Too many warlock versus other casters

[Cybren]

Back in the days of yore my issue with Warlock wasn't the mechanical power (though the very first blast was off the charts), but the awful cost becoming one would not be reflected, either in the RP of the individual players (frankly a great many characters are so full of themselves and their own general awesomeness it was hard to imagine them RPing fear of their patron, and less still the lack of free will that comes with the pact), or by the mechanics themselves.

The part I bolded confuses me. Arelith decided to invent lore that warlocks have to do cosmic soul crimes to get power. Surely there would be no need to hand wring about people not properly role playing “the awful cost” if we uh, didn’t impose that cost contrary to how warlocks work in the source material we are ostensibly drawing from?

The text for warlocks in 3.5 makes it clear you can get warlock powers without even intending to do so.

Warlocks are born, not made. Some are the descendants of people who trafficked with demons and devils long ago. Some seek out the dark powers as youths, driven by ambition or the desire for power, but a few blameless individuals are simply marked out by the supernatural forces as conduits and tools. The exact nature of a warlock's origin is up to the player to decide; just as a sorcerer is not beholden to the magic-wielding ancestor that bequeathed his bloodline with arcane power, a warlock is not bound to follow the source that gifted him with magic.

[Kuma]

Also, the "awful cost" in days of yore was giving up your bard song and literally nothing else. It was on the bard chassis and you HAD to take it in character by finding the NPC. There was no implications of selling your soul, fealty, or any other services rendered- you just gave up your bardsong.

I appreciate and respect Irongron's approach to this and if he says so that's how it is, but it is pretty incorrect to say there's a great and terrible cost and it's fully willing by canon purposes- this is wholly an Arelithism, further influenced and compounded by later editions.

Warlocks are closer to weird sorcerers. The way we've rules lawyered them makes them closer to the Disciple of [demon lord/etc] class from a few splatbooks, unfortunately.

[Cybren]

Also to encourage more people to play non warlocks we should send anyone with 27 or more wizard or sorcerer levels on a character in their vault $45

[miesny_jez]

If there (supposedly) are so many warlocks versus normal casters, shouldn't we be actually seeing RP plots of warlocks hunting other casters out and branding them as outliers and evils of the world?

Its the majority which dictates the social rules after all, and the norm of "warlock=evil" and "brand him out" is a social construct only in the server.

Sure in DND maybe they are rare but if here they are a majority then why not warlock to become the new norm and a traditional caster be the outlier