Prerequisite: 9th level
You can cast Levitate on yourself at will, without expending a spell slot or material components.
Ascendant Step: I Believe I can Fly
Review by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold
An eerie calm washes over the room as the light seems to flicker out from the windows. Behind the altar, the red-robed figure turns, tossing their hood back to reveal twisted black goat horns, blood dripping from their inky black eyes. They raise their dagger in both hands, muttering incomprehensible gibberish, beginning to float upward as the pentagram on the stone tablet flashes red and black lights, crackling with ethereal flames. The ritual begins.
Warlocks have a rich history in D&D as wizard-like cultist kinds. Ascendant Step, to me, is one of the most iconic looks a warlock can get. It's the Exorcism floating body horror scene, or it's the quiet contemplative fey monk chilling with their elder fey patron in a glade. Levitation is a huge part of the fantasy of these character archetypes. Unfortunately, Ascendant Step comes just a bit too late for me to really love it.
Levitate is like Fly, but worse, when you can only cast it on yourself. If you’re in a group otherwise lacking a fly speed, going from no fly speed to any amount of flight is enormous. Getting it at will, too, opens up a lot of doors, and can allow for some resources to be held back while you explore the world in more dimensions. Navigating around with it also feels great; you push off of things as you gently float about, raising and lowering yourself as you need to to interact with a giant magical library or gently float down into the trap laden tomb below the sands. It feels great.
Time hasn’t been kind to Ascendant Step. Races like Owlkin and Aaracockra come with fly speeds, making it so you don’t need to wait until 5th (or in Ascendant Step’s case, 9th) level to explore the world this way. There are cheaper, easier ways to get access to a floating effect, and while not exactly the same, will do enough of what this does that you won’t really need Ascendant Step at those tables.
On top of that, Ascendant Step doesn’t remove the concentration component. This means it breaks longer duration concentration effects, heavily mitigating its usefulness. If you’re DMing for somebody with Ascendant Step, who really wants it as part of their character's fantasy, I highly recommend waving the concentration here. It’s an at will ability that will mostly get value in character presentation and out of combat exploration; it doesn't need this restriction. If you’re dedicated to conjuration magic or Hex, it can feel impossible to actually cast this without it hurting the rest of what you’re trying to do. It's seriously gated this way.
Still, despite all its glaring flaws, and how new races and features have made the 9th level prerequisite completely unmerited, I love Ascendant Step. It's such an iconic way to live so many warlock fantasies. If you want to float about like an astronaut, and don’t care all that much about long concentration effects, Ascendant Step can be for you.
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