D&D (2024) They butchered the warlock in the new packet

[Ashrym]

Some of us understand an apples to oranges comparison when we see it. And others of us understand that precisely this sort of butchery, ripping the casting out of the class and replacing it with generic off-the-shelf half-casting while giving back basically nothing to replace what was already there in the class (an certainly near the magnitude of that which was stripped away) is exactly the sort of thing the people who like the bards being true full casters fear.

And this doesn't prevent it from being a "threw the baby out with the bathwater" situation. It doesn't look random or arbitrary. It looks half-assed and done with the goal of homogenisation and grid-filling. It looks like a design that looks only at those concerns while not having paid any attention to how the warlock fits together mechanically, or to preserving its casting uniqueness or even its identity.

"I sold my soul ... for half-assed half-casting".

And one of the problems with this change is that warlock casting used to complement pact magic well. Invocations handled the low level, baseline, and utility magic with a minimum of fuss and hassle while Pact Magic handled the high level moments of awesome. Half-casting handles low level, baseline and utility magic and does nothing to give you moments of awesome. As I've pointed out repeatedly before level 9 it's almost never worth using a standard action to cast a spell in combat.

So you're handling the low level slots twice in two different ways and never get a time to shine coming from your class mechanics. If this weren't so half-assed there might be an idea there. But it was half-assed enough that they changed the Hex spell in a way that makes some sense with Pact Magic while being a major nerf as a generic half-caster.

Personally I can't help wonder whether they deliberately put out one stunningly badly implemented idea with each of the packets (like cookie cutter druids with no variance in transformation) because they know people are going to rage at something whatever.

This doesn't look like an apples and oranges comparison. It looks like an emotional response full of hyperbole over a change that still works when I try it. The fact that it's not a change with which you agree does not invalidate my experience or opinion.

"Some of us understand an apples to oranges comparison when we see it."

That implies I lack understanding because I do not agree with you. Your experience and opinions are also valid but they are not better than mine and I do not appreciate the implication. No one's experience or opinions are less than yours just because they disagree with you.

The change from pact magic to that spell progression did not break the class. It made it different than it was and it still works. The higher level spells are still in the mystic arcanum invocation instead and that could come a bit earlier. The damage is still there in EB and there's more utility in the spell progression now so using mystic arcanum to add a spell like fireball at the same level as a wizard or sorcerer is still an option.

If you think it's an apples to oranges comparison please explain why. We can discuss that without the micro-aggression.

One side that only has one class catering to it and has just had that class have its guts ripped out - and the other that already had two classes catering to it, has had a third tweaked to cater to it in the playtest, and now has a fourth almost entirely sacrificed upon its altar. So yes there is technically more than one side. But only one of the two sides has 100% of the classes catering to it about to have that capability removed. And one side already has an embarrassment of riches.

But we don't. I'm sorry, this is simply not true. We have full casters that have to play book keeper and juggle low level spell slots.

I wouldn't be quite as against making the warlock into a third full arcane caster as I am against making it a half-caster; I can understand the appeal of sacrificing your soul for full casting. But the simple fact of the matter is that the warlock's casting mechanics are both unique and strongly thematic, in terms of having cheated their way to power and not having the foundations and low level spell slots.

But the warlock doesn't do things significantly differently when you make them a generic, off the peg half-caster. They do do things significantly differently when they have their own casting mechanics. There quite simply isn't a big difference between Eldritch Blast + Hex and Archery + Hunter's Mark. They just have different spell lists

And I think that the misrepresentations of what the issues are is hurting the conversation.

Congratulations. You've just put your finger on what another problem with this half-assed half-caster is. It just now has a bunch of full caster spells cast through half-casting and has even less integration between the two than there was before (because the New Hex works with Pact Magic but not the new casting).

The warlock, meanwhile, had a number of synergies. Notably:

• Top level spells are meant to be showstoppers in their own right and thus don't need subtle synergies. Because those were the spells warlocks cast the relative lack of synergy didn't matter. The design was structurally sound
• Invocations are normally low level spells you can cast a lot of. This synergises well with the warlock chassis which has no low level spell slots. Meanwhile (and this is part of why I call this implementation half-assed) the warlock has a lot of low level slots, meaning those plus Invocations are gilding the lilly while it lacks the top level stuff
• Hex (and Armour of Agathys) used to scale with spell slot. This worked with warlocks. But with the breaking of pact magic these synergies have gone

This doesn't mean there are no synergies; for example shield is always good (but not as good as e.g. on an Armourer). The warlock now is actively less self-synergetic than the artificer. This isn't "retuning" it needs but an entire rewrite because the heart of the way those synergies worked has been torn out. (Parts do need retuning; neither defensive invocation for the warlock works as Mage Armour is pretty pointless and False Life doesn't scale and this has always been the case).

Like I said this implementation is half-assed. And it would take as much work to put in the needed synergies as it would to put them into the warlock.

I don't agree with the implementation being half-assed. I do prefer pact magic and plan on putting that in my feedback. It didn't make the class unplayable or radically nerfed, however.

@Neonchameleon I'm impressed you still have the energy to keep debating this with people.

Who are "these people"? That's placing anyone who doesn't agree with you into a category of a lesser person. Your opinions do not invalidate anyone else. That's the type of toxic attitude we don't need on this site.

Go hydrated. Eat a Snickers. Relax. And then post why you prefer your opinion instead of expressing that type of aggression. It's okay.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Who are "these people"? That's placing anyone who doesn't agree with you into a category of a lesser person. Your opinions do not invalidate anyone else. That's the type of toxic attitude we don't need on this site.

The quote says 'people', not 'these people'.

 

[Neonchameleon]

This doesn't look like an apples and oranges comparison. It looks like an emotional response full of hyperbole over a change that still works when I try it. The fact that it's not a change with which you agree does not invalidate my experience or opinion.

Everyone has an opinion and everyone has experience, and everyone can assert whatever they like including about both.

"Some of us understand an apples to oranges comparison when we see it."

That implies I lack understanding because I do not agree with you.

No. It outright says you are making an apples to oranges comparison when you bring up the bard because guess what? You are bringing up an apples to oranges comparison. A key difference between the bard threads and this is that this contains specific proposals and they are both bad and half-assed. And they are very clearly half-assed or this playtest packet would not come with the changes to Hex that only make sense under the pact magic paradigm but constitute a significant and pointless nerf under the new one. And when something put up for playtesting doesn't work because of another change put up for playtesting it's clear that whoever made those changes either wasn't communicating or didn't think things through.

It is also an apples to oranges comparison because if the bard were to change there would still be two other arcane and two other non-arcane full casters in the game. Changes to the bard are about changing one class to better reflect the archetype. Meanwhile ripping Pact Magic out of the game tears out an entire approach to magic, and forces all casters to approach magic with the book keeping of low level spells and a dozen or more spell slots. It meaningfully makes the game smaller and more homogenous in ways changing the bard while keeping the mechanics on other classes would not.

The change from pact magic to that spell progression did not break the class. It made it different than it was and it still works.

It did however break the synergies within the class. It also broke the balancing of the class. The current class has the level of balancing done for the Artificer, in which the class is made up of a set of cool abilities which add up to ... a pile of cool abilities. The whole is no more than the sum of the parts.

The higher level spells are still in the mystic arcanum invocation instead and that could come a bit earlier. The damage is still there in EB and there's more utility in the spell progression now so using mystic arcanum to add a spell like fireball at the same level as a wizard or sorcerer is still an option.

But the damage literally isn't there unless you take some hyper-specific options.

Eldritch Blast only looks good in terms of damage (before level 17) because people compare it to cantrips. When compared to baseline weapon attacks it comes out looking not so hot; the Ranger gets an accuracy buff and things like Sharpshooter (and Hunter's Mark is IME far more usable than Hex both pre and post changes) and magic weapons are easier to get than Pact Rods, plus there's no Pact Rod equivalent to the Bracers of Archery while a standard +X bow doesn't require attunement. Eldritch Blast does sub-ranger damage and is better compared to a bow wielding Artificer - except that they get to make their own magic items.

In addition to this the Ranger actually has magic that stacks damage with archery in the form of "smite spells" such as Ensnaring Smite and Hail of Thorns that lets you go above the effects of simple arrows plus Hunter's Mark. (Of course most of these don't actually work that well in the 2014 rules thanks to Concentration and Hunter's Mark just being better; one of the things that is a genuine improvement in the One D&D rules). And rangers get damage buffs from their subclasses. And more.

And the damage from baseline casting isn't there either. A single beam Eldritch Blast plus Hex does d10 + Stat Modifier + d6 damage - which is an approximate match for most PHB first level single target spells on the Arcane list like Chromatic Orb (Dissonant Whispers and Guiding Bolt oddly enough lead the pack). With the exception of Hellish Rebuke (and you're incredibly squishy - and False Life doesn't scale) the only times you might want to cast first level damage spells are if you get a good AoE for Arms of Hadar/Burning Hands/Thunderwave. At fifth level you get second level spells, the damage benchmark for which is Scorching Ray. And this is barely worth casting against a baseline two beam Eldritch Blast; 6d6 fire is technically higher than 2d10 + 2*stat (when your stat probably went to 18 at level 4) force - 21 vs 19 damage. But it sure isn't worth a second level spell slot.

In the classic Warlock it didn't matter your baseline damage lagged below the Ranger. Twice per short rest you got to throw a bigger spell than you could with Eldritch Blast thanks to Pact Magic. Your damage baseline was decent and then spiked higher other than at level 2. Meanwhile this version of the warlock needs to give up entire class features to take hyper-specific options (a once per day slot that can only be used for fireball for example) to be able to do better than Eldritch Blast before level 9. And if you need to take a hyper-specific action to make something work then it's bad design.

So no they don't have the damage. Eldritch Blast gives you a lower damage version of the archery ranger rather than a low damage with more spike damage rival. And they now don't have higher level slots unless they burn their invocations.

And this is another problem - half-caster with ranged attacks and extra class based utility brings the warlock very close to being an arcane mirror of a ranger. If that's what you want just reskin. The warlock used to be its own thing, not a knock-off of an existing class.

 

[HammerMan]

I will say the new warlock is playable but not as fun as the pact magic version.

 

[codo]

I will say the new warlock is playable but not as fun as the pact magic version.

I'm curious how many short rests per long rest your parties typically get? That really seams like the dividing line if people liked the old 5e warlock or not.

I really want to like the pact magic version. When 5e first came out, I loved the idea of having different classes having different recharge rates on their abilities. I like that sort of asymmetrical design. However, when I started DMing, I found that maintaining the balance between the two difficult sometimes for groups with different playstyles.

For one group I DMed, it worked great. They were a bunch of kids from work that were interested in d&d, so I DMed for them. (I say kids but they were late teens/early twenties, and they are all married with families and kids of their own they are introducing to D&D. 5e has been out for a long time, and I am getting old.) They liked combat and dungeons and liked tons of fights a day. It worked great for them.

My other group liked more roleplaying and tended to have fewer combats. If you only have 1 big fight a day, the warlocks really could get the short end of the stick and could really feel not fun to play. It can suck to feel like you are constantly begging the rest of the party to stop and rest.

At the end of the day, I just don't think that using short rests to recover a classes primary abilities works for enough playstyles to be worth it. I wonder if letting a short rest pact magic warlock recover their spells once per day by focusing or meditating for 5 minutes would work?

On the other hand, I really do like getting low level spells to use for fun utility spells. When I played a 5e warlock I always ended up multiclassing into a caster just to get low level spell slots. They are just so much fun. Burning a 1st level slot to casually cast an unseen servant spell to carry something because you don't want to get you hands dirty just make you feel like a spell caster.

As I have had some time to playtest the warlock a bit, I think I am coming around to the Idea of keeping warlock half casters but giving them 1 spell slot at full caster progression that recovers on a short rest. So one, third level spell slot at warlock level 5. Maybe even just let them get their bonus pact spells 2 levels sooner and recover on a short rest. I think I like the idea of having the utility spells and 1 big nuke spell per short rest.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I'm curious how many short rests per long rest your parties typically get? That really seams like the dividing line if people liked the old 5e warlock or not.

I'd say the sweet spot is 1-2. More than 2 and they are utterly broken. Fewer than 1 and pointless.

At the end of the day, I just don't think that using short rests to recover a classes primary abilities works for enough playstyles to be worth it. I wonder if letting a short rest pact magic warlock recover their spells once per day by focusing or meditating for 5 minutes would work?
...
As I have had some time to playtest the warlock a bit, I think I am coming around to the Idea of keeping warlock half casters but giving them 1 spell slot at full caster progression that recovers on a short rest. So one, third level spell slot at warlock level 5. Maybe even just let them get their bonus pact spells 2 levels sooner and recover on a short rest. I think I like the idea of having the utility spells and 1 big nuke spell per short rest.

I'm now confused. I agree that splitting short rests out is a good thing - so why add them back?

On the other hand, I really do like getting low level spells to use for fun utility spells. When I played a 5e warlock I always ended up multiclassing into a caster just to get low level spell slots. They are just so much fun. Burning a 1st level slot to casually cast an unseen servant spell to carry something because you don't want to get you hands dirty just make you feel like a spell caster.

The thing here is that warlocks get their magical utility differently from other casters. The ability to cast Disguise Self as an at will spell is, for example, qualitatively different to the ability to cast it only a tiny handful of times at a resource cost. You can play some utter shenanigans or farces if you can change your apparent shape every time you step out of sight. Or just play for comedy in a way that only a level 6+ wizard with the illusionist subclass can come close to. And there are plenty of other spells that by becoming at will or permanent are changed this way, with theSilent Image, Beast Speech (Disney Princess time?), and (oddly enough) Detect Magic being obvious standouts for your second level invocations. (For anyone wondering about Detect Magic as it's a ritual, the Warlock can have it always up and passively ready, while the wizard needs to either burn slots and guess or stop for ten minutes before searching for ten minutes).

Combining the Pact Boon (access to all rituals you find can be powerful, as can a tiny flying invisible intelligent scout which inherently speaks multiple languages) I'd say I miss warlock low level utility more when playing a wizard than vise-versa. But they are different and getting both in the new warlock feels like gilding the lilly while taking away the ability to keep up in combat.

 

[codo]

I'm now confused. I agree that splitting short rests out is a good thing - so why add them back?

I am not against the idea of short rests. I just don't think a class should get back their major abilities only on a short rest. It is just to difficult to balance for different playstyles. I like having every class recovering some abilities and healing. I like warlocks having a big nuke they can drop occasionally. I am just spitballing some ways to do that without only relying only on 1 hour short rests. 1 free short rests gives them a minimum of 4 top level spells a day, 6 with a short rest. That feels a lot better than 2.

The thing here is that warlocks get their magical utility differently from other casters. The ability to cast Disguise Self as an at will spell is, for example, qualitatively different to the ability to cast it only a tiny handful of times at a resource cost. You can play some utter shenanigans or farces if you can change your apparent shape every time you step out of sight.

Believe me you don't need to tell me about mask of many faces shenanigans. That is the primary reason I play warlocks. I like the basic package of the 5e warlock: At-will eldritch blast, the occasional high level spell, and an at will "Trick". Disguise Person, beast speech, Magic Darkvison, etc. It works(if you get enough short rests per day or only have 1 fight a day), but it can feel like a 1 trick pony. You are really good at what do, but I would like a bit more variety in my utility. Like I said, I always multiclassed for low level slots.

Maybe I am being a bit greedy, I do kind of want everything, but I am just wish listing here.

 

[Pauln6]

I am not against the idea of short rests. I just don't think a class should get back their major abilities only on a short rest. It is just to difficult to balance for different playstyles. I like having every class recovering some abilities and healing. I like warlocks having a big nuke they can drop occasionally. I am just spitballing some ways to do that without only relying only on 1 hour short rests. 1 free short rests gives them a minimum of 4 top level spells a day, 6 with a short rest. That feels a lot better than 2.


Believe me you don't need to tell me about mask of many faces shenanigans. That is the primary reason I play warlocks. I like the basic package of the 5e warlock: At-will eldritch blast, the occasional high level spell, and an at will "Trick". Disguise Person, beast speech, Magic Darkvison, etc. It works(if you get enough short rests per day or only have 1 fight a day), but it can feel like a 1 trick pony. You are really good at what do, but I would like a bit more variety in my utility. Like I said, I always multiclassed for low level slots.

Maybe I am being a bit greedy, I do kind of want everything, but I am just wish listing here.

I half agree, in that it's not just the inability to take short rests as and when you run out of slots, it's also the fear of that inability which might lead you to hoard your slots.

I started off building more casting into my PC by picking Tome Pact, feats, a magical wand, and invocations (levitate, devil sight, mage armour, silent image) with utility but I still wanted a bit more spell casting power so I multi-classed into shadow sorcerer.

I found that accessing silent image with a first level spell, I was using it about as often as I did before, freeing up an invocation. The point is that the class is really flexible to dial magic up or down. I think that FORCING increased magic onto the class might actually harm it's popularity.

Looking at the playtest versions the good points for me are:

• Thematic known spells known/prepared automatically plus one free daily casting.
• Pacts have classic (almost always taken) invocations baked into them, freeing up potential utility
• Tome gets two first level spells.
• Mystic Arcana can be taken at lower levels across a broad selection of spells with one free daily casting.

Things I don't like:

• Half caster spell progression
• Unified spell lists
• Long rest recovery mechanic

How balanced the other changes would be if they aren't tied to being half casters, I couldn't say, but switching from 1 hour short rest recovery to a 10 minute ritual class feature usable 2/per long rest and themed spell lists being automatically known are the only changes I would say the class definitely needs as it stands, although the enhancement of the pacts look really welcome. Some feel it should be a 1 minute ritual but my view is that it takes a bit of time to petition a patron for more power and I don't see why the existing ritual casting rules should not be applied as they are. 10 minutes vs 1 hour is still a big improvement.

So you would end up with a warlock who would have 4 daily high level spell slots, one daily themed slot, more possible daily slots from invocations, more possible daily slots from feats, and possible At-will invocations.

 

[HammerMan]

I'm curious how many short rests per long rest your parties typically get?

It depends day by day. But I would have to think real hard to find a game I played or ran where the number was 0 more then once or twice. I would say we average 2. We got in the play test night both times long and 2 short (but only 1 on each of the days) and we ended about to travel for days.

.IAt the end of the day, I just don't think that using short rests to recover a classes primary abilities works for enough playstyles to be worth it. I wonder if letting a short rest pact magic warlock recover their spells once per day by focusing or meditating for 5 minutes would work?

I don’t understand people who don’t get any short rests. I have seen days with 0 short rests with only 1 encounter but again rare in our group (normally travel or us jumping someone) but I have seen plenty where 0 of the encounters used combat and the warlock always seems to have every option a rouge fighter barbarian or monk has play at least once 1 or 2 more.

On the other hand, I really do like getting low level spells to use for fun utility spells. When I played a 5e warlock I always ended up multiclassing into a caster just to get low level spell slots.

Before this playtest I only did that once. But I’m not sure warlock is even the way I would classify That character he was a bard warlock paliden rouge.

 

[codo]

I don’t understand people who don’t get any short rests.

I am not sure why it is so difficult to understand. Some of the games I play in and DM, tend to be fairly Cinematic and story focused. We spend a lot more time roleplaying then we do in combat.

I would say the most common number of combats per day for those groups is 1. It's not like we don't enjoy combat. The fights we have tend to be tough, almost always a CR of Deadly or Harder. They also tend to really dynamic with lots of different terrain and objects to interact with as well as different waves of enemies or a change to the battlefield part way through. We all enjoy the fights but we also enjoy exploring the world, solving mysteries, and roleplaying our characters just as much.

Truthfully, we only have so much time available to play, and there are other games that can scratch that tactical wargaming itch, that aren't as big a time commitment as D&D is, We would rather spend our limited table time focusing more on the roleplaying and social group nature of D&D, over the combat.

We also like to have cinematic, action movie like style and pacing. There is lots of melodrama, heroic actions, a quick fast moving pace with lots of last second escapes and dastardly plots that we just manage to foil at the last second. Lots of time the story pacing just doesn't allow for us to stop for an hour.