Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Consequences for leveling a warlock?

Just so it's clear from the get go, my enjoyment from games like this comes from finding the most viable builds for each class. That said, I do account for story elements and don't cheese encounters - like I will not knowingly take an Illithid power even though there is currently no consequence for it because it's obviously extremely powerful and should lock you into a specific story path.

The problem I've run into is that I feel the same way about a Warlock, even though it's not quite as broken. The game makes it too clear of a point that a Warlock's patron compromises its beneficiary, as seen with Wyll. On top of this, Eldritch blast, agonizing blast, devil's sight, and pact of the blade resolve every problem you have as a charisma based spell caster and you only need 4 levels to get all of those things, so you don't even have to commit to that play style if you don't want to.

Play how you want, I'm not criticizing, but I've got to be missing something here. Where is the consequence for playing a Warlock? Right now I'm fully expecting Larian to get around to adding one and I'm curious as to what to expect.

The consequence is what you see with Wyll.

Your patron can make demands of you which you must fulfil or be punished.

How temperamental your patron is will vary based on your DM's whim.

In the case of BG3, it's unlikely that they will add actual negatives to the Warlock class, especially since there is no choice for a specific patron. The three patrons you select from (Fiend, Great Old One and Archfey) don't specify anyone in particular, so you have to simply headcanon whomever/whatever you consider to be your character's patron.

Most likely they would flesh out Cleric Deities having more tangible impact on characters (Besides Selune having a bunch of extra dialogue, especially when interacting with Shadowheart) way before dealing with Warlock patrons. What with already having actual, specific, deities to pick on character creation.

In DnD you can have good aligned patrons - granted probably not as a fiend, though i always wanted to try out a walrock with basically Crowley from Good Omens (though Supernatural Crowley would probably work too) as a morally more amiguise fiend patron.
But there are good aligned fey patrons according to the lore, my feylock in our campaign has such a patron, some sort of water based nature protecting powerful creature. They actually have a good working relationship.
A friend of mine played a GOO warlock in a campaign and he had an agreement, that his character is benefitting from the powers and mostly left alone, but will go steadily more insane from the influence of his patron. I mean, what else to expect, if you have Cthulhu and his fellwow old ones as patrons.

I would have loved, if BG3 would give you some consequences - maybe make Raphael the patron of your fiendlock and in act 3 you have to decide, if you want to stay true to the pact or get the consequences. Ethel is probably not powerful enough to be a fey patron, but if her storyline would have been expanded, the feylocks patron could have gotten involved. GOO would have been a bit harder, but maybe with that, you would have starting to hear voices, make will saves or do erritcally insane things - if you ever played Vampire the Masqerade Bloodlines as a Malkavian - something like that, you hear and see things, that aren't there, maybe you get some insight, mabye your patron leads you to do some random stuff, you have no idea, why you are doing it, because you can't really understand the ways of an eldritch being.
It could be very unique experience for every warlock subclass, so granted, if Raphael would be your fiendlocks patron, you had more involvment with the direct story, though I can see the other two just being as fun. Ethels storyline is one of teh most popluar according to social media and a playstyle for a GOOlock could be very unique (again, maybe similar to the Malkavian from VtMB).

I'm a bit sad, that your warlock doesn't get to interact in any form with their patron or have a moral dilemma like Wyll about their pact tbh.

Oh, don't get me started. This hits home.
There is also a fair amount of Llolth content, Lathander obviously has a dungeon to his name. There is some interaction between a Cleric of Mystra and Gale, too.

And, that is where that ends. If you pick Moradin, you get nothing. All game long. This game shits on the Dwarfs.
[You get a line mentioning the Dwarffather at the encounter with Harper Yonas, but the response is the same as with any other class]

And, on top of that- you can't even pick Gaerdal Ironhand or Gond, which is a right bloody shame. Or Umberlee, even though the Bitch Queen has such a presence in the city; and you can actually earn Umberlee specific gear. [And Tempest Cleric is the coolest class in the game. ]

Isn't the main story like perfectly fitted for a GOO lock?

I will use the stones to destroy the stones

Yeah, it could be, that is true, but I don't see a Netherbrain on the same level as Cthulhu (or similar entities) tbh.
Plus, it would not really be special, since all characters are connected to the Absolute.

Sorry to bump this, but I feel it's important for someone to admit when they are wrong online. There doesn't need to be a lore requirement - I think it would be cool if there was one, but it's definitely not required for some balance reason. Any warlock build is just fine, and if you want to take a bunch of turns sitting in darkness pew-pewing everything, that's fine too (no sarcasm intended).

My opinion about how this game is balanced has changed significantly and to explain anymore would go off the general topic of game story, but thank you all for your input and having a small conversation I could enjoy reading because I don't know much of anything about D&D.

There is one consequence I can remember from playing a Warlock.


As far as other consequences, I think head canon is the answer. I actually like the way Larian did it with general patrons because it allows the player to role play more freely.

We could have gotten Psi Warriors and Abberant Mind too. But I think that's for another thread.