Ways to Keep Eldritch Blast Interesting

[BreaktheStatue]

If you find yourself playing a pure warlock, there's a good chance you'll fast become well-acquainted with the phrase, "I cast eldritch blast" during combat.

This isn't a complaint, or me asking for alternatives to Eldritch Blast spamming, I'm just curious what strategies you've used or seen used to stop EB spamming from getting monotonous.

For example, on my GOOlock I chose to flavor my EB as a tentacle that did various things (slapped him on the face! etc. - and no, I didn't go the low road), RP wise (with no mechanical difference).

Just looking for other ideas.

[ad_hoc]

Well...there are a ton of EB invocations now. So pick up some of those I guess.

I'm currently playing a Warlock and I didn't take EB. So you can just do that if you don't like it.

[Kane0]

Get yourself a sound effect to play instead of saying it yourself

Blind-fire

Gather some puns and one liners

Roll to see what color your blasts are every couple of castings

[Blood of Gaea]

My GoO Warlock would spawn eyes somewhere on his body and launch the blasts from there.

But in addition to flavoring, make use of invocations, not just ones that enhance EB (Pushing, Pulling, and Slowing can be a lot of fun and adds another dynamic), but also invocations that give you other things to do.

[Daithi]

Suppose your playing an Elvin archer whose role it is to be the sniper. Most of the time you'll be attacking from range and being a sniper.

I view the warlock in much the same vein. Most of the time you are the sniper attacking from range. You just happen to use magic (EB) instead of bows and arrows. On the other hand, you also get cool stuff like Mask of Many Faces to play Arya Stark type sniper. Or, you're a hexblade that's also using weapons to lend a hand at melee. Or... warlocks are just freaking cool.

Edit: I like firing by EB from my staff like it is a sniper rifle.

[JakOfAllTirades]

If you go BladeLock, you can pick up the Improved Pact Blade Invocation and conjure up a +1 Longbow instead of using EB all the time. It's got approximately the same damage (1d8+1 v. 1d10) and slightly better range (150' short range). It's upgradeable with the Sharpshooter feat, Archery fighting style, all the usual "archer" character type goodies. If you find yourself in need of a different weapon, you can summon a different one using an action.

The downsides of this option are the different damage type: magical piercing isn't quite as good as force damage. And all the pushing/pulling/slowing invocations aren't available. But if you're just tired of spamming Eldritch Blast, playing a magical archer is a fun alternative. I'm currently running one at 8th level and thoroughly enjoying it.

[BreaktheStatue]

Sorry guys, I guess I wasn't totally clear. I'm not looking for alternatives to EB spamming: I'm going to do it.

I was just wondering what sort of creative flavoring/color text ideas people have used before to liven-up repeated uses of EB.

[Shuruke]

In a campaign I play in our bard picked up eldritch blast and the missles are shaped as spelt out insults in different languages. Her way of vicious mocking people

[Trustypeaches]

An archfey warlock in my group flavors their eldritch blasts as resembling rose gold flowers that spiral through the air at odd, dancing angles leaving streams of pink light in their wake before blasting into their targets.

Another warlock I've played with flavors eldritch blast as his shadow lashing out at enemies.

[Shuruke]

Another warlock I've played with flavors eldritch blast as his shadow lashing out at enemies.

https://youtu.be/yZAY-78zhmw

This is stuck in my head at 2 am I blame u XD

Fun idea for taking spells like shadow of moil etc to add onto it though

[Misterwhisper]

I played a Raven Queen Chain Pact Warlock.

- He had the normal Raven on one shoulder
- His Imp took the form of the raven, which they can normally do anyway, on the other shoulder
- His casting foci was in the shape of a pistol, which he fired Eldritch Blasts from.
- His studded Leather was in the form of a tough old duster.
- He cast most of his spells as if he through bottles at people, ex. Darkness was a bottle of thick smoke.

I flavored everything to be like an old west gunslinger.

With Repelling Blast, Lance of Lethargy, and all the other nice EB modifiers, you can keep yourself very busy.

[RSP]

On my Hexblade, we fluff it as creating and throwing throwing knives (very similar in effect to Hela’s ability in Ragnorrak). But on the whole, this just changes “I cast EB” to “I throw knives,” so it’s not a huge difference. And I’m playing Pact of the Blade so those knives are mostly an alternative to when I can’t get into melee range, anyway.

I’d say your best bet to break the monotony, is to refluff EB to something you think is more interesting and to pick up Repelling Blast and the two new invocations that pull 10’ towards you and that subtract 10 movement; so you can throw in different options as the battlefield calls for them.

[Vogie]

My favorite flavors of Eldritch Blast have been:

Telekinetically accelerated ball bearings and rocks
Flying Shortswords, on a warlock based on Hela from Thor: Ragnarok
Arcane Foci that look like Rifles and pistols a la The Coffin Princess

[Chronos]

On my short-lived GOO warlock, the blasts looked like tears in the fabric of space that closed up behind... but where they hit a creature, the edges closed up a bit mismatched, like a zipper that's catching the wrong teeth.

[RogueJK]

Gambit-style force-enhanced mundance objects. Whatever fits the character's flavor. (Such as playing cards, stones, dice, ball bearings, darts, quills, etc.)

[Bloodcloud]

Coordinating with teammate can make repelling blast real cool. Have other caster setup firewall/spike growth/webs/etc...

Also, cliffsides. The warlock and paladin have been teaming up in the game I'm dming to maximize gravity damage...

[OverLordOcelot]

I see this a lot of times and... I just don't get what's specific to Eldritch Blast. If you play an archer you spam "Bowlitch Blast" over and over, and if you play a meleeer you spam "Swordlitch Blast" or "Polearm blast" or whatever over and over, occasionally broken up with spell and ability use. But I don't ever see people asking how to make Bowlitch Blast spam interesting, it's always Eldritch Blast that people talk about. I do have distinct looks for Eldritch Blast on all of my characters . My Great Old Ones warlock fires small rips in the fabric of space that weaken their body and teleport them back a short distance, and tentacles or claws erupt from the rips on a critical hit. Meanwhile my Celestial Warlock/Mostly Paladin fires beams of pure radiant light.

[RSP]

I see this a lot of times and... I just don't get what's specific to Eldritch Blast.

I believe it’s due to expectations and misconceptions about the Warlock playstyle, in that some think “oh it’s a full-caster class but I only find myself using EB.” While if you want to beat monsters with your maul, all day, everyday, you pick fighter or barb as your class and off you go. Likewise, if you want to stay back and shoot arrows at everything that looks at you the wrong way. For those characters, the expectation lives up to the play.