Here we are! The final Horror Month 2022 build! Oooh, so exciting! We've done a Vampire Champion, a sneaky serial killer who was never caught, and MUMM-RA! THE EVER LIVING!!!! With such a rogues gallery, what could I possibly choose to be the fourth and final build for this year? I mean, after a vampire, a serial killer, and a mummy. What can I possibly do to top all of that?
Ah, what the heck! Let's put Dorian Gray to pen & paper.
I mean, it's not like you didn't see the title of this post or the picture above or anything...
The Picture of Dorian Gray is the only novel ever written by one Oscar Wilde, Irish playwright and poet. It concerns itself with its title character - Dorian Gray - who has a portrait painted of him by his good friend Basil. Lamenting that he will grow old and ugly while the portrait remains unblemished by the passing of time, and wishes for the opposite. As Dorian gives in to more and more sin and vice, the portrait continues to twist and distort horrifically while he remains untouched by anything, even time itself cannot seem to touch him. In the end, however, his sins catch up with him...
Not so in D&D! Let's see what we can do!
For stats, we're going to use the standard array from the Player's Handbook. Roll if you like and use this as a guide for where to put your numbers!
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| Lestat, what are you doing here? This isn't your build! |
Charisma: 15
Dorian is described in the novel many times as being of angelic or otherworldly beauty. His nickname given to him by Sybil Vane is literally "Prince Charming".
Constitution: 14
Dorian remains as healthy as an ox as well as youthful throughout his years, indulging in various vices with seemingly no ill effect on his body.
Intelligence: 13
Dorian is as well-read as he is well-spoken.
Dexterity: 12
Dorian was quick on his feet to get the jump on Basil and murder him in his attic.
Strength: 10
Dorian is not a he-man, but he was able to murder Basil very effectively in a short amount of time.
Wisdom: 8
Listening to Lord Wotton, ruining the lives of everyone around you, and then trying to stab your own Satanic portrait? Not especially wise...
For race, Dorian is a Human, specifically a Variant Human. My second choice for this was a High Elf, but I decided against that due to Dorian being... well, human. Variant Humans get a +1 to two different Ability Scores: We'll be going with Charisma and Constitution to bump up our bonuses there. We'll also be getting one free skill and one free Feat. For our skill, go for Intimidation and for our feat, we'll go with Tough. Tough gets you two extra hit points per level for every level you have and every level you get. If taken at another level, it's applied retroactively. In this case, just add a +2 to whatever hit points you end up rolling.
For background, we'll take the Noble background, which gives us History and Persuasion as well as the Position of Privilege feature, which is detailed on page 135 of the Player's Handbook and has a few perks to it when dealing with high society.
Now, I don't know about you, but someone who makes a deal - even if not directly with a patron - sure sounds like a Warlock to me. Specifically, we're going to go with The Undying from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide. Before we get into that, though, we can pick two skills from the Warlock skill list: in our case, we'll go with Deception and Religion.
At first level (1), along with getting Pact Magic, the Undying Warlock receives Spare the Dying as a cantrip. They also have advantage on saving throws against any disease, mundane or magical. The undead will also have a more difficult time harming Dorian, having to pass a Wisdom check against Dorian's Spell DC. If they fail it, they have to pick another target or forfeit their attack altogether. If they succeed, they don't have to roll again for another 24 hours.
Also, just because Warlocks get so few spells anyway, I'm not going to go through the list and tell you what spells to pick and choose. I will say I never don't make a Warlock without Eldritch Blast, although you may not want to go full on theatrical with it. That, I leave entirely up to you. With that out of the way, let's crack into second level.
A second level Warlock (2) receives their first Eldritch Invocations, special powers you receive from your patron in order to do other things beyond just your spellcraft. With two given at second level, we'll be going with Mask of Many Faces, which allows you to cast disguise self at will without using a spell slot as well as Devil's Sight, which grants the warlock the ability to see normally in darkness (magical and nonmagical) up to 120 feet away. A handy thing if James Vane comes to call.
At third level (3), Warlocks must accept a Pact Boon. I wrestled with this decision for a bit, but eventually decided that Pact of the Tome was the best choice out of the canon options in 5e. My second choice was Pact of the Talisman from Tasha's, but it didn't play out how I thought it might and Pact of the Tome has better options for what I have in mind. Maybe ask your DM very nicely and you can re-flavor your tome as your portrait. And perhaps it doesn't burn into ash when you die, but instead is restored to its original state. Be nice to your DMs, they might let you get away with a lot of crazy stuff!
Pact of the Tome gives you a grimoire portrait upon the pages canvas are written three spells from any class list (and not all of them need to be from the same list) so long as they are all cantrips, having them count as warlock spells for you. Again, I'm not going to tell you which ones to pick, although I would be remiss if I didn't mention that toll the dead is a fun one, as is Thaumaturgy if you want to lean more into the supernatural end of this build.
Fourth level Warlocks (4) get an Ability Score Improvement or a Feat. Eldritch Adept will allow you to pick an Invocation from the Warlock's potential Invocations, so long as you meet any prerequisites that exist for said Invocation. In this case, we'll pick up Book of Ancient Secrets, which allows you to inscribe rituals in on your Book of Shadows portrait, getting two level one spells from any list (not just Warlock and not necessarily both off of the same list) so long as they have the ritual tag. Like the original Pact of the Tome powers, they don't count against the number of spells you know, but still count as Warlock spells for you. However, you can only cast them if you have your book portrait in hand and even then only can cast them as rituals and under the normal rules for rituals.
You can also add rituals you find to your book portrait so long as they're of a spell level equal to half your warlock level, rounded up. For each level, the process takes 2 hours and costs 50 gold pieces for the inks needed to inscribe them. Clearly, Basil was not working on the cheap!
Fifth level Warlocks (5) get no new abilities beyond a new Invocation. Aspect of the Moon assures that Dorian does not need to sleep and can't be put to sleep magically. He still gains the benefits from a short or long rest by being inactive for that period.
At sixth level, Warlocks (6) who followed the path of the Undying can Defy Death. When the warlock succeeds on a death saving throw or stabilizes another creature with Spare the Dying, they receive a boost of hitpoints equal to 1d8 + their Constitution modifier. Once this feature is used once, it can't be used again until after a long rest.
Seventh level Warlocks (7) get another Invocation, in this case we'll be taking Bewitching Whispers, which allows Dorian to cast compulsion using a warlock spell slot once per long rest.
At eighth level, Warlocks (8) gain another Ability Score Improvement or a Feat. Pop a point into your Charisma and Constitution.
At ninth level, Warlocks (9) gain another Invocation, and we're going to go with Gift of the Protectors. A new page bit of canvas is found untouched on your portrait upon which you can inscribe the name of an individual or (with your permission) the individual can write their name themselves. If said individual is dropped to 0 hit points, they magically drop to 1 instead. Once this gets triggered, no creature can have the same benefit until the warlock has a long rest.
At tenth level, Warlocks (10) on the path of the Undying gain an Undying Nature. They can hold their breath indefinitely, and they don't have to eat, sleep, or drink. They can still suffer exhaustion and still gain the benefits of long or short rests. In addition, they age at a rate of one year for every ten that pass. Congratulations! We have gotten to the closest we can get to effective immortality in D&D without going Mumm-Ra's Clone route or using a Boon from the Dungeon Master's Guide. Ironically, when we hit 14th level, it'll get even better!
For now, let's kick it into eleventh level, where Warlocks (11) gain their first Mystic Arcanum. Basically, they select a 6th level spell from the Warlock spell list that they may cast once, having to take a long rest to regain the ability. As I said, I won't be giving suggestions for spells in this build, but Mass Suggestion might help you get out of a dangerous mob... see what I did there? Oh, True Seeing is another good one.
Twelfth level Warlocks (12) get another Ability Score Improvement or Feat. Pump up that Constitution and Charisma. I know you can do it!
Said Warlocks also get another Invocation. Trickster's Escape allows you to cast freedom of movement once on yourself per long rest. I don't have to go over the virtues of freedom of movement, largely because I already have.
At thirteenth level, Warlocks (13) get their 7th level Mystic Arcanum. Go nuts, kids! No wrong answers here!
At fourteenth level, Warlocks (14) on the Undying path now have an Indestructible Life. Using this feature, you can automatically regain a number of hit points equal to 1d8 + your Warlock level. You can also reattach severed body parts. This, however, can only be done once per short or long rest.
At fifteenth level, Warlocks (15) get their 8th level Mystic Arcanum and another Invocation. Tomb of Levistus is a handy power that allows you to entomb yourself in ice as a reaction when you take damage. You gain 10 temporary hit points per level of warlock, which will take as much of the incoming damage as possible. At fifteenth, this is 150 damage, at twentieth, it'll be 200! However, this comes with some drawbacks. You gain vulnerability to fire damage, your speed is reduced to 0 and you are counted as incapacitated. When the ice melts, all of it goes away... including the temporary hit points, so be sure to use this carefully.
Plus, you can't use it again until you finish a short or long rest.
At sixteenth level, Warlocks (16) get another Ability Score Improvement or Feat. Keep pumping into what we've been pumping into. It's been working pretty well so far.
Seventeenth level Warlocks (17) get their 9th level Mystic Arcanum. Don't even tell me you weren't thinking of Power Word Kill, because I know you totally were.
Eighteenth level Warlocks (18) get the final Invocation. Shroud of Shadow allows you to cast invisibility at will without using a spell slot.
Ninteenth level Warlocks (19) get our final Ability Score Improvement or Feat. You know what to do in this situation.
At twentieth level, a Warlock (20) reaches the pinnacle of their abilities as an Eldritch Master, and may appeal to their patron for 1 minute in order to regain all expended spell slots from their Pact Magic. Once they have done this, they must finish a long rest to do so again.
Now that we've reached level 20, let's look at our pros and cons!
Pros:
- Dorian will make an excellent party face with a high Charisma modifier to boost his Deception, Intimidation, and Persuasion skills.
- Dorian will be able to keep others alive with Spare the Dying and himself alive with the various abilities he has that heal himself.
- He might not even need said abilities with the Tough feat and a higher than normal Constitution score (18 by the end of the build), he's a bit on the beefy side for a Warlock.
Cons:
- Unfortunately, beefy does not mean "difficult to hit". While a lot of Dorian's magical abilities are around disguise, deception, and distraction... dodging appears to be the one 'D' that he missed and that can spell a lot of trouble.
- The lack of spell slots for the Warlock will force you to play strategically. A high Charisma will help make sure that your blows land, but once they're gone, they're gone... and getting them back is a pain at any rate.
- Your dump stat is Wisdom, one of the most called for Saving Throws in the game. Good job! Next time, maybe tell Lord Wotton to shut up and leave.
But hey, you're Dorian Gray, a nobleman with the face of an angel and a heart blacker than almost any demon in Hell apart from Lucifer himself! Break the heart of that actress you claimed to love but not really, down all the opium you can get your hands on in good ol' London town, and definitely don't blackmail a chemist to pull a Walter White on the body of someone you unalived in a fit of rage. Just be careful about keeping your eyes open. Your good looks will only get you so far, and someone is bound to end up cutting you down to size!
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