D&D 5E (2014) Is Warlock broken?

[CapnZapp]

Presumably you don't claim there's an action economy issue comparable to the poor poor beastmaster...

 

[ChrisCarlson]

I just wish some people would bother actually playing certain things before going around making bold assertions as to perceived inadequacies...

 

[Sword of Spirit]

What makes you say that? Are you trying to use the familiar in combat?

How? Both as in "what does it do?" and "how does it survive?"

Our warlock has an Imp that's used to scout ahead, deliver messages and be, well, impish.

As a flying invisible superior darkvision scout it's almost without peer. And oh, it's unkillable too (in that it can be resummoned if it dies)

But in combat it generally is tucked safely inside it's master's vest.

While lots of people expect an animal companion to be present in combat that's not the case for familiars. And thus I don't see a direct comparison between the two as regards action economy - most often when the familiar acts, the master doesn't act, because she's not even there...

I agree that the imp is extremely useful outside of combat, and it doesn't need to be useful inside of combat to be a great class feature.

My criticism is just of the design decision that was made about pets, regardless of how it impacts the play experience of the warlock's familiar in general. I don't think Chainlocks are too weak as a subclass, I just dislike the artificial limitation on a philosophical basis. Thus my claim is that the negative impact (in my opinion) on the subclass derives from a general design decision rather than the class itself. I may have been overstating the issue to say that Chainlocks are broken.

 

[Caliban]

Presumably you don't claim there's an action economy issue comparable to the poor poor beastmaster...

No, I actually like the warlock quite a bit. It has it's foibles, but so do other classes. I haven't played any above lvl 10 so I can't speak to any high level play issues they might have, but I have played a couple of bladelocks and a chainlock into the lvl 8-10 range and enjoyed it. The bladelocks (with a 1 lvl fighter dip) have served as either main tank, melee striker, or a mediocre ranged combatant as needed. A lot of versatility. The chainlock is mainly a ranged striker with eldritch blast, with a secondary role as utility or battlefield control via judicious use of her two spell slots.

I'm currently playing in a party with 3 warlocks, all with different pacts, patrons, and themes. It's been fun.

 

[SailorNash]

I don't think I've ever seen 5e characters retreat for the day unless they were pretty spent with no way of recovering meaningly during a short rest.

Now, if you want to claim that the 6-8 encounters per day takes some work to pull off, you'll find no disagreement.

That's exactly what happens though. The party retreats when their resources are expended. They may have burned through these too quickly, and in theory should be left plinking away with cantrips for the remainder of the day's 6-8 battles. But unless there's a time constraint the majority votes to fall back. If the short-resters were to push them onward knowing they're spent, they'd be risking character death or possibly TPK. There's less punishment for those who overexert themselves, but is risk to go onward when your teammates can't.

Everything else a warlock gains has to take into account how crazy good their at-will (and almost at-will) damage output is compared to every other caster in the game.

But wouldn't that still be broken though? EB is broken by being so obscenely good, that the remaining 17-18 levels (the majority of the class) therefore has to be fairly weak to balance. Overall the Warlock 20 can do reliable damage, but the "fun factor" isn't there because it all comes from one singular ability.

That's what needs to be redesigned - more fun, more options, less constant EB spam and more incentive to go further than three levels.

 

[Degwerks]

I love my level 10 warlock, I seriously can't wait to hit level 11. I play a Tiefling tome pact with a fiend patron. My DM let my Patron teach me Wall of Stone as the only patron option 5th level spell. I'm in a kingdom building style of campaign so that helps a bit outside combat.

I've got a Grimoire that I found that is all mysterious and I know its sentient, but it won't talk to me yet. I know it hungers for worthy souls who have to die by my efforts though. Whenever I kill something that's "worthy" only I can see a incorporeal greenish soul get sucked into my Grimoire. There's more power to be gotten from this book but I am at a loss for now on how to unlock those secrets. It also acts as my Book of Ancient secrets as well.

All in all I love the class but at times I do wish I had more options or WoTC would add in more spells & invocations. I also would have liked to see Hunger of Hadar as a spell that scaled a bit more with my levels. I used that a lot when I first learned it.

Also I used Hex a total of 3 times in those 10 levels. I will get more mileage out of it when I hit level 11 though.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

That's exactly what happens though. The party retreats when their resources are expended. They may have burned through these too quickly, and in theory should be left plinking away with cantrips for the remainder of the day's 6-8 battles. But unless there's a time constraint the majority votes to fall back. If the short-resters were to push them onward knowing they're spent, they'd be risking character death or possibly TPK. There's less punishment for those who overexert themselves, but is risk to go onward when your teammates can't.

This is partly on the DM and partly on the players. If the players are used to just blowing all their resources as soon as they get them, they are going to have that problem. If they attempt to conserve resources they will get a lot further.

On the DMs end, if they are intentionally putting the party up against encounters designed to drain all of their resources, they are teaching their players to blow all their resources in the first couple of fights.

Some people like to play that way, but I'm not one of them.

But wouldn't that still be broken though? EB is broken by being so obscenely good, that the remaining 17-18 levels (the majority of the class) therefore has to be fairly weak to balance. Overall the Warlock 20 can do reliable damage, but the "fun factor" isn't there because it all comes from one singular ability.

That's what needs to be redesigned - more fun, more options, less constant EB spam and more incentive to go further than three levels.

I wouldn't say it's broken. Fighter gets Action Surge at level 2, which remains very powerful and useful for the rest of their career.

Maybe I'm just valuing Invocations higher than others. Let's see what our basic options are for those. (I'm going to ignore Bladelock because I do think it is broken.)

Free spells: 11 Invocations grant the ability to cast a spell (none of which are from the warlock's list) at-will, without using a spell slot. The spells range from 1st to 4th level.
Blast enhancements: 3 Invocations improve eldritch blast
Spell access:
7 Invocations allow you to cast a spell that isn't on the warlock's list 1/day, using a spell slot.
Boon enhancements:
5 Invocations are designed to improve on what you get with your pact boon.
Sense enhancements:
4 Invocations grant you new sensory (or extrasensory) capabilities
Miscellaneous:
1 Invocation grants you two skills, and 1 grants you a limited ability to become invisible

Tomelock and Chainlock both have a good Boon enhancement that they should probably be taking, and they should also be taking Agonizing Blast. So let's assume they take those, which leaves you with 6 discretionary Invocations to select from during your advancement.

The spell access invocations are unappealing, so let's just get that out of the way to start. While I understand why they are designed as they are, it means that you have to really want a particular spell to take one of these. As a player I probably would take one of those, but I'm not going to assume anyone else will for these purposes.

The sense enhancements and miscellaneous invocations give you new, non-combat at will abilities. The kinds of stuff other casters would use spells for. Except you can use yours all day. I'd think most players can find at least one thing they like here, if not more.

The discretionary blast enhancements are purely up to the player. You don't actually need them. But they are pretty cool if you want them. So excellent design here.

Which brings us to my favorite: free spells. You can choose from mage armor, levitate, speak with animals, detect magic, false life (1st level version), alter self, disguise self, silent image, jump, arcane eye, and speak with dead. This right here is my favorite part.

So after taking your boon enhancement and Agonizing Blast, you have 6 Invocation left to spend on free spells, blast enhancement, interesting sensory upgrades, and useful miscellaneous abilities.

That's pretty exciting to me. Would I like to get 12 rather 6? Of course. But the same can be said for any class's abilities.

I think part of the difficulty with "getting" warlock is that its features are spread out into 5 different categories. Eldritch blast, spells, Pact, Boon, and invocations. Most classes have their features spread out into about 2 or 3 categories.

People also see spellcasting and think that should be the basis of their flexibility. But that's not really how warlock is designed. You are splitting your "spellcasting" flexibility between spells and invocations. You can't look at spellcasting in isolation from invocations.

Now, I'm not saying warlock is the best designed class out there. It's its own thing, and it can be unwieldy because of it. But I don't think the class is broken in the sense of being underpowered.

 

[Shatners_bassoon]

I just wish some people would bother actually playing certain things before going around making bold assertions as to perceived inadequacies...

This I couldn't agree with more.

The op was asking for actual experience from those whom had played the warlock class. I've seen several posts over the course of this thread (me included) who are, or have had, a good experience playing their warlocks who are memorable characters without feeling underpowered or disadvantaged. Outnumbered, of course, by white room theorists claiming that it doesn't work or is too contrived.

It just leaves me scratching my head?

 

[Shatners_bassoon]

I love my level 10 warlock, I seriously can't wait to hit level 11. I play a Tiefling tome pact with a fiend patron. My DM let my Patron teach me Wall of Stone as the only patron option 5th level spell. I'm in a kingdom building style of campaign so that helps a bit outside combat.

I've got a Grimoire that I found that is all mysterious and I know its sentient, but it won't talk to me yet. I know it hungers for worthy souls who have to die by my efforts though. Whenever I kill something that's "worthy" only I can see a incorporeal greenish soul get sucked into my Grimoire. There's more power to be gotten from this book but I am at a loss for now on how to unlock those secrets. It also acts as my Book of Ancient secrets as well.

All in all I love the class but at times I do wish I had more options or WoTC would add in more spells & invocations. I also would have liked to see Hunger of Hadar as a spell that scaled a bit more with my levels. I used that a lot when I first learned it.

Also I used Hex a total of 3 times in those 10 levels. I will get more mileage out of it when I hit level 11 though.

Like here, for example. I love my warlock too!!

 

[Eric V]

Playing a warlock now. Love her. She does just fine. 5e means even mid-tier classes do really well.

The only problem is when things that are immune to low-level spells show up. Since the warlock relies on spamming a cantrip, that can be a problem. Helmed Horrors are problems for them too.

Eh, worth it for the flavour.