Recent content by Kurotowa

My experience as a player is somewhere in between. I'll come up with the seed of a character idea and then focus on learning about the parts of the setting that are relevant to the character. Learning about everything is too big for me to keep in my head. But if I want to make, say, an orcish...

Warlocks have a ton of flavor flexibility. You could easily do a GOO Warlock that steals notes from the old Vestige Binders of 3e. Someone who kindles the embers of dead or forgotten gods with small rituals, just enough to spark a few weary thoughts and tease a few magical secrets loose. They're...

My point is that you're positing the uncertainty of Patron is an out-of-game situation. That in-game the Patron is already locked in, but it exists in a state of quantum uncertainty until the player commits to a choice at 3rd level. My counter argument is that the uncertainty can be in-game as...

Warlock levels 1 and 2 are the intern levels. You're starting out, you're learning, you've put out feelers and probably have your sights set on the position you want, but the contracts aren't signed yet. Nothing is final, and maybe circumstances will force you to change plans in an unexpected...

The disconnect happens when either side, player or DM, forgets that a TTRPG is a collaborative endeavor and decides to just do whatever they want without considering the other party.

The problem with Chill Touch it that it's, finally, what it says on the can. A melee spell attack with a range of Touch. And a Warlock being able to survive in melee is a whole can of worms, where a lot of people swear they're too squishy and need something like a Fighter dip for Heavy armor...

EB + AB + Hex is simple, reliable, and a minimal investment in character build resources. It makes an excellent baseline for comparison. It's also dull as dishwater, especially if you enjoy slightly more complex builds or more tactical interactions in combat. It's good that it exists as an...

In Tier 2, if you take just Blade Pact so you can get a good Martial weapon with a large damage die, it's about even. A little behind EB if you use Hex, a little ahead if you're Celestial Pact. Once you hit Tier 3 and EB (or the full Blade Pact chain) gets a third attack, that's just far and...

No. It's the mechanic by which Warlocks get their 6th-9th level spells. Nothing new about it.

Now see, that's one of my pet peeves. People who obviously have an idea for a character independent of D&D and, instead of writing a novel about them, decide to use a new D&D campaign as the medium to play out their story. Regardless of the fact that the character is completely unsuitable for...

Sometimes reddit is useful. Sometimes they downvote anyone who dares question the legitimacy of bizarre weapon juggling routines. You gotta go into it with open eyes and double check everything yourself, if you want to get anything good. But that's the whole Internet, especially these days.

YMMV. Every campaign I've been in has skipped those levels since the early days of 5e. I was agreeing, echoing, and amplifying the sentiment.

At a certain point, we have to accept that this is a story made by humans for humans, and is thus not going to stray too far from a human perspective. It's nice to have a few unusual quirks, but a genuinely inhuman character is both hard to do and gets old real fast. There's a reason that...

Battle Smiths generally don't want to use it past 2rd level. They already get to make weapon attack with their caster stat, and True Strike is worse than making two attacks. The only use case is if you really need to deal Radiant damage. Artillerists though, yeah totally. Grab a ranged weapon...

I can't help but compare Battle Smith to Paladins and Rangers. Same casting progression, same intent to be primarily a martial character, but no Weapon Mastery or Fighting Style. The main advantage of the Battle Smith is that you're making weapon attacks with your caster stat, so your spells are...