Acolyte of the Skin

Acolyte of the Skin is a variant Warlock archetype themed around Demonic power and transformation. Introduced in Update 58.

Alignment options: Lawful, True, or Chaotic Neutral

Changes from base class

 * True Fiend pact
 * The only pact option for Acolytes. Same as Fiend pact, except the level 6 ability: give up Dark One's Luck, gain Fiendskin: Your skin has been grafted with demon skin, granting you some of its inherent defenses. You gain a +1 profane bonus to Fire Resistance per Warlock Level.
 * Unlike other pacts, this does not offer any autogranted spells.


 * Eldritch Blast and Pact dice
 * Give up Warlock's blast and pact dice progression, instead receive the following feats automatically:
 * 1: Lesser Pact Attunement: +2d8 Blast Dice, +2d6 Pact Dice
 * 6: Pact Attunement: +2d8 Blast Dice, +2d6 Pact Dice
 * 12: Greater Pact Attunement: +2d8 Blast Dice, +2d6 Pact Dice
 * 18: Ultimate Pact Attunement: +2d8 Blast Dice, +2d6 Pact Dice

This is a total of 8d8 Blast Dice, 8d6 Pact Dice. For comparison, a standard Warlock at level 18 has 5d8 Blast Dice and 8d6 Pact Dice (can push to 6d8 Blast and 10d6 Pact at level 20).


 * Multiclass characters can pick up these feats (just like Monk stance upgrade feats).


 * Enhancements
 * Give up Enlightened Spirit enhancements
 * Gain Acolyte of the Skin enhancements

Past life

 * +1 MRR, +5 Fire Spell Power (stacks 3 times)

Final Comparison
Overall compared to a standard Warlock, an Acolyte of the Skin hones their focus even further into the Eldritch Blast and more permanent passive effects/defenses, and further away from supplemental spells. When purely looking at Passive effects an Acolyte of the Skin has some of the strongest passive defenses found anywhere, and among Warlock trees the strongest set of SLA attacks calculated off of Blast damage plus the strongest baseline Blast damage dice for both core and Pact. This does come at the cost of lower adaptability and flexibility from less free-granted spells/SLAs, so an Acolyte will really need to make use of a strong UMD and potion/scroll/wand set to at least partially make up for it. Since the Blast is more like a weapon than a spell, an Acolyte is much closer to a fighter/archer hybrid than a true spellcaster compared to other Warlocks.