D&D 5E (2014) can warlocks be good guys?

[SirAntoine]

I'm playing a 5E warlock in a homebrew campaign right now. In this world, the Witchlords/Elan created or summoned an entire race to be their slaves: the Tainted (rough equivalent of tieflings). My character is a tainted whose parents were freed by their master, so he is technically free. However, other Witchlords don't honor this sort of freedom. My character's main goal in life is to free his people from permanent enslavement.

When offered power to help him in his cause, he jumped at the chance without looking to closely. In short, his pact is with a fiend who is apparently mostly amused by his futile (so far) efforts. But the character is good, and striving for a good cause. Just because he uses tools and powers provided by an evil immortal that doesn't make him evil.

Edit: ENWorld helpfully suggested this thread from 2008: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?228885-How-do-Good-Infernal-Pact-Warlocks-work

If he knows the patron is evil, it makes him evil. It is an evil act just to make that pact.

 

[Riley37]

But I feel as if someone at WotC was actually trying to build up tension in the class by tempting "good" characters to either be evil in some actions, or create characters that don't do evil, but are easily mistaken for it.

Oh, to be sure. If you meet a Drow on the surface, then either you're meeting Drizzt, or you're meeting any other Drow and they're about to poison you and sacrifice you to Lolth, the spider goddess of laughing out loud. You could easily mistake the Drow for evil. Unless you're genre-savvy, and thus you know that PCs are more likely to meet *the world's only non-evil drow* than to meet any other member of the entire species. On the surface, at least; if you meet Drow under the surface, then it's time to ask yourself whether your path to the Underdeep involved castles full of Giants.

If Drizzt joins your party and you enter Seaside Town with him, you can expect the ignorant peasants to form a mob with torches and pitchforks, because they will easily mistake Drizzt for evil.

Some players are happy playing right in the middle of a stereotype: the gruff Dwarvish warrior with a battle-axe, the unathletic, verbose human wizard, the cheerful cunning halfling rogue (with a heart of gold). Others would rather play the opposite: a barbarian elf, a half-orc paladin, the world's tallest gnome, or a Lawful Good warlock.

"Tonight, on Thinly Veiled Allegory Theater, a tiefling named Rocky Jackson joins one of the major Sportsball League teams. Nearly everyone hates and fears him, except for one enlightened, charismatic human coach who takes a chance on him. Rocky persists, turning the other cheek to mistreatment, muttered threats, and unfair rulings, until everyone who loves sportsball sees that he's really just like them at heart. At the end, the only people who still want him out of the League are those who hate tieflings more than they love sportsball."

(For those who don't get the reference: it's a thinly veiled allegory to a bit of USA history and culture, drawing a comparison to people who judge tieflings by their horns and tail, rather than by the content of their character.)

 

[Falling Icicle]

I'd say you have to be evil, beyond any doubt. The class is more evil than the assassin or the necromancer, as written.

I don't see "Alignment: evil only" anywhere in the warlock class description. I don't see it under the assassin or necromancer, either. Just the opposite, in fact. The necromancer's description states that "not all necromancers are evil."

 

[SirAntoine]

I don't see "Alignment: evil only" anywhere in the warlock class description. I don't see it under the assassin or necromancer, either. Just the opposite, in fact. The necromancer's description states that "not all necromancers are evil."

So, you go by the book.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Fantasy and mythology are chock full of characters who aren't evil making deals with devils or other evil beings. Some do it out of desperation, or foolishness, or recklessness, or a mistaken belief they can out-trick the devil, or due to an evil or selfishness they later grow out of, or for the greater good, or against a common foe.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

So, you go by the book.

*ahem*

I'd say you have to be evil, beyond any doubt. The class is more evil than the assassin or the necromancer, as written.

I rest my case.

 

[Charles Wright]

There's absolutely no reason a Warlock has to be evil. Not even all of the possible patrons are evil, FFS.

 

[SirAntoine]

There's absolutely no reason a Warlock has to be evil. Not even all of the possible patrons are evil, FFS.

Which patrons are not evil?

 

[Charles Wright]

If you aren't going to bother to read the patron entries (which I just did to validate my statement), I'm not going to discuss it with you.

 

[SirAntoine]

If you aren't going to bother to read the patron entries (which I just did to validate my statement), I'm not going to discuss it with you.

Does it give their alignments? My PHB just says their names. Most sound pretty bad, and some of the worst of the worst are there. Even under archfey, hags are mentioned, and they are evil.