Why shouldn’t they exist then, if they’re more customizable? And that makes Warlocks, the class most similarly built to 3.5e classes, very appealing. It makes them the only custom-building class in the game.Īnd it turns out, while many players wax rhapsodic about the streamlined simplicity of 5e - a lot of them really like the increased customization that 3.5e offers, even if they don’t realize that 3.5e offers it. This makes them easily the most customizable class in the game. It’s another whole layer of choice and options for difference playstyles, customizability that other classes can only dream of. But Invocations are a different story - the fact that you get to choose which ones you get means that you can essentially select and change your class features. After all, Pacts don’t really have that many features built into them. If it were just the two subclasses, I wouldn’t have so much of a problem. Plus, they get invocations, which the player gets to choose and change out as they level up, on top of the spells which are inherently customizable. But here’s the thing:Īs I see many people putting it online, they functionally get two subclasses: Pact and Patron. The answer is that they’re not more powerful necessarily, nor are they inherently more interesting. So, if Warlocks are essentially Sorcerers, why are they so much more popular to play? Surely, they’re not so much more powerful that you’d be a fool not to choose Eldritch magic over Wild? In exchange, they get more powerful cantrips, spells, and even a variety of martial options, both in the main class features or selectable through Invocations. Instead of the normal spell-slots-and-levels setup of other classes, Warlocks get a small number of slots and always cast at the highest spell level, limiting their casting capacity. But to make them two separate classes, they had to alter the play style and build between them. They went ahead and built two different classes, for no perceivable reason as far as I can tell. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it does sort of negate the real differences between sorcerers and warlocks.īut that begs the question - in a game system where class differences are primarily found through creative setup, rather than playstyle, how do you handle 2 classes that are thematically connected, but differentiated by playstyle alone? It plays more like a standard rpg video game than most other tabletops. There are 5 choices maximum: race, subrace, background, class, subclass. It’s a simple path to follow, with minimal customization. Even multiclassing isn’t terribly useful. Each class plays exactly the same as every other - you choose your class, and then your subclass, and you’re locked in. I’ve met plenty of fans who reduce it to “5e cuts down on the math and fiddly modifiers”, but 5e reduces more than that, really.ĥe streamlines the whole play of the game. It’s pretty obvious to anyone who even takes a cursory glance at both editions, but 3/3.5e and 5e play very differently from each other. Thus, I haven’t much problem with Warlocks themselves, just 5e’s implementation of them. These invocations are slightly overpowered, to allow them to outclass their spellcasting peers, but it fits within the play system of the game overall. Instead of customizing your character by what spells they can cast, with casting and play style determined by your class, Warlocks choose Invocations, which are essentially magical feats, and develop their play style in that way. For spellcasters, this is usually in the building of your spell list for rogues and rangers, it’s in the allocation of skill points for fighters, it's in feats, which they get broad choice from instead of pre-set class features every time they level up.ģe Warlocks, boiled down, are spellcasters that build and play like fighters. There, the playstyle and build of each class varies - you build up to a concept with the features that you choose, which in turn adapt the method in which you can best play your character. This isn’t much of a problem in 3.5e, unless you’re a particular stickler for worldbuilding. So, an arcane spellcaster whose magic is received due to a body-or-soul connection? Allowing magic power to be cast without a spellbook and intensive arcane study? So.a sorcerer? 5e even suggests “you are favored by an Archfey” as a backstory for sorcerers in the Player's Handbook - that’s almost exactly a Pact of the Archfey Warlock right there. It’s concept is simple: a spellcaster that gains their powers through a pact with a powerful entity. It first showed up as a class in 3.5e, designed specifically to be able to outpower any other spellcaster of the same level. To begin with, it helps to take a look at the origins of the warlock class.
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