What works for warlocks?

[Inane-Fedaykin]

I was thinking of making a c-g warlock and I wanted to know what works for feats and "spell" selection. Is there perhaps a link to a thread this is discussed in?

[MeklorIlavator]

I was thinking of making a c-g warlock and I wanted to know what works for feats and "spell" selection. Is there perhaps a link to a thread this is discussed in?

Eldrich Glaive(Dragon Magic) is probably the best invocation out there. Also, extra invocation is useful for greater invocations, as their are quite a few good ones out there. Some other nice ones are fell flight, see the unseen, baleful utterance, vitriolic blast, and whichever one mimics Evard's Black tentacles.

[sombrastewart]

Warlocks are really the prime class for battlefield control. At lower levels, Baleful Utterance can just destroy weapons to get the upper hand. As you get higher in levels, Chilling Tentacles gives you Evard's Black Tentacles along with 2d6 cold damage to everything in the area. Toss in Utterdark Blast and Eldritch Chain or Cone at higher levels to deal out negative levels.

All of that, if you can do it, at will.

Tack on Spiderclimb at lower levels, Fell Flight as soon as you hit level six and you can climb or fly for 24 hours. Vitriolic Blast is the best casting way to kill golems. It's also really the way to make your Eldritch Blast do major damage at higher levels; it won't keep up even with sneak attack damage, but it can chew right through some troublesome obstacles. Oh, and it bypasses spell resistance.

Couple of other things that warlocks are great at: Use Magical Device. It's a class skill, and Charisma is one of the main abilities for Warlocks, so max that baby out. You can mimic alignment to use just about whatever you want, and you can even make magic items as a Warlock.

Back to invocations. Do you like Blindsense? Take the Voidsense invocation. See the Unseen gives you darkvision and you can see invisible things. Believe it or not, Entropic Warding is right useful: 20% miss chance, no scent, leaving no trail. Charm is Charm person, Flee the Scene is Dimensional Door and Major Image. Path of Shadow to teleport, Walk Unseen for Invisibility...

Yeah.

[Hunter Noventa]

Just whatever you do, don't take dark discorporation. Unless it's been errata'd, you remain a swarm of bats for 24 hours, unable to do anything useful. It's utter crap.

However, we had a warlock who made good use of summon swarm, it was fun making fun of him for barfing bats.

[Kurald Galain]

[QUOTE=sombrastewart;3078748]Charm is Charm person, Flee the Scene is Dimensional Door and Major Image. Path of Shadow to teleport, Walk Unseen for Invisibility.../QUOTE]

I suspect most good warlock builds spend nearly all their feats on extra invocations?

[Zincorium]

Just whatever you do, don't take dark discorporation. Unless it's been errata'd, you remain a swarm of bats for 24 hours, unable to do anything useful. It's utter crap.

However, we had a warlock who made good use of summon swarm, it was fun making fun of him for barfing bats.

Um, 4d6 automatic damage for anyone in your area isn't too bad. No save, no spell resistance, no attack roll. And a save or suck effect on top of that. Nauseated isn't just a penalty, mind you, it means you can't do anything except a single move action.

And really it's a defensive option. You're immune to weapon damage, period, and a lot of spell effects (anything that targets a specific amount of creatures. 1 is a specific number). That, and nothing stops you from invoking one of the invisibility options beforehand.

Really, it is the epitome of warlockdom, you are weak offensively but pretty damn hard to kill.

Edit:


I suspect most good warlock builds spend nearly all their feats on extra invocations?

Yep. Pretty much the best feat available for most warlocks.

[Person_Man]

Warlocks are generally considered to be one of the weakest classes in the game. Their damage scales very poorly. Their invocations, while useful, are limited. And they have very little support in terms of feats, multi-classing, or prestige classes.

You could try the Dragonfire Adept (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20060912a&page=2), essentially the fixed version of the Warlock. Or you could go into Hellfire Warlock (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20061207a&page=3), the one solid Warlock PrC I'm aware of.

Otherwise, I believe your best bet is heavy use of UMD. Buy various wands and the wand staff blow people away. If the enemy doesn't warrant wasting charges, hang back and annoy them with your Eldritch Blast.

There are also a few combo tricks available: Walk Unsen makes you Invisible, and Summon Swarm and Animate Dead are summons and not an attack, thus it doesn't dispel your Invisibility. Chilling Tentacles provides decent battlefield control. Darkness and Devil's Sight gives your enemy's a 20% miss chance that you ignore (though your team members might be pissed).

[Nerd-o-rama]

Fun fact: find something that reduces or negates ability damage (like Craft Soulmeld: Strongheart Vest from Magic of Incarnum), and Hellfire Warlock's drawback goes away, and you're left with a competent damage-dealer. Unless the DM calls shenanigans, but really, nerfing Warlocks is like kicking someone when they're down.

Anyway, yes, all Warlocks really need in terms of feats is Point Blank/Precise Shot (yes, touch attacks are easy to make, but still, do you want a -4 to anyone your basher's engaging?), Maximize Spell-Like Ability, maybe Quicken Spell-Like Ability, and Extra Invocations. The Lesser and Greater tiers in particular have a lot of really good ones.

And Eldritch Glaive is really good, but remember it does very little for you until level 8 when you get iterative attacks.

Oh, and Use Magic Device should be as high as you can get it, until you get at least a +19 total mod. Wands and scrolls are godsends in terms of versatility.

[AtomicKitKat]

You can't actually negate ability damage, or you lose Hellfire Warlock. What you should do is crank that UMD check(I think Item Mastery lets him create with UMD check. I do know he needs to make a DC that is 10 points higher for using Divine vs Arcane scrolls) ridiculously high, and craft yourself some nice scrolls/wands of Restoration. Badabing, Badaboom, you can now blow them away with Hellfire with impunity(at least, until you go broke).