formulae on themselves and one of their new creations happens to mutate them into a part-dragon-like creature, they level up by discovering new formulae to increase their transformation, and their sorcery points are alchemical concoctions they have created that enhance their spellcasting.
Again the formulae (cool idea btw) still feels like a separate aspect; that's a reason to take alchemist's supplies proficiency and maybe some extra points of Intelligence for any rolls the DM asks for using them if they want to make it mechanical. But really that's more just flavouring your levelling up and learning of spells, because the actual spellcasting ability still comes from physiological changes, i.e- it's still innate casting.
An abberrant mind sorcerer could be an Intellect Devourer who has taken over a humanoid body and then magically sealed inside so is now trying to learn to live as a humanoid.
An intellect devourer is only very slightly more Intelligent than anything else (12 INT, 11 WIS, 10 CHA), they also don't have any spellcasting of their own, so the spellcasting would still be something innate to the host's body?
A wild magic sorcerer could be a former wizard who was investigating ancient ruins when a strange magical device latched onto them and now causes their magic to go haywire.
This one feels like it very much needs some kind of homebrew as I'm not sure either class is an ideal fit for that; if I were DMing it I'd have the "magical device" be a magic item that basically grants the Wild Magic Surge and Tides of Chaos features on top of Wizard, or maybe a custom sub-class. Switching to Sorcerer would be eliminating any trace you were ever a Wizard, so it'd be an odd fit IMO.
A shadow sorcerer could be an city investigator who was clearing out a mad mage's tower when they got sucked through a black mirror into a strange world that was a shadowy reflection of the material plane, luckily they managed to find a way back through the mirror but not alone... since that day they have cast 2 shadows instead of one, and discovered strange magical abilities, they are not obsessed with trying to learn about what happened to them and control their new powers.
Again cool idea, but very much a physiological change that's granting the actual spellcasting.
To be clear, I'm not saying I fully agree with Charisma being the correct spellcasting ability score for Sorcerers as "physiological" spellcasters; as others have argued Constitution makes more logical sense for that, but clearly Wizards of the Coast don't want to try and balance that, and have settled on Charisma as the "force of will" score, among other things, similar to how it's the saving throw for banishment etc.
Bards could be any casting stat really, they are gathers of lore and knowledge (Int), performers (Cha), and tell legends and myths filled with moral lessons (Wis).
These are all side factors rather than the spellcasting itself; nothing prevents a Charismatic Bard from gathering lore and knowledge, you don't need high Wisdom to tell legends with a moral message or live in accordance with that morality. The key factor is the actual act of spellcasting, and how it is done, and the Bard class is very much described as doing so through music and words rather than formulae or channelling.
This is the point that people have been trying to make in this thread; the actual mechanism for how Warlocks cast spells isn't well defined. While they get the knowledge from the pact, how do they then cast the magic? What if the knowledge their patron granted was a bunch of magical formulae?
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What if the knowledge their patron granted was a bunch of magical formulae?
It isn't because warlocks do not use a spellbook, nor any other mechanism to encode those formulae. The only part of warlock that even hints that it might be granted as formulae is the pact of the tome and that is specifically only ritual spells & a couple cantrips. So a warlock can use magical formulae granted through their Pact Tome to cast rituals but there is no more reason to believe Pact Magic is via formulae than a bard's songs are formulae - honestly a lot of music has underlying mathematical patterns to it, so it is much more plausible that a Bard simply encodes the same magical formulae the Wizards use into easy-to-remember songs, poems, or mnemonics, than a warlock uses formulae.
Warlocks are granted power directly from their Patrons to cast spells. We saw in the previous UA that even your pact of the chain and pact of the blade could simply be a cantrip granted by your patron. It is more akin to Sorcerer's innate casting than a Wizard, it's just not the warlock's innate magic they are using but their patron's innate magic.
Bards and Sorcerers are more deserving of flexible casting than Warlock is.
i dunno about 'more' deserving, but it's something i'm coming to expect will be addressed for multiple classes in the 2024 version of whatever next tashas/xanthars we get.
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So, regarding “how do Warlocks cast magic”, let’s break that down a bit by class features and descriptions. We can infer they’re running on some fundamentally different since their spell slots and high level spells operate differently from any other caster. Also, regardless of how people choose to frame the initial setup, at the fundamental level it’s always some other being giving you the power. Most caster classes also indicate that it takes an inborn trait of some kind to be able to use magic, whereas of course one of the classic tropes associated with Warlocks is the idea of a mundane person using a pact to obtain magic in the first place. So, the answer to “how do Warlocks get a handle on magic in the first place” seems to be “someone gives them one”, at least to bridge the gap between the hypothetical “level 0” student of magic and a 1st level PC.
As for how they learn spells, that’s more subject to interpretation. I would argue that the class indicates that their spells are all learned in the same manner as explicitly described for Mystic Arcanum of the patron teaching in some way, whether by face to face, passing along a message in the vein of “do X, Y, and Z to make a Fireball”, or the classic Lovecraftian bit of inspirational dreams. But mechanically it’s the same as all the other spontaneous casters, and doesn’t really tell us anything. And at the moment of casting they just do the same “provide V, S, and M components as needed and expend a spell slot” bit as every other caster, with anything further being between the player and the DM.
Regarding what this all means for the casting stat, I would personally argue that if nothing else the fact that they’re working off an implanted and thus now internalized foundation for their magic makes them like Sorcerers and thus inclined to use the same stat, the people who want INT will of course rebut with the usual “but the description says you learned secrets” argument, so I don’t expect this conclusion to actually take the discussion anywhere new.
...People build these threads to have echo chambers. Echo chambers are bad. Telling me to make a new poll is pointless. The only poll that will matter for this would be if WoTC did another one. Technically they already did one when play testing 5e and we know the put come of that one even if we never saw the results.
i don't think the thread was meant to confirm assumptions. honestly, i wish i had more to contribute regarding analysis of the data and i feel like it's for a worthy cause. all the echos came with us off topic posters.
Thank you rum. While I did have some inkling of where the answers might land in this poll, I was actually hoping to get more information so that I could better form my own opinion. As I have stated before and presented reasoning to back my view (in the other, previous thread), I generally find Charisma to be the most logical spellcasting ability score for Warlocks. Had it not been for some strong arguments I have heard for a flexible stat, I might have answered exclusively Charisma for my own vote in the poll. However, through that discussion I obtained a better understanding of why providing flexibility to choose Intelligence in particular is reasonable lore-wise and would probably be beneficial to the game. I was also curious how many people genuinely wanted Intelligence exclusively for the Warlock's casting ability, even though that is certainly not a position I support.
For Ain, going into a discussion assuming that the person that initiated the thread is acting in bad faith (myself in this case) is rather insulting. I would challenge you to find any evidence from my actions on this forum that points to me working solely to advance my own opinions while entirely discounting counter arguments.
Btw: I find it a bit sad to see that roughly one in three of the players vote for "my interpretation of the class is the only correct one", i.e., "CHA/INT/WIS exclusively". I mean who gets hurt if players get more choices? The issues with dips must be dealt with regardless (i.e., EB scaling with Warlock lvl, PotB giving less power on lvl 1, etc.). Once this is done, potential Wizlock, Druidlock, ..., *lock builds should not be a problem.
Part of that is the thread title asks one question, the poll another.
I find intelligence to be the most appropriate for the class as described, and by a large margin. I support a flexible stat option though. If I am answering the title I would give the first answer, if i am answering the poll question the second.
Edit well that quote attempt failed in editing.
You are correct that I could have worded the title and the poll better so that they were completely aligned. The fact is that I am interested in the answers to both questions, but decided against making two polls that would have been so similar (most logical attribute/peoples preferences for the attributes used). I am happy that you and others in the discussion thread have explained your views on both aspects (as I did for my opinions in the original post).
I never once claimed your thread was made in bad faith. Right now you are antagonizing me for something I never did to you. I said you poll is flawed because it doesn’t have a selection for me to answer. Technically I’m discovering the entire thread is flawed because I had a post struck for talking about logic in a thread about logic. The biggest flaw with the poll shows itself in this post from this post for Haravikk:
The top three results in the poll right now are Charisma or Intelligence, Intelligence only, and Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma, meaning Intelligence accounts for over 80% of all votes cast so far.
They took the data and combined it to state that 80% of the voters are okay with Int based Warlock. Which is not necessarily true. An unknown portion of those voters might only be okay with Int based warlock under the condition that the other stat(s) they voted for are also fulfilled. I never once stated you intentionally created the poll to be used this way, but you thanked Haravikk for that post.
It isn't because warlocks do not use a spellbook, nor any other mechanism to encode those formulae.
Neither does a Wizard when actually casting their prepared spells; the spellbook is what gives them access to a lot more known spells, but they still memorise the formulae they actually want to then use.
Warlocks are granted power directly from their Patrons to cast spells. We saw in the previous UA that even your pact of the chain and pact of the blade could simply be a cantrip granted by your patron.
An aborted (and highly questionable) mechanical change feels like a poor justification for the idea that Warlocks get all of their power from their patron, especially when the class description repeatedly contradicts that idea. All WotC turning boons into cantrips tells us is that they thought it might be a good way to handle them mechanically, but it really wasn't.
There's certainly some reasonable basis to suggest that patrons can and do make changes to a Warlock in a similar way to physiological changes made to a Sorcerer (e.g- is Devil's Sight something you learn to do, or a change to your actual body? Probably the latter). However the description also clearly mentions being granted knowledge, and the Warlocks using that to gain their powers.
Drawing on the ancient knowledge of beings such as fey nobles, demons, devils, hags, and alien entities of the Far Realm, warlocks piece together arcane secrets to bolster their own power.
"Own power", as in something that they themselves posses, rather than their patron.
A warlock might lead a cult dedicated to a demon prince, an archdevil, or an utterly alien entity—beings not typically served by clerics. More often, though, the arrangement is similar to that between a master and an apprentice. The warlock learns and grows in power, at the cost of occasional services performed on the patron’s behalf.
Strongly suggests the Warlock is learning from their patron in order to do some of the things their patron can do, as an apprentice to a master.
The magic bestowed on a warlock ranges from minor but lasting alterations to the warlock’s being (such as the ability to see in darkness or to read any language) to access to powerful spells.
The word "bestowed" seems like the tricky one for this sentence, but it usually means gifted/given, i.e- while the Warlock is changed by the patron, losing the patron's favour doesn't mean they would change back, or forget what they knew. They now have those things regardless of whether their patron hates them or not, but most Warlocks want to remain on a patron's good side because a) they can gain even more knowledge and b) they already have enough powerful enemies who know everything about them and what they can do.
Once a pact is made, a warlock’s thirst for knowledge and power can’t be slaked with mere study and research. No one makes a pact with such a mighty patron if he or she doesn’t intend to use the power thus gained.
This again is about gaining power, not borrowing it or being a conduit for it.
There's also this snippet in the actual (5e) Pact Magic rule:
Your arcane research and the magic bestowed on you by your patron have given you facility with spells.
This is broadly the same as in Playtest 5:
Delving into eldritch secrets, you have learned how to cast spells.
Both suggesting at least some or all of your spellcasting ability is from "arcane research" or "eldritch secrets".
The problem is none of these really describe how the Warlock is actually casting spells, it just reinforces that whatever it is isn't purely from the patron (beyond the initial giving of knowledge). There's no mention of drawing on a patron's powers, unlike Clerics who are specifically described as being conduits for their deities power.
As I said before, this is also the case for Paladins as it's left very unclear what an oath actually is; I'd still maintain that it's an external entity channeling power as for a Cleric, because Paladins literally have the Channel Divinity feature, plus an oath has clear tenets they must follow suggesting an external entity to oversee that. The Paladin just doesn't need to know who or what is judging them when they swear their oath.
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Also, given that this discussion is mostly fueled by the people who want a change, it’s not exactly a useful sample for drawing conclusions on how many people are content with just being CHA casters as opposed to a change so much as it’s useful for seeing what kind of change the people who already want to get away from CHA want.
Re:Harrikk only two sentences in all of what you posted has any implication that a warlock is learning to use magic and that is a very generic sentence that can be found in a ton of class descriptions - every class learns to use their powers better as that is the basis of the XP leveling up system, "learning to cast spells" is also used in the Bard description, and Bards even go to College to learn to cast spells - so if CHA is right for Bards, why isn't it right for Warlock?. All the rest of the text is the patron giving "bestowing" power unto the warlock and there are many invocations which imply the warlock is physically changed by the patron:
all 3 "Sight" ones,
Aspect of the Moon
Beast Speech
Eyes of the Rune Keeper
Eldritch Mind
Fiendish Vigor
Gift of the Depths
Gift of the Everliving Ones
One with Shadows
(debatably) cloak of flies
(debatably) Tome of Levistus
(debatably) Visions of Distant Realms
Which agrees with my point that warlock spellcasting is much more similar to a Sorcerer than to a Wizard, the difference being a Sorcerer is changed by environmental/genetic exposure, whereas a Warlock is changed by their patron. Thus if CHA is right for sorcerer, CHA is right for warlock.
...People build these threads to have echo chambers.
I never once claimed your thread was made in bad faith. Right now you are antagonizing me for something I never did to you. I said you poll is flawed because it doesn’t have a selection for me to answer. Technically I’m discovering the entire thread is flawed because I had a post struck for talking about logic in a thread about logic.
I am a person and I built one of "these" threads, which you categorize as my wish to have an "echo chamber". How is that not accusing me of acting in bad faith?
Yes, the poll is flawed because I could not anticipate every answer, which is one of the reasons why I put in an "other" response, which could lead to those folks explaining their beliefs and reasoning. A few have used that option because they think Constitution should be the casting stat for a Warlock (I'm sorry, I can't remember if you were one of those). MyDudeicus has also pointed out that the name of the thread and the poll question do not align perfectly either, which is a valid observation.
I had no control over the post that was struck, and am sorry that I probably did not get a chance to read it therefore.
...People build these threads to have echo chambers.
I never once claimed your thread was made in bad faith. Right now you are antagonizing me for something I never did to you. I said you poll is flawed because it doesn’t have a selection for me to answer. Technically I’m discovering the entire thread is flawed because I had a post struck for talking about logic in a thread about logic.
I am a person and I built one of "these" threads, which you categorize as my wish to have an "echo chamber". How is that not accusing me of acting in bad faith?
Yes, the poll is flawed because I could not anticipate every answer, which is one of the reasons why I put in an "other" response, which could lead to those folks explaining their beliefs and reasoning. A few have used that option because they think Constitution should be the casting stat for a Warlock (I'm sorry, I can't remember if you were one of those). MyDudeicus has also pointed out that the name of the thread and the poll question do not align perfectly either, which is a valid observation.
I had no control over the post that was struck, and am sorry that I probably did not get a chance to read it therefore.
Don't worry, you didn't miss much.
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Look at what you've done. You spoiled it. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Go sit and think about your actions.
Don't be mean. Rudeness is a vicious cycle, and it has to stop somewhere. Exceptions for things that are funny. Go to the current Competition of the Finest 'Brews! It's a cool place where cool people make cool things.
How I'm posting based on text formatting: Mod Hat Off - Mod Hat Also Off (I'm not a mod)
Also, given that this discussion is mostly fueled by the people who want a change, it’s not exactly a useful sample for drawing conclusions on how many people are content with just being CHA casters as opposed to a change so much as it’s useful for seeing what kind of change the people who already want to get away from CHA want.
Yes, I made that observation earlier as well, but so long as that is kept in mind, it at least provides some kind of a framework for which direction of change would be most popular, if it were to occur.
Giving the warlock a choice of spellcasting ability doesn’t take anything away from the people who like Charisma for its spellcasting ability, all it does is give options to people who want them to have a different spellcasting ability. What’s the problem with that?
This thread and every discussion like it shows us that one can get real fun and creative to make up any explanation for any caster using any casting stat. Cool beans, but none of that matters to me at all. Warlocks should use INT because there aren't enough INT classes. The others are all fine.
Re:Harrikk only two sentences in all of what you posted has any implication that a warlock is learning to use magic
More than two actually (at least four), and none that say otherwise, so your point is… ?
"learning to cast spells" is also used in the Bard description
As are clear descriptions about how Bards actually then go on to cast those spells; a point that you seem to conveniently keep ignoring.
Because yet again, the issue in question is spellcasting, how they are learned isn't the important part. I've only highlighted how Warlocks learn their spells because it demonstrates that they have gained actual usable knowledge from their patron, rather merely acting as conduits.
All the rest of the text is the patron giving "bestowing" power unto the warlock and there are many invocations which imply the warlock is physically changed by the patron
Which is covered in my post; I even gave the specific quote from the class description that mentions this:
The magic bestowed on a warlock ranges from minor but lasting alterations to the warlock’s being (such as the ability to see in darkness or to read any language) to access to powerful spells.
Spells and alterations are mentioned separately, the alterations are described as minor, and the examples given are specifically invocations. Meanwhile gaining knowledge, arcane secrets etc. is mentioned repeatedly (again, at least four times), but we're never told how Warlocks actually cast magic, only that they can, which has been literally my entire point this entire time.
I'm not pointing out these things with a view to advocating any particular position; I could be wrong (and can't be arsed checking), but I'm pretty sure I haven't even mentioned my preferred option for Warlock's spellcasting ability since the first or second page. I'd also like to reiterate that people asking "why should the Warlock get special treatment" already have their answer, and that answer is "because this thread is for Warlocks' casting ability".
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This thread and every discussion like it shows us that one can get real fun and creative to make up any explanation for any caster using any casting stat. Cool beans, but none of that matters to me at all. Warlocks should use INT because there aren't enough INT classes. The others are all fine.
Assuming congruency of casting stat distribution is a meaningful issue in the first place, sounds more like a reason to make another class rather than shoehorn a class whose basis is bargaining for power into the stat whose casting basis is a thorough understanding of the laws and principles that govern magic without needing someone to continually coach you through them.
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I can see Bard being Int (the whole College thing), but Sorcerer? Nah.
Not really, I've personally DMed or played:
a Gloomstalker Ranger who was an assassin that hated nature instead preferred dark dank city streets.
a Drakewarden Ranger who was an academic obsessed with dragons who again hating roughing it in nature.
a Hunter Ranger who just wanted to kill the most exotic and dangerous creatures they can.
a Beastmaster Ranger who became a ranger because they were accidentally infected with Lycantrope and forced into exile.
Do you guys really have so little imagination that you constrain yourself to the fluff text?
Thank you rum. While I did have some inkling of where the answers might land in this poll, I was actually hoping to get more information so that I could better form my own opinion. As I have stated before and presented reasoning to back my view (in the other, previous thread), I generally find Charisma to be the most logical spellcasting ability score for Warlocks. Had it not been for some strong arguments I have heard for a flexible stat, I might have answered exclusively Charisma for my own vote in the poll. However, through that discussion I obtained a better understanding of why providing flexibility to choose Intelligence in particular is reasonable lore-wise and would probably be beneficial to the game. I was also curious how many people genuinely wanted Intelligence exclusively for the Warlock's casting ability, even though that is certainly not a position I support.
For Ain, going into a discussion assuming that the person that initiated the thread is acting in bad faith (myself in this case) is rather insulting. I would challenge you to find any evidence from my actions on this forum that points to me working solely to advance my own opinions while entirely discounting counter arguments.
You are correct that I could have worded the title and the poll better so that they were completely aligned. The fact is that I am interested in the answers to both questions, but decided against making two polls that would have been so similar (most logical attribute/peoples preferences for the attributes used). I am happy that you and others in the discussion thread have explained your views on both aspects (as I did for my opinions in the original post).
Why not Int for a sorcerer?
A sorcerer that gets their powers from being infected by a Mindflayer tadpole, or coming into contact with Aboleth slime, or from travelling to the Astral Plane or Far Realms could absolutely be uber-nerd academics researching those places / creatures, who then learn to wield their powers through experimentation and research on themselves.
A draconic sorcerer could be a Dr. Jeckel-type character, who was a serious high-Int alchemist who was researching new formulae and tested those formulae on themselves and one of their new creations happens to mutate them into a part-dragon-like creature, they level up by discovering new formulae to increase their transformation, and their sorcery points are alchemical concoctions they have created that enhance their spellcasting.
An abberrant mind sorcerer could be an Intellect Devourer who has taken over a humanoid body and then magically sealed inside so is now trying to learn to live as a humanoid.
A wild magic sorcerer could be a former wizard who was investigating ancient ruins when a strange magical device latched onto them and now causes their magic to go haywire.
A shadow sorcerer could be an city investigator who was clearing out a mad mage's tower when they got sucked through a black mirror into a strange world that was a shadowy reflection of the material plane, luckily they managed to find a way back through the mirror but not alone... since that day they have cast 2 shadows instead of one, and discovered strange magical abilities, they are not obsessed with trying to learn about what happened to them and control their new powers.
Bards could be any casting stat really, they are gathers of lore and knowledge (Int), performers (Cha), and tell legends and myths filled with moral lessons (Wis).
...would be a psion? Or a mindflayer? Or become an NPC? Or have spell-like abilities that are not spellcasting per se, as in BG3?
...would be diseased. Nothing about aboleth slime gives you inherent magic abilities or control over magic.
...would be a wizard. There is nothing "inherent" to the guy who visits a place of study to study and then utilizes the things they have learned.
Sounds like an alchemist artificer to me.
All this is covered by the aberrant mind sorcerer. Hey, what if the concept is a sorcerer that gets magical abilities by being a rogue who is haunted by the spirit of a long dead cleric!?
This is getting truly silly.
At the core of it, the sorcerer's access to magic is innate, and their command over magical abilities is through sheer force of personality. That is their defining trait, always has been.
Warlock, on the other hand, got access to magic through a pact of some sort. No particular ability score is The One That Determines Your Ability To Make And Keep Pacts. Popular culture is *rotten* with characters that have made deals with devils and demons and whatnot, and then either found loopholes, played along, or entered into it with full knowledge of all the facts. Not hard to see how all of these might fit any of the ability scores, because the theme of "arcane power granted by a patrion through a pact" is retained.
Because the spellcasting is still supposed to be innate, i.e- they somehow manipulate the Weave (or gain psionics) as a result of a physiological feature.
If the spellcasting is still innate rather than learned it doesn't matter if you did it on purpose or why; the key part is how the spells are actually cast, rather than how you figured out how to do so. That's why it's a spellcasting ability score. A character can use an intelligent, methodical way to learn what their powers are, or they can just have a go at random and see what works, but they'd both still be casting via the same basic physiological mechanism (parasite, mutation etc.).
Another way of thinking about it is learning to box; you can learn to punch through observation, repetition etc., but ultimately the actual act of doing it is a physical one. It doesn't matter how you learned to do it, because you'll ultimately doing the same basic thing.
Again the formulae (cool idea btw) still feels like a separate aspect; that's a reason to take alchemist's supplies proficiency and maybe some extra points of Intelligence for any rolls the DM asks for using them if they want to make it mechanical. But really that's more just flavouring your levelling up and learning of spells, because the actual spellcasting ability still comes from physiological changes, i.e- it's still innate casting.
An intellect devourer is only very slightly more Intelligent than anything else (12 INT, 11 WIS, 10 CHA), they also don't have any spellcasting of their own, so the spellcasting would still be something innate to the host's body?
This one feels like it very much needs some kind of homebrew as I'm not sure either class is an ideal fit for that; if I were DMing it I'd have the "magical device" be a magic item that basically grants the Wild Magic Surge and Tides of Chaos features on top of Wizard, or maybe a custom sub-class. Switching to Sorcerer would be eliminating any trace you were ever a Wizard, so it'd be an odd fit IMO.
Again cool idea, but very much a physiological change that's granting the actual spellcasting.
To be clear, I'm not saying I fully agree with Charisma being the correct spellcasting ability score for Sorcerers as "physiological" spellcasters; as others have argued Constitution makes more logical sense for that, but clearly Wizards of the Coast don't want to try and balance that, and have settled on Charisma as the "force of will" score, among other things, similar to how it's the saving throw for banishment etc.
These are all side factors rather than the spellcasting itself; nothing prevents a Charismatic Bard from gathering lore and knowledge, you don't need high Wisdom to tell legends with a moral message or live in accordance with that morality. The key factor is the actual act of spellcasting, and how it is done, and the Bard class is very much described as doing so through music and words rather than formulae or channelling.
This is the point that people have been trying to make in this thread; the actual mechanism for how Warlocks cast spells isn't well defined. While they get the knowledge from the pact, how do they then cast the magic? What if the knowledge their patron granted was a bunch of magical formulae?
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It isn't because warlocks do not use a spellbook, nor any other mechanism to encode those formulae. The only part of warlock that even hints that it might be granted as formulae is the pact of the tome and that is specifically only ritual spells & a couple cantrips. So a warlock can use magical formulae granted through their Pact Tome to cast rituals but there is no more reason to believe Pact Magic is via formulae than a bard's songs are formulae - honestly a lot of music has underlying mathematical patterns to it, so it is much more plausible that a Bard simply encodes the same magical formulae the Wizards use into easy-to-remember songs, poems, or mnemonics, than a warlock uses formulae.
Warlocks are granted power directly from their Patrons to cast spells. We saw in the previous UA that even your pact of the chain and pact of the blade could simply be a cantrip granted by your patron. It is more akin to Sorcerer's innate casting than a Wizard, it's just not the warlock's innate magic they are using but their patron's innate magic.
i dunno about 'more' deserving, but it's something i'm coming to expect will be addressed for multiple classes in the 2024 version of whatever next tashas/xanthars we get.
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So, regarding “how do Warlocks cast magic”, let’s break that down a bit by class features and descriptions. We can infer they’re running on some fundamentally different since their spell slots and high level spells operate differently from any other caster. Also, regardless of how people choose to frame the initial setup, at the fundamental level it’s always some other being giving you the power. Most caster classes also indicate that it takes an inborn trait of some kind to be able to use magic, whereas of course one of the classic tropes associated with Warlocks is the idea of a mundane person using a pact to obtain magic in the first place. So, the answer to “how do Warlocks get a handle on magic in the first place” seems to be “someone gives them one”, at least to bridge the gap between the hypothetical “level 0” student of magic and a 1st level PC.
As for how they learn spells, that’s more subject to interpretation. I would argue that the class indicates that their spells are all learned in the same manner as explicitly described for Mystic Arcanum of the patron teaching in some way, whether by face to face, passing along a message in the vein of “do X, Y, and Z to make a Fireball”, or the classic Lovecraftian bit of inspirational dreams. But mechanically it’s the same as all the other spontaneous casters, and doesn’t really tell us anything. And at the moment of casting they just do the same “provide V, S, and M components as needed and expend a spell slot” bit as every other caster, with anything further being between the player and the DM.
Regarding what this all means for the casting stat, I would personally argue that if nothing else the fact that they’re working off an implanted and thus now internalized foundation for their magic makes them like Sorcerers and thus inclined to use the same stat, the people who want INT will of course rebut with the usual “but the description says you learned secrets” argument, so I don’t expect this conclusion to actually take the discussion anywhere new.
I never once claimed your thread was made in bad faith. Right now you are antagonizing me for something I never did to you. I said you poll is flawed because it doesn’t have a selection for me to answer. Technically I’m discovering the entire thread is flawed because I had a post struck for talking about logic in a thread about logic. The biggest flaw with the poll shows itself in this post from this post for Haravikk:
They took the data and combined it to state that 80% of the voters are okay with Int based Warlock. Which is not necessarily true. An unknown portion of those voters might only be okay with Int based warlock under the condition that the other stat(s) they voted for are also fulfilled. I never once stated you intentionally created the poll to be used this way, but you thanked Haravikk for that post.
Neither does a Wizard when actually casting their prepared spells; the spellbook is what gives them access to a lot more known spells, but they still memorise the formulae they actually want to then use.
An aborted (and highly questionable) mechanical change feels like a poor justification for the idea that Warlocks get all of their power from their patron, especially when the class description repeatedly contradicts that idea. All WotC turning boons into cantrips tells us is that they thought it might be a good way to handle them mechanically, but it really wasn't.
There's certainly some reasonable basis to suggest that patrons can and do make changes to a Warlock in a similar way to physiological changes made to a Sorcerer (e.g- is Devil's Sight something you learn to do, or a change to your actual body? Probably the latter). However the description also clearly mentions being granted knowledge, and the Warlocks using that to gain their powers.
These are the quotes that seem most relevant to me (from the 2014 PHB/Basic Rules):
"Own power", as in something that they themselves posses, rather than their patron.
Strongly suggests the Warlock is learning from their patron in order to do some of the things their patron can do, as an apprentice to a master.
The word "bestowed" seems like the tricky one for this sentence, but it usually means gifted/given, i.e- while the Warlock is changed by the patron, losing the patron's favour doesn't mean they would change back, or forget what they knew. They now have those things regardless of whether their patron hates them or not, but most Warlocks want to remain on a patron's good side because a) they can gain even more knowledge and b) they already have enough powerful enemies who know everything about them and what they can do.
This again is about gaining power, not borrowing it or being a conduit for it.
There's also this snippet in the actual (5e) Pact Magic rule:
This is broadly the same as in Playtest 5:
Both suggesting at least some or all of your spellcasting ability is from "arcane research" or "eldritch secrets".
The problem is none of these really describe how the Warlock is actually casting spells, it just reinforces that whatever it is isn't purely from the patron (beyond the initial giving of knowledge). There's no mention of drawing on a patron's powers, unlike Clerics who are specifically described as being conduits for their deities power.
As I said before, this is also the case for Paladins as it's left very unclear what an oath actually is; I'd still maintain that it's an external entity channeling power as for a Cleric, because Paladins literally have the Channel Divinity feature, plus an oath has clear tenets they must follow suggesting an external entity to oversee that. The Paladin just doesn't need to know who or what is judging them when they swear their oath.
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Also, given that this discussion is mostly fueled by the people who want a change, it’s not exactly a useful sample for drawing conclusions on how many people are content with just being CHA casters as opposed to a change so much as it’s useful for seeing what kind of change the people who already want to get away from CHA want.
Re:Harrikk only two sentences in all of what you posted has any implication that a warlock is learning to use magic and that is a very generic sentence that can be found in a ton of class descriptions - every class learns to use their powers better as that is the basis of the XP leveling up system, "learning to cast spells" is also used in the Bard description, and Bards even go to College to learn to cast spells - so if CHA is right for Bards, why isn't it right for Warlock?. All the rest of the text is the patron giving "bestowing" power unto the warlock and there are many invocations which imply the warlock is physically changed by the patron:
Which agrees with my point that warlock spellcasting is much more similar to a Sorcerer than to a Wizard, the difference being a Sorcerer is changed by environmental/genetic exposure, whereas a Warlock is changed by their patron. Thus if CHA is right for sorcerer, CHA is right for warlock.
I am a person and I built one of "these" threads, which you categorize as my wish to have an "echo chamber". How is that not accusing me of acting in bad faith?
Yes, the poll is flawed because I could not anticipate every answer, which is one of the reasons why I put in an "other" response, which could lead to those folks explaining their beliefs and reasoning. A few have used that option because they think Constitution should be the casting stat for a Warlock (I'm sorry, I can't remember if you were one of those). MyDudeicus has also pointed out that the name of the thread and the poll question do not align perfectly either, which is a valid observation.
I had no control over the post that was struck, and am sorry that I probably did not get a chance to read it therefore.
Don't worry, you didn't miss much.
Look at what you've done. You spoiled it. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Go sit and think about your actions.
Don't be mean. Rudeness is a vicious cycle, and it has to stop somewhere. Exceptions for things that are funny.
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Yes, I made that observation earlier as well, but so long as that is kept in mind, it at least provides some kind of a framework for which direction of change would be most popular, if it were to occur.
Giving the warlock a choice of spellcasting ability doesn’t take anything away from the people who like Charisma for its spellcasting ability, all it does is give options to people who want them to have a different spellcasting ability. What’s the problem with that?
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This thread and every discussion like it shows us that one can get real fun and creative to make up any explanation for any caster using any casting stat. Cool beans, but none of that matters to me at all. Warlocks should use INT because there aren't enough INT classes. The others are all fine.
More than two actually (at least four), and none that say otherwise, so your point is… ?
As are clear descriptions about how Bards actually then go on to cast those spells; a point that you seem to conveniently keep ignoring.
Because yet again, the issue in question is spellcasting, how they are learned isn't the important part. I've only highlighted how Warlocks learn their spells because it demonstrates that they have gained actual usable knowledge from their patron, rather merely acting as conduits.
Which is covered in my post; I even gave the specific quote from the class description that mentions this:
Spells and alterations are mentioned separately, the alterations are described as minor, and the examples given are specifically invocations. Meanwhile gaining knowledge, arcane secrets etc. is mentioned repeatedly (again, at least four times), but we're never told how Warlocks actually cast magic, only that they can, which has been literally my entire point this entire time.
I'm not pointing out these things with a view to advocating any particular position; I could be wrong (and can't be arsed checking), but I'm pretty sure I haven't even mentioned my preferred option for Warlock's spellcasting ability since the first or second page. I'd also like to reiterate that people asking "why should the Warlock get special treatment" already have their answer, and that answer is "because this thread is for Warlocks' casting ability".
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Assuming congruency of casting stat distribution is a meaningful issue in the first place, sounds more like a reason to make another class rather than shoehorn a class whose basis is bargaining for power into the stat whose casting basis is a thorough understanding of the laws and principles that govern magic without needing someone to continually coach you through them.