Warlocks are not actually “Full Casters” in the same way and IMO thinking of them as such is a trap. They are so drastically different from the way that Wizards, Clerics, Bards, Druids, and even Sorcerers work in so many ways that they are more like a “Full Caster Equivalent.” They’re just as powerful, but they work in such a dramatically different way on so many fundamental levels that including them in the comparison artificially skews the results, and therefore the conversation. Whenever scientists/mathematicians find data points like that they call them outliers and literally leave them off the charts. It is a legitimate practice considered globally as the scientific standard. To my point, Warlocks have to dedicate their major 3rd level decision (that their players probably made before even picking the background) to get a thing that gives them 3 Cantrips (that they probably won’t use combined half as often as they will most likely use Eldritch Blast) and gain the potential to dedicate one Invocation to so they can improve the first thing enough to give them something WAY safer than a Wizards spell book because if anything ever happens to it they can simply summon up a replacement with all its contents intact. Or they can pick one of two other things that they will also probably not use half as much as Eldritch Blast (unless they go Hexblade when the Blade starts to actually look better and better and then they might move Eldritch Blast to their backup piece. But then their Hex Feature is objectively not as good as the spell so...?) And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, see? The Warlock skews the comparison too much to make the comparison simple, and we have 5 other, more consistent points of data to use so better to just leave that one off the charts entirely when comparing the “Full Casters” directly against each other instead of against everything else as a whole.
I agree with you 100% that the Sorcerer’s theme of intrinsic spellcasting* does thematically preclude any rational explanation for them to have the Ritual Casting Feature. It’s just not a good fit. But does Metamagic really balance that out? Sure, if that was the only thing it had to account for. But the Sorcerer also stands alone with the smallest Hit Die in the game, a much smaller spell list compared to the other Full Casters, and far less utility because once they pick a spell, they’re stuck with it. Granted, the new UA takes some steps to rebalance things a bit by addressing some of these exact issues. Is it enough to keep up with the boosts that everyone else’s characters will be getting too? I guess we’ll find out.
As to your point about simply multiclassing into Wizard for a dip as a simple and narratives solution, I think you have overlooked one major point. The Wizard uses Intelligence as it’s casting stat, the Sorcerer uses Charisma. If they did as you suggest and dip a little into Wiz then not only would they have to keep track of two different spell lists, but they would also have to keep track of different caster levels and Casting Stats because their Wizard’s Spell Book would only be able to hold their Wizard Spells which would only go up to 1st, maybe 2nd level spells, and they couldn’t use their Charisma to cast those spells. If just the take the Feat it eats one ASI instead of 2-3 character levels, they could pick Warlock or Bard for their list instead of Wizard so they could still use their Charisma, and the max Spell Level for their Rituals would scale somewhat with their Sorcerer level. Despite the Feat’s shortcomings it’s still objectively the better option. Or better yet, they could instead dip 3 levels into Warlock, pick Pact of the Tome, boost it with the Ancient Secrets upgrade, and they get to do Sorlock shenanigans and gain themselves Eldritch Blast as a cherry on top that they can also upgrade with their other Eldritch Invocation. IMO, any choice that presents you with one clearly better option is almost as bad as no choice at all. Have you noticed the prevailing trend of Charisma Caster mashups?!? Remember what I said about them skewing the conversation?
*When the Sorcerer Class was first introduced to D&D when WotC published 3.0, they had no Spell Slots, instead they used the point based system now published as optional in the DMG. When I read that back then it struck me how remarkably similar it was to the way the Psionicist was WAY back when TSR was still a major player in the industry. There were major differences, the Sorcerer uses “Magic” to cast “Spells” instead of the Talents and Disciplines that the Psionicist used that were explicitly “NOT Spells” and therefore completely immune to magic. But it got me thinking.
My personal theory is that WotC put out the Sorcerer in the 3.0PHB as a subtle replacement for the Psionicist. They knew they could never ever call them Psionicists or the fanbase would have lost their effing $h!+. They’re not even close to the actual Psionicist, neither mechanically nor flavorwise. I think their hope was that the Spell Point system and the “Inherent Power from Within” vibe would scratch the older players’ nostalgia itch, that newer players would find the already existing Spell system WAAAAYYYY more approachable than the more complicated Talents and Disciplines has been, and that Metamagic Feature and a decent Con Save would have bridged the gap. I think they were hoping that the world would just quietly forget about Psionics entirely, so they would never actually have to deal with attempting the impossible task of trying to balance Psionics against Magic in a way that would both satisfy older players without being too much of a pain in the ass for newer players.
If you’ve heard about the now abandoned Mystic debacle and the supposed replacement that Mearls had been working on a year ago and nobody has heard about since, then you already know their plan didn’t work. The old guard still wanted pseudomedieval psychics. The Spell Point system was still unpopular and generally considered too much bookkeeping by newer players. The simpler Spell mechanic was so appealing to the playerbase that now WotC is afraid to deviate from it as the development of the 5e Artificer has proven. And now their back to square one, only now they need to balance the Sorcerer too.
Hopefully never. All the time and money DDB will put into this would be better spent on other things. WotC will completely alter this article and/or then put what they want into potentia a new SOurce book. After that, they will force DDB to take away what we want to keep but they don't want us to have.
All the time and money waste on UA articles could be going into stuff like combat tracking, dice rolling, maybe, someday a VTT . . .
Nothing we say here will make the faintest impact on what WotC wants except to tease us into buy a new source book and not giving us what we asked for.
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Watch your back, conserve your ammo, and NEVER cut a deal with a dragon!
Hopefully never. All the time and money DDB will put into this would be better spent on other things. WotC will completely alter this article and/or then put what they want into potentia a new SOurce book. After that, they will force DDB to take away what we want to keep but they don't want us to have.
All the time and money waste on UA articles could be going into stuff like combat tracking, dice rolling, maybe, someday a VTT . . .
Nothing we say here will make the faintest impact on what WotC wants except to tease us into buy a new source book and not giving us what we asked for.
There is another thread that basically explains that they are working on adding these options, but it won't be ready for a while, and yes while there are many "permanent" things that we want to see adding a UA this intricate would be an excellent learning resource for the team, the code they use to add these features can help them expand other new options that come in the future. There is a lot of value in adding a UA like this.
Five seconds of basic research would've provided the answer. Same as it would've provided the answer for the seven hundred and thirty-four people who asked the question without bothering to do the five seconds of research before you.
Five seconds of basic research would've provided the answer. Same as it would've provided the answer for the seven hundred and thirty-four people who asked the question without bothering to do the five seconds of research before you.
You have no idea how badly I want to ask this question right now. I won’t, but I really, really want to.
I LOOOOVE everything about this UA when it comes to the Druid enhancements. Most of the spells should have originally been for druids to begin with in my opinion, and i love that druids can use find familiar now, even if its only for a limited time.
This is my first post here! Even though my favorite class is Warlock, I feel that there are some areas left for improvement! <3
First, I have noticed a number of people commenting that the class is too front loaded which leads to some pressure to multi-class after the first couple of levels. I think that this is somewhat answered by Eldritch Invocations. The Warlock class is, “Come for the E.Blast, but stay for the E.Invocations!” Unfortunately, as Eldritch Invocations have been added after the PHB was released there is a growing disparity in the power of these Invocations. For example, there are five separate invocations which allow a Warlock to see better/ differently. Several Invocations use a Warlocks precious few spell slots, or eat into our already overtaxed concentration budget. Outside of the Eldritch Blast cantrip, few Invocations augment our core skills. Our Invocations seem unfocused and uninspiring. There could also be some consolidation done as well- combining some of the redundant Invocations to make them desirable.
I would like to see some Invocations which thematically address our roles in the game— perhaps a clear line of Invocations which synergies together, like the Eldritch Blast Invocations do for blastlocks. Maybe there could be a clear line of Invocations for battlefield control or social manipulation? I know that there are several for bladelocks, but I can’t comment of the efficiency of this since I haven’t played using that style.
Additionally, to balance out the more fun and flavorful Invocations from the more mechanically powerful Invocations, I would implement a point buy system. Powerful Invocations cost 2 points, more character driven Invocations cost 1 point. Let each Warlock gain 1 point for each Warlock level.
Lastly, please consider adding a Hex or Hex-like feature to the class. I would place it at the 5th Warlock class Level to dissuade dippers. While Hex is fun, it is frustrating to manage not only it’s action, movement, concentration, and slot cost.
I really LOVE this class and appreciate what you have done with it! I hope I did not come off too negative in this post! I think the recent UA definitely gave us much more of what we already loved about this class, but did only very little to streamline and improve the core functions. <3
Thank you for reading all that! <3
Megan
EDIT: I also meant to put that it would be nice to get that 3rd spell slot a bit earlier too, but- I think just changing Hex to a feature and editing the Eldritch Invocations might fix the warlock in the mid-tier. <3
Huh, this is pretty interesting. I hadn't thought about it before, but what if there were an invocation with a prerequisite of 19th level that let you cast your 6th-level Mystic Arcanum twice per long rest? And another one with a prerequisite of 20th level that did the same thing for your 7th-level Arcanum? Essentially mimicking when more traditional full casters get their second spell slots of those levels.
Thats a pretty good idea! I definitely agree that the Warlock needs some mechanical benefits in the mid tiers and the later tiers to keep people from multi classing out after level 3/4!
Mechanically powerful Invocations with level requirements are certainly one way to do this. I think the current Invocations throw fun spells and enhancements at the Warlock at later levels but don’t fundamentally improve its core mechanics.
There is an argument to be made that the lackluster Class Capstone doesn’t incentivize sticking with the class either. Perhaps offering the option of picking an additional couple of invocations would be a neat reward.
Additionally, the mid tier suffers a bit. I think that possibly moving that 3rd spell slot to Level 6 is the way to correct for this. Or, maybe an extra invocation at this point?
Every warlock I've ever seen being played has been spell slot starved. I get that they recharge on a short rest, but the prevalence of short rests varies so much between sessions, let alone between campaigns, that I don't think that's good justification for limiting their spell slots to the degree that they do. I think getting that third spell slot at level 6 or so would go a long way to making the class feel more versatile in practice. I think giving them a 1-minute or 10-minute ritual to replenish their spell slots, which can be performed over a short rest or on its own, would also solve some of the issues with games that don't have many short rests. Keeps them from just regaining spell slots in combat, or in a time-sensitive situation, but also helps give them a little more control on whether they can get their spell slots back or not.
I also feel like they've painted themselves into a corner with hex. You've got the spell Hex, and if you go Hexblade you get the Hexblade's Curse. I really think they should have done the same thing they did for rangers with this UA and given Warlocks a class feature that gives them Hex as an always-known spell that they can cast without requiring concentration up to CHA-mod times per long rest. Put it at level 5 to reduce some of the front-loading issues (They need to do something similar for rangers too, 1-level dip for free hunter's mark is a bit much). They should also modify the Hexblade's Curse feature to enhance the class's Hex rather than being a separate thing altogether.
While on the subject of Hexblades, I feel like they need a feature that lets them substitute a melee attack with their pact weapon for each beam of eldritch blast, thereby allowing them to make up to 4 attacks at level 17+ and split them as they see fit between ranged blasts and melee strikes with their pact weapon. As it stands now, once you get three beams there's not a lot of reason to get into melee distance since you can only make two melee attacks. Sure, your pact weapon may have extra bonuses and such your Eldritch blast doesn't benefit from, but your Eldritch Blast has range whereas using the pact weapon puts you more in harm's way.
Lastly, I want a feat that allows you to pick up to 3 Invocations from the Warlock list, following whatever restrictions they have on them (like requiring a specific level, or requiring Eldritch Blast). It would allow Warlocks to get some extra invocations in, and it would allow other characters to get access to some of them as well. I would love to build a fighter with Devil's Sight, or a wizard or sorcerer with Armor of Shadows, or even just a Warlock with extra invocations for some of the more flavorful stuff as opposed to just that which benefits me most mechanically.
if the feat follows the restrictions it means non warlocks can't get any of the level required invocations at all as it has been confirmed the level requirements refer to warlock levels not character levels and honestly allowing warlocks 3 extra invocations that they can use met requirements for seems more than a little unbalanced. probably better if it was limited to the invocations with no requirements. still allows a lot of good stuff but not quite as powerful
if the feat follows the restrictions it means non warlocks can't get any of the level required invocations at all as it has been confirmed the level requirements refer to warlock levels not character levels and honestly allowing warlocks 3 extra invocations that they can use met requirements for seems more than a little unbalanced. probably better if it was limited to the invocations with no requirements. still allows a lot of good stuff but not quite as powerful
I mean, it would take a feat for a Warlock to get 3 more invocations. That's giving up an ASI or another feat, and they'd have to be a Warlock to access the higher-level ones anyway (which encourages not-multiclassing). I could see limiting it to those with no level requirements, but I don't see why you would need to restrict, for example, Agonizing Blast for a non-Warlock who knows Eldritch Blast through some other feature, like the Magic Initiate feat.
if the feat follows the restrictions it means non warlocks can't get any of the level required invocations at all as it has been confirmed the level requirements refer to warlock levels not character levels and honestly allowing warlocks 3 extra invocations that they can use met requirements for seems more than a little unbalanced. probably better if it was limited to the invocations with no requirements. still allows a lot of good stuff but not quite as powerful
I mean, it would take a feat for a Warlock to get 3 more invocations. That's giving up an ASI or another feat, and they'd have to be a Warlock to access the higher-level ones anyway (which encourages not-multiclassing). I could see limiting it to those with no level requirements, but I don't see why you would need to restrict, for example, Agonizing Blast for a non-Warlock who knows Eldritch Blast through some other feature, like the Magic Initiate feat.
I really think that feat would really be abused in game with characters doing exactly that, It would be bad i think
Huh, this is pretty interesting. I hadn't thought about it before, but what if there were an invocation with a prerequisite of 19th level that let you cast your 6th-level Mystic Arcanum twice per long rest? And another one with a prerequisite of 20th level that did the same thing for your 7th-level Arcanum? Essentially mimicking when more traditional full casters get their second spell slots of those levels.
I would prefer a bit more flexibility than just an additional casting but would love invocations that grants an additional 6th/7th level Mystic Arcanum at levels appropriate to a full caster. This was if you want to be the full caster replacement in your party, you can lean more into that role.
Thats a pretty good idea! I definitely agree that the Warlock needs some mechanical benefits in the mid tiers and the later tiers to keep people from multi classing out after level 3/4!
Mechanically powerful Invocations with level requirements are certainly one way to do this. I think the current Invocations throw fun spells and enhancements at the Warlock at later levels but don’t fundamentally improve its core mechanics.
There is an argument to be made that the lackluster Class Capstone doesn’t incentivize sticking with the class either. Perhaps offering the option of picking an additional couple of invocations would be a neat reward.
Additionally, the mid tier suffers a bit. I think that possibly moving that 3rd spell slot to Level 6 is the way to correct for this. Or, maybe an extra invocation at this point?
<3
Lots of agreement with your comment. One way to help the mid-tier a bit is to home-brew that any Invocation that grants a new spell also grants a once a day usage of that spell. This goes a long way toward that mid-tier power gap.
Another bit of homebrew that my DM and I agreed to was the Mike Mearls Spell Level equivalency rule. That is Mike Mearls has ruled, when it comes to homebrew balance, any spell can be considered balanced against the power and usefulness of any other spell of equal level. Which means if you have an invocation that grants at will usage of a spell, you can homebrew at will usage of a different spell of equal level. So for me, my Feylock loves to bounce around so at level 15 she took the invocation "Shroud of Shadow" which grants unlimited Invisibility and we changed it to "Step of the Fey" which grants unlimited Misty Step as they are both level 2 spells. Earlier I took "Minions of Chaos" which grants Conjure Elemental and we changed it to "Wrath of the Feywild" which grants Insect Plague.
And just like that, I have 2 very thematic invocations to complement my whimsical Eladrin Feylock that maintain the same 5e game balance even though they are homebrew.
ALSO- Could not agree with you more on the lackluster warlock capstone. Realistically that should be a level 12-15-ish ability. I would love to see Warlock capstones reminiscent of the Paladin capstones where you become like the living avatar of your patron for a short time and gain a bunch of cool abilities.
if the feat follows the restrictions it means non warlocks can't get any of the level required invocations at all as it has been confirmed the level requirements refer to warlock levels not character levels and honestly allowing warlocks 3 extra invocations that they can use met requirements for seems more than a little unbalanced. probably better if it was limited to the invocations with no requirements. still allows a lot of good stuff but not quite as powerful
I mean, it would take a feat for a Warlock to get 3 more invocations. That's giving up an ASI or another feat, and they'd have to be a Warlock to access the higher-level ones anyway (which encourages not-multiclassing). I could see limiting it to those with no level requirements, but I don't see why you would need to restrict, for example, Agonizing Blast for a non-Warlock who knows Eldritch Blast through some other feature, like the Magic Initiate feat.
I really think that feat would really be abused in game with characters doing exactly that, It would be bad i think
Ok, but how is that example abuse? How is a character taking two whole feats to get Eldritch Blast and add Agonizing Blast to it any more powerful than, say, taking Sentinel and Polearm Master to lock down enemy movement? Or taking Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter to be able to make extra-powerful ranged weapon attacks, even in melee? Keep in mind that Agonizing Blast relies on your Charisma modifier, so unless you're doing this on a high-charisma character that could just as easily multiclass into Warlock to achieve the same results you're not going to get that big of a bonus from it anyway.
I see this invocation as being a way to have a Warlock-lite. We already have Martial Adept giving us Battlemaster-lite and the Ritual Caster feat giving us Wizard-lite. Why would making some of the invocations available to non-locks through a feat break the game balance?
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Noxx,
Warlocks are not actually “Full Casters” in the same way and IMO thinking of them as such is a trap. They are so drastically different from the way that Wizards, Clerics, Bards, Druids, and even Sorcerers work in so many ways that they are more like a “Full Caster Equivalent.” They’re just as powerful, but they work in such a dramatically different way on so many fundamental levels that including them in the comparison artificially skews the results, and therefore the conversation. Whenever scientists/mathematicians find data points like that they call them outliers and literally leave them off the charts. It is a legitimate practice considered globally as the scientific standard. To my point, Warlocks have to dedicate their major 3rd level decision (that their players probably made before even picking the background) to get a thing that gives them 3 Cantrips (that they probably won’t use combined half as often as they will most likely use Eldritch Blast) and gain the potential to dedicate one Invocation to so they can improve the first thing enough to give them something WAY safer than a Wizards spell book because if anything ever happens to it they can simply summon up a replacement with all its contents intact. Or they can pick one of two other things that they will also probably not use half as much as Eldritch Blast (unless they go Hexblade when the Blade starts to actually look better and better and then they might move Eldritch Blast to their backup piece. But then their Hex Feature is objectively not as good as the spell so...?) And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, see? The Warlock skews the comparison too much to make the comparison simple, and we have 5 other, more consistent points of data to use so better to just leave that one off the charts entirely when comparing the “Full Casters” directly against each other instead of against everything else as a whole.
I agree with you 100% that the Sorcerer’s theme of intrinsic spellcasting* does thematically preclude any rational explanation for them to have the Ritual Casting Feature. It’s just not a good fit. But does Metamagic really balance that out? Sure, if that was the only thing it had to account for. But the Sorcerer also stands alone with the smallest Hit Die in the game, a much smaller spell list compared to the other Full Casters, and far less utility because once they pick a spell, they’re stuck with it. Granted, the new UA takes some steps to rebalance things a bit by addressing some of these exact issues. Is it enough to keep up with the boosts that everyone else’s characters will be getting too? I guess we’ll find out.
As to your point about simply multiclassing into Wizard for a dip as a simple and narratives solution, I think you have overlooked one major point. The Wizard uses Intelligence as it’s casting stat, the Sorcerer uses Charisma. If they did as you suggest and dip a little into Wiz then not only would they have to keep track of two different spell lists, but they would also have to keep track of different caster levels and Casting Stats because their Wizard’s Spell Book would only be able to hold their Wizard Spells which would only go up to 1st, maybe 2nd level spells, and they couldn’t use their Charisma to cast those spells. If just the take the Feat it eats one ASI instead of 2-3 character levels, they could pick Warlock or Bard for their list instead of Wizard so they could still use their Charisma, and the max Spell Level for their Rituals would scale somewhat with their Sorcerer level. Despite the Feat’s shortcomings it’s still objectively the better option. Or better yet, they could instead dip 3 levels into Warlock, pick Pact of the Tome, boost it with the Ancient Secrets upgrade, and they get to do Sorlock shenanigans and gain themselves Eldritch Blast as a cherry on top that they can also upgrade with their other Eldritch Invocation. IMO, any choice that presents you with one clearly better option is almost as bad as no choice at all. Have you noticed the prevailing trend of Charisma Caster mashups?!? Remember what I said about them skewing the conversation?
*When the Sorcerer Class was first introduced to D&D when WotC published 3.0, they had no Spell Slots, instead they used the point based system now published as optional in the DMG. When I read that back then it struck me how remarkably similar it was to the way the Psionicist was WAY back when TSR was still a major player in the industry. There were major differences, the Sorcerer uses “Magic” to cast “Spells” instead of the Talents and Disciplines that the Psionicist used that were explicitly “NOT Spells” and therefore completely immune to magic. But it got me thinking.
My personal theory is that WotC put out the Sorcerer in the 3.0PHB as a subtle replacement for the Psionicist. They knew they could never ever call them Psionicists or the fanbase would have lost their effing $h!+. They’re not even close to the actual Psionicist, neither mechanically nor flavorwise. I think their hope was that the Spell Point system and the “Inherent Power from Within” vibe would scratch the older players’ nostalgia itch, that newer players would find the already existing Spell system WAAAAYYYY more approachable than the more complicated Talents and Disciplines has been, and that Metamagic Feature and a decent Con Save would have bridged the gap. I think they were hoping that the world would just quietly forget about Psionics entirely, so they would never actually have to deal with attempting the impossible task of trying to balance Psionics against Magic in a way that would both satisfy older players without being too much of a pain in the ass for newer players.
If you’ve heard about the now abandoned Mystic debacle and the supposed replacement that Mearls had been working on a year ago and nobody has heard about since, then you already know their plan didn’t work. The old guard still wanted pseudomedieval psychics. The Spell Point system was still unpopular and generally considered too much bookkeeping by newer players. The simpler Spell mechanic was so appealing to the playerbase that now WotC is afraid to deviate from it as the development of the 5e Artificer has proven. And now their back to square one, only now they need to balance the Sorcerer too.
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So when will these variants be available on dndbeyond?
Hopefully never. All the time and money DDB will put into this would be better spent on other things. WotC will completely alter this article and/or then put what they want into potentia a new SOurce book. After that, they will force DDB to take away what we want to keep but they don't want us to have.
All the time and money waste on UA articles could be going into stuff like combat tracking, dice rolling, maybe, someday a VTT . . .
Nothing we say here will make the faintest impact on what WotC wants except to tease us into buy a new source book and not giving us what we asked for.
Watch your back, conserve your ammo,
and NEVER cut a deal with a dragon!
There is another thread that basically explains that they are working on adding these options, but it won't be ready for a while, and yes while there are many "permanent" things that we want to see adding a UA this intricate would be an excellent learning resource for the team, the code they use to add these features can help them expand other new options that come in the future. There is a lot of value in adding a UA like this.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/dungeons-dragons-discussion/unearthed-arcana/51023-read-here-before-asking-when-does-the-new-class
Stop. Asking. This. Question. Please.
Five seconds of basic research would've provided the answer. Same as it would've provided the answer for the seven hundred and thirty-four people who asked the question without bothering to do the five seconds of research before you.
Please do not contact or message me.
You have no idea how badly I want to ask this question right now. I won’t, but I really, really want to.
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I know kung fu.
DX
Please do not contact or message me.
😜😂🤣🤪
I know snark fu.
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I LOOOOVE everything about this UA when it comes to the Druid enhancements. Most of the spells should have originally been for druids to begin with in my opinion, and i love that druids can use find familiar now, even if its only for a limited time.
Hi!
This is my first post here!
Even though my favorite class is Warlock, I feel that there are some areas left for improvement! <3
First, I have noticed a number of people commenting that the class is too front loaded which leads to some pressure to multi-class after the first couple of levels. I think that this is somewhat answered by Eldritch Invocations. The Warlock class is, “Come for the E.Blast, but stay for the E.Invocations!” Unfortunately, as Eldritch Invocations have been added after the PHB was released there is a growing disparity in the power of these Invocations. For example, there are five separate invocations which allow a Warlock to see better/ differently. Several Invocations use a Warlocks precious few spell slots, or eat into our already overtaxed concentration budget. Outside of the Eldritch Blast cantrip, few Invocations augment our core skills. Our Invocations seem unfocused and uninspiring. There could also be some consolidation done as well- combining some of the redundant Invocations to make them desirable.
I would like to see some Invocations which thematically address our roles in the game— perhaps a clear line of Invocations which synergies together, like the Eldritch Blast Invocations do for blastlocks. Maybe there could be a clear line of Invocations for battlefield control or social manipulation? I know that there are several for bladelocks, but I can’t comment of the efficiency of this since I haven’t played using that style.
Additionally, to balance out the more fun and flavorful Invocations from the more mechanically powerful Invocations, I would implement a point buy system. Powerful Invocations cost 2 points, more character driven Invocations cost 1 point. Let each Warlock gain 1 point for each Warlock level.
Lastly, please consider adding a Hex or Hex-like feature to the class. I would place it at the 5th Warlock class Level to dissuade dippers. While Hex is fun, it is frustrating to manage not only it’s action, movement, concentration, and slot cost.
I really LOVE this class and appreciate what you have done with it! I hope I did not come off too negative in this post! I think the recent UA definitely gave us much more of what we already loved about this class, but did only very little to streamline and improve the core functions. <3
Thank you for reading all that! <3
Megan
EDIT: I also meant to put that it would be nice to get that 3rd spell slot a bit earlier too, but- I think just changing Hex to a feature and editing the Eldritch Invocations might fix the warlock in the mid-tier. <3
Huh, this is pretty interesting. I hadn't thought about it before, but what if there were an invocation with a prerequisite of 19th level that let you cast your 6th-level Mystic Arcanum twice per long rest? And another one with a prerequisite of 20th level that did the same thing for your 7th-level Arcanum? Essentially mimicking when more traditional full casters get their second spell slots of those levels.
Partway through the quest for absolute truth.
Hi EddyJ!
Thats a pretty good idea! I definitely agree that the Warlock needs some mechanical benefits in the mid tiers and the later tiers to keep people from multi classing out after level 3/4!
Mechanically powerful Invocations with level requirements are certainly one way to do this. I think the current Invocations throw fun spells and enhancements at the Warlock at later levels but don’t fundamentally improve its core mechanics.
There is an argument to be made that the lackluster Class Capstone doesn’t incentivize sticking with the class either. Perhaps offering the option of picking an additional couple of invocations would be a neat reward.
Additionally, the mid tier suffers a bit. I think that possibly moving that 3rd spell slot to Level 6 is the way to correct for this. Or, maybe an extra invocation at this point?
<3
Every warlock I've ever seen being played has been spell slot starved. I get that they recharge on a short rest, but the prevalence of short rests varies so much between sessions, let alone between campaigns, that I don't think that's good justification for limiting their spell slots to the degree that they do. I think getting that third spell slot at level 6 or so would go a long way to making the class feel more versatile in practice. I think giving them a 1-minute or 10-minute ritual to replenish their spell slots, which can be performed over a short rest or on its own, would also solve some of the issues with games that don't have many short rests. Keeps them from just regaining spell slots in combat, or in a time-sensitive situation, but also helps give them a little more control on whether they can get their spell slots back or not.
I also feel like they've painted themselves into a corner with hex. You've got the spell Hex, and if you go Hexblade you get the Hexblade's Curse. I really think they should have done the same thing they did for rangers with this UA and given Warlocks a class feature that gives them Hex as an always-known spell that they can cast without requiring concentration up to CHA-mod times per long rest. Put it at level 5 to reduce some of the front-loading issues (They need to do something similar for rangers too, 1-level dip for free hunter's mark is a bit much). They should also modify the Hexblade's Curse feature to enhance the class's Hex rather than being a separate thing altogether.
While on the subject of Hexblades, I feel like they need a feature that lets them substitute a melee attack with their pact weapon for each beam of eldritch blast, thereby allowing them to make up to 4 attacks at level 17+ and split them as they see fit between ranged blasts and melee strikes with their pact weapon. As it stands now, once you get three beams there's not a lot of reason to get into melee distance since you can only make two melee attacks. Sure, your pact weapon may have extra bonuses and such your Eldritch blast doesn't benefit from, but your Eldritch Blast has range whereas using the pact weapon puts you more in harm's way.
Lastly, I want a feat that allows you to pick up to 3 Invocations from the Warlock list, following whatever restrictions they have on them (like requiring a specific level, or requiring Eldritch Blast). It would allow Warlocks to get some extra invocations in, and it would allow other characters to get access to some of them as well. I would love to build a fighter with Devil's Sight, or a wizard or sorcerer with Armor of Shadows, or even just a Warlock with extra invocations for some of the more flavorful stuff as opposed to just that which benefits me most mechanically.
if the feat follows the restrictions it means non warlocks can't get any of the level required invocations at all as it has been confirmed the level requirements refer to warlock levels not character levels and honestly allowing warlocks 3 extra invocations that they can use met requirements for seems more than a little unbalanced. probably better if it was limited to the invocations with no requirements. still allows a lot of good stuff but not quite as powerful
Oh go on. Ask it!!! :-)
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Don't be Lawful Evil
I mean, it would take a feat for a Warlock to get 3 more invocations. That's giving up an ASI or another feat, and they'd have to be a Warlock to access the higher-level ones anyway (which encourages not-multiclassing). I could see limiting it to those with no level requirements, but I don't see why you would need to restrict, for example, Agonizing Blast for a non-Warlock who knows Eldritch Blast through some other feature, like the Magic Initiate feat.
I really think that feat would really be abused in game with characters doing exactly that, It would be bad i think
I would prefer a bit more flexibility than just an additional casting but would love invocations that grants an additional 6th/7th level Mystic Arcanum at levels appropriate to a full caster. This was if you want to be the full caster replacement in your party, you can lean more into that role.
Lots of agreement with your comment. One way to help the mid-tier a bit is to home-brew that any Invocation that grants a new spell also grants a once a day usage of that spell. This goes a long way toward that mid-tier power gap.
Another bit of homebrew that my DM and I agreed to was the Mike Mearls Spell Level equivalency rule. That is Mike Mearls has ruled, when it comes to homebrew balance, any spell can be considered balanced against the power and usefulness of any other spell of equal level. Which means if you have an invocation that grants at will usage of a spell, you can homebrew at will usage of a different spell of equal level. So for me, my Feylock loves to bounce around so at level 15 she took the invocation "Shroud of Shadow" which grants unlimited Invisibility and we changed it to "Step of the Fey" which grants unlimited Misty Step as they are both level 2 spells. Earlier I took "Minions of Chaos" which grants Conjure Elemental and we changed it to "Wrath of the Feywild" which grants Insect Plague.
And just like that, I have 2 very thematic invocations to complement my whimsical Eladrin Feylock that maintain the same 5e game balance even though they are homebrew.
ALSO- Could not agree with you more on the lackluster warlock capstone. Realistically that should be a level 12-15-ish ability. I would love to see Warlock capstones reminiscent of the Paladin capstones where you become like the living avatar of your patron for a short time and gain a bunch of cool abilities.
Ok, but how is that example abuse? How is a character taking two whole feats to get Eldritch Blast and add Agonizing Blast to it any more powerful than, say, taking Sentinel and Polearm Master to lock down enemy movement? Or taking Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter to be able to make extra-powerful ranged weapon attacks, even in melee? Keep in mind that Agonizing Blast relies on your Charisma modifier, so unless you're doing this on a high-charisma character that could just as easily multiclass into Warlock to achieve the same results you're not going to get that big of a bonus from it anyway.
I see this invocation as being a way to have a Warlock-lite. We already have Martial Adept giving us Battlemaster-lite and the Ritual Caster feat giving us Wizard-lite. Why would making some of the invocations available to non-locks through a feat break the game balance?