D&D 5E can warlocks be good guys?

I've been wondering that if a warlock has made a pact with a patron, be it a demon, devil, old one or a fey, can he be a good guy? I mean you sold your soul just for power, doesnt that inhibit good alignment?

What do you guys think?

Ever hear of a superhero named Ghost Rider? Maybe John Constantine rings a bell? There's a tradition of using malevolent power against its creator/owner, although that route is certainly dangerous.

Sure, either with the John Constantine route, or reskin as celestial or ancestral

Well, there is such a thing as an anti-hero, but beyond that you can play out the internal conflict they face too. It makes for an interesting time when you role-play.

Oh, and then there is the Fey Patron which is more chaotic than evil in effect.

Alignment debates always sadly end up going sideways down crazy paths, but sure I can see someone being Good by D&D's definition of good, and making a deal with a powerful outsider as long as they thought it served the Greater Good.

Let some oil company help pay your way through law school, with the caveat that you intern there during the summer and start as a paralegal for X amount of time. You do this knowing you want to become an environmental lawyer and fight against them one day but you need the money and want the insider knowledge to help you.

I see a background in D&D as something like; Daniel was not the smartest, strongest, or bravest kid in his village and when the Gnoll horde and packs of ghoul scavengers that followed destroyed the only life and loved ones he knew, he hid and cried for what seemed like days in the darkness until a ghoul burst into the small alcove he had hidden in. Time seemed to freeze, as Daniel called out for help, a voice answered and told him the power to fight back against this creature was his for the small price of his soul that Daniel would have the tools to destroy all the gnolls that killed his family if he just said "Yes.". Time came rushing back as a whimpered yes escaped his lips. Daniel let loose his first eldritch blast into the ghoul that crawled toward him.

Daniel made a deal with a demon lord who opposed Yeenoghu "Demon Prince of Gnolls", the pact has been struck and power given with his patron thinking Daniel will focus his new found power down a dark and self destructive path of vengeance and hatred directed at worshipers of his patrons enemy.

But Daniel has a choice now, he could tap into this power and use it as his patron expects or he could find forgiveness and use his powers to make life better for everyone and if some evil gnolls get in his way that's karma.

I guess I am saying it's not who gives you the gun and the training to use it, it is what you do with it that makes you a good person or not.

Of course they can. And where does it say that you've sold your soul? I remember a comic where a powerful witch had made a deal for beauty and the demon botched the contract giving her a bunch of magical powers. What if your pact was a small trade and there was a mistake in your favor? Your whole back story could be the patron trying to get out of the contract. Or perhaps they're constantly trying to mess with you because they goofed up. Perhaps (mostly applicable for fey, but could work for others) your patrons rival messed with things in order to give you more than you were supposed to get. Maybe the deal was made with an underling and it goofed up and is constantly trying to get you to agree to a new deal to save it's hide.

Even if you made an iron clad deal with the foulest demon nothing about it says that you have to be evil. The demon could revel in the fact that no matter what Mr. Goodytwoshoes does, it get's his soul in the end. And the purer the soul the more valuable it is. Demons could be sponsoring heroes as an investment.

You can be a good guy. But it's important that these types of characters don't have it too easy. Power is seductive, and there is always a price to be paid.

I'm not saying make it overly difficult for them, but these characters can't really be "unthinkingly" good.

They can be any alignment you want.

A good warlock would be cool, but don't forget that just because you're good doesn't mean you wear a sign above your head stating it. People may treat you like a monster even though you are good.

Sure. Especially since you included Great Old One and Fey in there.

Eldritch beings might be like the Fade spirits in Dragon Age: simply alien, coming from a world where nothing is permanent, where thought and memory are solid and flesh is the immaterial thing. For them, "selling your soul" could be totally the wrong perspective on it. They just want to see what the world is like. You could think of it like a polydimensional "anthropologist," wanting a peek into a reality that is as alien to it as its reality would be to us! Alternatively, you could riff on an idea that struck me some time back, that the only reason we think of "eldritch" beings as "abominations" is because the only ones who voluntarily restrict their awareness (and powers) to such a "narrow" space as our reality are insane, twisted, or both. Some are bad, and all are mad, who trample in the ring. But there are a few "positive"-minded eldritch beings, the equivalent of "hippies" or "conservationists," who lend power not because they want anything in particular, but to help counteract the negative effects of the "crazy ones."

And then Fey...well, the fey may be capricious, but they also run a spectrum from the rosy-cheeked fairy godmother to the dark unseelie who plot doom and gloom. You could quite easily have a fey patron who wants to see beauty created in the world; less a matter of "selling your soul" and more a matter of "take this power and make the world a cooler, more magical place to be."

In fact, I kinda think your "sell your soul" thing is precisely the problem. It's a pact, sure, but that doesn't mean necessarily turning over your immortal soul to a malicious entity. There are all sorts of ways these kinds of pacts could be made, all sorts of "services rendered."

Then there's characters like Ammon Jerro from Neverwinter Nights II. Guy's a warlock, a very powerful one, almost certainly going to get himself dragged into a hellish abyss--but deep down, underneath the "whatever it takes" attitude, he has some fairly "good" leanings (despite his official alignment being Neutral Evil, he considers it a terrible crime to have slain his only living relative, even when her actions directly harmed his source of power.) With just some slight shifting of his priorities and actions, he could be plausibly called a "good" (albeit ruthless) person.

There's a Celestial Warlock patron right here.