Celestial Pact Warlock--front line duty

People really under value Armor Agathy on a Warlock. This spell cept up should really work wonders. I plan on using it in my melee warlock build.

In my humble opinion with one level of fighter or 2 lvls of Paladin (smite) or 1 lvl dip healer cleric (heavy armor shield and bonus to all healing spells) u will be more than fine.

Going pure warlock should not be cast aside spell progression is huge imo, if doing that pick up the invocation that gives arcane armor at will and spam Armor of Agathy.

Celestial does have a melee combo with Green Flame Blade and Radiant Soul, but it doesn't much benefit from blade pact. Indeed you are better going book pact for Shillelagh.

Armour of Agthys doesn't stack with other sources of temp hp, such as Celestial Resilience, although you can always cast it after they are used up.

Very few classes can really tank in 5e, the real question is, will I be a liability being in melee? Armor of Agathy is great because it gives you more total hp than a fighter, you can recast it if needed and it does damage, in most cases double damage, for example if they don't do 5 damage on the attack at lvl 1 it will do 10 damage, and 20 damage at lvl 3 and 30ish damage at lvl 5. So if they attack you, it does damage if they don't, you have served it purpose. With the bonus action heal, Mage Armor and Armor of Agathy I'm confident that the warlock will be fine in melee. Yes less av, but more total hit points and damage to enemies on attack should make up for this.

Lillika said:

People really under value Armor Agathy on a Warlock. This spell cept up should really work wonders. I plan on using it in my melee warlock build.

In my humble opinion with one level of fighter or 2 lvls of Paladin (smite) or 1 lvl dip healer cleric (heavy armor shield and bonus to all healing spells) u will be more than fine.

Going pure warlock should not be cast aside spell progression is huge imo, if doing that pick up the invocation that gives arcane armor at will and spam Armor of Agathy.

Click to expand...

People don't under value Armor of Agythis. The purpose of that spell is basically the same as helping rebuke. It's not really to,protect you, even though it offers some level of protection with the temps it give, but rather to punish enemies for hitting you. It can be devastating to those enemies that don't hit very hard and have low HP, but against bigger badder creatures it may mitigate damage off of 1 or 2 hits.

neogod22 said:

People don't under value Armor of Agythis. The purpose of that spell is basically the same as helping rebuke. It's not really to,protect you, even though it offers some level of protection with the temps it give, but rather to punish enemies for hitting you. It can be devastating to those enemies that don't hit very hard and have low HP, but against bigger badder creatures it may mitigate damage off of 1 or 2 hits.

Click to expand...

your right I wasn't clear, imo most people under value Armor of Agathys (maybe because they can't spell it). your analysis of it is pretty spot on. The idea is pretty much if you spam it when attacked, then you are doing lots of damage and mitigating a decent amount of damage that the party could be taking. Can it be over powered by many or powerful melee opponents yes of course, but can a fighter take be taken down in melee as well yes. The fact that you can heal yourself is also good since you may be the one needing healing. A good turn when focused on would be recast AoA, and heal yourself back up .

Do many of the abilities lend to a ranged style yes, but they are also great for melee. For example the 60 ft range on heal doesn't hinder you being in melee, in fact it means you don't need to move as much to use it and many times melee characters can't or don't want to move that much. Also the bonus fire damage at lvl 6 can be used quite nicely with Green Flame Blade (might not be a desirable after lvl 6, but debateable). Another thought I haven't ran the numbers but there is a good chance that Green Flame Blade combined with the lvl 6 add Cha damage to fire attacks might come out stronger than a second regular attack and allow you to pick something other than pact of the blade, Pact of the Tome gives you Shillelah meaning you could boost Cha faster at the expense of AC, dex save and init.

some numbers
Green Flame Blade lvl 6 with Shillelagh and boosted Cha lvl 4. 2d8 + 8 damage and 1d8+4 to another close enemy.

Much of what I've states has already been states on this thread (guess it pays to actually read stuff lol)

The celestial pact warlock seems like so much fun btw giving me so many character idea, in many ways its what I had envisioned for the favored soul.

Lillika said:

your right I wasn't clear, imo most people under value Armor of Agathys (maybe because they can't spell it). your analysis of it is pretty spot on. The idea is pretty much if you spam it when attacked, then you are doing lots of damage and mitigating a decent amount of damage that the party could be taking. Can it be over powered by many or powerful melee opponents yes of course, but can a fighter take be taken down in melee as well yes. The fact that you can heal yourself is also good since you may be the one needing healing. A good turn when focused on would be recast AoA, and heal yourself back up .

Do many of the abilities lend to a ranged style yes, but they are also great for melee. For example the 60 ft range on heal doesn't hinder you being in melee, in fact it means you don't need to move as much to use it and many times melee characters can't or don't want to move that much. Also the bonus fire damage at lvl 6 can be used quite nicely with Green Flame Blade (might not be a desirable after lvl 6, but debateable). Another thought I haven't ran the numbers but there is a good chance that Green Flame Blade combined with the lvl 6 add Cha damage to fire attacks might come out stronger than a second regular attack and allow you to pick something other than pact of the blade, Pact of the Tome gives you Shillelah meaning you could boost Cha faster at the expense of AC, dex save and init.

some numbers
Green Flame Blade lvl 6 with Shillelagh and boosted Cha lvl 4. 2d8 + 8 damage and 1d8+4 to another close enemy.

Much of what I've states has already been states on this thread (guess it pays to actually read stuff lol)

The celestial pact warlock seems like so much fun btw giving me so many character idea, in many ways its what I had envisioned for the favored soul.

Click to expand...

So with AoA, vs the fighter is, the fighter has better armor (heavy vs light), more HP, and usually more CON. The healing dice do help in a fight, but 2 things you have to remember, 1. 1d6 per die, no bonuses, so the healing is kind of weak. 2. They recover on a long rest not short. Trying to be a frontliner wi'll probably having you burning through those dice fast. GFB is a good combination, but I play in AL, so that's not an option for my warlock. . But what I use is, firebolt and flaming sphere (pact of the tome). That's a pretty good combo. If you took fighter at 1st lvl and then went with your warlock, you would be better at melee. The heavy armor would help a lot.

Start wild sorcerer 1 for Con saves, and the shield spell. Each time you cast the shield spell, you explode with magic.
(Or Stone sorcerer if you have UA)

Use darkness + devils sight, warcaster, and booming blade. Go 20 Dex, and some Cha. Hit things when they try to run out of the darkness. Eldrich Blast is only for backup.

Later take wild sorcerer 2, and turn your warlock slots into extra level 1 slots for even more shield spells.

Possibly dip for a physical shield.

Hey Warpiglet I read your other thread about Front Line Warlock awhile back and someone mentioned Blade Ward. At first I dismissed this because nooobody likes that spell and generally say that dodge action is better. But just this morning I was thinking of how to abuse Armor of Agathys (even so far as the contemplate 3 lvls of fighter for battle master Parry). But that old thread made me look up what Blade Ward actually does. Blade Ward is a cantrip and uses your action to give yourself resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage till the end of your next turn.

Granted you will not be attacking much with it up, but it could certainly be a good move when needed. Assuming Armor of Agathys is precast (last 1 hr) your opening move would be to walk into the fray and Blade Ward, so what the enemies react, maybe do lots of damage if they decide to attack you. If not you are pretty free to move as you need next turn because Blade Ward last until the end of your next turn, possibly booming blade them then walk away (hope for opp attack). Or just smack them, or Blade Ward again if you feel you will be attacked and have AoA still up.

Its not end all be all but it gives you a decent easy to use combo and some defense. Considering the most dangerous turn for most melee is turn 1 when they decide to move at the enemy and can be surrounded and killed. After turn 1 most enemies have sort of figured out who they are attacking and such, but it will give a lvl of safety in an unsafe world.

Also with AoA, the warlock will have 15 (10 real 5 temp) total HP lvl 1 (assuming 14 con) while a fighter will have 12 or 13 (14 or 16 con), at lvl 5 53 total hit points (38 real 15 temp) while the fighter will have 44 or 49. The idea is that the punishment for attacking you will make up for the ac difference. I think mage armor + dex is probably the way to go, because going str will make you 2 MAD or just have a terribad AC (which might be sorta ok with AoA and Blade Ward actually)

mellored said:

Start wild sorcerer 1 for Con saves, and the shield spell. Each time you cast the shield spell, you explode with magic.
(Or Stone sorcerer if you have UA)

Use darkness + devils sight, warcaster, and booming blade. Go 20 Dex, and some Cha. Hit things when they try to run out of the darkness. Eldrich Blast is only for backup.

Later take wild sorcerer 2, and turn your warlock slots into extra level 1 slots for even more shield spells.

Possibly dip for a physical shield.

Click to expand...

Why would he turn his warlock slots to level 1 slot? Yeah, I wouldn't allow that at my table. Lol

neogod22 said:

Why would he turn his warlock slots to level 1 slot? Yeah, I wouldn't allow that at my table. Lol

Click to expand...

Seems flavorful and imo def not overpowered. All this multiclassing to do cool things is mostly a trap anyways. Most of the time multiclassing doesn't make the character anymore powerful, just able to do a specific thing that people want to do with their character. The widely considered best multiclass pal2/sorc x even has serious issues, if you paly first then you have much slower spell progression, and at any point below lvl 17 you lose spell progression, and imo any good gm with properly spaced encounters will show a smite happy smiter that these spell slot are probably better used to cast actual spells.