Dragonfire Adept v Warlock

[tedcahill2]

Very similar class features, yet I've heard people say that the Dragonfire Adept is considered very weak.

I'm working on replacing the Sorcerer in my campaign world with a Dragonfire Adept (although taking away all the dragon theme in place of a straight up arcane magic theme).

So I'm curious why the Dragonfire Adept is considered so weak. Is it class features, weaker invocations, is breath weapon worse than eldritch blast, or is it some of everything?

[ZamielVanWeber]

DFA's are certainly not weak. If you want someone who can consistently dole out a lot of damage, prepare to be disappointed. On the flip side, entangling exhalation and some good breath effect choices later you can have a lot of BFC abilities (Slow Breath was just mean). Pumping your Breath Weapon DC is trivial as well, since it is based off of one of the most commonly boosted stats. They are designed similarly, but really play out differently.

[tedcahill2]

They are designed similarly, but really play out differently.
That's why I chose Dragonfire Adept to base my sorcerer off of. A sorcerers connection to magic should allow them to use it at will, which invocations and the dragon breath ability emulate masterfully, it's such a better concept than the spontaneous casting that core sorcerers are based in.

[ExLibrisMortis]

When the novelty of at-will magic wears off (at level 12), warlocks get Imbue Item, practically turning them into artificers overnight. There isn't a lot you can't do with Scribe Scroll and the ability to bypass spell requirements for item crafting. That's why DFAs are relatively weak.

[Troacctid]

DFA is not weak. It sits at basically the same power level as Warlock, give or take.

[ZamielVanWeber]

When the novelty of at-will magic wears off (at level 12), warlocks get Imbue Item, practically turning them into artificers overnight. There isn't a lot you can't do with Scribe Scroll and the ability to bypass spell requirements for item crafting. That's why DFAs are relatively weak.

DFAs are still rocking extremely reliable BFC that is difficult to avoid and at 15 they pick up some very nasty Breath Effects (paralyzing need not apply). At will slow that works on a passed save never goes out of style, as does their ability to quickly rip through structures. Baleful Geas is also absolutely disgusting as an invocation, let alone at will.

[Efrate]

DFAs have a bit more flexibility than warlock. They get less invocations but some very good ones, and you won't put out hellfire warlock DPS number until maybe fivefold breath of tiamat comes online, but since you can endlessly apply metabreath feats you can do a whole lot provided you have a bit of foresight. Entangling exhalation is your level 1 feat, every time, otherwise your feats are open and able to be customized to your liking. DFAs do a lot of things well, but nothing great. Other than BFC because entagling exhalation slow breath is stupid awesome. Your breath weapon is a SU so that gets by a lot of issues that warlock had unless they take supernatural transformation.

DFA also is a class you generally want as many levels in as possible, barring maybe like legacy champion shenanigans, because all their stuff is highly dependent on levels of DFA. You can dip into warlock to make a glaivelock or clawlock and then go to whatever else you want a lot easier than trying to do anything else with DFA. A level of binder for narbareus or marshall for motivate charisma if you go social focus isn't terrible, or be a better enchanter because charm monster if one of your invocations.

DFAs are better diplomancers and party faces than warlocks FWIW.

[Malimar]

If anything, DFA is a touch stronger than Warlock. Warlock's got generally better invocations (Magic Insight notwithstanding, but the warlock can replicate that with a few K gp for an Artificer's Monocle), and warlock has a few more invocations known, and the other class features are comparable between the two classes, but breath weapon is way better than eldritch blast (especially if you regularly face more than one or two opponents at once), plus metabreath feats and breath effects are generally better than blast feats and invocations.

[ExLibrisMortis]

DFAs are still rocking extremely reliable BFC that is difficult to avoid and at 15 they pick up some very nasty Breath Effects (paralyzing need not apply). At will slow that works on a passed save never goes out of style, as does their ability to quickly rip through structures. Baleful Geas is also absolutely disgusting as an invocation, let alone at will.
Well, yes. Barring Imbue Item, DFAs are not weaker than warlocks. That doesn't mean the answer to the OPs question isn't "Imbue Item is really strong", because it is. It's not the DFAs fault (or the warlock's merit), but it's the main difference between the classes in terms of raw power, and I think it explains why they are rated differently.

As we all know, most anything you can do is a notch below "get a scroll of shapechange, do whatever" (to take the most extreme example).

Of course, bringing the classes more in line with eachother at higher levels is very easy, because it's so clearly one ability that does the heavy lifting.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Well, yes. Barring Imbue Item, DFAs are not weaker than warlocks. That doesn't mean the answer to the OPs question isn't "Imbue Item is really strong", because it is. It's not the DFAs fault (or the warlock's merit), but it's the main difference between the classes in terms of raw power, and I think it explains why they are rated differently.

As we all know, most anything you can do is a notch below "get a scroll of shapechange, do whatever" (to take the most extreme example).

Of course, bringing the classes more in line with eachother at higher levels is very easy, because it's so clearly one ability that does the heavy lifting.

Except you need a supply to downtime to craft, a supply of exp to craft with, peg the UMD checks to mimic stats (and those checks can become difficult to peg reliably until very high levels). You also don't have the resources to spend on fixing a lot of these problems, unlike an artificer. Crafting is cool, but you are not suddenly a wizard because you can spend an outrageous amount of resources on a single casting of a 9th level spell. Even then? Baleful Geas can give you access to those spells anyways by nasty mind-controlling powers that allow for no save or SR.

[tedcahill2]

So would giving my custom DFA Imbue help close that gap?

I already plan to remove dragon kin from my DFA I could give it Deceive Item and Imbue Item.

I was also thinking of taking all of the breath effects and metabreath feat, and making them invocations similar to a warlocks blast effects, and giving them more invocations per level. That would give them the same flexibility that warlocks get regarding whether they focus on invocations or their blast.

[ExLibrisMortis]

I wouldn't grant DFAs Deceive Item. I never really associated UMD with dragons - they have sorcerer casting, they can use sorcerer (dragon-made) magic items. Imbue Item could be reflavoured draconically, but it's really open-ended and quite strong, plus it encourages book-diving like nothing else. Maybe limiting it to sorcerer spells only would be fair.



Except you need a supply to downtime to craft, a supply of exp to craft with, peg the UMD checks to mimic stats (and those checks can become difficult to peg reliably until very high levels). You also don't have the resources to spend on fixing a lot of these problems, unlike an artificer. Crafting is cool, but you are not suddenly a wizard because you can spend an outrageous amount of resources on a single casting of a 9th level spell. Even then? Baleful Geas can give you access to those spells anyways by nasty mind-controlling powers that allow for no save or SR.
I have the feeling that you're trying to argue some point I didn't make. I said: "Imbue Item is the main difference between DFAs and warlocks, and it's a very powerful ability, hence warlocks are rated higher than DFAs, from level 12 onwards". You're not contradicting that, and I didn't write anything disagreeing with what you posted.


Initially, it's not relevant to my answer whether Imbue Item is indeed that powerful (people may be rating warlocks wrong, after all), but I'll go ahead and say that it is. All the downsides of item crafting don't change that access to all spells from all spell lists is a very nice ability, and grants warlocks everything from level 1 haste (thanks Trapsmith!) to anyspell (thanks Mystra!), and from antimagic field to disjunction. If you're saying that it's not a tier 2+ ability (or that DFAs are tier 2+ as well), I disagree, but I'm not looking to argue about that. I'm just answering the OP.

[Troacctid]

Deceive Item and a generally wider selection of strong invocations make a much bigger difference than Imbue Item.

[ZamielVanWeber]

I have the feeling that you're trying to argue some point I didn't make. I said: "Imbue Item is the main difference between DFAs and warlocks, and it's a very powerful ability, hence warlocks are rated higher than DFAs, from level 12 onwards". You're not contradicting that, and I didn't write anything disagreeing with what you posted.

I am disagreeing with you, especially since your statement was not "warlocks are better" but was literally "DFAs are relatively weak." I have contradicted it multiple times and explained why. Troacctid has contradicted it. You are dramatically overvaluing Imbue Item as it can be strong, but can also be literally useless. Deceive Item is the sexy defining ability on the two of them.



Initially, it's not relevant to my answer whether Imbue Item is indeed that powerful (people may be rating warlocks wrong, after all), but I'll go ahead and say that it is. All the downsides of item crafting don't change that access to all spells from all spell lists is a very nice ability, and grants warlocks everything from level 1 haste (thanks Trapsmith!) to anyspell (thanks Mystra!), and from antimagic field to disjunction. If you're saying that it's not a tier 2+ ability (or that DFAs are tier 2+ as well), I disagree, but I'm not looking to argue about that. I'm just answering the OP.

What? Given that your answer is "DFA's are weak because Imbue Item is awesome" the question of how relevant Imbue Item is is critical. You also said it was a Tier 2+ ability as well. I am really not sure what to make of this at this point.

[tedcahill2]

What if I give my DFA an ability to disrupt magic near him, say 50ft away, effectively dispelling it. Basically would allow him to ready an action and try to dispel/counter a spell as if he had the correct spell available to do so.

Since it requires both readying an action and succeeding a spellcraft check to identify the spell I could see that as a level 4 ability to replace Deceive Item.

[ZamielVanWeber]

What if I give my DFA an ability to disrupt magic near him, say 50ft away, effectively dispelling it. Basically would allow him to ready an action and try to dispel/counter a spell as if he had the correct spell available to do so.

Since it requires both readying an action and succeeding a spellcraft check to identify the spell I could see that as a level 4 ability to replace Deceive Item.

DFA's actually have some sexy dispell options. The GDM is obnoxiously melee range but their DM gives them temporary HP. Try upgrading that to allow to counter spells first.

[Troacctid]

DFAs already have a counterspell invocation, Voracious Dispelling. It's one of the class's best invocations, too.

My recommendation is to increase the DFA's breath weapon damage dice to d8s, and allow prestige classes to advance breath effects as well as invocations. I would also add a few extra invocations to both classes to fill in their more dead levels.

[tedcahill2]

DFA's actually have some sexy dispell options. The GDM is obnoxiously melee range but their DM gives them temporary HP. Try upgrading that to allow to counter spells first.

Would you be so kind to tell me what GDM and DM are?

[ZamielVanWeber]

Would you be so kind to tell me what GDM and DM are?

GDM = Greater Dispel Magic and DM = Dispel Magic. Troacctid is correct, by the way, in that Voracious Dispelling can counter spells.

[tedcahill2]

DFAs already have a counterspell invocation, Voracious Dispelling. It's one of the class's best invocations, too.

My recommendation is to increase the DFA's breath weapon damage dice to d8s, and allow prestige classes to advance breath effects as well as invocations. I would also add a few extra invocations to both classes to fill in their more dead levels.

I don't think I need to increase the breath to d8's. By most accounts the warlock is balanced at d6's and the DFA has identical damage progression. I had not seen the Voracious Dispelling invocation, thanks.

[ExLibrisMortis]

I am disagreeing with you, especially since your statement was not "warlocks are better" but was literally "DFAs are relatively weak."
DFAs are relatively weak compared to warlocks. Context is relevant! (to think I could've avoided the whole argument if I'd added those three words in the first place :smalltongue:).

As for Deceive Item, it's certainly a good ability, but the ability to take 10 is peanuts compared to the ability to get any spell. For one, Imbue Item can't be replaced by a +9 bonus to UMD.

As for "It can be strong, but it can also be useless": you mentioned Baleful Geas, which is exactly the same, and in loads of abilities have that particular characteristic (maybe Alter Reality doesn't).

Now, since you're still not arguing my point (and it's been three posts) I'm done here.

[ZamielVanWeber]

I don't think I need to increase the breath to d8's. By most accounts the warlock is balanced at d6's and the DFA has identical damage progression. I had not seen the Voracious Dispelling invocation, thanks.

Both of them have horribly low damage scaling actually. The warlock pulls ahead because eldritch glaive and eldritch claws can fix that.

[Troacctid]

I don't think I need to increase the breath to d8's. By most accounts the warlock is balanced at d6's and the DFA has identical damage progression. I had not seen the Voracious Dispelling invocation, thanks.
Warlock is below par at d6s. I would increase Warlock damage to d8s as well.


DFAs are relatively weak compared to warlocks.
Not really. They're about the same.

[tedcahill2]

Both of them have horribly low damage scaling actually. The warlock pulls ahead because eldritch glaive and eldritch claws can fix that.
How does 9d6 every single round not scale? Or are we talking highly optimized play?

[Gruftzwerg]

DFAs have a bit more flexibility than warlock.

Depends on the POV. Certain builds on a DFA can be played somewhat flexible. But you can't flexible make use of the DFA class. You are stuck for 18+ lvls because without the breath effects/boots, he feels to weak. If you see a DFA, you can predict to a high degree how his fighting style will be (breath focused in some way).
The same can't be said about Warlock. Warlocks have much more flexibility with their builds. be it straight 20 warlock, PRCs, multiclassing, gishes, "Chameleon 2", blastlock, glaivelock, clawlock, control lock.. all that gives a warlock much more flexibility imho.
But as said, just a matter of POV.

I think the biggest issue is that DFA lacks diversity (between DFA builds). They are to similar to each other compared to other classes like the warlock.


The real issue with DFA is: How many DFA build are you going to play (in your lifetime)? 10? 5? 3? 1? For Warlock I can guess that there will be much more play worth builds that I would like to play. I intending to play a DFA too when "his time comes" to be played again. But for now I need a break for using breathweapon 99,99% of the time, from the last one (DFA I played).

[Grod_The_Giant]

How does 9d6 every single round not scale? Or are we talking highly optimized play?
It's not that it doesn't scale, it's that it scales too slowly. 31 damage at level 20 is nothing. Heck, 70 damage (20d6) isn't much either. The Warlock has much better tools for boosting their damage (Hellfire Warlock, Eldritch Claws, Eldritch Glaive) than the DFA; on the other hand, the DFA is a painfully efficient (if repetitive) debuffer.

Utlimately, both classes can be pretty boring-- they don't have access to many invocations, and really only ever have one or two offensive tricks, so you're mostly doing the same thing over and over again like some sort of mundane chump.

[Troacctid]

The Tiamat/Bahamut breath effects do a pretty decent job multiplying damage on your breath weapon. AoE helps too, since you can usually hit multiple enemies.

[Telok]

I'm sure I could rip a copy of the relevant book and just find the answer for myself, but I'm feeling lazy and I don't have much time for pleasure reading this week.

Every discussion of DFAs revolves around breath weapons, occasionally someone mentions that they get an invocation, maybe two. So are DFAs anything but a breath weapon class or do they have actual options and choices?

[Troacctid]

They have enough good options, but there are few enough of them that there tends to be not much variation between builds.

[Efrate]

Your breath weapon choices and your invocations vary and can change your playstyle; but you are more or less a breath weapon class.

Choice picks from invocations

Lesser Invocations Available at level 1

Beguiling influence: +6 bonus on diplo bluff and intimidate, untyped.
Draconic Knowledge: +6 to all knowledges and allows you you make them untrained. untyped bonus.
Endure Exposure: Endure elements as well and allies are immune to your breath weapons
Magic Insight: Detect magic at will and totally identify any magic item as a full round action with no component cost.

Lesser Invocations available at level 6

Charm: Charm monster at will.
Draconic Flight: Sprout wings and fly with good manueverability, equal to your land speed, 24 hr. duration.
Energy resistance: Resist 10 to any one energy type, 24 hr. duration.
Frightful Presence: Cast as a swift action, anytime you breath or attack, will save or enemies become shaken for 10 minutes. No Caveat about it NOT stacking fear stages FWIW.
Humanoid Shape: Assume any humanoid form for up to 24 hrs., gain movement modes, natural attacks, EX special atttacks, as the change shape special ability. Oriental adventures has some fun ones, though updated in dragon if you use dragon stuff.
Voidsense: 30 ft. blindsense. 24 hr. duration.
Walk Unseen: Invisibility at will, self only.
Voracious Dispelling: At will dispel magic. Medium range and everything dispelled deals 1 point of damage per spell level no save.


Greater Invocations, lvl 11

Baeful Gaes: As Gaeas but no HD limit and as a standard action.
Chilling fog: As the solid spell fog, plus 2d6 cold damage a round.
Draconic Toughness: temporary HP equal to your DFA level. Reusable at will so you can top yourself off constantly, not amazing but nice.


Dark Invocations, lvl 16

Greater draconic flight: +30 ft. on normal draconic flight and perfect maneuverability.
Energy Immunity: Immune to one of the 5 energy types for 24 hrs. Only one able to be cast per person at once.
Instill vulnerability: Target takes +50% damage from an energy type, unless immune, for negates. Not great but its a thing.


Some nice things, there are more that can combo with various things, but those are the more stand alone pretty solid ones. You only get 2 of each unless you take extra invocation but there is a decent little bit of variety there.

[Troacctid]

Lesser Invocations available at level 6

Charm: Charm monster at will.
Draconic Flight: Sprout wings and fly with good manueverability, equal to your land speed, 24 hr. duration.
Energy resistance: Resist 10 to any one energy type, 24 hr. duration.
Frightful Presence: Cast as a swift action, anytime you breath or attack, will save or enemies become shaken for 10 minutes. No Caveat about it NOT stacking fear stages FWIW.
Humanoid Shape: Assume any humanoid form for up to 24 hrs., gain movement modes, natural attacks, EX special atttacks, as the change shape special ability. Oriental adventures has some fun ones, though updated in dragon if you use dragon stuff.
Voidsense: 30 ft. blindsense. 24 hr. duration.
Walk Unseen: Invisibility at will, self only.
Voracious Dispelling: At will dispel magic. Medium range and everything dispelled deals 1 point of damage per spell level no save.

Energy resistance is easy to get in other ways, so you shouldn't be spending an invocation on it. Blindsense, just get a familiar.


Dark Invocations, lvl 16

Greater draconic flight: +30 ft. on normal draconic flight and perfect maneuverability.
Energy Immunity: Immune to one of the 5 energy types for 24 hrs. Only one able to be cast per person at once.
Instill vulnerability: Target takes +50% damage from an energy type, unless immune, for negates. Not great but its a thing.

Vulnerability is just plain not good. Energy immunity is underwhelming at this level, as is increasing your flight speed. There aren't really any standout dark invocations. Basically you get to take greater draconic flight and trade out the old version for another lesser, I guess.