The level 5 Warlock Elf eyes the battlefield. Grasslands merge into the plains, and a small squad of orcs are closing in. Having rolled initiative, the Warlock player rolls high and goes first. He grabs his shortsword and hurries to meet the first orc enemy! The Warlock chooses to attack.
A 7 on the dice. No hit, so the Warlock ends his turn.
The players, including the Dungeon Master, look at the Warlock player befuddled. The round continues. The Barbarian rages and prevents the Warlock from getting surrounded. The fighter joins in and uses an extra attack to dispatch the nearest orc, and the Wizard casts webbing to prevent the orcs from surrounding the team.
As the rounds go, and the Warlock takes similar actions, the DM eventually asks him if he plans to use any of his spell slots. But in this scenario, the Warlock player totally knows better. The elf had already used up his spells in the last battle, and they hadn’t finished a long rest yet!
But the DM reminds the Warlock about his Eldritch Invocations, which is another way to cast spells.
“What’s that?” The player asks.
Everyone else facepalms.
In this article, I aim to teach new and experienced players interested in the Warlock class about the features available to them at level 5. For simplicity, I only focus on the ones available to the Warlock from the Player’s Handbook (PHB). Some features and abilities won’t be listed because they are unavailable until higher levels (such as some Pact Features that become available to Warlocks at level 6). Without further ado, let’s get started!
Table of Contents:
The Warlock at Level 5: Features & Abilities
To start, the Warlock is a relatively complicated class to play compared to the Fighter or the Barbarian. The reason for this is the way Warlock spell slots work and the added ability called Eldritch Invocations. At level 5, the basic Warlock has:
- Three cantrips they can choose from the Warlock spell list.
- Six spells they can learn from the Warlock spell list. (Level 5 warlocks only have access to 1st level through 3rd level spells.)
- Two spell slots at level 3 to use. (Again, level 5 warlocks have access to 1st-3rd level spells only.)
- 3 Eldritch Invocations the Warlock can use. Some invocations Warlocks can choose from have specific requirements related to levels or are pact-specific. Often, these invocations allow Warlocks to use more spells with little or no additional cost or grant particular abilities.
Warlock players can choose from three Otherworldly Patron types to make a pact with, which gives them added features and abilities. These patrons are not usually gods but are extraplanar beings from different realms. Or if they are god-like, they are vastly different from the known gods of the D&D multiverse. The description of these entities can be found in the Player’s Handbook, which I highly recommend getting, but here is a small excerpt:
- The Archfey: Usually a lord or lady of the fey, their motivations are as myriad as their intentions are for you. They can be whimsical, but they do strive for great magical power.
- The Fiend: Fiends are evil entities desiring the corruption or destruction of everything. – Potentially including you.
- The Great Old One: This patron is mysterious and utterly foreign to your world. It could be from the Far Realms or an elder god known only through myth.
The Three Otherworldly Patrons:
Here, I describe the features and abilities the Warlock gains from choosing one of the three available patrons available in the PHB. The Archfey, the Fiend, and the Great Old One. Each patron has several features available to the Warlock. However, at level 5, they only have access to one feature from each patron. The next feature does not appear until level 6, so I won’t be detailing those just yet (perhaps in another article).
The Archfey:
No matter who your Archfey patron is, they will have granted your Warlock a boon of spells and one feature. This feature will have been available to you since level 1.
Expanded Spell List
You know 6 of these specific Warlock spells at level 5:
- 1st Level: Faerie Fire, Sleep
- 2nd Level: Calm Emotions, Phantasmal Force
- 3rd Level: Blink, Plant Growth
Whenever your Warlock levels up, you can choose to replace one spell, which must match your spell slot level. Level 5 Warlocks have access to 3rd-level spell slots.
Spells that take attack actions can have the Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma modifier added to them.
Spells requiring saving throws follow this Save DC calculation: 8 + Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma Modifier.
You must have an arcane focus to cast these spells.
Fey Presence
This feature gives your Warlock the ability to charm or frighten other creatures!
- The choice to charm or frighten creatures is up to the player.
- The aura of Fey Presence is a 10 ft. square originating from the player. The effect lasts until the end of your next turn.
- Any creature within the aura must make a Spell Save DC: 8 + Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma modifier.
- Fey Presence recharges after taking a short or long rest.
Cosmetic Reminder:
The PHB encourages players to factor in fey-flavored cosmetic changes to their chosen weapons and patron abilities. For example, Warlocks with the Pact of the Tome may have a leafed book wrapped in shadowy pages. Warlocks with Pact of the Blade may have vines adorning their pact weapon. Food for thought!
The Fiend:
No matter who your Fiend patron is, they will have granted your Warlock a boon of spells and one feature. This feature will have been available to you since level 1.
Expanded Spell List
You know 6 of these specific Warlock spells at level 5:
- 1st Level: Burning Hands, Command
- 2nd Level: Blindness / Deafness, Scorching Ray
- 3rd Level: Fireball, Stinking Cloud
Whenever your Warlock levels up, you can choose to replace one spell, which must match your spell slot level. Level 5 Warlocks have access to 3rd-level spell slots.
Spells that take attack actions can have the Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma modifier added to them.
Spells requiring saving throws follow this Save DC calculation: 8 + Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma Modifier.
You must have an arcane focus to cast these spells.
Dark One’s Blessing:
You gain temporary hit points when you reduce a hostile creature to 0 HP!
The calculation for the temporary hit points: Charisma Modifier + Warlock Level (5).
Note about Temporary Hitpoints: Temporary hit points disappear after a long rest, and you cannot add temporary hit points cumulatively. To clarify: If your Warlock has 4 temporary hit points, and they recently gained 8 temporary hit points, the player can choose which number to keep, but they cannot add them to a total of 12 temp hit points. They can only choose 4, or 8. The temp hit points they don’t select get removed.
The Great Old One:
No matter who your Great Old One patron is, they will have granted your Warlock a boon of spells and one feature. This feature will have been available to you since level 1.
Expanded Spell List
You know 6 of these specific Warlock spells at level 5:
- 1st Level: Dissonant Whispers, Tasha’s Hideous Laughter
- 2nd Level: Detect Thoughts, Phantasmal Force
- 3rd Level: Clairvoyance, Sending
Whenever your Warlock levels up, you can choose to replace one spell, which must match your spell slot level. Level 5 Warlocks have access to 3rd-level spell slots.
Spells that take attack actions can have the Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma modifier added to them.
Spells requiring saving throws follow this Save DC calculation: 8 + Warlock Proficiency (3) + Charisma Modifier.
You must have an arcane focus to cast these spells.
Awakened Mind:
You can communicate telepathically with any creature you see within 30 feet of you!
Note: The creature you communicate with must understand at least one language.
About Warlock Pacts:
Warlock Pacts are the specific gifts granted to your Warlock by their patron. In the PHB, there are 3 Pacts for Warlocks to choose from, which give particular features:
- Pact of the Tome
- Pact of the Blade
- Pact of the Chain
Pact of the Tome
You gain the Book of Shadows Feature! This feature allows you to choose 3 cantrips from any class spell list and add them to the Book of Shadows grimoire that you receive from your patron.
- With the book, your Warlock can cast those cantrips at will!
- These additional cantrips do not count against the number of cantrips your Warlock already knows.
- If the Book of Shadows is lost, your Warlock can perform a 1-hour ceremony to receive a replacement from their patron (Which includes short/long rests). The previous book is destroyed.
- The Book of Shadows turns to ash when your Warlock dies.
Pact of the Blade
You can now use an action to create a specific pact weapon in your Warlock’s hand! This weapon takes any form of the Warlock’s choice, and they are proficient with it. This weapon’s damage is magical too!
- The weapon will disappear if it is over 5 feet away from your Warlock for over a minute. This weapon also disappears if it is summoned again, if the weapon is dismissed (no action needed), or if the Warlock dies.
- A magical weapon can convert to a Warlock’s pact weapon by performing a 1-hour ritual. The PHB says it can be done during a short rest. When the new weapon gets dismissed, it goes to an extra-dimensional space until it gets summoned again. The new weapon ceases being the Warlock’s pact weapon if they die, if they perform the ritual on another weapon, or if they perform a similar ceremony to break their bond to it (Where the weapon will appear at the Warlock’s feet if it’s still in the other dimension).
- Artifact and sentient weapons cannot turn into pact weapons (Personally, I’d allow it as a DM. That sounds cool).
Pact of the Chain
You now know the find familiar spell and can cast it as a ritual! Find familiar will not count against the number of spells you already know. Learning about find familiar is essential to understanding Pact of the Chain better, so here it is in detail:
Find Familiar – You gain the service of a spirit animal! They can be any form you choose below:
- Bat
- Cat
- Crab
- Frog (Toad)
- Hawk
- Lizard
- Octopus
- Owl
- Poisonous Snake
- Fish
- Rat
- Raven
- Sea Horse
- Spider
- Weasel
This familiar appears in an unoccupied space in range of the Warlock and has the monster statistics of the chosen form. It will always type as a celestial, fey, or fiend instead of a beast. — Determined by the Warlock.
- The familiar is independent, but it will always obey the Warlock’s commands. It has its own initiative in combat and acts on its own. A familiar cannot attack but can take other actions as usual.
- If the familiar drops to 0 HP, it disappears and leaves anything it wore or carried behind. It will reappear when casting the find familiar spell again. A warlock can temporarily dismiss the familiar to a pocket dimension (Pokemon style) or even banish it forever. If it is temporarily dismissed, you can take an action to make it reappear anywhere within 30 feet of the Warlock as long as it’s still an unoccupied space.
- While your familiar is 100 feet from you, you can talk to it telepathically! Also, as an action, you can see and hear what your familiar can and gain any additional senses the familiar has. However, you are deaf and blind to your own.
- Only one summoned familiar can occur at a time. If the Warlock does cast find familiar, the current familiar transforms into another chosen creature of the Warlock’s choosing (from the list above).
- Your Warlock can use touch-based spells with their familiar! If the familiar is within 100 feet and it uses a reaction to deliver the spell, they can cast it instead of the Warlock. If this spell requires an attack roll, the Warlock’s attack modifier is used for that roll.
With that out of the way…
Pact of the Chain entails the following:
Instead of the available list of forms from above, your Warlock is entitled to these additional familiar forms:
- Imp
- Pseudodragon
- Quasit
- Sprite
The Warlock’s familiar also adopts the stats of the chosen form.
- Additionally, if the Warlock chooses to forgo attacking on their turn, the familiar can attack instead! When the familiar attacks, it does so with a reaction.
- Your familiar is much more cunning than other familiars and takes on the attributes tied to your patron. If it must default to a particular form, your familiar will always default to your patron’s type (Fiend equals imp, Archfey equals sprite, etc.).
About Eldritch Invocations
A 5th-level Warlock should have 3 Eldritch Invocations they can cast. –Which means your Warlock can do special magic that other magic-wielding classes cannot! Remember that this list pertains only to PHB invocations that a Warlock can do at level 5. There are other invocations from other modules and at higher levels. Here are the basic rules for Eldritch Invocations:
- When you gain a level in the Warlock class, you can pick an invocation you learned and replace it with another invocation.
- A level requisite in the detailed description of invocations refers to Warlock levels, not character levels. For people who love multi-classing, beware of this fact!
- If an invocation has prerequisites, you must reach that threshold to learn it. Invocations can be understood at the same time that you reach that requisite. (Personal note: it reminds me of the videogame Valheim, where your Viking character somehow “knows” what a new item does when you pick it up from the ground… If you don’t have that game, I highly recommend it!)
Here are all the PHB Eldritch Invocations available to the level 5 Warlock. I grouped them up by requisites (or lack thereof) so aspiring Warlocks can choose their invocations easily:
Eldritch Blast & Eldritch Invocations that enhance it:
Before we can dive into the eldritch invocations for Eldritch Blast, it’s important to note what the cantrip can do at the base level for Level 5 Warlocks because it’s pretty important:
- As an action, you can create up to 2 beams of energy at a range of 120 ft to attack a creature.
- If this spell hits, the creature takes 1d10 force damage.
- Each beam attack from eldritch blast requires its own attack roll (3 + CHA).
- You can choose to attack different enemies with different beams!
This base cantrip is powerful! The fact that you can do two attacks instead of one makes the Warlock on par with the Barbarian in terms of attacking power. It’s fascinating, considering you can attack at range. The fact that you can augment eldritch blast to do additional things makes this a must-have for Warlocks looking to deal damage or control the battle, which we will get into below.
The following invocations require the eldritch blast cantrip, which your Warlock must learn to use:
Agonizing Blast – When casting eldritch blast, you can add your Charisma modifier to your damage when it hits!
Eldritch Spear – When casting eldritch blast, you can extend its range to 300 feet!
Repelling Blast – When you hit a creature with eldritch blast, you can choose to push it 10 feet away!
Pact Invocations:
These invocations have requisites involving the PHB available pacts, such as:
- Pact of the Tome
- Pact of the Blade
- Pact of the Chain
Pact of the Tome:
- Book of Ancient Secrets – This invocation grants many boons. You can add two 1st-level spell rituals from any class spell list to your Book of Shadows!
- These ritual spells do not count against the spells your Warlock knows.
- As long as the book is in your hand, you can cast those spells only as rituals unless your Warlock learned them another way.
- This allows you to cast a Warlock spell that you already know as a ritual (as long as that spell has a ritual tag).
- You are free to add additional ritual spells to the Book of Shadows. When added, the spell level must be equal to or less than half your Warlock’s level rounded up (so a level 5 Warlock can inscribe a level 2 ritual spell, but not a level 3 spell). The time and cost it takes to transcribe the spell is 2 hours and 50 gold pieces for rare inks to write them down.
Pact of the Blade:
- Thirsting Blade – You can now attack with your pact weapon twice when taking the attack action on your turn!
Pact of the Chain:
- Voice of the Chain Master – You can now communicate with your familiar telepathically!
- You can also perceive through your familiar’s senses as long as they are on the same plane.
- You are also able to speak through your familiar in your own voice, even if that familiar isn’t capable of speaking.
Eldritch Invocations With No Requisites:
These Eldritch Invocations for level 5 Warlocks are accessible without any requisites (Some may require Warlocks to be level 5, but no higher). Some of these eldritch invocations allow you to cast spells for free, while others will enable you to expend a Warlock spell slot to cast spells instead. Some of these are very useful:
Armor of Shadows – You can cast the mage armor spell at will without using a spell slot or materials!
Beast Speech – You can cast the speak with animals spell at will without using a spell slot!
Beguiling Influence – You are now proficient with Deception and Persuasion!
Devil’s Sight – You can see in darkness, magical or otherwise, up to 120 feet!
Eldritch Sight – You can cast the detect magic spell at will without using a spell slot!
Eyes of the Rune Keeper – You can read any form of writing!
Fiendish Vigor – You can cast a level 1 false life spell on yourself without using a spell slot or materials!
Gaze of Two Minds – As an action, you can touch a willing humanoid and perceive its senses until the end of your next turn!
- You can extend the effect’s duration for subsequent turns as long as the humanoid is on the same plane of existence as you.
- You gain any special senses the humanoid may have.
- You are blinded and deafened to your own senses.
Mask of Many Faces – You can cast the disguise self spell at will without using a spell slot!
Mire the Mind – You can cast the slow spell with a Warlock spell slot!
- You can only do this again after you finish a long rest.
Misty Visions – You can cast the silent image spell at will without using a spell slot or materials!
One with Shadows – Whenever you are in dim light or the dark, you can use an action to become invisible!
- You become visible again when you move, take an action, or take a reaction.
Sign of Ill Omen – You can use a Warlock spell slot to cast the bestow curse spell!
- You can only do this again after you finish a long rest.
Thief of Five Fates – You can use a Warlock spell slot to cast the bane spell!
- You can only do this again after you finish a long rest.
After reading and writing through the invocations, my favorite is the One With Shadows invocation.
Remember that a level 5 Warlock can only choose up to 3 Eldritch Invocations at this time. So make sure to choose them wisely! You can only change one invocation once you level up again.
Ability Score Improvement
The ability score improvement to your Warlock’s character sheet will have been achieved by level 4. So your Warlock should have been able to increase their ability score by 2, or instead choose to increase two ability scores by 1. You cannot increase an ability score above 20, or the dragon in the article may try to convince your patron to consume your soul.
Now You Know All About the Warlock at Level 5!
I hope I made it easier for players to understand what the Warlock can be capable of in Dungeons and Dragons 5e. There is so much more content to dive into involving the Warlock. I mean, I haven’t even gotten into the features, pacts, and invocations from other modules! –And already it’s a lot of info!
I can say that the Warlock is one of the most versatile classes in D&D. Choosing to multi-class a warlock with another class, such as Rogue, can turn your character into an excellent assassin. I’m still drooling over the power to remain invisible at will, thanks to the One With Shadows eldritch invocation ability. The next time I get to play D&D as a player character (hah!), I’ll try out that build.
I cannot understate the potential of this class enough. If you want to be all about combat, you can go all in on Pact of the Blade and supplement it with the Eldritch Blast cantrip and invocation abilities.
Or, if you want to go more into RP and to socialize, your Warlock can easily use Beast Speech, Beguiling Influence, and Eyes of the Runekeeper invocations to persuade NPCs and perceive things in-game that other players would have a hard time with. Tie this with Pact of the Chain, where you can manipulate your familiar to places that your Warlock cannot reach, and you can break out and escape any area that may confine you!
Very fun.
Is there anything else I should mention about the Warlock at level 5? Do you have any suggestions, or did I make a mistake anywhere? Please let me know! Thank you so much for reading.