D&D General The Player's Quantum Ogre: Warlock Pacts

[TwoSix]

I imagine a lot of DM/player drama could be avoided by asking everyone during session 0: "Do you consider a characters' class to be the "basic premise" of that character?"

If different people at the table have different answers to that question, they might not be a good fit for one another in terms of play style, as their expectations for the game might vary.

Yea, that's a fantastic way to phrase it. 100% agree.

 

[TwoSix]

In a more open-ended setting, for sure.

I'd want to negotiate a little in a more specialized, well known and defined setting though. Exceptions can be really compelling though, I admit.

I think there's also a possible conflict in whether individuals consider "core D&D" to be a well-known and defined setting, in and of itself.

 

[Bae'zel]

I think there's also a possible conflict in whether individuals consider "core D&D" to be a well-known and defined setting, in and of itself.

Yeah it goes right back to my insistence to new DMs that D&D is a "toolbox" for making up your own settings, tapping into whatever tropes and themes you and your players want.

If I had a very fine-tuned setting that didn't have the Warlock class available for purely thematic reasons, but a player REALLY wanted to play as one for mostly mechanical reasons, we'd work something out, creating a new concept that has Warlock mechanics but a wholly different theme.

 

[Scribe]

I think there's also a possible conflict in whether individuals consider "core D&D" to be a well-known and defined setting, in and of itself.

And this is why I can easily let it go (the pact having an impact) in 5/5.5. The default core experience has nothing about it, its just a fluff ribbon, and 5/5.5 doesnt have any real narrative weight anyway, so sure, handwave it, move on and get back to the core gameplay loop.

 

[Micah Sweet]

And this is why I can easily let it go (the pact having an impact) in 5/5.5. The default core experience has nothing about it, its just a fluff ribbon, and 5/5.5 doesnt have any real narrative weight anyway, so sure, handwave it, move on and get back to the core gameplay loop.

I play all my D&D and D&D-like games with a 1e/2e attitude. Narrative weight is a thing, and the rules are never more important than the fiction

 

[Scribe]

I play all my D&D and D&D-like games with a 1e/2e attitude. Narrative weight is a thing, and the rules are never more important than the fiction

Yeah but you are not playing 5/5.5, your version of D&D has zero relation to the vast majority of players in likely tone, mechanics, experience, or expectation.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

I could see how this works for you. I use the VTT whisper on a macro for each player, so I do whisper alot of specialized knowledge to the wizard or warlock. There is a buttload of lore... so depending on your playstyle and campaign purpose. Mine has alot of mystery-solving. The wizard has been filling out the VTT journal.

EACH class has played their parts quite well, sometimes in unusual ways. So people saying why not so-&-so class doesn't hold up in my game. It is just that, the warlock, by nature of "pact" is a more contractually set class at an individual basis than others. Yes, the fighter, probably "worked for the man" at some point.. maybe not, they don't have the same supernatural hard-wired obligation.

The party wizard, gets whispered lore frequently to present however she would like to the party, playing the keeper of knowledge.. she also has stank wizard-eyes. I also canonized that she loves mind-expanding ground pixie dusts or gets an itchy nose if the party defeats a magical being.

The Warlock... boy that one is alot to unpack. The player picked the patron type and said please make the rest a mystery. Basically BOTH parties in that pact made the pact under duress. I love the reminders I have seen though that sometimes the warlock can actually be in the position of authority with the pact - "Give me back my blood Joshua!!!"

The fighter deals with his killer side regularly, now with a cursed weapon on-hand I will force him to deal with the downsides of being a soldier, with some moral compass stripping away.

The monk, raised by wild animals in the Veldt. Embraces the nothingness of the wastes quite well.

Long-winded way of saying it is not easy to guess, but there are a lotto homebrews keen to world-building

Oh! I have been on this forum for over 20 years, I can well believe that there are a lot of home brewers and world builders out there. Sounds like a great campaign.

 

[TorgoTheWhite]

Oh! I have been on this forum for over 20 years, I can well believe that there are a lot of home brewers and world builders out there. Sounds like a great campaign.

Thx, it has been my baby for several years. If I have stress, a wandering mind, or watch a disparate themed show I have jotted so many notes in a journal. It is crazy how inspired you can get when you take something not geared to high fantasy and bend it into that frame.. Always Sunny In Philadelphia has been a surprising gold mine for me. Plenty of patron-warlock pacts to draw from that show

 

[CreamCloud0]

Aside from jerk-off DMs picking on Warlocks (and paladins, and clerics etc), I was curious about something.

For those of you who want to remove the pact-patron back and forth relationship... what exactly did you character do to arrange the pact? A pact involves a cost or mutually-agreed upon bargain of some sort. The very WORDING of the powers includese the word "pact".

So your character gets awesome powers for free... what's in it for the patron? What did they get out of this "pact"? If the PC walks away with ever increasing power (the lore of the class stipulates that the power source IS the patron)... what does the patron gain from this one-sided relationship?

There must be SOMETHING there, even if its just fluff. Perhaps the Warlock has to spread the Faith? Align with the goals of the Feywild? Mark every temple across the world with their Patron's secret 'mark"? Something.

To me, this is a bit like "Atheist Clerics". Don't get me started LOL

If I had a player (in a bog-standard D&D setting) who insisted that they wanted the game mechanics of the Warlock class but without ANY of the fluff or concepts of it... I'd allow it but call them something else (they're a Sorceror from a very unique, special culture or something, or a Fey Shaman or whatever).

see, i'd say you're making assumptions about what form a 'pact' needs take, that there are always concrete terms stipulated and agreed to, the initial pact needn't be an obvious transaction, a warlock-to-be could perform an ritual for power that's light on the specific results, carrying around that old amulet from the attic that's your good luck charm, or a whispered prayer in a moment of desperation silently heard and answered, all without an inkling of there being anyone on the other end or that any of those are serving as tacit agreement to a deal with more strings attached than an industrial loom.

and what does the patron get out of it? why their soul of course, in a measly 60* years or so (geez, these mortal lives are so short, aren't they?), maybe even sooner knowing the dangerous hi-jinks some of these people get up to, so let that mortal run around having their fun, the more powerful they get then all the more valuable their soul will be when they finally breathe their last and it falls into their lap.
*yes i know longer lived species exist

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah but you are not playing 5/5.5, your version of D&D has zero relation to the vast majority of players in likely tone, mechanics, experience, or expectation.

I play a slightly modified version of Level Up, a 5e ruleset. It hardly has zero relation.