Learn Baleful Utterance
shatter locks, traps, spell pouches, swords, whatever the DM lets you
I was reading over Shatter, and I was a bit confused at the saves section. Basically, it allows a will save (object)... so, is it the will save of, say, the item's wielder? How does that work?
Unattended mundane items get no save. Unattended magical items save at 2+(caster level)/2. Attended items save at their wielder's value or their unattended value, whichever is better.
IIRC
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Last edited by Foryn Gilnith : 11-04-2009 at 09:53 PM.
Say what you will, shattering doors is much more impressive than just having the barbarian hack it with an axe. (Seriously, though, baleful utterance is one of the most useful ones, you just have to be creative. A lot of monsters have nonmagical weapons and armor even at mid-levels. Get your DM to describe things in detail; evil guy takes a sip of wine and you shatter the glass and force a Fort save.)
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5) Feats of choice: Empower Spell-Like Ability, Quicken Spell-Like Ability, Point Blank and Precise shot (so you don't hit your buddies in melee with your targets), and Ability Focus (+1 DC for invocations).
Couple things here. First is that PBS and Precise Shot should only be taken with consideration or if retraining is available. Because you're attacking someone's touch AC, the -4 doesn't hurt much beyond the first few levels.
Ability focus is also only useful if you use a lot of blast essences; personally the only two I seem to have room for don't have saves anywho (Vitriolic and Utterdark). If you use them regularly, though, by all means.
Point Blank and Precise shot (so you don't hit your buddies in melee with your targets)
Rod of Magical Precision, Complete Mage pg. 128, gives the effects of Precise Shot for spells and spell-like abilities. At 12,000 gp, it's not an option at early levels (when Precise Shot perhaps matters the most), but overall it's not that pricey and it saves you two feats - pretty worth it, IMO. Unless, of course, you have better things to be holding...
Veyr, Human Sorcerer Chance, Human Rogue Paul Lukische, Human Harrowed Melina, Human Cerebremancer María Elena, Human Knight Dualist (needs new game!) Cuilë Ráhonda, Kobold Puppet Master Aghihoti, Bhuka Urth-Priest Talya, Human Bardic War Weaver Caran Eru, Human Firedancer (needs new game!) Faernacha, Warforged Totemist Predator (needs new game!) Charade, Living Spell Mindthief
My experience has been that most actual games consist of playing with real people - not crazy optomizers that have schroedinger spellbooks exploiting rule loopholes.
Warlock is a fine class, which is
- easy to play
- does good, reliable damage
- fairly tough
- and has fun tricks (shatter, flee, fly)
Throw points in con, dex, concentration, and UMD.
You'll come out of the gate pretty strong due to ranged touch attacks that increase before people get iterative attacks, and have no saving throws.
Later on, if your party starts gearing up, as long as the Magic Item Compendium is OK to use, you can amp your blast with gloves, neck items, and warlock scepter for bursts (maybe a belt too, I forget). Yes these have charges, but you can buy spares too.
At level 10 pick up Eldritch Chain which doubles your damage to groups without giving folks a chance to save.
At 11 pick Vitriolic blast to penetrate SR, or the shadow tentacles (they also ignore SR for the grappling, crushing AND cold damage).
Flight is cool, but you can't take people with you. Just blast away, and maybe take Flee for escapes and mobility, because that CAN bring friends.
Well I already spent my two flaw feats on PBS and Precise Shot, so I guess that would make me an Archer. Only thing is, Hellfire Warlock and Binder aren't from books I have access to, and I don't even want to ask my DM to spare us both the headache of reading through new content to figure out if it's balanced for this campaign.
Are controllers really feat-dependant? Are there even any feats that are must-haves for Archer and Controller warlocks, aside from Quicken SLA, Maximize SLA and Extra Invocations? Because to me, it seems like doing both these things is perfectly doable and wouldn't leave me too feat-starved.
Well I already spent my two flaw feats on PBS and Precise Shot, so I guess that would make me an Archer. Only thing is, Hellfire Warlock and Binder aren't from books I have access to, and I don't even want to ask my DM to spare us both the headache of reading through new content to figure out if it's balanced for this campaign.
Are controllers really feat-dependant? Are there even any feats that are must-haves for Archer and Controller warlocks, aside from Quicken SLA, Maximize SLA and Extra Invocations? Because to me, it seems like doing both these things is perfectly doable and wouldn't leave me too feat-starved.
HFW. Balanced if you don't go Binder, most of the time at least.
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I play primarily 3.5 D&D. Most of my advice will be based off of this. If my advice doesn't apply, specify a version in your post.
Warlocks are NOT underpowered. I once played one in a campaign and I was the most powerful character. I overpowered 2 sorcerers, a druid, 2 rangers, and a wizard who had spontaneous casting but still used a spellbook. That is why I think warlocks are not underpowered.
Warlocks are NOT underpowered. I once played one in a campaign and I was the most powerful character. I overpowered 2 sorcerers, a druid, 2 rangers, and a wizard who had spontaneous casting but still used a spellbook. That is why I think warlocks are not underpowered.
Warlocks are NOT underpowered. I once played one in a campaign and I was the most powerful character. I overpowered 2 sorcerers, a druid, 2 rangers, and a wizard who had spontaneous casting but still used a spellbook. That is why I think warlocks are not underpowered.
It was houseruled in because it was someones younger brother. He was not the best optimiser but everyone else played powerful characters.
The how refered to how the hell were you more powerful than those other ones. Even if he wasn't optomizing, a spontenous wizard should have outshine a warlock many fold. And that still leaves the cleric and sorceror who had powerful character builds. In the first encounter of the day they would have reigned supreme. How amny encounters per day did you have?
I became more powerful at around level 4 when I took baleful utterance and the DM started sending more encounters at us per day.
After how many encounter in the day did you become more powerful? The two sorcerors should have been more powerful in the first few. Also, what was it about baleful utterance made you overpower the others?
Warlocks are NOT underpowered. I once played one in a campaign and I was the most powerful character. I overpowered 2 sorcerers, a druid, 2 rangers, and a wizard who had spontaneous casting but still used a spellbook. That is why I think warlocks are not underpowered.
I'm guessing the sorcerers and wizard blasted, the druid spent more time in caster form than animal form and didn't use his animal companion, and the rangers weren't swift hunters. None of them knew how to optimize in the least, including blowing through spell slots like crazy doing damage for the casters and, as a result, the melee got close to death after just one or two encounters.
Try is again with a batman-buffer/battlefield controlled, one sorcerer debuffer/blaster, one sorcerer as Arcane Fusion nova, the druid going fleshraker with the same as an animal companion and possibly being a summoner, and the rangers both as swift hunters.
The druid did use his animal companion. The other spellcasters were blasters though. The rangers were probrably the least optomised of us. One sorcerer and the druid were above average power but all of the others were suboptimal. I used baleful utterance to solve many of the problems we faced. I was the most powerful after 2 encounters When sorcerers started saving spell slots. We usually did 4 encounters per day.
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Re: [3.5] Warlocks and actions
Gronk by dallas-dakota
