Ranking EVERY CLASS ARCHETYPE in 5e (Warlock Edition) 

Finally someone recognizing Celestial Warlock's power! Every time I've played one, in low and high levels, very impressed.

Hmm hexblade warlock getting/stealing/winning his glaive from a horned devil, so many avenues you could take for the character development, not to mention glaives being damn strong

Warlock is my favorite 5E class just for how different two different characters can be. I am currently playing a Celestial and it is far more useful than most people in the group thought it would be. Also my gf played a Archfey and had lots fun playing her.

If you make a Gish Celestial warlock you are good literally at everything: supporting long range spell casting supporting keeping your party alive btw there this new spell that conjures ghosts unto you blade 3th level at does 2d8 or 1d8 damage per attack I think but here its the huge thing: you can choose Radiant damage to add you charisma bonus

Timestamp in the description please. It helps for coming back and review. Optimizers are real and if you make it easier they’ll come back to re-watch.

Personally, I would place Archfey below Fiend. Charm and fear are good utilities but in play do not surpass raw damage. Archfey spell list is decent but doesn't contend with the Fiends raw damage output capabilities from their spells. Features: (14) Hurl through hell > Dark Delirium. 10d10 psychic damage v Charm or fear for 1 min that breaks on damage. Easy choice. (10) A resistance to any damage type is pretty good. Immunity to charm is also pretty good. I might call this a draw but turning a charm back on the caster is fun. Favors Archfey. (6) Getting a 1d10 added to a key save or ability check can save your life. So can invisibility / teleport after taking damage. This is a tough choice. I think this favors Fiend because you can prevent something serious from happening in the first place while Misty Escape is for after the fact. (1st) Continuous source of temp HP v a 1 turn charm or frighten in a 10ft cube. I lean toward temp HP rather than the action to charm or frighten tho both are good. EDIT: Also, remember that the higher level you go, the more creatures/enemies become immune to fear and charm. Reese, when you look strictly at the subclass features, then there's an argument that Celestial is stronger than Hexblade. (EDIT: That's not my opinion tho. Hexbalde gets so much at 1st level that it blows the others out of the water till level 14. In fact, it's so much at level 1 that it's border line poor subclass design cause now it's just a crazy 1-3 level multiclass dip). This type of examination works for most other classes. It doesn't work as well for Warlocks. The reason is due to the choices of pact boon and invocations and how those interact with a given Patron to provide differing levels of support. Considering that a Hexblade is most likely going to take Pact of the Blade (if you don't, you're doing Hexblade wrong), you should factor this in. Pact of the Blade provides tremendous invocation support to a Hexblade synergizing with Hex Warrior. These combo's are so good that I think Hexblade would surpass the Celestial in power. Celestial doesn't get anything specific from any of the pact boons that other Warlock subclasses do not get. There's no real synergy there tho there is utility (EDIT: arguable for Gift of the Everliving ones in a Celestial pact healer build). I think this pushes Hexblade into the #1 spot.

Great new video Rhys! Have been looking forward to the Warlock list for a while now and I agree with your list overall. Congrats on nearly getting 2K!

Almost 2k subs! Keep up the good work :)

I'm glad I subscribed to your channel. Your delivery is very good. You're articulate, your pacing is good, and you inject enough humor in to keep things fresh without trying to actually do D&D standup. Plus, you're spot on with your information as far as I can tell (some creators get their facts wrong). Well done! Now...can I talk you into going over the Artificer Class and the various sub-classes, please? Tasha's Cauldron introduced a new one that is crazy good on paper and I'll be playing either that or a Battle Smith in a new campaign in January.

I like Undying because it's basically a funny "haha" towards anyone that tries to kill you. Plus it brings to mind the Black Knight from Monty Python for some reason.

I wouldn’t mind watching some build videos. Could be fun to see you make a party.

I like the Fiend but there is one new from TCOE: the Genie. Guess someone still loves to rewatch classic Disney movies.

Love the video. I might disagree on the placement of the Hexblade mainly because I think the abilities of that patron are greatly enhanced by pact of the blade and the eldritch invocations that pact gets (lifedrinker, ultimate pact weapon, etc) as well as having booming blade to make the class more than a 1 trick pony with eldritch blast. However, I also acknowledge that I am biased due to my love for a caster that can smack someone with a sword with greater effect than a kitten running into godzilla’s leg.

I am playing a level 10 Celestial warlock right now in a campaign and I love it! Healing light being a bonus action is definitely super strong, I usually just throw 1d6 down to an unconscious teammate, If it's near the end of the day and it's been a long battle I will throw 5d6 to someone badly wounded but not yet unconscious. Also, summon demon is the most fun you can possibly have. It's such a gamble put can really pay off big when it works, and it always brings a laugh.

Rizz is that Hokusai famous painting in the background? Undying is most likely getting Erata to be the Undead Warlock. Hurl through hell is how we took down 2 Demon Lord with ease. My reason to picking Celestial Warlock over Arch Fey is Cure Wound and Healing Light. Blood hunter is missing from Ranking and let's not forget their are coming more with Tasha here in November

Love the vid. Hexblade is my favorite subclass. Here is my build that I've been working on. It's not AL legal. here's the build (it's a long one): You need to start with the half elf race, both for the 2 charisma and something you will take later, if your dm allows them, take the drow half elf for the 3rd charisma. My dm has us roll and i got lucky enough to get a 16 which i used for my charisma. I also got a 15 which i put in con. Everything else is borderline irrelevant for minmaxing purposes. You are limited on spell slots, so no point wasting it on big stuff. Same thing with cantrips known. Take eldritch blast and booming blade. Booming blade will be your bread and butter at later levels. Eldritch blast is something I never planned on using but when I explained the build to my DM to ask how he would rule a couple scenarios, he told me that he will be making encounters and have a bunch of flying enemies specifically to counter me. For your spells I would pick shield from your hexblade extra list and hex. Hex is going to be your damage for now and your concentration spell. For your invocations at level 2 get devils sight and eldritch sight. Devils sight might seem like a waste because of your dark sight from being an elf. But the magical darkness is what is going to make this build come together. At level 3 take pact of the blade and swap out eldritch sight for improved pact weapon. You will be picking it up Eldritch sight later, but having your weapon be your focus is beyond needed, because at this point, you will be able to use your pact of the weapon to take a glaive. Also at this level, drop hex and pick up darkness. This is going to be your new concentration spell. I gave a hint earlier as to why this will end up being good later. With darkness you will constantly have advantage on your attacks. At level 4, you can take a stat increase or feat. Take the feat. Either take PAM or GWM. Take GWM if you feel like you you are ready to hit like a truck especially with what you will be getting at your next level. Get PAM if you feel like you should be using your action economy better. So for a little bit of strategy so far on what to do until the build fully comes online, up til this point, you should be using booming blade for your basic attacks just for the extra damage since it doesn't use your spell slots. You only have 1 attack at this point, but once you get the 2nd one next level (5) you will not be able to use booming blade because it doesn't count as the attack action but rather the spell action. so if you take GWM at this point, you will be able to apply the both parts to your booming blade attacks because they dont require the attack action. If you take PAM however, you can't use booming blade for your attacks because it requires the attack action with your polearm, and you are going to want to use your charisma modifier on your basic attacks as much as possible. Plus you are going to be getting rid of booming blade next level, so don't take this as me saying not to take polearm master here because it is just as good. At level 5, you are going to be picking up thirsting blade invocation for double attack. This will add to your action economy and with darkness, you will have advantage all the time as well as giving disadvantage on attacks. You will be a dark ball of death. Also for your 3rd cantrip, feel free to get mage hand or pres or whatever your favorite utility spell is. Since you are no longer using booming blade, it is recommended to drop it.... for now. Eldritch blast is still just there for the flying monsters. Toll of the dead also works if you have another ranged damage dealer to hit the flyer first. (i actually prefer Toll). At level 6, nothing of major importance happens different from any other build. At level 7, you get another invocation. The options are either relentless hex or eldritch smite. I personally would take eldritch smite because of your spell slot level is now 4 giving you 5 damage dice on the spell and you already have a lot of ways to use your bonus action. You will be getting the other when the next slot opens up at 9 though. The eldritch smite can be a noob trap so be wary of it. You are going to want to save it for specific things. With only 2 slots and 1 already going to darkness, you need to make that eldritch smite count. This build is a crit-fishing build. So being able to drop double the dice (depending on how your dm runs crit) is what you want. At level 4, on a crit that is 10d8 from that 1 spell. I would say not much is going to be worth your spell slot other than that. This build will only be getting better from here. At level 8, grab whichever feat you didnt grab between PAM and GWM you didnt grab at 4. So now with potentially 3 attacks per round AND another way to use your opportunity attack and apply GWM, your damage output is immense. Add in the fact that you have advantage to all attacks and your crit on 19, your hex curse target doesnt stand a chance. At level 9, grab relentless. This will make sure that your cursed target cant ever escape and will really make you a monster at level 14, but it is still really good for right now. At level 10, you will be getting your armor of hexes. As if hitting you wasnt hard enough with constant disadvantage, having a 50% chance to make the hex target miss is now available. Level 11 is another level. At level 12 is where you start ramping up for real. You now get the lifedrinker invocation. That's your modifier being added again bit this time as necrotic damage. Now for 3 hits a turn. And for your feat is the thing i was hinting at this whole time. Elven accuracy. Put your point into charisma to top off at 20. And now your attacks are rolled with double advantage. You are now a crit monster. Which is perfect because you now just added a 3rd spell slot for a 2nd eldritch smite. And as a level 5 spell, on crit that is 12d8. So with proficiency being 5 as well as GWM and double your charisma mod for 3 attacks, that is 75 damage before any dice is rolled for damage. If you hit your opportunity attack, that is 100. At level 13, nothing major to report. At level 14, your hex curse can now be passed around. You are a crit machine. Everyone else in your party that isnt minmaxxed is no longer having fun in combat. At level 15, pact of the blade is the only one without an invocation that isnt in UA. Pick up what you want at this point. Eldritch sight is always good. Maybe if your dm is putting a lot of flying monsters to counter you, buffing your eldritch blast could work. At level 16, you pick up the war caster feat as well as get booming blade put back into your cantrips. Gfb can be there if you like but it's more situational. War caster plus booming blade is both the whole purpose for going war caster as well as the reason you didnt bother with sentinel. Either forcing them to stay in your range or take an immense amount of damage. Having war caster for the advantage on saving throws is good for sure. And not needing to use your hands for spells is good, but your weapon is already your focus so its whatever. You mostly want it for the ability to use booming blade for your opportunity attacks. This plus how you can add GWM to the attack because of the wording means you are a nightmare to deal with. If you get within 10 feet of anything, it might as well give up and die. The only downside to not taking sentinel is that it can disengage from you and go towards your team which it could have prevented. But it just wasted its action, so hopefully your team can deal with an actionless whatever. Also you wouldnt have been wanting to retaliate your ally getting attacked anyway because that would have meant they are in your darkness cloud and would be getting more debuffs than help. At level 17, you now have your 4th spell slot. You are basically a 1 shot machine. I would not recommend using all your eldritch smites on a creature if you crit 3 times. Unless it's super monster or something. Also, your booming blade will be maxxed. With your reaction doing more damage than a regular attack of yours especially if they move. At level 18, nothing of note. At level 19, for your last asi, you still don't take an asi. Take the resilience feat and put it in constitution. It may be a little later than you usually take it, but you should have been borderline unhittable up til this point. Now you will have your proficiency modifier to your advantaged concentration checks. At level 20, for 99% of builds this utterly worthless. But you just got 4 eldritch smite opportunities back. Or at minimum, you're good to go for another full fight. The damage numbers for this build are absurd. I had said earlier that the other ability scores are irrelavent, but with the best armor being medium, maybe dexterity shouldn't be a dump stat. This build will make you a monster and will make anything short of a terrasque a piece cake. This build is something that I created because my dm likes to kill characters and I am attached to my current character so I used this build to threaten him not to kill of my dude. I should also say that this a campaign that I am guaranteed to get to level 20 and it might not be as good if it isnt something like that. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

Controversial as always. Looking forward to your future videos

I mean, Tasha's Cauldron of Everything is going to have an absurd number of subclasses in it when it comes out next month, so you could probably get anywhere from 1-4 more archetype videos out of that.

Good luck on getting to 2k!

Could you put the time of each subclass next time?

If you're ONLY looking at warlock as a pure class, sure I'd say Celestial is better than Hexblade. BUT if you consider how GOOD hex warrior is for multiclassing with paladins or ANY other charisma class... I think Hexblade sees a LOT more play.

So what would a level 10 Celestial Warlock look like in combat? Their versatility doesn't really exist outside of two beams and a heal, right? Seems sorta lame.

Can you do a Tasha’s update?😁🙏🏻

Cantrips aren't going to be breaking the game any time soon... Cries in Illusionist's Bracers on our level 9 warlock in Curse of Strahd.

I know it's Unearthed Arcana, but you seemed really positive about the Undead patron in your video on the subject. How would you stack it up against the archetypes you listed in this video?

I prefer DPS over Support Characters. Hexblade= Best DPS warlock Celestial= Best Supportive warlock Hexblade is only talked about its exclusive Features in this video and NOT their synergy. Which is fine. But of course, if he talked about synergy this video would be a lot longer. Tip for new hexblades~ lvl 3 you get a boon Choose pact of the blade. All pact weapons now get HexWarrior's ability. Even if it's two-handed.

I hate the click baity titles. “It’s so broken” people say when there’s an actual well designed class that’s fun to play. A good class should survive bad rolls.

Kind of disagree with the ranking of celestial over hexblade. In order to bring out the full potentiality of the celestial, you generally have to multi-class it with the Divine Soul Sorcerer in order to bring out the maximum healing capacity of the Celestial Warlock. The celestial warlock, by design, is intended to be more of a heal-bot and defensive rear-line caster, than it is it actual offensive, or melee, caster. Additionally, on its own, the Celestial Warlock pales in comparison to an actual Life Domain Cleric or a Divine Soul Sorcerer individually, in terms of its overall max healing capacity, which is why you generally want to multi-class into Divine Soul Sorcerer, in order to boost your max healing output. In comparison, the Hexblade is a damage output monster at higher levels, even though it's 14th level Capstone is a bit underwhelming. But the fact that this class's Capstone ability is underwhelming is also a reason why people tend to level-dip into hexblade. For example, when level dipping via the Paladin, the spell slots that you gain from the Paladin class allow you to convert your slots from Paladin into Eldritch Smite fuel, and Warlock spell slots into Paladin Smite fuel (which in turn can be recharged off of a short rest due to being a warlock). Even on its own, the hexblade's offensive versatility (between EB and Melee) and damage output at later levels (1d10 x 4 for EB @ 17th lvl. + anything else you tack onto it, and that's before you factor in Invocations tailored to the Hexblade) outweighs the Celestial's ability stay in the fight. After all, there's no real need to heal during the fight if the enemy's dead before it can hit you. The best defense is a good offense, and if the enemy can't stand, can't breathe, or is blinded somehow, it's not going to last long.

Nice vid! A series on some multiclass builds could be a lot of fun. Cheers

Your seriously over-rating Celestial, which is one of the weakest warlock subclasses. It literally only has one good ability, which is just glorified healing word. the 10th level ability that you were saying as being amazing, is effectively just the Inspiring Leader feat.

I mean... the celestial warlock gets what pretty much amounts to the level 1 cleric spell, healing word. It’s a nice ability but you act like it’s world conquering.

Rank top multiclass combos? 😇

what is up reesee!

Multiclassing?

Hexblade is powerful but have few things that get me cringe like Why no base extra attack ? why does all feature evolve around killing a creature. encourages

Cmon dude....

Over valuing healing is proof of not doing math. Celestial's 2 "most valuable" features are crap. Healing is less valuable than just about anything else, and the Inspiring Leader feat is superior to their thp feature, and any CHA subclass can get it. Not sure if you were just trying to be edgy by not ranking the Hexblade top, but it doesn't work. Control > damage > buffs > defense > running away > healing.

Oh, great! Another 5e channel focusing on button mashing. Pass!