How Involved Should The DM Be As A Warlock's Patron?

As the title says, how involved should I be as the DM portraying a warlock's patron? I have a player starting a Celestial warlock in a new campaign. He is a younger player, with decent role-playing instincts, but none of my players have ever put a lot of thought or effort into a backstory. It's always like pulling teeth...

I have asked him a series of questions, probing for his expectations, and I have a starting point. Now, do I fill in the gaps (e.g. Patron's attitude, special terms of the contract, etc)? Or do I just go hands off? It just seems like a wasted opportunity to ignore. To me, a Patron is much more hands on than an aloof deity of a cleric...

Thoughts?

I leave a lot of this to the player. If I had a reason to want to involve the patron as some kind of NPC in the game (essentially), I'd seek to get on the same page with the player on that score before implementation. That might include talking about what I had in mind and making sure the player didn't feel like he or she had obligations or consequences that players with other characters don't have for no additional upside. Screen time would also be a consideration. If the patron becomes a major part of the campaign for whatever reason, it risks pushing the warlock more into the spotlight than other characters (and players).

As for backstories, I like to keep those down to less than the length of a Tweet - just enough to give everyone an idea of the character concept while leaving plenty up in the air for revealing or developing during play.

My personal opinion is the DM should have the patron be as involved as the player wants them to be, generally.

Some players have a character concept that has the patron being heavily involved with the character (i.e. communicating via dreams and visions, having other warlocks or minions show up to talk to the character or give them missions, etc.). The patron can act as a nemesis to the character or an ally, or the character could see themselves as a loyal servant to the patron.

Other players prefer it to be treated as a one time business transaction and they never interact with the patron again if they can help it. Or the patron is a distant plot device that the character is working against, with an eventual showdown when they are much higher level.

Syntallah said:

As the title says, how involved should I be as the DM portraying a warlock's patron? I have a player starting a Celestial warlock in a new campaign. He is a younger player, with decent role-playing instincts, but none of my players have ever put a lot of thought or effort into a backstory. It's always like pulling teeth...

I have asked him a series of questions, probing for his expectations, and I have a starting point. Now, do I fill in the gaps (e.g. Patron's attitude, special terms of the contract, etc)? Or do I just go hands off? It just seems like a wasted opportunity to ignore. To me, a Patron is much more hands on than an aloof deity of a cleric...

Thoughts?

Click to expand...

I set up specific, individual patrons that are an inherent part of the megadungeon - to the point where each area of the dungeon shares a theme with the patron, and the patron is resident in the area. To the point where, upon first entering the megadungeon, the players see the Fiend on the far side of the hellish cavern that is the introductory area.

I did specify a restriction for the Fiend warlock (don't attack the devil captains) but mostly because I'm intentionally discouraging the pact. The Archfey warlock is tasked to (eventually, no hurry) retrieve a seed from his patron (which is a tree) and plant it in elsewhere, while the Great Old One warlock's pact is with an inscrutable sleeping god it's best he let stay asleep.

And yet after doing this, the patrons in my game are still less hands on than the gods. The gods head up the various guilds in the city above the dungeon.

I'm trying my upmost to let the players control how much they interact with the gods and patrons. So the players initiate nearly all the interactions by actually seeking to contact them, whether through warlock ritual, prayer, or contacting them in person. The interactions I initiate are more like those I've always used with quest givers (the players are requested to visit Thor because he has something delicate he needs taken care of, say)

I really like Web DM's discussion about this and recommend watching/listening to it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-nO8vIJP-E

In my last campaign, a character multi-classed into a warlock. The patron was an arch fey. She expected that certain tasks and quests be completed for her. Often these had little effect on the party. In other instances, they would be the impetus for the parties quest. Most of her interaction with the character were via a Satyr who would relay messages, instructions, and deliver and retrieve items.

One thing that I did, which I thought worked well, as I had her reward the character with a magic artifact (based off of an ENWorld En5ider article on Fey world magic items, whose title is escaping me at the moment). The more powerful effects of this item required accepting a geas from the Arch Fey. The mid-range power required doing something to impress the Fey patron. If you succeed, then she gives you the boon, if not, you might be punished for bothering her with trivial feats not worth her attention much less a boon. That magic item did more to make the patronage feel an important part of the game than the class mechanics did and I think in the future, I would also have the character receive magic items from the patron with similar mechanics.

--

UPDATE:

The article was EN5ider 92 - Armament of the Courts, by Colin McLaughlin. I tweaked the "Horn of Winter" to fit my campaign and the character.

But the mechanics that I like from the items in this article are:

Legendary Deed: basically you offer a tale of your deed to your archfey patron. If accepted, the magic items gain some temporary powers. If not, the character suffers some penalty.
Royal Will: Once every month and a day, during a long rest, you can become receptive to the will of your arch-fey patron and you have a geas placed upon you (automatic failure of any save). Once you complete the objective of the geas, the item receives an especially powerful, but temporary, property or power.

I liked this so much that I would seriously consider making this a homebrew addition to the warlock class. Either an item or powers that can only be unlocked by offering up legendary deeds or taking on compulsory quests.

I tend to keep the patron available in case the real world interferes with my DM prepping. In which case, the patron or (more likely) his/her/its representatives will show up asking the PC (and his/her buddies by extension) for something. Most patrons are evil or weird (or driven in the celestial patron case), so they may feel the urge to "renegotiate" (or push things to see if the warlock will just go with it). I usually work with the notion that if the warlock doesn't want to do what the patron is asking, if the party can thump the representative (for gold and xp), then that is that (until the next time I need a "filler" session).

Now if the warlock's player wants the warlock to interact with the patron, well, no DM worth his/her salt should turn down that opportunity.....

D&D is a role playing game. Characters play a role in a story. Tell a good story. That is where I'd begin.

There are a lot of ways to have an active patron drive a great story, but there are also ways in which the patron might be burdensome and 'unfun' for the players. Read the room and determine what works and what doesn't for your group, as the best approach will differ amongst player groups.

In my campaign it depends on the patron. If your patron is one of the Sidhe (fey powers from Celtic mythology) for example they may be quite directly involved, especially when PCs are higher level. This can be anything up to and including pulling the PC into the FeyWild to have a chat with them. That's not always a good thing or pleasant for the PC. I view these patrons as being more relatable than the gods, but still quite other with motivations and reasoning that may not make sense to the PC. There's normally a logical reason behind their requests that may become obvious later but they don't bother explaining themselves.

I don't know if you've ever read The Dresden Files, but I get some inspiration from that.

On the other hand, if it's a great old one you really don't want them to notice you. Think "if they notice I'm siphoning power from them, it could trigger a minor apocalypse". Think more along the lines of you're getting power from Cthullu.

Obviously the real answer is what makes sense for your world and what you think will be most fun. Don't fall into the trap of trying to force your players to play the way you "think" they should. For some people, background fluff is irrelevant to their enjoyment of the game. So encourage and reward, but don't badger or punish if they aren't playing the "right" way.

Caliban said:

My personal opinion is the DM should have the patron be as involved as the player wants them to be, generally.

Click to expand...

This.

You know what. I think you should be involved as long as it adds value to the story. Actually, that's a powerful tool that can be used in your campaign to help the story along. If the players are taking too long or seem like they are lost, have the patron give the warlock an urgent quest that takes them to where they need to be. Maybe the warlock is pact of the chain, and the familiar has information that can help them on their quest. I think this is a huge resource that many DMs fail to tap.