How do I turn a Lock into a tank?

[ShynePhryne]

Hi there! I just started a campaign with some people. It's only my 2nd one but I'm trying my best to be as helpful to the group as I can. Long story short we lost both of our tanks right off the bat and are now running with a rogue, a bard, a cleric, and myself, a warlock. Now the cleric has offered to tank but I'm worried. He's already our healer (bard has explicitly said he won't heal) so I feel like he's taking on a lot. I got to thinking I might be able to tank if I take pact of the blade. Trouble is, I have no idea how to do this and my stats are not in line with the strength based builds I find on youtube. Anyone have solid ideas how to pull off a Dex based bladelock tank? Anything from UA is fine but no homebrew please. Here's my character's stats at lvl 2:
Str 8, Dex 15, Con 14, Int 13, Wis 10, Cha 16

Thanks for your help!

[DarkKnightJin]

If you're allowed to swap some things around.. Hexblade is definitely something you want. Medium armor and the Medium Armor Master feat seem pretty good to be an off-tank.

Also, what kind of Bard outright refuses to do any healing?
I'd personally say he doesn't GET any healing if he's not willing to at least Healing Word someone if they're on the ground making Death Saves.

[Malifice]

Stats dont help you to tank. Low Strength rules out heavy armor and barbarian M/Cing.

Warlocks make surprisingly effective tanks. You want heavy armor, and coupled with things like HAM feat, Flames of Phegethos (for tieflings) hellish rebuke and armor of agathys (plus gaining Temp HP on a kill from fiend lock) you can be not only a fantastic tank, but also a fantastic 'porcipine' tank.

My current 'lock runs heavy armor (and defence style), plus fiend lock for temp HP and HAM for DR 3/-.

It pairs nicely with resistance (gained from a cleric and Warding bond or whatever its called) until Fiendlock resistance comes online.

They hit you, the damage gets reduced by 3 and then halved. The remainder comes of Temp HP (from armor of agathys or fiendlock). You then hellish rebuke them, kill something on your turn and get more temp HP.

[Mortis_Elrod]

Stats dont help you to tank. Low Strength rules out heavy armor and barbarian M/Cing.

Warlocks make surprisingly effective tanks. You want heavy armor, and coupled with things like HAM feat, Flames of Phegethos (for tieflings) hellish rebuke and armor of agathys (plus gaining Temp HP on a kill from fiend lock) you can be not only a fantastic tank, but also a fantastic 'porcipine' tank.

My current 'lock runs heavy armor (and defence style), plus fiend lock for temp HP and HAM for DR 3/-.

It pairs nicely with resistance (gained from a cleric and Warding bond or whatever its called) until Fiendlock resistance comes online.

They hit you, the damage gets reduced by 3 and then halved. The remainder comes of Temp HP (from armor of agathys or fiendlock). You then hellish rebuke them, kill something on your turn and get more temp HP.

+1 solid advice.

Hexblade is an option too but Fiendlock does it better(read consistent). What race are you? Tieflings can be and do anything now via recent UA+SCAG.

[Tanarii]

Define 'tank'. High HP and high AC? Stopping enemies from hitting allies?

Pact of the Blade doesn't make a Tank, because it's an offensive melee buff. Unless you stack it with something that makes offensive melee good for tanking, like Sentinel.

You can certainly tune your character for high HP, but AC will be lacking until you crank your Dex up. Two invocations will give you Mage Armor at will, and 8 temp HPs before every fight. If you're a Fiendlock, you add Dark Ones Blessing, provided you keep enough offense to kill things. Armor of Agathys before every fight. Take the toughness Feat. If multiclasing is available, consider taking your next level in something to get Medium Amor and Shields.

Of course, all that will take some levels to do, unless you have permission to rebuild your character.

Generally speaking, Warlocks are not designed to be anything resembling tanks. You can do it, but it takes serious feat and invocation and spell investment. And multiclasing is a really good idea.

[ShynePhryne]

+1 solid advice.

Hexblade is an option too but Fiendlock does it better(read consistent). What race are you? Tieflings can be and do anything now via recent UA+SCAG.
Right I forgot to mention my warlock is tiefling with the fiend patron.

[ShynePhryne]

Define 'tank'. High HP and high AC? Stopping enemies from hitting allies?

Pact of the Blade doesn't make a Tank, because it's an offensive melee buff. Unless you stack it with something that makes offensive melee good for tanking, like Sentinel.

You can certainly tune your character for high HP, but AC will be lacking until you crank your Dex up. Two invocations will give you Mage Armor at will, and 8 temp HPs before every fight. If you're a Fiendlock, you add Dark Ones Blessing, provided you keep enough offense to kill things. Armor of Agathys before every fight. Take the toughness Feat. If multiclasing is available, consider taking your next level in something to get Medium Amor and Shields.

Of course, all that will take some levels to do, unless you have permission to rebuild your character.

Generally speaking, Warlocks are not designed to be anything resembling tanks. You can do it, but it takes serious feat and invocation and spell investment. And multiclasing is a really good idea.

I guess I was thinking a frontliner with high AC. I was already considering getting a couple levels of fighter, get a shield and maybe protection style, and maybe get some medium armor, and use a rapier as my pact weapon? After that what invocations can I use to increase my frontline potential, either damage or tanking?

[MrStabby]

Given your state array I would be tempted to say multiclass rogue for tankyness. Uncanny dodge at level 5 is a great boost. On the other hand your existing rogue could do this 5 levels earlier.

Devils sight and darkness is basically a good tanking combination. Using that in short term is good (stops enemies seeing your allies, gives disadvantage to attack you). Care is needed to stop this making things harder for your allies so keep some enemies visible.

[rollingForInit]

To tank, you need to get medium armor and shield proficiency for starters. You can get that by taking the feat Moderately Armored. Get a decet medium armor and you'll have an AC of 14+2+2=18. That's tanky enough. You already have d8's for hit dice which works fine. If you wanted more, you could take the Tough feat at later levels (12 maybe), when it makes a significant difference.

Get your defensive spells going. Armor of Agathys is nice. So is Mirror Image.

Now, as for pact ... you could go Blade for the extra attack, but I honestly think you'd be better off taking the Tome. You can get Shillelagh as a cantrip, and wield a club, meaning you can use Charisma to attack with it (so no need to boost strength or dexterity). Then you can grab the Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade cantrips from SCAG. Booming Blade in particular is a really good cantrip for tanks, because it gives you stickiness, meaning that you give an enemy incentive to stay and fight you instead of disengaging. The damage is respectable as well, not quite as good as the same number of extra attacks, but the extra features make up for that.

And of course you can still wield Eldritch Blast if you're at a distance, and you got your arsenal of spells in addition.

You could also be a Hexblade from UA, but I honestly think that class is in such a weird place that I don't think I'd want to play it myself. It's pretty strong though, you get medium armor and shields for free, you get to attack with Charisma if you use one-handed weapons, and you get the Shield spell. But at this point, that class feels a bit cheesy and weird. I'd probably rather go with the other build. Of course you've already chosen your patron, so Hexblade would also require you to get permission to rebuild from scratch.