D&D 5E Is Warlock broken?

[Caliban]

Can you rest *while concentrating*. THAT IS THE QUESTION.

Yes. Yes you can. Glad thats settled.

 

[Ancalagon]

Yes. Yes you can. Glad thats settled.

I'm tempted to agree with the arguments presented and Mike Mearl's ruling. I was just pointing out that a subsection of the arguments for/against were not properly constructed.

 

[happyhermit]

THAT IS THE QUESTION. That little mental gymnastic in the back of your head "hex hex, hex hex hex, ok now the moon has shifted so in reverse xeh xeh xeh xeh, xeh, xeh, xeh!, oh thank you great Marguflax, hex hex heeeeeex...." (or whatever it is), does that stop you from effectively resting?

It is a bit confusing because there are two things being discussed that relate to each other, I will try it this way;

IF, concentration can be maintained for whatever the duration of the spell, while doing all sorts of strenuous activities and is only lost in very specific circumstances.

THEN, that would lead one to believe it was not more strenuous than the example activities given to "set the bar" for what is permitted during a short rest. Reading or patching wounds would take at least as much mental and/or physical attention. Performing them while attacking for example would be difficult at best while concentration is a given.

AND SO, since there is absolutely no reason whatsoever within the game to indicate that concentration is more strenuous than the example activities provided, there seems to be no RAW or RAI reason to prevent concentration during a short rest.

Now, as "cool" as I think concentration can be flavour-wise for some casters, it was introduced as a balancing mechanic IIRC. If WOTC decided that the game is "better" with it disallowed, that would be fine, but that isn't how it is now.

 

[S'mon]

DMG Page 267. It even states in the 'shorter rest' variant that you should not allow casters to regain anything over 5th level slots when they long rest in that variant because its OP.

DM's Workshop Chapter pg 267 'Adventuring Options' - 'Rest Variants' - discussion of Epic Heroism and Gritty Realism options. Talks about 'spellcasters' recovering long-rest slots faster in the Epic variant (SR 5 mins, LR 1 hr), suggests limiting this. There is NO real discussion of game design short rest vs long rest class balance here, just as there is none anywhere else in any of the books I can find.

Frankly I am flabbergasted, there have been countless hundreds of posts here on ENW concerning 5e game design being based around short vs long rest class balance, but judging by your responses there is zero actual discussion of this in either the PHB or DMG.


BTW re Concentration & Resting - I have house rules that (a) short rest is only 15 minutes (b) Druids come out of Wildshape at the end of a Short Rest and (c) You can only take the benefit of a short rest 3/day. This is working very well but I think allowing Concentration while resting would screw it up, so I'll not allow that. I want Short Rest to be as far as possible a Reset button, like in 4e.

 

[CapnZapp]

...and the rules do state that attacking someone who cannot see the attacker is done with advantage but that one seems too silly to me.

Attacks while unseen (by the target) giving advantage doesn't seem one bit silly to me.

Don't forget attacks while effectively blind give disadvantage.

This is why attacks made in darkness you can't see in ends up with neither advantage nor disadvantage. Advantage from being unseen is cancelled by making attacks without seeing the target (or much of anything).

If your target sees you, you end up with disadvantage.

If you see the target, you end up with advantage.

If you both see each other (two Dwarves brawling in natural darkness, for instance) neither of you gets any 'vantage at all and again, the fight proceeds normally.

Instituting a house rule saying blind fighting defaults to disadvantage rather than "novantage" is fine.

But the rule granting advantage to people that attack you from an unseen position (from hiding, while invisible etc) seems perfectly normal and uncontroversial to me.

 

[Shatners_bassoon]

I've read about half this thread and skipped to here so apologies if the discussion has moved on? Anyway, I'm playing a 13th level half elven fiend pact blade lock (started at 4th). We've been playing razor coast for the best part of a year. The party consists of me, a Druid/barbarian, a vengeance paladin, a bard and an evoker wizard. I've really enjoyed playing this character. He doesn't hit the hardest, hasn't got best ac/hp, doesn't cast the most spells. However, he does hit pretty hard, takes a fair bit of taking down due to temp hp/AoA etc.., has a dangerous ranged attack.
In addition, in the absence of a rogue he can be sneaky when needed and with a good mix of invocations he can do all sorts of other cool stuff - Devils sight, mask of many faces etc.. Oh, and he's a real charmer, smooth talking and persuasive. I've gone down twice in combat - once to a megalodon bite and once to getting cut to ribbons by a marelith.
Also, the DM has had great fun with my patron. My character is besotted with an Erinyes who is an agent of my patron and he'll do ANYTHING for her!
This class doesn't feel broken to me. I think the party impress each other on a regular basis. The only issue that seems to worry our DM is the huge hit point soak of the Druid/Barb but it's not removed any enjoyment?

Hex and concentration. We allow it to roll through short rests. It doesn't seem to 'break' the spell? And I'd say that's how the designers intended it, but I think it should have been a class feature, personally?

My one criticism of the class. As a blade lock, I think thematically with the gift of this awesome weapon you should feel obliged to use it. But it is always not quite as good as EB which is a shame. But I ignore that and always close if I can. Some would consider this sub optimal! Ha ha!

So in answer to the op, yes, choose warlock! It's a (not necessarily eldritch) blast!



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[CapnZapp]

3) I agree that invocations for learning a spell that uses a warlock spell slot and also can only be used once per day seems a bit excessive. It's hard to look at those as priority invocations when the at-will SLA's have some pretty good options. The point of them is to add spells known (even if it's restricted usage) for more of a caster oriented warlock.

Actually, when I think about it, this mechanism (but possibly not the descriptive prose) would serve a Sorcerer well.

Taking some class feature that allows you to cast a spell not on your very short list of spells would be interesting for a Sorcerer, even if it also sucks up one of your spell slot.

Since the Storm Sorcerer taught WotC handing out a full "domain" or mini-list of spells is too powerful (or at least too desirable) perhaps this method would work better; effectively handing out the spells one at a time.

Looking at the number of Invocations known per level (and tweaking a bit for "cleaner" progression) this would effectively grant Sorcerers the following spell additions:

At 2nd level, add two 1st level spells to your list of known spells.
At 5th level, add one spell of 2rd level or less to your list of known spells.
At 7th level, add one spell of 3th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 9th level, add one spell of 4th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 12th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 15th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 18th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
​

Obviously there should be thematic restrictions. Draconics take spells of their element. Wilds take spells with random elements (oh, why, aren't there a couple of "wild" spells in the PHB!) Even if this list was so restrictive it wasn't a selection at all, but a directive "at this level you gain this specific spell" it would still greatly enhance the flavor-building strength of the Sorcerer class!

What Warlocks want, on the other hand, is more slots. I would much rather take an Invocation that granted you a slot, even if a) it was of a relatively low level, and b) it didn't come with any new spells.

Which brings us back to why people select invocations that either boost your existing abilities or grants you "spell-like abilities". The ones extending your spell list but also steals your precious slots are way too expensive.

 

[Shatners_bassoon]

Actually, when I think about it, this mechanism (but possibly not the descriptive prose) would serve a Sorcerer well.

Taking some class feature that allows you to cast a spell not on your very short list of spells would be interesting for a Sorcerer, even if it also sucks up one of your spell slot.

Since the Storm Sorcerer taught WotC handing out a full "domain" or mini-list of spells is too powerful (or at least too desirable) perhaps this method would work better; effectively handing out the spells one at a time.

Looking at the number of Invocations known per level (and tweaking a bit for "cleaner" progression) this would effectively grant Sorcerers the following spell additions:

At 2nd level, add two 1st level spells to your list of known spells.
At 5th level, add one spell of 2rd level or less to your list of known spells.
At 7th level, add one spell of 3th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 9th level, add one spell of 4th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 12th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 15th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
At 18th level, add one spell of 5th level or less to your list of known spells.
​

Obviously there should be thematic restrictions. Draconics take spells of their element. Wilds take spells with random elements (oh, why, aren't there a couple of "wild" spells in the PHB!) Even if this list was so restrictive it wasn't a selection at all, but a directive "at this level you gain this specific spell" it would still greatly enhance the flavor-building strength of the Sorcerer class!

What Warlocks want, on the other hand, is more slots. I would much rather take an Invocation that granted you a slot, even if a) it was of a relatively low level, and b) it didn't come with any new spells.

Which brings us back to why people select invocations that either boost your existing abilities or grants you "spell-like abilities". The ones extending your spell list but also steals your precious slots are way too expensive.

I agree with this. I didn't take any invocations that granted further spell options requiring slots. It's just another spell you don't have the slots to cast?

 

[CapnZapp]

In the building an encounter section (the adventuring day) it expressly states that long rest resources are expected to be stretched out over 6-8 medium-hard encounters, and that a standard adventuring day should feature around 2 short rests.

Read those sections as a whole. Long rest resources are supposed to be stretched over 6-8 medium-hard encounters, while short rest resources are supposed to be rationed over around 2-3.

"are expected"... "are supposed"...

But how? The rules don't actually help you out. Like, at all.

Flamestrike's solution is "unless you're ready to spend hours coming up with story reasons". Why the party can't simply rest whenever they feel like it. If you feel that's good game design, go for it.

I, however, expects a game that makes this expectation to also make it happen.

The default should be that when the Dm (or adventure designer) doesn't do or say anything special, the balance expectation should be fulfilled pretty much automatically.

Then, it should be easy for the DM to say "you can rest here" whenever he or she feels the situation warrants it.

But the facts remains: The game is built around expectations that the completely open and generous rest options actively work against. First the game says "you gain a long rest each night", and then it pretty much says to the DM "if you want to be the ass hat that takes this away from the players, go head, but we won't help you".

Of course, the REAL take away is: the 6-8 encounter 2 short rest expectation is rather unrealistic. At least if you're not content with eight trivial three-round fights any gamer worth her salt finds utterly unchallenging. With the way rests are handed out without any real restrictions (including spells that trivialize any environmental issues), a much more practical balacing point would be perhaps half that.

Make the classes balance around 3-4 encounters of perhaps 5 combat rounds each and one short rest, and suddenly you have a much superior basis for a game almost for free.

Unless you prefer 3.P's game of rocket tag, caster dominance, and the utter immersion destroying 5 minute adventuring day paradigm, in which case fill your boots.

Yeah, keep doing that. Make us DMs feel like , that's the solution. :-/

Any DM that doesn't spend hours rewriting adventures and generally does his outmost to create compelling hooks for why the adventurers should press on when the rules continously lure and seduce you with "just take a small small rest... just say the magic words "we rest" and suddenly everything will feel much better..." is most definitely a lover of rocket tag. And "caster dominance"! And don't forget "hater of cute bunnies"! (That one I added)

And yeah, I absolutely love "immersion destroying" stuff, right? Just pile it on. After all, it's my fault, since the holy designers cannot and must not do anything wrong. Right?

Right?

Utterly patently unfathomably ridiculous. Is what I think of your position.

 

[CapnZapp]

Yes. Yes you can. Glad thats settled.

I remain amazed this can be such a issue.

Rule that in your campaign rests break concentration, fine.
Accept that casters will think twice before taking spells with 1+ hour duration, fine.

No big problem either way. No caster's balance or power has ever relied upon taking the very few long-duration spells in the game.

So why not simply shrug and move on...?