Converting warlocks to a long rest class

[Skrum]

I'm currently playing a warlock, and after many games and lots of combats, Im more and more convinced that warlocks are fundamentally broken. They are built to get lots of short rests, but there's a real problem with that.
- they are seriously at odds with almost all of the other classes, which really stinks for a collaborative game
- building adventure around more frequent, less deadly encounters is pretty clunky. Combat takes a lot of time. Increasing the amount of encounters, even shorter ones, really starts to eat into total game time
- for this reason, I think a lot of tables naturally gravitate towards the classic "5 minute adventuring day." It's a more natural storytelling pace, generally, to have intrigue interspersed with meaningful combat. Even if the DM is aware of it and trying to avoid it, there's real systemic pull in the other direction
- regardless of the overall combat schedule, the Final Battle (whether at the end of a campaign or even lessor bosses) is going to be a big, epic affair that probably lasts a few more rounds than usual. I.e., a combat where the warlock, fighter, and t2 monk are going to be out of resources half way through the battle and left with lessor options. Or in other words, excluded from fighting an epic battle epically because they're not only built to get lots of short rests, they *not* built to fight at their best for more than 3-4 rounds.

Anyway, that's the strongly stated version of my thoughts (I wouldn't, in practice, say I feel quite *this* adamant about it, but for the sake of discussion...)

Has anyone tried converting warlocks and fighters into a form that's a little more compatible with a 5 minute adventuring day? Either by changing their abilities (more uses but comes back on a long rest), or by having some kind of mid-combat recovery mechanic? Something like at the end of the 5th round, all characters may recover their spent short rest powers.

[Kane0]

For the sake of the thought experiment

Prof bonus times per long rest

Double or triple the uses per long rest, with an extra limitation such as not being able to use back-to-back on subsequent turns

Change to recharge 5-6

Throw in some instant-recharge mechanics like potions or burning hit die

[Mastikator]

You need different constrains for things that are utility, healing and combat. (I consider healing non-combat because it tends to only be efficient use of action economy to only heal out of combat, only exception being healing word on a PC that is on death saves, because you spend a bonus action to give them back their whole action).

For warlock spells I'd rather just multiply their pact slots by 3 and let them recover on a long rest. I think the game is sufficiently balanced if you actually do run a 6-8 encounter adventuring day with 2 short rests. Multiplying by 3 instead just compresses those uses into fewer combats. (I mean you can just run longer days, but you do you)

Any warlock pact ability that restores hit points has 3 uses per long rest instead of 1 per short rest.

The reason I set them at a specific number rather than proficiency bonus is that PB uses/long rest favors dipping.

Making them recharge is problematic for warlocks with healing spells, since you'd get near unlimited out of combat healing.

-

For fighters I'd make action surge once per initiative roll, on 17th level twice per initiative roll. (I'd like to fix indomitable to only be spent if it leads to a successful save)
I'd make second wind to proficiency bonus times, it's not really strong enough at high level, but also not without many fighter levels. Getting 5d10+5 healing from dipping a fighter on a high level wizard is actually only sorta good, but a fighter having 5d10+65 at level 13 is sufficiently good.
Their battle master maneuvers, rune knight, etc stuff. You can just double it and let them recover 1 or 2 on the first short rest.

-

For monks, also a short rest based class. I'd give them 1 free use of each of their monk ability per long rest. It would encourage them to diversify their tactic. Secondly I'd double their ki point pool. And let them once per long rest recover PB ki points from a 1 minute meditation (maybe at level 3 or 6).
I'd also like to increase their hit dice to d10s and their martial arts dice by 1 level, start at d6 and end at d12. Also give them wisdom saving throw proficiency at level 6, con saving throw proficiency at 10. (charisma and int are gained at level 14)

[Kane0]

A different angle to take would be letting a character take a short rest in a much shorter timeframe so they can choose individually rather than stopping the whole party, but also lock them to only benefitting from two short rests per long rest so it can't be spammed.

[stoutstien]

As long as the players are aware of this pacing pattern before hand there isn't any reason to change warlocks. They have enough built in flexibility regardless of pact recover timing.

As for the the rest of it I'd suggest looking into some OSR stuff for ideas on how to prevent table time to fall into the combat balance/time sinkhole.

[KorvinStarmast]

For fighters I'd make action surge once per initiative roll, on 17th level twice per initiative roll. (I'd like to fix indomitable to only be spent if it leads to a successful save) I like that, particularly the action surge suggestion, and it feels a little bit more like how 13th age (and I suspect 4e) do it. But beware of dips, so the action surge might be a step too far.
I'd suggest that making second wind rather than action surge a once per initiative deal makes the Fighter more tanky, which is kind of what a lot of the fighter archetype feels like. It also then dials up or down with adventure day pacing.

[Sigreid]

I think this mostly has to do with group perception. I tend to view my warlock as an archer+. Another member of our group seems to view his as a melee+. Meaning neither of us sees their spellcasting as the main thing they bring to the party.

[Tanarii]

I'd content that trying to play 5e with a 5MWD is fundamentally broken, not that a short rest class is fundamentally broken for working great within the expected use case.

That said, just triple all the short short rest resources for all classes and call it done.

Now all you have to do is fix all 12 classes (and various other rules that are class independent) so they actually work properly with a 5MWD ...

[Demonslayer666]

The problem with just multiplying per short rest to times per day is that warlocks get a lot more power in that once per day combat, more powerful than a wizard when all the slots are at max level.

For example, a 5th warlock would have 6 3rd level slots, where a wizard would only have 2 3rd level slots. Granted, the wizard also has 3 2nd and 4 1st level slots, but that still makes the warlock leaps and bounds better considering 3rd level spells like Fireball.

That seems to put the power balance out of whack. It seems like there would still need to be a per combat limit.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'd content that trying to play 5e with a 5MWD is fundamentally broken, not that a short rest class is fundamentally broken for working great within the expected use case.

That said, just triple all the short short rest resources for all classes and call it done.

Now all you have to do is fix all 12 classes (and various other rules that are class independent) so they actually work properly with a 5MWD ...

I agree. Resource-based balancing doesn't work in that environment at all...and that's the dominant form of balancing D&D has ever done.


The problem with just multiplying per short rest to times per day is that warlocks get a lot more power in that once per day combat, more powerful than a wizard when all the slots are at max level.

For example, a 5th warlock would have 6 3rd level slots, where a wizard would only have 2 3rd level slots. Granted, the wizard also has 3 2nd and 4 1st level slots, but that still makes the warlock leaps and bounds better considering 3rd level spells like Fireball.

That seems to put the power balance out of whack. It seems like there would still need to be a per combat limit.

Unless you have a good, reliable way of burning more than one spell slot per action (cough divine smite cough), spell slots are not a significant constraint in a one-fight-per-day environment. Because you're only going to be burning 3-5 of them total. You'll generally run out of good targets for fireball well before you run out of slots for fireball. Plus the whole "hitting allies" thing.

[Demonslayer666]

...
Unless you have a good, reliable way of burning more than one spell slot per action (cough divine smite cough), spell slots are not a significant constraint in a one-fight-per-day environment. Because you're only going to be burning 3-5 of them total. You'll generally run out of good targets for fireball well before you run out of slots for fireball. Plus the whole "hitting allies" thing.

You mean like Counterspell? Well I think 3, 4, or 5 3rd level slots is better than 2.


It's called splash damage. Suck it up or go talk to the cleric.

There are other options besides Fireball. It's just a great example of the power level of 3rd level slots. :smallsmile:

[PhoenixPhyre]

You mean like Counterspell? Well I think 3, 4, or 5 3rd level slots is better than 2.


It's called splash damage. Suck it up or go talk to the cleric.

There are other options besides Fireball. It's just a great example of the power level of 3rd level slots. :smallsmile:

At level 5, there aren't many monsters casting spells. At level 7+, you're wasting 4th (and 5th later) level slots on counterspell, which fails to scale very well.

And fireball is a horrible horrible horrible example of anything--it's entirely, intentionally, word-of-dev overtuned. It's a 4th or 5th level spell in a 3rd level slot. By design as an "iconic" spell. Which is horrible design, FYI.

So effectively this is an artifact of being level 5, not a general issue (beyond the total broken-ness of the 5mwd).

[Hail Tempus]

- they are seriously at odds with almost all of the other classes, which really stinks for a collaborative game

Fighters, Monks, Druids and Clerics all have significant class features tied to short rests. Most of the other classes also get at least some benefits from short rests.

Actually, plenty of Warlock classes don't need a lot of short rests to do their basic thing- cast Hex and blast faces with Eldritch Blast.

[Tanarii]

The problem with just multiplying per short rest to times per day is that warlocks get a lot more power in that once per day combat, more powerful than a wizard when all the slots are at max level.

For example, a 5th warlock would have 6 3rd level slots, where a wizard would only have 2 3rd level slots. Granted, the wizard also has 3 2nd and 4 1st level slots, but that still makes the warlock leaps and bounds better considering 3rd level spells like Fireball.

That seems to put the power balance out of whack. It seems like there would still need to be a per combat limit.
If that's an issue it already is an issue, it just usually occurs over 6 battles instead of 1.

And 5h level is when the Warlocks average of 6 slots per long rest is compared to the other casters 9 slots. At 7th level it's 6 vs 12 and at 9th it's 6 vs 15. Usually folks complain that's to the other casters advantage. Personally I always say that it's only the top 3 levels of casting which really count, so I do get where you're coming from. :smallamused:

[Skrum]

A few factors that are somewhat specific to the game I'm in:

- most of the adventures are pseudo-one shots. There's a huge shared world and continual narratives, but the adventures themselves are mostly contained. Play for 3-5 hours, game ends with some level of conclusion, and all characters get long rests before the next adventure
- at levels 5 and 6 it's possible to drain resources in this format, but at 8, 9, and 10 it becomes difficult to challenge characters without going "all in" on a single, incredibly deadly encounter. There's just not enough time. Almost all of us play quite optimized characters as well, and are very tactical.

To my eye, winning and losing these encounters is increasingly about high level spell casts, and having strong defensive reactions (shield and silvery barbs at the top of the list, but even things like cloud rune, tomb of levistus, and counterspell).

In general the group is very against straying from RAW, but the idea that sounds like *might* be getting traction is giving a "SR" after 5 rounds of combat. Probably not my favorite solution, but it's better than nothing.

[windgate]

How does warlock compare to long rest casters spell slot wise if you convert everything via the alternate Spell Point system (DMG page 288)? How many short rest recoveries do they need to be comparable?

[windgate]

Went Ahead and Answered my own question:


If you convert spell slots via the spell point system. Warlocks will require more than two short rests to have comparable spell casting after level 5. I don't think that happens that often. Data is below. Sorry for the formatting issues I couldn't figure out how to properly copy a table here from excel.


Normal Caster Warlock
Level No Short Rest One Short Rest Two Short Rest Three Rests
1 4 2 4 6 12
2 6 4 8 12 24
3 14 6 12 18 36
4 17 6 12 18 36
5 27 10 20 30 60
6 32 10 20 30 60
7 38 12 24 36 72
8 44 12 24 36 72
9 57 14 28 42 84
10 64 14 28 42 84
11 73 21 42 63 126
12 73 21 42 63 126
13 83 21 42 63 126
14 83 21 42 63 126
15 94 21 42 63 126
16 94 21 42 63 126
17 107 35 70 105 210
18 114 35 70 105 210
19 123 35 70 105 210
20 133 35 70 105 210

[Yakk]

Everyone gets 2 short rests per long rest (or ... proficiency bonus).

Taking a short rest requires an action.

You cannot take a short rest within an hour of taking a short rest.

And yes, you can take a short rest in combat.

...

You can get 2x short rest's worth of resources in a fight at the cost of 1 action. You can burn a short rest to roll your HD and recover from being nearly wiped out, so this benefits non-SR classes a bit.

Taking SR out of combat is still better than in combat for action economy purposes.

...

Fighters can action surge, retreat, second wind, short rest, second wind, and come back with another action surge.

...

The "burn an action" makes it an interesting tactical decision to make. Being able to retreat and disengage from combat to do this has value.

[Akal Saris]

What if you gave warlocks the ability to take a short rest in 1 minute, X/day (maybe 1/day at first, then scale up to 2 or 3/day)? That way they could recover their resources just before a big boss fight, for example.

[Bobthewizard]

I am running a campaign that tends to have 2-3 fights per day but they can last 10-15 rounds each. Sometimes it's hard to get even one short rest in, so I had the players double all short rest abilities, and then they can recover the base amount once on a short rest. So until level 11, warlock gets 4 spell slots and can gain 2 more from a short rest. Further short rests do not give them more spell slots. It's worked out well for this pace.

[Skrum]

last 10-15 rounds

0_o

Wowzer. That's hella rounds. Even long rest characters don't have the resources to be fighting for that long at an intense pace. Do the combats feature lots of movement, alternative objectives, etc?

[Bobthewizard]

Yes. Lot's of movement. Lots of trying to sneak in and get something without being caught. Usually two or more competing objectives, like two targets fleeing in different directions, and often stringing together two or more combats. For example, they were fighting mechanical dragons in the cargo hold of the flying ship when the ship tilted and started to dive because flying warforged assassins landed on the deck and started killing the crew.

It's Embers of the Last War set in Sharn in Eberron. It's a lot of fun.

[diplomancer]

Went Ahead and Answered my own question:


If you convert spell slots via the spell point system. Warlocks will require more than two short rests to have comparable spell casting after level 5. I don't think that happens that often. Data is below. Sorry for the formatting issues I couldn't figure out how to properly copy a table here from excel.


Normal Caster Warlock
Level No Short Rest One Short Rest Two Short Rest Three Rests
1 4 2 4 6 12
2 6 4 8 12 24
3 14 6 12 18 36
4 17 6 12 18 36
5 27 10 20 30 60
6 32 10 20 30 60
7 38 12 24 36 72
8 44 12 24 36 72
9 57 14 28 42 84
10 64 14 28 42 84
11 73 21 42 63 126
12 73 21 42 63 126
13 83 21 42 63 126
14 83 21 42 63 126
15 94 21 42 63 126
16 94 21 42 63 126
17 107 35 70 105 210
18 114 35 70 105 210
19 123 35 70 105 210
20 133 35 70 105 210

When calculating Warlocks' spell points, you forgot to account for their Mystic Arcanums. It's not as bad as that, worse levels are actually levels 9-10. Also, at 20th level, you did not account for their once a day "recover all slots" feature.

[Pixel_Kitsune]

I see a lot of just trippling the SR spell slots.

I just gave the Warlock a normal Spell Progression. Changed the Mystic Incarnum to spells picked and known and gave a flavor buff that any spell off the Patron's list is always cast as if at max level available. It hasn't had any issues so far.

[Tanarii]

A few factors that are somewhat specific to the game I'm in:

- most of the adventures are pseudo-one shots. There's a huge shared world and continual narratives, but the adventures themselves are mostly contained. Play for 3-5 hours, game ends with some level of conclusion, and all characters get long rests before the next adventure
- at levels 5 and 6 it's possible to drain resources in this format, but at 8, 9, and 10 it becomes difficult to challenge characters without going "all in" on a single, incredibly deadly encounter. There's just not enough time. Almost all of us play quite optimized characters as well, and are very tactical.
3-5 hours is enough time for 6-10 Medium encounters (~15 min each) or 3-5 Deadly encounters (30 min or less each) with half the session time for other stuff. The upper end of that will stretch resources even for a lvl 8-10 party, even with 3 short rests.

[Skrum]

3-5 hours is enough time for 6-10 Medium encounters (~15 min each) or 3-5 Deadly encounters (30 min or less each) with half the session time for other stuff. The upper end of that will stretch resources even for a lvl 8-10 party, even with 3 short rests.

That is *impressive* combat times. Our short encounters typically take 30m-40m, and the really deadly ones will go over an hour. Slow, sure, but we trend towards difficult encounters. The general table feeling is "why bother with encounters that aren't going to drain significant resources/carry a chance of death."

Most games have 2 encounters. Some might get 3, but that's the upper end.

[Tanarii]

That is *impressive* combat times. Our short encounters typically take 30m-40m, and the really deadly ones will go over an hour. Slow, sure, but we trend towards difficult encounters. The general table feeling is "why bother with encounters that aren't going to drain significant resources/carry a chance of death."

Most games have 2 encounters. Some might get 3, but that's the upper end.I get it. Also I'm going to assume your "short encounters" are what the book calls "Deadly", and not that you're playing slowly. :)

I'm suggesting an alternative to try occasionally that you might find an alternate kind of challenging, especially since you're used to LR class dumping all their big guns on a very few extremely dangerous encounters. It'll also give your SR classes a chance to shine.

If instead you run 5 "Deadly" encounters (which would probably count as your 'short' encounters) with a short rest between each one, I'd guess your group will probably struggle by the end of the last one, especially if they don't really pace their resources. That's more than 1.5 adventuring days by-the-book.

I've seen it over and over again with players used to 1 very dangerous (multiple times "Deadly") encounter. The first few times they have to deal with by-the-book Deadly encounters but far more encounters before a LR than the book says, as opposed to less encounters than the book says but each one far more powerful than by-the-book, they find it far more challenging.

[Ganryu]

Honestly, at the table I'm at, we do 1 superboss a day, have for years, and warlock is still one of the most picked classes due to how customizable it is. I think the thing with warlocks is, they are designed to be a 2/3's caster in a way, they have so much packed into their class that they aren't supposed to equal full casters in magic, so messing with them to be a long rest class is difficult.

[Skrum]

Honestly, at the table I'm at, we do 1 superboss a day, have for years, and warlock is still one of the most picked classes due to how customizable it is. I think the thing with warlocks is, they are designed to be a 2/3's caster in a way, they have so much packed into their class that they aren't supposed to equal full casters in magic, so messing with them to be a long rest class is difficult.

I think this is true, but it also puts them in a little bit it of a no man's land. For very deadly encounters especially, casters rely on an arsenal of spells. Hypno, fireball, Banishment, slow, like those are the ones that win encounters, but shield, absorb elements, silvery barbs, healing word, misty step, vortex warp, and bless are in their own way just as important. Even more niche spells like darkness, silence, hold person, and calm emotions can be situationally amazing.

Warlocks don't get to do those things. They can cast *a* high end spell, typically. But they also don't have the heavy armor/high hit points that martial characters have. And no one is going to convince me that cantrips and a few invocations (which are mostly weak and/or situational) fully make up for it.

Believe me, this is a lament lol. Warlock is my favorite class, mostly for the reasons you gave. But they are at best middle of the pack, a nowhere near the strength of the top 5

[animorte]

We've tried changing Warlock to half-caster progression. You lose a significant amount of maximum power (max spell level and mystic arcanum), but have far more spell slots that kind of makes up for it. The other features (invocations/pact boon/subclass) mixed in really make it feel closer to what a half-caster should be.

(Side note: the level 1 spells started as usual for Warlock.)

[Tanarii]

Meanwhile my experience is Warlocks are the top full caster out of all 6 full casters. Because they aren't long rest, and all my player groups regularly pushed well past a full adventuring day, taking 3 or even 4 short rests in the process. Long rest casters struggled to hang because their spell slots were so strung out, even in late Tier 2 when they come close to max of how many they will have.

[Skrum]

Meanwhile my experience is Warlocks are the top full caster out of all 6 full casters. Because they aren't long rest, and all my player groups regularly pushed well past a full adventuring day, taking 3 or even 4 short rests in the process. Long rest casters struggled to hang because their spell slots were so strung out, even in late Tier 2 when they come close to max of how many they will have.

Living the dream lol

[Ganryu]

I think this is true, but it also puts them in a little bit it of a no man's land. For very deadly encounters especially, casters rely on an arsenal of spells. Hypno, fireball, Banishment, slow, like those are the ones that win encounters, but shield, absorb elements, silvery barbs, healing word, misty step, vortex warp, and bless are in their own way just as important. Even more niche spells like darkness, silence, hold person, and calm emotions can be situationally amazing.

Warlocks don't get to do those things. They can cast *a* high end spell, typically. But they also don't have the heavy armor/high hit points that martial characters have. And no one is going to convince me that cantrips and a few invocations (which are mostly weak and/or situational) fully make up for it.

Believe me, this is a lament lol. Warlock is my favorite class, mostly for the reasons you gave. But they are at best middle of the pack, a nowhere near the strength of the top 5

I honestly wish Wizards would learn from Invocations and give similar customization to more classes.

[Tanarii]

Living the dream lol
It's why I'm recommending trying it out as an alternative, at least from time to time. :smallamused:

Obviously it's also an example of how it's entirely possible to stretch the game in the opposite direction and eventually break it.

It was primarily driven by a simple: When the characters retreat from the adventuring site for their Long Rest, the Session Ends. Which, since they were 'pick up' tables you had to schedule a seat at, strongly incentivized players to have their characters push on.

I can understand if your table doesn't WANT to spend half their session in combat. That's the normal reason I hear folks talk about a 5MWD. They want to spend 30 minutes of a 4 hour session fighting and the other 3-1/2 talking to NPCs or something. But if you're already spending 2 hours out of 4 doing two times 1 hour over powered (by the book) combats, it should be possible to have 4 very strong (by-the-book) 30 min encounters instead and still be challenged. Just in a different way.

[sithlordnergal]

So, I've found a pretty simple fix for Warlocks, outside of the old "No 5 minute adventuring days":

Give them one extra spell slot and Invocation at levels 5 or 6.

There ya go, just do that. I am personally convinced WotC realized Warlocks needed that extra spell slot. Why? Because they made the Rod of the Pact Keeper. Now, feel free to correct me, but I'm pretty sure the only items in the DMG that restore spell slots are the Rod of the Pact Keeper and the Pearl of Power. Out of those two, the Pearl can only restore a 3rd level spell slot, while the Rod simply restores a Warlock spell slot regardless of level.

I find that other Short Rest classes, such as the Fighter and Monk, tend to do just fine with 2 to 3 encounters between Short Rests. Warlocks are the only ones who struggle. I gave them an extra spell slot and Invocation, and they were able to keep up with the rest of the classes.

[Bane's Wolf]

I see a lot of just trippling the SR spell slots.

I just gave the Warlock a normal Spell Progression. Changed the Mystic Incarnum to spells picked and known and gave a flavor buff that any spell off the Patron's list is always cast as if at max level available. It hasn't had any issues so far.

I was actually about to suggest something similar... :smalleek:
What if the warlock just uses the normal Full caster spell progression, instead of the Short rest spell slots and Mystic Arcanum?

I know this is a drastic change in the feel of the warlock, but how does it actually affect the power of the class?