How do Good Infernal Pact Warlocks work?

[Otterscrubber]

I say house rule the flavor anyway you want and use the mechanics that fit your concept. If you want to say the source of the power is something else, then do it. But if the way it is written fits, do that.

I have a wizard i'm converting over, and the blood mage powers fit well with what I had in mind, but he's not a blood mage. Simply a wizard who draws on his power from within is the story i'm stickin to.

 

[gmredux]

Obviously they're using the 'bad' magic to do good, but how and why would someone do that?

A great book to underscore how someone with 'bad' magic can do good is in the Roger Zelazny book(s) Dilvish the Damned, and The Changing Land.

Dilvish is a general who was imprisoned in hell but fought his way out. Along the way, in the stories, he picks up a number of mighty evil curses of great power (he could level a mountain, but not levitate a coin, for example), plus a demonic horse made of hollow iron named Black.

The horse and his nuke magic were both infernal. But as you see in the book, Dilvish puts them both to good ends.

 

[Scrollreader]

Ever seen ghostrider? There's always the deal with the devil you make for all the best reasons ...

The fiddle of gold, where you trick or win your powers from the devil, without being bound to serve him. Also see many russian and slavic folktales where the devil can be outsmarted.

There's the John Constantine model, where the character could be convinced they're /already/ going to hell, so what's a little more taint on their souls? This can also tie into the first.

And all this assumes that devils are actually /trying/ to offer you the infernal pact in order to get something from you. If you want to use the weaksauce book explanation, that works just as well, I suppose. But it's not really that hard to come up with nifty ideas.

 

[kennew142]

Because they can? Although in the case of Tieflings I'd probably house rule that they don't exactly have an Infernal Pact, but rather get their power from their curse.

That's how it works IMC.

 

[Drakhar]

From a fluff stand point, it seems to be what the designers were going for with Tieflings, however as I don't have my books yet I'm not sure on the fluff for Warlock Pacts.

 

[VannATLC]

The only warlock player I have in my campaign has opted to be an amnsiac, and completely forgotten how/when she made her pact.

I'm gonna go all 'Nameless One' on her.

 

[ryryguy]

Read the fluff for Infernal warlocks. It says that a race of devils created the pacts, but Asmodeus destroyed them and wiped their names from mortal memory. "But you study their perilous secrets anyways."

So really you're just tapping into the deals, the packets of power, that those devils forged long ago.

That works... plus there are many other roleplaying possibilities as others have suggested.

It's worth noting that with the new alignment system, there are no real gameplay consequences to the pact being "infernal". The powers themselves are not Evil. Using them is not an Evil act like casting an Evil spell in 3e.

So if your Good warlock uses an infernal power in a temple of Bahamut, if it's fun you can roleplay it like someone farted in church... but its not like the altar will shatter or the temple paladins have to slay him on the spot.

 

[Old Gumphrey]

you can roleplay it like someone farted in church

This.

 

[SableWyvern]

I planned to go with Malazan-inspired style religious/infernal power sources, and was happy to see that clerics and paladins were already altered to suit that exactly.

People taking power from higher beings, be they clerics, paladins or warlocks, do so mainly because they can. While it's generally easiest to draw on the power of something roughly similar in attitudeto oneself, the fact that some people worship or bind themselves to the sources of their power is almost entirely incidental.

It's only at higher levels that these sources may start to actually notice what specific individuals are doing with their power, since epic characters may actually be using a god or demons own power to work against him, or at the least leave him weakened while he's trying to pursue his own ends. This may require an epic level warlock to occasionally apply the smack-down to a rather enraged demon prince that doesn't like the way his infernal power is being used and abused by some up-start mortal warlock.

 

[Kurotowa]

And all this assumes that devils are actually /trying/ to offer you the infernal pact in order to get something from you.

Indeed. You could turn it around so that people who sell their souls are basically scriptkiddy losers, cultists trying to take a shortcut to their desires. Real Warlocks don't beg or barter. They command. After they best the infernal powers in a contest of will and strength a pact is made on their terms. What power they have is rightfully won and not at the behest of anyone else.