Prerequisite: Eldritch Blast cantrip
When you cast eldritch blast, add your Charisma modifier to the damage it deals on a hit.
Agonizing Blast: Put the Hurt On
Review by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold
It's a simple life, but it's honest work. Tis the life of a blaster warlock. The glue that holds Eldritch Blast options together is Agonizing Blast; it takes the effectiveness of your Eldritch Blast and nearly doubles it. It may not be complex, but it is certainly powerful.
Adding your Charisma to your Eldritch Blast damage is enormous. It turns a raw, volatile d10 that ranges from 1-10 damage into a far more consistent 6-15. Upping that minimum and average per shot makes it so Eldritch blast starts killing extremely low CR creatures outright, regardless of result, and seriously maims mid CR creatures with each shot. As your Eldritch Blast scales with level, granting more and more shots, Agonizing Blast is there to get better with it. Going from 1d10 to 2d10 to 1d10+5 to 2d10+10 is literally doubling its damage, and each subsequent boost feels strong.
This isn’t a warlock exclusive opportunity, though. A two level dip into warlock is all you need to get access to Agonizing Blast and Eldritch Blast, alongside a subclass feature, two pact magic slots, and another low level invocation of your choice. This makes it incredibly easy to fit into your builds as other characters like sorcerers or bards, gives you a powerful in combat option that scales with your Charisma modifier and total level, and can open up opportunities to really specialize in the out of combat elements of the game while losing almost nothing in the process.
Paired with action surge and Quicken Spell, you can get into some really munchkin-y shit with this, too. A two level dip for Agonizing Blast as a sorcerer with Quicken Spell means you can convert 2 sorcery points into a bonus action Eldritch Blast however many times you can afford. Add in action surge and you’re firing out six, nine, twelve, or up to FIFTEEN Eldritch Blasts a round, all dealing bonus damage equal to your Charisma modifier. This isn’t the only time these kinds of builds are going to come up when going through the invocations, but it is definitely at its cheapest and easiest with Agonizing Blast. You’re going to deal a lot of damage, and you just need a 13 Dex and a baller Charisma score to get there.
What’s also neat is these builds tend to abuse some in-game sorcery point mechanics with Pact Magic as well, opening up the “coffeelock” builds where you’re able to generate a ton of bonus spell slots by taking a bunch of short rests in place of a long one while abusing warlock’s pact magic feature tied to sorcerer’s font of magic. Really munchkin-y; a blast to play, and requires a lot of DM leniency and build specifications, but it can work in tandem with the Quicken Spell Agonizing Blaster lock should you choose to. You could even forgo extra spell slots and just bank a ton of sorcery points every long rest to get a massive well of bonus action Eldritch Blasts if all you ever want to do is mow down enemies from 120 feet away.
All of these builds and ideas work without Agonizing Blast, but Agonizing Blast nearly doubles their effectiveness while radically improving each shot's consistency. Agonizing Blast isn’t complicated, but it is powerful. It, on its own, puts warlocks on the map as damage dealers at a lot of tables, comparable to ranged multi-attack fighters while only needing to dedicate a cantrip and an invocation to get there. 1d10+mod outdoes nearly every martial ranged weapon option. With some thought put into multiclassing, you can become an Eldritch Blast gatling gun, and double up each shot's effectiveness to pump out heinous amounts of damage each round. If you want a Warlock who is decent in combat, while focusing the rest of your build on utility, social navigation, or any other kinds of play options, Agonizing Blast will give you all you ever need. It won’t be super exciting to use, but it will be powerful.
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