Hellfire Warlock discussion.

[GreenSerpent]

Hello,

So we all know Hellfire Warlock cannot be used by creatures without a CON score (this is relevant to a character concept I'm working on).

What is the Playground's opinion on allowing Undead Hellfire Warlocks to use CHA to power Hellfire Blast instead? Or in the case of a Vampire, CON they've drained using their Blood Drain ability?

EDIT: The Vampire concept I'm working on has NO LA.

Thanks and merry discussion.

[Alleran]

As far as vampires are concerned, if you're willing to eat the +5/+8 LA and then try being a blaster via Hellfire Warlock, I'd probably have no compunctions about allowing you to power it with blood-drained CON.

[Keneth]

If this were Pathfinder, I would allow it, since Cha affects the undead's HP, Fort saves, and special abilities. I'm not so sure how it makes much sense in 3.5 though. I'd probably just have them take normal damage instead, and rule that fast healing can't heal the wounds.

Warlocks are still underpowered any way you turn them, though. I'd just let them use hellfire with no damage, one way or the other. My Pathfinder warlock conversion (which is significantly stronger) has a Hellfire Adept archetype which racks up corruption much like in Heroes of Horror, rather than take any kind of damage, so that might a better solution.

[GreenSerpent]

Oops, forgot to mention. I have Vampire with NO LA thanks to a houserule.

[Twilightwyrm]

I actually created a custom magic item for a campaign I was in called the "Bloodfire Amulet". It basically let a Vampire, or other Con-draining monster, "store" some of their syphoned Con for use with a Hellfire Blast. It was capped at 3, 5, and 8 stored points of Con for the Least, Lesser and Greater versions of the amulet respectively (though you could, going with the warlock theme, make a "Dark" version that stores 10-12). This allows a vampiric Hellfire Warlock to actually use their Hellfire blast in a very thematic manner, without making it unlimited.

[Fouredged Sword]

I would go with Charisma. It is fluffed as life force for undead.

[limejuicepowder]

Warlocks are still underpowered any way you turn them, though.

I don't think this is exactly true; a warlock's at-will abilities and variety of easy ways to stay out of melee range could prove to be very disruptive to a lower OP group that is used to seeing powers/day. Providing a substantial boost to the warlock's main weakness, damage, could make them a little overpowered - it would make them quite strong out-of-the-box, which rubs some people the wrong way.

[Diarmuid]

I would go with Charisma. It is fluffed as life force for undead.

While yes, it's the "life force" of the Undead, that doesnt mean it's equally desired/useful/etc for the powers that are granting the Hellfire ability and requiring the sacrifice as payment.

[Keneth]

I don't think this is exactly true; a warlock's at-will abilities and variety of easy ways to stay out of melee range could prove to be very disruptive to a lower OP group that is used to seeing powers/day. Providing a substantial boost to the warlock's main weakness, damage, could make them a little overpowered - it would make them quite strong out-of-the-box, which rubs some people the wrong way.

And yet, all of their abilities are still very tame. They're good at crafting and running away, that's pretty much it. They might be half decent at crowd control and spreading effects, but that requires a large investment into Charisma which you generally can't afford if you want to do anything else.

Also, +6d6 at level 15 is hardly a substantial boost. An average non-optimized caster will still do more damage and to a larger amount of creatures. If you want to do any decent amount of damage, you have to get into melee range, and at that point, you're just a fighter with a lightsaber.

The only people a warlock rubs the wrong way are inexperienced DMs and that one guy who thought it was a good idea to make an archer.

[limejuicepowder]

And yet, all of their abilities are still very tame. They're good at crafting and running away, that's pretty much it. They might be half decent at crowd control and spreading effects, but that requires a large investment into Charisma which you generally can't afford if you want to do anything else.

Also, +6d6 at level 15 is hardly a substantial boost. An average non-optimized caster will still do more damage and to a larger amount of creatures. If you want to do any decent amount of damage, you have to get into melee range, and at that point, you're just a fighter with a lightsaber.

The only people a warlock rubs the wrong way are inexperienced DMs and that one guy who thought it was a good idea to make an archer.

A fighter with a lightsaber who can also teleport short distances, summon a massive field of grappling tentacles, see invisible enemies, and shatter nearly every small to medium sized item/feature in their path (just to list a few of the best invocations that in no way limit the 'locks melee abilities).

And they can do all of that whenever they want, with no limit. I would agree with you that the people who have a problem with this are probably the same people who have a problem with ToB, but I'm just pointing out that giving an already decent class a boost like that is more geared towards mid to high OP groups.

[Keneth]

Then let me just point out that solo-teleporting is pretty useless in combat (and at short range only good for infiltration and exfiltration), invisible creatures are easily dealt with by magical or mundane means (though it might spare you an unfortunate sneak attack), figters can be just at good at shattering things (better, really) and on top of that, you're wearing worse armor, have fewer hit points, and have to constantly worry about your spells being interrupted or otherwise rendered ineffective. Which is why a warlock is in the same tier as a dungeoncrasher fighter. Tentacles are nice though but you can't really deploy them in an ongoing melee. Luckily you're marginally effective at range as well. I'd also like to point out that OP has a vampire with no LA, so I don't see this as a low OP group.

Also, all three ToB classes are just plain better than warlock at more or less everything except crafting.