Why are warlocks a separate thing?

The warlock as a class in 4e and 5e bothers me. I understand the mechanical difference, but what fluff difference is there from a divine caster? A higher being grants you innate magical abilities as long as you serve it. It's the same shit, except you use a different stat to cast it. Is the difference that warlock patrons aren't gods? Well, in 5e, clerics and paladins can worship non-divine entities for their powers (paladins can even just be dedicated to an ideal and develop their abilities out of that devotion, something I think is stupid personally). So what if anything is the difference? The warlock is spookier? Is that it?

The warlock has been granted a spark of power but from thereon, it's his own. A divine caster has a channel to a higher being concept and the power flows from that through him.

The warlock is a battery, the divine caster is an electrical socket.

Obligatory "Have you tried not playing DnD reply."

Because, yes, we get it, DnD is full of stupid """lore""" decisions, mechanical decisions, and everything else decisions and we really need ANOTHER topic complaining about it instead of playing literally anything else.

There's a difference between worshiping an entity and making a pact with it.
A cleric does not just receive power from his deity, he upholds the values and tenets of said deity and tries to affect the world according to it.
A warlock was once in a bad spot, or put its ambition before his safety, and got his powers for a price (thematically at least).
Now, do these things need different classes? The concepts are pretty different, and since D&D is a class based system, I would say yes (even more so than "fighter""angry fighter" "fist fighter" "bow fighter")

The difference is about as far between as a sorcerer and a wizard or a fighter and a barbarian. They're simply different walks of life, and the story of man bargaining life and limb for power and control is too common not to offer as a class option. It might seem clever to draw the parallels between the source of their power but the actions they themselves took are more defining: clerics require virtue and disciplines, following the ideals of their deity. Warlocks on the other hand will bargain with their idol (typically a lesser being than a god) and have no issues with exploiting their power without thought or temperance. The difference between an evil cleric and evil warlock probably isn't obvious on the surface, but the primary one would be that a cleric wants to be closer to their master while a warlock would likely take any chance he can to stab them in the back and run far away as they can.

Why are universal wizards still a thing? They should be fragmented into specialized roles.

See

Because doing so would pretty much write wizards out of existence.

>Damage-focused wizard
Sorcerer/Warlock

>Defensive/Healer Wizard
Cleric

>Control/Charm Wizard
Bard

>Shapeshifter wizard
Druid

>Transmutation Wizard
Alchemist

>Crafting Wizard
Artificer

>Melee Wizard
Monk/Mystic

Sure, wizards can do all these roles BETTER than their dedicated classes, but the point is that specialized-role casters DO exist.

How about limiting them to two or three schools?

The divine caster is rather a conductor of the power of divinity.

Warlocks don't have to like their patrons and vice versa. As opposed to clerics?

Think of it like this? Being a Cleric is having the company credit card, being a Warlock is being handed a suitcase of unmarked bills every week as long as you keep some super badass but very cruel drug dealer happy.

Being a cleric is having a stable job, being a warlock is selling kidneys to shady eastern european men behind the train station on sunday nights to pay the bills and score cocaine.

Sounds good in theory. In practice it ends up sucking because some schools never get used ever. Yeah, I'm gonna spend one of my schools on Divination or Abjuration when I only get two? Fuck that.

Also, literally just loops back to the problem of other non-wizard casters already being specialized in one or two generally, like how Bards are thematically about enchanting and illusion rather than raw power.

The answer is to ban wizards.

Fighters should also be deleted from existence. They are relics from a bygone era.

Paladins have always gotten power from ideals and not gods except for a few specific settings and 4e. Personally, I feel that a militant priest is better represented by the Cleric class anyway.

Paladins are classically militant wandering dogooders, not priests.
Even in 4e, they were a part of the 5 facets of the militant faithful as the "shield".

This is the weapon of a Knight. Not as clumsy or as random as a spell. An elegant weapon... for a more civilized age.

I guess it is the difference between private and public sector.

Gods have thousands of servants, they don't give a fuck about most of them the servants can get away with crippling inefficiency and misconduit but if they get caught for something bad they are far past fucked.

Warlocks are part of much tighter hierarchy and the boss is constantly monitoring them but fucking around will most likely lead to just getting fired.

A Warlock makes a Pact or Lasting Contract with a being classed as an Outsider by D&D's Planar standards. The Outsider takes the Warlocks soul through some varied means and replaces it with unstable Incarnum from it's own body. As this is the unspecified cosmic makeup of various outsiders which determines how they take form, Warlocks master disciplines known as invocations to warp these innate energies to their liking as a form of pseudo-magic. To note, the difference between a Warlock and a native outsider is that say, a Succubus is born with it's innate abilities, fresh out the oven, and in some cases, per depiction through the concept of Monster Class Templates in 3.5 We know these are gained over a short period of time until said Outsider is up to standards with it's base Statblock.

In 40k, that's the equivalent of becoming a Daemon Prince.

A Warlock, is- in effect, to the notion of his Patron- what Wizards are to the Arcane- to the very notion of Outsiders, beings who in generalization (Far Realm, Native outsiders and other rare exceptions to this excluded) are beings who have their Souls and Bodies in One single unit and express the natures of their homeworlds through native powers, personalities, and other such common-features.

A Warlock, takes this energy, and innovates it to his own ends, namely to become a unique Outsider-like or actual Outsider His/herself. Come many a year later, a Warlock may be an outsider of certain CR whose Warlock Disciplines are all but gone and are now Spell-like abilities and a natural Spellcasting ability to the equivalent of a Certain spellcasting class serving as equivalent CL. In effect, a Warlock takes what to an Outsider is as easy as breathing, and innovates it into something they can call their own that even the Outsider could not perform.

I should also note this transformation makes them attuned to Magical Energies, as the initial inspiration for Warlock pacts was for Evil outsiders to prey on the weaknesses of mortals who are talentless and/or powerless compared to those capable of taking up Arcane discipline through Vancian spellcasting or Strong Faith, the idea is that the Warlock gains power and a CHANCE to become like the Wizards they Envy, at cost of greater influence, corruption or Rail-roading to a shit-build and bottom bitch in either the Nine or Abyss respectively.

Though, traditionally- The Older idea of a Warlock was really tied in with creepy old long-fingered men spoken to be Demonic offspring with long fingers and nails, and 'Warlock' was often used as a the word for Male Witch, or as an insult to Evil Male Wizards.

We then have the classic western children's Warlock which is always some bare-bones evil Tyrant that looks halfway into some kind of Demonic Transformation, resembling a Demon themselves, often sporting martial and magical disciplines being defeated by a simple hero in the end, or- serving a greater behind the scenes evil power.

A main concept behind the above type of Warlock linked in with how they came to be around 3.5, before the 4E rework which went over the top with it because of how they shat over the Far Realm and Trivilized the place moreso than thought previously possible, was that they were based on the noticable slow effects of tell-tale Demonic Corruption and association found in the routes of Western Fantasy and European supersition over Witches and Dark magic.

>2017
>Classes

Gul'dan from Warcraft, in his latest depiction- is a very good example of this kind or Warlock, next to the like of that one member of the secret society of Wolfram and heart in the Buffyverse who was a Warlock who was old as fuck, on a drip, and had Red Skin and obvious signs of corruption by that point- the real Out for power, generic villian sort, but also played so traditionally one can appreciate it's merits.

The thing about Warlocks, is that the term Pact spreads itself over multiple concepts, and it isn't explicitly linked to their ilk, nor is the concept of binding contracts held through magical terms either- and that is something that deserves to be distinguished more, such as Truenaming Demonic Binding, and the rules of Magical Creatures and Fey.

A Warlock is wanting magic, then you see some shady fucking Chinaman offering it- and after doing some market research, you discover it isn't magic to the spirit, but rather the letter, and you've still got a chance of getting what you want if your decide to work your balls off and learn a little-legal lingo, making sure your patron is not a bigshot, and isn't running a clique of any size that obligates you to perform objectively evil acts, over a long time of reading D&D, a common thing Demons are prone to doing is being EXTREMELY friendly to you if you even jokingly attempt to speak their silly over-the-top super Evil LOLSORANDUM language, as they will be MORE Than willing to help you, if they even have a hint of the idea that what you're doing is WRONG. Even dealing with them like this, on their native plane is enough to actually twist your alignment, even if it's for a good thing, -Logical conversation negotiation and diplomacy in the Abyss with Demons is actually enough to turn you Objectively Evil ALONE.

The best part comes down to your cheaper magical items though, a Wizard's lifeblood is making money to fund his progress, and you can oust him in this and make them reliant on you gaining not only their trust, but a nice way to worm your way into their good graces to fund your own schemes "main aim of most warlocks is effective entry into a 'true' spellcasting class power, which can lead to this or Demonhood." As well as also assisitng Rogues with less savory activity, bluffing to keep a Macguffin, and other subversive stuff, like say, identity theft via one invocation which requires the subject you wish to impersonate captured and kept alive.

Study, replication, monetization and collection of Magical Items will assist with gaining Lasting, sustainable power and success as a warlock- in practice, and earning followers, thralls, etc... will also benefit this common process. A common Warlock Goal really is just "I want something to call my own." That a PC can be proud of.

>except for a few specific setting
Literally every D&D settting I can think of requires Paladins to serve deities. The "muh paladins of ideals" bullshit is a side rule because early editoons of D&D couldn't handle clerics/divine magic being present.

Birthright Requires you have a diety. Forgotten Realms requires you have a deity. Mystara requires a divine patron/demigod. Dark Sun has elemental spirits/Sorcerer Kings which are essentially demigods.

The only settings that allow Paladins/Clerics of ideas that I'm am aware of are Greyhawk and Eberron.

>why are hot and cold separate things?
>they both deal with heat
>the only difference being that they are polar opposites

>why are fighters and thieves separate things?
>they're both just physical class based on weapon damage
>the only difference is strength vs dexterity

tl;dr Holy and unholy are different.

>cold doesn't exist
My modern take on magic have temperature as a "magic school" (and damage type), having both heat and cold.

>The warlock as a class in 4e and 5e bothers me. I understand the mechanical difference, but what fluff difference is there from a wizard? A higher being grants you the knowledge to cast arcane magic instead of a book. It's the same shit, except you use a different stat to cast it. Is the difference that warlock patrons aren't books and that the warlock is spookier? Is that it?

Except class and alignment are completely separate now. You can be a CE cleric or a LG warlock.

>the point
>your head
>muh modern take
Nobody gives a shit about your magic system. Protip: Fire and ice are different and should be classified as such. Go ahead and make a dumbed down version and call it "modern" though.

Except I didn't mention shit about alignment, so what's your point?

Wielding unholy energy doesn't mean you have to be an asshole, nor do you have to be a girlscout to cast holy magic. No shit.

Holy and Unholy are different. As opposite as Fire and Ice. That's the whole point.

tl;dr: read tl;drs

There's a difference between a relationship based on a contract and one based on reverence.

>Holy and Unholy are different.
They really aren't, though. Evil deities are often called unholy.