Blasting Warlock Tips

[demigodus]

So I'm trying to make a ranged blasting warlock. I'm aware that warlocks are supposed to need to get into melee to do decent damage. Still, the idea of wading into melee with d6 hit die doesn't appeal to me. That, and I figure the point of their invocations was to mess with stuff from range all day long.

Strong Heart Halfling (for the extra feet)
Warlock 7
Str 6, Dex 18 (20), Con 17, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 10

Two Flaws:
Non-Combatant, Vulnerable

Two Traits:
Aggressive, Focused

Feats:
Wild Talent, Point Blank Shot, Psionic Meditation, Mortal Bane, Psionic Shot, Greater Psionic Shot

Maxing Concentration and UMD, then putting the rest in Intimidate, Knowledge (Planes), and Spellcraft so as to qualify for Hellfire Warlock at lvl 10.

Intending to get a Strongheart Vest, and take Hellfire Warlock at lvl 10

Items I have on him:
Less Chausuble of Fell Power
Eternal Wand of Neverskitter
Boots of Dexterity +2
Mithralmist Shirt
Eternal Wand of Shield

Invocations:
Eldritch Spear
Entropic Warding
Swimming the Styx
Sudden Swarm

With the build, he can currently, as a move action get a psionic focus (DC 20 check), and then expand it as a standard action to do 9d6 damage from 250ft away at lvl 7. 5 times per day he can make it 11d6, and the first time in an encounter when he kills someone with this, a swarm bursts out of that person to attack someone nearby.

Sadly, his AC of 19 isn't all too impressive, and even with DR 2/cold iron, I don't think he would be very durable. Nor is his damage all that impressive since that is ALL that he can do.

So are there any tips for improving his damage or survivability? I was considering going 2 levels of psychic warrior for the feats, so I can pick up empower spell like ability, but that would put me behind on invocations.

[Mithril Leaf]

Remember to go Legacy Champion for the continued Hellfire progression. :smallwink:

[Daer]

why no fell flight, flee the scene or at least spiderwalk? those three give nice amount of survivability by giving you extra mobility.

[gorfnab]

Intending to get a Strongheart Vest, and take Hellfire Warlock at lvl 10

Strongheart Vest is a highly debated on if it works with Hellfire. If you keep your con score odd a level of Binder, for the Naberious vestige, works fairly nicely.

[Malroth]

Martial study to gain Assassins Stance for 2d6 sneak attack damage, grab the craven feat to add your character level as additional base damage to your sneak attacks.

[Vizzerdrix]

Strongheart Halfling is very nice, but consider the humble Petal for your race of choice. A big dex boost, flight and size bonuses are worth the feat, no?

[Psyren]

A psionic race, like the Xeph, is another good choice; Psionic Shot is a great way to boost your eldritch blast damage at lower levels.

[Krazzman]

Strongheart Halfling? Why not Lightfood for the extra feat?

Additionally: Swimming the Styx because of Campaign reasons?

Sudden Swarm can be ditched for something useful: You have a quite superb list to choose from for your lesser invocs.
Switch that out for either: Flee the Scene or The Dead Walk (the strongest choices there), Eldritch Chain, Walk Unseen or Fell Flight.

If swimming the Styx is not for campaign reasons why not switching that for Baleful Utterance or Spider Walk or See the Unseen.

[demigodus]

Strongheart Halfling is very nice, but consider the humble Petal for your race of choice. A big dex boost, flight and size bonuses are worth the feat, no?

the level adjustment is a bit tough. That and the strength penalty would mean she likely can't actually carry equipment. Tempting though.


A psionic race, like the Xeph, is another good choice; Psionic Shot is a great way to boost your eldritch blast damage at lower levels.

Already on there. Used the Wild Talent feat instead. I figured the smaller size was better then the extra stuff Xeph get. Now if there was a small sized psionic race that boosted dex, with no LA, that would just be wonderful.


Strongheart Halfling? Why not Lightfood for the extra feat?

Lightfood? Not familiar with that? Where is it from?


Additionally: Swimming the Styx because of Campaign reasons?

Mostly, yes. Intending to get rid of it the moment I get flight. Tempted to dump it even so.


Sudden Swarm can be ditched for something useful: You have a quite superb list to choose from for your lesser invocs.
Switch that out for either: Flee the Scene or The Dead Walk (the strongest choices there), Eldritch Chain, Walk Unseen or Fell Flight.

Dead Walk to get a flying mount is tempting XD

Probably will make that change. Though not sure how Sudden Swarm is not useful.


If swimming the Styx is not for campaign reasons why not switching that for Baleful Utterance or Spider Walk or See the Unseen.

See the Unseen is pointless in this campaign, but I'm considering Baleful Utterance.

[Zaq]

If you can reliably get the conditions for Sneak Attack (a wand of Greater Invisibility is a good start, as is a Ring of Blinking, if you don't mind eating a small miss chance in exchange for guaranteed SA and a nice defensive boost), a single level of Rogue and the feat Craven help immensely. This is similar to Malroth's advice, but as written, I don't believe that Assassin's Stance lets you qualify for Craven, since it specifies that you must have SA as a class feature, which you don't.

The feat Mortalbane only works five times a day (which isn't terrible), but it lets you add +2d6 with any SLA (and guess what Eldritch Blast is) against most targets.

[Dayaz]

last time i checked you can't control a swarm i think >.>

EDIT: also, no precise shot? your melee will love you lol

[Zaq]

last time i checked you can't control a swarm i think >.>

EDIT: also, no precise shot? your melee will love you lol

Whether Precise Shot is necessary really depends on the level you're at. A –4 to hit really sucks, no argument, but since it takes not one but two feats to get rid of it, it may or may not be worthwhile, depending on how reliably you can hit without it. After a while, touch attacks like Eldritch Blast become really easy to make (monster touch AC doesn't tend to scale, while your to-hit bonus will, just through BAB and DEX). If you're already hitting on a 2, you may or may not have a better use for two feats. If you find yourself missing a lot, though, then yeah, Precise Shot is frustrating but useful.

[Psyren]

Whether Precise Shot is necessary really depends on the level you're at. A –4 to hit really sucks, no argument, but since it takes not one but two feats to get rid of it, it may or may not be worthwhile, depending on how reliably you can hit without it.

Just one actually. Since he already wants PBS (for Psionic Shot, among other things) it's a sunk cost and shouldn't be factored into the cost of Precise Shot.

I agree that it might not be worth the +4 though, since touch attacks are easier to land. But it might depend.

[Krazzman]

Lightfood Halflings are in the same book as Strongheart Halflings and Ghostwise Halflings: The Faerun Campaign Setting. They lose their +1 on all saves part but you could... for example take heroes luck (faerunian background feat) to get +1 to all saves and a +1 bonus to AC.

Summon Swarm was lackluster for the other options you have on this level. Check out LT's work at the new Warlock Handbook here. He and Tiago made a really nice work so far.

Baleful Utterance or Spiderwalk give you (at least normally) more points of usage. And with 12 Invocations over 20 levels you better make them give you many different uses.

[Venusaur]

Lightfood Halflings are in the same book as Strongheart Halflings and Ghostwise Halflings: The Faerun Campaign Setting. They lose their +1 on all saves part but you could... for example take heroes luck (faerunian background feat) to get +1 to all saves and a +1 bonus to AC.

That is Strongheart. I think Lightfoot are pretty much just vanilla halflings.

[Glimbur]

Martial study to gain Assassins Stance for 2d6 sneak attack damage, grab the craven feat to add your character level as additional base damage to your sneak attacks.

Ranged sneak attack is a little difficult to trigger. (Greater) Invis, winning initiative, and so on will work, but they take some effort.

[Socratov]

Advice: check strongheart vest with DM before books fly

For ranged blasting, take hfw with uncanny trickster, legacy champion or a bloodline and take mobility invocations. Remember that you can't sneak atmore then 30' unless with a crossbow with the crossbowsniper feat.

[Zaq]

Just one actually. Since he already wants PBS (for Psionic Shot, among other things) it's a sunk cost and shouldn't be factored into the cost of Precise Shot.

I agree that it might not be worth the +4 though, since touch attacks are easier to land. But it might depend.

Good point. I had forgotten that he already has PBS. In that case, yeah, +4 to-hit for a single feat is a pretty darn good deal, unless you're already literally hitting on a 2. If you don't hit, your damage doesn't matter.

[Socratov]

The thing is the fact that you hit for touch ac, if you proceed to use tricks to make them flat footed you will hit on ac 10, which is not much. Hitting isn't exactly the problem, damage is, as is sr before vitriolic blast.

[ThiagoMartell]

Drop Point Blank Shot, it's pretty useless specially if you're using eldritch spear.

Your damage output is never going to be spectacular. With items you might be able to be a secondary ranged damage dealer with a bit of debuffing tacked on. That is probably going to be good enough for most groups.

People seem to think melee warlocks are better because they do more damage. That's not really the case. You can be a blastlock, but then you have to focus on the other stuff warlock gives you to be effective.
People have been mentioning Assassin's Stance, and that is actually pretty good for a blastlock. You only get access to it around level 12, so you get it after chilling tentacles. While the tentacles grapple them, blast away with sneak attack. That's a very small damage boost though - you're sinking two feats to get an average of +7 damage.
One thing to remember is that you have Eldritch Chain available and it does not get sneak attack, so I wouldn't take both.

Long story short: yes, melee warlocks deal more damage. It doesn't mean ranged warlocks are not viable, it just means they are not good damage dealers.

[Zaq]

The thing is the fact that you hit for touch ac, if you proceed to use tricks to make them flat footed you will hit on ac 10, which is not much. Hitting isn't exactly the problem, damage is, as is sr before vitriolic blast.

Eh, I dunno, man. Missing means that your turn was totally wasted, and that's no fun. +4 is actually noticeable. If it were just +2, I'd say yeah, you're probably just as well off without it. +4, though? I feel like that'll actually come up at least once an encounter, maybe more. Also, if you're tacking on any kind of interesting blast essences, remember that you don't get a chance to apply them if you miss.

Again, if you're literally hitting on a 2 already, then yeah, it's obviously not going to be very useful. (I am wary of strategies that assume that you'll always get your enemies denied their DEX, since ways to counter that become more and more common as you level up.) As a lazer pew pew Warlock, you only get one shot a round more often than not, so you really want to make it count each and every round.

Hmm. Speaking of ways to get enemies denied DEX, though, if you can get Hide as a class skill somehow (MS: Shadow Hand, Able Learner with a Rogue or other sneaky dip, or whatever), there's always the feat Blend Into Shadow for the ability to hide more or less in plain sight as a swift action, which can make triggering SA (and thus Craven) a breeze. Add Darkstalker as necessary. That helps with both accuracy and damage.

[Socratov]

Again, touch ac. You have 3/4bab, and touch ac is (unless a very small, very dextrous opponent) prolly going to be 12, that means hitting guaranteed on lvl 12 unless nat 1. The rest is very high chance.

I played a blasterlock once, Ihad no problems hitting, unless (at lvl 6)blasting an erinyes with sr 20 here the sr was the problem.

And, sa means getting within 30 ft of the target, else sa can't be applied (at least according to core).

You can, however, get skirmish (perfect for gestalt blasterlocks) and actually benefit from that classfeature.

And a blasterlock uses other options in a fight (the other invocations he has) applying a little more battlefield control through chilling tentacles and whatnot.

[Malroth]

The reason Sneak attack is reccomended is not that its a good option, just that its the least bad of the bad options left avalible to him.

[ThiagoMartell]

The reason Sneak attack is reccomended is not that its a good option, just that its the least bad of the bad options left avalible to him.

Mortalbane is also +2d6. It's only 5/day, but affects more creatures than sneak attack, works with all shapes and costs only a single feat.
I'd go with Mortalbane myself.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Take Hidden Talent (XPH p67) and pick Endure Elements, Psionic (CP).

Take Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm) at 3rd level, it starts as a Ring of Protection +1, for which you pay full price. You can upgrade it yourself into a Ring of Invisibility with a +1 Deflection bonus to AC (MIC p234), at a cost of 10,000 gp and 800 xp (you'll still have over 2,000 xp extra from the 10% bonus it grants). An item familiar is an intelligent item, which is treated as a construct and thus a creature per the DMG, which means it cannot be disabled by dispel or disjunction and it continues to function in antimagic and dead magic areas. As a creature it gets actions, which can include activating itself. You can shoot, have your ring activate itself to turn you invisible, and then move and hide after shooting. Get a Wand of Camouflage and a Dorje of Chameleon to get +20 Hide for ten minutes at a time, which makes up for the -20 Hide penalty for sniping.