Starting a new campaign and need help deciding on the best option for a free level 1 feat.
I've gone with a Tabaxi Genie Warlock (Dao). Total desert theme. Grey sphinx cat. Obsessed with shinies. Greedy amd sleepy. Ability scores are standard array or point buy... so point buy. Dumping STR and INT. Want least a 14 in DEX for AC. Both CON and CHA will atleast be 16, possibly 18 considering feat choice.
My top options are:
A. Moderately Armored to increase AC.
B. Resilient CON for better health and CON saves.
C. Crusher to take advantage of the Genie's Wrath additional bludgeoning damage for forced movement.
Can your level 1 feat be a standard ASI, or are you constrained against it like with Tasha's Custom Lineage? I'll assume the latter. That means your stats should be 16/16/16 + a full feat or 17/16/15 + a half feat and planning to take a second half feat at level 4. That makes your choices much simpler: Is there a pair of half-feats you definitely like, or not?
Moderately Armored is a special case, because then you want to be base 17/16/13/12 Cha/Con/Dex/Wis. How badly do you want Wis 12? This choice absolutely skyrockets your AC, as you will be AC 19 at pretty much all times.
Resilient Con or its cousin, War Caster, depend partially on your spell loadout in utility. Can't speak to that without knowing how hard you want to lean into concentration spells and how exposed to danger you routinely expect to be.
Crusher and Telekinetic are poor choices. If you want a half-feat for Charisma, Fey Touched is the bee's knees, and in general, Skill Expert is a stellar feat you can judge all other feats by. Crusher and Telekinetic both fail to measure up.
I’m playing a Efreeti Genie Pact Warlock right now and as soon as you hit 6th level you’ll gain the ability to fly in most combats making your AC irrelevant…..except when your DM uses flying opponents against you! I’d save that feat for something else unless you get into melee a lot.
Thank you for the inputs! Just a reminder though, this is a free feat so no feat is a bad feat. Even weapon master or athlete would have some sort of additional benefit to a character at no cost or risk.
To answer your questions quindraco, as a warlock I am absolutely going to lean into concentration spells.
Also, I just need to say that you should try to be more open to the niche capabilities of crusher and telekinetic. They are far from bad in a good player's hand. For instance, as a warlock we get plenty of nasty AOE spells and using forced movement to keep enemies in these spells is clutch. Telekinetic gives you a bonus action, cost free, every turn to try and do so whereas if you hit at least once on a turn you can further hinder an enemy with crusher. Dao gives you bludgeoning damage so it applies once per turn.
Fey Touched is great, but you have to make a far stretching story reason as to why a level 1 genie warlock has it. There's nothing more frustrating to me than when a choice is made that is for optimization reasons over story reasons. Nothing against the suggestion or the quality of the feat mind you! It's appreciated, and I wasn't clear with everything concerning this character either.
I think I'd go with Telekinetic for 18 CHA right off the bat. That's going to be a killer edge at tier 1, putting you well over the curve. There's also the whole synergy to consider with spike growth early on. Repelling blast+agonizing blast invocations, combined with telekinetic... that's a good deal of forced movement there. Plus, you get utility with more cantrips. As a warlock, you're fairly limited with access to cantrips. Mage hand is already a fantastic cantrip with loads of utility. Of course you want mage hand. Telekinetic gives it to you, and a WAY stronger version at that. Now you can have another cantrip. Whatever you decide, at least you now have more wiggle room and/or utility.
However, if you don't want to go over the curve and play at a strength that's more in line with what the game expects, that's a very valid choice. In that case, I'd start with a 15 in CON, 17 CHA, go with Crusher at lvl 1, and increase CON to get it to 16 starting. That way, I could also probably start with a 16 in DEX using point buy. With repelling blast, you're shooting things away for 15 ft. With that kind of forced movement, you'll really be encouraging melee attackers to use their action to dash. That's action economy in your favor. With Spiked Growth, that's 6d4 of damage a turn.
Then at lvl 4, I'd take whatever you didn't at lvl 1. Now you're talking potentially 8d4 of spiked growth damage per turn. 20 damage on average, discounting the damage from your eldritch blast which could be even stronger with agonizing blast and genie's wrath. Golly, all that damage at tier 1. All that battle field control. And it just gets even better once you hit tier 2 and shoot TWO beams.
Resilient CON is an alright choice, but as Tim pointed out, you're going to be a tough target to reach. So, I'd lean into the spike growth/battlefield control aspects.
I played a DAO with Telekinetic, and it was very useful. At low levels I used it along with repelling blast and spike growth to give enemies a lot of trouble. Upon getting my lvl4 spell slot, I swapped spike growth for Sickening Radiance for a similar tactic. And telekinetic is always useful to help your teammates too (removing them from melee combat, getting them out of places they don't want to be, etc.) It is a feat to which I gave a lot of use.
Thank you for the varied and wise advice! I've taken all of this into consideration during character creation and completed/survived my first session with it! Here's the breakdown below:
Name: Toe-Beans
Race: Tabaxi (small) (+2 CHA, +1 CON)
Background: Custom (Smuggler)
Class: Warlock
Subclass: The Genie (Dao)
Free Feat: Telekinetic (CHA)
Ability Scores: STR 8, DEX 14, CON 15, INT 8, WIS 12, CHA 18
HP: 20 (10 base plus an 8 on my second level roll)
Cantrips: Eldritch Blast, Minor Illusion, Mage Hand (Telekinetic)
Spells: Hex, Armor of Agathys
We are playing Curse of Strahd so we are in the Death House right now (No spoilers, it's my first time!). The twist to our campaign is that the DM has a randomizer for places and NPCs, so for instance Strahd has been randomized as Cecil from Final Fantasy 4 and Barovia has been randomized as Moe's Tavern (how that will take form, only the Divine know!)
Thus far...
Telekinetic has come into play in both the exploration and combat pillars of play! Opening doors safely with an invisible mage hand, picking up dangerous looking objects, pushing glasses off tables because cat stuff, positioning enemies into melee range of the heavies in the party or out of the squishies melee range for safety.
Spells have yet to be used as it was a 2 hour session with large amounts of role play, introduction, and general first session speed bumps.
Highlight for me was when I crit on an enemy that appeared out of nowhere after forcing it out of my melee range with Telekinetic, dealing 17 force damage and 2 magical bludgeoning damage in one hit!
At the end of the first session we leveled up. So more Warlock choices are to be made! With a party consisting of Shaggy Rogers (Monk), Rick (Artificer), Morty (Barbarian), and Nora (Cleric), I foresee this warlock needing to bring the pain as well as battlefield control. As a warlock, we get 2 invocations, another pact slot, and another spell known.
For invocations, I'm going to bump my damage with Agonizing Blast. An extra 4 damage is too juicy to pass up. The second choice has me torn. I'll most likely switch to Repelling Blast no matter what to cheese the Spike Growth damage at the next level up.
For spells, I'm going with one on The Genie spell list, Sanctuary. It's a safe fail safe spell cast as a bonus action.
So my question for any who wish to weigh in, what invocation sticks out to you? Detect Magic at will seems nifty, saving the spell slots or 10 minute ritual casting time for the other casters. False Life is practical, but my level up HP roll was at a max, so this isn't 100% necessary. Mage Amror would give a a +2 to AC... fingers crossed, but I haven't been targeted yet and don't plan on it with smart positioning and strategy. Or, I could just take Repelling Blast and maximize my push, pull bullying capabilities.
Starting a new campaign and need help deciding on the best option for a free level 1 feat.
I've gone with a Tabaxi Genie Warlock (Dao). Total desert theme. Grey sphinx cat. Obsessed with shinies. Greedy amd sleepy. Ability scores are standard array or point buy... so point buy. Dumping STR and INT. Want least a 14 in DEX for AC. Both CON and CHA will atleast be 16, possibly 18 considering feat choice.
My top options are:
A. Moderately Armored to increase AC.
B. Resilient CON for better health and CON saves.
C. Crusher to take advantage of the Genie's Wrath additional bludgeoning damage for forced movement.
D. Telekinetic CHA for more forced movement.
Thank you!
Can your level 1 feat be a standard ASI, or are you constrained against it like with Tasha's Custom Lineage? I'll assume the latter. That means your stats should be 16/16/16 + a full feat or 17/16/15 + a half feat and planning to take a second half feat at level 4. That makes your choices much simpler: Is there a pair of half-feats you definitely like, or not?
Moderately Armored is a special case, because then you want to be base 17/16/13/12 Cha/Con/Dex/Wis. How badly do you want Wis 12? This choice absolutely skyrockets your AC, as you will be AC 19 at pretty much all times.
Resilient Con or its cousin, War Caster, depend partially on your spell loadout in utility. Can't speak to that without knowing how hard you want to lean into concentration spells and how exposed to danger you routinely expect to be.
Crusher and Telekinetic are poor choices. If you want a half-feat for Charisma, Fey Touched is the bee's knees, and in general, Skill Expert is a stellar feat you can judge all other feats by. Crusher and Telekinetic both fail to measure up.
I’m playing a Efreeti Genie Pact Warlock right now and as soon as you hit 6th level you’ll gain the ability to fly in most combats making your AC irrelevant…..except when your DM uses flying opponents against you! I’d save that feat for something else unless you get into melee a lot.
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Thank you for the inputs! Just a reminder though, this is a free feat so no feat is a bad feat. Even weapon master or athlete would have some sort of additional benefit to a character at no cost or risk.
To answer your questions quindraco, as a warlock I am absolutely going to lean into concentration spells.
Also, I just need to say that you should try to be more open to the niche capabilities of crusher and telekinetic. They are far from bad in a good player's hand. For instance, as a warlock we get plenty of nasty AOE spells and using forced movement to keep enemies in these spells is clutch. Telekinetic gives you a bonus action, cost free, every turn to try and do so whereas if you hit at least once on a turn you can further hinder an enemy with crusher. Dao gives you bludgeoning damage so it applies once per turn.
Fey Touched is great, but you have to make a far stretching story reason as to why a level 1 genie warlock has it. There's nothing more frustrating to me than when a choice is made that is for optimization reasons over story reasons. Nothing against the suggestion or the quality of the feat mind you! It's appreciated, and I wasn't clear with everything concerning this character either.
I think I'd go with Telekinetic for 18 CHA right off the bat. That's going to be a killer edge at tier 1, putting you well over the curve. There's also the whole synergy to consider with spike growth early on. Repelling blast+agonizing blast invocations, combined with telekinetic... that's a good deal of forced movement there. Plus, you get utility with more cantrips. As a warlock, you're fairly limited with access to cantrips. Mage hand is already a fantastic cantrip with loads of utility. Of course you want mage hand. Telekinetic gives it to you, and a WAY stronger version at that. Now you can have another cantrip. Whatever you decide, at least you now have more wiggle room and/or utility.
However, if you don't want to go over the curve and play at a strength that's more in line with what the game expects, that's a very valid choice. In that case, I'd start with a 15 in CON, 17 CHA, go with Crusher at lvl 1, and increase CON to get it to 16 starting. That way, I could also probably start with a 16 in DEX using point buy. With repelling blast, you're shooting things away for 15 ft. With that kind of forced movement, you'll really be encouraging melee attackers to use their action to dash. That's action economy in your favor. With Spiked Growth, that's 6d4 of damage a turn.
Then at lvl 4, I'd take whatever you didn't at lvl 1. Now you're talking potentially 8d4 of spiked growth damage per turn. 20 damage on average, discounting the damage from your eldritch blast which could be even stronger with agonizing blast and genie's wrath. Golly, all that damage at tier 1. All that battle field control. And it just gets even better once you hit tier 2 and shoot TWO beams.
Resilient CON is an alright choice, but as Tim pointed out, you're going to be a tough target to reach. So, I'd lean into the spike growth/battlefield control aspects.
I played a DAO with Telekinetic, and it was very useful. At low levels I used it along with repelling blast and spike growth to give enemies a lot of trouble. Upon getting my lvl4 spell slot, I swapped spike growth for Sickening Radiance for a similar tactic.
And telekinetic is always useful to help your teammates too (removing them from melee combat, getting them out of places they don't want to be, etc.)
It is a feat to which I gave a lot of use.
Thank you for the varied and wise advice! I've taken all of this into consideration during character creation and completed/survived my first session with it! Here's the breakdown below:
Name: Toe-Beans
Race: Tabaxi (small) (+2 CHA, +1 CON)
Background: Custom (Smuggler)
Class: Warlock
Subclass: The Genie (Dao)
Free Feat: Telekinetic (CHA)
Ability Scores: STR 8, DEX 14, CON 15, INT 8, WIS 12, CHA 18
HP: 20 (10 base plus an 8 on my second level roll)
Cantrips: Eldritch Blast, Minor Illusion, Mage Hand (Telekinetic)
Spells: Hex, Armor of Agathys
We are playing Curse of Strahd so we are in the Death House right now (No spoilers, it's my first time!). The twist to our campaign is that the DM has a randomizer for places and NPCs, so for instance Strahd has been randomized as Cecil from Final Fantasy 4 and Barovia has been randomized as Moe's Tavern (how that will take form, only the Divine know!)
Thus far...
Telekinetic has come into play in both the exploration and combat pillars of play! Opening doors safely with an invisible mage hand, picking up dangerous looking objects, pushing glasses off tables because cat stuff, positioning enemies into melee range of the heavies in the party or out of the squishies melee range for safety.
Spells have yet to be used as it was a 2 hour session with large amounts of role play, introduction, and general first session speed bumps.
Highlight for me was when I crit on an enemy that appeared out of nowhere after forcing it out of my melee range with Telekinetic, dealing 17 force damage and 2 magical bludgeoning damage in one hit!
At the end of the first session we leveled up. So more Warlock choices are to be made! With a party consisting of Shaggy Rogers (Monk), Rick (Artificer), Morty (Barbarian), and Nora (Cleric), I foresee this warlock needing to bring the pain as well as battlefield control. As a warlock, we get 2 invocations, another pact slot, and another spell known.
For invocations, I'm going to bump my damage with Agonizing Blast. An extra 4 damage is too juicy to pass up. The second choice has me torn. I'll most likely switch to Repelling Blast no matter what to cheese the Spike Growth damage at the next level up.
For spells, I'm going with one on The Genie spell list, Sanctuary. It's a safe fail safe spell cast as a bonus action.
So my question for any who wish to weigh in, what invocation sticks out to you? Detect Magic at will seems nifty, saving the spell slots or 10 minute ritual casting time for the other casters. False Life is practical, but my level up HP roll was at a max, so this isn't 100% necessary. Mage Amror would give a a +2 to AC... fingers crossed, but I haven't been targeted yet and don't plan on it with smart positioning and strategy. Or, I could just take Repelling Blast and maximize my push, pull bullying capabilities.
Keep agonizing blast no matter what. Repelling blast is what I'd recommend taking as well for the other invocation.