Canon grounds for Warlocks in FR?

Leareth · Post by **Leareth** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 5:08 pm

The problem with making them follow a demon is you remove the option of making them good aligned. I don't know many good align characters that would make that type of deal and stick with it. While knowing which devil/deamon your powers where granted on I like but I don't see the point of having them have to be orignators.

Leareth

Ronan · Post by **Ronan** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 5:24 pm

Not follow necissarily, just that they had made a deal with them at some point in time. In FR, I'd think this would mostly commonly come from devil worshipers.

Spider Jones · Post by **Spider Jones** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 5:38 pm

Complete Mage lists devils (horned, pit fiends, and a few archdevils), demons (mariliths, balors, and Graz'zt), fey (unseelie or otherwise), slaadi (Ssendam Lord of Insanity, Ygorl Lord of Entropy, et cetera), and celestials (CG eladrin lords) as possible sources for a warlocks power.

Reading the description of the class, it seems they a portion of their soul was bartered away and replaced with this piece of fiendish innate magic (or feyish, or uh, slaadiish). To outsiders like demons and devils, souls are valuable things, and other than being beholden the the alignment restrictions there, I don't believe they should be further restricted.

AcadiusLost · Post by **AcadiusLost** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 6:38 pm

RE: their alignment restrictions: what happens when a warlock gets his/her alignment shifted away from Chaotic / Evil? Can they just no longer take Warlock levels, or do they actually find their abilities fail?

Leareth · Post by **Leareth** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 7:01 pm

hrmmm Good question. There is no mention of loss of power over alignment change that I rember in teh book so I suspect they just can't take warlock anymore.

Leareth

Lusipher · Post by **Lusipher** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 7:40 pm

We come up with anymore ideas here for this class? Im curious as it seems warlocks would make great additions to the Cult of the Dragon since they value Necromacy above all other types of spellcasters. I would think a Warlock could worship someone like Varshoon, etc. Are we only going to allow them to worship fiends and not Gods?

HEEGZ · Post by **HEEGZ** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 8:01 pm

I'm pretty sure that a warlock's powers are not being tied to a divine source. From that I would imagine that Warlocks can have pretty much any patron deity that they want.

psycho_leo · Post by **psycho_leo** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 8:36 pm

Warlocks powers come from bargaining with devils and feys. It has nothing to do withthe gods. Now, if a god decides to have a problem with that ...

White Warlock · Post by **White Warlock** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 9:02 pm

I'll repost what i presented in a different forum.

Historical:

"The titles of warlock and witch are actually, from a Christian standpoint, considered to be malicious figures. This, however, is old propaganda. They seem to be derived from old tribal lifestyles, wherein witches performed certain rituals and caretaking, and warlocks performed certain rituals and caretaking, each based on their strengths and weakness in a particular tribe. I.e., roles. So, basically, both shaman and warrior. There's also indication that warlocke is a reference to someone protected from harm, especially iron. The phrase, "war-lucked" is thought to have come from that title. The English application of the word, 'warlock,' in which it is stated to mean 'oath breaker,' is a later addition and considered to be part and parcel to the propaganda posed in the past and further propagated by print and picture.

"If we wish to look at it from a historical perspective, warlocks are the male participants of ancient tribes, whose job it was to protect, and who would take upon the role of rebels if their leaders were forced to surrender, or submit, to the Christian Romans (i.e., the oath-breaker aspect later attributed to these 'war-lucked' warriors)."

Wizards, Sorcerers, Clerics, Druids, & Warlocks:

"For this game's perspective, we could consider warlocks to be influenced by ancient ways (the ancient gods/powers as opposed to the more commonly followed gods). The powers of warlocks also differ substantially from druids, since druids gain their powers from natural means (and nature-inclined gods), and warlocks harness supernatural, or eldritch, powers. Eldritch powers, in and of themselves, are considered 'other realm.'

"Warlocks are more akin to clerics than they are to wizards/sorcerers. Clerics/druids serve their god and if they fall afoul of their god, they lose their powers, or a portion thereof. Warlocks, on the other hand, are self-serving and acting of their own accord, albeit with a degree of dependency on an 'other' realm entity or entities. In a way, they are 'supernatural' power-brokers who do not lose their powers because the contract has already been fulfilled (soul, first born child, etc). Clerical contracts, oaths, are dependent upon lifetime servitude and worship. Warlocks are more akin to small businesses striking deals with Microsoft. If you're not careful, you could be absorbed, but if you play it smart, you could become a powerful entity in and of your own."

Multiclassing:

"Warlocks, in and of themselves, i agree are reasonably balanced. The problem comes about when someone opts to use a few levels of warlock to enhance another class-type, such as rogue. That same problem exists with almost any magic-wielding combo class, to one degree or another.

"From a powergaming perspective, it is not a good idea to multi-class if your intent is to create a powerful spellcaster, but if your primary class is a warrior/rogue class, it's actually a pretty good idea to multi-class a little."

Testing Builds:

"Been doing some testing of the warlocks, from a pging standpoint, and they're pretty lame when dual-classed. Best setup i could find was a bard/warlock, and that still sucked. the blast is only good if your warlock goes up in levels, and if you're dual classing him, it's a waste. A loss to put a level in warlock if you intend on fixating with a different class, because whatever benefits you could have obtained with the +4 leap/bound, or any of the other early-on warlock abilities, they just don't make up for being a level behind in your chosen class. I.e., pretty much a waste. warlocks are only really worth it if you single-class them. Too bad they're rather restricted in build. It would have been nice if they made something a bit more creative with that class. More warlock eldritch powers to choose from would have been good enough."

Wiccanism (has no relevant connection to witches/warlocks, as presented in D&D, and thus is an unacceptable source for insight):

"Wicca material was first 'concocted' in 1899, with more fanciful notions posed as time went by. Gardner's renditions in the 1950s are the most widely accepted, and oddly enough... the most contrived. As cute as it may be, it's actually a collection of disconnected rituals, many of which were extracted from fragments of ancient civs."

Sidenote - Developer origins of sorcerers:

"Many D&Ders found the 'notion' of magicians 'forgetting' their spells after they cast them utterly ludicruous, so there started this trend in the early 80's to pose magicians with 'mana points,' so that they would have so many spells memorized and they could cast spells as long as they had mana points remaining. This, essentially, is the present-day D&D sorcerer."

FatboyT · Post by **FatboyT** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 10:59 pm

Does anyone remember the old spellfire books. FR, late 80s, early 90s (2nd edition era). Essentually, the premise was that this girl, with no real talent whatsoever inherited an ability to shoot bolts of magic from her body. Then Elminster, her, and a few others get into shenanigans and such and end up battling a dracolich.

As far as I can tell, the Warlock is just merely a more indepth take on this ability, which actually floated around the 2nd ed world for a bit before fading into obscurity.

My 2 cents.

PensivesWetness · Post by **PensivesWetness** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 12:22 am

FatboyT wrote:Does anyone remember the old spellfire books. FR, late 80s, early 90s (2nd edition era). Essentually, the premise was that this girl, with no real talent whatsoever inherited an ability to shoot bolts of magic from her body. Then Elminster, her, and a few others get into shenanigans and such and end up battling a dracolich.

As far as I can tell, the Warlock is just merely a more indepth take on this ability, which actually floated around the 2nd ed world for a bit before fading into obscurity.

My 2 cents.

Don't they have written up or typed up, stats on current or past cannon charactors over the years, for any edition, somewhere? The Spellfire chick (the name eludes me and my books are several time zones away

) battled the Zhents, the Cult of the Dragon, and others as well. But i'm curious what her charactor sheet looks like...

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 2:05 am

FatboyT wrote:Does anyone remember the old spellfire books. FR, late 80s, early 90s (2nd edition era). Essentually, the premise was that this girl, with no real talent whatsoever inherited an ability to shoot bolts of magic from her body. Then Elminster, her, and a few others get into shenanigans and such and end up battling a dracolich.

As far as I can tell, the Warlock is just merely a more indepth take on this ability, which actually floated around the 2nd ed world for a bit before fading into obscurity.

My 2 cents.

Spellfire is still around and still a highly sought-after uber ability, and is the main reason why Warlocks are BS for FR without some major retconning in some upcoming sourcebook.

yavanion · Post by **yavanion** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 2:55 am

Regarding warlocks... iwe tested playing one, and a second level power they get at i think level six, does HASTE the entire party for sixty seconds, now since a warlock also can be invisible for 24hours, they can basically walk with the party and haste haste haste haste, since they newer ewer run out of spells... there is need to look though some of the warlocks powers... there is balance issues !

Yav

Orcpaladin · Post by **Orcpaladin** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 5:59 am

yavanion wrote:Regarding warlocks... iwe tested playing one, and a second level power they get at i think level six, does HASTE the entire party for sixty seconds, now since a warlock also can be invisible for 24hours, they can basically walk with the party and haste haste haste haste, since they newer ewer run out of spells... there is need to look though some of the warlocks powers... there is balance issues !

Yav

Help me out here. I just finished the OC with a human warlock. The 2nd level warlock incantation Yavanion mentions here (Flee the Scene) does NOT haste the entire party. It hastes the warlock PC only. Now, understand I am playing NWN2 unpatched. My internet connection is fubared so no patching. Does it haste the entire party after patching?

yavanion · Post by **yavanion** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 7:26 am

OP

As i have played a warlock on a rather hack n slach server, i choose warlock just to test it out... and people wanted me in their group just couse of warlocks ability to haste entire party... and frankly iwe no idea if its a patch thing...

But, thats not all, since warlocks get invisibility, lasts 24 hours, wich is not a nerfed mage invis... they can basically use it as a hide in plane sight, eldritch blast, invis, eldritch blast, invis, rince and repeat...

I know warlock is a kinda fun class, and most of its stuff is just cool... but some can be used in a way that the game engine just cant cope with...