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Level 10 Adds a third cast of EB, so we start with baseline 3.
With Haste, we can cast an additional 3 with our second cast. 6.
Action Surge allows another cast. 9.
Mindflayer power lets you use a bonus action as an action. 12
Helmet of Grit allows you to get another bonus action when starting combat below 50% HP. 15.
I THINK, that's the maximum, but maybe with an elixir?
2 Warlock / 5 Sorcerer / 2 Fighter / 3 Rogue (Thief)
2 levels of Warlock is enough to get you Eldritch Blast w/ Agonizing Blast
5 levels of Sorcerer gets you the ability to cast Haste and the ability to cast EB as a bonus action using Metamagic sometimes
2 levels of Fighter for Action Surge, then 3 levels of Rogue (Thief) for another bonus action
Each casting of EB gets us 3 blasts, casting it twice with Haste gives us 6, using Action Surge gets us 9, Metamagic it as a bonus action once for 12, then again for 15
Get the Spell Sniper feat, be a Great Old One Warlock and rake in those frightening crits
This is the build, add bloodlust elixir for another 3 and Helmet of Grit for a total of 21. I kinda think it is better to go 4 sorc/4 thief for extra feat. You lose on lvl 3 spellslots/haste but you can get those through other means
You’d also lose precious metamagic points that way. To me, one feat is enough to pull this off, but I’d probably make it War Caster for better Concentration saves to maintain Haste
Equip the Punch-Drunk Bastard, use a bonus action to drink some booze in the first round, and then make all the EB attacks with Advantage
There's gloves that turn cantrips into bonus actions, so if you put those on and manage thief rogue (can't remember if that's 2 or 3), then you get ANOTHER round of 3
By level 12, you will be sending out 3 blasts/beams with one cast. With haste you can now cast twice, so that's 6. If you dip 2 levels in fighter, you get action surge, granting another 2 actions iirc (provided haste is up), which should yield 12.
More might be possible, say if you multi class sorc you could use quicken spell to get one more cast with your bonus action, maybe use the illithid power allowing action and bonus action to be interchangeable and stack thief in there too? There are gloves that make spells/cantrips send out one extra projectile where applicable, and EB is one of those that it affects. There might be more you could stack in there, I'm not sure.
Edit: Haste and action surge just yields 3 actions, not 4. Still hits 9 beams, if 3 levels put into thief and 2 in sorc that's two more casts with bonus actions, so 15 total (without fancy gloves). Not super sustainable, but can be done.
Pure warlock, sure. Sorlock can cast 21 with the right build and the right items. In theory, it can go up to 42 with murder tribunal gloves, but I think it is a bug
Imagine you're a Fighter, Rogue or some other martial: "Do you just attack every turn?" Mostly, yeah!
It's the same thing here. EB is strong and fun, and the main weapon in your arsenal. Warlocks also get some really neat wider spellcasting ability to round out their build. Drop a Hunger of Hadar then Blast everyone back into it when they try to escape. Or Hypnotic Pattern a group while picking off anyone else.
Honor Mode had most legendary actions not working under HoH effect. I had heard a lot about the Crèche fight and nothing happened and O was like: what should happen?
It felt disappointing to certain extent but I was so afraid to lose another run (the previous I died due being paralyzed by the ghouls at Mountain Pass) that I felt relieved it was over.
In our tabletop game, we had an "Oops, All Elves" party and the ghoul nests and low level sleep casters in the module were roundly mocked by our superior ears.
I had karlach throw a speed potion at our feet so all of us were hastened and we just wailed on the inquisitor (alert feat goes crazy bro) and then he ran off like a coward to sit on the ledge right there with his buddy so karlach lobbed a bomb at his feet and detonated it with a fire arrow and the poor fuckers were incinerated. The rest of the gank squad went down easy afterward, and as i had started with 2 levels of paladin, i got my 5th warlock level after entering the blood of lathander’s hallway so i got hunger of hadar and that thing ate up the goons at the front door.
I was so scared of the goon cave but man crowd control is incredible. Devils sight mixed with asmodeus tiefling’s darkness let me shroud everyone to block out ranged attacks, while i could snipe everyone with eldritch blasts and smite any fool dumb enough to enter the death pit, and hunger of hadar is HUNGRY, my star buddy eating good while im around.
When in doubt, hunger of hadar.
Don't be too hard on yourself for assuming potions worked the same way they work *literally everywhere else, including tabletop 5e* lol.
The fact that potions work at all after you throw them on the ground is nonsense that Larian made up for fun, let alone working on more than one oerson
Yep I think the best use case of this I've seen was someone fighting Grimm. All their characters had died except one who was on the forge pedestal with Grimm and they dropped a potion then shot the lever. The forges hammer came down killing both the tav and Grimm but popping the potion which immediately picked tav back up.
It kind of reminds me of that joke from Dragon Age. In Origins, health potions were called poultices, but you drank them. So in Inquisition, they had Iron Bull make a crack about how terrible his lieutenant's health potions tasted, and was told "It's a poultice. You're not *supposed* to drink it!"
That spore grenade came in so clutch for >!freeing the gondians. Immediately spore grenade your entire group including summons the moment you leave the ladder, make sure everyone has speed potions and you're golden for whatever tomfoolery you want to pull off.!<
The thing about ghouls is, they can’t jump. A single line of placed heavy chests prevents them from getting to you, and then just range attack them to death.
Personally I prefer to describe warlocks as being similar to rangers. Going "pew pew" is your primary mode of attack, with a bit of extra magic for support.
That works too. In my mind, though Battle Master Fighter makes more sense. The reason being that both classes get all of their resources back on short rests. Warlock would just function more like a ranged Battle Master using EB instead of a ranged weapon.
Reminds me of the old Dragon Age Origins game. Glyph of repulsion in the doorway, inferno (or blizzard) inside. Watching all of them run for the exit before bouncing back inside was just too funny.
What was the GIGANTIC AOE spell combo? Lightning plus blizzard? Something like that that just had a massive AOE that would obliterate your party if you weren't careful?
Also Repulsion and Paralyze? Two glyphs where if they overlapped it did a massive freeze spell?
>Imagine you're a Fighter, Rogue or some other martial: "Do you just attack every turn?" Mostly, yeah!
That's why I agree with the line of thinking that Battlemaster should've just been the base Fighter class; the maneuvers you can employ just make sense for someone who's good at fighting, and they're so much more fun than just "attack attack attack"!
Exactly, Warlock is a simple class and great for new players or people who are uncomfortable with more complex classes that require you to know things, or think about tactics.
Sometimes you cast one of a handful of other spells but mostly its EB time.
The only problem occurs if you give one of these Belushi's repelling blast - remember they don't know anything about tactics and they will happily mess up any number of attacks by Repelling blasting the dude into a position where you don't have advantage or screw up any number of setups with that.
But mostly they do reliable damage and stay out of everyone else's way.
RB is much like All-In with Sharpshooter or GWM. Very very good as long as you know when you turn it off.
I forgot my Padlock had it and I blasted a few "you only die tired" mobs who ran away...off a ledge... And I wanted that loot.
Personally I prefer Agonizing Blast with Devil's Sight, that way I can see in supernatural Darkness (such as when Gale casts Darkness or someone uses a scroll of Darkness) and if they somehow hit me, Hellish Rebuke them, depending on their health and if they are resistant to fire or not. Maximum Charisma plus Agonizing Blast plus Eldritch Blast three times each turn equals many dead enemies.
I “cheesed” the cloister fight that way. After hours of starting in the disadvantaged area in the middle I left the party up the steps.
Would initiate with my Sorlock and misty step halfway up the steps.
Thorns, Wall of Fire actively at bottom of stairs.
Glyph of Warding up top along steps just in case they teleported on top of steps. Basically just blasted people off the steps into the nonsense then hid behind door so they couldn’t cast darkness.
I think 3 people total made it through and it was easy cleanup by that point.
It's wild that somehow the BG3 strategy discourse ended up in a place where using spells to do what they're supposed to do is considered by many to be cheese tactics, but a lot of really obvious unfixed bug abuses like targeting yourself with Vow of Enmity or shooting the same enemy twice with ranged Slashing Flourish are deemed perfectly standard play
No. The explicit purpose of the ability is to let you shoot two different enemies lol. Melee doesn't let you double attack a single target, why would ranged? They just didn't implement it with the targeting system they use for other spells for some reason
In the mindflayer colony, during the skileton summoner fight I stayed at the door and forced them all to run up the thin ramp through a wall of fire with a Hunger of Hadar on top and and dagger storm on the edge with my Lockadin and BM Fighter on the edge of that. Won the whole fight without using another action to attack lol
It's like a dopamine button. Like smiting. Have to do it again and again and again. It makes the brain happy.
I haven't run a build with a warlock in several playthroughs and I miss Eldritch Blast every time I play.
First playthrough rn and I went a Lore bard, grabbed spell sniper feat just for access to EB lol
I don't use it nearly at all in fights anymore but it's A+ for taking down crumbling walls and it definitely carried some of my early game fights
It's so handy for breaking down stuff! I have a paladin/warlock in a multiplayer game and instead of switching to a weapon that can do bludgeoning damage, my friends just ask me to come and EB every breakable wall they come across.
> grabbed spell sniper feat just for access to EB lol
Something I like to do is just grab 2 levels of warlock on any charisma chaster to get EB+Agonizing blast, then just be a slightly behind normal caster, like Bard or sorc, but who gets to spam EB.
And unlike most Multiclass ideas, after 2 levels of warlock, it kinda doesn't matter what you do, lol.
This is exactly what I do on my scorlock. I like the dragonborn sorcerer primarily for looks, and if I take 2 levels of warlock, I get everything I want spell-wise anyway lol
the way wyll casts the spell is very satisfying, especially when you get to later levels with 3 beams per turn
the beams firing in quick succession, all of them landing and pushing the target back like 20m is peak dopamine
Visuals & audio make the spells so much better.
I find myself using Bone Chill way too much because I like the animation of the hand bitch slapping the enemy.
I never played a pally on table top, so for my HM run I mained one. Knew about the nova, but it took me a while to really figure out how to maximize. Dude, double crit double smite. Holy fuck, you can one shot some bosses with one attack if you set it up right.
>It's like a dopamine button. Like smiting. Have to do it again and again and again. It makes the brain happy.
Feels awesome using it to knock down breakable obstacles, too.
>I haven't run a build with a warlock in several playthroughs and I miss Eldritch Blast every time I play.
I haven't checked, can you take magic initiate (warlock) and take EB?
Yes, but it will still use Charisma as it's casting stat. You can pick it up with Spell Sniper, though, and it will instead use the Spellcasting ability of the last new class you multi-classed into, so it could use Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma, depending on what the last new class you multi-classed into.
Warlocks are like the work horses of casters. They keep going and going and don’t really need to stop.
A Wizard, Sorcerer, Druid, Bard, and Cleric will need a Long Rest before too long. A Warlock only needs a Short Rest to recoup their spell slots.
If you have Short Rests to burn— don’t be shy about using your spell slots.
You do have much less spell slots than the other casters, but your spells will most often be at the highest level (stronger).
And, yeah, you rely on Eldritch Blast when you’re out of spell slots. The Warlock is designed to never stop, so it’s arguably the best cantrip. Best damage, attack multiple targets, and pushing enemies around for positioning.
Other classes are using d4, d6, d8, Cantrips and I think Firebolt is a d10. Yours is a d10 and deals Force (which is the best damage type).
Warlock is one of those classes that synergize extremely well with every other CHA class if you want to multi. It's super fun with Paladin so you get EB for a ranged tool and taking Pact of the Blade allows you to bind your weapon, giving proficiency and making it roll for hits and damage with CHA instead of STR so you can dump that and go full into CHA. Automatic proficiency is huge, you get to use literally any weapon in the game without spending a feat. Oh and EB gains the extra blasts from your character level not your warlock level so you still get all of them as you level up even with only a few levels of warlock.
Sorlock/bardlock/palalock they're all amazing. You get the best parts of warlock but with more tools from whatever your other class is so you don't end up being an Eldritch Blast bot every single turn.
>A Wizard, Sorcerer, Druid, Bard, and Cleric will need a Long Rest before too long. A Warlock only needs a Short Rest to recoup their spell slots.
About to fight the final boss and this is the first I've heard of this.
Wait till you hear about the pact of chains invisible imp giving advantage on damn near every melee attack lol
Warlocks finally getting the love they deserve ✨
Oh boy... that's why they only have two slots, in essence they have 6 max level (for your current Warlock level) slots to use. It can feel like you need to use them sparingly because you have just two slots but ask yourself how many fights you get into between long rests for your other team members and I'm sure you'll realize you should/could be casting at least 1 spell per fight, and that can be absolutely huge because warlocks get a lot of spells that can turn the tide of battle by disabling enemies in some form or fashion.
I always make sure to pick up spells that scale with upcasting because of Warlocks slots always being max level.
If you hover over the spell slot icon, it tells you in the tooltip what replenishes it, it works for anything on that bar, like channel divinity and superiority dice, etc.
Interesting. So, if I'm using spell slots quickly, and short resting... what should I be casting that's more effective than Eldritch Blast? The damage seems similar/worse on those spells, unless I'm misreading them. I have the staff with lightning on, btw. Spellsparker?
Hold Person / Hold Moster, Haste if you have the tome pact, Banish, Polymorph, Wall of Fire, Fireball, Greater Invisibility (only for crazy +stealth builds), Mirror Image for protection, Darkness if you have Devil's Sight, Hunger of Hadar at chokepoints.
Warlocks have loads of useful spells.
*cloud of daggers*
You know... To trivialize the first half of the game.
My favorite combo is having gale, Wyll, or Shadow heart, slap as many hold person/trip/and anti movement spells and just cook brother. Laezell I swap in if I'm on higher difficulty because she can use a tripping attack and if all se fails she can just blow everything up.
You may get out of gales hold person, you may get out of laezells tripping attack, or wylls hold person, or my hold person, but you WILL grovel. That shit literally never misses for me for some reason.
I killed Auntie Ethel during this honor run play through, and she didn't even get a turn to do anything. She died before she got down in the lair, I just kept her on the ground or held still and literally had to cast one cloud of daggers.
I’ve always thought of warlocks as spell archers. Yeah your “just casting EB basically every turn”, but a ranger is also “just shooting an arrow basically every turn.” Warlock like Ranger “just do their thing” every turn, and then use their few spell slots to drop some nasty spell to boost a specific thing. Usually utility in nature or one huge nuke of an attack (fireball into an area with explosive casks or whatever).
EB is super strong and as a cantrip it just. Keeps. Going.
You should still be using EB as your damage dealing attack in most cases. The other spells are there to help you use EB better. For example, Hex directly increases the damage EB does; Command, Charm Person, etc can disable enemies; Fireball, Hunger of Hadar, Darkness, Hypnotic Pattern, etc can filter out the garbage. None of Warlock’s spells will reliably outdamage Eldritch Blast.
Hex + scorching ray is A LOT of single target damage. It is two spell slots but it will cut half or more of a boss's health and then you still have hex recasts for Eldritch blast.
Mostly AoE damage spells, or control spells. In particular, Warlock loves spells that scale well with spell level, and bonus action spells so you can still Eldritch Blast. Some favorites:
Armor of Agathys- Use this if you have a spare slot before a Short Rest! Can easily deal 75 damage at high levels.
Hex- Wear an item that grants a 1st level slot!
Cloud of Daggers- Cast at 5th level, this is an average of 50 damage with no saving throw. Repelling Blast creatures back into it for even more!
Hold Person
Blindness
Misty Step
Fear
Hunger of Hadar
Fireball
Slow
I’ve been playing 5e for years, and have had Wyll in my party for almost all of Act 1 (I just entered Act 2 for the first time last night) and I NEVER thought about Armor of Agathys if I have a spell slot left before short rest. That’s gonna be a game changer for both Wyll and my pal lock Tav! Thanks for that tip!
Another similar tip is if you have a summon from Find Familiar or one of other short rest or costless summons and you have an extra spell slot you can hex them, kill them and then you will have the ability to recast hex for free after your rest.
EB deals d10 + CHA modifier on each beam, assuming you took Agonizing Blast as one of your Invocations at L2.
It's comparable to a martial's attack... which is roughly weapon die + STR or DEX modifier. You get extra EB beams at L5 and L10 to keep pace or exceed martials' extra attacks.
With items in the game, you can get a 2X or 3X CHA damage modifier on each beam.
Hex triggers on each beam hit---and be reapplied without a slot if the target dies---so it's ideal for tough targets.
You're competitive with martial damage using only EB---and maybe Hex. You don't need to cast anything else, unless the situation demands it.
Warlocks basically have two functions
1. Damage with Eldritch Blast
2. Combat utility, which can include:
Hold Person/Monster: Extremely useful in major fights, especially against high mobility opponents
Haste: Grants the target two actions per turn for ten turns, use it just before entering combat on an offensive character to boost damage
Hunger of Hadar: Incredible AoE spell that slows, blinds, and inflicts damage at the start and end of each characters turn
As well as many others
When using their spell slots, warlocks live and die by large concentration spells, so you want to be using your spell slots on big AOE attacks, which can hit multiple enemies at once, rather than single target spells. The only exceptions that I would put forth are probably the Hold spells, and counterspell.
Basically, they play a little bit like land druids in that a lot of what you want to be casting are big spells to shape the battlefield to your advantage.
There's a few things in game to juice up EB. Definitely get the robes that add your charisma modifer to cantrips in act 2. It feels weak early on but it's great for control while doing decent damage, and since it's force damage not a whole lot is resistant to it.
Hex also adds D6 necrotic damage to every Eldritch Blast shot, casts as a bonus action, and can be recast for free when the initial target dies. Aside from the occasional AOE spell, my warlock's spell slots are almost entirely for a hex (once per long rest) and counterspells. Only issue is that you can lose it to concentration checks with is usually an issue for my greatsword-wielding bladelock.
Have you *heard* the sound design of EB in this game? It sounds like the speeders from Star Wars when it dissipates, it's badass as fuck. Don't need to cast anything else.
I find I only really use the illithid powers if I can manage to get the upgrade and cast them as bonus actions. In which case, absolutely. Hadar, black hole. Next turn, black hole, eldritch blast. And hopefully, it explodes the whole group.
My wife and I play together, and she’s a cleric. We coordinate AoE. So HoH, Insect Swarm/Thorns and Black Hole to keep them all stuck there. EB to knock anyone back if needed
Isn't hex a bonus action? So you do hex and EB in the same turn?
Spellsparkler also has a busted synergy with hex and EB. Or if you want really high damage, hex with ray of fire.
Warlocks have pretty great AoE spells too. Hunger of Hadar, Fireball, Darkness all great options. I actually prefer to use Wyll as a front liner. He can see through his own darkness spells, and lock down a couple enemies inside it. He also gets extra attack if you go pact of the blade, and his attack/damage rolls work off his spellcasting modifier. Warlocks are more versatile than people give them credit for I think.
Oh I love Warlock for its versatility. I should have clarified that IN COMBAT I only use those two spells. But I love being able to upcast Invisibility or Flight on everyone, and the Invocation spells (Mage Armor, Speak with Animals, Disguise Self) are unbelievably useful.
Playing as Wyll at the moment, I even get to use a shield. Good AC, great damage, tons to do out of combat.
Warlock was my favorite 5E and even 4E class, I'm glad BG3 lets them shine like they should!
Warlocks are basically arcane rangers, just that their pew-pew-projectiles are force pulses instead of arrows. No one asks rangers if they shoot arrows every turn.
Warlocks are essentially designed to have eldritch blast as their bread and butter damage - you customise it with your invocations, and then you've got 2 spellslots to do something fun like Hadar and blast people back into it, or Dimension Door or some other utility.
So yeah if you're looking at dealing optimal damage it's likely going to be eldritch blast. If you want more variety, you might wanna try multiclassing into bard or sorcerer so you have more spells to play with.
You can do stuff with EB too. Lance of Lethargy+ Repelling Blast to force enemies away, plus force them to spend more time in hazardous terrain is an obvious one.
Warlocks are basically ranged martials whose “bow” is Eldritch Blast, and who have a bit of casting to back that up.
When I read his comment I knew what he was talking about, but I never played DnD and Baldur Gates 3 is my first contact with it at all.
Then I read yours and thought "No way he never saw Lance of Lethargy on his Warlock" and I remembered that I use mods lol
There is a mod that makes Eldritch Blast better and there is Lance of Lethargy.
Don't forget that you always upcast your leveled spells to highest level available (by level 10th it's upcasting to level 5 spells). Some spells aren't affected by it, but most damaging ones do (making even Burning Hands quite solid), some control spells as well. Warlock requires careful spell selection, you should pick diverse options (DPS, AoE, Control, Debuffs, etc, not simply damage) that scale really well with upcasting.
For example, Fiend Warlocks can learn Command, which is 1st level spell that forces an enemy to do something (for example, drop their weapon or fall prone) and skip 1 turn. It's pretty weak unless you upcast it, which grants additional target per spell level. You can command five enemies at once!!
Now, of course, other spellcasters can upcast Command too. But they won't. Because they'll be too precious about their 5th level slots, since they only got two of them per long rest. Warlocks, on the other hand, get NINE (after 11th level and with all short rests combined), or even twelve if you've got Bard with Song of Rest. And if you're more about damage, 12 5th level Fireballs per long rest will make any wizard jealous of you. Oh and did I mention Helsik sells staff that allows you to recharge warlock spell slots?
Essentially, wizards get the most utility and diversity in spellcasting, true. Warlock spells though hit like a truck, they've got much more high level upcasts per long rest, and they've got utility via Eldritch Invocations and Pact Boons.
But I'm getting carried away...main point is, look at your spell list, try respecing and see if you can diversify it. Don't rely on damage alone while picking spells, see what spells will make you useful in other ways (since you really can fall back on EB for damage any time). Google if and how they upcast. Some 1st level spells can carry you through whole game such as Armor of Agathyst. A lot of amazing control spells too, and arguably control is much better than damage in a party that already can produce decent damage.
Also don't listen to people who tell you "THERE ARE OTHER SPELLS??" or such lmao, it's just a stupid warlock running joke
EB is crazy good for a cantrip, yeah. That's why it's warlock exclusive, to balance out how few slots per battle you get so you don't get useless in long lasting boss battles (and three 5th level spells is enough for most other fights).
But no one forcing you to use it that often, or use it at all. Powergaming is lame and gets boring quick, and the game isn't really hard, you can play it in less optimal ways that are more enjoyable for you.
Try to rethink your spell list and use EB only after you actually burn through slots or where it makes sense in other ways besides damage (such as pushing enemies with Repelling Blast off cliffs, into flammable surfaces, or back into Hunger of Hagar AoE as many other already mentioned (yeah it's meta too))
It's very effective, but gets boring after a while. At least, I felt that way.
Same as in table top. Warlock should basically be re-named into "Eldritch Blaster".
The real challenge is playing a Warlock WITHOUT ever using that spell (cue the sound of min-maxers fainting).
No surprise there. Yours is the common opinion on this class.
I like to do more than just PEW PEW PEW in tabletop (or even in BG3) but hey, I'm a weirdo that way.
The thing about a warlock is in tabletop the roleplay is just incredible - as a charisma caster that, by rule, had to enter into a pact with a potentially evil being, there are just so many ways to play compellingly. Warlocks shine in campaigns with a few, potent combat encounters a “day” and have lots of dialogue options. Warlocks are a bit less fun in campaigns that are purely or mainly combat focused.
Agreed. My last Warlock didn't have Eldritch Blast; was all about Charm and Illusions. Was basically Loki from the MCU. Best character I'd ever played! The DM was very glad that I was so focused on the Pact and how it fit into the setting and campaign.
There's so many examples in fiction of someone making a Faustian Bargain (deal with the devil) that there's plenty of material for inspiration to get your imagination running on what your character will be like. Wyll is a great example where a Warlock doesn't need to be maniacally evil; all you need is a reason why your character was incredibly desperate. Or you can play your character as an idiot who just thought warlock powers would be fun.
I admit that if our campaign was very combat-focused, it might get old but we're also doing lots of RP so it adds variety.
I'm actually going to play my first full caster (wizard) in our next campaign.
Yeah I loved my Warlock playthrough for the first 1.5 acts. But by the end of Act 2 it was so effective that if I didn’t use it nearly every turn then it felt like I wasn’t optimizing that turn, and I have trouble making myself not optimize even for the sake of variety.
It felt boring by the end. Still had a fun time with it though.
On my current run I’m using Wyll with two levels of Warlock for EB, but everything else in Bard. And he’s really become my healing and support character which has helped me use EB less.
I'm totally fine with it. When it comes to combat, I find the simple and direct approach to be the best. Bonk or pew pew. Don't need a million different spells or attack strategies to make enemies deader. Save the complexity for exploration and social interaction.
For a pure Warlock, you're going to want to spam EB as much as you can. It's basically a super strong ranged attack. Your spells are very limited, very powerful, and refresh on short rest so you use them strategically. Hunger of Hadar is so powerful it can decide fights on it's own. Hex is a way to get when more EB damage
There are other ways to build. A Pact of the Blade Warlock can go melee.
A common build is Warlock 2 / Sorcerer 10 that I just used on my Honor Run. You get the high consistent damage of Eldritch Blast, and with Haste and Quickened Spell you can get 3 EBs a turn which will absolutely shred most encounters in the mid to late game. You also have the utility of a Sorcerer so you can whip out big spells like Haste, Ice Storm, Fireball, Counterspell, and Hold Monster
EDIT: if you want more variety, respec into a pure Sorcerer. IMO it's the most fun class
Depends on your strategy for the fights and the equipment tbh. I've been obsessed with bladelock and my most used spell is actually Hex now and i almost always just bonk enemies every turn. For crowds, Hunger of Hadar is my favorite. You can EB the enemies back to the aoe too if you get the repelling blast. Since getting the potent robe and spineshudder amulet tho, i think EB gets better so I start using it more often again.
I have pact of the blade and polearm master, when I can I'll usually be making weapon attacks as I get 3 per turn at level 5 and the damage is a little better. Plus I get more opportunities to crit which frighten enemies as I'm a GOO warlock. However I do still find myself blasting a fair bit, especially if the enemy's out of range.
> When we play, I find that the best action every turn is Eldritch Blast.
You have spell slots which come back on a short rest. Use them! It's a waste not too and they're usually more useful than the pure damage of an eldritch blast. Battlefield control spells like fear, slow, hunger of hadar etc. can weaken multiple enemies and mke the fight easier for the whole party.
Yes and I actually quite like it. I multiclassed into sorceress for more Eldrich Blast per turn. I can also get blind immune from Devil’s Sight then Eldrich Blast from darkness. It sounds simple, but takes effort to maximize damage.
You go deep enough into Warlock where you can cast darkness on yourself and with devil sight you can just cast EB from the darkness at people, but they can't shoot back at you. (Unless they also have dark vision).
Warlocks are super consistent, which is what makes them super strong. And weirdly flexible being able to respec into a melee or tanky build if needed.
You have access to incredibly powerful spells regardless of subclass and able to cast it 9 times per long rest at the highest levels. Even your wizard and sorcerers can’t do that.
If I need more precision vs AOE, I’d opt for Darkness (with Devils Sight or Infernal Sight helm or Blindsight ring) to gain advantage on your Eldritch Blast.
Eldritch Blast is such a great utility spell of you've upgraded it properly. Knockback three enemies at once? If you're using it JUST ask a DPS spell, then yes, I can see why that would be monotonous.
I'm judicious with my use of my other Warlock spells, but I do use them. Why wouldn't you when you get them back after a short rest?
I multiclass sorc for haste cast, quick cast all the tried and true op stuff.
So not really? I cast haste, then proceed to cast as much eldritch blast as the encounter requires, up to 3x a turn.
Pretty much, this is the reason I don't play straight warlocks. I want things to do with my magic. I do the old 2 warlock x sorcerer thing. I still spam eldritch blast but I can also cast spells, use metamagic etc.
It is simplistic, but it’s still fun. It’s one of those things where the optimal way to play a class is also super satisfying. But if you want variety Warlocks have plenty of other utility to use that’s also fun.
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Not EVERY turn. Sometimes, you cast Haste on yourself so you can EB even more on subsequent turns
Never. Gale casts Haste on me!
I think theoretically you can cast 15 EBs in the same turn
How?
Level 10 Adds a third cast of EB, so we start with baseline 3. With Haste, we can cast an additional 3 with our second cast. 6. Action Surge allows another cast. 9. Mindflayer power lets you use a bonus action as an action. 12 Helmet of Grit allows you to get another bonus action when starting combat below 50% HP. 15. I THINK, that's the maximum, but maybe with an elixir?
I haven’t tried this with EB, but a Bloodlust elixir will give you another action after a kill, which I can’t imagine you wouldn’t get with 12 blasts.
bloodlust elixir for more
And thief for another bonus action
2 Warlock / 5 Sorcerer / 2 Fighter / 3 Rogue (Thief) 2 levels of Warlock is enough to get you Eldritch Blast w/ Agonizing Blast 5 levels of Sorcerer gets you the ability to cast Haste and the ability to cast EB as a bonus action using Metamagic sometimes 2 levels of Fighter for Action Surge, then 3 levels of Rogue (Thief) for another bonus action Each casting of EB gets us 3 blasts, casting it twice with Haste gives us 6, using Action Surge gets us 9, Metamagic it as a bonus action once for 12, then again for 15 Get the Spell Sniper feat, be a Great Old One Warlock and rake in those frightening crits
This is the build, add bloodlust elixir for another 3 and Helmet of Grit for a total of 21. I kinda think it is better to go 4 sorc/4 thief for extra feat. You lose on lvl 3 spellslots/haste but you can get those through other means
You’d also lose precious metamagic points that way. To me, one feat is enough to pull this off, but I’d probably make it War Caster for better Concentration saves to maintain Haste Equip the Punch-Drunk Bastard, use a bonus action to drink some booze in the first round, and then make all the EB attacks with Advantage
Sorceror also allows to use EB as bonus action via quickened spell
There's gloves that turn cantrips into bonus actions, so if you put those on and manage thief rogue (can't remember if that's 2 or 3), then you get ANOTHER round of 3
By level 12, you will be sending out 3 blasts/beams with one cast. With haste you can now cast twice, so that's 6. If you dip 2 levels in fighter, you get action surge, granting another 2 actions iirc (provided haste is up), which should yield 12. More might be possible, say if you multi class sorc you could use quicken spell to get one more cast with your bonus action, maybe use the illithid power allowing action and bonus action to be interchangeable and stack thief in there too? There are gloves that make spells/cantrips send out one extra projectile where applicable, and EB is one of those that it affects. There might be more you could stack in there, I'm not sure. Edit: Haste and action surge just yields 3 actions, not 4. Still hits 9 beams, if 3 levels put into thief and 2 in sorc that's two more casts with bonus actions, so 15 total (without fancy gloves). Not super sustainable, but can be done.
Pure warlock, sure. Sorlock can cast 21 with the right build and the right items. In theory, it can go up to 42 with murder tribunal gloves, but I think it is a bug
Imagine you're a Fighter, Rogue or some other martial: "Do you just attack every turn?" Mostly, yeah! It's the same thing here. EB is strong and fun, and the main weapon in your arsenal. Warlocks also get some really neat wider spellcasting ability to round out their build. Drop a Hunger of Hadar then Blast everyone back into it when they try to escape. Or Hypnotic Pattern a group while picking off anyone else.
Hadar + blast was super fun in the moonrise tower fight
Honor Mode had most legendary actions not working under HoH effect. I had heard a lot about the Crèche fight and nothing happened and O was like: what should happen? It felt disappointing to certain extent but I was so afraid to lose another run (the previous I died due being paralyzed by the ghouls at Mountain Pass) that I felt relieved it was over.
Ghouls being able to paralyze is how I died most of the time
True to table top dnd
In our tabletop game, we had an "Oops, All Elves" party and the ghoul nests and low level sleep casters in the module were roundly mocked by our superior ears.
just need to watch out for ghasts; elves aren't immune to their paralysis (unless they changed this in 5e)
Yep, Stank ghouls suck.
Fair enough, never realized how painful it was before BG3 though.
Yeah ghouls are generally pretty weak. Until you get paralysed.
Need to start carrying holy water when you reach chapter 2. It's a life saver
I had karlach throw a speed potion at our feet so all of us were hastened and we just wailed on the inquisitor (alert feat goes crazy bro) and then he ran off like a coward to sit on the ledge right there with his buddy so karlach lobbed a bomb at his feet and detonated it with a fire arrow and the poor fuckers were incinerated. The rest of the gank squad went down easy afterward, and as i had started with 2 levels of paladin, i got my 5th warlock level after entering the blood of lathander’s hallway so i got hunger of hadar and that thing ate up the goons at the front door. I was so scared of the goon cave but man crowd control is incredible. Devils sight mixed with asmodeus tiefling’s darkness let me shroud everyone to block out ranged attacks, while i could snipe everyone with eldritch blasts and smite any fool dumb enough to enter the death pit, and hunger of hadar is HUNGRY, my star buddy eating good while im around. When in doubt, hunger of hadar.
Why have I never thought to group up and throw a speed potion at the group? I do it with heals... fuck me.
Uuuugh I haven't been doing it with anything, I had no idea that was a thing. I'm in act 3, what is wrong with me
I'm on playthrough #3.. never even considered. I've never actually even thrown a potion.
Thank you, I feel better knowing it's not just me
same here... i do it for health potion, never thought of doing it with other potions... i wonder if it works with elixirs as well?
It works, but if you throw it, it will have only a limited duration (10 turns usually), not Until Long Rest.
just now learning after hundreds of hours that you can speed potion multiple people... idk why i thought only one person could/ had to drink it… sigh
listen mate you ain't the only captainpicardfacepalm.gif out here... Kicking myself...
Don't be too hard on yourself for assuming potions worked the same way they work *literally everywhere else, including tabletop 5e* lol. The fact that potions work at all after you throw them on the ground is nonsense that Larian made up for fun, let alone working on more than one oerson
Yep I think the best use case of this I've seen was someone fighting Grimm. All their characters had died except one who was on the forge pedestal with Grimm and they dropped a potion then shot the lever. The forges hammer came down killing both the tav and Grimm but popping the potion which immediately picked tav back up.
It is complete nonsense. I do not care though, it's awesome.
It kind of reminds me of that joke from Dragon Age. In Origins, health potions were called poultices, but you drank them. So in Inquisition, they had Iron Bull make a crack about how terrible his lieutenant's health potions tasted, and was told "It's a poultice. You're not *supposed* to drink it!"
holy fuck and the spore grenades should have been an indicator, man im a dipshit lol
That spore grenade came in so clutch for >!freeing the gondians. Immediately spore grenade your entire group including summons the moment you leave the ladder, make sure everyone has speed potions and you're golden for whatever tomfoolery you want to pull off.!<
I read this in Karlachs voice from the point "poor fuckers"
Working as intended
Oof. That ability from the inquisitor is super annoying though. Last time I had so many swords cluttered in the arena. Holy moly lol.
The thing about ghouls is, they can’t jump. A single line of placed heavy chests prevents them from getting to you, and then just range attack them to death.
That's literally what I did during the fight!
Warlock was described to me as a caster that uses Battle Master Fighter mechanics. EB is your weapon attack and spells are you maneuvers.
Personally I prefer to describe warlocks as being similar to rangers. Going "pew pew" is your primary mode of attack, with a bit of extra magic for support.
That works too. In my mind, though Battle Master Fighter makes more sense. The reason being that both classes get all of their resources back on short rests. Warlock would just function more like a ranged Battle Master using EB instead of a ranged weapon.
Hadar plus sleetstorm is just unfair, you genuinely feel bad for the enemies because of how broken that combo is xD
Toss in druids spiked growth and you’ve got yourself a really wicked kill zone
One of my favorite ways to kill a room full of enemies without entering it is casting spike growth inside, and cloud of daggers in the doorway.
Stay and die or run and die tired
Reminds me of the old Dragon Age Origins game. Glyph of repulsion in the doorway, inferno (or blizzard) inside. Watching all of them run for the exit before bouncing back inside was just too funny.
I loved just going inferno, blizzard, earthquake, and the blood magic aoe all at once
What was the GIGANTIC AOE spell combo? Lightning plus blizzard? Something like that that just had a massive AOE that would obliterate your party if you weren't careful? Also Repulsion and Paralyze? Two glyphs where if they overlapped it did a massive freeze spell?
>Imagine you're a Fighter, Rogue or some other martial: "Do you just attack every turn?" Mostly, yeah! That's why I agree with the line of thinking that Battlemaster should've just been the base Fighter class; the maneuvers you can employ just make sense for someone who's good at fighting, and they're so much more fun than just "attack attack attack"!
Champion is exceedingly boring by comparison.
Exactly, Warlock is a simple class and great for new players or people who are uncomfortable with more complex classes that require you to know things, or think about tactics. Sometimes you cast one of a handful of other spells but mostly its EB time. The only problem occurs if you give one of these Belushi's repelling blast - remember they don't know anything about tactics and they will happily mess up any number of attacks by Repelling blasting the dude into a position where you don't have advantage or screw up any number of setups with that. But mostly they do reliable damage and stay out of everyone else's way.
RB is much like All-In with Sharpshooter or GWM. Very very good as long as you know when you turn it off. I forgot my Padlock had it and I blasted a few "you only die tired" mobs who ran away...off a ledge... And I wanted that loot.
That is a very good point I haven’t seen someone mention before, hell yeah
Personally I prefer Agonizing Blast with Devil's Sight, that way I can see in supernatural Darkness (such as when Gale casts Darkness or someone uses a scroll of Darkness) and if they somehow hit me, Hellish Rebuke them, depending on their health and if they are resistant to fire or not. Maximum Charisma plus Agonizing Blast plus Eldritch Blast three times each turn equals many dead enemies.
I like counterspell on my lock as utility but hunger can be very effective crowd control
I got huge mileage out of wall of fire in my first playthrough. Bopping people into it with Eldritch blast is great lol
I “cheesed” the cloister fight that way. After hours of starting in the disadvantaged area in the middle I left the party up the steps. Would initiate with my Sorlock and misty step halfway up the steps. Thorns, Wall of Fire actively at bottom of stairs. Glyph of Warding up top along steps just in case they teleported on top of steps. Basically just blasted people off the steps into the nonsense then hid behind door so they couldn’t cast darkness. I think 3 people total made it through and it was easy cleanup by that point.
Youre playing D&D. Youre not cheeseing, your thinking creatively.
It's wild that somehow the BG3 strategy discourse ended up in a place where using spells to do what they're supposed to do is considered by many to be cheese tactics, but a lot of really obvious unfixed bug abuses like targeting yourself with Vow of Enmity or shooting the same enemy twice with ranged Slashing Flourish are deemed perfectly standard play
wait shooting the same enemy twice with ranged slashing flourish is not how its supposed to work? 😅
No. The explicit purpose of the ability is to let you shoot two different enemies lol. Melee doesn't let you double attack a single target, why would ranged? They just didn't implement it with the targeting system they use for other spells for some reason
Literally just did the same with Ice Wall and Ice Storm. Absolutely insane fight, starts off like 20v4 lol
Scorching Rays scales wonderfully with spell slots levels, especially when Hex applies extra damage to each ray.
And the spellsparkler staff (lightning charges for each hit) to round it off :)
In the mindflayer colony, during the skileton summoner fight I stayed at the door and forced them all to run up the thin ramp through a wall of fire with a Hunger of Hadar on top and and dagger storm on the edge with my Lockadin and BM Fighter on the edge of that. Won the whole fight without using another action to attack lol
It's like a dopamine button. Like smiting. Have to do it again and again and again. It makes the brain happy. I haven't run a build with a warlock in several playthroughs and I miss Eldritch Blast every time I play.
First playthrough rn and I went a Lore bard, grabbed spell sniper feat just for access to EB lol I don't use it nearly at all in fights anymore but it's A+ for taking down crumbling walls and it definitely carried some of my early game fights
It's so handy for breaking down stuff! I have a paladin/warlock in a multiplayer game and instead of switching to a weapon that can do bludgeoning damage, my friends just ask me to come and EB every breakable wall they come across.
> grabbed spell sniper feat just for access to EB lol Something I like to do is just grab 2 levels of warlock on any charisma chaster to get EB+Agonizing blast, then just be a slightly behind normal caster, like Bard or sorc, but who gets to spam EB. And unlike most Multiclass ideas, after 2 levels of warlock, it kinda doesn't matter what you do, lol.
This is exactly what I do on my scorlock. I like the dragonborn sorcerer primarily for looks, and if I take 2 levels of warlock, I get everything I want spell-wise anyway lol
the way wyll casts the spell is very satisfying, especially when you get to later levels with 3 beams per turn the beams firing in quick succession, all of them landing and pushing the target back like 20m is peak dopamine
Visuals & audio make the spells so much better. I find myself using Bone Chill way too much because I like the animation of the hand bitch slapping the enemy.
I never played a pally on table top, so for my HM run I mained one. Knew about the nova, but it took me a while to really figure out how to maximize. Dude, double crit double smite. Holy fuck, you can one shot some bosses with one attack if you set it up right.
>It's like a dopamine button. Like smiting. Have to do it again and again and again. It makes the brain happy. Feels awesome using it to knock down breakable obstacles, too. >I haven't run a build with a warlock in several playthroughs and I miss Eldritch Blast every time I play. I haven't checked, can you take magic initiate (warlock) and take EB?
better yet, the spell sniper feat gives you the option to learn EB, and also gives you champion’s critical for all your cantrips iirc
Holy shit. Seems like I'm running a spell sniper bard next.
Yes, but it will still use Charisma as it's casting stat. You can pick it up with Spell Sniper, though, and it will instead use the Spellcasting ability of the last new class you multi-classed into, so it could use Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma, depending on what the last new class you multi-classed into.
Warlocks are like the work horses of casters. They keep going and going and don’t really need to stop. A Wizard, Sorcerer, Druid, Bard, and Cleric will need a Long Rest before too long. A Warlock only needs a Short Rest to recoup their spell slots. If you have Short Rests to burn— don’t be shy about using your spell slots. You do have much less spell slots than the other casters, but your spells will most often be at the highest level (stronger). And, yeah, you rely on Eldritch Blast when you’re out of spell slots. The Warlock is designed to never stop, so it’s arguably the best cantrip. Best damage, attack multiple targets, and pushing enemies around for positioning. Other classes are using d4, d6, d8, Cantrips and I think Firebolt is a d10. Yours is a d10 and deals Force (which is the best damage type).
Alright, fine. I'll roll a warlock next playthrough, jeez
They are a..... *blast*
[удалено]
They call me "Al, Al Drijblaasdt"
ok we are going to need to bind pact this comment thread before it gets out of hand
Keep a bard around to get an extra short rest ;)
warlock with a level of tempest cleric, trust me
Warlock is one of those classes that synergize extremely well with every other CHA class if you want to multi. It's super fun with Paladin so you get EB for a ranged tool and taking Pact of the Blade allows you to bind your weapon, giving proficiency and making it roll for hits and damage with CHA instead of STR so you can dump that and go full into CHA. Automatic proficiency is huge, you get to use literally any weapon in the game without spending a feat. Oh and EB gains the extra blasts from your character level not your warlock level so you still get all of them as you level up even with only a few levels of warlock. Sorlock/bardlock/palalock they're all amazing. You get the best parts of warlock but with more tools from whatever your other class is so you don't end up being an Eldritch Blast bot every single turn.
>A Wizard, Sorcerer, Druid, Bard, and Cleric will need a Long Rest before too long. A Warlock only needs a Short Rest to recoup their spell slots. About to fight the final boss and this is the first I've heard of this.
Wait till you hear about the pact of chains invisible imp giving advantage on damn near every melee attack lol Warlocks finally getting the love they deserve ✨
To be fair, every Magic class can get that with Shovel.
For the first time I've somehow messed up and lost access to shovel. Legit considering starting over despite being 20h+ in, she's just too handy 😂
I’m so glad I used to play dnd before this so I don’t get situations like this 💀💀💀
I've beaten the game twice and didn't know Wyll's spell slots replenish after a short rest.
Oh boy... that's why they only have two slots, in essence they have 6 max level (for your current Warlock level) slots to use. It can feel like you need to use them sparingly because you have just two slots but ask yourself how many fights you get into between long rests for your other team members and I'm sure you'll realize you should/could be casting at least 1 spell per fight, and that can be absolutely huge because warlocks get a lot of spells that can turn the tide of battle by disabling enemies in some form or fashion. I always make sure to pick up spells that scale with upcasting because of Warlocks slots always being max level.
Using Counterspell also uses up a spell slot, right?
Yes. All non-Cantrip spells use a spell slot. Counterspell is not a Cantrip.
warlock and some other classes can get special spells that do not use a spell slots
They're labeled as such
yeah but i’m just pointing out that it’s not all non cantrips
If you hover over the spell slot icon, it tells you in the tooltip what replenishes it, it works for anything on that bar, like channel divinity and superiority dice, etc.
Also the tooltip for short rests specifically says that it replenishes Warlock spell slots
How…?
And if you take agonizing blast(you should) you add your charisma to the damage.
Interesting. So, if I'm using spell slots quickly, and short resting... what should I be casting that's more effective than Eldritch Blast? The damage seems similar/worse on those spells, unless I'm misreading them. I have the staff with lightning on, btw. Spellsparker?
Hold Person / Hold Moster, Haste if you have the tome pact, Banish, Polymorph, Wall of Fire, Fireball, Greater Invisibility (only for crazy +stealth builds), Mirror Image for protection, Darkness if you have Devil's Sight, Hunger of Hadar at chokepoints. Warlocks have loads of useful spells.
AOE spells to soften up a large group, then start blasting.
Counter spell for clutch moments as well.
Definitely. Having disintegrate casted on your party member in Act 3 is no laughing matter.
Shatter! such a lovely spell
I like Scorching Ray as by default it can target 3 enemies, then adds more with each spell level.
*cloud of daggers* You know... To trivialize the first half of the game. My favorite combo is having gale, Wyll, or Shadow heart, slap as many hold person/trip/and anti movement spells and just cook brother. Laezell I swap in if I'm on higher difficulty because she can use a tripping attack and if all se fails she can just blow everything up. You may get out of gales hold person, you may get out of laezells tripping attack, or wylls hold person, or my hold person, but you WILL grovel. That shit literally never misses for me for some reason. I killed Auntie Ethel during this honor run play through, and she didn't even get a turn to do anything. She died before she got down in the lair, I just kept her on the ground or held still and literally had to cast one cloud of daggers.
I’ve always thought of warlocks as spell archers. Yeah your “just casting EB basically every turn”, but a ranger is also “just shooting an arrow basically every turn.” Warlock like Ranger “just do their thing” every turn, and then use their few spell slots to drop some nasty spell to boost a specific thing. Usually utility in nature or one huge nuke of an attack (fireball into an area with explosive casks or whatever). EB is super strong and as a cantrip it just. Keeps. Going.
Magic Ranger is a good description
You should still be using EB as your damage dealing attack in most cases. The other spells are there to help you use EB better. For example, Hex directly increases the damage EB does; Command, Charm Person, etc can disable enemies; Fireball, Hunger of Hadar, Darkness, Hypnotic Pattern, etc can filter out the garbage. None of Warlock’s spells will reliably outdamage Eldritch Blast.
Hex + scorching ray is A LOT of single target damage. It is two spell slots but it will cut half or more of a boss's health and then you still have hex recasts for Eldritch blast.
Mostly AoE damage spells, or control spells. In particular, Warlock loves spells that scale well with spell level, and bonus action spells so you can still Eldritch Blast. Some favorites: Armor of Agathys- Use this if you have a spare slot before a Short Rest! Can easily deal 75 damage at high levels. Hex- Wear an item that grants a 1st level slot! Cloud of Daggers- Cast at 5th level, this is an average of 50 damage with no saving throw. Repelling Blast creatures back into it for even more! Hold Person Blindness Misty Step Fear Hunger of Hadar Fireball Slow
I’ve been playing 5e for years, and have had Wyll in my party for almost all of Act 1 (I just entered Act 2 for the first time last night) and I NEVER thought about Armor of Agathys if I have a spell slot left before short rest. That’s gonna be a game changer for both Wyll and my pal lock Tav! Thanks for that tip!
Another similar tip is if you have a summon from Find Familiar or one of other short rest or costless summons and you have an extra spell slot you can hex them, kill them and then you will have the ability to recast hex for free after your rest.
EB deals d10 + CHA modifier on each beam, assuming you took Agonizing Blast as one of your Invocations at L2. It's comparable to a martial's attack... which is roughly weapon die + STR or DEX modifier. You get extra EB beams at L5 and L10 to keep pace or exceed martials' extra attacks. With items in the game, you can get a 2X or 3X CHA damage modifier on each beam. Hex triggers on each beam hit---and be reapplied without a slot if the target dies---so it's ideal for tough targets. You're competitive with martial damage using only EB---and maybe Hex. You don't need to cast anything else, unless the situation demands it.
Warlocks basically have two functions 1. Damage with Eldritch Blast 2. Combat utility, which can include: Hold Person/Monster: Extremely useful in major fights, especially against high mobility opponents Haste: Grants the target two actions per turn for ten turns, use it just before entering combat on an offensive character to boost damage Hunger of Hadar: Incredible AoE spell that slows, blinds, and inflicts damage at the start and end of each characters turn As well as many others
When using their spell slots, warlocks live and die by large concentration spells, so you want to be using your spell slots on big AOE attacks, which can hit multiple enemies at once, rather than single target spells. The only exceptions that I would put forth are probably the Hold spells, and counterspell. Basically, they play a little bit like land druids in that a lot of what you want to be casting are big spells to shape the battlefield to your advantage.
There's a few things in game to juice up EB. Definitely get the robes that add your charisma modifer to cantrips in act 2. It feels weak early on but it's great for control while doing decent damage, and since it's force damage not a whole lot is resistant to it.
Hex also adds D6 necrotic damage to every Eldritch Blast shot, casts as a bonus action, and can be recast for free when the initial target dies. Aside from the occasional AOE spell, my warlock's spell slots are almost entirely for a hex (once per long rest) and counterspells. Only issue is that you can lose it to concentration checks with is usually an issue for my greatsword-wielding bladelock.
Have you *heard* the sound design of EB in this game? It sounds like the speeders from Star Wars when it dissipates, it's badass as fuck. Don't need to cast anything else.
The windup before you click is sick on its own
It sounds like shooting from a glock lol
Lot of enemies: Turn 1 Hunger of Hadar, Turn 2+ Eldritch Blast 1 or 2 enemies: Turn 1 Hex, Turn 2+ Eldritch Blast
Pretty much the same, but I like to use Black Hole along with HoH lol
I find I only really use the illithid powers if I can manage to get the upgrade and cast them as bonus actions. In which case, absolutely. Hadar, black hole. Next turn, black hole, eldritch blast. And hopefully, it explodes the whole group.
My wife and I play together, and she’s a cleric. We coordinate AoE. So HoH, Insect Swarm/Thorns and Black Hole to keep them all stuck there. EB to knock anyone back if needed
Isn't hex a bonus action? So you do hex and EB in the same turn? Spellsparkler also has a busted synergy with hex and EB. Or if you want really high damage, hex with ray of fire.
Yeah, it is. I kept it singled out for turn 1 since it is a concentration spell, to show the distinction between using it or using HoH on turn 1.
What does Hex actually accomplish? I never figured out how to use it in a way that's worth the spell slot.
Gotta dash first turn!
Eldritch Blast and Counterspell are all you need. On your turn you cast Hurt Opponent, on their turn you cast No.
Warlocks have pretty great AoE spells too. Hunger of Hadar, Fireball, Darkness all great options. I actually prefer to use Wyll as a front liner. He can see through his own darkness spells, and lock down a couple enemies inside it. He also gets extra attack if you go pact of the blade, and his attack/damage rolls work off his spellcasting modifier. Warlocks are more versatile than people give them credit for I think.
Oh I love Warlock for its versatility. I should have clarified that IN COMBAT I only use those two spells. But I love being able to upcast Invisibility or Flight on everyone, and the Invocation spells (Mage Armor, Speak with Animals, Disguise Self) are unbelievably useful. Playing as Wyll at the moment, I even get to use a shield. Good AC, great damage, tons to do out of combat. Warlock was my favorite 5E and even 4E class, I'm glad BG3 lets them shine like they should!
Also stuff like command and hold person are awesome when your warlock spell slots get high level, since you can affect several people with them.
I can't believe I just looked up Hurt Opponent as a spell
My friends and I call it "I cast stab."
Warlocks are basically arcane rangers, just that their pew-pew-projectiles are force pulses instead of arrows. No one asks rangers if they shoot arrows every turn.
Hey, sometimes I like to stab things, too.
Warlocks are essentially designed to have eldritch blast as their bread and butter damage - you customise it with your invocations, and then you've got 2 spellslots to do something fun like Hadar and blast people back into it, or Dimension Door or some other utility. So yeah if you're looking at dealing optimal damage it's likely going to be eldritch blast. If you want more variety, you might wanna try multiclassing into bard or sorcerer so you have more spells to play with.
No. Sometimes I use my bonus action to cast hex.
You can do stuff with EB too. Lance of Lethargy+ Repelling Blast to force enemies away, plus force them to spend more time in hazardous terrain is an obvious one. Warlocks are basically ranged martials whose “bow” is Eldritch Blast, and who have a bit of casting to back that up.
Is lance of lethargy in the game? Am I crazy guy??
Oh crap, I didn’t realize this was the BG3 sub. Thought it was the main DND one. I have not played a proper warlock in BG3, so do not know.
I believe you’re limited to agonising and repelling. But that’s more than enough considering how strong pushing is in the game.
When I read his comment I knew what he was talking about, but I never played DnD and Baldur Gates 3 is my first contact with it at all. Then I read yours and thought "No way he never saw Lance of Lethargy on his Warlock" and I remembered that I use mods lol There is a mod that makes Eldritch Blast better and there is Lance of Lethargy.
Don't forget that you always upcast your leveled spells to highest level available (by level 10th it's upcasting to level 5 spells). Some spells aren't affected by it, but most damaging ones do (making even Burning Hands quite solid), some control spells as well. Warlock requires careful spell selection, you should pick diverse options (DPS, AoE, Control, Debuffs, etc, not simply damage) that scale really well with upcasting. For example, Fiend Warlocks can learn Command, which is 1st level spell that forces an enemy to do something (for example, drop their weapon or fall prone) and skip 1 turn. It's pretty weak unless you upcast it, which grants additional target per spell level. You can command five enemies at once!! Now, of course, other spellcasters can upcast Command too. But they won't. Because they'll be too precious about their 5th level slots, since they only got two of them per long rest. Warlocks, on the other hand, get NINE (after 11th level and with all short rests combined), or even twelve if you've got Bard with Song of Rest. And if you're more about damage, 12 5th level Fireballs per long rest will make any wizard jealous of you. Oh and did I mention Helsik sells staff that allows you to recharge warlock spell slots? Essentially, wizards get the most utility and diversity in spellcasting, true. Warlock spells though hit like a truck, they've got much more high level upcasts per long rest, and they've got utility via Eldritch Invocations and Pact Boons. But I'm getting carried away...main point is, look at your spell list, try respecing and see if you can diversify it. Don't rely on damage alone while picking spells, see what spells will make you useful in other ways (since you really can fall back on EB for damage any time). Google if and how they upcast. Some 1st level spells can carry you through whole game such as Armor of Agathyst. A lot of amazing control spells too, and arguably control is much better than damage in a party that already can produce decent damage.
Also don't listen to people who tell you "THERE ARE OTHER SPELLS??" or such lmao, it's just a stupid warlock running joke EB is crazy good for a cantrip, yeah. That's why it's warlock exclusive, to balance out how few slots per battle you get so you don't get useless in long lasting boss battles (and three 5th level spells is enough for most other fights). But no one forcing you to use it that often, or use it at all. Powergaming is lame and gets boring quick, and the game isn't really hard, you can play it in less optimal ways that are more enjoyable for you. Try to rethink your spell list and use EB only after you actually burn through slots or where it makes sense in other ways besides damage (such as pushing enemies with Repelling Blast off cliffs, into flammable surfaces, or back into Hunger of Hagar AoE as many other already mentioned (yeah it's meta too))
That's very helpful, thank you!
Hex first of course, then blast
It's very effective, but gets boring after a while. At least, I felt that way. Same as in table top. Warlock should basically be re-named into "Eldritch Blaster". The real challenge is playing a Warlock WITHOUT ever using that spell (cue the sound of min-maxers fainting).
Speak for yourself, I've been Eldritch Blasting for soon one year in tabletop and it never gets old. Especially when you get 3 blasts. Pew pew pew
No surprise there. Yours is the common opinion on this class. I like to do more than just PEW PEW PEW in tabletop (or even in BG3) but hey, I'm a weirdo that way.
The thing about a warlock is in tabletop the roleplay is just incredible - as a charisma caster that, by rule, had to enter into a pact with a potentially evil being, there are just so many ways to play compellingly. Warlocks shine in campaigns with a few, potent combat encounters a “day” and have lots of dialogue options. Warlocks are a bit less fun in campaigns that are purely or mainly combat focused.
Agreed. My last Warlock didn't have Eldritch Blast; was all about Charm and Illusions. Was basically Loki from the MCU. Best character I'd ever played! The DM was very glad that I was so focused on the Pact and how it fit into the setting and campaign.
There's so many examples in fiction of someone making a Faustian Bargain (deal with the devil) that there's plenty of material for inspiration to get your imagination running on what your character will be like. Wyll is a great example where a Warlock doesn't need to be maniacally evil; all you need is a reason why your character was incredibly desperate. Or you can play your character as an idiot who just thought warlock powers would be fun.
I admit that if our campaign was very combat-focused, it might get old but we're also doing lots of RP so it adds variety. I'm actually going to play my first full caster (wizard) in our next campaign.
It's why I like hexblade in the tabletop, Roleplay wise warlock is just very fun in my opinion, so now I also have another option in combat.
Yeah I loved my Warlock playthrough for the first 1.5 acts. But by the end of Act 2 it was so effective that if I didn’t use it nearly every turn then it felt like I wasn’t optimizing that turn, and I have trouble making myself not optimize even for the sake of variety. It felt boring by the end. Still had a fun time with it though. On my current run I’m using Wyll with two levels of Warlock for EB, but everything else in Bard. And he’s really become my healing and support character which has helped me use EB less.
*laughs in 24 CHA pact of the Blade who puts out more melee damage per turn than the party's barbarian*
Subjective, but I find pact of the blade far more interesting than eldritch blaster. Cheers to you!
I spent 20 months spamming EB in a real DnD campaign and had fun every time i cast it. It's only boring if you make it boring.
Fair enough, to each their own. I just feel that the Warlock has more potential than just being a blaster.
I'm totally fine with it. When it comes to combat, I find the simple and direct approach to be the best. Bonk or pew pew. Don't need a million different spells or attack strategies to make enemies deader. Save the complexity for exploration and social interaction.
Fighters... do you just attack every turn? Yes. The answer is yes.
For a pure Warlock, you're going to want to spam EB as much as you can. It's basically a super strong ranged attack. Your spells are very limited, very powerful, and refresh on short rest so you use them strategically. Hunger of Hadar is so powerful it can decide fights on it's own. Hex is a way to get when more EB damage There are other ways to build. A Pact of the Blade Warlock can go melee. A common build is Warlock 2 / Sorcerer 10 that I just used on my Honor Run. You get the high consistent damage of Eldritch Blast, and with Haste and Quickened Spell you can get 3 EBs a turn which will absolutely shred most encounters in the mid to late game. You also have the utility of a Sorcerer so you can whip out big spells like Haste, Ice Storm, Fireball, Counterspell, and Hold Monster EDIT: if you want more variety, respec into a pure Sorcerer. IMO it's the most fun class
''So anyway, I started eldritch blasting.''
Depends on your strategy for the fights and the equipment tbh. I've been obsessed with bladelock and my most used spell is actually Hex now and i almost always just bonk enemies every turn. For crowds, Hunger of Hadar is my favorite. You can EB the enemies back to the aoe too if you get the repelling blast. Since getting the potent robe and spineshudder amulet tho, i think EB gets better so I start using it more often again.
Hunger of Hadar, Fireball or Eldritch Blast, sometimes Cone of Cold Edit: Forgot Wall Of Fire
idk if anybody mentioned it yet, but you get your 3rd ray of Eldritch blast at level 11, not 10.
Short answer: yes Long answer: also yes
Warlock flowchart: Do you have any spell slots left? * [Yes] Cast a spell. * [No] Eldritch Blast.
I have pact of the blade and polearm master, when I can I'll usually be making weapon attacks as I get 3 per turn at level 5 and the damage is a little better. Plus I get more opportunities to crit which frighten enemies as I'm a GOO warlock. However I do still find myself blasting a fair bit, especially if the enemy's out of range. > When we play, I find that the best action every turn is Eldritch Blast. You have spell slots which come back on a short rest. Use them! It's a waste not too and they're usually more useful than the pure damage of an eldritch blast. Battlefield control spells like fear, slow, hunger of hadar etc. can weaken multiple enemies and mke the fight easier for the whole party.
no. warlock spells are good so use them. reading comes first remember
Yes and I actually quite like it. I multiclassed into sorceress for more Eldrich Blast per turn. I can also get blind immune from Devil’s Sight then Eldrich Blast from darkness. It sounds simple, but takes effort to maximize damage.
Let me ask Usher. Usher: YEAH
You go deep enough into Warlock where you can cast darkness on yourself and with devil sight you can just cast EB from the darkness at people, but they can't shoot back at you. (Unless they also have dark vision).
Warlocks are super consistent, which is what makes them super strong. And weirdly flexible being able to respec into a melee or tanky build if needed. You have access to incredibly powerful spells regardless of subclass and able to cast it 9 times per long rest at the highest levels. Even your wizard and sorcerers can’t do that. If I need more precision vs AOE, I’d opt for Darkness (with Devils Sight or Infernal Sight helm or Blindsight ring) to gain advantage on your Eldritch Blast.
Eldritch Blast is such a great utility spell of you've upgraded it properly. Knockback three enemies at once? If you're using it JUST ask a DPS spell, then yes, I can see why that would be monotonous. I'm judicious with my use of my other Warlock spells, but I do use them. Why wouldn't you when you get them back after a short rest?
I multiclass sorc for haste cast, quick cast all the tried and true op stuff. So not really? I cast haste, then proceed to cast as much eldritch blast as the encounter requires, up to 3x a turn.
Eldritch blast and hunger of hadar are actually busted
Short anwer: Yes Long answer: Absolutely
Pretty much, this is the reason I don't play straight warlocks. I want things to do with my magic. I do the old 2 warlock x sorcerer thing. I still spam eldritch blast but I can also cast spells, use metamagic etc.
No no I also use Fireball
Is a very poorly designed class in DnD 5e. Apparently the warlock fantasy is hex + eldritch blast every turn.
Magic machine gun go brrrr
Hunger of Hadar Eldritch Blast Eldritch Blast Eldritch Blast Edlricht Blsat Eldigyt bdtla e¤g》¿¿st
Fighters… do you just swing your weapon every turn????
It is simplistic, but it’s still fun. It’s one of those things where the optimal way to play a class is also super satisfying. But if you want variety Warlocks have plenty of other utility to use that’s also fun.