Unorthodox Warlock Patrons

I am not making new subclasses here, just brainstorming some new ways to fluff what you have. I mean, for all the different subclasses that there are, they're all boring; vaguely evil god that might either get in the way or just be an enemy of an enemy situation gives powers to some random PC. Whatever. There's good patrons now, I think, maybe that was still in UA, but the formula doesn't really change.

So here's some ideas to spice up your Warlock's life (or your own, if you should be so lucky).

Q

No, not the annoying character from Star Trek (I'll get there), but the guy who fits out James Bond with all his technogadgetry. Their patron is a living person they see regularly who gives them some new things to try out. Only a few at a time, things that need to recharge, things that have been built specifically for them and cannot be shared between characters, but they are still gadgets and gear rather than powers. EB is now a special handheld crossbow that, as they level up, is improved to fire quicker, or gets other abilities based on invocations. Fireball is literally a grenade. Might take a little work and imagination, as well as some player buy-in, both from the player and everyone else in the group, to suspend disbelief and just imagine that only the Warlock can use these cool items and happens to have the ones they want to cast, but it'd work. It'd be amazing with a Warforged.

The Muse of An…Protagonists

So I'm stealing this from Threshold, go look them up on youtube, dead channel but better than any other DnD youtube channel out there, fight me. Ok, got distracted, but there are muses, right? What if the evil muse became a patron. "My sister gets all the fame and glory and appreciation, and it's only because we're the story. There's good and evil, and I got to play the evil part, patron of Antagonists, where do you think that gets me? Nowhere, I always lose. Well I'm tired of it, so I thought, why not change the story? If I'm sponsoring the Protagonist, then I become one too." Basically, the whole thing gets very meta, with the patron constantly describing their warlock as a player in a game, just part of a story, and maybe literally breaking the fourth wall if you want to get real meta. Because the story is the power, the story is what matters, not the actual sides of the story, and this muse is more focused on making sure she wins in her own story for once.

Themselves

Maybe the warlock has no idea who they in fact get their powers from. Some shadowy figure behind the curtain, that's all they know (Warlocks are not well known for their Wisdom scores). Maybe it's actually them all along. Their powers are their own, their growth is their own; the patron is an illusion constructed to make them not fear failing. Who would make such an illusion? Why, themselves from an alternate Universe / Timeline! They know best why they don't believe in themselves, so they also knew best that to get them to save the world they'd have to make them think that they actually had powers when they were actually encouraging them to progress themselves! Confusing enough? With this patron, it should be, that's the fun. What if it is ever revealed? Do they trust themselves? Could be great drama.

Rufus

Rip off Bill and Ted so that the patron is from the future and wants to protect the timeline. They go back in time to give this PC what they need to succeed, maybe even actually downloading the powers into their brains Matrix style. Every time they meet this traveler, it's a moment of fear. "You're going to need this," they say, handing over some new invocation. "For what," asks the player. "If you knew, you might not do it," responds their patron. I would love the foreboding that happened every level up.

Broker

This shady figure gives them tasks in exchange for powers. The tasks aren’t for the broker, they’re for some third party that works through him to get things done. Same with the powers; they offer a reward for tasks done, and the broker redistributes as he will to ensure as many tasks get done and he gets a cut of everything.

Every level up becomes a negotiation where they are exchanging new powers for some new plot hook. I like this one for turning levelling up into something slightly harrowing and interesting, which the next one does as well. There’s also lots of opportunity for humor with pyramid schemes and whatnot.

Q

Ok, Star Trek this time. I hated Q at first, but he's grown on me a little. Not the character, but the arc that he guides other characters through. The problem with Q is that he wants to give you all the power just for funsies, to show that everyone would be as capricious and evil as he is if they just had access to the same powers he does. So that's the temptation. Not the traditional, "warlock patron might be evil and work against the party," drama, but man versus self drama. Can the player, when constantly offered more, take only what they need? When they do level up, it comes at the cost of making their patron really smug, "See, I know you'd need that extra spell slot, are you sure you won't take more?" It totally turns the idea of leveling on its head, and for the right player, it'd be perfect.

Conclusion

What I've noticed while typing is that Warlocks, as generally written and played, generally only target one, maybe two of the classic literary conflicts; man versus supernatural, or maybe man versus man. Boring. My quick brainstorm can help you hit all sorts of others; man versus technology, man versus story, man versus self, man versus fate, and uh, man versus self again but in a totally different way. Conflict and its resolution is why we make stories, and it's kinda lame that Warlocks, pretty much the only class with a conflict built into their powers, only ever plays out the same sort of conflict over and over. Change up the patron and tell some totally different stories.