I do this for my players but it’s abilities instead of subclasses. Counter charm can be used to replace movement instead of an action, and it applies to any wis, int, or charisma saving throw. The planes walker gets a new ability called portal master so if someone misses her with a ranger attack by 5 or more, she can teleport the projectile at another target within 20 ft of her. A bit hard to maneuver into, but super thematic and effective when it happens
My DM kinda did that for my celestial warlock in his campaign where I’m the only spell caster. Basically the only change was that I get the entire expanded spell list automatically giving me a ton of spells and I have a familiar with book of ancient secrets so I can heal two different targets each turn. I still went the eldritch blast/agonizing blast route though
I think they''re trying to fix this garbage subclass with the upcoming Undead Warlock in the Ravenloft book. If they don't change it too much it will be a pretty cool subclass with the ability to tack on extra necrotic damage with every hit. Also alot of free Temp. HP at early levels too.
What if you were a war forged undying warlock, would you not need to eat sleep and breathe so hard that you actually just exhale food and oxygen at all times?
I've been playing a reborn that is an undying warlock that would eventually multiclass into necromancer wizard. When I read up on the undead warlock I quickly swapped. The flavor of the undying is nice but that's about it. The undead actually packs a punch with some unique abilities.
Its very niche. If you're playing at a table where the DM wants to do survival scenarios and you can't play a Warforged then that ability can be helpful. That's about it though.
The moments in these videos (like 20:40) when Monty makes a statement and Kelly's clearly about to make a big retort then there's a cut and the video comes back with both guys are looking calmly at the camera kill me. Release the Monty cut!
I think one aspect of Healing Light not mentioned (though maybe I just missed it), is that because it's a bonus action and NOT a spell, it allows you to cast full spells with your action, while Healing Word would limit the caster to only casting a cantrip with their action. Cast a Synaptic Static with your action, then bring up the unconscious Fighter with your bonus action.
I feel like Celestial Warlock should be an A, just because it has such a potent healing ability that costs no spells, along with some pretty good abilities and a dope spell list. That's just me and my personal bias though.
This is a huge thing that they missed. Warlocks don't have many options for their bonus action, so being able to heal on the same turn that you cast a spell is almost enough alone to raise the Celestial subclass to an A. (I think it should be an A anyway). I also find it interesting that they keep comparing Healing Light to Healing Word, when it's much more similar to the paladin's Lay on Hands. I love this style of healing, because you can ration it out however you want, instead of using up your spell slots. You can be a lot more tactical with it. And by the way, Lay on Hands costs an action and can't be cast at range.
Now I kinda want to run a campaign where my players have to play a four elements monk, purple dragon knight, a beast master ranger (old version) and an undying warlock.
As long as ALL the characters are derpy, or as long as ALL the characters are absolute legends, it's still possible to have a fun game. As a DM, all I have to do is set up my encounters as if the party was one level lower or higher than they actually are, or I can give the derpy party extra feats and magic items. The problem is when you have derpy and S-tier characters in the same party, as the magic items could well end up in the hands of the already-dominant characters. For avoiding that, bonus feats are better. "We know this subclass sucks, so pick something off this list as a bonus feat to make it suck less." At least then it remains attached to the character that needs it.
@@mal2ksc That's why I much prefer rewarding players with feats, abilities or spells. I only give out magic items sparingly, and usually they're utility items like an immovable rod or something.
@@mal2ksc Yep. I'm currently running one of those. His "patron" is essentially the specter of a long-dead hero from Cormyr who offered to help him avenge his dead sister who was murdered (and other things) by a host of fiends - hence he's all about finding and eradicating fiends - and isn't afraid of heading to the lower planes in order to do so.
Hell I've been that as an Ancients Paladin. Ancients are about protecting the good and beautiful things in the world, it doesn't say that you have to be nice about it. XD
I know it's not exactly what you're getting at, but you could technically say your Fiend pact is with Tiamat, or a Celestial pact with Bahamut(probably an ancient gold or silver dragon, too, depending on your DM).
I like how they outright call Hexblade’s spell list bad but have to carefully try and find good points about Undying so they don’t go too hard on it too early
@@kellywelch2515 They are looking at the subclasses how they function now. They even mention how Tasha's has brought so many options and improvements to some subclasses
@@LethalLemonade that is true. But one thing to keep in mind with spells is what spells were available when class was made. A frame of reference is important
@@kellywelch2515 Yes, it is important when you're examining game design and the effects of power creep. However, in a situation such as this when you're comparing every existing subclass in the current iteration of the game, frame of reference is of little importance if you're only trying to determine the relative power of the subclasses
And they brushed right past the existence of blur and wrote off blink. Ive been playing a mid to now high level hexblade warlock for almost 2 years and while I don't often use them, I absolutely have blur, blink, and mirror image... Because I can literally have all of them up at once, along with a ridiculous ac thanks to some wise spending on magic items and some very helpful buffing mages in the party. The ability of the hexblade to not only deal insane damage but also turtle up with massive layered defenses if the situation calls for it is what makes it so good, the versatility to be the best or damn near it at many things. Also, they were so ungodly wrong about it being nowhere near as strong without pact of the blade. None of the buffs or abilities of hexblade require usage of weapons except the bonding with hex warrior. You can just be a high ac shield toting blaster using hex combined with hexblade's curse to smite foes and sending your specter out to harass melee enemies while making any ranged assaults fail due to the armor of hexes. Hexblade is simply the best consistent damage dealer among warlocks and the best melee burst, while fiend pact is the best long range burst specifically.
A healer who gets their healing spells back on a short rest, can toss them out for free as a bonus action, and can still do damage makes the Celestial lock awesome. Now if only we had a fire or radiant version of agonizing blast.
I have an invocation from a DM's Guild product that lets me transmute EB into radiant or fire damage and upgrades the Radiant Soul feature by adding your CHA mod to multiple fire or radiant damage rolls as you level up. (2 rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th). It makes the Lightlock become the A tier it deserves to be!
Good news! Tasha's has info on changing damaging types and flavoring how your spells look, like a fireball looking like a dragon head flying at your enemy.
@@jeremybosworth2275 Spell Personalization only applies to describe their spellcasting in a way that works w/ their character's beliefs, preferences, or magic sources. As long as the mechanics of spell, "damage type or AoE" AREN'T CHANGED. Changing the damage type/AoE, you as a player would need to discuss with your DM because that will require re-balancing on his/her part in other areas as well to keep combat encounters fair, but challenging.
@@GunnerM60 Ah, I must have misread when I perused that section. Still, most DM's would be amenable to something like that, but I honestly don't think EB needs to change damage types just for flavor. There is almost nothing that resists force damage.
I've got an Aasimar Celestial Warlock in my current campaign. When his wings are out, Eldritch Blast adds Radiant damage once per turn. My DM ruled that could be paired with Radiant Soul (RAW state "when you roll radiant or fire damage, you can add your charisma modifier." Since I wasn't rolling the extra radiant damage from my wings, it could be argued I shouldn't get the additional damage from Radiant Soul.) Annoying side note: Both Aasimar and Celestial Warlock have different abilities called Radiant Soul. It's confusing and dumb.
Now you need a campaign and party consisting of a Purple Dragon Knight, 4 Elements Monk, Undying Warlock and PHB Beastmaster. Their mission : to save the world. If they fail we all die...
I know a bit late to the party but you can use beast master ranger with great succses if you choose your companion to be Pteranodon. While small you can use him as a mount and with a lance you can be quite deadly while staying out of reach. So yeah, PHB beastmaster sucks but with the right build its not THAT BAD.
I'd call it 'Elemental Blast'. Maybe make the warlock pick a damage type after a Short/Long Rest and it would provide resistance to that element for the duration. Basically Absorb Elements and Protection from Energy, but lasts until you pick another damage type after a Short/Long Rest.
I like that homebrew and have thought about it a lot. Different subclasses should have different kinds of Eldritch blasts. Like the GOO Warlock dealing Psychic damage for example, Fathomless doing Cold damage, etc. I wish there were more Patron specific invocations as well.
Yes, I have a DMs Guild product that has an invocation that allows you to transmute EB into fire or radiant damage. That same invocation also makes Radiant Soul act exactly like Agonizing Blast. You can add your CHA modifier to multiple damage rolls of fire or radiant. (2 rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th) So if you are a warlock that doesn't take Agonizing Blast, now you're covered. It's important to note that you're EB CANNOT benefit from both this upgraded Radiant Soul feature and Agonizing Blast.
I get the idea, but why would you ever do that? Eldritch Blast deals force damage, which is the least-resisted damage type in the game. What benefit is there in changing the damage type?
The breathing ability for an Undying warlock means that they can replicate the genie vessel by crawling into a bag of holding. That's it, that's all I got.
I've always thought the Undying Warlock is just a lame version of the UA Undead Warlock. They're basically identical to each other in terms of Patron choice, but the Undead Warlock has much better abilities and imo a better expanded spell list.
With the right DM the severed limbs ability is fantastic and pretty much the only way to replicate certain character concepts. I need to cast this touch spell on that enemy leader all the way over there. I pop off my own head, hand it to the barbarian, and say "Don't miss." Also the undead sanctuary effect is the best ability in the right campaign. Even a one level dip into undying warlock on an eloquence bard in a setting with whole civilizations of intelligent undead is a game changer. Ravenloft, Innistrad, Grimm Hallow, Theros, and any game where the DM says you're playing through pirates of the Caribbean or the walking dead. Yeah, the UA undead subclass has more dps. Undying has alternate playstyles.
@@CitanulsPumpkin The Undying patron is not special for being 'good' under sufficiently tailored conditions. Houserules can make any otherwise-garbage-tier class/subclass/ability campaign-endingly overpowered, and very nearly every garbage ability in the game _could, in theory,_ have a campaign built around making it useful.
@@CitanulsPumpkin you can use that same line of reasoning for any bad subclass. Also, if a subclass is only good in certain situtations or campaigns or DMs, then its not a good subclass
@@BardedWyrm so the only measure of quality in the game is how generic a subclass is and how much it appeals to munchkins. Got it. Thanks for the input.
I just wish to point out one thing about the hexblade With the improved pact weapon invocation, your hexblade can also be ranged (Longbow, heavy crossbow) So you can deal eldritch smite, crit on 19 on a distance
Yeah, I did this in my current campaign, and it's actually really interesting as a dynamic, because while I am primarily the ranged damage dealer, if either our paladin or fighter need to fall back from the front lines too heal, I can just on the fly swap from a pact bow, to a pact sword, pop out a lovely thing my DM allowed me to get, which is essentially an archers armbrace that can fold out into a shield, grab my actual hexblade out, and can fight on the front lines for a few turns while one of our main tanks heals back up enough that I can fall back and return to dealing damage at a range. Improved pact weapon makes this subclass so versatile that pigeon holing it into great weapon master, polearm master, is doing it a disservice, because while you may not be the true melee monster, you don't have to be the melee monster, other classes do it better. You instead become this invaluable character in mid length and long fights, where you can deal consistent damage at range, depending on your other invocations you can have battlefield control on your cantrips (although who honestly takes repelling blast), and then, when things are looking dicey for your main tank, you can have that AC, decent if not overly spectacular health, and armour of hexes, to be able take their place for long enough that they can heal up and get back into the fight, at which point, you pull back, and return to what you were doing. Plus, if you really want, you can pull some feat shenanigans and have things like metamagic initiate and do things like quickened misty step to gtfo of a bad position, not have used a movement or action, and then take aim while firing your longbow or whatever you have.
@@drew9092 I feel it's more like he rebuilt his character from having proficiency in Charisma (Persuasion) when he's plugging Grim Hollow, to having proficiency in Charisma (Intimidation) when ranking subclasses. Or maybe Charisma (Performance) with the musician vibe, as stated above!
I've found a combo I love: Celestial Pact of the Chain Warlock with Gift of the Ever-Living One invocation. Until you run out of healing light, you can replenish your hit points quickly and reliably, even in the middle of battle. Oh, and you can heal others, too, though not with the same efficiency.
Hexblade can also make an INSANE Arcane Archer. Improved Pact Weapon lets you make Bows and Crossbows. Add Life Drinker and Sharpshooter to that, and you have 2 Attacks at 1d8+21 damage. For good measure, you can also get Witch Sight to make all your attacks from a field of Impenetrable Darkness for permanent Advantage without getting in the way of the rest of the party.
@@e4ehco21 This is the official wording of Eldritch Smite: "Once per turn when you hit a creature with your pact weapon, you can expend a warlock spell slot to deal an extra 1d8 force damage to the target, plus another 1d8 per level of the spell slot, and you can knock the target prone if it is Huge or smaller." So, make a bow or crossbow your Pact Weapon through Improved Pact Weapon and enjoy!
*Sigh* I just finished running a campaign. Our Warlock was using it CONSTANTLY in the endgame, dodging multiattacks and often using hellish rebuke on the same turn. I should've done my homework (but so should she).
I can't wait for you guys to cover the Circle of Wildfire druid. I've been playing a modified version of it (I call it the Circle of Hurricanes, it replaces the fire damage and healing of the original with thunder and lightning damage) and having an absolute BLAST, pun intended.
the Celestial pact warlock inspired my favorite character background snippet I've written in a long time So imagine if you will a campaign of holy warriors hunting down a specific evil cult that resulted in the redemption arc of an infernal pact warlock. This was several generations ago. The warlock joined the church and their descendants had pledged themselves to the service of the god who redeemed them. The road was not always easy and not everyone in the church trusted them claiming "blood will tell". Then more recently one of the descendants was born a tiefling, marked by the infernal power of their ancestor's pact. The church's hierarchy went berserk but the high priest was having none of it, absolving the child of the ancestor's sin. As the child came of age and was choosing their path, they wanted to join the clerics out of respect for the high priest that stuck up for them. Internal church politics got in the way and that path was blocked. Someone consoled the young tiefling with the fact that "clerics are just warlocks with better publicity" and this gave the child an Idea. If none of the existing orders of clergy would have them they would found their own. Studying the lore of their ancestors the young teifling devised a ritual to form a pact, not with an infernal power but with an Archangel. "You say my kind always makes deals? This is the deal I make."
GOO Warlock is good if you have the team for it. Like, my Kenku HEAVILY relies on the telepathy power to communicate with teammates (she uses images instead of words, usually) and for keeping our dimwitted warforged on-track without having to speak, we tend to travel tightly so the range isn't that bad, and entropic ward has been an utter blessing for keeping me up as the second squishiest in our group of four. However, both the GM and I goofed by thinking Sleep was a spell GOOlocks got for the first few sessions before I was browsing the books and realized, nerp. It's not useful anymore at our current level anyway, but it was still a big oopsie on our parts.
Having played a celestial warlock I loved, it hurt me how accurate the math breakdown was. Especially because I did the same math and got the same conclusion.
Possible houserule fix that could stay fitting for the flavor, I might allow the Celestial Warlock to switch their Eldritch Blast damage type to Radiant instead of Force, at will. I'd do similar things to each subclass, like Fiend Warlocks could use a fire Eldritch Blast at will
I think of it as a "nice add on" for when you actually use this spells rather than having to take them? it doesn't take from the subclass it gives you another resistance (if tiefling you might also take infernal constitution) and if you are Bladelock getting spirit shroud as an option its great.
A thing to note with the Hex Warrior feature for Hexblade is that the Hex Warrior feature is automatically applied to a Pact of the Blade Weapon. This means a Hexblade with Pact of the Blade can dual wield with charisma.
An interesting thing about the wording of hex warrior is that it says you can use charisma for a single one handed weapon you choose AND* weapons summoned using pact of the blade, meaning you can have a badass dual-wielding hexblade
That is a very specific wording. I like it. Go with a pact rapier and a scimitar for your offhand weapon. Touch the scimitar and summon the rapier. Go with the fighting style feat for dual wielding.
@@justaredpanda3283 ngl I’m sick of people pointing this shit out when someone wants to do any sort of dual wielding build. Like YES WE GET IT GWM+PAM ID GREAT NOW STFU AND LEMME PLAY MY BADASS DUAL WIELDING HEXBLADE
I put Tasha’s Cauldron’s Summon:Celestial as Warlock spell for Celestial Warlocks. Seemed like it was an oversight. Also, WoTC needs a few more Warlock-only spells given their limited usage.
Seriously, while I'm super glad there's still things like Spirit Shroud on the Warlock list now, not having the option to cast Summon Celestial is pretty dumb. It's not even the best of the Tasha's summoning spells or anything, just thematic.
Being that Xanathar's has been out for 4 years now, WotC really needs to add more radiant/holy spell options to the base list for us good-aligned Warlocks. It's irritating the Celestial Patron gets kicked to the curb behind all the other dark & evil entities.
@@GunnerM60 i've said this for a long time, but I think eldritch blast should be a class feature for warlocks, and it should have different damage types/effects for different patrons. example, the fiend pact version deals fire damage (or maybe you choose between fire or force each time), and as you level up it adds more effects like maybe a DOT burning effect at 5th, a small AOE at 11th, and some sort of Heat Metal-like effect at 17th. the celestial's could deal radiant damage, maybe have some small healing features, at higher levels it could turn undead or something. adding more customizability and uniqueness to each warlock patron would make the class a lot more fun I think, especially since your subclass fully defines your character as a warlock unlike other classes.
@@timob1681 I have a DM's Guild PDF that greatly expands your Patron & pact specific invocations to augment whichever Warlock you are. For instance the invocation I'll take soon is called "Celestial Fire": ▶It gives me the 'option' to transmute EB, Hex, or Armor of Agathys into 🔥 or radiant damage. ▶The Radiant Soul feature basically becomes an Agonizing Blast-esque ability as you lvl up. (+ CHA mod to 2 🔥 or radiant damage rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls, @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th). ▶If you have an invocation that gives you a spell that deals damage, you can transmute that type into 🔥 or radiant. ▶Another ability grants you a souped-up version of the Elemental Bane spell 'as written', but both my DM and I agree it's too powerful and we're working on balancing it. So you to get that Celestial flavor, but I think it's better that it's in invocation option from your Patron granting you more divine power to channel into your spells.
I played a Pact of the Tome Hexblade just for shits and giggles and it turned into a really strong blaster class. The story was that my pact was a curse by an evil sword that I was actually trying to find so I could destroy it, and the closer I got to finding it the stronger our connection became (ie, leveling up). It was really fun, and made for a satisfying reason for my character to retire mid-campaign after the cursed sword was destroyed.
*Me after seing the Undying Warlock:* Wow, i haven't seen so much bashing since the Purple Dragon Knight! P.S: I'm still too much of a noob to bash classes since only experience i've ever had is playing a Kensei Monk so people who like this Warlock, you're all good cuz you're having fun with it! (infact i've considered making my next character a Fighter Champion even thought of what our dear Dudes said in previous videos simply cuz i think playing the "Farmer/Peasant that takes up arms" could be fun and i think Remarkable Athlete offers me some roleplay opportunities since it'll level up all my dex and strength proficiencies so i could make my champion with nothing but roleplay proficiencies and let that particular skill carry me later on)
I’ve actually been having a lot of fun with my half-orc Shadow Sorcerer 1/ Undying Warlock X.... but if we weren’t fighting Undead all the time he’d be pretty weak and a lot of his power comes from Invocations
Undying warlock, not undead! I know it seems like a small difference but Van Ricven’s guide is going to have the Undead warlock on it, and that one actually kinda rocks. Name is gonna be confusing lol
Regarding the Undying Warlock spell list, the ability to cast death ward with Pact Magic can be pretty powerful. You can dole out death wards in the middle of an adventure, short rest, and still have death wards running for another 7 hours. Still doesn't pull it above other Warlock subclasses, but it's a capacity that shouldn't be overlooked in my opinion.
Yep death ward is mighty powerful if you have enough time you can death ward so many people at lv 20 you can death ward 8 people if you wanna and still get it back.
I decided to play an Undying warlock for Curse of Strahd and it's worked out pretty good, mostly because of that sweet Death Ward + short rest combo. Having the life cleric and a certain important NPC death warded at all times has saved our asses over and over, and the undead sanctuary has come in handy a few times. Our party is also 100% human and halfling, so the "you don't need sleep" thing paired with Devil's Sight made my warlock our go-to sentry. It's still not a good subclass, but in the right campaign you can definitely squeeze some utility out of it. Mostly from the Death Ward, though.
The most awful part to me about Undying Warlock is that your "spring back from unconsciousness with a little bit of HP" ability only can be used when you *succeed* a death saving throw, meaning you can have the ability and not get to use it because of bad luck causing you to die anyways.
As someone who has played an undying warlock to lv 20 on a server I must say ^ this well its either this or you take multiple death saves in a turn. Yes before you ask I do joke about dying a lot.
Pirate Zombie campaign sounds awesome! That's what it would take for me to play a undying warlock. "If you gave the Hexblade a D you are a troll and get out of here." Best line. :)
If you look into Theros, particularly the culture and societies of the Returned, you'll find plenty of ways undying can be more than useful. Hell, just adding one level of undying warlock to an eloquence bard can drastically change your options in settings like Ravenloft, Innistrad, Grimm Hallow, Theros, ghosts of Saltmarsh, and a bunch of others.
@@CitanulsPumpkin I felt like "you can breathe underwater" is a bit of an oversimplification. You can also survive on a bag of holding indefinitely and are immune to other forms of suffocation. It's not much, but it's something
I felt the same way on the Dreams Druid as I do for the Celestial Warlock, the ability to heal with your BA while still being able to cast a leveled spell with your action really shouldn't be undersold. There are a lot of other classes that can heal better, but they either need their action or a spell slot
I would make Celestial Warlock an A tier. To me it is an alternative for healers who dont want to play the typical healer classes. As such it gets much stronger when no other healer is in the party, but that option is not on your tier list. So I go with "Strong Benefits that support an important specialication"
Too situational. So many classes have access to healing magic -- bards, clerics, druids, paladins, rangers, plus self healing for monks or abilities. Finally, healing isn't really needed in 5e. You have potions, wands, short and long rests, etc. If you really has a party with no healer... you typically have a lot of offense/defensive abilities to take foes out quickly (avoiding taking damage) or the DM is going to scale back encounters. Worst case, a hexblade or fiend could take a level of bard and get a ton of healing, extra slows, skills, special abilities, etc.
@@dumbwaki5877 I get your point, but I still think healing is too situational and common in 5e to focus on. I've seen a lot of players focus on a secondary role and get frustrated when it doesn't pan out because it doesn't make that big a difference or other PCs can do it well enough anyway. In all my years in 5e, I've yet to see a DM who is really going to punish a party without healing -- i.e. not allow rests, potion buying, etc. Most adventures aren't written that way. The alternative is to kill the players off. I don't see that as needing to view this in a vacuum... it's how actual games are played. I'll warn people about plans which (while perfect on paper) often don't work out when you run into actual play -- devil's sight and darkness is awesome... yet, I never use it as a player since other players don't like having their turns nerfed either. I once made an archery ranger, only to find no one else could tank and I'd spend half my time using a short sword and shield. I just caution this as a situational build. Unless you knew the rest of the party had no healing (and the party couldn't make up for it with a mass of other abilities) it might not pan out. A cleric, bard, or druid in the party is good enough and you might find yourself back on normal warlock duty anyway.
@@BW022 if party members don't play into good plans then you're right, it doesn't matter what builds you ever create because your party isn't that great at stuff. Sleep spell is one of the best early level spells unless your party members enjoy wasting your spell slots by hitting the sleeping creature. The reason why measuring in a vacuum is important is because we want to promote scenarios where everybody is playing in a way that is smart, fun, and doesn't step on each other's toes. Thats why optimizers usually have the most fun combat, because everyone at the table understand that working together is both the most fun and the most optimal thing to do. I don't think this makes unoptimized DnD worse, but I don't see a reason to consider "your DM/party might do weird things" as a part of a ranking involving math and tactics. I actually agree that the celestial warlock isn't as effective as other divine classes, but I disagree on what constitutes as situational. There's a baseline for everything within reason.
@@dumbwaki5877I appreciate the discussion. I don't generally consider play (that is either known if you know the players, or as you say a vacuum as you take your chances). However, I disagree that you plan characters in a vacuum. You will be playing with 2-5 other players and you can make some preparations (even if statistical) for the other characters at the table. Statistically, you will have other characters who can heal in a party or ways around needing healing. As such, IMO, this character is too situational. You are giving up other abilities for something which is probably not that needed. In the end, play whatever you like. However, IMO, people don't enjoy playing characters with some special ability which isn't used or others can do. I once had a player who made up an outdoor rogue... only to play in a campaign with a nature cleric and ranger. Ugg. I once had a gal with a bladelock build... only to end up with a fighter and barbarian in the group and she spent 90% of her time using EB anyway. IMO, Celestial Warlocks run that risk. If you have another healer (or two) in the group, you run the risk of regretting that as you really won't be healing that often and even then, it may not be critical. If you don't have a healer, probably a terrific class. Given the number of classes with healing in 5e (and that it isn't that critical as previous editions), I still say it is situational.
I strongly believe the Celestial is an A or S. The point of Radiant Soul is to give you the flexibility to take invocations not dedicated towards improving Eldritch Blast. It's one of the best support subclasses in the game. Healing light is phenomenal. A bunch of free healing words/day with a better die. Healing word is already an incredible spell.
I think it is kind of hilarious that a Hexblade attacks with his charisma. The way I explain it is that my Hexblade Warlock has a sentient spear that attacks for him so he just gets rag dolled around during combat. He has sentinel and pole arm master so he attacks a ton every turn so it is hilarious since he's basically just terrified the whole time. He is basically Giladaroy Lockhart but he made a pact with this spear so he could become the most famous hero in the world.
@@villainvoice5143 He is super fun to play. He is super overconfident in social situations and he has to pass a wisdom check or he tries to sell people copies of his book. When he is anywhere dangerous he plays almost like Shaggy from Scooby Doo. If he gets startled he instinctually casts eldritch blast which looks like a golden image of his own smiling face with flowiing golden hair that looks like fire blowing behind it. After that the spear just pulls him towards the enemy as he digs in his heels or hides behind his shield.
I came to the same conclusion. I figure it as like the blade is correcting his aim. Like autoaim in videogames. Would love to create a hexblade with a big damn sword that he should be too weak to handle properly, but It fairly glows and moves with him making it possible. And at the end of character arc he should be able to say "We" like Venom in the movie, and fight together
@@andreacristiano5452 I went a bit of a different route and instead of the patron giving my warlock a magic weapon, it turned her arm into a weapon. So now she claws at things with her new obsidian arm that is actually not hers anymore, the patron is controlling it and giving it the power to hit hard, hence the charisma for attacks
Yeah I've been lucky enough to have a DM let me use it in our current campaign, and it's been an absolute blast. Super unusual on how little combat focus it has, but having a free, expendable pet has been super useful. Really looking forward to the level six ability.
Yes I know. I just stated that I wish they would cover the raven queen materials. I did not say I wanted them to include it in the warlock patrons rankings.
Although it'd be great if, after they've hit up all the classes, and then gone back around to catch all the Tasha's additions, if they'd then go back around again and do a "what could have been" round with all the UA stuff. I think that there's some gold in UA that's not had an official publication, and which should get more attention. Besides, there are only so many of these videos that DD can make, and it's my favourite series they do, so the more the better. :)
I like the idea of the Undying being able to reattach limbs, my DM's crit table includes a couple of options that cut off limbs, so multiple characters have lost limbs. I wish the subclass was better though.
The FIRST thing that needed to happen was Wizards needed to buck up and give Animate Dead on the spell list. Yes, it can get super busted if the player goes ham with it, but it largely isn't going to go that way. Even then, it wouldn't make up for the lackluster subclass. Want to play a better Undying Warlock? Go fiend pact, flavor it as a lich/vampire/etc, and take the (meh) invocation for Animate Dead. You'll have the same feel, better availability for the class, and actually survive adventures.
I'm glad that the community sees the Celestial as an "A". Radiant Soul is definitely the subpar feature of the class. I did expect Kelly and Monty to rip it apart and potentially drop their rank, which they did. I'm the primary healer for my DIA module as a Celestial Warlock and it's pretty clutch!
Thanks to Tasha's, Radiant Soul now combines with Spirit Shroud, so you can make a pretty good bladelock with the celestial warlock. Radiant Soul basically becomes a Lifedrinker-like ability at low levels and later on can be combined with Lifedrinker for even more damage
The ranking of B Tier for the Celestial Warlock seemed a little harsh to me; I play one and he’s amazing. Until I rewatched this instalment and noted that Kelly and Monty are pretty accurate in their synopsis. I don’t use too many fire or radiant spells and I haven’t taken many of the spells on the extended list. The Healing at 60ft has been the difference between victory and defeat. In our campaign the Celestial is an A tier; only because (as the Dudes rightly say) I’m the only character who can heal and lean into the Cleric spell list. Hat tipped good Sirs
Fun Fact: A Hexblade Bladelock 12/Oathbreaker 8 multiclass can, with feats, a Haste buff, and a couple rounds of set up (possibly out of combat), NOVA for 33d8 + 14d6 + 128, an average of 326 damage in a single turn. An Ancient White Dragon has 333HP. This assumes all attacks hit along with a single crit to activate the GWM bonus action attack. With this build you also have very high magical non-NOVA damage, viable magical ranged damage, healing, minimum 19 AC with plate, high health, minimum +4 in saving throws, decent utility, and great RP skills. You can also achieve all this with just about any race, as this is a SAD CHA build. It’s definitely my favorite build I’ve come up with so far because literally the only thing you need to pull off that NOVA is a Potion of Haste or another party member. Any other magic items are just gravy for this build.
The Hexblade approaches cheese to me. Much like the Twilight Domain from Tasha's, it feels too powerful and flexible. As pointed out by the Dudes, serious "Main Character Syndrome" here and that's not a good thing in a cooperative game. My regular group has a player who already tries to do everything and be in the spotlight all the time; I'm just glad they haven't looked too hard at this subclass. Short story: I played in a game where one of the other characters was a Celestial Warlock who was masquerading as a Cleric. They basically got impatient wanting to be chosen by their to become a Cleric, so they made a pact with a unicorn to get the power. The DM twisted the knife with this when we later encountered their deity who was like "I was going to make you a Cleric, but then I felt you'd bound yourself to another." It was a cool RP moment.
Really enjoying playing a Celestial warlock. Used Revivify, and I do love the upcast Guiding Bolt. The ranged healing is useful. It's definitely niche for sure.
Underwater zombie campaign - Triton, Sea Elf, Water Genasi, Simic Hybrid with Underwater Adaptation: Welcome to our element. Lizardfolk: I can hold by breath for 15 minutes. Locathah and Grung (both need to be released in a book): We like the water. We need it.
I think a big thing with celestial warlock, is that the radiant soul feature (as well as the other healing features) offers something that allows you to not have to rely on eldritch blast as much to be viable in a game, which an overreliance on EB is a bit of a curse for warlocks. Technically the hexblade does the same thing but with a focus on weapons rather than spells.
you actually don't need to follow the specifics of a melee combatant with hexblade warlock. Just the fact that you are using armor and shield as a caster, you are good to go. Hexblade curse combines really well with eldritch blast. You can leave the melee option for emergency or something, and go nuts with eldritch blast.
Exactly. Which is why I disagree with them saying you are nerfed if you don't go pack of the blade. Pact of chain or tomb offer great options and If you go human you have a master blaster warlock with heavy armor and a shield at lvl 1. Super op
My Celestial Warlock is one of my favorite character, and her go to spell is Wall of Light, which she lays flat on her enemies then can fire Beams of light at her foes. Amazing, it blinds people, does group damage then single target damage. Plus eldritch blast is my back up.
Currently running a semi-regular game with a Hexblade, and he nearly got the whole party killed trying to save himself with a darkness spell, lol. Other than that though, he just tears through my encounters, it’s wild. Excited to hear you guys’ thoughts on the new Druid subclasses. You do great work.
Healing light plus the gift of the ever living ones invocation gives you a way to heal yourself 6x hp (max 30hp) as a bonus action. Takes pact of the chain, but that has its own benefits on its own.
Undying Warlock: Who are you? UA Undead Warlock: I'm you but fun, embrace my theme and give the meta Pact of the Blade Hexblade build a run for its money with any pact I wish.
Hexblade's ranking is no surprise, as it defines "Game-changing features" in that it turns a long-range, squishy, blaster into a melee brawler with actual armor options, all without taking much (if anything) away from the base class.
My favorite thing about the celestial warlock is taking the Gift of the Everliving Ones invocation for the Pact of the Chain. Every time you roll dice to regain hit points you just get the max if your familiar is within 100 ft. So you just use a bonus action to heal 6 hit points every turn and freak out your enemies lol. Plus if you do want to go all in, you can cast a 5th level cure wounds and use 5 of those bonus action dice to heal 70 hit points by yourself two levels before the cleric get the heal spell. Definitely not sustainable but it makes for a fairly survivable class
I'm surprised they didn't talk about the celestial warlock gift of the everliving-one combo. Being able to just max out healing on yourself when you have a pool of healing dice is pretty good.
Especially since they we on about the pact of the blade with hexblade. The celestial does something similar with the pact of the chain. Just like how you ignore the spell list with hexblade, you ignore the radiant/fire damage and use the healing spells on yourself to always be at full health and you might also heal your party members in clutch situations.
I've gobbling up every single one of these ranking videos! I especially love that you two don't always agree and allow that difference of opinion create discussion. Now please PLEASE tell me of my decision to play a Clockwork Soul Sorcerer is terrible or not lol
No, it isn't. Unless you aren't having fun, in which case it could still be no. Depends on whether your abilities, or lack of abilities a different subclass would give you, is the cause of not having fun. If so, it was a bad choice. If something else is the reason for a lack of fun, then there continues to be nothing wrong with your subclass choice.
It's important to note that the lvl 10 ability of the Hexblade uses your reaction, so you can avoid only half the attacks that you actually get to use the Armor of Hexes. It's still good imo.
Warlock is my favorite class. Currently playing a Celestial. The Radiant Soul isn't as big a trap as they say when you automatically get Sacred Flame and can get Sickening Radiance. And I use my spell selection and slots in a reactive way: wait for something to happen, here's a spell for it. Our Light Cleric is slightly more powerful, but I think Celestial is an A.
I absolutely love the flavor of The Undying, especially since the ambiguousness of the patron here means it's, lore-wise, even possible to have a lawful-good patron. Even when I read it's abilities and spell list for the first time I *still* felt tempted to play it (did not face the same temptation after reading the PHB Beast Master the first time), but yeah, this is a really fair ranking. In fact, even if I was feeling particularly generous, I would only bump it up to a C, just because of the sanctuary and hold breath abilities, but if I did something like take a Water or Air Genasi as the race, half of those features suddenly are redundant.
I really love your guys' content, my go too DND videos and I recommend you guys more than any other DND median, Warlocks are my go-to class and I've been a Fiend and Celestial pact. One thing that gets glossed over with the Celestial pacts Radiant Soul feature is that it combos well with green flame blade which at that point does a D8 of damage to a creature you hit, if you combo that with Pact of the Tomb and take shillelagh cantrip you have a Warlock that does good at close range with a 1D8+CHA and 1D8+CHA, combo that with spirit shroud in a desperate pinch(Another 1D8 or 2D8 at level 5 + one time use of Radiant Soul) and you can lay down some series hurt on someone close. Plus I think flame sphere can do just as good at hex, the only problem be it's initial action cast time.
Regarding Spirit Shroud, it's actually even better, with a 5th level spell, it's 3d8 extra damage per hit. Also, Hexblade's Curse works with all attacks, meaning Eldritch Blast benefits from it as well, though it heavily competes with Hex in that situation.
In the first part you talked about how Tasha's made playing the PHB subclasses (and Hexblade) better, yet with the Celestial you made no mention of how great Spirit Shroud can be for making that "trap" bonus damage much more viable for Blade Pact/cantrips or close range Eldritch Blasting. Especially close range Eldritch Blast; truly a matter of the risks being worth the rewards and basis of a whole build goal, with that extra Charisma mod of radiant damage further stacking on the hurt output in a much more thematic way than on the shadowy Hexblade when choosing its best damage type option. Also, Sickening Radiance. There, you only had to spend two spells known on fantastic concentration spells that'll get the most out of your limited spell slots; one for mixing it up in the fray and the other for long range artillery that's synergistic with Repelling Blast, ranged Eldritch Smite, and other such. Plus, everyone else already mentioned how you slightly undersold Healing Light even with saying it was quite good.
After playing a celestial warlock in a campaign I would personally give it an A ranking. Healing word is one of the best spells in the game and getting a bunch of free casts is just really good. This doesn't fully 'solve the problem' that warlocks have too few spell slots, but it certainly helps. It gives you enough healing to constantly bring allies up as they drop while not getting in the way of your top tier damage capabilities. The 6th lv feature is mostly just ribbon but the fact that the other abilities are just that good makes up for it.
One thing I noticed when I hear you discussing Celestial Warlock spell chouce is that you seemed to fixate a bit on the damage spells. At least how I play it, the Celestial Warlock should take mostly support spells and have their cantrips be their attack option. The leveled spells, Guiding Bolt included, should be reserved for utility and helping the team.
Actually, the Celestial Warlock has a great damage spell, and it's only 2nd level. Flaming Sphere. Read the description, and it sounds an awful lot like the cleric's Spiritual Weapon, which the Dungeon Dudes have praised in other videos. It takes an action to cast, but then you can use your bonus action to move it, including attacking with it. It's kind of the perfect spell for a warlock: it extends the spell effects over multiple rounds so it makes efficient use of your spell slots, it gives you something to do with your bonus action so you can use it and eldritch blast on the same turn, you can move it around on the battlefield so it remains useful throughout the combat unlike some AoE spells, it scales up with more damage at the automatic higher spell levels that warlocks get, and it's a "save for half damage" spell, so you're guaranteed at least some damage when you attack with it. The main drawback as compared to spiritual weapon is that it's concentration, so it competes with your other concentration spells. But with your limited spellcasting you're not going to want to cast Flaming Sphere and, say, Hunger of Hadar both in the same fight anyway. This just gives you another option in those battles where you feel that an extra attack per round (which is what this amounts to) is better than casting a big AoE spell.
Friend of mine ran a gnome undying warlock who lived in a bag of holding. DM ruled in a prior campaign that if you didn't need to breathe that you weren't affected by the time limit you can be inside the bag. Came up one time when the party was captured and Fooñey Bónnes was able to hide in the magic bag for a few days.
I blended Celestial warlock and divine soul sorcerer for a great damage dealer who bolsters the parties HP with huge Aid spells(5th level warlock aid's over breakfast(+20 max hp)) and celestial resistance. It's a huge support warlock build.
I know this is weird request. But y’all should do a video on the PACTS OF THE WARLOCK. I feel warlock is the only class that has sorta of two choices that’s determine how they are played
I'm busy playing a hexblade "necromancer" like warlock with all these necromancer invocations. Feels awesome. Blink worked pretty well for me in combat:) i did chose shield and some smites but that's for roleplay and for the feel of the character, also plan on taking 3 levels of bard for some low level spell slots to burn
It can also be lots of fun when mixed with a Paladin (allows you to heavily focus on charisma for both casting and attacking), or even a Swashbuckler Rogue.
I love lose to see/hear a hard mode campaign using only ranked D subclasses to see/hear the outcome. Also, kudos on the video guys, pretty much listen to everything you upload. Keep up the great work!
14:59 "Forget you, unicorn; I want the *devil!"* Those boomer zealots from the 80s & 90s are going to be furious with you when they regain consciousness, having just fainted
Playing a Protector Aasimar Celestial Warlock, Protector Aasimar have a racial ability called “Radiant Soul”. It gives you incorporeal wings with a flying speed of 30. You also can do an additional radiant damage on your first hit (melee or spell) equal to your character level. Meaning that damage scales up with your character level not class level. Add that additional damage from the Aasimar racial ability to the radiant damage potential of the Celestial Warlock. You could potentially do an ungodly amount of damage in a single attack.
I personally feel like giving the Celestial a B over 1 bad ability because it might be a trap, (that still gives radiant resistance) and then giving the Hexblade an S despite recognizing its spell list as a bad ability AND stating that if you don’t do x y and z things, you won’t get the use out of it, is a tad inconsistent and unfair
Agreed. Celestial is an easy A. It may not due as much damage as other subclasses, but that’s not its purpose. And its healing abilities are so awesome and versatile.
The more optional rules in the DMG you use the better the Undying Warlock becomes. If you use the lingering injuries table the ability to reattach limbs is great. If you use the slow natural healing rule any form of healing the class provides becomes extremely well appreciated. With gritty realism all of the short rest abilities become a ton more useful. If your DM actually uses the recommended food and water guidelines and doesn’t allow the Outlander background (because in terms of survival being able to feed a group of 6 consistently no matter the environment without any ability checks is ludicrous) you’ll find that not having to drink or eat is a massive boon not just a flavor boost. Which is why I’m always weary to introduce warforged into a survival campaign because they kinda just don’t need to do anything to sustain themselves. TL;DR The rules that make the game harder make undying warlock better.
For plot reasons, my character in my most recently completed campaign was a Fiend warlock for the first half of the campaign and a Celestial for the second half, and I loved both and found them roughly equivalent in terms of impact, albeit in very different ways. Fiend's ability to dish out massive damage is absolutely unparalleled, and Dark One's Blessing encourages a kind of reckless "the best defense is a good offense" playstyle that fits the theme. However, I didn't miss the fiend features when I went for Celestial because Healing Light is such a great feature; when you land three eldritch blast beams and dish out 5d6 points of healing in the same turn, you feel like a badass. Also, I think you folks missed one redeeming feature of Radiant Soul: it combos very well with Sacred Flame, which you also get for free, to give you a great backup cantrip option. If your target ducks behind cover to get away from your Eldritch Blasts, or they have a super high AC, you can break out Sacred Flame instead and still do decent damage.
As someone who has never played a Celestial Warlock, ^ that was my initial understanding of the class: Sacred Flame is used as a backup. Eldritch Blast and all the Invocations therein still comprise the base of the attack. However, when in melee or with high AC opponents, that's when SF comes into play. Perhaps that is incorrect?
@@jagdhillon757 That's totally correct. Although because I was a Tomelock, in melee I actually used a different combination that also benefits from Radiant Soul: Shilelagh plus Green Flame Blade. 2d8+ 10 to one enemy and 1d8+5 to an adjacent one actually beats out Eldritch Blast in some cases, particularly if you're using your concentration on, say, Wall of Fire instead of Hex.
@@ColinKillick That seems to be the popular melee alternative to EB with Tomelock, but I'm wondering at the opportunity cost between those 3 Cantrips vs just relying SF in melee (because it gets the modifier bonus) and 3 other Utility Cantrips instead? Shillelagh also takes BA economy away from Hex etc...
Have you guys considered the Sharpshooter hexblade? Because whenever you crit you can Eldritch Smite with your longbow. A Shadow of Moil hexblade archer will have advantage on all attacks to counteract their sharpshooter penalty, you can use a feat to get +2 to hit with the archery fighting style at level 12 as well, and use +1/2/3 arrows to further offset the -5 to hit Seriously, go look at the Arcane Archer fighter, and then examine the possibilities of a Hexblade archer, I think you'll agree with me that the latter is INFINITELY better
I think a "D" for the Undying is unfair - while it's worse than the other options, it doesn't actively weaken the class as a whole, meaning it should rate a "C" at lowest according to the scale.
I kinda agree with their reasoning, being that the "trap" is that you didn't take any of the other subclasses. Even beyond that, someone who makes an Undying Warlock is going in thinking they're gonna be able to cheat death and not die as easily, when the Celestial Warlock can do those things better and with more versatility.
I think Blink is an amazing spell all around, and especially for a melee character. Basically 50% of the time you become virtually untouchable during enemy turns, and it doesn't use concentration. Who needs shield when half the time you simply can't be attacked. As for Cone of Cold, I can see taking it over something like Synaptic Static (even though Synaptic is objectively the better spell) simply because as a cone attack, it should be somewhat more flexible to use as a melee attacker. It's going to be difficult to target a 40 foot diameter AoE when you're in the midst of a group of enemies, but with a bit of smart positioning you might be able to make a 60 ft cone attack work just as well, while making it easier to avoid hitting yourself or other allies.
Radiant soul is more for a paladin multiclass for the smite spells plus if you choose tomb pact you can take green flame blade and scale from both your physical modifier and your charisma modifier through one attack plus add a smite. I agree with B though it's not a great subclass. Too many long rest recharges
I'd love a series where you guys take your D and C tier subclasses and homebrew them into S tier
plz
I do this for my players but it’s abilities instead of subclasses. Counter charm can be used to replace movement instead of an action, and it applies to any wis, int, or charisma saving throw. The planes walker gets a new ability called portal master so if someone misses her with a ranger attack by 5 or more, she can teleport the projectile at another target within 20 ft of her. A bit hard to maneuver into, but super thematic and effective when it happens
My DM kinda did that for my celestial warlock in his campaign where I’m the only spell caster. Basically the only change was that I get the entire expanded spell list automatically giving me a ton of spells and I have a familiar with book of ancient secrets so I can heal two different targets each turn. I still went the eldritch blast/agonizing blast route though
@@johnowen5662 Ay man we still warlocks tho, we love the pew pew's
That's a great idea for when they run out of official material.
Undying Warlock: I don't need to eat, sleep and breathe.
Warforged: I gain this at 1st level.
I think they''re trying to fix this garbage subclass with the upcoming Undead Warlock in the Ravenloft book. If they don't change it too much it will be a pretty cool subclass with the ability to tack on extra necrotic damage with every hit. Also alot of free Temp. HP at early levels too.
What if you were a war forged undying warlock, would you not need to eat sleep and breathe so hard that you actually just exhale food and oxygen at all times?
Bruh, power creep in races is a real thing. A couple races nowadays get Magic Resistance, which is just insane.
I've been playing a reborn that is an undying warlock that would eventually multiclass into necromancer wizard. When I read up on the undead warlock I quickly swapped. The flavor of the undying is nice but that's about it. The undead actually packs a punch with some unique abilities.
Its very niche. If you're playing at a table where the DM wants to do survival scenarios and you can't play a Warforged then that ability can be helpful. That's about it though.
The moments in these videos (like 20:40) when Monty makes a statement and Kelly's clearly about to make a big retort then there's a cut and the video comes back with both guys are looking calmly at the camera kill me. Release the Monty cut!
I think one aspect of Healing Light not mentioned (though maybe I just missed it), is that because it's a bonus action and NOT a spell, it allows you to cast full spells with your action, while Healing Word would limit the caster to only casting a cantrip with their action. Cast a Synaptic Static with your action, then bring up the unconscious Fighter with your bonus action.
I feel like Celestial Warlock should be an A, just because it has such a potent healing ability that costs no spells, along with some pretty good abilities and a dope spell list. That's just me and my personal bias though.
Especially good if you just accidentally knocked said fighter unconscious with your synaptic static.
@@asherandai1000 That whole "Who cares if i accidentally kill you ill just bring you back before the end of my turn np np"
This is a huge thing that they missed. Warlocks don't have many options for their bonus action, so being able to heal on the same turn that you cast a spell is almost enough alone to raise the Celestial subclass to an A. (I think it should be an A anyway).
I also find it interesting that they keep comparing Healing Light to Healing Word, when it's much more similar to the paladin's Lay on Hands. I love this style of healing, because you can ration it out however you want, instead of using up your spell slots. You can be a lot more tactical with it.
And by the way, Lay on Hands costs an action and can't be cast at range.
Completely agree. It takes the best of Healing Word and the best of Lay on Hands-both already very strong-and combines them. That’s just incredible.
Now I kinda want to run a campaign where my players have to play a four elements monk, purple dragon knight, a beast master ranger (old version) and an undying warlock.
You monster!
At least an undying warlock is still an Eldritch Blast machine.
Run it on April fools
As long as ALL the characters are derpy, or as long as ALL the characters are absolute legends, it's still possible to have a fun game. As a DM, all I have to do is set up my encounters as if the party was one level lower or higher than they actually are, or I can give the derpy party extra feats and magic items. The problem is when you have derpy and S-tier characters in the same party, as the magic items could well end up in the hands of the already-dominant characters. For avoiding that, bonus feats are better. "We know this subclass sucks, so pick something off this list as a bonus feat to make it suck less." At least then it remains attached to the character that needs it.
@@mal2ksc That's why I much prefer rewarding players with feats, abilities or spells. I only give out magic items sparingly, and usually they're utility items like an immovable rod or something.
"You don't have to be a goody-two-shoes Paladin."
*laughs in Oath of Conquest*
Oath of Vengeance can be fun too, if you properly select what you're avenging.
@@mal2ksc Yep. I'm currently running one of those. His "patron" is essentially the specter of a long-dead hero from Cormyr who offered to help him avenge his dead sister who was murdered (and other things) by a host of fiends - hence he's all about finding and eradicating fiends - and isn't afraid of heading to the lower planes in order to do so.
Hell I've been that as an Ancients Paladin. Ancients are about protecting the good and beautiful things in the world, it doesn't say that you have to be nice about it. XD
Isn't that the very definition of Paladin?
*Laughs in eldritch knight who bought deep magic*
My babies? Got their second part so fast??
Dungeon dudes being the REAL warlock patron
Can’t wait for an official warlock that makes a deal with a dragon.
Don’t you mean bards?
I know it's not exactly what you're getting at, but you could technically say your Fiend pact is with Tiamat, or a Celestial pact with Bahamut(probably an ancient gold or silver dragon, too, depending on your DM).
@@acarnivorouslizardfolk1033 bargains with, not sleeps with.
If they do, it should be in whatever book the Drake Warden and Dragon monk are going to be in. Maybe a Dragon-lance book?
I'd say just re-flavor the efreeti/mardid genie warlock from Tasha to get a fire- or cold-based dragon
I like how they outright call Hexblade’s spell list bad but have to carefully try and find good points about Undying so they don’t go too hard on it too early
One thing I realized is they keep referring to synaptic strike and spirit shroud.... But when these subclasses came out those weren't options
@@kellywelch2515 They are looking at the subclasses how they function now. They even mention how Tasha's has brought so many options and improvements to some subclasses
@@LethalLemonade that is true. But one thing to keep in mind with spells is what spells were available when class was made. A frame of reference is important
@@kellywelch2515 Yes, it is important when you're examining game design and the effects of power creep. However, in a situation such as this when you're comparing every existing subclass in the current iteration of the game, frame of reference is of little importance if you're only trying to determine the relative power of the subclasses
And they brushed right past the existence of blur and wrote off blink. Ive been playing a mid to now high level hexblade warlock for almost 2 years and while I don't often use them, I absolutely have blur, blink, and mirror image... Because I can literally have all of them up at once, along with a ridiculous ac thanks to some wise spending on magic items and some very helpful buffing mages in the party. The ability of the hexblade to not only deal insane damage but also turtle up with massive layered defenses if the situation calls for it is what makes it so good, the versatility to be the best or damn near it at many things. Also, they were so ungodly wrong about it being nowhere near as strong without pact of the blade. None of the buffs or abilities of hexblade require usage of weapons except the bonding with hex warrior. You can just be a high ac shield toting blaster using hex combined with hexblade's curse to smite foes and sending your specter out to harass melee enemies while making any ranged assaults fail due to the armor of hexes. Hexblade is simply the best consistent damage dealer among warlocks and the best melee burst, while fiend pact is the best long range burst specifically.
A healer who gets their healing spells back on a short rest, can toss them out for free as a bonus action, and can still do damage makes the Celestial lock awesome. Now if only we had a fire or radiant version of agonizing blast.
I have an invocation from a DM's Guild product that lets me transmute EB into radiant or fire damage and upgrades the Radiant Soul feature by adding your CHA mod to multiple fire or radiant damage rolls as you level up. (2 rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th).
It makes the Lightlock become the A tier it deserves to be!
Good news! Tasha's has info on changing damaging types and flavoring how your spells look, like a fireball looking like a dragon head flying at your enemy.
@@jeremybosworth2275 Spell Personalization only applies to describe their spellcasting in a way that works w/ their character's beliefs, preferences, or magic sources.
As long as the mechanics of spell, "damage type or AoE" AREN'T CHANGED.
Changing the damage type/AoE, you as a player would need to discuss with your DM because that will require re-balancing on his/her part in other areas as well to keep combat encounters fair, but challenging.
@@GunnerM60 Ah, I must have misread when I perused that section. Still, most DM's would be amenable to something like that, but I honestly don't think EB needs to change damage types just for flavor. There is almost nothing that resists force damage.
I've got an Aasimar Celestial Warlock in my current campaign. When his wings are out, Eldritch Blast adds Radiant damage once per turn. My DM ruled that could be paired with Radiant Soul (RAW state "when you roll radiant or fire damage, you can add your charisma modifier." Since I wasn't rolling the extra radiant damage from my wings, it could be argued I shouldn't get the additional damage from Radiant Soul.) Annoying side note: Both Aasimar and Celestial Warlock have different abilities called Radiant Soul. It's confusing and dumb.
This is weird. Almost all of the videos I've watched so far are at least a year old. You guys are so consistent with your presentation. I love it.
undying warlock can live forever in a bag of holding?
Baglock new build.
Kobold undying warlock with a bag of holding
Hmmm... Aren't there a few other classes that can get the whole no air required thing? This gives me an idea... Party in a bag! xD
@@asherandai1000 what an opportunity to have the bbeg say "you and what army" then you casually pull out your bag of holding.
Castle castle no mi
After jack in the box now 'lock in a bag
Now you need a campaign and party consisting of a Purple Dragon Knight, 4 Elements Monk, Undying Warlock and PHB Beastmaster. Their mission : to save the world. If they fail we all die...
I know a bit late to the party but you can use beast master ranger with great succses if you choose your companion to be Pteranodon. While small you can use him as a mount and with a lance you can be quite deadly while staying out of reach. So yeah, PHB beastmaster sucks but with the right build its not THAT BAD.
This is the plot of the suicide squad
@@watcherknight8760
Someone has to say "we're bad guys it's what we do" in the worst, and most cliché way possible
Ironically, I think the Purple Dragon Knight would be the best one out of them.
Throw in a School of Transmutation wizard while you're at it.
I feel like Warlock's should have invocations which let them have their Eldritch Blast deal a different damage type. Adding flavour.
I'd call it 'Elemental Blast'. Maybe make the warlock pick a damage type after a Short/Long Rest and it would provide resistance to that element for the duration. Basically Absorb Elements and Protection from Energy, but lasts until you pick another damage type after a Short/Long Rest.
I like that homebrew and have thought about it a lot. Different subclasses should have different kinds of Eldritch blasts. Like the GOO Warlock dealing Psychic damage for example, Fathomless doing Cold damage, etc. I wish there were more Patron specific invocations as well.
This would have been great to see in Tasha's
Yes, I have a DMs Guild product that has an invocation that allows you to transmute EB into fire or radiant damage. That same invocation also makes Radiant Soul act exactly like Agonizing Blast. You can add your CHA modifier to multiple damage rolls of fire or radiant.
(2 rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th)
So if you are a warlock that doesn't take Agonizing Blast, now you're covered.
It's important to note that you're EB CANNOT benefit from both this upgraded Radiant Soul feature and Agonizing Blast.
I get the idea, but why would you ever do that? Eldritch Blast deals force damage, which is the least-resisted damage type in the game. What benefit is there in changing the damage type?
The breathing ability for an Undying warlock means that they can replicate the genie vessel by crawling into a bag of holding. That's it, that's all I got.
I've always thought the Undying Warlock is just a lame version of the UA Undead Warlock. They're basically identical to each other in terms of Patron choice, but the Undead Warlock has much better abilities and imo a better expanded spell list.
With the right DM the severed limbs ability is fantastic and pretty much the only way to replicate certain character concepts.
I need to cast this touch spell on that enemy leader all the way over there. I pop off my own head, hand it to the barbarian, and say "Don't miss."
Also the undead sanctuary effect is the best ability in the right campaign. Even a one level dip into undying warlock on an eloquence bard in a setting with whole civilizations of intelligent undead is a game changer.
Ravenloft, Innistrad, Grimm Hallow, Theros, and any game where the DM says you're playing through pirates of the Caribbean or the walking dead. Yeah, the UA undead subclass has more dps. Undying has alternate playstyles.
@@CitanulsPumpkin The Undying patron is not special for being 'good' under sufficiently tailored conditions. Houserules can make any otherwise-garbage-tier class/subclass/ability campaign-endingly overpowered, and very nearly every garbage ability in the game _could, in theory,_ have a campaign built around making it useful.
@@CitanulsPumpkin you can use that same line of reasoning for any bad subclass. Also, if a subclass is only good in certain situtations or campaigns or DMs, then its not a good subclass
@@BardedWyrm so the only measure of quality in the game is how generic a subclass is and how much it appeals to munchkins. Got it. Thanks for the input.
I just wish to point out one thing about the hexblade
With the improved pact weapon invocation, your hexblade can also be ranged (Longbow, heavy crossbow)
So you can deal eldritch smite, crit on 19 on a distance
Yeah, I did this in my current campaign, and it's actually really interesting as a dynamic, because while I am primarily the ranged damage dealer, if either our paladin or fighter need to fall back from the front lines too heal, I can just on the fly swap from a pact bow, to a pact sword, pop out a lovely thing my DM allowed me to get, which is essentially an archers armbrace that can fold out into a shield, grab my actual hexblade out, and can fight on the front lines for a few turns while one of our main tanks heals back up enough that I can fall back and return to dealing damage at a range.
Improved pact weapon makes this subclass so versatile that pigeon holing it into great weapon master, polearm master, is doing it a disservice, because while you may not be the true melee monster, you don't have to be the melee monster, other classes do it better. You instead become this invaluable character in mid length and long fights, where you can deal consistent damage at range, depending on your other invocations you can have battlefield control on your cantrips (although who honestly takes repelling blast), and then, when things are looking dicey for your main tank, you can have that AC, decent if not overly spectacular health, and armour of hexes, to be able take their place for long enough that they can heal up and get back into the fight, at which point, you pull back, and return to what you were doing. Plus, if you really want, you can pull some feat shenanigans and have things like metamagic initiate and do things like quickened misty step to gtfo of a bad position, not have used a movement or action, and then take aim while firing your longbow or whatever you have.
The best subclasses are actually Kelly’s hair and Monty’s rockin facial hair
Rocking the CoFro for the win LOL
Pact of the hair-bro
Kelly's hair is S-tier
They both look dapper
Ngl, monty has some impressive beard game going
This week in Dungeon Dudes: Kelly lets his hair down.
And oh yeah, WARLOCKS!!!
You know he took a negative to Charisma for this, right? Like, I'm not going to trust anything this guy says, with his hair so floppy.
@@drew9092 tbh i think its a plus in charisma for me. gives me hard musician vibe and im IN
@@drew9092 I feel it's more like he rebuilt his character from having proficiency in Charisma (Persuasion) when he's plugging Grim Hollow, to having proficiency in Charisma (Intimidation) when ranking subclasses. Or maybe Charisma (Performance) with the musician vibe, as stated above!
I couldn't help myself but reading your comment with Clarkson's voice
@@drew9092 No need to _war_ against his _locks._
I've found a combo I love: Celestial Pact of the Chain Warlock with Gift of the Ever-Living One invocation. Until you run out of healing light, you can replenish your hit points quickly and reliably, even in the middle of battle. Oh, and you can heal others, too, though not with the same efficiency.
Hexblade can also make an INSANE Arcane Archer.
Improved Pact Weapon lets you make Bows and Crossbows.
Add Life Drinker and Sharpshooter to that, and you have 2 Attacks at 1d8+21 damage.
For good measure, you can also get Witch Sight to make all your attacks from a field of Impenetrable Darkness for permanent Advantage without getting in the way of the rest of the party.
Don't forget the fact that Eldritch Smite is not limited to melee attacks
@@jr-jl9702 wait what
@@e4ehco21 Hey, why do you think Hexbow builds are popular?
@@e4ehco21 This is the official wording of Eldritch Smite:
"Once per turn when you hit a creature with your pact weapon, you can expend a warlock spell slot to deal an extra 1d8 force damage to the target, plus another 1d8 per level of the spell slot, and you can knock the target prone if it is Huge or smaller."
So, make a bow or crossbow your Pact Weapon through Improved Pact Weapon and enjoy!
Well that's kind of broken
The Armor of Hexes ability requires your Reaction to use, so it's only against one attack per turn.
*Sigh* I just finished running a campaign. Our Warlock was using it CONSTANTLY in the endgame, dodging multiattacks and often using hellish rebuke on the same turn. I should've done my homework (but so should she).
This gets missed so much, its not a 4+ unlimited save by any stretch
Wow. I did not see that somehow. Maybe different sentence structure than normal? Thanks for saying something, that *really* changes that ability.
Thank you, I was coming here to say the same thing. It’s a once per turn ability and is not a 50% all the time miss.
I was going to say the same, if you're really fighting a legendary boss you're probabilly getting hit more often than 50%.
I can't wait for you guys to cover the Circle of Wildfire druid. I've been playing a modified version of it (I call it the Circle of Hurricanes, it replaces the fire damage and healing of the original with thunder and lightning damage) and having an absolute BLAST, pun intended.
the Celestial pact warlock inspired my favorite character background snippet I've written in a long time
So imagine if you will a campaign of holy warriors hunting down a specific evil cult that resulted in the redemption arc of an infernal pact warlock. This was several generations ago. The warlock joined the church and their descendants had pledged themselves to the service of the god who redeemed them. The road was not always easy and not everyone in the church trusted them claiming "blood will tell".
Then more recently one of the descendants was born a tiefling, marked by the infernal power of their ancestor's pact. The church's hierarchy went berserk but the high priest was having none of it, absolving the child of the ancestor's sin. As the child came of age and was choosing their path, they wanted to join the clerics out of respect for the high priest that stuck up for them. Internal church politics got in the way and that path was blocked.
Someone consoled the young tiefling with the fact that "clerics are just warlocks with better publicity" and this gave the child an Idea. If none of the existing orders of clergy would have them they would found their own. Studying the lore of their ancestors the young teifling devised a ritual to form a pact, not with an infernal power but with an Archangel. "You say my kind always makes deals? This is the deal I make."
Wow that is really awesome
As a spokesman to the incomprehensible horrors of the void I can't tear myself away from the great old ones
GOO Warlock is good if you have the team for it. Like, my Kenku HEAVILY relies on the telepathy power to communicate with teammates (she uses images instead of words, usually) and for keeping our dimwitted warforged on-track without having to speak, we tend to travel tightly so the range isn't that bad, and entropic ward has been an utter blessing for keeping me up as the second squishiest in our group of four. However, both the GM and I goofed by thinking Sleep was a spell GOOlocks got for the first few sessions before I was browsing the books and realized, nerp. It's not useful anymore at our current level anyway, but it was still a big oopsie on our parts.
“How old are you?”
“Idk... somewhere between 14 and 34.”
“What? Send a pic”
*Kelly with his hair down*
Rock it, Kelly!
this genuinely made me laugh out loud lmao
With a beard like that, it’s more like 22 and 33.
Having played a celestial warlock I loved, it hurt me how accurate the math breakdown was. Especially because I did the same math and got the same conclusion.
Possible houserule fix that could stay fitting for the flavor, I might allow the Celestial Warlock to switch their Eldritch Blast damage type to Radiant instead of Force, at will.
I'd do similar things to each subclass, like Fiend Warlocks could use a fire Eldritch Blast at will
At least sickening radiance exists?
@@jonahwillliams5959 also Sacred Flame. If you're fighting something with high AC but poor dex saves, it might be more reliable
@@jcdenton2187 I definitely am house ruling that cause the warlock at my table wanted to switch to the celestial pact.
I think of it as a "nice add on" for when you actually use this spells rather than having to take them? it doesn't take from the subclass it gives you another resistance (if tiefling you might also take infernal constitution) and if you are Bladelock getting spirit shroud as an option its great.
A thing to note with the Hex Warrior feature for Hexblade is that the Hex Warrior feature is automatically applied to a Pact of the Blade Weapon. This means a Hexblade with Pact of the Blade can dual wield with charisma.
An interesting thing about the wording of hex warrior is that it says you can use charisma for a single one handed weapon you choose AND* weapons summoned using pact of the blade, meaning you can have a badass dual-wielding hexblade
That is a very specific wording. I like it. Go with a pact rapier and a scimitar for your offhand weapon. Touch the scimitar and summon the rapier. Go with the fighting style feat for dual wielding.
@@justaredpanda3283 can’t use hexblade on two handed weapons.
@@justaredpanda3283
Nah², get that one invocation that lets you get ranged weapons as pact weapons and get an crossbow with the crossbow expert feat.
@@justaredpanda3283 completely forgot about that, haven’t checked out hexblade in awhile
@@justaredpanda3283 ngl I’m sick of people pointing this shit out when someone wants to do any sort of dual wielding build. Like YES WE GET IT GWM+PAM ID GREAT NOW STFU AND LEMME PLAY MY BADASS DUAL WIELDING HEXBLADE
I put Tasha’s Cauldron’s Summon:Celestial as Warlock spell for Celestial Warlocks. Seemed like it was an oversight. Also, WoTC needs a few more Warlock-only spells given their limited usage.
there's also only 1 sorcerer-only spell, Chaos Bolt. other classes than the wizard really need more love
Seriously, while I'm super glad there's still things like Spirit Shroud on the Warlock list now, not having the option to cast Summon Celestial is pretty dumb. It's not even the best of the Tasha's summoning spells or anything, just thematic.
Being that Xanathar's has been out for 4 years now, WotC really needs to add more radiant/holy spell options to the base list for us good-aligned Warlocks. It's irritating the Celestial Patron gets kicked to the curb behind all the other dark & evil entities.
@@GunnerM60 i've said this for a long time, but I think eldritch blast should be a class feature for warlocks, and it should have different damage types/effects for different patrons. example, the fiend pact version deals fire damage (or maybe you choose between fire or force each time), and as you level up it adds more effects like maybe a DOT burning effect at 5th, a small AOE at 11th, and some sort of Heat Metal-like effect at 17th. the celestial's could deal radiant damage, maybe have some small healing features, at higher levels it could turn undead or something. adding more customizability and uniqueness to each warlock patron would make the class a lot more fun I think, especially since your subclass fully defines your character as a warlock unlike other classes.
@@timob1681 I have a DM's Guild PDF that greatly expands your Patron & pact specific invocations to augment whichever Warlock you are. For instance the invocation I'll take soon is called "Celestial Fire":
▶It gives me the 'option' to transmute EB, Hex, or Armor of Agathys into 🔥 or radiant damage.
▶The Radiant Soul feature basically becomes an Agonizing Blast-esque ability as you lvl up. (+ CHA mod to 2 🔥 or radiant damage rolls @ 5th, 3 rolls, @ 11th, & 4 rolls @ 17th).
▶If you have an invocation that gives you a spell that deals damage, you can transmute that type into 🔥 or radiant.
▶Another ability grants you a souped-up version of the Elemental Bane spell 'as written', but both my DM and I agree it's too powerful and we're working on balancing it.
So you to get that Celestial flavor, but I think it's better that it's in invocation option from your Patron granting you more divine power to channel into your spells.
It looks like both Kelly and Monty got caught in the rain on their way to film just at different times
Goodnight, the accuracy of this comment is so... weirdly on-point.
I played a Pact of the Tome Hexblade just for shits and giggles and it turned into a really strong blaster class. The story was that my pact was a curse by an evil sword that I was actually trying to find so I could destroy it, and the closer I got to finding it the stronger our connection became (ie, leveling up). It was really fun, and made for a satisfying reason for my character to retire mid-campaign after the cursed sword was destroyed.
Warlocks get the Whispers of the Grave invocation at 9th level, which gives the ability to cast Speak with Dead WITHOUT using a spell slot
*Me after seing the Undying Warlock:* Wow, i haven't seen so much bashing since the Purple Dragon Knight!
P.S: I'm still too much of a noob to bash classes since only experience i've ever had is playing a Kensei Monk so people who like this Warlock, you're all good cuz you're having fun with it! (infact i've considered making my next character a Fighter Champion even thought of what our dear Dudes said in previous videos simply cuz i think playing the "Farmer/Peasant that takes up arms" could be fun and i think Remarkable Athlete offers me some roleplay opportunities since it'll level up all my dex and strength proficiencies so i could make my champion with nothing but roleplay proficiencies and let that particular skill carry me later on)
I’ve actually been having a lot of fun with my half-orc Shadow Sorcerer 1/ Undying Warlock X.... but if we weren’t fighting Undead all the time he’d be pretty weak and a lot of his power comes from Invocations
Undying warlock, not undead! I know it seems like a small difference but Van Ricven’s guide is going to have the Undead warlock on it, and that one actually kinda rocks. Name is gonna be confusing lol
Undead or undying tbh to different things
Undying is not good tbh I don’t like it
@@heartbreak1740 Kag the Puny is an Undying Warlock
Regarding the Undying Warlock spell list, the ability to cast death ward with Pact Magic can be pretty powerful. You can dole out death wards in the middle of an adventure, short rest, and still have death wards running for another 7 hours. Still doesn't pull it above other Warlock subclasses, but it's a capacity that shouldn't be overlooked in my opinion.
Yep death ward is mighty powerful if you have enough time you can death ward so many people at lv 20 you can death ward 8 people if you wanna and still get it back.
I decided to play an Undying warlock for Curse of Strahd and it's worked out pretty good, mostly because of that sweet Death Ward + short rest combo. Having the life cleric and a certain important NPC death warded at all times has saved our asses over and over, and the undead sanctuary has come in handy a few times. Our party is also 100% human and halfling, so the "you don't need sleep" thing paired with Devil's Sight made my warlock our go-to sentry.
It's still not a good subclass, but in the right campaign you can definitely squeeze some utility out of it. Mostly from the Death Ward, though.
The most awful part to me about Undying Warlock is that your "spring back from unconsciousness with a little bit of HP" ability only can be used when you *succeed* a death saving throw, meaning you can have the ability and not get to use it because of bad luck causing you to die anyways.
It might be worse than every other way of self-recovering from 0 hp given by race or class.
As someone who has played an undying warlock to lv 20 on a server I must say ^ this well its either this or you take multiple death saves in a turn.
Yes before you ask I do joke about dying a lot.
Meanwhile Celestial gets it for free.
Hell of a thing to have written on your grave: His pact was Undying, he proved less so.
Pirate Zombie campaign sounds awesome! That's what it would take for me to play a undying warlock.
"If you gave the Hexblade a D you are a troll and get out of here." Best line. :)
If you look into Theros, particularly the culture and societies of the Returned, you'll find plenty of ways undying can be more than useful. Hell, just adding one level of undying warlock to an eloquence bard can drastically change your options in settings like Ravenloft, Innistrad, Grimm Hallow, Theros, ghosts of Saltmarsh, and a bunch of others.
@@CitanulsPumpkin I felt like "you can breathe underwater" is a bit of an oversimplification. You can also survive on a bag of holding indefinitely and are immune to other forms of suffocation. It's not much, but it's something
I felt the same way on the Dreams Druid as I do for the Celestial Warlock, the ability to heal with your BA while still being able to cast a leveled spell with your action really shouldn't be undersold.
There are a lot of other classes that can heal better, but they either need their action or a spell slot
For sure!
If they gave the Hexblade warlock spiritual weapon as part of their spell list, they would’ve gained omnipotence.
Don't threaten me with a good time
Take 3 levels of divine soul sorcerer and you're good to go
I would make Celestial Warlock an A tier. To me it is an alternative for healers who dont want to play the typical healer classes. As such it gets much stronger when no other healer is in the party, but that option is not on your tier list. So I go with "Strong Benefits that support an important specialication"
Too situational. So many classes have access to healing magic -- bards, clerics, druids, paladins, rangers, plus self healing for monks or abilities. Finally, healing isn't really needed in 5e. You have potions, wands, short and long rests, etc. If you really has a party with no healer... you typically have a lot of offense/defensive abilities to take foes out quickly (avoiding taking damage) or the DM is going to scale back encounters. Worst case, a hexblade or fiend could take a level of bard and get a ton of healing, extra slows, skills, special abilities, etc.
@@BW022 using DM decisions when talking about balance and power scaling is a pothole, because we're comparing everything in a vacuum.
@@dumbwaki5877 I get your point, but I still think healing is too situational and common in 5e to focus on. I've seen a lot of players focus on a secondary role and get frustrated when it doesn't pan out because it doesn't make that big a difference or other PCs can do it well enough anyway. In all my years in 5e, I've yet to see a DM who is really going to punish a party without healing -- i.e. not allow rests, potion buying, etc. Most adventures aren't written that way. The alternative is to kill the players off. I don't see that as needing to view this in a vacuum... it's how actual games are played.
I'll warn people about plans which (while perfect on paper) often don't work out when you run into actual play -- devil's sight and darkness is awesome... yet, I never use it as a player since other players don't like having their turns nerfed either. I once made an archery ranger, only to find no one else could tank and I'd spend half my time using a short sword and shield.
I just caution this as a situational build. Unless you knew the rest of the party had no healing (and the party couldn't make up for it with a mass of other abilities) it might not pan out. A cleric, bard, or druid in the party is good enough and you might find yourself back on normal warlock duty anyway.
@@BW022 if party members don't play into good plans then you're right, it doesn't matter what builds you ever create because your party isn't that great at stuff. Sleep spell is one of the best early level spells unless your party members enjoy wasting your spell slots by hitting the sleeping creature.
The reason why measuring in a vacuum is important is because we want to promote scenarios where everybody is playing in a way that is smart, fun, and doesn't step on each other's toes. Thats why optimizers usually have the most fun combat, because everyone at the table understand that working together is both the most fun and the most optimal thing to do. I don't think this makes unoptimized DnD worse, but I don't see a reason to consider "your DM/party might do weird things" as a part of a ranking involving math and tactics.
I actually agree that the celestial warlock isn't as effective as other divine classes, but I disagree on what constitutes as situational. There's a baseline for everything within reason.
@@dumbwaki5877I appreciate the discussion. I don't generally consider play (that is either known if you know the players, or as you say a vacuum as you take your chances). However, I disagree that you plan characters in a vacuum. You will be playing with 2-5 other players and you can make some preparations (even if statistical) for the other characters at the table. Statistically, you will have other characters who can heal in a party or ways around needing healing. As such, IMO, this character is too situational. You are giving up other abilities for something which is probably not that needed.
In the end, play whatever you like. However, IMO, people don't enjoy playing characters with some special ability which isn't used or others can do. I once had a player who made up an outdoor rogue... only to play in a campaign with a nature cleric and ranger. Ugg. I once had a gal with a bladelock build... only to end up with a fighter and barbarian in the group and she spent 90% of her time using EB anyway. IMO, Celestial Warlocks run that risk. If you have another healer (or two) in the group, you run the risk of regretting that as you really won't be healing that often and even then, it may not be critical. If you don't have a healer, probably a terrific class. Given the number of classes with healing in 5e (and that it isn't that critical as previous editions), I still say it is situational.
I strongly believe the Celestial is an A or S. The point of Radiant Soul is to give you the flexibility to take invocations not dedicated towards improving Eldritch Blast. It's one of the best support subclasses in the game. Healing light is phenomenal. A bunch of free healing words/day with a better die. Healing word is already an incredible spell.
Can you imagine a party with a Gloomstalker Ranger and a Hexblade Warlock with the right feats, omg 😱 so much killing power!!!
I was the warlock in this situation, my hexblade was also an archer...melee enemies had bad days.
Add Path of Shadows Monk ..
I think it is kind of hilarious that a Hexblade attacks with his charisma. The way I explain it is that my Hexblade Warlock has a sentient spear that attacks for him so he just gets rag dolled around during combat. He has sentinel and pole arm master so he attacks a ton every turn so it is hilarious since he's basically just terrified the whole time. He is basically Giladaroy Lockhart but he made a pact with this spear so he could become the most famous hero in the world.
Holy shit, that's fantastic!!
@@villainvoice5143 He is super fun to play. He is super overconfident in social situations and he has to pass a wisdom check or he tries to sell people copies of his book. When he is anywhere dangerous he plays almost like Shaggy from Scooby Doo. If he gets startled he instinctually casts eldritch blast which looks like a golden image of his own smiling face with flowiing golden hair that looks like fire blowing behind it. After that the spear just pulls him towards the enemy as he digs in his heels or hides behind his shield.
I came to the same conclusion. I figure it as like the blade is correcting his aim. Like autoaim in videogames. Would love to create a hexblade with a big damn sword that he should be too weak to handle properly, but It fairly glows and moves with him making it possible. And at the end of character arc he should be able to say "We" like Venom in the movie, and fight together
I would use Alucard from Castlevania as a basis, with a sentient, flying sword, that is basically controlled through telepathy/ basic magic
@@andreacristiano5452 I went a bit of a different route and instead of the patron giving my warlock a magic weapon, it turned her arm into a weapon. So now she claws at things with her new obsidian arm that is actually not hers anymore, the patron is controlling it and giving it the power to hit hard, hence the charisma for attacks
Really wish they would cover The Raven Queen for Warlocks. Really been wanting this to be covered.
Yeah I've been lucky enough to have a DM let me use it in our current campaign, and it's been an absolute blast. Super unusual on how little combat focus it has, but having a free, expendable pet has been super useful. Really looking forward to the level six ability.
They dont cover UA material in videos like this. It's a breakdown of the official subclasses
Yes I know. I just stated that I wish they would cover the raven queen materials. I did not say I wanted them to include it in the warlock patrons rankings.
Although it'd be great if, after they've hit up all the classes, and then gone back around to catch all the Tasha's additions, if they'd then go back around again and do a "what could have been" round with all the UA stuff. I think that there's some gold in UA that's not had an official publication, and which should get more attention.
Besides, there are only so many of these videos that DD can make, and it's my favourite series they do, so the more the better. :)
I like the idea of the Undying being able to reattach limbs, my DM's crit table includes a couple of options that cut off limbs, so multiple characters have lost limbs. I wish the subclass was better though.
The FIRST thing that needed to happen was Wizards needed to buck up and give Animate Dead on the spell list. Yes, it can get super busted if the player goes ham with it, but it largely isn't going to go that way. Even then, it wouldn't make up for the lackluster subclass.
Want to play a better Undying Warlock? Go fiend pact, flavor it as a lich/vampire/etc, and take the (meh) invocation for Animate Dead. You'll have the same feel, better availability for the class, and actually survive adventures.
I'm glad that the community sees the Celestial as an "A". Radiant Soul is definitely the subpar feature of the class. I did expect Kelly and Monty to rip it apart and potentially drop their rank, which they did.
I'm the primary healer for my DIA module as a Celestial Warlock and it's pretty clutch!
Thanks to Tasha's, Radiant Soul now combines with Spirit Shroud, so you can make a pretty good bladelock with the celestial warlock. Radiant Soul basically becomes a Lifedrinker-like ability at low levels and later on can be combined with Lifedrinker for even more damage
The ranking of B Tier for the Celestial Warlock seemed a little harsh to me; I play one and he’s amazing. Until I rewatched this instalment and noted that Kelly and Monty are pretty accurate in their synopsis. I don’t use too many fire or radiant spells and I haven’t taken many of the spells on the extended list. The Healing at 60ft has been the difference between victory and defeat. In our campaign the Celestial is an A tier; only because (as the Dudes rightly say) I’m the only character who can heal and lean into the Cleric spell list.
Hat tipped good Sirs
"Screw you Unicorn, I want the Devil!"
When you stop listening to prog rock and start listening to metal.
Fun Fact: A Hexblade Bladelock 12/Oathbreaker 8 multiclass can, with feats, a Haste buff, and a couple rounds of set up (possibly out of combat), NOVA for 33d8 + 14d6 + 128, an average of 326 damage in a single turn. An Ancient White Dragon has 333HP. This assumes all attacks hit along with a single crit to activate the GWM bonus action attack. With this build you also have very high magical non-NOVA damage, viable magical ranged damage, healing, minimum 19 AC with plate, high health, minimum +4 in saving throws, decent utility, and great RP skills. You can also achieve all this with just about any race, as this is a SAD CHA build. It’s definitely my favorite build I’ve come up with so far because literally the only thing you need to pull off that NOVA is a Potion of Haste or another party member. Any other magic items are just gravy for this build.
The Hexblade approaches cheese to me. Much like the Twilight Domain from Tasha's, it feels too powerful and flexible. As pointed out by the Dudes, serious "Main Character Syndrome" here and that's not a good thing in a cooperative game. My regular group has a player who already tries to do everything and be in the spotlight all the time; I'm just glad they haven't looked too hard at this subclass.
Short story: I played in a game where one of the other characters was a Celestial Warlock who was masquerading as a Cleric. They basically got impatient wanting to be chosen by their to become a Cleric, so they made a pact with a unicorn to get the power. The DM twisted the knife with this when we later encountered their deity who was like "I was going to make you a Cleric, but then I felt you'd bound yourself to another." It was a cool RP moment.
Really enjoying playing a Celestial warlock. Used Revivify, and I do love the upcast Guiding Bolt. The ranged healing is useful. It's definitely niche for sure.
Underwater zombie campaign -
Triton, Sea Elf, Water Genasi, Simic Hybrid with Underwater Adaptation: Welcome to our element.
Lizardfolk: I can hold by breath for 15 minutes.
Locathah and Grung (both need to be released in a book): We like the water. We need it.
I think a big thing with celestial warlock, is that the radiant soul feature (as well as the other healing features) offers something that allows you to not have to rely on eldritch blast as much to be viable in a game, which an overreliance on EB is a bit of a curse for warlocks. Technically the hexblade does the same thing but with a focus on weapons rather than spells.
14:27 HAHAHA! I said “unless you’re a bard” right when you guys said it as well
you actually don't need to follow the specifics of a melee combatant with hexblade warlock. Just the fact that you are using armor and shield as a caster, you are good to go. Hexblade curse combines really well with eldritch blast. You can leave the melee option for emergency or something, and go nuts with eldritch blast.
I agree. Hexblade is just better than the others because it covers the warlock's main weakness (defense) and boosts the warlock's main strength.
Exactly. Which is why I disagree with them saying you are nerfed if you don't go pack of the blade. Pact of chain or tomb offer great options and If you go human you have a master blaster warlock with heavy armor and a shield at lvl 1. Super op
My Celestial Warlock is one of my favorite character, and her go to spell is Wall of Light, which she lays flat on her enemies then can fire Beams of light at her foes. Amazing, it blinds people, does group damage then single target damage. Plus eldritch blast is my back up.
She sounds awesome!
Currently running a semi-regular game with a Hexblade, and he nearly got the whole party killed trying to save himself with a darkness spell, lol. Other than that though, he just tears through my encounters, it’s wild.
Excited to hear you guys’ thoughts on the new Druid subclasses. You do great work.
"Unless you're a bard"
I cracked XD
Healing light plus the gift of the ever living ones invocation gives you a way to heal yourself 6x hp (max 30hp) as a bonus action. Takes pact of the chain, but that has its own benefits on its own.
Undying Warlock: Who are you?
UA Undead Warlock: I'm you but fun, embrace my theme and give the meta Pact of the Blade Hexblade build a run for its money with any pact I wish.
Mortal Husk and Tomb of Lavistus combo at level 10 makes the Undying shit itself...
Yeah, Undead is leagues better, and actually makes for an utterly hellish Hex/Blaster or Hexblade/Spirit Shroud maven. Definite improvement.
Hexblade's ranking is no surprise, as it defines "Game-changing features" in that it turns a long-range, squishy, blaster into a melee brawler with actual armor options, all without taking much (if anything) away from the base class.
I am currently playing a genie warlock with elemental bane and it's pretty good. Also, the ludicrous amount of spell choices is amazing.
I was hoping for a rating on Genie. I am thinking of playing one as my next character
My favorite thing about the celestial warlock is taking the Gift of the Everliving Ones invocation for the Pact of the Chain. Every time you roll dice to regain hit points you just get the max if your familiar is within 100 ft. So you just use a bonus action to heal 6 hit points every turn and freak out your enemies lol. Plus if you do want to go all in, you can cast a 5th level cure wounds and use 5 of those bonus action dice to heal 70 hit points by yourself two levels before the cleric get the heal spell. Definitely not sustainable but it makes for a fairly survivable class
I'm surprised they didn't talk about the celestial warlock gift of the everliving-one combo. Being able to just max out healing on yourself when you have a pool of healing dice is pretty good.
Especially since they we on about the pact of the blade with hexblade. The celestial does something similar with the pact of the chain. Just like how you ignore the spell list with hexblade, you ignore the radiant/fire damage and use the healing spells on yourself to always be at full health and you might also heal your party members in clutch situations.
Screw you second wind!
I've gobbling up every single one of these ranking videos! I especially love that you two don't always agree and allow that difference of opinion create discussion. Now please PLEASE tell me of my decision to play a Clockwork Soul Sorcerer is terrible or not lol
No, it isn't. Unless you aren't having fun, in which case it could still be no. Depends on whether your abilities, or lack of abilities a different subclass would give you, is the cause of not having fun. If so, it was a bad choice. If something else is the reason for a lack of fun, then there continues to be nothing wrong with your subclass choice.
It's important to note that the lvl 10 ability of the Hexblade uses your reaction, so you can avoid only half the attacks that you actually get to use the Armor of Hexes. It's still good imo.
Warlock is my favorite class. Currently playing a Celestial. The Radiant Soul isn't as big a trap as they say when you automatically get Sacred Flame and can get Sickening Radiance. And I use my spell selection and slots in a reactive way: wait for something to happen, here's a spell for it. Our Light Cleric is slightly more powerful, but I think Celestial is an A.
I absolutely love the flavor of The Undying, especially since the ambiguousness of the patron here means it's, lore-wise, even possible to have a lawful-good patron. Even when I read it's abilities and spell list for the first time I *still* felt tempted to play it (did not face the same temptation after reading the PHB Beast Master the first time), but yeah, this is a really fair ranking.
In fact, even if I was feeling particularly generous, I would only bump it up to a C, just because of the sanctuary and hold breath abilities, but if I did something like take a Water or Air Genasi as the race, half of those features suddenly are redundant.
I can’t wait for you guys to talk about all the wizard subclasses, especially the Bladesinger!
I really love your guys' content, my go too DND videos and I recommend you guys more than any other DND median, Warlocks are my go-to class and I've been a Fiend and Celestial pact. One thing that gets glossed over with the Celestial pacts Radiant Soul feature is that it combos well with green flame blade which at that point does a D8 of damage to a creature you hit, if you combo that with Pact of the Tomb and take shillelagh cantrip you have a Warlock that does good at close range with a 1D8+CHA and 1D8+CHA, combo that with spirit shroud in a desperate pinch(Another 1D8 or 2D8 at level 5 + one time use of Radiant Soul) and you can lay down some series hurt on someone close. Plus I think flame sphere can do just as good at hex, the only problem be it's initial action cast time.
Loved the episode dudes! Appreciate the extra commentary on variants, social play, and altering the meta. Y’all are great!
O yeah, the Hexblade, the poster child of minmaxing and power gaming, and I love it!
Hexblade: I spent all my resources so I can do BIG damage at level 11!
War domain Cleric : "Hold my beer..."
Regarding Spirit Shroud, it's actually even better, with a 5th level spell, it's 3d8 extra damage per hit.
Also, Hexblade's Curse works with all attacks, meaning Eldritch Blast benefits from it as well, though it heavily competes with Hex in that situation.
Ok but gift of the ever living ones stacks crazy well with celestial healing dice pool
In the first part you talked about how Tasha's made playing the PHB subclasses (and Hexblade) better, yet with the Celestial you made no mention of how great Spirit Shroud can be for making that "trap" bonus damage much more viable for Blade Pact/cantrips or close range Eldritch Blasting. Especially close range Eldritch Blast; truly a matter of the risks being worth the rewards and basis of a whole build goal, with that extra Charisma mod of radiant damage further stacking on the hurt output in a much more thematic way than on the shadowy Hexblade when choosing its best damage type option.
Also, Sickening Radiance. There, you only had to spend two spells known on fantastic concentration spells that'll get the most out of your limited spell slots; one for mixing it up in the fray and the other for long range artillery that's synergistic with Repelling Blast, ranged Eldritch Smite, and other such.
Plus, everyone else already mentioned how you slightly undersold Healing Light even with saying it was quite good.
So we're just missing Wizard and Artificer subclass ranking now, right?
That and all the other Tasha's subclasses.
@@jeremybosworth2275 Well, yeah, but I assume they'd do those after everything else is covered
@@jeremybosworth2275 Yep, can't wait for my Fathomless
@@ricklawrence7215 I can't wait Artificer in general, and Bladesinger.
@@ricklawrence7215 didn't impress me as much as the genie
After playing a celestial warlock in a campaign I would personally give it an A ranking. Healing word is one of the best spells in the game and getting a bunch of free casts is just really good. This doesn't fully 'solve the problem' that warlocks have too few spell slots, but it certainly helps. It gives you enough healing to constantly bring allies up as they drop while not getting in the way of your top tier damage capabilities. The 6th lv feature is mostly just ribbon but the fact that the other abilities are just that good makes up for it.
One thing I noticed when I hear you discussing Celestial Warlock spell chouce is that you seemed to fixate a bit on the damage spells. At least how I play it, the Celestial Warlock should take mostly support spells and have their cantrips be their attack option. The leveled spells, Guiding Bolt included, should be reserved for utility and helping the team.
Actually, the Celestial Warlock has a great damage spell, and it's only 2nd level. Flaming Sphere. Read the description, and it sounds an awful lot like the cleric's Spiritual Weapon, which the Dungeon Dudes have praised in other videos.
It takes an action to cast, but then you can use your bonus action to move it, including attacking with it. It's kind of the perfect spell for a warlock: it extends the spell effects over multiple rounds so it makes efficient use of your spell slots, it gives you something to do with your bonus action so you can use it and eldritch blast on the same turn, you can move it around on the battlefield so it remains useful throughout the combat unlike some AoE spells, it scales up with more damage at the automatic higher spell levels that warlocks get, and it's a "save for half damage" spell, so you're guaranteed at least some damage when you attack with it.
The main drawback as compared to spiritual weapon is that it's concentration, so it competes with your other concentration spells. But with your limited spellcasting you're not going to want to cast Flaming Sphere and, say, Hunger of Hadar both in the same fight anyway. This just gives you another option in those battles where you feel that an extra attack per round (which is what this amounts to) is better than casting a big AoE spell.
Friend of mine ran a gnome undying warlock who lived in a bag of holding. DM ruled in a prior campaign that if you didn't need to breathe that you weren't affected by the time limit you can be inside the bag. Came up one time when the party was captured and Fooñey Bónnes was able to hide in the magic bag for a few days.
Imagine having a dragon patron who adopted and raised you like you their child like a mother interesting backstory.
Sooo fairy tale?
I blended Celestial warlock and divine soul sorcerer for a great damage dealer who bolsters the parties HP with huge Aid spells(5th level warlock aid's over breakfast(+20 max hp)) and celestial resistance. It's a huge support warlock build.
I know this is weird request. But y’all should do a video on the PACTS OF THE WARLOCK. I feel warlock is the only class that has sorta of two choices that’s determine how they are played
I'm busy playing a hexblade "necromancer" like warlock with all these necromancer invocations. Feels awesome. Blink worked pretty well for me in combat:) i did chose shield and some smites but that's for roleplay and for the feel of the character, also plan on taking 3 levels of bard for some low level spell slots to burn
kelly's hair is magnifecent
Lads, forgetting Wall of Light on the spell list for Warlock? Or Pact of the Tome for more cantrips like Firebolt? Radiant soul is worth.
also spirit shroud for bladelock :/
Here it comes Can't wait for the two page essay on why Hexblade is the best Warlock.
Feylock is funlock
@@carthagegaming5545 Feylock is fun
I like hexblade but with improved pact weapon and making it a archer. No need to get up close with a d8 hd
I, for some reason, got this idea for a high elven hexblade archer with a "mastery seems magical" confidence in their abilities.
It can also be lots of fun when mixed with a Paladin (allows you to heavily focus on charisma for both casting and attacking), or even a Swashbuckler Rogue.
I love lose to see/hear a hard mode campaign using only ranked D subclasses to see/hear the outcome. Also, kudos on the video guys, pretty much listen to everything you upload. Keep up the great work!
14:59 "Forget you, unicorn; I want the *devil!"* Those boomer zealots from the 80s & 90s are going to be furious with you when they regain consciousness, having just fainted
Playing a Protector Aasimar Celestial Warlock, Protector Aasimar have a racial ability called “Radiant Soul”. It gives you incorporeal wings with a flying speed of 30. You also can do an additional radiant damage on your first hit (melee or spell) equal to your character level. Meaning that damage scales up with your character level not class level.
Add that additional damage from the Aasimar racial ability to the radiant damage potential of the Celestial Warlock. You could potentially do an ungodly amount of damage in a single attack.
I personally feel like giving the Celestial a B over 1 bad ability because it might be a trap, (that still gives radiant resistance) and then giving the Hexblade an S despite recognizing its spell list as a bad ability AND stating that if you don’t do x y and z things, you won’t get the use out of it, is a tad inconsistent and unfair
Agreed. Celestial is an easy A. It may not due as much damage as other subclasses, but that’s not its purpose. And its healing abilities are so awesome and versatile.
Hexblade Warlock feels like a band-aid solution to the actual balance problems that the Warlock has. Change my mind.
"Welcome back to our subclass ranking series with Wizard episode 9,423!"
-Future Monty
I mean, Cleric has more subclasses than Wizard
The more optional rules in the DMG you use the better the Undying Warlock becomes. If you use the lingering injuries table the ability to reattach limbs is great. If you use the slow natural healing rule any form of healing the class provides becomes extremely well appreciated. With gritty realism all of the short rest abilities become a ton more useful.
If your DM actually uses the recommended food and water guidelines and doesn’t allow the Outlander background (because in terms of survival being able to feed a group of 6 consistently no matter the environment without any ability checks is ludicrous) you’ll find that not having to drink or eat is a massive boon not just a flavor boost. Which is why I’m always weary to introduce warforged into a survival campaign because they kinda just don’t need to do anything to sustain themselves.
TL;DR The rules that make the game harder make undying warlock better.
got to be honest, that celestial warlock sounds mighty fun
One of my player's once played it, and she had a blast! Really flexible, and we didn't have a dedicated healer, so hybrid classes were really shining.
For plot reasons, my character in my most recently completed campaign was a Fiend warlock for the first half of the campaign and a Celestial for the second half, and I loved both and found them roughly equivalent in terms of impact, albeit in very different ways. Fiend's ability to dish out massive damage is absolutely unparalleled, and Dark One's Blessing encourages a kind of reckless "the best defense is a good offense" playstyle that fits the theme. However, I didn't miss the fiend features when I went for Celestial because Healing Light is such a great feature; when you land three eldritch blast beams and dish out 5d6 points of healing in the same turn, you feel like a badass. Also, I think you folks missed one redeeming feature of Radiant Soul: it combos very well with Sacred Flame, which you also get for free, to give you a great backup cantrip option. If your target ducks behind cover to get away from your Eldritch Blasts, or they have a super high AC, you can break out Sacred Flame instead and still do decent damage.
As someone who has never played a Celestial Warlock, ^ that was my initial understanding of the class: Sacred Flame is used as a backup. Eldritch Blast and all the Invocations therein still comprise the base of the attack. However, when in melee or with high AC opponents, that's when SF comes into play. Perhaps that is incorrect?
@@jagdhillon757 That's totally correct. Although because I was a Tomelock, in melee I actually used a different combination that also benefits from Radiant Soul: Shilelagh plus Green Flame Blade. 2d8+ 10 to one enemy and 1d8+5 to an adjacent one actually beats out Eldritch Blast in some cases, particularly if you're using your concentration on, say, Wall of Fire instead of Hex.
@@ColinKillick That seems to be the popular melee alternative to EB with Tomelock, but I'm wondering at the opportunity cost between those 3 Cantrips vs just relying SF in melee (because it gets the modifier bonus) and 3 other Utility Cantrips instead? Shillelagh also takes BA economy away from Hex etc...
Celestial warlock abilities sounds like they started making a kickass Paladin and then decided halfway through to make it a warlock
Have you guys considered the Sharpshooter hexblade? Because whenever you crit you can Eldritch Smite with your longbow. A Shadow of Moil hexblade archer will have advantage on all attacks to counteract their sharpshooter penalty, you can use a feat to get +2 to hit with the archery fighting style at level 12 as well, and use +1/2/3 arrows to further offset the -5 to hit
Seriously, go look at the Arcane Archer fighter, and then examine the possibilities of a Hexblade archer, I think you'll agree with me that the latter is INFINITELY better
I think a "D" for the Undying is unfair - while it's worse than the other options, it doesn't actively weaken the class as a whole, meaning it should rate a "C" at lowest according to the scale.
I kinda agree with their reasoning, being that the "trap" is that you didn't take any of the other subclasses. Even beyond that, someone who makes an Undying Warlock is going in thinking they're gonna be able to cheat death and not die as easily, when the Celestial Warlock can do those things better and with more versatility.
@@TheWayOfTheWott Yeah I think Wott's point here makes sense. There is nothing Undying about the Undying warlock as is.
I think Blink is an amazing spell all around, and especially for a melee character. Basically 50% of the time you become virtually untouchable during enemy turns, and it doesn't use concentration. Who needs shield when half the time you simply can't be attacked. As for Cone of Cold, I can see taking it over something like Synaptic Static (even though Synaptic is objectively the better spell) simply because as a cone attack, it should be somewhat more flexible to use as a melee attacker. It's going to be difficult to target a 40 foot diameter AoE when you're in the midst of a group of enemies, but with a bit of smart positioning you might be able to make a 60 ft cone attack work just as well, while making it easier to avoid hitting yourself or other allies.
Yes, yes, warlocks, that's all fine and well... but let's talk about how Kelly is rocking that bedhead look.
Radiant soul is more for a paladin multiclass for the smite spells plus if you choose tomb pact you can take green flame blade and scale from both your physical modifier and your charisma modifier through one attack plus add a smite. I agree with B though it's not a great subclass. Too many long rest recharges