Another Big Playtest Post from Michele Carter

[Imp]

The way I see it, if you make a "pact" with a good-aligned power, you'll become either a cleric or a (good-aligned) paladin.

It was my perception that the 3.5e Binder class could be modded, by adding spirits and aspects-of-gods to the vestige list, to unify divine and arcane magic under one banner, for precisely this reason. That's sort of where this discussion about the 4e warlock is going. A class that makes pacts with various supernatural forces can cover a whole entire magic system.

I think this would be awesome, but it's clearly not where 4e is going just yet.

(FWIW I think the idea that good-aligned deities don't/ wouldn't make pacts with their followers is fairly off-base: monasteries? Myths and religious texts have good deities demanding bargains and sacrifices from their followers all the time. This does eventually veer into theological questions, why is there evil in the world when the good god is the most powerful, etc. that are beyond the scope of this board, of course.)

 

[Branduil]

So I guess Paladin's are stealing the Knight's stuff, as well as the Ranger's favored enemy ability.

 

[grimslade]

The paladin denies herself her powers when she falls. The powers of the paladin come from walking the righteous path; a paladin that has strayed from the path realizes her flaw and it unfocuses her power. It may be subconscious but it is there. At least IMC.

Warlocks can make pacts with theoratically anyone. A mercantile god, like Zilchus in Greyhawk, could be considered good but is primarily lawful. The bargain or contract is an object of religious significance to his followers. The pact or covenant is a tool for the righteous to gain power over discord. The quid pro quo comes in the form of order over chaos and the tenor of good reaped from the pact. Zilchus is much pleased. The 'lock gets neat powers.
Looking at it another way, peope of questionable morals may have to be bribed into doing good. The altruistic become clerics and paladins to good gods, the less than corrupt form a pact with an angel on a deadline and become 'locks. The war of G vs. E needs footsoldiers and in a 'points of light' setting the altruistic have their hands full. Warlocks with celesial pacts are mercenaries of the higher path.

 

[FireLance]

I'm not limiting 'good' to be 'altruistic' - D&D is. The only other things it mentions under the definition of good in the PHB are "respect for life, concern for the dignity of sentient beings" and "(making) personal sacrifices to help others."

The first two are pretty irrelevant to any concept of "pacts." That leaves us with "Good implies altruism" and "Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others." The second is pretty much the same as the definition of "altruism" I quoted in my previous post. Moreover, every single "good" alignment has a line about "helping others" or "benevolence" so that seems to be the pretty universally accepted D&D definition of what "good" is.

So if you don't like it, don't take it up with me, take it up with the people who defined "good" in the PHB.

And I have no need to justify my position since it's perfectly in-line with that of the designers and developers at WotC. As far as we know, there's no provision for "good" entities who make pacts with warlocks. If you're still involved, I'd love to hear a philosophical rationale (not a D&D rule, all of which can be interpreted differently) that equates "good behavior" with the "trading of favors."

I realize the flavor could be rewritten as a "boon" the character is born with, but to me the notion of "pacts" is more in-keeping with devils, fey, and other creatures of a questionable (usually selfish or evil) nature.

And I can't say any more on this subject without touching on violating the CoC. Personally, I'm happy with Infernal, Fey and Shadow Warlocks. I don't need shiny ones too.

Well, I for one would like to have shiny warlocks , and I think the key issue here is whether Good entities can only perform Good acts. I don't believe this to be true. If there is nothing inherently Evil about making a pact, i.e. it is a Neutral act, then I don't see why Good entities can't make pacts, too.

EDIT: Between offering pacts to secure the services of (at least) non-evil agents, and leaving shadowy, feral and infernal powers as the only possible "employers" of warlocks, I believe that good powers entering the warlock pact-making market is (ahem ) the lesser evil.

 

[Ahglock]

Completely agree. Come on guys, pretty much everyone agrees that alignment restrictions on core classes was a bad idea. Even the beacon of good paladin is now allowed for different alignment.

The warlock class seems fine to make a pact with a good diety or an evil devil. Yet all we hear about are the infernal pacts and the feral powers. Its a core class, it should be flexible. I'm sure lots of players want to sell their souls to the devil and then play the character whose trying to redeem himself. But there are plenty who just want good powers from a good diety and go kick butt with them!!

No flavor text should be stronger than mechanics. I mean sure it was a bad idea in 3rd edition but that flavor text for the paladin and monk was lame. The warlock flavor text is cool so all the logical arguments that brought a change for paladins in 4e are pointless.

All your reasoning and thinking are pointless you are trying to argue with cool. Light up and join the crowd.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Well, I for one would like to have shiny warlocks , and I think the key issue here is whether Good entities can only perform Good acts. I don't believe this to be true. If there is nothing inherently Evil about making a pact, i.e. it is a Neutral act, then I don't see why Good entities can't make pacts, too.

EDIT: Between offering pacts to secure the services of (at least) non-evil agents, and leaving shadowy, feral and infernal powers as the only possible "employers" of warlocks, I believe that good powers entering the warlock pact-making market is (ahem ) the lesser evil.

Thing is, I don't get the impression that the pacts ARE neutral. How about that ability that rewards you for slaughtering your enemies ("boon of souls," I think)? At the very least, these warlock pacts are heavy stuff, plot-wise.

 

[FireLance]

Thing is, I don't get the impression that the pacts ARE neutral. How about that ability that rewards you for slaughtering your enemies ("boon of souls," I think)? At the very least, these warlock pacts are heavy stuff, plot-wise.

Well, a pact with a Good entity might involve the destruction of creatures that are almost always evil, such as evil undead and evil outsiders immortal humanoids, or redemption rather than slaying (using social combat rules after capturing them in physical combat, perhaps ).

 

[D.Shaffer]

Thing is, I don't get the impression that the pacts ARE neutral. How about that ability that rewards you for slaughtering your enemies ("boon of souls," I think)? At the very least, these warlock pacts are heavy stuff, plot-wise.

We dont have enough information to assume this is a power that all warlocks possess. As is, if you want to make a good talent tree for a Warlock, you just need to switch some modifiers around to suit the alignment. The only problem here is making the fluff text NOT seem like a paladin with a different name.

For example, you could gain "Boon of the Righteous": When you dispatch creatures of pure evil alignment (Devils, Demons, Clerics of evil gods, undead, etc), you heal X hp's where X is equal to your level.

 

[Darrius Adler]

Had a random idea here when reading warlock stuff, since Shadowfell is also the plane of the dead, anyone see the shadow Warlock being sorta like a shaman? Guided by the spirits? Would be a fun way to do a good aligned Warlock.

 

[OakwoodDM]

The problem I see with having Warlocks making pacts with deities is that you're dangerously close to stepping on either the Cleric's or the Paladin's toes (or both).

On top of that, see the number of people complaining that there are three "Elf-ish" races confirmed for the PHB? Don't you think people would kick up a stink if you couldn't (in their eyes) swing a dead cat without hitting someone doing something for a god in the classes section?

I agree, it'd be nice if there were a more clear-cut Good option for warlocks, but it's nice there's a class which gets its power from an external source that isn't a God.