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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mephista" data-source="post: 6538636" data-attributes="member: 6786252">Necrotic damage, curses, deals with fiends, excessive mind control akin to a mind flayer, deception and inflicting madness, calling upon creatures of darkness, draining life energy from slain foes, casting people into hell, summoning undead, inflicting fear and shadows/darkness in general.   Tell me when any of this starts to sound like something that an angel, archon, or Pelor-like sun god would not only endorse, but actually teach.    Thematically, the warlock's spells and abilities definitely tend to the dark side of magic.   Even the sorcerer and wizard have enough spells they can serve as a buffing specialist - the warlock has maybe the Fly spell, some teleports; the warlock is all but purely destructive and debuffing magic.   Gods such as Pelor are tied to the positive energy plane, light, life.   Even when destructive, the magic is almost always radiant damage.    And what of the average citizen?   The ones who don't care about the finer points of academia?  You would be being taught magic directly from a god or his angels.   The mere fact that you have sustained friendly contact with a holy being isn't going to make most people look at you with awe?  "Oh, and last night I spoke with a Solar in my dreams, and he asked us to go help out this village.   We're on a mission from God!"That is vastly different than a devil whispering in your ear, asking you to do this little thing, stop these bandits.   Just think of all the people you'll help by killing those outlaws.  Don't worry about the cultists moving in after.  Oh, and here's a little bit of power to help you in your mission.   Its not so bad, is it?  Saving people, that is?  Its not like you're attacking someone Good, now is it?Or drawing strings of magic out that mind flayer's thoughts that got stuck in your head when they tried to capture you last month.  Its thoughts are rolling around in your head, but you can handle it.   Just pick out what you need, and ignore the parts that tell you its okay to read a person's most private thoughts, that its okay to dominate and mind control others, that calling upon things from outside reality can't possibly hurt. Or serving as Titania's pet warlock.  That's kosher, right?  She's one of the good people?   Just because she's ordered a war on some goodly elves that sided with the Glooming Court on a matter decades ago and wants them all dead doesn't mean anything.   Or opposing human settlement encroachment.   Nothing wrong with playing tricks on them, driving them crazy with dark delusions.   Its all for the Queen, and she's got to be one of the Good Guys.   No, her entire war isn't about vanity.  It just can't be.  Shut your mouth!  I don't care what everyone else in court says!   I'm not a dirty assassin!  ((Remember, the DMG explicitly said that the Summer Court rulers aren't Good, and the entire eternal war with the Glooming Court is over petty insults.  All other fey patrons are definitely dark or evil.))  And what exactly would forbidden lore of Good creatures look like?    Forbidden lore is knowledge that is dangerous, blasphemous, or harmful.  Blasphemous and harmful divine creatures tend to be fallen angels and evil empyreans (and thus qualify for the Fiend pact).   Jack Nicholson in that movie, if you remember, ordered the murder of one of his own men because he had a medical condition, couldn't keep up with the other men, and wanted out before he died.   That's not the actions of a Good man.   Its the actions of a Lawful Evil man drunk on his own self-importance.     And what would a Heretic in D&D be like?   By definition, a heretic is going against the teachings of their god.   Which implies that they're either insane (direct communication with gods kind of clears up the whole issue of what is or isn't the will of the divine), or actually following a different god in secret (at which point, they're not anything of Pelor). I can totally see a warlock that worships Pelor with an erinyes as a patron, where the warlock making the common mistake of confusing the erinyes for an angel.  It does happen.  And the warlock would be a heretic.  But that's still fundamentally a Fiend Pact.</blockquote>

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