Starlock: AC too low to be playable?

[Black Knight Irios]

Any suggestions involving the warlock's use of weapons isn't cool, because the most interesting things going for warlocks are the tactical combinations opened by double rods.

I was partial to using a Rod of Reaving as my implement with a +1 Rod of Corruption in my off-hand; the Rod of Corruption's effects don't scale with enhancement, so there's no need to replace it, and between the two you can wipe out pretty much all the minions in an encounter as a free action. (Curse one, it takes damage equal to enhancement bonus from the Rod of Reaving, it dies, you sacrifice the pact boon to instead curse everybody within 5 squares... and they all immediately take damage equal to your Rod of Reaving's enhancement bonus...)

You know it is nice to mention this but you have to consider the following: You can't have everything with every build!

Sometimes you have to sacifice options for a higher success in surviving encounters.

Decide what you want but don't blame the game that you have to make choices that are meaningful.

 

[Caliban]

Any suggestions involving the warlock's use of weapons isn't cool, because the most interesting things going for warlocks are the tactical combinations opened by double rods.

I was partial to using a Rod of Reaving as my implement with a +1 Rod of Corruption in my off-hand; the Rod of Corruption's effects don't scale with enhancement, so there's no need to replace it, and between the two you can wipe out pretty much all the minions in an encounter as a free action. (Curse one, it takes damage equal to enhancement bonus from the Rod of Reaving, it dies, you sacrifice the pact boon to instead curse everybody within 5 squares... and they all immediately take damage equal to your Rod of Reaving's enhancement bonus...)

A) placing a curse is a minor action, not a free action.

B) Some DM's (such as myself) rule that "transferring" the curse using the Rod of Reaving does not count as "placing" the curse for the purposes of the Rod of Corruption, so you don't get a "chain reaction curse", just the single "curse explosion" when you pop the first minion and curse everything in 5 squares. Still effective, but not overpowered.

 

[yesnomu]

I think it's a fair houserule to simply change all Star powers to being Con-based. There are already two totally Cha-based pacts, and this gives Con-based warlocks more options and prevents them from being MAD.

 

[Akaiku]

Unfortunately this is a silly scenario too: The back rower is not all that squishy.

The OP says that most of his guys are rocking ~23 ac. The starlock is sitting at 18.

With concealment, that's 20. With cover from the front rowers (or even just from cover) that's 22. Add in appropriate marking, and you're on 24. The warlock is no longer the squishiest party member at that point. As a ranged combatant, there will be points where improved cover is available, for another +3.

There a better target still if they only have cover and concealment then. Not every party can keep all foes marked eternally. Ranged aoe's also tend to ignore both of those if placed properly. And sometimes to often the terrain favors your foes, outdoors particularly, where the front line CAN'T stop people from moving around it. There are also a few types of monsters that excel at moving past defenders, (Lurkers and skirmishers, I think?) that will tend to mess your day up.

 

[Black Knight Irios]

There a better target still if they only have cover and concealment then. Not every party can keep all foes marked eternally. Ranged aoe's also tend to ignore both of those if placed properly. And sometimes to often the terrain favors your foes, outdoors particularly, where the front line CAN'T stop people from moving around it. There are also a few types of monsters that excel at moving past defenders, (Lurkers and skirmishers, I think?) that will tend to mess your day up.

There are always situations that play to the advantages of your opponents.

The point is that you can get decent defenses if you play clever and use your resources wisely.

 

[MwaO]

Having two primary stats and one secondary stat isn't fine, tho. Paladins have this problem, they have crappy wisdom by this route.

Paladins really aren't a problem if you go Str/Cha - in some ways, I think Wis is a natural dump stat for a Cha-based Paladin - it doesn't give the benefit that say Int does for a Warlock and it overlaps on defenses. It looks like something you have to have, but multiclassing via Warlock can get around most of the limitations. Dragonborn with Str 16, Dex 14(for heavy blade feats), Con 13, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 18 as an example.

Ditto for Warlock. A half-elf with Str 13, Con 18, Dex 10, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 16 works reasonably well - you've got the stats for Chain/Scale and a high enough Int that you'll get at least part of the effect. But also, as a Con-based Warlock, you're actually good at the Cha skills a party typically needs you to be good at. And you qualify for multiclassing into Paladin with a Charisma high enough to take advantage of both the mark and Half-Elf's dilettante ability.

 

[Saeviomagy]

There a better target still if they only have cover and concealment then. Not every party can keep all foes marked eternally. Ranged aoe's also tend to ignore both of those if placed properly. And sometimes to often the terrain favors your foes, outdoors particularly, where the front line CAN'T stop people from moving around it. There are also a few types of monsters that excel at moving past defenders, (Lurkers and skirmishers, I think?) that will tend to mess your day up.

You don't need to mark every foe all the time, just the ones that matter.

Ranged AOEs have a pretty high chance of targeting fort or will. Additionally: why would you target an AOE to hit a single back-rower when you could hit 2+ front-rowers? As far as I know, no monsters have the equivalent of cloud of knives (the only single-target AOE I know of).

If your DM is lazy enough that all your battles occur in a featureless plane (or a meadow with no terrain features), then yes, you'll have problems with getting swarmed. Most parties will have issues in this scenario. Additionally most monsters would have serious problems against an adventuring party if they started at 40+ squares of range.

Monsters that excel at moving past defenders are filling the same role as your strikers: They tend to have low defenses and cause lots of damage. If they're not using their own brutes and soldiers to defend themselves, that's actually in your parties interests: simply focus all your strikers on them, exactly like what happens if your party rogue leads a charge.

This is all counterable with tactics. If your party don't have the tactics down, then yes: your squishy guys will die.

 

[Nahat Anoj]

I think if the warlock were designed today, it probably would be a Cha primary class (although I think it should be Con primary) with Int and Con secondary. People who choose to be Con secondary would probably get to add their Con mod to AC in place of intelligence.

 

[Plane Sailing]

In one of my gaming groups, we have a star warlock in the group. He has a high con and charisma, but only a mediocre int.

As such, his AC is abysmal (18 at 7th level) while the rest of the party is in the 23 or higher range.

Unplayable? No. More fragile and has to be more cautious - sure.

Perhaps the issue is that every character is not going to be best at everything, and that some people will always be more squishy than others?

It was his choice to max Con and Cha rather than, say, Con and Int. Typically I see effective Starlocks who pick from Star + Infernal options or Star +Fey options depending upon which is their main casting stat - much more likely to be the former because of (a) the hp benefit and (b) Dire Radiance.

I do think that the starlocks should have been a Con-only class, but I don't imagine massive errata would ever change things on that wholesale a basis.

 

[Trevelyan]

Ditto for Warlock. A half-elf with Str 13, Con 18, Dex 10, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 16 works reasonably well - you've got the stats for Chain/Scale and a high enough Int that you'll get at least part of the effect.

Drop Cha by two points in exchange for having Hellish rebuke and Dire Radiance as at-will powers and you've got my human warlock right there. And he had the spare feat to pick up chain proficiency out of the gate. Focusing on Con based powers from the Star and Infernal sets as I level up and picking up the feat for an additional pact to go full Star/Infernal at paragon means that I never need to bother with Cha at all. In time, boosting Con and Int at every opportunity, it will become worthwhile retraining chain for hide and picking up the Hide specialisation, or just picking up an extra feat for scale if I prefer.

The problem isn't that Starlocks need both Con and Cha, but that people seem to think they do. The only real problem is that Dire Radiance is Con based so doesn't really support the notion of a Cha based Starlock whatever the Dragon article seemed to suggest.

If Arcane Power provides an extra at-will power for each pact then Starlocks will be totally viable whichever way you build them.