It feels fitting to start kick off this loosely eldritch themed newsletter to do a deep dive on the new D&D 2024 Player's Handbook (PHB) class: The Warlock.

The Warlock received one of the biggest overhauls, along with Monk, in the new PHB, which changes the way we are going to build Warlocks moving forward.

Actually, let me jump in here before we get too far:

I am going to refer to as 5.24 from here on because, as an avid fan of an unnamed (but critically acclaimed, etc etc) MMORPG, patch notes are something that makes sense to me. This update to 5e has DEFINITELY felt like a patch. Game balance has changed, fundamental abilities of some classes have either been removed or renamed, and yet the *essence* is still there, and you will see why.
- Grimoire Goblin

Updates to the Warlock from the 2024 Player’s Handbook for D&D 5e

The core of these changes coming in two forms: Invocations and Leveling.

To start, Warlocks no longer get boons! You heard that right, the fundamental structure of the Warlock has now been completely upended! Previously, was a nice “Holy Trinity” of Features, Invocations, and Pact Boons that made the Warlock worth playing but NO MORE!

Is this bad? No actually, it’s fucking fantastic.

Let’s start with the obvious: all of the previous “pact boons” are now invocations. Just regular invocations you say? What happened to all of the boon-specific, tailor-made invocations like Far Scribe?

Stay with me, it gets better, I promise.

The 5.24 Pact of the Tome, now an invocation (not a boon) is now the Old Tome boon (three cantrips from any class) AND the Book of Ancient Secrets (1st level spells and rituals) rolled up into one.

Again, this is really great in terms of game design, because it shows (at least in this specific instance) that the designers are listening to the players. Try and think of how many times either you, or players at your table, have wanted to play Warlocks.

If they played a sword-wielding Warlock what did they play? Probably Hexblade, Pact of the Blade. If they wanted to play a more blaster-caster or utility Warlock, what did they play? Probably Pact of the Tome, taking Book of Ancient Secrets.

These choices were automatic and baked into the "meta" of Warlocks. Invocations were agonizing (no pun intended) choices to make, because if you wanted to do any ranged damage reliably, at least one invocation choice was taken up by one of the many Eldritch Blast modifiers.

So a Tomelock was forced to choose between damage and... mage armor, I guess? It's not like they're going to NOT take Book of Ancient Secrets-- and this was always my gripe with Warlocks...

There were very specific pigeonholes that Warlocks were locked into when you played a certain style of Warlock, and it was even worse with Hexblade. The Hexblade’s Charisma-based weapon attack feature was just SO good, and the Blade boon was SO worthless, it was a no-brainer– if you were going to play a melee Warlock, you were going to play a Hexblade or a Hexblade multiclass.

Now? These new Warlock subclasses and Invocations feel waaay less typecasted and forced.

If you wanted to be a Knight of the Summer Court, blinking around the battlemap, slashing around with a flurry of strikes, you can do that! You can be the Cthulhu Davy Jones’ first mate! You can choose to be a Devilish enforcer or a Celestial investigator, the sky is the limit! Cast off the shackles of the Shadowfell, my fellow gish, and rise up against your otherworldly masters by blade or by– ahem. Sorry. Got a teeny bit excited there. Moving on…

Speaking of Pact of the Blade, it is now (almost) completely fixed. You can now use your Charisma modifier for Attack and Damage rolls AND you can change the damage type to Necrotic, Radiant, Or Psychic!? I sense many Jedi builds in our future.

Thirsting Blade for Extra Attack is now a 5+ Invocation, and Lifedrinker is now 9th level+ Invocation that adds 1d6 extra damage instead of CHA modifier, and also adds a healing feature (i.e. drinking life, duh) which is SUCH nice flavor.

Additionally, Devouring Blade now grants the same features we used to get in Baldur's Gate 3 when multiclassing for Thirsting Blade and Extra Attack: THREE ATTACKS PER ATTACK ACTION. Can you hear me drooling? So awesome. Thanks Larian, so many changes came down the pipeline from the fun things added in BG3 so, like the Lifedrinker Smitedin build,

What I really like about the Devouring Blade, is that it is available at 12th level. Around the level that most campaigns reach their capstones of play (10-12), the Bladelock is going to get a suitably massive upgrade, but this level barrier also prevents players from feeling like they are unable to take the cool lower level Invocations because they have to "save room" for their good Invocations. Being able to replace them every level on top of having more Invocations than ever before, is great news for all of the Gish lovers out there (myself included) and I can’t wait to hear all of the awesome build that come out of the 5.24 update.

I intend to update this post as more and more builds are unearthed, and after I have had time to really chew on the nuance of the 5.24 Warlock.

Thanks for stopping by!

The Warlock: The 2024 DnD Player’s Handbook Changes

Updates to the Warlock from the 2024 Player’s Handbook for D&D 5e