I once had a Warlock at my table that did a Scott Pilgrim. His Fiend patron was like “you need to kill my 7 demon exes (one for each sin) so you can be with me”. It was a good time.
That sounds fun. The party can just be working on some unrelated quest and *pop* it's demon ex #3. Nice way for the DM to have an excuse for a filler fight too.
Ah, but the complication would then be, that the warlock needs to keep their patron (and their friends) entertained, lest they withdraw their support. And like any good show, the hijinks and stakes need to pretty much always increase over time.
So basically Mojo from Marvel comics. Probably best for and Archfey or Noble Genie patron. Though you could probably make it work for a Fiend or Undead (aka a VERY bored Lich)
Pretty sure that's why aliens haven't invaded Earth yet: humans make great reality tv. Also, am I the only one hoping that the new 5e Spelljammer has some kind of ET warlock patron?
My favorite warlock/patron relationship was a tiefling who had her demon dad as a patron. It was very much a relationship where they'd just check in on each other. Occasionally she'd reach out with the equivalent of "can I bring some laundry home?" or "Uh, help, I maxed the emergency credit card." and he'd reach out to say "You know it would be helpful if you and your friends did some errands for me. They can stay over if they want before you head out." It was wholesome.
I had to speedily make a character and my DM helped me and I basically have the same situation but make it fae. I swear I almost had tears in my eyes when the DM messaged me because my character's mom/patron decided to send them a letter to tell them they're doing well. Like, it was so friggn wholesome 😭 It was also the first time a character of mine actually had an NPC who cared for them, usually I just follow the party and do whatever serves the team, so it's nice to have someone with actual personality and a background that comes up instead of being unimportant.
There was someone playing a character like that where the patron was actually the parent of that character...though most of us didn't actually know that until far later in the game. The rogue was making jokes about the warlocks patron being his domme mommy...and multiclassed because he wanted the same thing as he'd thought it meant. We actually encountered said patron in the next session...and we found out that... A: The patron was their biological parent and... B: They were a Celestial patron... Which led to C... C: While the original Warlock was the mother helping her kid, the Rogue/Warlock's was the equivalent of a bribe based restraining order Well, that was after we had milk and cookies with a high level hound archon...
I have a very similar vibe with my character in my husband's homebrew campaign setting. She's a homebrew race (that's essentially the Archfey version of a tiefling) and her patron is her heretofore absentee Archfey dad. He showed up with her pact of the chain familiar basically like "I got you a pet!" like a deadbeat dad showing up with a puppy. "Dad... I'm 23 years old." I love it.
This is why I describe my genie warlock’s patron giving her magic less like she’s receiving it from her like a wifi signal and more like she’s planting a seed of her own magic inside her to grow over time on its own, like a tree.
Left Brain: "It says here 'the patron is a strict disciplinarian, but treats the warlock with a measure of respect.'" Right Brain: "Kinky!" Left Brain: "Stop it!"
While I understand people's fear of "main character syndrome" with patrons, it's important to remember that throughout a good campaign each player will be the main character at some point. Not everyone can have equal time every session, and part of the reason we are at the table is to enjoy each others stories, not just our own. DM's being too afraid to let a character take center stage once in a while can end up with them limiting the stories the players want to tell because it might not involve every character in the exact same way all the time.
The reason this tends to be more problematic for warlocks is that no-one else at the table is privy to the patron relationship. Whatever time is spent between the DM and warlock player role-playing their ties is spent by the other players sitting on their hands. This can also be the case for paladins and clerics, but generally less so, because paladins and clerics tend to be more overt about the higher power they serve and that power is likely very readily recognizable by anyone else, so they can feel involved by helping their teammate with their goals. *Cleric of Leira:* I serve Leira, Goddess of Illusion and Trickery. *Barbarian:* I would like to help you spread deceit. *Warlock of Non-Disclaimed Patron:* Mwah-ha-ha! *Ranger:* I don't know how to get involved with that. This doesn't need to be the case, of course. But it does have tendencies. Enough so that Ginny makes a video to address it. So, ultimately, it became a good thing, because more Ginny videos.
@@FlatOnHisFace Table secrets are a difficult thing in themselves. They can be fun and intriguing, but they can also quickly lead to some players feeling paranoid that they're left out, or that they're supposed to come up with more secrets to have with the DM. It's important to know your table. If the table is very social theater kids, it's probably fine. A table that has less social, sitting at home video gamer nerds, there is a more significant risk that something goes sideways. Saying that as a videogamer nerd who had it go sideways.
@@lagg1e I make a point running my games that there are NO SECRETS between players. Characters? Yes. Players? NO. The big reveal surprising all the players is a fun trope, but when you're a group of adults with lives and work to deal with, it becomes a waste of time. I trust my players to maintain some separation of metaknowledge in this regard.
@@davididiart5934 The only thing I restrict from between my players are efforts to hurt the party. But if the player has a secret that they're not presenting to the story, they don't have a secret. Example: A player has decided that they are secretly on the run from the law, but make no effort to hide their identity or whereabouts, but rather live their life like any an adventurer - they are not hunted by the law. I have 3-6 other characters to worry about, in addition to the main plot and every single NPC in the game. I'm not going to waste my energy trying to drag the story out of a character whose player doesn't want to play their own idea of their character.
I really enjoy playing a side character. In all of media, I never related to main characters so I tend to play the capable friend whenever I don't DM myself.
In my campaign our Warlock and her patron are pretty much just friends. We reflavored Archfey to fit what she was going for. Basically, her character is really into using psychedelics/tripping. One day she tripped so hard that her consciousness transcended into the Feywild. This is where she met her patron, and they just kind of hit it off so the fey spirit decided to give her power. The fey spirit is now her ”supplier”, and she uses a component pouch filled with ”gifts” as an arcane focus. Also, her pact of the tome is actually a “pact of the pipe”, which she smokes to cast the cantrips it came with.
Nice, my planned warlock, cuz we're in a Warhammer Fantasy game rn, is a Kalashtar from Eberron, but we're applying the race in regardless, and while his clan was travelling on a ship, an eldritch deity sunk their ship, twisted the Quori of the clan and as he grew up, the Quori became a patron of the Fathomless
Archfey really CAN go places, this is pretty great; feels that a lot of them tend to be 'i know whats best and want to help' even if they REALLY don't know best, or just want to enjoy/are delighted by their warlocks.
Yeah, that's something a lot of people tend to forget. People are so obsessed with the whole faustian bargain aspect of the fiendlock that they completely ignore the fact that GOOLocks can be completely accidental, Feylocks could be the result of an archfey getting bored, hexblades are often a mutual long-term relation with a sentient weapon and celestiallocks are often the result of a call to action more than anything. Heck, even a fiendlock doesn't necessarily have to be a faustian bargain, I read a story once about a fiendlock who's patron was a retired succubus who decided to marry the warlock and gave him some of her infernal power, and another one where the warlock's patron was some sort of mother-devil who was actually really sweet and played the role of the team mom.
@@VestedUTuber Kinda reminds me of one I had where my character was the result of a night of heavy drinking between two devils who are now both her patron and parents. They pop in every once in a while to check up on her and though they do care about her in their own way, they are still devils, so that caring tends to cause more problems for her than anything else.
@Jacoby Gonzales Great Old One, the pact with which is often made when a mortal glimpses the mind or realm of the patron. These pacts are based on the knowledge stolen from the patron by glimpsing them, allowing the warlock to cast magic based on those ancient secrets. The realms of these patrons being naturally chaotic means the patron often will not notice the disturbance.
Gotta have Archfey or Devil patron. Those tend to hold to the Pact treaty to the T, abusing the fine print as much as possible. Hilarious, but also RP-heavy battle of Treaty abuse ensues.
Had a player running a Fiend patron warlock that was basically playing a defense lawyer/asset acquisition (truly evil 'quality' souls rather than just 'distressed' souls), whom both they and their patron would constantly bicker over contracts with both thinking they always had the better end of the deal. It's pretty good stuff.
Doable, but in the game the patron sooner or later is going to have to be appeased or they'll cut the partnership altogether, out of the game you'd have to make sure the DM isn't going to say "your interpretation is invalid".
I love seeing the sheer variety of ways that warlocks can interact with their patrons. We currently have a celestial warlock at our table, and her story is a hoot and has the whole group involved without overtaking the spotlight. So, in essence, she is a farm girl that wanted to get away to see the world before settling down, and along her travels she had a series of one night stands so that she could 'try everything'. A few days after one such one-night-stand, she realized that she had weird powers. So, she just kind of went 'huh, neat' and kept on traveling. So, several times now, she has met back up with this person, who is a traveling merchant. Their relationship has grown and is super adorable. He is so smitten with her and will randomly show up and gift her and the party things. We all keep trying to tell her that based on the evidence, he surely has to be a god in disguise. And she staunchly disagrees. The exact nature of what he is has yet to be revealed. X)
Really cool way of doing a patron, very creative! And @@Cassian2506 they know the character is a celestial warlock, so the patron must be some powerful being from the Upper Planes.
I love Warlocks, truly. But my favorite patron was an Archfey of the Winds who wanted to screw over his rival by screwing up the rival's marriage to the Triton princess. My character was the Triton princess. She didn't want to get stuck in the Feywild for all her days. So they made a pact. The terms were: 1. She cannot return to any form of salt water. If she does, she turns into sea foam. 2. She cannot get her heart broken. If she does, she turns into sea foam. 3. If she finds someone who loves her truly and she loves them truly, and they get married, she gets her powers free and clear. She and her patron eventually fell for each other. It was hilarious bc he didn't see that one coming, especially as he fell in love first. So the patron is trying to get with my Bardlock and for a while she was not having it. The whole table kept giggling at how the tables turned.
My character is a warlock with an Archfey patron, but his party thinks he’s a bard. That’s because my character made the pact to essentially get a ghost writer for his songs. It’s such a stupidly mundane thing to basically sell your soul for that it’s just funny to me, and honestly some Archfey out there definitely thinks it’s also hilarious af too.
My player’s warlock lost his soul in a bet because he thought the guy was kidding. This was a mid game multiclass and the party (including the character!) DID NOT NOTICE for about a month of in game time
Sounds like how the Sandman comics explain why Shakespeare was so talented. He made a deal with Dream to give up caring about anything except writing plays for the ability to write extraordinary plays. Though, to be fair, Dream wasn't ghostwriting for him or anything, just altering his psychology.
This is insanely funny to me. Im just imagening some bard ask an insanely powerfull being: "Hey, ima give you my soul if you help me git good at the thing i like doing"
I know this post is a bit old now, but if you wanna do this, your patron works best as a Leanan Sidhe, or Muse Fairy, which takes artists as lovers, giving them creativity but draining their life force. 4e also has Vampire Muses, which are the same, but goth, and drain blood to fill a cauldron for Lich-like resurrection.
I've been working with my DM on a warlock for a while now, and what started as a throwaway joke concept I had while brainstorming has become a hilarious concept that we're both hyped about seeing in game. It's a fathomless warlock who was previously a lighthouse keeper before being thrown into the ocean by an angry mob after a crash. It turns out that the lighthouse has become a Kuo-Toa deity and it saves the new warlock from drowning, wanting him to go and protect ships further from shore. Now wherever he sails the same lighthouse is inexplicably present. Deserted Island? Lighthouse. Mountaintop miles from shore? Lighthouse. Coastal city that already has a lighthouse? 2 lighthouses. Anyone living nearby acts as though the lighthouses have always been there and nobody questions it.
I absolutely agree that a warlock/patron relationship doesn't need to be negative. I'm currently playing an air genasi whose dad is a genie and also their patron! It's a super fun dynamic, where instead of the patron wanting the warlock to risk their lives to do their bidding, my warlock is often lying to her dad about how much danger she's in, so that he doesn't ground her, I'm having so much fun with it
I had a different but same idea (earth genasi with Dad as a patron) but with an absentee father trying to get back in his son's life so it boils down to "Hey, here's some cool powers, just call me every once in a while."
I’ve been wanting to do something similar with my own Warlock character, where the patron is her partner and the pact is the couple getting quite literally adventurous
Don’t forget. For fiend patrons, the patron’s desire may in fact be for the warlock to live a life preforming actions that flavor their soul to the patron’s liking for the feast that is to come. [Side eye at my player who has a pact with Pazuzu]
That's basically an variation on the theory that patrons are basically using warlocks as investments, and dont actual need favors. They give a warlock a spell slot and they will grow it ten fold before dying. They use favors to A keep people thinking that favors are what they want and B to incite the warlock to get involved in things that will bring danger and experience thus grow their power.
I've got a similar situation with my Kobold feylock I penned up for AL and pickup games, minus the soul-eating part - her patron is really just sitting back and eating popcorn while watching the adventures (and misadventures) of a magically empowered Kobold raised by a retired Elf paladin.
@@Scientision Makes sense, Or the agriculture theory where the patron thinks it will take too long to grow their own power on their own so the warlocks are their work around, Here's a seed of power, in return for a rich harvest!
@@zacharyhawley1693 Or maybe they don't actually need the Warlock directly, but realizes they'd like a layer of plausible deniability to their peers. That's always what I assume with Celestial patrons, sometimes even gods or godlike beings look each other in the eye and lie. "Mortals...what'ca gonna do, eh?"
I'm remembering my favorite warlock character idea. His patron in a former devil who saw the light and switched sides in the celestial struggle to become "the Horned Angel". Problem is, while he used to be a Pit Fiend who had had thousands of warlock contracts over the centuries and was almost as powerful as one of the Archdevils (once you included all of his contacts and favors) now he's kind of a meh celestial. He figured out that a big chunk of his own raw power didn't transfer over but was still unclaimed. Yet he couldn't use it as it was fiendish power, not celestial. So, he did what any good devil would, he found a loophole. After scouring the heavenly laws of Mt Celestia and the various Lawful Good gods and whatnot, he found one. Basically, the horned angel set it up so that he gets credit for helping any warlock of his with any good deed that they perform. This (through a series of legal loopholes that would cause even professionals headaches) increases his standing with his new Lawful Good peers and converts large chunks of his power into something he can safely use. However, he also gets credit for their evil acts and while he's prepared for a certain amount of this, frequent serious evil will bring consequences beginning with warnings and ending with him expending significant amounts of time, favors, and effort to undo every effect of the contract. Also the character is an urchin with a heart of gold who communicates with the angel through his pet mouse and has no idea how magic works but is having way too much fun abusing Mask of Many Faces through the Eldritch Adept feat. I hope you liked reading this.
Reminds me a little of my Patron. She is a fallen Angel called the mother of birds but never fell to evil. Just she said fuck the gods I'm going to help the mortals myself. She is fine using the darker side of her magic and believes angels are slaves to the gods. So she has a range of light and darkness powers.
Warlocks are a class with epic roleplay opportunities between the DM and the warlock’s player. However, it is essential that both parties understand the characterization and nature of this warlock partnership. The DM shouldn’t spoil everything (duh) but make sure that you establish what the warlock/player understands about the patron at session 0. Pull that off and you can have one of your campaign’s best storylines in the palm of your hand!
There are other things that REALLY need to be understood about the partnership... I recently joined an ongoing campaign where my character had a few levels of hexblade. I had a basic idea for my patron (an ancient, lazy and greedy shadow dragon who just wants to be surrounded by treasure), but strongly encouraged my DM to use my patron to tie me in to whatever goals the party currently had. DM: "Great! The PC you're replacing was a full hexblade. His patron was actually the BBEG of the current arc. The PC ended up joining up with their patron. You could have the same patron and work as his agent to infiltrate the party." Me: "Awesome! Sounds like a great way to tie me in to the narrative. I'll probably work it out so that I let party know that I'm supposed to spy on them, but that I actually want to team up with them to free me from my patron. If he needs me to spy on them, he must obviously be somewhat afraid of the party" DM: "Yeah, that might be fun. Glad to have you on board!" Problem is, a few more sessions in, the DM is now indicating that I basically have to choose between my warlock powers or the party. That's hardly a fun choice for anyone to make so I need to have a talk with my DM. I see a warlock pact as an already done deal (you're not gonna lose your powers. At worst, you simply can't gain more warlock powers) whereas he sees it as ongoing, but that can really ruing the fun of things here. All I wanted was a hook to be a part of the narative... Not having to choose between my character concept or becoming an enemy of the party.
@@oOPPHOo talking is def the correct choice, and there can be a middle ground, solution here. A patron swap, where part of the break off is finding. New Patreon to empower you. (Some being be it god or demon who has an interest in opposing the bbg for example)
An example of a warlock patron relationship I like to refer to is the one between Harry Dresden and his godmother, the Leanansidhe. In the multi-book storyline, the Leanansidhe trades the bargain with Harry to Queen Mab, in part because Harry has broken the deal at least three times. There is a LOT more to the tale.
I agree! A good example would be of (Spoilers for Campaign 2 and Campaign 3 of Critical Role) Laudna versus Fjord. Fjord, when he got his hexblade, seriously didn't understand a lot about it. It was very, very cryptic. Over time he came to understand what he was *really* being puppeteered by. Laudna, on the other hand, understands exactly who her patron is, even if she's not sure why she in specific came back to life. The same class, but very different messages.
@@arhalts Possibly. I just know that, before we were settled on the current patron, he talked about me having a rival of the BBEG as my patron. I then brought up the two options of said rival being the aforementioned shadow dragon or that I simply go the spy route and have the BBEG as my patron. He said he preferred the second option. Granted, rereading the chat logs now, I had forgotten that the reason why he preferred the spy option over the rival option was because he felt like his world already had something like the shadow dragon patron I suggested. I recall him being worried about "doubling up" and had forgotten he was worried about the dragon patron doubling up a third entity in the world. Not the fact that there'd be another option for hexblade pacts outside of the main Sorry this post comment is a bit all over the place ^^; I was writing it, then rereading some old chat logs and then continued writing the comment with different and contradictive knowledge from what I had at the start
Having a warlock was actually the goal of the patron I play in my current setting. They're basically a destroyed god trying to reincarnate themselves by slowly dripping their power into a mortal shell. I've been hinting at it through dreams the warlock gets whenever the player takes a warlock level. I don't know if the player has figured it out already, but their character definitely hasn't.
IMO, Warlocks are created when a being seeks more power. The Warlocks power is then subsumed when the PC dies and is returned to the entity increased by how powerful the warlock has grown in levels.
My warlock oc's patron is literally a sugar daddy. She managed to free a marid when working as a courtesan and he rewarded her with cool powers. He occasionally asks for her to find treasures and spread the word of how he's totally the best genie, but otherwise its "Here's some powers for being pretty"
This makes me want to revive the Celestial Warlock I played in a one-shot a while back. He was a dwarven woodcutter who accidentally chopped down a tree infected with negative energy, releasing it into the world at large. Horrified at his mistake, he pledged his service to the guardian of the forest, a Unicorn, to hunt down and eradicate all of the demons and undead that he'd unleashed. The Unicorn gave him his powers in return. I played him more like a front-line fighter than a full caster, using Booming Blade instead of Eldritch Blast as my main attack and taking some defensive buff spells and invocations to keep him alive.
when you said, that warlocks can see their relationship with the patron as just work, i couldn't help but imagine an average-ass guy, who gets magical powers from 9 to 5 and can't care less about adventuring and stuff, but puts up with it cause everyone should earn their living somehow and it's not the worst way to do so. that's what i call relatable.
My patron is my character’s begrudging dad, Essentially, I have a slime character, due to backstory reasons (I know at least one party member watches these videos so I don’t wanna spoil it), they believe that their patron is their dad, their patron is a necromancer by the name of Mobius, who gave them pity powers and added them to their undead horde/army. He is like a doofensmirtz, ‘evil’ but genuinely quite pathetic and goofy. I love their dynamic “I’m not your dad!” But also, “don’t be late to dinner!” It’s really charming ^^
The warlock that I played for the longest was in a high level campaign (12-16) where I was playing an Archfey Warlock. When I first made her, I didn't even have a specific patron in mind, but through play me and the DM created what I now find to probably be my favourite backstory I've written for a PC. It went like this: One upon a time, there was an old woman who had always wanted children. So naturally she did what most old women do, and ate two kids who would later become her hag daughters, forming her coven. As she grew older and more powerful, so too did her daughters, and she found herself in a seat of power within the infinite network of hags. Less fortunate for her, due to sabotage from one of her adversaries, her youngest daughter died. This significantly weakened her coven, as hags are always strongest in groups of three, and needed to have this problem solved immediately. So when a young woman came seeking her magic, it was a natural follow that she would ask for her firstborne child in exchange. Hesitantly, the woman agreed, on the promise that her child would live a long life, which the granny hag was more than happy to agree to, as it would hold true even if she turned this child. As it turns out however, the woman already had a firstborn child, who was seven years old, far too old to be turned. And being bound by her promise to the young woman, the hag had to make use with what she had, and take the long road to convert this child instead, which means the child had to grow stronger before they could complete the magic and turn the child. So when she was older, the hag let her borrow some of her power so she could grow it on her own. Thus creating a reason for my character to adventure, and she had a whole arch about turning on this purpose of her life and actually ended up killing the hag at one point and becoming a minor Archfey herself. She also ate her dad at one point but that's a whole other thing.
@@MyrddinDerwydd because hags eats babies to turn them into changelings (not the shapeshifting kind) that will then grow up normally and turn into a hag spawn when they’re about ~14. When you have a young kid instead of a baby, that’s no longer possible
@@ShadowPhoenix82 oh absolutely. She was a fun NE character, in the sense that ultimately she only cared about herself, but she needed the party to grow stronger so she was happy to help in keeping them around. By any means necessary
Idea for a warlock: A painter who got hired by a deity to make paintings to decorate their manor. The deity grants the warlock the powers to defend himself, and in return the warlock paints (maybe on a magical canvas that gets whisked away to the deity then he's finished) all the beautifl scenery he comes across.
My warlock's actually taking advantage of his patron. He dabbled in the occult during his more angsty teenage years, and while most of his friends moved past that phase, he found he had a talent for it. In modern terms, he and his friends played with ouija boards, and after they got bored and left, he got a response. He tapped into the dreaming subconscious of Azathoth, the blind idiot god of the far realms. Azathoth doesn't really "know" he exists beyond the extent that you know that a particular ant exists in your yard. Sure, you know ants do exist, but you wouldn't know one from the next, and really don't care. Azathoth has a few different descriptions and themes tied to his lore, but my warlock pact focuses on the sort of "simulation" theory of reality, the idea that this all could just be a program, or someone's dream, and if it's ever shut off or they wake up, everything we know will cease to exist. Sort of the nihilistic idea of an uncaring universe that might not even be real. My warlock is clever, but he is NOT the wisest of men. He decided to play the dangerous game of trying to whisper suggestions in Azathoth's ear to influence how his dream is playing out. All of his powers are explained in non-euclidean, reality-bending, almost quantum phenomena. His Armor of Agathys temporary HP is described as his limited ability to retroactively fix any mistakes he's made. I walk into a room and some bandit was waiting by the door to stab me. He succeeded, as I was surprised, but it didn't break my temp HP. He remembers very vividly having stabbed me, but my character basically told Azathoth "nah" and reality warped to an alternate timeline where that didn't happen. During the dramatic shift to the new reality, the coldness of the void seeps out around the point where those realities diverged. Essentially, the person who attacked me suffers cold damage because the bending of space-time left a pocket of deathly cold vacuum. They feel a freezing chill, and then see that their attack apparently never hit me in the first place. They missed. How? They remembered me bleeding out on the floor... But yeah, my patron is the Hexblade, but that's boring, so we flavored it as me essentially convincing Azathoth that such a weapon existed and that it was somewhere my character was able to find it.
I love that reflavoring of Armor of Agathys. It's such an interesting way to explain a power that otherwise doesn't really align to the origin of said power.
Reminds me of something that happened at my table... Warlock: Well, I took my 1 level warlock dip. Back to leveling up in druid! Titania: Yeah... no. I feel that may distract you from important things, namely me. Warlock: W-w-what? Titania: Let's make a deal...
Another interesting reason for pacts that I've read about is as follows: The Patron lends it's warlock a smidgen on their power. Then as the warlock becomes stronger that power grows as well. When the Warlock inevitable dies that power returns to the Patron. No matter what the warlock does during their finite time, the patron will be better off since they'll end up stronger AND have infinite time to realise their plans. This doesn't mean that Patrons don't have other plans and can't demand things from you. Why sell something for a penny if you can sell it for a pound. But the philosophical idea that Patrons persue some unknowing goal (or for demons political struggle) and warlocks exist as a power charger and function as handy subordinate seems really interesting.
Oh! A matrix Patron! That sounds great, especially when combined with one of the community answers: Some kinds of the Patron (typically Great Old One or Fathomless) may not even know the Warlock did form something like a Pact with them, a mere single mortal being deep below their discerning capabilities. In this case, the Patron would just influence the Warlock passively (doesn't mean it can't have profound effects on the Warlock - after all, Lovecraftian beings tend to induce madness without even noticing), also passively getting a tiny bit of power afterwards (and most probably not noticing that either).
Ive played with that reasoning once and it worked really well for the PC. But we worked out that there is an upfront cost that is greater than the return on investment if the warlock dies too quickly. Like a power tax crossing the planes to make it unfeasible for entities to game the system with a no loss investment. Basically a justification for Patrons to try and invest in people who can both grow, and hopefully accomplish something for them instead of sending them on suicide missions as cheap fodder. Similarly why not every cultist is a warlock.
I love that everyone is coming out of the woodwork with their warlock stories, so here's my favorite from my table so far: My warlock in the Curse of Strahd campaign I'm running wants to romance his vampire patron, an idea I love because it fits well in the tone of the story and would make a great contrast to how Strahd treats his lovers. Due to some scheduling shenanigans we weren't able to meet for awhile and I was squirelly to play, so I offered to run "prequel" solo sessions for everyone, noting how they learned about Barovia, introduce NPCs that would show up later, stuff like that. For the warlock, I set up the prequel session of him getting his pact, which involved some fun shenanigans of attending a fancy party, stealing a book from the host that detailed how to make a pact, and the two of them running off to a specific location to do a ritual to confirm the pact. And yes, the fact that the words they exchanged sounded VERY close to wedding vows was done on purpose by me, because I live to feed my players, lol. Aaaand currently? The gang is off to rescue the warlock's patron. Because Strahd kidnapped him. I don't want to spoil too much, but it's gonna get wild and I'm glad everyone is trusting me to give them a good storytelling experience.
I like the idea of having a warlock that forms a pack with a young being, the patron wants stories and attention like a child and the warlock is happy to give it as they've always wanted to feel important in that way.
I've never thought of moon night like that but Steven/mark and consu definitely strike me with a warlock & patron relationship now that you mention it!
I played a 2000 year old semi-immortal bard-warlock who had been serving his patron since his 20's. He had since been cut off from her but she continued to give him power. Whenever they finally met again they basically acted as old friends instead of patron and servant. It was a fun dynamic.
Probably the best scene in a long time on my most recent D&d table was when the Warlock was forced to switch his pact. He definitely knew his patron was a villain, but he knew he was screwed when she started demanding that he killed the girl he liked. For context, the girl was the BBEG, and the Warlock pretty much knew that (actually, he was the only one to know that), but was on denial and trying to redeem the gal. When they later had to "recruit" a demigodess to a war, she revealed herself as the daughter of the Warlock's patron, and demanded that the man was either sacrificed or forced to let go of his power and broke the pact, for she wasn't going to work alongside a servent of such an evil being. He was hesitant about it, since he knew he wouldn't be strong enough to fight without his magic, until he realised that, if the demigodess had the power to break his pact with her mother, she was probably just as strong as his previous patron, so he switched to her, staying as a Hexblade without the downside of having to send souls to the worst fate possible. Everyone was the happiest they've ever been in a while for the Warlock. That was until... He realised the demigodess was the Patron equivalent of a "Lawful Good Paladin", if you know what i mean, and that... for as good as it was to not be forced to do so much evil, he would now have to face what a real patron looks like, and what is like to have a VERY STRICT code to follow.
@@pyrarius1598 update for you: we later changed the system to Pathfinder 2e, and since there's no Warlock in that game (there is Witch, but they use Intelligence and he didn't wanna lose his rizz), he had to switch classes. To justify that, the BBEG lady beat the shit out of him, snapped his maul in half, decapitated his patron right in front of his eyes and said "c'mon, fight me." One 5 year timeskip later, he not only went to therapy to recover from the trauma, he also hit the gym, turning his broken maul into a one-handed war hammer and studying the secrets of the obscure. That means the once 8 Strength Warlock that was pretty much the least physically imposing man in the whole group now turned into an 18 Strength Thaumaturge (think basically a Witcher. Studies his opponents, hits them REALLY hard with their most deadly weakness and somehow still manages to be a Charisma class after all. I love Pathfinder) who looked like an absolute colossus next to anyone in that team. You wanna know the best part? The player and I were talking and it turns out she went "honestly, looking back at everything he went through, I don't think he ever actually liked women, he was just too emotionally attached to the BBEG but actually... I think he's gay." So yeah, he once wanted to fix her so badly he switched his whole moral code for that, but then she hit him so hard he became a "sigma male" who doesn't like women. 🤣
I once played a character who had an a powerful being indebted to her, because she helped them out of a bind on the material plain. He expected her to ask for wealth or love or some low-level magics to help with her work as a healer; instead, she asked for the ability to cast True Resurrection (because her twin brother was at serious risk of assassination.) A level 0 character simply is not able to hold the power of a 9th level spell, so ALL her other magical powers were just spillover from that one spell, and I had to choose abilities that could be tied to dancing that line between restoring life & true death. We also had the additional wrinkle where the reward she asked for was so beyond the help she had provided, as soon as she actually cast True Resurrection for the first time, the debt would be flipped; the only thing she specified he could not ask in return was anything that would threaten the life of the person she saved, even indirectly. (Ended up spending it on a toddler-the final boss’s daughter. The boss’s guard fumbled an explosive, and the kid was too close. Last I saw of my character, she was kneeling in the shouldering remains of that nursery, clutching that little girl close, crying. Oh, did I mention the kid is the twin brother’s rival for the throne?) Shame that campaign’s never coming back, but at least I got to exit on a high note!
My warlock's patron is the ghost/spirit of his dead aunt, so my relationship with the patron is like a mother/son relationship, which is so much fun and kinda cute to play.
I am currently playing a Warlock named Alfie whos Patron is his own Father.✨ Best part about it is that he's actually super supportive, and loves watching his son go on adventures. Imagine, that one social anxious teen who's having an awesome house party, and then suddenly their dad shows up with crustless sandwiches while wearing an apron, and suddenly the teens now super embarrassed and trying to get him out of the room. that's their Dynamic ☺✨
To any DMs out there, don't flinch away from this concept even if the player wants to lean into fiend or great old one patrons for this, you absolutely won't regret it; it's a great way to tie players to the story you want to tell, something that can be hard to do for sure. Plus, it's just fun to roleplay, much less have an adventurer that ACTUALLY has parents. For once. :p
That could actually be really cool. If Alfie's half-Fey, that works even better: Alfie: "Father, where is Kim?" Daddy Dearest: "Oh, you mean the girl that made you cry. I turned her into a frog and let her loose in the pond. That'll teach her to upset my li'l baby."
I also have played a warlocke where there patron was there father. Pathos kardia a teifling. There mother was a cleric of Athena and her father was Khalfor demon lord of Khaos, who was her hexblade patron as her mother trapped him inside a sword to save the world from his power, but after her death pathos took up the blade to keep him contained but he slowly began to corrupt her...
This reminds me of an idea I had. (Someone else has certainly thought of this but as far as I know I didn't take it from one of them.) And Archfey patron who is the character's fairy godmother. So many possible ways to do this but to avoid stealing your vibes lets picture an ancient fey with connections to a family or area (is this how they became an archfey?) who eventually becomes the godmother (or godfather, whatever) to a child (parents know who they are? anyone know who they are?). Then the parents or family get killed by an orc warband or something and the archfey was only able to save the kid. To keep them safe the archfey locked them in a tower or something. And all was well, until they broke out. Maybe they stole their powers on the way out (that's how they broke out?) either way, they've been running ever since.
A Summary of my current patron: “You seem very nice and respectful, how about you go use that pure spirit to vanquish the darkness of the mortal plane, because I can’t leave feywild. Being the gatekeeper and all. Here’s some magic.” Internally: *This kid’s life sucks so bad and he’s been gaslighted so hard he doesn’t even know it, let’s try and get him out of the house so he can actually use those skills of his.*
A bunch of my players have taken warlock levels BECAUSE we're so RP heavy, and I try really hard to create interesting patrons. It works for us. We also have a "Pact of the Lovers" homebrew we've been working on for one player who accidentally made a powerful being fall in love with him. Warlocks rock.
My Hexblade warlock, a tabaxi, is a collector of things. Sometimes i get to taunt someone with a posession, sometimes it helps out in some way. But the best moment so far was when I got cursed with a nightmare. When asked my character's worst fears, i said 'abandonment'. it was expected that my party would leave in the dream, but when the Raven Queen turned her face from me... literal goosebumps.
Love this video! Two of your points spoke to my own experiences as a player - on switching your pacts, and on the relationship of a warlock and their patron. TL:DR Warlock patrons can be JUST AS IMPORTANT to the rest of the party as their own follower!! In our long running campaign, our warlock (who served the Raven Queen) was possessed by a parasitic, genocidal spirit in his mechanical arm who drove the warlock to be reckless, do a lot of drugs, and generally be sour all the time. In the next act of the campaign, we broke into an archmage's vault and discovered a smoky black compass. Compelled by the other party members and an incredibly odd feeling, the warlock shattered the glass and released a mysterious spirit. This spirit thanked the warlock for freeing her, introduced herself as Peace, and INSTANTLY KILLED the genodical spirit that inhabited his body. The spirit Peace offered the warlock a Deal: to give him alternative powers in exchange for giving her strength - she was quite weak after being trapped in the compass. The warlock agreed, was able to work out an expensive deal with the Raven Queen, and Peace became like a new party member. There was quite a bit of drama around her mysterious past and certain other player characters not trusting her, but the DM played this well - she never felt intrusive or over bearing as a DM insert. Eventually Peace had the power to return to her dayjob of being a Reaper, but not before she began a romantic relationship with the warlock... AND another player character. Peace has become one of my favourite NPCs, and everytime her name comes up in RP conversation or in the letters she writes, I can't help but smile :)
I think my favorite warlock was my younger brother's fathomless warlock. He didn't have a formal pact but instead shared a body with his patron (like a venom symbiote). The patron could force a charisma save to hijack the warlocks body while the warlock could make a spell casting ability check to force the patron to cast a spell against the patron will. The DC was determined by the warlocks used spell slots.
I made a genie (dao) warlock pact, where the character made the pact with his ancestor. OG's family was a well known villain family of Genasi's. He was treated as garbage as his twin brother gained all the earth traits in the womb, leaving him as essentially a earth flavored human. OG was treated as trash and took up tailoring as a hobby. Ended up looting his Father's desk and running away, only to find that his father was using his Dao ancestor as a servant. He was given a portion of his "grandads" power in return for freeing him and promising the enslavement of the family who enslaved him. Also he got Granddad's swanky ring which he turned into his bachelor's pad/clothing shop. Hence Taylor the Tailor was born.
I've made one Dao Genie warlock too! I decided to do "1001 nights" as inspiration but with a twist. My Warlock is the daughter of the king's steward, and has insulted the King. She got thrown into jail, and managed to find a magic lamp hidden under a loose brick, and she made a pact with the Dao Genie inside it to break free. The Dao Genie wants stories, so she must take the genie and the lamp with her to travel, she must travel to many different places, she must write and compile stories or tales she hears while travelling, and if need be, have an adventure so the Genie has first seatings in THAT particular story. Only once she gave the genie one thousand and one stories total is she free from the pact. The name of my Warlock is... Scheherazade.
My first ever character was a human monk and early in the campaign one of the party members sold everybody in the party’s soul to Tiamat (he quickly learned his mistake, and he was still fun to play with). Everybody was given a different color of chromatic wyrmling, mine being a green one because my character used poison often. The campaign ended with us learning who Tiamat was and dying to prevent her from forcing us to set her free. I later created various characters that were reincarnations of this character. A more recent one is a green dragonborn warlock. Basically, he’s a warlock of Tiamat who is good aligned and doesn’t even know that he’s a warlock with a patron. He just knows that he has magic, and probably thinks of himself as something that would line up with a sorcerer. The “pact” was when his soul was sold to Tiamat in a previous life, so because of that, he’s still able to use some of her power.
I'm making a warlock right now so this should be helpful That was actually pretty useful, really helped me define some of my choices. My warlocks patron was once a deity of equipment that gifted her followers with weapons and armor, whether these were natural, wielded, worn, normal or magical depended on one's devotion and situation. But since many beasts and monsters kept natural weapons and armor through evolution and many creatures learned how to make and enchant them by themselves, my patron stopped getting worshipped in many places, and eventually turned into a celestial spirit. Still powerful, but no god. My character, who came from a family that had always worshipped her for protection, got a dream in which she gave him an offer: she would grant his family natural weapons such as fangs or claws for protection and additionally grant him a tiny % of her power and the ability to summon weapons and armor (hexblade warlock, pact of the blade, armor of the shadows, improved pact weapon). In return my character will travel through all of Faerûn to spread her name and worship once again. They (mostly) have a deity-follower relationship since that's how it started, although she sometimes gives my character a specific request or task.
The one warlock I had in my campaign was groomed to be a sacrifice for his patron to permit the patron (a banished great old one) to come back to a plane near the prime material. As the campaign progressed, the player though he was going to be a mortal avatar for his patron... Especially when the PCs met a cult to the patron. Until the time came for him to be sacrificed. When the other PCs saved him and he betrayed his patron, he lost his powers until he made a new pact with a new entity. My player LOVED having misinterpreted the end-goal of the patron and since that whole arc was incorporated in my main campaign, no-one felt that player was in any way more special or important than the others or that he had more "screen time" than the other players. Also, the character was unaware of his warlock powers. They would manifest subconsciously or when the character had taken 75% damage, then the warlock aspect would emerge and start blasting eldritch bolts.
I've posted this before, but I love the story. My first 5E character was an Archfey warlock that, as a small child, made a deal with a runaway fey princess (also relatively young for fey, and this was her first time in the mortal world). Strictly speaking, they both agreed to the terms of the contract: he find her in a game of hide or seek, she help him heal his ill father. He found her, and she bestowed his left hand with the cantrip Guidance. What NEITHER of them realized at the time was that this counted as a Warlock/Patron contract and he would slowly gain more of her power. It would take a long time for it to be enough for her to notice, but surely someday she would. In short, it can be REALLY fun if NEITHER of them realize the contract is made.
My favourite idea for a Warlock/Patron dynamic was for my Tiefling Patience, who's patron was her ancient succubus ancestor, through her infernal heritage. Had a fun plan, for kinda awkward (given her being a succubus), but ultimately wholesome family dynamic between the two.
I saw something talking about a "pact of the goblin" yesterday and it was litterally just a single goblin that follows the player. And all it's abilities are like it helping in small ways like guarding the players valuables or finding gold other people dropped. And the whole thing was based on the concept of "it's not magic, but they're trying their hardest to help" and it was pretty dope.
I started watching this and as soon as "the demands of their patrons drive warlocks towards adventuring" I came up with a possible Ioun (the knowing mistress) pact, as the video continued it kept checking all the boxes. Ioun makes a pact, her only conditions are that she is allowed to watch the warlock, and if anything too dangerous is found (Like a tome that could unleash Vecna [her rival] she will tell the warlock to turn it into the temple/library). This allows the warlock pact to remain in the background unless the DM wants to throw in a plot hook. Party is hired to retrieve a journal of some long deceased person. Upon acquisition, the warlock is contacted and told to bring it to the temple of Ioun. Party will role play a debate (lose the reward for completing the mission vs potentially handing over a dangerous item to the mission giver). Fun thing is, the temple may only want to make a copy or possibly entrap the mission giver as a follower of Vecna. Either way, the end reward should be as much as the initial reward or greater. However, the reward may also be in favors or take longer/more effort to receive. As for possible boons, the warlock could be given the ability to identify an object if they study it for 10 minutes (basically a ritual cast of identify), and can lose that ability if they go against Ioun's wishes. In a party without identify from other means, this would be a huge thing. If Identify is plentiful, perhaps Legend Lore once per week (still requiring material components) could be an option, Or detect magic aura that points out things Ioun is interested in seeing. Another interesting option would be once per day the warlock has a trait that's basically a "primeval awareness"(general direction and distance within 6 miles) for books Ioun wants brought to the temple/library. Group is in a dungeon and 2 players can't make it to the next session? Ioun appears and helps points them towards a wall (with a brand spanking new hidden door) and the members go off on a side dungeon that seems to line up with the current members. It could even be as simple as figuring out which book in a bookstore is wanted by the temple. Imagine walking into a bookstore and trying to pick out the one book your patron wants you to deliver.....
My warlock is a failed wizard student who happened to discover that she had fey blood in the family. One quick conversation through a crystal later, and she had the backing of a fairy queen who gifted her some powers to help her trick her way through the wizard finals. Now in between roaming the lands, collecting information for the queen, and helping lost fey, she and her patron are essentially prankster buddies, with a whole world to pull tricks on.
lol. I also have a Feylock who got her pact to pass her classes. Difference is, she has no idea that she's a warlock, she doesn't _actually_ owe her patron anything (the patron was mostly just being nice) despite believing she has mountains of debt, and... yeah. Pretty much a comedy of errors.
Thanks for the advice! I just texted one of my players to ask how he felt about the amount of presence The Traveller has had in the campaign! It's entirely possible to run different levels of presence in the same campaign as well. I have three players with pact magic with very different ideas of how much engagement they want: The blood hunter chose Quajath the Undermaw both in and out of character because a giant imprisoned worm with an int of 4 probably won't ask for much. The Warlock/Bard was given powers by The Traveller mostly as a joke and enjoys being the butt of the occasional joke. The rogue/warlock knew the Blade of Broken Mirrors was evil when he started usimg it, but sometimes you need the ability to hurt werewolves, or an early level up when imprisoned by hags, and is loving the story of slowly corrupting himself by bargaining for new abilities at suspiciously reasonable prices. . .
One of my players multiclassed into warlock when the party accidentally summoned Zariel to try and get an NPC revenant out of her contract that was about to expire. Zariel's expectations are basically for him to kill demons whenever he runs into them and then to fight in the Blood War once he dies. Other than that, she lets him do what he wants. The more powerful he becomes before he dies, the more useful he will be as a soldier in the legions of Avernus.
I really enjoyed Wrath's pact in "Shadows of Drakkenheim"; where Wrath's player, Joe, constantly invoked the presence and demands of his patron, Bruce, without relying on the DM's input.
I was sent this video by my DM literally yesterday. Perfect timing for my character: an artificer that unexpectedly entered a pact near the end of our first campaign. I enjoyed the video!
I’m playing my first campaign ever and chose a lore bard who demonstrated stereotypical bard horniness initially, only for the party to find he just wanted to have deep and existential conversation with members of different races and creeds to understand more about the world around him. My lore bard is so excited by knowledge that, upon encountering a trapped, quest-giving aboleth with the party, he had a total fanboy moment and flattered the creature thoroughly. He promised the aboleth to give it constant psychic updates on the goings on in the modern world to receive some of its knowledge.. and thus I dipped my one and only point into warlock. My DM helped me homebrew a Lurker lock variant that views the aboleth as its patron and wellspring of knowledge - without the cost of corruption -with the reward being 120 foot telepathy with creatures with innate swimming speed, 30 ft telepathy in general, and Tentacles of the Deeps. I also have Arms of Hadar personally flavored as “Arms of the Aboleth.” My psionic powers continue to grow!!
My last group ended up with 2 warlocks, the first one died at lvl9, then about level 12 my swashbuckling rogue was uh, possessed? By the warlock that died. Apparently he battled his Parton to a near draw and the patron cast him back to the realm trapped in a dagger, who was found by my rogue. This allowed the og warlock to keep playing the character, was hilarious!
I have a player who’s patron is an aboleth named YuTu… he’s basically UA-cam. As an aboleth, he has memories from the beginning of time, so he has all this “content” and I allow the warlock to roll a WIS check sometimes and if he rolls poorly so he ends up getting random cat videos or Rick rolled. Other time he gets visions that are actually useful. I love that Ginny basically signed a pact with UA-cam in the exact same way 😆
In the current Curse of Strahd/Domains of Dread campaign I'm in, I took another spin on the Warlock Patron: Knowledge. An Undead Patron Warlock whose patron is actually esoteric necromantic and magical research. As such, the build is an Intlock, and the requirement for progress is further research and analysis. She is bending the laws of magic in an effort to cure her vampiric curse (Dhampir, formerly vampire via backstory), but as a result is being shaped and defined by it, simultaneously becoming more and less human/vampire.
I have a double patron Fey warlock at the ready if my current character either finishes his mainquest or dies. Already excited to play him and these tips make it a lot easier to play warlocks
I adore how creative warlock patron stories can be. My favorite character is a warlock who's pact was made for him at birth by his parents, his parents werent around at all in his life and he had to live with his patron. Their abilities are also psychic based so the patron is very prevalant in my characters life and talks with him in his mind very often. The Warlock wants to explore the world because of his nature and the patron wants to see the world for all that shes missed in her reclusive lifestyle so she sees the world through his eyes
Huh. You know what? I’ve never been interested in playing a a warlock. Mostly because I am personally fiercely into my own independence. Also as a newish DM I’ve never encouraged one of my players into playing one. It sounded too complex and intimidating for me to run. But you’ve made me turn around and made it sound fun and exciting. Thanks!
A really brilliant fix my DM came up with to make sure the warlock wasn't taking up too much time is that a couple other characters also have a connection to the patron (not all in a positive way). Because of this, when patron stuff comes up the warlock doesn't always want to jump right in (sometimes it's a hook for a different character) and sometimes he wants to outright hide his patronage. She also tends to come to him in dreams, which helps because it's ideal for in-between-session text RP so it's not taking up group play time.
I love you Ginny and the way you’re videos are always entertaining as well as thought provoking. Having watched this video a player in my campaign has asked me to formalise what we have agreed about her pact with her patron as an actual drawn up contract she can add to her character sheet. She is a space pirate who Captain (An Elder Brain) has sent her out into the world to recruit both crew for the ship and soldiers for his Mind Flayer army to retake the city he once ruled. Her pact equipment includes flyers to attract new crew and a bag containing Illithid tadpoles in jam jars. The relationship is respectful and based on mutual trust and friendship. After all she served as 2nd mate on the ship for ten years before getting her current assignment.
This is perfect timing - I have a warlock player in the group I DM for and I've been wondering for a while now how to bring that relationship to the fore. I've sent this video to the player and we can have a talk about it :)
18:21- It was short lived, but my bard got a blessing in my friends game from a deity called the All-Mother who was rat-themed where she could gnaw through any bindings.
Yes! Thank you! I love the warlock/patron dynamic so much that I gave my 1ePathfinder Bard a patron as flavor for a late game ability (Music Beyond the Spheres.) The relationship isn't complex or close, he sees her as just a pretty thing he likes to help, but as he is so alien he often messes it up, and the brush with the eldritch always hurts her (it grants a warped limited-wish for some stat drain.) It's resulted in my favorite quote: "You've angered The Great Old One's favorite Barbie. The punishment is death."
The first real Patron-Warlock relationship I really GMd was one, where the pact was unclear and actually happened accidentally for both sides. As a child, the warlock got lost in the woods and the patron took notice, got curious and decided to help via sending a guide (a familiar) to help the child find home. This triggered the warlocks latent magical talent, leading to all sorts of trouble that finally resulted in the warlock being sent/sold to the local hag to be trained (a much clearer bargain). The patron eventually fell in love with the person their warlock came to be and started to occasionally visit in disguise and the occasional bumps in power (leveling up) happened to be gifts send the warlock's way. The Hag and the Familar were always disagreeing, except on the topic of the fae patron whom they found untrustworthy and stalker-y. The actual terms of the pact were fist discussed 13 Years after it was formed, when the patron was called by the warlock, to aid the party, and actually made an appearance. The second pact I GMd was a Hexblade patron who considered themselves a weapon of heroes. But sadly for them they had been found by a graverobber and thief... in exchange for power, the warlock had to perform good deeds. :D
in one of the games I dm there is a genasi monk/warlock that has their genie parent as their warlock patron. It is very much a relationship based in a parent feeling that the child needs help protecting themselves, thus granting some extra magic. While the patron isn't always obviously caring in attitude, it's still a parent that want their child to be safe and happy. and the attitude of the warlock has so far been that they want their parent to be proud of them, and feel like they need to show that they can handle the powers granted. It's really fun to have small interactions between these two, because it is almost always related to balancing getting tasks done but not just doing so rashly with no regard to safety. There was one session where the patron learned that the warlock had been in a large battle and got quite upset that they hadn't used a magic item the warlock has that lets the patron get to them in emergencies (re-flavoured ring of Djinni summoning, specifically summons patron and player does not get to control or give commands). I really like that this player wanted to go this route with their character, and it also adds a lot more reasons for me as a dm to actually have the patron interact with them and get the party to feel like the patron of this warlock isn't an evil being that they have to defeat.
Ive played a warlock who adopted father as well the “king” of the entire area the campaign took place as well a lich was her patron as a caring father . Their relationship was very close but i played my character as a child who wanted to do things on her own. But Sametime she also was such a daddys girl. Ive slightly dn’d for a player who a warlock but the relationship their was handed to me to be creative with. Only info was goven was patron was the hexblade sword but pc has no idea what they want or even says cause a language barrier. So the idea to go for is building that relationship & the patron take either end good or bad etc depending the players actions. Took me two years to finally figure out something on the whys & hows of them working together. Was Stressful but very fun.
I'm currently playing a Celestial Warlock, and my patron, a Unicorn, actually exists in the setting. She has never directly appeared in any scene, but she has sent messages through my familiar, and I've even sent my familiar off to go get help directly from my patron. In the beginning, seeking my familiar was a big component in our adventure until level 3 when we found her. I'm level 9 now and my DM gave me permission to take Summon Celestial, but I've re-flavored it as summoning my patron's avatar. My party loves the unicorn shooting radiant beams from her horn! In any event, my patron is impactful in the story without being critical to it. She's influenced events in the background and once provided direct aid, in the form of a magic item, but the story would have occurred even if she'd never existed. I feel that's a pretty good balance for a patron.
Im so glad youre singing the praises of warlocks!! They are such a blast to play! My archfey warlock became a warlock bc of someone made a pact with his patron without reading the terms and conditions, and now if the warlock dies without fulfilling the terms of the pact, the next living creature that touches the pact tattoo is automatically made the new warlock. Its a super fun way to 1-2 combo his class and background as an inheritor. IM LOVING reading everyone elses warlock/patron dynamics
My only issue with the Archfey patron is the lack of spell diversity when it comes to whom you pledge to. I would imagine there to be differences between a warlock for The Queen of Air and Darkness and one for Titania.
This helped me add the final touches to the warlock I've been creating for a while! Don't know if I'll ever play her, but at least I have something finished to bring to the table I ever get to play her. Thank you!
"The Seer of Possibilities" by Thomas O Wagner is an excellent example. The Patron asks for seemingly innocent favours, each of which causes a harm to someone else and a boost to the "Warlock." This Patron is hands on and is guiding their subject to achieve a goal that they've no idea of.
while I hated playing warlocks when I was playing DnD, they were definitely the funnest class to write The things you can do with a patron are insane- e.g: A Midsummer Night's Dream scenario where Titania and Oberon fight over you, and you're stringing them along, or a "celestial" warlock who's their own parton, a minor deity on the rise, or (my favourite) A logical, emotionally stunted warlock who made a pact with the moon- an alien being of pure chaos and emotion, where the to exchange not just power and servitude, but experiences and outlooks through the Warlock's sketchbook credit to Genuine's "Compendium of Forgotten Secrets" for the last one
In my D&D game, my Warlock changed patron before the game. My caracter got a 6 in wisdom and got screw with the pack and got possesed by the demon. The new pack is with an angel who just want to mess with the older patron. The DM had a field day with that story! Much fun!
I want to try out 2 types of patrons eventually: 1 - a brother-in-law who married my character's sister and is very chill and basically a bestie with my character. 2 - the DM. I mean, thnk about it - an entity who knows all, sees all, decides on almost everything, is always present and knows what the warlock may be up to. And yes, the warlock calls the DM by the real name, which would sound really funny I think xD
Excellent timing! I just started playing a Warlock! Feylost>Hexblood>Archfey>Tome- She was born when a hag disguised herself as an archfey and made a deal with a wood elf couple who wanted children. The Archfey got upset that the hag used her image and claimed that due to the fact that the elf couple made a deal with the image of the Archfey, in the name of the Archfey, that by rights the child was hers. So the relationship is one of a mother and daughter. Now my character had been shunted to the prime material so she doesn't get caught up in the bitter rivalry between the hag and the Archfey! She's been left wondering what to do but has decided to make the most of this opportunity to see a world that she was born into, but never experienced.
Great advice, as usual, Ginny! Thanks! I have a newbie PC that started as a Rogue but took a pact after they, uh, "forgot a Rogue can disengage as a bonus action; in front of Bugbear. Boss." (Read: died) The PC really liked their character and didn't want to lose them, so I went with it. They were holding a weapon collected from a ghoul they defeated earlier, so I decided it was a key to a demiplane prison - and The Forever King was born! Accept the pact and get your life back. Now I play the patron as a teacher, slowly instructing the PC in his worldview... And I'm not even a UA-camr ;-}
I played in a campaign where the player's patron was a unicorn. Her part of the pact was to feed him flowers sing him songs and provide a lap for him to rest his head in at lead once a month. He in turn promised to "to provide Power and Holy Light, Guidance of the Right and True, Inspiration for songs of Happy Gladness." As a sign of his favor she shall bear his Mark and Shine as a Beacon of Hope in The World" Little did I know that the first time i cast a warlock spell my bard , who was trying to sneak up on the bad guys would develop a tiny glowing golden horn on her forehead. and No, hats did not cover it! My DM took inspiration for his unicorn from Mercedes Lackey description of them Powerful, Beautiful and not as smart as a thick skulled golden retriever!
First time dm here! I took some lessons from other DMs by starting out with general point a to b and then c narrative then building detail that derived from the players' characters and their imagination. The warlock turned out to be the one that helped me think of a good place to start for developing my major city and web-weaved a intricate, meaningful narrative. BUT, the patron was something I needed help with so thank you! Very grateful!
Warlock was my favorite class before Artificer came in and stomped it into the dirt. It’s still my favorite charisma class. In my own opinion, a warlock pact makes a great B-story. Not the main, but connected to it in some fashion. Heck, every character should have a connection to the main story as well as their own self-focused B-story.
"I'm sure this is going to be a completely balanced and healthy partnership," she said, screaming behind the eyes.
The terrifying thing is that was a real UA-cam entity, not Ginny in cosplay.
Warlock pacts are perfectly balanced with absolutely no exploits
Being able to keep the smile up despite that shows all the experience of being a DM, too.
Healthy... UA-cam... yes
And THAT moment was, when my ``Wanna play a warlock!´´ turned ``Sorcerers are so much more independent personalities...´´ 🤣
I once had a Warlock at my table that did a Scott Pilgrim. His Fiend patron was like “you need to kill my 7 demon exes (one for each sin) so you can be with me”. It was a good time.
That sounds fun. The party can just be working on some unrelated quest and *pop* it's demon ex #3. Nice way for the DM to have an excuse for a filler fight too.
Thats fucking amazing. I love that!
♪ If you want to fight me ♪
@@akiumzeno "you're not the brightest"
@@rainbowmothraleo ♪ You won't know what hit you in the slightest ♪
IDEA: A warlock whose pact is basically "do whatever you want, but my friends and I get to watch via Divination".
Ah, but the complication would then be, that the warlock needs to keep their patron (and their friends) entertained, lest they withdraw their support.
And like any good show, the hijinks and stakes need to pretty much always increase over time.
Is this patron Jhonny Knoxville?
So basically Mojo from Marvel comics. Probably best for and Archfey or Noble Genie patron. Though you could probably make it work for a Fiend or Undead (aka a VERY bored Lich)
Pretty sure that's why aliens haven't invaded Earth yet: humans make great reality tv.
Also, am I the only one hoping that the new 5e Spelljammer has some kind of ET warlock patron?
a friend have a old one with this concept, the pact made him gain a third eye, and the patron watch the world from the eye.
My favorite warlock/patron relationship was a tiefling who had her demon dad as a patron. It was very much a relationship where they'd just check in on each other. Occasionally she'd reach out with the equivalent of "can I bring some laundry home?" or "Uh, help, I maxed the emergency credit card." and he'd reach out to say "You know it would be helpful if you and your friends did some errands for me. They can stay over if they want before you head out." It was wholesome.
I had to speedily make a character and my DM helped me and I basically have the same situation but make it fae. I swear I almost had tears in my eyes when the DM messaged me because my character's mom/patron decided to send them a letter to tell them they're doing well. Like, it was so friggn wholesome 😭 It was also the first time a character of mine actually had an NPC who cared for them, usually I just follow the party and do whatever serves the team, so it's nice to have someone with actual personality and a background that comes up instead of being unimportant.
There was someone playing a character like that where the patron was actually the parent of that character...though most of us didn't actually know that until far later in the game. The rogue was making jokes about the warlocks patron being his domme mommy...and multiclassed because he wanted the same thing as he'd thought it meant.
We actually encountered said patron in the next session...and we found out that...
A: The patron was their biological parent and...
B: They were a Celestial patron...
Which led to C...
C: While the original Warlock was the mother helping her kid, the Rogue/Warlock's was the equivalent of a bribe based restraining order
Well, that was after we had milk and cookies with a high level hound archon...
I have a very similar vibe with my character in my husband's homebrew campaign setting. She's a homebrew race (that's essentially the Archfey version of a tiefling) and her patron is her heretofore absentee Archfey dad.
He showed up with her pact of the chain familiar basically like "I got you a pet!" like a deadbeat dad showing up with a puppy.
"Dad... I'm 23 years old."
I love it.
@@riguref-zero. 0©®%™
Ginny: Patrons can’t remove power
Ginny’s IRL patron: removes Ginny’s powers every January with an algorithm curse
XD
This is why I describe my genie warlock’s patron giving her magic less like she’s receiving it from her like a wifi signal and more like she’s planting a seed of her own magic inside her to grow over time on its own, like a tree.
@@JaelinBezel Growing like a tree, or like a cordyceps fungus, depending on how good-intentioned the genie might be. :D
Lol. Yearly pact bane.
Left Brain: "It says here 'the patron is a strict disciplinarian, but treats the warlock with a measure of respect.'"
Right Brain: "Kinky!"
Left Brain: "Stop it!"
Yeah, I totally choked on my coffee at that
Because blatant consent and respecting boundaries are the foundation of BDSM
I died XD
Do the patron and warlock have a safe word?
@@lagg1e Well, I don't speak for all warlocks but my warlock's safe word is "margarita"
*In best pirate voice* The DM's rule book is more guidelines than actual rules, Welcome aboard the campaign Miss Turner
You best start believing in fantasy stories Miss Turner, you’re in one.
Underrated comment
Flawless thread
The DM's Guide is exactly that: A guide.
And the best way outta any problematic situation is invoking the right of parley.
While I understand people's fear of "main character syndrome" with patrons, it's important to remember that throughout a good campaign each player will be the main character at some point. Not everyone can have equal time every session, and part of the reason we are at the table is to enjoy each others stories, not just our own. DM's being too afraid to let a character take center stage once in a while can end up with them limiting the stories the players want to tell because it might not involve every character in the exact same way all the time.
The reason this tends to be more problematic for warlocks is that no-one else at the table is privy to the patron relationship. Whatever time is spent between the DM and warlock player role-playing their ties is spent by the other players sitting on their hands. This can also be the case for paladins and clerics, but generally less so, because paladins and clerics tend to be more overt about the higher power they serve and that power is likely very readily recognizable by anyone else, so they can feel involved by helping their teammate with their goals.
*Cleric of Leira:* I serve Leira, Goddess of Illusion and Trickery.
*Barbarian:* I would like to help you spread deceit.
*Warlock of Non-Disclaimed Patron:* Mwah-ha-ha!
*Ranger:* I don't know how to get involved with that.
This doesn't need to be the case, of course. But it does have tendencies. Enough so that Ginny makes a video to address it. So, ultimately, it became a good thing, because more Ginny videos.
@@FlatOnHisFace Table secrets are a difficult thing in themselves. They can be fun and intriguing, but they can also quickly lead to some players feeling paranoid that they're left out, or that they're supposed to come up with more secrets to have with the DM.
It's important to know your table. If the table is very social theater kids, it's probably fine. A table that has less social, sitting at home video gamer nerds, there is a more significant risk that something goes sideways. Saying that as a videogamer nerd who had it go sideways.
@@lagg1e I make a point running my games that there are NO SECRETS between players. Characters? Yes. Players? NO. The big reveal surprising all the players is a fun trope, but when you're a group of adults with lives and work to deal with, it becomes a waste of time. I trust my players to maintain some separation of metaknowledge in this regard.
@@davididiart5934 The only thing I restrict from between my players are efforts to hurt the party. But if the player has a secret that they're not presenting to the story, they don't have a secret.
Example: A player has decided that they are secretly on the run from the law, but make no effort to hide their identity or whereabouts, but rather live their life like any an adventurer - they are not hunted by the law.
I have 3-6 other characters to worry about, in addition to the main plot and every single NPC in the game. I'm not going to waste my energy trying to drag the story out of a character whose player doesn't want to play their own idea of their character.
I really enjoy playing a side character. In all of media, I never related to main characters so I tend to play the capable friend whenever I don't DM myself.
In my campaign our Warlock and her patron are pretty much just friends. We reflavored Archfey to fit what she was going for. Basically, her character is really into using psychedelics/tripping. One day she tripped so hard that her consciousness transcended into the Feywild. This is where she met her patron, and they just kind of hit it off so the fey spirit decided to give her power. The fey spirit is now her ”supplier”, and she uses a component pouch filled with ”gifts” as an arcane focus. Also, her pact of the tome is actually a “pact of the pipe”, which she smokes to cast the cantrips it came with.
You just gotta expand your mind, maaaaaaan
Nice, my planned warlock, cuz we're in a Warhammer Fantasy game rn, is a Kalashtar from Eberron, but we're applying the race in regardless, and while his clan was travelling on a ship, an eldritch deity sunk their ship, twisted the Quori of the clan and as he grew up, the Quori became a patron of the Fathomless
I love that idea. Imagine if Snoop Dogg was a warlock's patron.
I just wrote a Circle of Mushrooms for Druids with some of the same ideas...
Archfey really CAN go places, this is pretty great; feels that a lot of them tend to be 'i know whats best and want to help' even if they REALLY don't know best, or just want to enjoy/are delighted by their warlocks.
Ginny: "Your patron has to want something, otherwise why make a pact?"
GOO-Warlock: "My patron doesn't even know I exist."
Yeah, that's something a lot of people tend to forget. People are so obsessed with the whole faustian bargain aspect of the fiendlock that they completely ignore the fact that GOOLocks can be completely accidental, Feylocks could be the result of an archfey getting bored, hexblades are often a mutual long-term relation with a sentient weapon and celestiallocks are often the result of a call to action more than anything. Heck, even a fiendlock doesn't necessarily have to be a faustian bargain, I read a story once about a fiendlock who's patron was a retired succubus who decided to marry the warlock and gave him some of her infernal power, and another one where the warlock's patron was some sort of mother-devil who was actually really sweet and played the role of the team mom.
@@VestedUTuber Kinda reminds me of one I had where my character was the result of a night of heavy drinking between two devils who are now both her patron and parents. They pop in every once in a while to check up on her and though they do care about her in their own way, they are still devils, so that caring tends to cause more problems for her than anything else.
Heyyyy, new player here. What's a GOO?
@Jacoby Gonzales Great Old One, the pact with which is often made when a mortal glimpses the mind or realm of the patron. These pacts are based on the knowledge stolen from the patron by glimpsing them, allowing the warlock to cast magic based on those ancient secrets. The realms of these patrons being naturally chaotic means the patron often will not notice the disturbance.
@@banananarwhal6591
Great Old One
idea: warlock who is a lawyer and constantly annoys their patron because they keep using loopholes
Gotta have Archfey or Devil patron. Those tend to hold to the Pact treaty to the T, abusing the fine print as much as possible. Hilarious, but also RP-heavy battle of Treaty abuse ensues.
I did that too much and the DM just Rule 0'd me out because I was getting too technical lmao
@@Alche_mist "Section 5, table 3, column 4 indicates that I have been getting less spell slots lately"
"Oh gods, not this guy again."
Had a player running a Fiend patron warlock that was basically playing a defense lawyer/asset acquisition (truly evil 'quality' souls rather than just 'distressed' souls), whom both they and their patron would constantly bicker over contracts with both thinking they always had the better end of the deal. It's pretty good stuff.
Doable, but in the game the patron sooner or later is going to have to be appeased or they'll cut the partnership altogether, out of the game you'd have to make sure the DM isn't going to say "your interpretation is invalid".
I love seeing the sheer variety of ways that warlocks can interact with their patrons. We currently have a celestial warlock at our table, and her story is a hoot and has the whole group involved without overtaking the spotlight.
So, in essence, she is a farm girl that wanted to get away to see the world before settling down, and along her travels she had a series of one night stands so that she could 'try everything'. A few days after one such one-night-stand, she realized that she had weird powers. So, she just kind of went 'huh, neat' and kept on traveling.
So, several times now, she has met back up with this person, who is a traveling merchant. Their relationship has grown and is super adorable. He is so smitten with her and will randomly show up and gift her and the party things.
We all keep trying to tell her that based on the evidence, he surely has to be a god in disguise. And she staunchly disagrees. The exact nature of what he is has yet to be revealed. X)
How does not knowing what he is work, though? Do you know at least if he is archfey, fiend or smth like that?
LOVE this! thanks for sharing. sounds so charming! and can totally still fit every mechanic of the class rules-as-written. sounds like great D&D play
that sounds amazing!
aw that’s so cute
Really cool way of doing a patron, very creative!
And @@Cassian2506 they know the character is a celestial warlock, so the patron must be some powerful being from the Upper Planes.
I love Warlocks, truly. But my favorite patron was an Archfey of the Winds who wanted to screw over his rival by screwing up the rival's marriage to the Triton princess. My character was the Triton princess. She didn't want to get stuck in the Feywild for all her days. So they made a pact. The terms were:
1. She cannot return to any form of salt water. If she does, she turns into sea foam.
2. She cannot get her heart broken. If she does, she turns into sea foam.
3. If she finds someone who loves her truly and she loves them truly, and they get married, she gets her powers free and clear.
She and her patron eventually fell for each other. It was hilarious bc he didn't see that one coming, especially as he fell in love first. So the patron is trying to get with my Bardlock and for a while she was not having it. The whole table kept giggling at how the tables turned.
I love that
The little mermaid, but wholesome and taking no shit! Love that as well!
@@Alche_mist The little mermaid, but the guy is also the octopus witch xd
This was the most romantic thing I’ve seen in some time. I’ma save it and re-read when sad.
I love this so much
My character is a warlock with an Archfey patron, but his party thinks he’s a bard. That’s because my character made the pact to essentially get a ghost writer for his songs. It’s such a stupidly mundane thing to basically sell your soul for that it’s just funny to me, and honestly some Archfey out there definitely thinks it’s also hilarious af too.
My player’s warlock lost his soul in a bet because he thought the guy was kidding. This was a mid game multiclass and the party (including the character!) DID NOT NOTICE for about a month of in game time
That’s pretty much my character too. In exchange for music talent, he makes me come off as creepy. Darn trixy fey.
Sounds like how the Sandman comics explain why Shakespeare was so talented. He made a deal with Dream to give up caring about anything except writing plays for the ability to write extraordinary plays. Though, to be fair, Dream wasn't ghostwriting for him or anything, just altering his psychology.
This is insanely funny to me. Im just imagening some bard ask an insanely powerfull being: "Hey, ima give you my soul if you help me git good at the thing i like doing"
I know this post is a bit old now, but if you wanna do this, your patron works best as a Leanan Sidhe, or Muse Fairy, which takes artists as lovers, giving them creativity but draining their life force. 4e also has Vampire Muses, which are the same, but goth, and drain blood to fill a cauldron for Lich-like resurrection.
I've been working with my DM on a warlock for a while now, and what started as a throwaway joke concept I had while brainstorming has become a hilarious concept that we're both hyped about seeing in game.
It's a fathomless warlock who was previously a lighthouse keeper before being thrown into the ocean by an angry mob after a crash. It turns out that the lighthouse has become a Kuo-Toa deity and it saves the new warlock from drowning, wanting him to go and protect ships further from shore. Now wherever he sails the same lighthouse is inexplicably present.
Deserted Island? Lighthouse. Mountaintop miles from shore? Lighthouse. Coastal city that already has a lighthouse? 2 lighthouses.
Anyone living nearby acts as though the lighthouses have always been there and nobody questions it.
This is an awesome concept.
What what what what what what what what what!
Have we considered the possibility that the lighthouse's chameleon circuit broke, and that the lighthouse is bigger on the inside?
Who's gonna call the SCP Foundation
I absolutely agree that a warlock/patron relationship doesn't need to be negative. I'm currently playing an air genasi whose dad is a genie and also their patron! It's a super fun dynamic, where instead of the patron wanting the warlock to risk their lives to do their bidding, my warlock is often lying to her dad about how much danger she's in, so that he doesn't ground her, I'm having so much fun with it
so, basically the powers are like his allowance XD
That’s effing brilliant.
I had a different but same idea (earth genasi with Dad as a patron) but with an absentee father trying to get back in his son's life so it boils down to "Hey, here's some cool powers, just call me every once in a while."
I’ve been wanting to do something similar with my own Warlock character, where the patron is her partner and the pact is the couple getting quite literally adventurous
"Dad, heading out, I'll have your powers back by 10:30! Yes, I'll be careful!"
Don’t forget. For fiend patrons, the patron’s desire may in fact be for the warlock to live a life preforming actions that flavor their soul to the patron’s liking for the feast that is to come. [Side eye at my player who has a pact with Pazuzu]
That's basically an variation on the theory that patrons are basically using warlocks as investments, and dont actual need favors. They give a warlock a spell slot and they will grow it ten fold before dying. They use favors to A keep people thinking that favors are what they want and B to incite the warlock to get involved in things that will bring danger and experience thus grow their power.
I've got a similar situation with my Kobold feylock I penned up for AL and pickup games, minus the soul-eating part - her patron is really just sitting back and eating popcorn while watching the adventures (and misadventures) of a magically empowered Kobold raised by a retired Elf paladin.
PAZUZU, YOU UNGRATEFUL GARGOYLE!!!
@@Scientision Makes sense, Or the agriculture theory where the patron thinks it will take too long to grow their own power on their own so the warlocks are their work around, Here's a seed of power, in return for a rich harvest!
@@zacharyhawley1693 Or maybe they don't actually need the Warlock directly, but realizes they'd like a layer of plausible deniability to their peers. That's always what I assume with Celestial patrons, sometimes even gods or godlike beings look each other in the eye and lie. "Mortals...what'ca gonna do, eh?"
I'm remembering my favorite warlock character idea. His patron in a former devil who saw the light and switched sides in the celestial struggle to become "the Horned Angel". Problem is, while he used to be a Pit Fiend who had had thousands of warlock contracts over the centuries and was almost as powerful as one of the Archdevils (once you included all of his contacts and favors) now he's kind of a meh celestial. He figured out that a big chunk of his own raw power didn't transfer over but was still unclaimed. Yet he couldn't use it as it was fiendish power, not celestial. So, he did what any good devil would, he found a loophole. After scouring the heavenly laws of Mt Celestia and the various Lawful Good gods and whatnot, he found one.
Basically, the horned angel set it up so that he gets credit for helping any warlock of his with any good deed that they perform. This (through a series of legal loopholes that would cause even professionals headaches) increases his standing with his new Lawful Good peers and converts large chunks of his power into something he can safely use. However, he also gets credit for their evil acts and while he's prepared for a certain amount of this, frequent serious evil will bring consequences beginning with warnings and ending with him expending significant amounts of time, favors, and effort to undo every effect of the contract.
Also the character is an urchin with a heart of gold who communicates with the angel through his pet mouse and has no idea how magic works but is having way too much fun abusing Mask of Many Faces through the Eldritch Adept feat.
I hope you liked reading this.
Reminds me a little of my Patron. She is a fallen Angel called the mother of birds but never fell to evil. Just she said fuck the gods I'm going to help the mortals myself. She is fine using the darker side of her magic and believes angels are slaves to the gods. So she has a range of light and darkness powers.
So they're basically laundering "power" via Warlocks.
Warlocks are a class with epic roleplay opportunities between the DM and the warlock’s player.
However, it is essential that both parties understand the characterization and nature of this warlock partnership.
The DM shouldn’t spoil everything (duh) but make sure that you establish what the warlock/player understands about the patron at session 0.
Pull that off and you can have one of your campaign’s best storylines in the palm of your hand!
There are other things that REALLY need to be understood about the partnership...
I recently joined an ongoing campaign where my character had a few levels of hexblade. I had a basic idea for my patron (an ancient, lazy and greedy shadow dragon who just wants to be surrounded by treasure), but strongly encouraged my DM to use my patron to tie me in to whatever goals the party currently had.
DM: "Great! The PC you're replacing was a full hexblade. His patron was actually the BBEG of the current arc. The PC ended up joining up with their patron. You could have the same patron and work as his agent to infiltrate the party."
Me: "Awesome! Sounds like a great way to tie me in to the narrative. I'll probably work it out so that I let party know that I'm supposed to spy on them, but that I actually want to team up with them to free me from my patron. If he needs me to spy on them, he must obviously be somewhat afraid of the party"
DM: "Yeah, that might be fun. Glad to have you on board!"
Problem is, a few more sessions in, the DM is now indicating that I basically have to choose between my warlock powers or the party. That's hardly a fun choice for anyone to make so I need to have a talk with my DM. I see a warlock pact as an already done deal (you're not gonna lose your powers. At worst, you simply can't gain more warlock powers) whereas he sees it as ongoing, but that can really ruing the fun of things here. All I wanted was a hook to be a part of the narative... Not having to choose between my character concept or becoming an enemy of the party.
@@oOPPHOo talking is def the correct choice, and there can be a middle ground, solution here. A patron swap, where part of the break off is finding. New Patreon to empower you. (Some being be it god or demon who has an interest in opposing the bbg for example)
An example of a warlock patron relationship I like to refer to is the one between Harry Dresden and his godmother, the Leanansidhe.
In the multi-book storyline, the Leanansidhe trades the bargain with Harry to Queen Mab, in part because Harry has broken the deal at least three times.
There is a LOT more to the tale.
I agree! A good example would be of (Spoilers for Campaign 2 and Campaign 3 of Critical Role)
Laudna versus Fjord. Fjord, when he got his hexblade, seriously didn't understand a lot about it. It was very, very cryptic. Over time he came to understand what he was *really* being puppeteered by. Laudna, on the other hand, understands exactly who her patron is, even if she's not sure why she in specific came back to life. The same class, but very different messages.
@@arhalts Possibly. I just know that, before we were settled on the current patron, he talked about me having a rival of the BBEG as my patron. I then brought up the two options of said rival being the aforementioned shadow dragon or that I simply go the spy route and have the BBEG as my patron. He said he preferred the second option. Granted, rereading the chat logs now, I had forgotten that the reason why he preferred the spy option over the rival option was because he felt like his world already had something like the shadow dragon patron I suggested. I recall him being worried about "doubling up" and had forgotten he was worried about the dragon patron doubling up a third entity in the world. Not the fact that there'd be another option for hexblade pacts outside of the main
Sorry this post comment is a bit all over the place ^^;
I was writing it, then rereading some old chat logs and then continued writing the comment with different and contradictive knowledge from what I had at the start
Having a warlock was actually the goal of the patron I play in my current setting. They're basically a destroyed god trying to reincarnate themselves by slowly dripping their power into a mortal shell. I've been hinting at it through dreams the warlock gets whenever the player takes a warlock level.
I don't know if the player has figured it out already, but their character definitely hasn't.
Very cool!
IMO, Warlocks are created when a being seeks more power. The Warlocks power is then subsumed when the PC dies and is returned to the entity increased by how powerful the warlock has grown in levels.
My warlock oc's patron is literally a sugar daddy. She managed to free a marid when working as a courtesan and he rewarded her with cool powers. He occasionally asks for her to find treasures and spread the word of how he's totally the best genie, but otherwise its "Here's some powers for being pretty"
okay...that's really cool back story 👏👏👏 well done and a funny one at that.
This makes me want to revive the Celestial Warlock I played in a one-shot a while back. He was a dwarven woodcutter who accidentally chopped down a tree infected with negative energy, releasing it into the world at large. Horrified at his mistake, he pledged his service to the guardian of the forest, a Unicorn, to hunt down and eradicate all of the demons and undead that he'd unleashed. The Unicorn gave him his powers in return. I played him more like a front-line fighter than a full caster, using Booming Blade instead of Eldritch Blast as my main attack and taking some defensive buff spells and invocations to keep him alive.
when you said, that warlocks can see their relationship with the patron as just work, i couldn't help but imagine an average-ass guy, who gets magical powers from 9 to 5 and can't care less about adventuring and stuff, but puts up with it cause everyone should earn their living somehow and it's not the worst way to do so. that's what i call relatable.
Pact of the Salary
Check out TV Tropes, specifically Punch-clock Villain trope. You'll get a lot of inspiration for this approach there.
that sounds like a great idea for a warlock NPC
My patron is my character’s begrudging dad,
Essentially, I have a slime character, due to backstory reasons (I know at least one party member watches these videos so I don’t wanna spoil it), they believe that their patron is their dad, their patron is a necromancer by the name of Mobius, who gave them pity powers and added them to their undead horde/army. He is like a doofensmirtz, ‘evil’ but genuinely quite pathetic and goofy. I love their dynamic “I’m not your dad!” But also, “don’t be late to dinner!” It’s really charming ^^
Thats hilarious!
@@ultranecrozma7449 I know!! I love them sm 😊
The warlock that I played for the longest was in a high level campaign (12-16) where I was playing an Archfey Warlock. When I first made her, I didn't even have a specific patron in mind, but through play me and the DM created what I now find to probably be my favourite backstory I've written for a PC. It went like this:
One upon a time, there was an old woman who had always wanted children. So naturally she did what most old women do, and ate two kids who would later become her hag daughters, forming her coven. As she grew older and more powerful, so too did her daughters, and she found herself in a seat of power within the infinite network of hags. Less fortunate for her, due to sabotage from one of her adversaries, her youngest daughter died. This significantly weakened her coven, as hags are always strongest in groups of three, and needed to have this problem solved immediately. So when a young woman came seeking her magic, it was a natural follow that she would ask for her firstborne child in exchange. Hesitantly, the woman agreed, on the promise that her child would live a long life, which the granny hag was more than happy to agree to, as it would hold true even if she turned this child. As it turns out however, the woman already had a firstborn child, who was seven years old, far too old to be turned. And being bound by her promise to the young woman, the hag had to make use with what she had, and take the long road to convert this child instead, which means the child had to grow stronger before they could complete the magic and turn the child. So when she was older, the hag let her borrow some of her power so she could grow it on her own.
Thus creating a reason for my character to adventure, and she had a whole arch about turning on this purpose of her life and actually ended up killing the hag at one point and becoming a minor Archfey herself. She also ate her dad at one point but that's a whole other thing.
@@MyrddinDerwydd why is that nonsense, but not the rest? It just sounds like establishing world rules.
Man, pretty twisted family ties, huh?
What a great backstory, very interesting xD
@@MyrddinDerwydd because hags eats babies to turn them into changelings (not the shapeshifting kind) that will then grow up normally and turn into a hag spawn when they’re about ~14. When you have a young kid instead of a baby, that’s no longer possible
@@ShadowPhoenix82 oh absolutely. She was a fun NE character, in the sense that ultimately she only cared about herself, but she needed the party to grow stronger so she was happy to help in keeping them around. By any means necessary
Idea for a warlock: A painter who got hired by a deity to make paintings to decorate their manor. The deity grants the warlock the powers to defend himself, and in return the warlock paints (maybe on a magical canvas that gets whisked away to the deity then he's finished) all the beautifl scenery he comes across.
I could see this being a Dorian Grey situation.
Great way to explain short rests, sit down for an hour and paint.
My warlock's actually taking advantage of his patron.
He dabbled in the occult during his more angsty teenage years, and while most of his friends moved past that phase, he found he had a talent for it. In modern terms, he and his friends played with ouija boards, and after they got bored and left, he got a response. He tapped into the dreaming subconscious of Azathoth, the blind idiot god of the far realms. Azathoth doesn't really "know" he exists beyond the extent that you know that a particular ant exists in your yard. Sure, you know ants do exist, but you wouldn't know one from the next, and really don't care.
Azathoth has a few different descriptions and themes tied to his lore, but my warlock pact focuses on the sort of "simulation" theory of reality, the idea that this all could just be a program, or someone's dream, and if it's ever shut off or they wake up, everything we know will cease to exist. Sort of the nihilistic idea of an uncaring universe that might not even be real.
My warlock is clever, but he is NOT the wisest of men. He decided to play the dangerous game of trying to whisper suggestions in Azathoth's ear to influence how his dream is playing out. All of his powers are explained in non-euclidean, reality-bending, almost quantum phenomena. His Armor of Agathys temporary HP is described as his limited ability to retroactively fix any mistakes he's made. I walk into a room and some bandit was waiting by the door to stab me. He succeeded, as I was surprised, but it didn't break my temp HP. He remembers very vividly having stabbed me, but my character basically told Azathoth "nah" and reality warped to an alternate timeline where that didn't happen. During the dramatic shift to the new reality, the coldness of the void seeps out around the point where those realities diverged. Essentially, the person who attacked me suffers cold damage because the bending of space-time left a pocket of deathly cold vacuum. They feel a freezing chill, and then see that their attack apparently never hit me in the first place. They missed. How? They remembered me bleeding out on the floor...
But yeah, my patron is the Hexblade, but that's boring, so we flavored it as me essentially convincing Azathoth that such a weapon existed and that it was somewhere my character was able to find it.
This is fucking awesome. I may or may not be stealing this 🤌
this is literally just "i reject your reality and substitute my own": the patron
That’s cool as hell
I love that reflavoring of Armor of Agathys. It's such an interesting way to explain a power that otherwise doesn't really align to the origin of said power.
Reminds me of something that happened at my table...
Warlock: Well, I took my 1 level warlock dip. Back to leveling up in druid!
Titania: Yeah... no. I feel that may distract you from important things, namely me.
Warlock: W-w-what?
Titania: Let's make a deal...
Another interesting reason for pacts that I've read about is as follows: The Patron lends it's warlock a smidgen on their power. Then as the warlock becomes stronger that power grows as well. When the Warlock inevitable dies that power returns to the Patron. No matter what the warlock does during their finite time, the patron will be better off since they'll end up stronger AND have infinite time to realise their plans.
This doesn't mean that Patrons don't have other plans and can't demand things from you. Why sell something for a penny if you can sell it for a pound. But the philosophical idea that Patrons persue some unknowing goal (or for demons political struggle) and warlocks exist as a power charger and function as handy subordinate seems really interesting.
Oh! A matrix Patron! That sounds great, especially when combined with one of the community answers: Some kinds of the Patron (typically Great Old One or Fathomless) may not even know the Warlock did form something like a Pact with them, a mere single mortal being deep below their discerning capabilities. In this case, the Patron would just influence the Warlock passively (doesn't mean it can't have profound effects on the Warlock - after all, Lovecraftian beings tend to induce madness without even noticing), also passively getting a tiny bit of power afterwards (and most probably not noticing that either).
Ive played with that reasoning once and it worked really well for the PC. But we worked out that there is an upfront cost that is greater than the return on investment if the warlock dies too quickly. Like a power tax crossing the planes to make it unfeasible for entities to game the system with a no loss investment.
Basically a justification for Patrons to try and invest in people who can both grow, and hopefully accomplish something for them instead of sending them on suicide missions as cheap fodder. Similarly why not every cultist is a warlock.
I REALLY love this take on it. Excellent idea!
@@Hunter2400 very important distinction in the case of an aware patron. Smart. 👌🏾
This sounds like the Grimnoir Chronicles by Larry Correia.
Honestly, using a personified UA-cam to visualise the points you're making was such a genius idea!
I love that everyone is coming out of the woodwork with their warlock stories, so here's my favorite from my table so far:
My warlock in the Curse of Strahd campaign I'm running wants to romance his vampire patron, an idea I love because it fits well in the tone of the story and would make a great contrast to how Strahd treats his lovers. Due to some scheduling shenanigans we weren't able to meet for awhile and I was squirelly to play, so I offered to run "prequel" solo sessions for everyone, noting how they learned about Barovia, introduce NPCs that would show up later, stuff like that. For the warlock, I set up the prequel session of him getting his pact, which involved some fun shenanigans of attending a fancy party, stealing a book from the host that detailed how to make a pact, and the two of them running off to a specific location to do a ritual to confirm the pact. And yes, the fact that the words they exchanged sounded VERY close to wedding vows was done on purpose by me, because I live to feed my players, lol.
Aaaand currently? The gang is off to rescue the warlock's patron. Because Strahd kidnapped him. I don't want to spoil too much, but it's gonna get wild and I'm glad everyone is trusting me to give them a good storytelling experience.
I like the idea of having a warlock that forms a pack with a young being, the patron wants stories and attention like a child and the warlock is happy to give it as they've always wanted to feel important in that way.
The correlation between the warlock patron and UA-cam as context for the video is genius. Excellent content as always.
Summoning The Algorithm via a pact of the chain would slap a little too hard, in the end.
I feel like Moon Knight is a very useful, current, and inspiring work for an interesting Warlock/Patron relationship.
I can't believe it's been almost a year and I'm still finding more reasons to love Moon Knight
I've never thought of moon night like that but Steven/mark and consu definitely strike me with a warlock & patron relationship now that you mention it!
Warlock or Paladin. one of the Two
@@spottedslash4256 multiclass
@@spottedslash4256 could you explain where you see paladin in him? I dont get it (it has been a while since i've watched the show)
I played a 2000 year old semi-immortal bard-warlock who had been serving his patron since his 20's. He had since been cut off from her but she continued to give him power. Whenever they finally met again they basically acted as old friends instead of patron and servant. It was a fun dynamic.
Probably the best scene in a long time on my most recent D&d table was when the Warlock was forced to switch his pact.
He definitely knew his patron was a villain, but he knew he was screwed when she started demanding that he killed the girl he liked. For context, the girl was the BBEG, and the Warlock pretty much knew that (actually, he was the only one to know that), but was on denial and trying to redeem the gal.
When they later had to "recruit" a demigodess to a war, she revealed herself as the daughter of the Warlock's patron, and demanded that the man was either sacrificed or forced to let go of his power and broke the pact, for she wasn't going to work alongside a servent of such an evil being. He was hesitant about it, since he knew he wouldn't be strong enough to fight without his magic, until he realised that, if the demigodess had the power to break his pact with her mother, she was probably just as strong as his previous patron, so he switched to her, staying as a Hexblade without the downside of having to send souls to the worst fate possible.
Everyone was the happiest they've ever been in a while for the Warlock. That was until...
He realised the demigodess was the Patron equivalent of a "Lawful Good Paladin", if you know what i mean, and that... for as good as it was to not be forced to do so much evil, he would now have to face what a real patron looks like, and what is like to have a VERY STRICT code to follow.
"… Kinky!"
"Stop it!"
He literally said "I can fix her" so hard that he switched alignments and states of being lol
@@pyrarius1598 update for you: we later changed the system to Pathfinder 2e, and since there's no Warlock in that game (there is Witch, but they use Intelligence and he didn't wanna lose his rizz), he had to switch classes. To justify that, the BBEG lady beat the shit out of him, snapped his maul in half, decapitated his patron right in front of his eyes and said "c'mon, fight me."
One 5 year timeskip later, he not only went to therapy to recover from the trauma, he also hit the gym, turning his broken maul into a one-handed war hammer and studying the secrets of the obscure. That means the once 8 Strength Warlock that was pretty much the least physically imposing man in the whole group now turned into an 18 Strength Thaumaturge (think basically a Witcher. Studies his opponents, hits them REALLY hard with their most deadly weakness and somehow still manages to be a Charisma class after all. I love Pathfinder) who looked like an absolute colossus next to anyone in that team.
You wanna know the best part? The player and I were talking and it turns out she went "honestly, looking back at everything he went through, I don't think he ever actually liked women, he was just too emotionally attached to the BBEG but actually... I think he's gay."
So yeah, he once wanted to fix her so badly he switched his whole moral code for that, but then she hit him so hard he became a "sigma male" who doesn't like women. 🤣
I once played a character who had an a powerful being indebted to her, because she helped them out of a bind on the material plain. He expected her to ask for wealth or love or some low-level magics to help with her work as a healer; instead, she asked for the ability to cast True Resurrection (because her twin brother was at serious risk of assassination.) A level 0 character simply is not able to hold the power of a 9th level spell, so ALL her other magical powers were just spillover from that one spell, and I had to choose abilities that could be tied to dancing that line between restoring life & true death. We also had the additional wrinkle where the reward she asked for was so beyond the help she had provided, as soon as she actually cast True Resurrection for the first time, the debt would be flipped; the only thing she specified he could not ask in return was anything that would threaten the life of the person she saved, even indirectly.
(Ended up spending it on a toddler-the final boss’s daughter. The boss’s guard fumbled an explosive, and the kid was too close. Last I saw of my character, she was kneeling in the shouldering remains of that nursery, clutching that little girl close, crying.
Oh, did I mention the kid is the twin brother’s rival for the throne?)
Shame that campaign’s never coming back, but at least I got to exit on a high note!
My warlock's patron is the ghost/spirit of his dead aunt, so my relationship with the patron is like a mother/son relationship, which is so much fun and kinda cute to play.
I am currently playing a Warlock named Alfie whos Patron is his own Father.✨
Best part about it is that he's actually super supportive, and loves watching his son go on adventures. Imagine, that one social anxious teen who's having an awesome house party, and then suddenly their dad shows up with crustless sandwiches while wearing an apron, and suddenly the teens now super embarrassed and trying to get him out of the room.
that's their Dynamic ☺✨
To any DMs out there, don't flinch away from this concept even if the player wants to lean into fiend or great old one patrons for this, you absolutely won't regret it; it's a great way to tie players to the story you want to tell, something that can be hard to do for sure. Plus, it's just fun to roleplay, much less have an adventurer that ACTUALLY has parents. For once. :p
That could actually be really cool. If Alfie's half-Fey, that works even better:
Alfie: "Father, where is Kim?"
Daddy Dearest: "Oh, you mean the girl that made you cry. I turned her into a frog and let her loose in the pond. That'll teach her to upset my li'l baby."
I also have played a warlocke where there patron was there father.
Pathos kardia a teifling.
There mother was a cleric of Athena and her father was Khalfor demon lord of Khaos, who was her hexblade patron as her mother trapped him inside a sword to save the world from his power, but after her death pathos took up the blade to keep him contained but he slowly began to corrupt her...
As a DM, I adore this. No Warlocks currently in the campaign I'm running, but if someone makes a backup character, I'll suggest this.
This reminds me of an idea I had. (Someone else has certainly thought of this but as far as I know I didn't take it from one of them.)
And Archfey patron who is the character's fairy godmother. So many possible ways to do this but to avoid stealing your vibes lets picture an ancient fey with connections to a family or area (is this how they became an archfey?) who eventually becomes the godmother (or godfather, whatever) to a child (parents know who they are? anyone know who they are?). Then the parents or family get killed by an orc warband or something and the archfey was only able to save the kid. To keep them safe the archfey locked them in a tower or something. And all was well, until they broke out. Maybe they stole their powers on the way out (that's how they broke out?) either way, they've been running ever since.
A Summary of my current patron:
“You seem very nice and respectful, how about you go use that pure spirit to vanquish the darkness of the mortal plane, because I can’t leave feywild. Being the gatekeeper and all. Here’s some magic.”
Internally: *This kid’s life sucks so bad and he’s been gaslighted so hard he doesn’t even know it, let’s try and get him out of the house so he can actually use those skills of his.*
A bunch of my players have taken warlock levels BECAUSE we're so RP heavy, and I try really hard to create interesting patrons. It works for us. We also have a "Pact of the Lovers" homebrew we've been working on for one player who accidentally made a powerful being fall in love with him. Warlocks rock.
Tbis is an amazing idea!
My Hexblade warlock, a tabaxi, is a collector of things. Sometimes i get to taunt someone with a posession, sometimes it helps out in some way. But the best moment so far was when I got cursed with a nightmare. When asked my character's worst fears, i said 'abandonment'. it was expected that my party would leave in the dream, but when the Raven Queen turned her face from me... literal goosebumps.
I've been STRUGGLING, DYING with patron writing problems, You're a life saver Ginny!
Love this video! Two of your points spoke to my own experiences as a player - on switching your pacts, and on the relationship of a warlock and their patron. TL:DR Warlock patrons can be JUST AS IMPORTANT to the rest of the party as their own follower!!
In our long running campaign, our warlock (who served the Raven Queen) was possessed by a parasitic, genocidal spirit in his mechanical arm who drove the warlock to be reckless, do a lot of drugs, and generally be sour all the time. In the next act of the campaign, we broke into an archmage's vault and discovered a smoky black compass. Compelled by the other party members and an incredibly odd feeling, the warlock shattered the glass and released a mysterious spirit. This spirit thanked the warlock for freeing her, introduced herself as Peace, and INSTANTLY KILLED the genodical spirit that inhabited his body.
The spirit Peace offered the warlock a Deal: to give him alternative powers in exchange for giving her strength - she was quite weak after being trapped in the compass. The warlock agreed, was able to work out an expensive deal with the Raven Queen, and Peace became like a new party member. There was quite a bit of drama around her mysterious past and certain other player characters not trusting her, but the DM played this well - she never felt intrusive or over bearing as a DM insert. Eventually Peace had the power to return to her dayjob of being a Reaper, but not before she began a romantic relationship with the warlock... AND another player character. Peace has become one of my favourite NPCs, and everytime her name comes up in RP conversation or in the letters she writes, I can't help but smile :)
I think my favorite warlock was my younger brother's fathomless warlock.
He didn't have a formal pact but instead shared a body with his patron (like a venom symbiote).
The patron could force a charisma save to hijack the warlocks body while the warlock could make a spell casting ability check to force the patron to cast a spell against the patron will.
The DC was determined by the warlocks used spell slots.
Ginny: The warlock and patron relationship can be romantic
Me: Someone needs to make Beauty and the Beast where Beast is Beauty's patron
as a bonus twist, make the warlock the most deranged one XD
@@saparapatepete Personally I wouldn't but you do you
My Archfey Warlock, Eldrin Moonscar, got married to his Archfey patron at the end of the campaign I used him in.
I made a genie (dao) warlock pact, where the character made the pact with his ancestor. OG's family was a well known villain family of Genasi's. He was treated as garbage as his twin brother gained all the earth traits in the womb, leaving him as essentially a earth flavored human. OG was treated as trash and took up tailoring as a hobby. Ended up looting his Father's desk and running away, only to find that his father was using his Dao ancestor as a servant. He was given a portion of his "grandads" power in return for freeing him and promising the enslavement of the family who enslaved him. Also he got Granddad's swanky ring which he turned into his bachelor's pad/clothing shop. Hence Taylor the Tailor was born.
I've made one Dao Genie warlock too! I decided to do "1001 nights" as inspiration but with a twist. My Warlock is the daughter of the king's steward, and has insulted the King. She got thrown into jail, and managed to find a magic lamp hidden under a loose brick, and she made a pact with the Dao Genie inside it to break free. The Dao Genie wants stories, so she must take the genie and the lamp with her to travel, she must travel to many different places, she must write and compile stories or tales she hears while travelling, and if need be, have an adventure so the Genie has first seatings in THAT particular story. Only once she gave the genie one thousand and one stories total is she free from the pact. The name of my Warlock is... Scheherazade.
My first ever character was a human monk and early in the campaign one of the party members sold everybody in the party’s soul to Tiamat (he quickly learned his mistake, and he was still fun to play with). Everybody was given a different color of chromatic wyrmling, mine being a green one because my character used poison often. The campaign ended with us learning who Tiamat was and dying to prevent her from forcing us to set her free. I later created various characters that were reincarnations of this character. A more recent one is a green dragonborn warlock. Basically, he’s a warlock of Tiamat who is good aligned and doesn’t even know that he’s a warlock with a patron. He just knows that he has magic, and probably thinks of himself as something that would line up with a sorcerer. The “pact” was when his soul was sold to Tiamat in a previous life, so because of that, he’s still able to use some of her power.
Holy cow, this video was so helpful. It also gave me confidence that as a DM I'm approaching my warlock's background appropriately. Thanks so much!!
That makes me so happy to hear!!
Or read lol
I'm making a warlock right now so this should be helpful
That was actually pretty useful, really helped me define some of my choices.
My warlocks patron was once a deity of equipment that gifted her followers with weapons and armor, whether these were natural, wielded, worn, normal or magical depended on one's devotion and situation. But since many beasts and monsters kept natural weapons and armor through evolution and many creatures learned how to make and enchant them by themselves, my patron stopped getting worshipped in many places, and eventually turned into a celestial spirit. Still powerful, but no god. My character, who came from a family that had always worshipped her for protection, got a dream in which she gave him an offer: she would grant his family natural weapons such as fangs or claws for protection and additionally grant him a tiny % of her power and the ability to summon weapons and armor (hexblade warlock, pact of the blade, armor of the shadows, improved pact weapon). In return my character will travel through all of Faerûn to spread her name and worship once again. They (mostly) have a deity-follower relationship since that's how it started, although she sometimes gives my character a specific request or task.
The one warlock I had in my campaign was groomed to be a sacrifice for his patron to permit the patron (a banished great old one) to come back to a plane near the prime material. As the campaign progressed, the player though he was going to be a mortal avatar for his patron... Especially when the PCs met a cult to the patron. Until the time came for him to be sacrificed. When the other PCs saved him and he betrayed his patron, he lost his powers until he made a new pact with a new entity. My player LOVED having misinterpreted the end-goal of the patron and since that whole arc was incorporated in my main campaign, no-one felt that player was in any way more special or important than the others or that he had more "screen time" than the other players. Also, the character was unaware of his warlock powers. They would manifest subconsciously or when the character had taken 75% damage, then the warlock aspect would emerge and start blasting eldritch bolts.
I've posted this before, but I love the story. My first 5E character was an Archfey warlock that, as a small child, made a deal with a runaway fey princess (also relatively young for fey, and this was her first time in the mortal world). Strictly speaking, they both agreed to the terms of the contract: he find her in a game of hide or seek, she help him heal his ill father. He found her, and she bestowed his left hand with the cantrip Guidance. What NEITHER of them realized at the time was that this counted as a Warlock/Patron contract and he would slowly gain more of her power. It would take a long time for it to be enough for her to notice, but surely someday she would.
In short, it can be REALLY fun if NEITHER of them realize the contract is made.
My favourite idea for a Warlock/Patron dynamic was for my Tiefling Patience, who's patron was her ancient succubus ancestor, through her infernal heritage.
Had a fun plan, for kinda awkward (given her being a succubus), but ultimately wholesome family dynamic between the two.
I saw something talking about a "pact of the goblin" yesterday and it was litterally just a single goblin that follows the player. And all it's abilities are like it helping in small ways like guarding the players valuables or finding gold other people dropped. And the whole thing was based on the concept of "it's not magic, but they're trying their hardest to help" and it was pretty dope.
I was brainstorming a Pirate Warlock and here comes Ginny with a video and sponsor relating to both.
I started watching this and as soon as "the demands of their patrons drive warlocks towards adventuring" I came up with a possible Ioun (the knowing mistress) pact, as the video continued it kept checking all the boxes.
Ioun makes a pact, her only conditions are that she is allowed to watch the warlock, and if anything too dangerous is found (Like a tome that could unleash Vecna [her rival] she will tell the warlock to turn it into the temple/library). This allows the warlock pact to remain in the background unless the DM wants to throw in a plot hook. Party is hired to retrieve a journal of some long deceased person. Upon acquisition, the warlock is contacted and told to bring it to the temple of Ioun. Party will role play a debate (lose the reward for completing the mission vs potentially handing over a dangerous item to the mission giver). Fun thing is, the temple may only want to make a copy or possibly entrap the mission giver as a follower of Vecna. Either way, the end reward should be as much as the initial reward or greater. However, the reward may also be in favors or take longer/more effort to receive.
As for possible boons, the warlock could be given the ability to identify an object if they study it for 10 minutes (basically a ritual cast of identify), and can lose that ability if they go against Ioun's wishes. In a party without identify from other means, this would be a huge thing. If Identify is plentiful, perhaps Legend Lore once per week (still requiring material components) could be an option, Or detect magic aura that points out things Ioun is interested in seeing. Another interesting option would be once per day the warlock has a trait that's basically a "primeval awareness"(general direction and distance within 6 miles) for books Ioun wants brought to the temple/library.
Group is in a dungeon and 2 players can't make it to the next session? Ioun appears and helps points them towards a wall (with a brand spanking new hidden door) and the members go off on a side dungeon that seems to line up with the current members.
It could even be as simple as figuring out which book in a bookstore is wanted by the temple. Imagine walking into a bookstore and trying to pick out the one book your patron wants you to deliver.....
As a first time DM, I was literally just talking about this with a friend and then I find this JUST got uploaded. Wonderful timing, Ginny 😅
My warlock is a failed wizard student who happened to discover that she had fey blood in the family. One quick conversation through a crystal later, and she had the backing of a fairy queen who gifted her some powers to help her trick her way through the wizard finals. Now in between roaming the lands, collecting information for the queen, and helping lost fey, she and her patron are essentially prankster buddies, with a whole world to pull tricks on.
lol. I also have a Feylock who got her pact to pass her classes. Difference is, she has no idea that she's a warlock, she doesn't _actually_ owe her patron anything (the patron was mostly just being nice) despite believing she has mountains of debt, and... yeah. Pretty much a comedy of errors.
Easily my favourite class! The warlock/patron dynamic is so versatile it makes writing up a backstory for one a blast!
Thanks for the advice! I just texted one of my players to ask how he felt about the amount of presence The Traveller has had in the campaign!
It's entirely possible to run different levels of presence in the same campaign as well. I have three players with pact magic with very different ideas of how much engagement they want:
The blood hunter chose Quajath the Undermaw both in and out of character because a giant imprisoned worm with an int of 4 probably won't ask for much.
The Warlock/Bard was given powers by The Traveller mostly as a joke and enjoys being the butt of the occasional joke.
The rogue/warlock knew the Blade of Broken Mirrors was evil when he started usimg it, but sometimes you need the ability to hurt werewolves, or an early level up when imprisoned by hags, and is loving the story of slowly corrupting himself by bargaining for new abilities at suspiciously reasonable prices. . .
Immediately liked! The roleplay opportunity of being a Warlock is one of the best parts of the class!
One of my players multiclassed into warlock when the party accidentally summoned Zariel to try and get an NPC revenant out of her contract that was about to expire. Zariel's expectations are basically for him to kill demons whenever he runs into them and then to fight in the Blood War once he dies. Other than that, she lets him do what he wants. The more powerful he becomes before he dies, the more useful he will be as a soldier in the legions of Avernus.
I really enjoyed Wrath's pact in "Shadows of Drakkenheim"; where Wrath's player, Joe, constantly invoked the presence and demands of his patron, Bruce, without relying on the DM's input.
Monty does a really good job playing along with it too. Joe is perhaps one of the best roleplayers I've ever seen.
I was sent this video by my DM literally yesterday. Perfect timing for my character: an artificer that unexpectedly entered a pact near the end of our first campaign. I enjoyed the video!
I’m playing my first campaign ever and chose a lore bard who demonstrated stereotypical bard horniness initially, only for the party to find he just wanted to have deep and existential conversation with members of different races and creeds to understand more about the world around him. My lore bard is so excited by knowledge that, upon encountering a trapped, quest-giving aboleth with the party, he had a total fanboy moment and flattered the creature thoroughly. He promised the aboleth to give it constant psychic updates on the goings on in the modern world to receive some of its knowledge.. and thus I dipped my one and only point into warlock. My DM helped me homebrew a Lurker lock variant that views the aboleth as its patron and wellspring of knowledge - without the cost of corruption -with the reward being 120 foot telepathy with creatures with innate swimming speed, 30 ft telepathy in general, and Tentacles of the Deeps. I also have Arms of Hadar personally flavored as “Arms of the Aboleth.”
My psionic powers continue to grow!!
I like the idea of Warlocks having an item like a Ring that physically represents their pack and lets the Warlock and Patron contact each other
My last group ended up with 2 warlocks, the first one died at lvl9, then about level 12 my swashbuckling rogue was uh, possessed? By the warlock that died.
Apparently he battled his Parton to a near draw and the patron cast him back to the realm trapped in a dagger, who was found by my rogue.
This allowed the og warlock to keep playing the character, was hilarious!
I have a player who’s patron is an aboleth named YuTu… he’s basically UA-cam. As an aboleth, he has memories from the beginning of time, so he has all this “content” and I allow the warlock to roll a WIS check sometimes and if he rolls poorly so he ends up getting random cat videos or Rick rolled. Other time he gets visions that are actually useful.
I love that Ginny basically signed a pact with UA-cam in the exact same way 😆
In the current Curse of Strahd/Domains of Dread campaign I'm in, I took another spin on the Warlock Patron: Knowledge. An Undead Patron Warlock whose patron is actually esoteric necromantic and magical research. As such, the build is an Intlock, and the requirement for progress is further research and analysis. She is bending the laws of magic in an effort to cure her vampiric curse (Dhampir, formerly vampire via backstory), but as a result is being shaped and defined by it, simultaneously becoming more and less human/vampire.
Warlock is defiantly my next characters class.😀
I have a double patron Fey warlock at the ready if my current character either finishes his mainquest or dies. Already excited to play him and these tips make it a lot easier to play warlocks
I adore how creative warlock patron stories can be.
My favorite character is a warlock who's pact was made for him at birth by his parents, his parents werent around at all in his life and he had to live with his patron. Their abilities are also psychic based so the patron is very prevalant in my characters life and talks with him in his mind very often.
The Warlock wants to explore the world because of his nature and the patron wants to see the world for all that shes missed in her reclusive lifestyle so she sees the world through his eyes
Huh. You know what? I’ve never been interested in playing a a warlock. Mostly because I am personally fiercely into my own independence. Also as a newish DM I’ve never encouraged one of my players into playing one. It sounded too complex and intimidating for me to run.
But you’ve made me turn around and made it sound fun and exciting. Thanks!
A really brilliant fix my DM came up with to make sure the warlock wasn't taking up too much time is that a couple other characters also have a connection to the patron (not all in a positive way). Because of this, when patron stuff comes up the warlock doesn't always want to jump right in (sometimes it's a hook for a different character) and sometimes he wants to outright hide his patronage. She also tends to come to him in dreams, which helps because it's ideal for in-between-session text RP so it's not taking up group play time.
Good timing considering Moon Knight's first season ended this week and that was a very entertaining "warlock patron" story.
I love you Ginny and the way you’re videos are always entertaining as well as thought provoking. Having watched this video a player in my campaign has asked me to formalise what we have agreed about her pact with her patron as an actual drawn up contract she can add to her character sheet.
She is a space pirate who Captain (An Elder Brain) has sent her out into the world to recruit both crew for the ship and soldiers for his Mind Flayer army to retake the city he once ruled. Her pact equipment includes flyers to attract new crew and a bag containing Illithid tadpoles in jam jars. The relationship is respectful and based on mutual trust and friendship. After all she served as 2nd mate on the ship for ten years before getting her current assignment.
This is perfect timing - I have a warlock player in the group I DM for and I've been wondering for a while now how to bring that relationship to the fore. I've sent this video to the player and we can have a talk about it :)
18:21- It was short lived, but my bard got a blessing in my friends game from a deity called the All-Mother who was rat-themed where she could gnaw through any bindings.
Even though I'm pretty new to playing D&D I LOVE warlocks. It offers so many ways to create and play and I am so here for it.
Yes! Thank you! I love the warlock/patron dynamic so much that I gave my 1ePathfinder Bard a patron as flavor for a late game ability (Music Beyond the Spheres.) The relationship isn't complex or close, he sees her as just a pretty thing he likes to help, but as he is so alien he often messes it up, and the brush with the eldritch always hurts her (it grants a warped limited-wish for some stat drain.) It's resulted in my favorite quote: "You've angered The Great Old One's favorite Barbie. The punishment is death."
The first real Patron-Warlock relationship I really GMd was one, where the pact was unclear and actually happened accidentally for both sides. As a child, the warlock got lost in the woods and the patron took notice, got curious and decided to help via sending a guide (a familiar) to help the child find home. This triggered the warlocks latent magical talent, leading to all sorts of trouble that finally resulted in the warlock being sent/sold to the local hag to be trained (a much clearer bargain). The patron eventually fell in love with the person their warlock came to be and started to occasionally visit in disguise and the occasional bumps in power (leveling up) happened to be gifts send the warlock's way. The Hag and the Familar were always disagreeing, except on the topic of the fae patron whom they found untrustworthy and stalker-y. The actual terms of the pact were fist discussed 13 Years after it was formed, when the patron was called by the warlock, to aid the party, and actually made an appearance.
The second pact I GMd was a Hexblade patron who considered themselves a weapon of heroes. But sadly for them they had been found by a graverobber and thief... in exchange for power, the warlock had to perform good deeds. :D
in one of the games I dm there is a genasi monk/warlock that has their genie parent as their warlock patron. It is very much a relationship based in a parent feeling that the child needs help protecting themselves, thus granting some extra magic. While the patron isn't always obviously caring in attitude, it's still a parent that want their child to be safe and happy. and the attitude of the warlock has so far been that they want their parent to be proud of them, and feel like they need to show that they can handle the powers granted. It's really fun to have small interactions between these two, because it is almost always related to balancing getting tasks done but not just doing so rashly with no regard to safety.
There was one session where the patron learned that the warlock had been in a large battle and got quite upset that they hadn't used a magic item the warlock has that lets the patron get to them in emergencies (re-flavoured ring of Djinni summoning, specifically summons patron and player does not get to control or give commands).
I really like that this player wanted to go this route with their character, and it also adds a lot more reasons for me as a dm to actually have the patron interact with them and get the party to feel like the patron of this warlock isn't an evil being that they have to defeat.
Ive played a warlock who adopted father as well the “king” of the entire area the campaign took place as well a lich was her patron as a caring father . Their relationship was very close but i played my character as a child who wanted to do things on her own. But Sametime she also was such a daddys girl.
Ive slightly dn’d for a player who a warlock but the relationship their was handed to me to be creative with. Only info was goven was patron was the hexblade sword but pc has no idea what they want or even says cause a language barrier.
So the idea to go for is building that relationship & the patron take either end good or bad etc depending the players actions.
Took me two years to finally figure out something on the whys & hows of them working together.
Was Stressful but very fun.
Oh I always look forward to your gags and side story that happen during the video xDDD The UA-cam Patron is also hilarious.
I'm currently playing a Celestial Warlock, and my patron, a Unicorn, actually exists in the setting. She has never directly appeared in any scene, but she has sent messages through my familiar, and I've even sent my familiar off to go get help directly from my patron. In the beginning, seeking my familiar was a big component in our adventure until level 3 when we found her.
I'm level 9 now and my DM gave me permission to take Summon Celestial, but I've re-flavored it as summoning my patron's avatar. My party loves the unicorn shooting radiant beams from her horn! In any event, my patron is impactful in the story without being critical to it. She's influenced events in the background and once provided direct aid, in the form of a magic item, but the story would have occurred even if she'd never existed. I feel that's a pretty good balance for a patron.
I was struggling to find a guide on making a detailed pact as a DM for a month, this comes just in time before next week
Im so glad youre singing the praises of warlocks!! They are such a blast to play! My archfey warlock became a warlock bc of someone made a pact with his patron without reading the terms and conditions, and now if the warlock dies without fulfilling the terms of the pact, the next living creature that touches the pact tattoo is automatically made the new warlock. Its a super fun way to 1-2 combo his class and background as an inheritor. IM LOVING reading everyone elses warlock/patron dynamics
My only issue with the Archfey patron is the lack of spell diversity when it comes to whom you pledge to. I would imagine there to be differences between a warlock for The Queen of Air and Darkness and one for Titania.
I agree with this. I had a warlock whose patron was the Prince of Frost and something that made my character basically Elsa would've been great to rp.
This helped me add the final touches to the warlock I've been creating for a while! Don't know if I'll ever play her, but at least I have something finished to bring to the table I ever get to play her. Thank you!
"The Seer of Possibilities" by Thomas O Wagner is an excellent example.
The Patron asks for seemingly innocent favours, each of which causes a harm to someone else and a boost to the "Warlock."
This Patron is hands on and is guiding their subject to achieve a goal that they've no idea of.
while I hated playing warlocks when I was playing DnD, they were definitely the funnest class to write
The things you can do with a patron are insane- e.g:
A Midsummer Night's Dream scenario where Titania and Oberon fight over you, and you're stringing them along, or a "celestial" warlock who's their own parton, a minor deity on the rise, or (my favourite) A logical, emotionally stunted warlock who made a pact with the moon- an alien being of pure chaos and emotion, where the to exchange not just power and servitude, but experiences and outlooks through the Warlock's sketchbook
credit to Genuine's "Compendium of Forgotten Secrets" for the last one
In my D&D game, my Warlock changed patron before the game. My caracter got a 6 in wisdom and got screw with the pack and got possesed by the demon. The new pack is with an angel who just want to mess with the older patron. The DM had a field day with that story! Much fun!
4:23 Yep, that's the core of the Warlock, right there. "This might be a problem later, but sounds good enough right now."
I want to try out 2 types of patrons eventually: 1 - a brother-in-law who married my character's sister and is very chill and basically a bestie with my character. 2 - the DM. I mean, thnk about it - an entity who knows all, sees all, decides on almost everything, is always present and knows what the warlock may be up to. And yes, the warlock calls the DM by the real name, which would sound really funny I think xD
Excellent timing! I just started playing a Warlock! Feylost>Hexblood>Archfey>Tome-
She was born when a hag disguised herself as an archfey and made a deal with a wood elf couple who wanted children. The Archfey got upset that the hag used her image and claimed that due to the fact that the elf couple made a deal with the image of the Archfey, in the name of the Archfey, that by rights the child was hers. So the relationship is one of a mother and daughter. Now my character had been shunted to the prime material so she doesn't get caught up in the bitter rivalry between the hag and the Archfey! She's been left wondering what to do but has decided to make the most of this opportunity to see a world that she was born into, but never experienced.
lol
1 thing to add: if you have multiple warlocks, you need to know how their patrons feel about each other :)
Great advice, as usual, Ginny! Thanks! I have a newbie PC that started as a Rogue but took a pact after they, uh, "forgot a Rogue can disengage as a bonus action; in front of Bugbear. Boss." (Read: died) The PC really liked their character and didn't want to lose them, so I went with it. They were holding a weapon collected from a ghoul they defeated earlier, so I decided it was a key to a demiplane prison - and The Forever King was born! Accept the pact and get your life back. Now I play the patron as a teacher, slowly instructing the PC in his worldview... And I'm not even a UA-camr ;-}
I played in a campaign where the player's patron was a unicorn. Her part of the pact was to feed him flowers sing him songs and provide a lap for him to rest his head in at lead once a month. He in turn promised to "to provide Power and Holy Light, Guidance of the Right and True, Inspiration for songs of Happy Gladness." As a sign of his favor she shall bear his Mark and Shine as a Beacon of Hope in The World" Little did I know that the first time i cast a warlock spell my bard , who was trying to sneak up on the bad guys would develop a tiny glowing golden horn on her forehead. and No, hats did not cover it! My DM took inspiration for his unicorn from Mercedes Lackey description of them Powerful, Beautiful and not as smart as a thick skulled golden retriever!
First time dm here!
I took some lessons from other DMs by starting out with general point a to b and then c narrative then building detail that derived from the players' characters and their imagination.
The warlock turned out to be the one that helped me think of a good place to start for developing my major city and web-weaved a intricate, meaningful narrative.
BUT, the patron was something I needed help with so thank you! Very grateful!
Warlock was my favorite class before Artificer came in and stomped it into the dirt. It’s still my favorite charisma class. In my own opinion, a warlock pact makes a great B-story. Not the main, but connected to it in some fashion. Heck, every character should have a connection to the main story as well as their own self-focused B-story.