Level 1 warlock with 8th level spell, how to break?

[sleepyhead]

So my new GM had us make randomly generated characters. I ended up with a pact of the fey warlock. But he also gave us a random feature from our class and I ended up with Mystic Arcanum granting me an 8th level spell slot once per day. What's the best way to exploit this? Best I could come up with is casting Armor of Agathys on myself and getting other low level creatures to attack me.

[stoutstien]

So my new GM had us make randomly generated characters. I ended up with a pact of the fey warlock. But he also gave us a random feature from our class and I ended up with Mystic Arcanum granting me an 8th level spell slot once per day. What's the best way to exploit this? Best I could come up with is casting Armor of Agathys on myself and getting other low level creatures to attack me.

You actually can't do that because of how MA works. Those spells are exclusive to that feature so you can't cast a normal warlock spell into them.

Glibness for just stupid social fun or maddening darkness for a huge aoe that does good damage with a long duration.

Feeblemind is ok but those top 2 are the ones that seem the biggest impact at low levels

[sleepyhead]

You actually can't do that because of how MA works. Those spells are exclusive to that feature so you can't cast a normal warlock spell into them.

Huh, good to know.

That Maddening Darkness does sounds exciting though. We don't come across many strangers since were doing more of a survival thing.

[stoutstien]

For survivability go demiplane. It's so flexible and can pretty much act as a huge safety net for the party. Rations check, water check, safe place to rest check, spare supplies check, make shift prison check, all for free once a day.

Talk to your team about it because are potentially can completely negate any aspect of survival as a issue for the game.

[Sparky McDibben]

For survivability go demiplane. It's so flexible and can pretty much act as a huge safety net for the party. Rations check, water check, safe place to rest check, spare supplies check, make shift prison check, all for free once a day.

"I cast 'Avoid All Survival Challenges!'"

[stoutstien]

"I cast 'Avoid All Survival Challenges!'"

Pretty much. Very cool to use but will make it almost impossible to challenge a well prepared party.

[Keravath]

For survivability go demiplane. It's so flexible and can pretty much act as a huge safety net for the party. Rations check, water check, safe place to rest check, spare supplies check, make shift prison check, all for free once a day.

Talk to your team about it because are potentially can completely negate any aspect of survival as a issue for the game.

Demiplane has limited usefulness. It creates a door to a 30' room that lasts for one hour. The room doesn't contain water, rations or anything else unless you stock it up. Also, because the door only lasts an hour, it isn't suitable for any sort of rest since RAW, from what I can see, if you cast demiplane from inside the demiplane, you only end up in another demiplane. Basically, you don't have any way back to where you came from since the door disappears after one hour and you can't reopen it from inside the demiplane.

Maddening Darkness looks nasty, useful for a warlock with devils sight who could see through it but it also does a lot of damage every round for creatures that can't get out of it. It is save for 1/2 so even the lower DCs you start with would be doing damage. However, the very large area of effect and the fact that it damages both enemies and allies make it risky though depending on DM an evocation wizard might be able to exclude allies from the area of effect since it is an evocation spell.

[J-H]

I would favor using spells that don't grant a save, since you only get one shot. You should face very few enemies with >150hp, so Power Word: Stun is a reliable stunlock for at least one round per day, if not more. "Delete boss monster".

[Bobthewizard]

That is a funny bonus. On the one hand, it's completely OP for a first level character. On the other hand, 8th level is the worst of the higher level lists for a warlock.

Since he's giving you an 8th level spell though, maybe he'd allow you to upcast a lower level spell as your mystic arcanum. I certainly would if I were the DM. If a player wanted to use their 8th level mystic arcanum for an 8th level mass suggestion, I'd allow it. It's not RAW though.

8th level AoA would be hilarious so I hope he allows it.

[airless_wing]

+1 to Glibness. Dealing damage at low of a level shouldn't be a huge deal. But being unable to fail a Charisma check for an entire hour is incredible, no matter the level.

[stewstew5]

That is a funny bonus. On the one hand, it's completely OP for a first level character. On the other hand, 8th level is the worst of the higher level lists for a warlock.

Since he's giving you an 8th level spell though, maybe he'd allow you to upcast a lower level spell as your mystic arcanum. I certainly would if I were the DM. If a player wanted to use their 8th level mystic arcanum for an 8th level mass suggestion, I'd allow it. It's not RAW though.

8th level AoA would be hilarious so I hope he allows it.

Mystic arcanum doesn't actually grant you a spell slot though, it allows you a 1/day cast of a (level 8, in this case, there are multiple levels) spell, and only the spell you chose when you got the feature

[stoutstien]

Demiplane has limited usefulness. It creates a door to a 30' room that lasts for one hour. The room doesn't contain water, rations or anything else unless you stock it up. Also, because the door only lasts an hour, it isn't suitable for any sort of rest since RAW, from what I can see, if you cast demiplane from inside the demiplane, you only end up in another demiplane. Basically, you don't have any way back to where you came from since the door disappears after one hour and you can't reopen it from inside the demiplane.

Maddening Darkness looks nasty, useful for a warlock with devils sight who could see through it but it also does a lot of damage every round for creatures that can't get out of it. It is save for 1/2 so even the lower DCs you start with would be doing damage. However, the very large area of effect and the fact that it damages both enemies and allies make it risky though depending on DM an evocation wizard might be able to exclude allies from the area of effect since it is an evocation spell.

True the rest benefit doesnt come online until later but the 30x30x30 mobile storage is applicable right off the bat.

*Pretty much once the party has access to banishment you can get out of the demiplane or if you need to but the rest of the party can use it while you chill outside of it. One with shadow works well here. Due to how warlocks cast they have little need for a long rest.

[jaappleton]

Gotta suggest Feeblemind here.

Decimate an enemy spellcaster, or really any intelligent creature.

And it lasts for 30 days. So there's actually lots of RP usage. Oh, the King is suddenly... uh.... 'sick'? For 30 days? I mean, what better time to throw a bloody revolution?

......what? Your brain didn't automatically go to bloody revolution? What kind of game are you playing?!

[MaxWilson]

So my new GM had us make randomly generated characters. I ended up with a pact of the fey warlock. But he also gave us a random feature from our class and I ended up with Mystic Arcanum granting me an 8th level spell slot once per day. What's the best way to exploit this? Best I could come up with is casting Armor of Agathys on myself and getting other low level creatures to attack me.

Dominate Monster would be fun. Starts off low-powered but scales higher as you fight tougher enemies.

[jaappleton]

Dominate Monster would be fun. Starts off low-powered but scales higher as you fight tougher enemies.

Enemy still gets a save whenever they're damaged. So against a single target BBEG, its a bit limited.

[stoutstien]

Dominate Monster would be fun. Starts off low-powered but scales higher as you fight tougher enemies.

If it wasn't for the ST Everytime the target took damage and was a charm effect it would be on my short list. Too many what ifs for me.

[Bundin]

If you're the party face, take Glibness. If not, Demiplane. Demiplane helps the party, Glibness can help a lot in your role. Also, they're not flashy and attention-grabbing, which helps keep balance in the party.

Of course, the necessity for that balance is dependent on the random boons the other players received.

[Rukelnikov]

You don't relaly have THAT many options, and almost all of them are amazing at lvl 1:

Demiplane - Fill it with stuff you may need, treat it like Leomund's Secret Room, spares of weapons and armor for if you get caught, a loaded ready to fire cannon, in order to summon and fire it, rations, etc.

Dominate Monster - Only lasts for one hour and your save DC won't be any different from your other spells, I think this is the weakest option.

Feeblemind - 4d6 psychich damage no attack roll or saves, meh at high levels, useful in Tier 1, but the added possibility of (practically) wiping someone's mind, could prove very useful.

Glibness - 15 minimum in every Cha roll, plus fool lie detection spells, what's not to like?

Maddening Darknes - The only damage spell from the bunch. Do you like Fireball? This has 3 times the radius, deals a bit more damage of a much lesss resisted type, and keeps on for as long as you maintain concentration, you can also take Devil's Sight at lvl 2, to keep shooting Repelling blasts to those inside the sphere. Solid damage and CC.

Powerd Word Stun - The lowest CR at which a creature in the MMS has more than 150 hp is 7, and there are less than ten creatures with tha many HP below CR 10. This essentially means that for most if not all of your Tier 1 experience, you get an auto Stun, for the record, being stunned makes you lose concentration.

[MaxWilson]

Enemy still gets a save whenever they're damaged. So against a single target BBEG, its a bit limited.

Are you kidding? You can either use that BBEG against some other monster, or you can drown him in a lake (auto-death). Or if you don't have water available, restrain them with manacles and a net and line up all of the other PCs around them with readied actions to hit them all simultaneously, at advantage, as soon as one PC damages them, which will be the warlock (because his concentration is busy with Dominate Monster). Then if you're using vanilla PHB initiative and if turn order makes it possible, all of the other PCs hit the BBEG again before it takes it next turn.

While I haven't seen that trick pulled with Dominate Monster, I've seen it pulled against e.g. Fire Giants hypnotized by Hypnotic Pattern, and it works perfectly well. "Spell breaks on damage" is not as restrictive as it sounds.

But for the most part, that's a waste, because what you're more likely to want to do instead of killing your minion is to use it up in combat against other monsters. IME and IMO.

Feeblemind - 4d6 psychich damage no attack roll or saves, meh at high levels, useful in Tier 1, but the added possibility of (practically) wiping someone's mind, could prove very useful.

Feeblemind has an Int save, and at level 1 there's not as much difference between Int saves and other saves like Wis as there will be later on. Feeblemind isn't interesting in Tier 1, IMO.

[Kane0]

I'd take PW: Stun, for the vast majority of your early and mid adventuring career it's a no nonsense, do-not-pass-go ability. By the time you start regularly coming up against creatures with 150HP or more you will have plenty of other tools at your disposal between you and the rest of your party, and even then it's still useful since it works on their current HP rather than maximum.
It's also nonlethal and lasts until they make the save without using your concentration.

[MaxWilson]

I'd take PW: Stun, for the vast majority of your early and mid adventuring career it's a no nonsense, do-not-pass-go ability. By the time you start regularly coming up against creatures with 150HP or more you will have plenty of other tools at your disposal between you and the rest of your party, and even then it's still useful since it works on their current HP rather than maximum.
It's also nonlethal and lasts until they make the save without using your concentration.

:) But it isn't interesting! If your DM is the type to tailor encounters to the party, it will just result in him adding an extra monster to every big fight on the assumption that you're going to stun it.

On the other hand, fighting a Purple Worm and then, instead of killing it, Dominating it into fighting for you is kind of interesting, especially if you make other PCs or summons tank for it to prevent it from getting damaged. (It has reach weapons and high mobility.)

IMO being constantly on the lookout for a nice temporary minion would be more fun for a blasty warlock than just auto-stunning one monster every game day, especially at low levels. It makes it so when a big monster turns up, your first thought isn't "Oh no!" but rather "Yum! [crosses fingers]"

[Kane0]

:) But it isn't interesting! If your DM is the type to tailor encounters to the party, it will just result in him adding an extra monster to every big fight on the assumption that you're going to stun it.

On the other hand, fighting a Purple Worm and then, instead of killing it, Dominating it into fighting for you is kind of interesting, especially if you make other PCs or summons tank for it to prevent it from getting damaged. (It has reach weapons and high mobility.)

IMO being constantly on the lookout for a nice temporary minion would be more fun for a blasty warlock than just auto-stunning one monster every game day, especially at low levels. It makes it so when a big monster turns up, your first thought isn't "Oh no!" but rather "Yum! [crosses fingers]"

True, but I suppose it comes down to how you use it. I've been known to pull stunts like stunning lone guardsmen to get the party through a stealth situation in the past. I'd try to save it as much as possible, I wouldn't go into every combat looking to make use of it.
It's also being a little bit nice to your DM, since it's a CON save each turn to shake off they don't have to pump HP just to counter you.

[MaxWilson]

True, but I suppose it comes down to how you use it. I've been known to pull stunts like stunning lone guardsmen to get the party through a stealth situation in the past. I'd try to save it as much as possible, I wouldn't go into every combat looking to make use of it.
It's also being a little bit nice to your DM, since it's a CON save each turn to shake off they don't have to pump HP just to counter you.

I'd rather Dominate the lone guardsman and then make him tell people I'm his cousin, recently back from overseas. :)

[stoutstien]

:) But it isn't interesting! If your DM is the type to tailor encounters to the party, it will just result in him adding an extra monster to every big fight on the assumption that you're going to stun it.

On the other hand, fighting a Purple Worm and then, instead of killing it, Dominating it into fighting for you is kind of interesting, especially if you make other PCs or summons tank for it to prevent it from getting damaged. (It has reach weapons and high mobility.)

IMO being constantly on the lookout for a nice temporary minion would be more fun for a blasty warlock than just auto-stunning one monster every game day, especially at low levels. It makes it so when a big monster turns up, your first thought isn't "Oh no!" but rather "Yum! [crosses fingers]"

I think that why I gravitate towards demiplane. It's just such a fun spell to have at all tiers of play and can be flexible enough to act like a peg for most holes. Make a private room for each party member and make them bribe you to see who gets to access everyday.
DM : how many arrowsdo you have again?
Party: all of them?

[RSP]

It’s probably not RAW, but if your DM will let you choose an upcasted Warlock spell, rather than limiting it to the 8th level spells, I’d choose either Major Image for permanent, Concentration-free illusions (if you're creative you’ll get use out of this from 1-20); or Finger of Death, and start building your undead army.

[Chaos Jackal]

The 8th-level spell list is the weakest among the warlock's overall limited options, but an 8th-level spell at lv1? Yeah, that won't end well.

Given that you can avoid friendly fire, Maddening Darkness can basically end every fight within one to three rounds, for the next five levels, without the enemies even making it out, and can reasonably be expected to decisively tip the scales for another three. Even on successful saves it's 18 psychic damage on average every turn, enough to kill all the bandits or all the orcs or all the tigers or whatever within the aforementioned rounds if they all make their saves... and they won't all make their saves.

Power Word: Stun is the only Power Word with a threshold reasonable for its level, and this is far from its level. For the next ten levels of play at least, you can expect to either instantly stun anything in your way, or do it after a couple hits from your frontliners.

Glibness is nice, but you said there's not much interaction planned, and Dominate Monster's repeat saves don't attract me, never mind the fact that the spell might be 8th-level but your DC is still that of a lv1 character (and unlike Maddening Darkness, it does nothing on a save) makes that nowhere near as attractive. Demiplane is also a nice, flavorful option, but it's only accessible for one hour every day, so it can't be used as a camping feature, and as an emergency button it's rather obsolete. Why have an emergency button when Maddening Darkness usually means there's no emergency outside of enemies way out of your league?

Overall, grabbing a random feature from high levels is just... bad. Especially for spellcaster features. It completely wrecks the game, as level-appropriate enemies can be easily run over, while more powerful enemies can ostensibly instantly destroy you in turn (given that outside that extra feature, you're still regular low-level adventurers with limitations in saves and HP).

[Rukelnikov]

Feeblemind has an Int save, and at level 1 there's not as much difference between Int saves and other saves like Wis as there will be later on. Feeblemind isn't interesting in Tier 1, IMO.

The 4d6 damage is independent of the save, those always land.

[MaxWilson]

The 4d6 damage is independent of the save, those always land.

I never noticed that before, thanks!

[Rukelnikov]

I never noticed that before, thanks!