Help with ideas against a warlock

[drakoonity]

Ok so one of our players retired his character earlier as he was ridiculously overpowered, so he decided to make a warlock. My question to everyone here is, what is the best way to fight a warlock. Like spells that hinder him (if any) or stuff that would stop him from doing some of is abilities. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Oh btw the warlock is level 6 at the moment and will probably be that way for a bit if that has any significance.

[Snowbluff]

Grapple.

SR.

It's easy, If you want to shut down someone already nerfing themselves...

[eggynack]

Warlocks can only do a few things, and spam those few things ad infinitum. That means that it's far easier to know his weaknesses after you know his build. For example, if he picks up free infinite flight, consider archers or flying enemies. Still, I've gotta agree with Snowbluff on this one. He seems to be calling off the player vs. DM optimization arms race, so it may be a bit mean to target him. I'd just let him do his thing, for the most part, though if your entire battle plan is shut down by a guy shooting at your encounters from the air, you may want to consider a new battle plan.

[Tokiko Mima]

Ok, a warning: I can tell you a quick easy way to completely shutdown a warlock's primary damage, but if you use it, the player will know you pulled this trick to specifically de-power/nerf his character. He will know this because it's only useful against warlocks, specifically, and it's obscure enough that no NPC would ever bother with it. Also, it has a minor drawback, in that the warlock can void this drawback if they pull something slightly less obscure.

Get Spell Compendium and open to page 166, and look for the 4th level Abjuration spell in the 3rd column. He won't be able to land eldritch blast after that spell is cast. Now, the weakness is that eldritch blast can be shaped into area effects, and also made into a melee touch attack; and if he does that that the spell won't protect you.

Probably the better way to challenge a determined Warlock is to use spell resistance (all of his abilities need SR rolls, barring a certain eldritch essense at level 16), swarms of many low level enemies, and flying/teleporting creatures.

[Lord Haart]

Why would you ever want to purposedly hinder or "counter" a player? Do you do that to everyone or only to this player? Did you consider the option of making the game world just cruel and hard enough that PCs will only manage to get by by using their strong assets, instead of trying to negate those very assets (thus kinda killing the point of having them at all and creating the impression that enemies are either metagaming, gathering information on the warlock or scrying — meaning that you'll also probably have to deal with players taking precautions against later two)? And if any one character just seems to be way too cookie-cutting compared to the rest of the party, just asking him to tone it down is a far wiser solution than initiating arms race of sorts.

Or are you not a DM, but another player who is expecting eventual PvP?

[Seffbasilisk]

4-8 archers pose a solid threat, yet allow him to feel useful.

16-30 archers would require some very smooth moves to evade.

50+ archers hunting in coordinated movements, the King decided not to abide the demonspawn tainting his land any more.

[Drachasor]

Was his previous class monk?

Warlocks are fun, but I wouldn't call them powerful. Granted they can be invisible and fly all the time, but they can't actually maximize on that capability very well (not that it isn't nice to have!) They are pretty dependent on what magical items they can find or create.

Seriously though, why are you so intent on hurting this player? What was this character that you potentially made him retire?

Edit: Does this Warlock have Vow of Poverty?

[EyethatBinds]

Ray Deflection, earthbind, and see invisibility. You can also just use golems.

[HalfQuart]

If you feel like you need to limit his power, limit his access to magic items. One of the tremendously useful abilities of a Warlock is UMD. Without an abundance of scrolls, wands, and the like, he will lose a lot of versatility.

[Novawurmson]

Why would you ever want to purposedly hinder or "counter" a player? Do you do that to everyone or only to this player? Did you consider the option of making the game world just cruel and hard enough that PCs will only manage to get by by using their strong assets, instead of trying to negate those very assets (thus kinda killing the point of having them at all and creating the impression that enemies are either metagaming, gathering information on the warlock or scrying — meaning that you'll also probably have to deal with players taking precautions against later two)? And if any one character just seems to be way too cookie-cutting compared to the rest of the party, just asking him to tone it down is a far wiser solution than initiating arms race of sorts.

Or are you not a DM, but another player who is expecting eventual PvP?

It sounds like they're already avoiding an arms race. Something to consider: How will intelligent enemies who have a chance to study the PC change their tactics? If my players turn invisible, sneak into the enemy camp, and murder a general, you better believe the next time they encounter the same enemies they're going to have something to counter invisibility (dogs or other creature with scent, a few characters with Blind-Fight, True Seeing for higher levels, etc.).

It's obviously mean if every creature a pyromancer fights has fire immunity, but it should happen sometimes, and intelligent enemies should know to cast Energy Resistance before battle.

[Yogibear41]

Warlocks are basically Samus Aran, they have about 4 different types of laser beams, but they never run out of ammo.

Wands are their missiles.


They are more or less a few trick ponies with wands being their only real way to diversify. Not really sure why you are trying to counter one, I'm guessing this player always makes better built characters or something as compared to the others players, and you might be trying to nerf him. If this is the case I would encourage you to work with the other players instead and try to up their game.

[Alienist]

I had another player (with a lot of experience) totally lose their **** when I wanted to play a Warlock, and a different one (also with a lot more experience) call me overpowered when I played a monk, so it doesn't surprise me.

Sad thing is I was trying to avoid arguments when I picked the Warlock, because I thought it was about the simplest most straightforward thing I could find that was still cool.

[Yogibear41]

I know a guy whos playing a wizard currently who thinks monks are the most Overpowered class in the game.

[Snowbluff]

I know a guy whos playing a wizard currently who thinks monks are the most Overpowered class in the game.

Yeah, I know quite a few people who think that. For example, Spoony and pretty much the groups I play with in the game.