In this Baldur’s Gate 3 Warlock Build Guide, I’m going to be showing you 3 early game Warlock Builds but unlike in the Paladin Build Guide, where we did something similar, these are not going to be Multiclassed ones. Instead, they’ll all be separate Single Class Warlock Builds and there’s a reason for that. 

Baldur’s Gate 3 Best Beginner Warlock Builds

I feel like Warlocks, in general, don’t lend themselves as well to multiclassing as something like Paladins and many other Classes because their Spell Slots don’t gain levels when multiclassing. So purely taking ranks in Warlock is the best way to make them stronger, especially if you’re a new player until you have a better understanding of the game.

Baldur’s Gate 3 The Fiend Fire Warlock Build

So the first Build I’m going to show you is a very offensive fire-oriented Fiend Build. You’ll obviously take The Fiend Subclass here and the reason for this is it has access to a lot of Fire Spells, allowing us to focus on dealing fire damage. Because of that, I suggest taking Burning Hands and Arms of Hadar as your 2 Level 1 Spells. 

Level 2 The Fiend Fire Warlock

And then, when we get to Level 2, we’re going to gain a second Spell Slot and a couple of Eldritch Invocations. I recommend taking Agonizing Blast here to further boost the damage of your Eldritch Blast by your Charisma Modifier when you attack with it. 

I also suggest getting Fiendish Vigor in order to let you cast False Life without expending a Spell Slot. This will give you 7 extra HP on top of your current HP every time you go into a fight, which is a lot at Level 2. However, as you get further and further into the game, False Life becomes less useful as health pools increase more and more because this will not scale up like it would if you had the regular version of the Spell.

Level 3 The Fiend Fire Warlock

When you get to Level 3, I recommend picking up Scorching Ray. Scorching Ray is absolutely devastating whether you want to use it on one or multiple enemies and it works very similarly to Eldritch Blast. This targets the Armor Class of the enemy and benefits from elevation but is penalized if you’re standing next to targets when you’ve cast it so you want to try and use this at range. You’re going to try and either melt one or enemies at once.

You’re also going to choose a Pact Boon. So I recommend either Pact of the Blade if you want to have a better melee option if enemies get close to you or Pact of the Chain in order to gain a Familiar like the Imp. The Imp can turn invisible and as it reaches Level 5, it’ll be able to attack twice in a given turn, which makes it really strong.

Level 4 The Fiend Fire Warlock

At Level 4, we’re going to pick up the Elemental Adept Feat, which is going to make it so that your Spells ignore resistance to a damage type of your choice like fire. Additionally, casting Scorching Ray to deal damage, for example, prevents you from rolling a 1, therefore you won’t be able to inflict terrible damage out of it. This becomes stronger as you progress in Baldur’s Gate 3.

Alternatively, you could go with Ability Score Improvement now and pick up Elemental Adept later on depending on what you do with your character but the idea here is you’re going to pick up a lot of Fire Spells from The Fiend particularly as you level up higher and higher since you’re focusing on one damage type. Now if an enemy, all of a sudden, has resistance to fire, you’re not screwed since you’ll still be able to take them out.

I also recommend picking up Cloud of Daggers at this level. Cloud of Daggers is just a really strong early-game AOE Spell where, if enemies walk through it or strike in their turn, they take damage. But remember that Cloud of Daggers requires Concentration and it’s the only Spell that does with this The Fiend Fire Warlock Build. We’re trying to limit the Concentration Spells we have so that we don’t have to worry about maintaining Concentration. 

Level 5 The Fiend Fire Warlock

And then when we get to Level 5, we’re going to pick up Fireball. This is a nice AOE Fire Spell that doesn’t need Concentration. You just choose an area to fling it onto and it does devastating effect, again, because we have Elemental Adept so if anything had fire resistance, it’s not going to matter. Also, your Spell Slots will be upgraded to Level 3 at this point, which means that any Spell you cast that can be upcast will deal more damage or have a better effect. 

For instance, Burning Hands, Cloud of Daggers, and Arms of Hadar will deal more damage while Scorching Ray will get an extra beam. And then Blindness can target another enemy once you pick that up as well, which I suggest you do. This Spell will allow you to target 2 characters to impose a Disadvantage on their Attack Rolls while all allies have an Advantage against them. It’s huge because no Concentration is needed. You’ll definitely want to use Blindness on difficult-to-kill enemies so it lasts on them for a good enough time. 

Additionally, at this level, you’re going to gain an extra beam for your Eldritch Blast, which means that you’re going to be able to hit two targets or the same target twice. And then you’ll gain Deepened Pact so if the Imp from your Pact of the Chain can now attack twice every turn, which is great. On the other hand, with Pact of the Blade, you’ll gain an extra attack on your turn. 

So the whole concept of this Build is to continue to take Fire Spells as you level up because you’re The Fiend Subclass. You also won’t use Concentration that much in order to focus on throwing Spells when you need to and attacking with a Weapon thanks to Pact of the Blade or using your Imp if you went with Pact of the Chain.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Melee Warlock Build

The next Build is going to be a melee-focused Warlock, one that primarily melees in Combat but can also use Eldritch Blast if needed and if they cannot reach a target at close range. It doesn’t really matter what Subclass you choose here. For instance, The Fiend gives you Dark One’s Blessing, which grants some health when you kill enemies. This isn’t bad particularly because they’re gonna be in the melee range.

Level 2 Melee Warlock

At Level 2, you’re going to pick 2 Eldritch Invocations so you’ll select Agonizing Blast to increase the damage of Eldritch Blast by your Charisma Modifier. You’ll also take Devil’s Sight, which is going to allow you to see in darkness, again, not in dark places but from the actual Darkness Spell.

Level 3 Melee Warlock

At Level 3, we’ll pick Pact of the Blade to attack with your Charisma Modifier, which means that you need higher Charisma for this Melee Warlock Build to attack and cast Spells effectively. Constitution is good and maybe some Dexterity for Armor Class. You won’t need Strength at all for this. 

What you do want to make sure of is to select the Darkness Spell at this level if no one else in your party has it. Ideally, one of your other casters would have it to prevent you from consuming 1 out of 2 of your precious Spell Slots. 

Level 4 Melee Warlock

At Level 4, we’re going to pick Great Weapon Master for our Feat and this is going to let us do a couple of things. First, it’ll let us take an extra attack with our Bonus Action if we critically strike or kill an enemy in melee combat. This will constantly happen, making it really good. Second,  you’ll gain a little Toggleable Feature under your passives that will allow you to take a -5 Attack Roll penalty if you’re using a Two-Handed Weapon in exchange for +10 damage. This is very good at killing enemies especially because of Darkness.

You’re going to gain an Advantage against them to offset some of that penalty, however, you can toggle it off if you’re outside of Darkness while fighting normally, and your chances of hitting aren’t very high. 

Level 5 Melee Warlock

At Level 5, your Spell Slots will get stronger but you’ll also gain Deepened Pact to execute an extra attack when using your Pact Weapons. Doing so will not only allow you to attack twice when inside Darkness but also, if you kill something, you’ll be able to attack a third time with your Bonus Action, which is incredibly strong.  

Another Spell that I really like besides Darkness for this Melee Warlock Build is Armor of Agathys. This is going to provide you with temporary HP and deal damage to enemies that hit you in melee combat. At first, the Armor of Agathys seems negligible but remember that it can be upcast to your Spell Slot so as it gets higher and higher, the temporary HP you’re going to gain will be greater and so will the melee damage you deal. The Spell doesn’t require Concentration either, it just stays on you until you take a Long Rest.

However, if you don’t have an ally who can cast Darkness, you won’t be able to cast any other Spell in combat since it’ll be reserved for the Armor of Agathys. So I think this works much better if someone else is going to use Darkness to free up your last Spell Slot. You can then cast Arms of Hadar, which is an AOE Spell in case you get surrounded by a lot of enemies either inside or outside of Darkness. And this can be upcast too so it’s going to deal more damage. Keep in mind though that you do need to maintain Concentration on Darkness to keep it up and that means if you stray too far from it, you’ll probably lose Concentration, which you aren’t set up for anyway. 

We’re banking on enemies gaining a Disadvantage on their attacks to miss a lot in Darkness. So you won’t get hit much by projectiles from ranged characters. Otherwise, you’ll be using Eldritch Blast and melee attacks outside of this sphere.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Control Warlock Build

And then for our third and final Warlock Build is more of a Control Warlock. Here, we’re going to focus on controlling the battlefield while dealing damage with Eldritch Blast. I like taking either The Great Old One or Archfey for Subclasses because they have a lot of Control Spells that you can choose from. I personally went The Great Old One because I can pick up Slow and gain Evard’s Black Tentacles later on. Dominate Beast, Dominate Person, and Telekinesis are also available so those who were fans of using Telekinesis on Divinity: Original Sin 2, you’ll be able to cast it here. 

Level 2 Control Warlock

So at Level 2, for our Eldritch Invocations, we’re gonna pick up Agonizing Blast to increase the damage of Eldritch Blast and Fiendish Vigor in order to cast False Life without consuming a Spell Slot.

Level 3 Control Warlock

And then at Level 3, you’ll take Cloud of Daggers, which I really like, because it deals with good damage early on. You also throw it on an area, forcing enemies to run around it, otherwise, they get punished severely, giving you control. 

You’ll then gain a Pact Boon here and I suggest going with Pact of the Tome to give a few Cantrips. But more importantly, at Level 5, you’ll receive more Spells, which can be cast without consuming your Spell Slots. 

Level 4 Control Warlock

At Level 4, you get to choose a Feat to select War Caster or Resilient. War Caster gives you an Advantage on Concentration Checks whereas Resilient grants a Proficiency Bonus to Constitution Saving Throws, which includes Concentration Checks. Both are really important for this Control Warlock Build because we use a lot of Spells that require Concentration and you don’t want to get hit for these to end early. 

Level 5 Control Warlock

At Level 5, for your Eldritch Invocation, I would take Repelling Blast to be able to knock things backward with Eldritch Blast. You’ll also receive Deepened Pact, allowing you to use Call Lightning, Animate Dead, and Haste once in between Long Rests. They don’t consume Spell Slots so that’s going to give you a lot more spell-casting capability on your Warlock.

For your Spell, I strongly suggest taking Hunger of Hadar. What this does is it’s going to put a black sphere in a large AOE on the map that’s going to become difficult terrain. So it’ll be hard for enemies to pass through and they’ll be blind when they’re inside of it, preventing them from doing much at all. What’s really great about this compared to Darkness is that targets who start their turn will take cold damage and if they end their turn while still remaining in the AOE, they take acid damage. They’re going to keep taking damage and it allows you to have an area denial and control over a large portion of the map far more than Darkness lets you to.

Another good Spell to pick for this Control Warlock Build is Hypnotic Pattern, which allows you to hypnotize enemies to forego their turn if they fail their Saving Throws. You can also choose Slow to prevent targets from moving much to reduce the amount of things they can do on each turn. It can even delay Spells of up to 6 of them.

But keep in mind that to get all these Spells, you’ll have to replace some of the early Spells you picked up before. This is a really fun Warlock Build and it’s probably my favorite of the three that I mentioned because you contribute to the battlefield in a unique way with some of these Spells. For instance, the Hunger of Hadar should definitely be in your repertoire if you’re playing a Warlock. And then you can set up this Control Warlock Build to maintain Concentration to use it more effectively than maybe some other Warlock Builds. 

Baldur’s Gate 3 Warlock Builds: Final Thoughts

So that wraps up our article on the 3 early-game Warlock Builds. I hope this helped to get a better understanding of playing as a Baldur’s Gate 3 Warlock between this and the Warlock Class Guide. We’ll have more advanced Builds that go up to Level 12 later on. Those individual Builds won’t be grouped together but I wanted to get some of them out to you now because you’ve been itching for them.

Again, if you have more tips for other players, leave them in the comments below so that they can learn more as well. If you have further questions let me know.

Stay tuned for more Baldur’s Gate 3 content.