Is the eldritch invocation "amour of shadows" worth it?

[Magenta]

I just started a caster warlock, and I plan on getting the "potent robe" which has a skill called Gregarious Caster: Your cantrips deal additional damage equal to your Charisma Modifier.

With that in mind, is it worth getting "armour of shadows", which gives you mage armour without spending a spell slot, or are there other ways to get a good AC on a caster? Peace.

[Goilveig]

It's not bad. If you're mainly going to be a cantrip caster, you could also do things like dip into Barbarian or Monk for the ability to add CON / WIS to your AC in addition to DEX. (With both CON and WIS being useful for other reasons, CON being the better choice since it also boosts HP). Note that some head gear is classified as light, medium, or heavy armor, and will negate your unarmored defensive bonuses including mage armor.

(Cantrips scale by character level not class level, so if you're mainly building around Eldritch Blast, you multiclass as much as you like as long as you get Agonizing Blast at least).

[Dragon Master]

Only if you have high dexterity. It's the equivalent of what medium armor gives you without the limitation of maxing out +2 for the dex bonus so you can wear the magic non-armored equipment. Only works if you aren't wearing any armor though, and that includes helmets, gloves and boots with light and medium armor features.

If you want to multiclass into sorcerer (that's not draconic because they get a default subclass feature that is basically the same thing and they do not stack) it can be awesome.

Sorcerer-Walocks have very good synergy for multi-classing because they're both charisma casters, you get spell slots that come back with a short rest and you get sorcery points alongside metamagic.

For a pure warlock it kind of depends on whether or not you plan on being on the front lines or not via pact of the blade or if you plan to be further back as Pact of the Tome and an Eldritch Blast turret or use Pact of the Chain to get an imp or a quasit familar who can turn invisible and interact with items since they also have hands, which gives you more action economy with some potential debuffs on enemies thanks to frighten (quasit) or poison sting (imp).

[deadsanta]

Just dip 1 level in fighter or cleric subclass for heavy armor. You have to take fighter at level 1 to get heavy armor, but it's worth it, because you also get a proficiency in CON, which is amazing for a warlock.

[Moffin Bovin]

Originally posted by deadsanta:

Just dip 1 level in fighter or cleric subclass for heavy armor. You have to take fighter at level 1 to get heavy armor, but it's worth it, because you also get a proficiency in CON, which is amazing for a warlock.

he's going to wear a robe, dingus.

[deadsanta]

Originally posted by Moffin Bovin:

Originally posted by deadsanta:

Just dip 1 level in fighter or cleric subclass for heavy armor. You have to take fighter at level 1 to get heavy armor, but it's worth it, because you also get a proficiency in CON, which is amazing for a warlock.

he's going to wear a robe, dingus.

Even if he does. And he shouldn't. But even if he does for RP reasons there are some fantastic helmets, gloves and boots that qualify as heavy, medium armor. Even wearing "light armor" gloves or helmet is enough to nix the mage armor, making it incredibly gear limiting for what it gives you.

Take fighter-heavy and fight in robes, shield and sword like Gandalf. +3 AC just from your shield, use all the utility items without restriction, including all the ones that give you crit immunity, which is huge.

Also there's a couple items that give you the bonus CHA skill to cantrips, and doesn't Warlock give it to you natively?

[BigJ]

Robes have among the most powerful aspects in act 3, followed by medium armor.

[Magenta]

Thanks for all the answers @Goilveig, @Dragon Master my stats will eventually be 16 dex, 16 con and 20 cha, and I am going pure warlock especially as a caster and I chose human for the extra skill and carrying capacity since my character´s str is 8 lol.

Anyway, I think I am gonna get the invocation and try it out when i get the robe.

[Xanshi]

Originally posted by deadsanta:

Originally posted by Moffin Bovin:

he's going to wear a robe, dingus.

Even if he does. And he shouldn't. But even if he does for RP reasons there are some fantastic helmets, gloves and boots that qualify as heavy, medium armor. Even wearing "light armor" gloves or helmet is enough to nix the mage armor, making it incredibly gear limiting for what it gives you.

Take fighter-heavy and fight in robes, shield and sword like Gandalf. +3 AC just from your shield, use all the utility items without restriction, including all the ones that give you crit immunity, which is huge.

Also there's a couple items that give you the bonus CHA skill to cantrips, and doesn't Warlock give it to you natively?

While you are not wrong, i think the best gear for eldritch blast warlock doesn't you use
medium or heavy armor. On early acts, yes using medium or heavy armors is beneficial. Rather than going for fighter or taking armour of shadows invocation. I take a multiclass dip into sorcerer. Take draconic bloodline which basically is always on mage armor. You get metamagic and more spell slots.

There are more pro's for going into sorcerer than gaining proficiency into medium or heavy armor. As for shield, i rather go for dual wield feat for dual wield staff for spell bonuses.

[deadsanta]

Originally posted by BigJ:

Robes have among the most powerful aspects in act 3, followed by medium armor.

I think the legendary set you get from a certain demon you can defeat is the best, both in the base 21 AC and in the bonuses. But I get that if you're gonna build around a set of robes its cool, still tons of great heavy/medium armor helms/gloves out there for spellblades, and like I said, even light armor negates mage armor, it's a terrible spell to build around.

[wendigo211]

Mage armor isn't that great. Take a Barb level, or a few since cantrips scale with character level instead of class level. The reason for Barb is the Amulet of Greater Health in act 3 (23 con), which will help with your AC woes if you're wearing robes. Be aware that wearing medium armor boots, gauntlets or helms will disable the Barb AC boost. I think the big damage Warlock builds exploit the Lightning Charges gear and a lot of that is medium armor, so I guess it depends on what you're going for.

[Dragon Master]

Originally posted by Magenta:

Thanks for all the answers @Goilveig, @Dragon Master my stats will eventually be 16 dex, 16 con and 20 cha, and I am going pure warlock especially as a caster and I chose human for the extra skill and carrying capacity since my character´s str is 8 lol.

Anyway, I think I am gonna get the invocation and try it out when i get the robe.

Hope you enjoy. If you want some advice, here's what I'd do but take it as you will.

I'd start with 16 Dex, 16 Cha and 14 Con at level 1, get spellsniper at level 4 if you're going pact of the chain or pact of the tome, especially if you are a Great Old One warlock since they frighten enemies and nearby enemies if you get a critical hit and Spell Sniper helps with that while also giving you another cantrip, which can be awesome. If you go Pact of the Tome you'll be the cantrip king which can be pretty dang useful if you use a little creativity.

If you go with Pact of the Blade I'd go warcaster or polearm mastery since you can just summon a polearm or bind a good magical one as your pact weapon and that feat is extremely good.

Go 18 and then 20 charisma at levels 8 and 12 respectively. Unless you're a human or have the noble or guild artisan background you can't get proficient in persuasion, unless you use an invocation for it.

But as I said, do what you want. Warlocks are very much a build-a-bear class where you can make your character however you want. Invocations and the types of pacts you can take can make you a very, very powerful character.

[Xanshi]

There numerous ways to resolve your armor issue.

Mage armor invocation is one way.
Multiclass into sorcerer for draconic bloodline passive is basically mage armor.
Multiclass for better armor proficiency
Multiclass for unarmoured defense
Spells like mirror image or haste
There are plenty of gear from other gear slot that provides armor bonus. Evasive shoes, Cloak of protection, ring of protection, wondrous gloves, bonespike boots all provide AC.