Eldritch Blast annoys me. The Warlock description lists it as a class feature, but that only means that you are forced to take it. It's not as if you get it for free, or have any other kind of bonus, as one would expect from a feature. And it does nothing special whatsoever. It counts as a ranged basic attack, which is mostly irrelevant except for a couple encounter or daily powers from other classes, but otherwise it has no ability. Or drawback, for that matter.
Because of this, among other reasons, Warlocks are in dire need of options for at-will powers. The feats I present today should give that, by changing EB, effectively turning it into different powers. The idea goes back to the first warlock appearance in D&D 3.5, though in that occasion the system was modular and very detailed, allowing for lots of combinations and changing from a turn to the next. My proposal isn't as ambitious, as a player can only choose a single modification for EB, and it is applied permanently.
We will define a new type of feat, the Eldritch Mystery. The following rules apply:
Eldritch Mystery feats.
These feats modify the effect of a Warlock's Eldritch Blast under certain conditions. They are denoted by "Eldritch Mystery" in brackets after the name of the feat. You can't take more than one Eldritch Mystery feat.
Because of this, among other reasons, Warlocks are in dire need of options for at-will powers. The feats I present today should give that, by changing EB, effectively turning it into different powers. The idea goes back to the first warlock appearance in D&D 3.5, though in that occasion the system was modular and very detailed, allowing for lots of combinations and changing from a turn to the next. My proposal isn't as ambitious, as a player can only choose a single modification for EB, and it is applied permanently.
We will define a new type of feat, the Eldritch Mystery. The following rules apply:
Eldritch Mystery feats.
These feats modify the effect of a Warlock's Eldritch Blast under certain conditions. They are denoted by "Eldritch Mystery" in brackets after the name of the feat. You can't take more than one Eldritch Mystery feat.
Posts
The trick I used was Eldritch Essences. I took the Eldritch Essences from 3.5 and made them into feats. Each different eldritch essence required you have one of the various pacts. For instance, Brimstone Blast was Infernal Pact. Let me see if I can find the list I used:
ReplyDeleteBrimstone Blast: Infernal Pact. Eldritch Blast can deal fire damage. If you critically hit with Eldritch blast, the target suffers ongoing fire damage (amount varied by tier).
Hellrime Blast: Infernal, Star, or Dark Pact. EBlast can deal cold damage. On a critical hit, the target is slowed (save ends).
Sickening Blast: Infernal, Dark, or Fey Pact. EBlast can deal POISON damage (I loved that one). On a critical hit, the target suffered ongoing poison damage.
Frightful Blast: Infernal, Star, or Vestige. EBlast can deal thunder damage. On a critical hit the target is defeaned (save ends). Deafen is such a useless effect, but having an at will thunder power is probably useful for something. Right?
Baneful Blast: Any. Choose one origin: You gain a +2 feat bonus to damage rolls against creatures with that origin when attacking with your eldritch blast. Increases to +4/+6 etc. You can select this feat multiple times to gain the bonus against multiple origins.
PARAGON TIER ESSENCES
Utterdark Blast: Infernal Pact, Dark Pact, Vestige Pact (No star pact for some reason?). Blast deals necrotic damage. On a critical hit, the target is weakened until the end of your next turn.
Repelling Blast: Star Pact or Fey Pact. Blast deals force damage. On a critical hit, you can push the target a number of squares equal to your intelligence modifier.
Vitriolic Blast: Infernal Pact (Maybe add Dark Pact). Blast deals acid damage. If you score a critical hit, the target is blinded (save ends)
Bewitching Blast: Fey, Dark, or Vestige. Psychic damage. On a critical hit the target is dazed (save ends). Probably a bit much.
EPIC TIER ESSENCES
Binding Blast: Fey pact or star pact. Deal RADIANT damage. If you score a critical hit, the target is STUNNED until the end of your next turn.
Master of Eldritch Energy: Allows you to use two eldritch essence feats. Not really great, unless you multiclassed Sorcerer or something for Essence Mage.
A later patch to my rules would allow eldritch essence feats to be applied to Eldritch Strike
Still not happy with Eldritch Blast? Why not try out the Blast Shape feats. Each one acts as an encounter power that shapes your eldritch blast.
HEROIC
NONE!
PARAGON
Eldritch Cone: Use blast as a Close Blast 4.
EPIC
Eldritch Doom: Use blast as a Close Burst 4 (maybe a wee bit large, but as an epic feat 1/encounter that's still only dealing 2d10+Etc, I figure it's not that big a deal). Only affects enemies.
Still not a fan of Eldritch Blast? Well, of course, this is all totally unofficial stuff, and it's really just a rehash from old 3E stuff, but it's still kind of fun.