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Welcome to the survivalist’s guide to the best feats for Warlocks in D&D 5e. In this article, you’ll find hidden secrets for selecting sultry feats to empower your Warlock. Feats are powerful customizations when coupled wisely with class abilities. Some feats are better than others, so I’ll direct you to Warlock feats that are worth your character’s time to learn.
Feats are spread out through several books, making it difficult to settle on 5e’s best Warlock feats. I’m guiding your Warlock to the best feats and weeding out the worst. My feat recommendations come from officially published sources, such as the PHB, TCoE, XGtE, etc.
How to Select Warlock Feats
Warlocks thrive on a high Charisma stat, followed by mild investments in Constitution and Dexterity (sometimes Strength instead of Dex). Alternatively, the Hexblade subclass can focus on Charisma more than other subclasses with the Pact of the Blade due to its ability to use Charisma for weapon-attack modifiers. Any other subclass taking the Pact of the Blade will need heavy investment in Strength or Dexterity, so they make character choices that don’t require Charisma. For these reasons, feats that boost stats are important to a Warlock.
It’s common for Warlocks to multiclass or function as one-to-three-level dips for other classes. My recommendations focus on the Warlock class, not the many multiclass combinations available, though the Hexblade feels like it deserves special consideration due to its crazy multiclass value at level one. I’d welcome suggestions for overlooked feats that become worthwhile with a particular multiclass concept.
Top Warlock Feats of D&D 5e
Unlike previous feat guides I’ve provided for character classes, I found it difficult and unhelpful to narrow down the Warlock feat list to a top ten. The Warlock is too customizable for a one-size-fits-all list. Instead, I created several lists based on the types of specialties a player may want for their Warlock. Some feats become more effective when coupled with others, so watch for synergies.
While my recommendations will help you identify feats that suit a typical Warlock, don’t shy away from feats that make your Warlock unique. As long as you know what you’re getting into, you can have fun with many feat options.
With the premise out of the way, here are my top ten feats for Warlocks in D&D 5e!
Warlock Spellcasting Feats
This categorization of feat recommendations is what I’d consider the most generalized recommendations for Warlock feats. These feats synergize with basic Warlock features or fit into specific niches that a Warlock may pursue.
Actor
The Mask of Many Faces Invocation allows a Warlock to cast the Disguise Self spell without limitation. Yes, they can cast Disguise Self as much as they please. An illusory disguise will only get a Warlock so far before skill checks pop up to maintain the deception. Actor couples well with Mask of Many Faces because it boosts Charisma while granting the Warlock several mechanical advantages for mimicking others.
Drow High Magic (Drow only)
While lacking a stat boost, this feat provides incredible value to the Warlock class. You know few spells and keep scarce spell slots. You get three incredible spells from this feat: Detect Magic, Levitate, and Dispel Magic. Additionally, Detect Magic gained from this feat can be cast at will without expending a spell slot. Any Drow Warlock seeking greater spellcasting potential will love this feat.
Lucky
This is always a good feat! Lucky can help you with saving throws, attacks, defenses, and skill checks (including Initiative). If you would fail a Con save to maintain concentration, Lucky can help you reroll.
Moderately Armored
Warlocks, excluding Hexblades, have no armor proficiency above light armor. Moderately Armored upgrades a Warlock’s armor proficiencies to include shields and medium armor. This can aid a Warlock in its durability by sporting a higher Armor Class without needing to invest stats heavily in Dexterity. You can limit your Dex to twelve or fourteen to get a +1 or +2 to AC, and that’s all you need. Of all the armor upgrading feats, this one is the best value.
Resilient (Con)
You don’t get many spell slots as a Warlock. Some of your most powerful spells require concentration, but Warlocks aren’t proficient with Constitution saving throws. Resilient can change that, boosting your Constitution for a potential hitpoint boost. Concentration is easier to maintain when you add your proficiency bonus to Constitution saving throws. It’s not the most exciting feat but it provides solid mechanical benefits.
Telekinetic
This has become my default feat for spellcasters that can feasibly spare bonus actions. First of all, you get an invisible, extended-range Mage Hand. Second, you can boost your Charisma by one. And third, you get an extremely useful bonus action to manipulate enemy and friendly positioning around the battlefield.
No matter what kind of spellcaster or warrior you are, Telekinetic is handy. You can mentally shove an enemy away from an ally who needs to move away, or you can shove a foe into a hazardous area to reduce their visibility and harm them.
War Caster
As I mentioned with the Resilient feat, concentration is worth fortifying. War Caster lets you roll Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration with advantage if the saving throw is prompted by damage.
Casting spells as opportunity attacks can be fun, too. Eldritch Blast would be cast with disadvantage if an enemy is moving away unless you’re wielding a polearm (see my melee-weapon Warlock suggestions). Reach weapons trigger their opportunity attacks at the end of their reach (usually ten feet from you), so you could cast Eldritch Blast without the usual close-quarters disadvantage on ranged attacks.
Melee-weapon-wielding Warlocks also benefit from War Caster by casting Booming Blade as an opportunity attack.
It’s convenient to cast Eldritch Blast while you’re holding weapons or a shield. War Caster allows you to seamlessly blend your weapon and spell attacks.
Shadow Touched
This is a solid feat for boosting your Charisma and expanding your spell options. You gain Invisibility and one other spell of first level from the schools of illusion or necromancy. I recommend choosing Silent Image or Cause Fear.
You can learn more about fear effects and using the Frightened condition effectively in my article on the subject. Illusions are also heaps of fun for confident, creative players.
Warlock Melee-Weapon Feats
The Pact of the Blade offers a playstyle that is unique to other Warlocks, focusing on weapons instead of spells for its primary damage output. These feats are tailored for the Pact of the Blade or the Hexblade Patron.
It’s important to note that a common desire of a melee-based Warlock is to combo the Darkness spell with the Invocation that allows vision within magical darkness, Devil’s Sight. Doing so will make you an unseen attack to gain advantage on your attacks against creatures who cannot see through magical darkness.
Polearm Master
The Lifedrinker Invocation is available at level twelve to Pact of the Blade Warlocks. It adds a character’s Charisma modifier as necrotic damage to attacks with pact weapons. Polearm Master is uniquely suited to take advantage of the fixed damage bonus from this Invocation.
The 1d4 bonus action attack doesn’t seem weak when it receives an additional +5 damage from a maxed-out Charisma stat. Lifedrinker stacks with whatever damage modifier already applies to a weapon, so each hit with the pact weapon could deal +10 guaranteed damage or more.
Great Weapon Master
Carrying on from the Polearm Master feat, we can further amp a character’s damage output by gambling with -5 to an attack roll for a potential +10 to damage. This can apply to the bonus-action and reaction Polearm Master attacks, too. Once we get GWM damage, Lifedrinker damage, and regular damage going, we’re looking at +20 to all attack damage rolls with the Warlock’s pact weapon.
Achieving +20 to pact weapon damage will likely require the Hexblade Patron so your character can use Charisma as its attack roll and attack damage modifier. Being able to focus on Charisma alone instead of splitting the focus with Strength will open your character up to select more feats. You are not required to select the Hexblade as your Patron, but the numbers are tempting, right?
Elven Accuracy (Elves only)
Now that our damage potential is super high, we need to improve our odds of achieving that potential. Elven Accuracy makes advantage extremely helpful for landing attacks after the -5 is applied from Great Weapon Master. If you secure advantage on attacks (such as with the Darkness spell and Devil’s Sight), you’re going to wreck your enemies.
One way to gain advantage is with the Eldritch Smite Invocation from XGtE. This Invocation deals extra damage while knocking an enemy prone if it is Huge or smaller (no saving throw). Once prone, you’ll massacre your enemy with your melee attacks rolled with three chances to hit per attack. This improves your chances for critical hits, too.
Lastly, Elven Accuracy benefits you by boosting a relevant stat like Charisma by one. It’s an excellent third piece to this melee feat trifecta.
Eldritch Blast Feats
These feats obviously flatter a Warlock who wants to start blasting. Eldritch Blast is a powerful cantrip that can provide much fun for a player, and these feats sweeten the deal… I mean pact.
Eldritch Adept
Invocations can empower the Eldritch Blast cantrip, but it can be disappointing to pass up other cool Invocations. The Eldritch Adept feat allows a Warlock to select an additional Invocation. You can pick an Invocation to further enhance your Eldritch Blast cantrip, or you can select an Invocation for some other benefit if your Eldritch Blast is augmented to your satisfaction.
You can read about Eldritch Invocations in this article written by Opal. I recommend the Agonizing Blast and Repelling Blast Invocations from the PHB.
Fey Touched
Hex is a great spell for increasing the damage of your Eldritch Blasts because it adds 1d6 for each Eldritch Blast that lands (at least at low levels). The problem is that Hex doesn’t scale efficiently with Pact Magic spell slots. You gain Hex from this feat to cast at first level once per long rest to deal with the spell slot issue. You’ll have Hex in your back pocket when you need it, and your spell slots won’t suffer for it.
Fey Touched also affords a +1 to your Charisma and a second-level casting of Misty Step once per long rest. Any spells we gain are useful since Warlock spell slots are so limited.
Warlock Subclass-Specific Feats
The Warlock’s customization prompted me to call out several feats that may find a place with a particular patron. These feats shine in the context of synergistic subclasses, so check them out!
Fiend / Celestial / Genie Patron Feats
These subclasses access fire spells that are usually inaccessible to Warlocks, including Fireball. The Fiend Warlock also gains a flexible damage resistance when it rests. The Efreeti Genie has its own fire specialty. The Celestial Warlock has fire options, too.
Keep in mind that many fire spells don’t scale well and they become less useful at high levels. It’s debatable whether you should invest in feats to augment your fiery onslaughts because you might swap out fire spells at later levels. Having said that, let’s see what we can do to compliment the Fiend Patron.
Flames of Phlegethos (Tiefling only)
This feat is golden for spells like Fireball that roll heaps of dice. You don’t want to roll ones when you cast Fireball, so rerolling them feels right. You’re likely to roll a one on your d6s at least once when you cast Fireball, but it’s the times that you roll a handful of ones that you’ll be relieved to reroll.
When you deal fire damage, you’ll gain a fiery aura that harms those who attack you within five feet. The damage is a meager 1d4, but it’s better than nothing and it discourages attacks against you. You’ll also provide bright and dim light with your glow to help your allies who lack darkvision. Even darkvision has its limits, so illuminating an area can help you avoid skulking denizens.
You can boost your Charisma with this feat, too. It’s a massive benefit to increase your stats while gaining a feat.
Infernal Constitution (Tiefling only)
Tieflings already resist fire damage, but this feat will expand your durability to resist cold and poison damage. Fiendish Resilience from the Fiend Patron gives you a flexible choice of damage resistance when you rest once you have it at level ten. Genie Patron Warlocks gain a resistance at level six with Elemental Gift determined by the type of genie with whom they made a pact. Between these Tiefling feats and Fiendish Resilience, you’ll have four damage resistances keeping you alive.
Elemental Adept (only to overcome resistances)
The minor fire damage buff isn’t appealing, but overcoming fire resistance is huge. Many creatures are resistant or immune to fire damage at higher levels of play. This feat won’t help with immunity, but overcoming fire resistance will be critical to your success.
I don’t normally recommend this feat, so I suggest picking it solely for Warlocks focusing on fire damage. It makes sense to me to take Flames of Phlegethos first if you’re a Tiefling, followed by Elemental Adept. You can reroll ones with Flames of Phlegethos, then any remaining ones will be treated as twos by Elemental Adept.
Crusher (to combo with the Dao’s bludgeoning damage bonus to Eldritch Blast)
You can push enemies around and gain extra stats. Critical hits become increasingly likely with Eldritch Blast as you gain more attacks at higher levels with the cantrip.
Great Old One / Archfey / Fathomless
(You can reference the spellcasting feats I outlined earlier in this article)
Inspiring Leader
If you don’t already have party members who regularly generate temporary hitpoints, you can support the group with Inspiring Leader. It’s a natural feat for a Charisma-based character who doesn’t have another feat that they want.
Hexblade Feats
(You can reference the melee-weapon feats I outlined earlier in this article)
Conclusion
The Warlock is a curious concept since it can go in many directions mechanically. Feats further complicate that progression, so it was a daunting task to figure out which feats I recommend. I’m happy with the result because I learned a lot about what is possible with a Warlock, but I surely missed a combination or stand-alone option that would be impressive and worth sharing.
I hope you’ll point out such details so I can improve this article for the players to follow after you in their Warlock feats search. Tell me, which feats have I been fair or unfair to? In the comments section below, cast Message to communicate if you emphatically agree with my recommendations or passionately disagree. I’m always learning more about this complex game. Thank you again for reading. I hope you’ll share this article with your friends to get a discussion started.
Before you go, your Passive Perception has shown you secret passageways to discover more content about feats and character concepts!
Thank you for the link, Jon!