Dungeons and Dragons dropped a playtest for four entirely new subclasses on January 15, and one is a clear winner when it comes to theme. The Vestige Patron Warlock is a unique take on this class, because your patron needs you more than you need it. A Vestige Warlock gets their power from a dying god that is desperate to restore its former power. To achieve this, it's promised you magical powers - and agreed to follow you everywhere as a pet.
There are many DnD classes that focus on adding pets to the party, but few of them can boast that they've got a literal god following them around. Mechanically, this deity manifests as the level-three subclass feature Vestige Companion.
Like most summons in D&D, you can command it in combat with a bonus action, or you can leave it to take the Dodge action and spend its reactions freely. The Vestige disappears when it drops to zero HP, but you can spend a minute performing a magic ceremony to bring your buddy back. You can also temporarily dismiss the Vestige to a pocket dimension if it's ever getting on your nerves.
Stats-wise, the Vestige's AC is determined by your Charisma modifier, while its HP scales with your Warlock 5e level. When you summon it, you choose whether it's a Fiend, Undead, or Celestial. This determines the Vestige's damage resistance and the effects of its once-a-day Divine Power bonus action.
Undead can curse a creature to give it disadvantage on attack rolls against you and the Vestige, Fiends can swap places with you when you're within 60 feet, and Celestials can restore HP and end the blinded, deafened, or poisoned conditions. All Vestiges also have a basic Vestige's Strike attack action (1d6 + 3 + your Charisma modifier) whose damage type depends on your choice of creature type.
Vestige Warlocks also gain additional Vestige Spells at level three. The Domain spells belonging to a certain kind of Cleric (Life, Light, Trickery, or War) are Warlock spells for you, and you always have them prepared. You're still restrained by the class' extremely limited spell slots, but the thought of a Warlock casting Fireball or Spirit Guardians at the highest level is pretty pleasing.
At level six, your Vestige Companion can now use its Divine Power once per rest rather than once per day, which makes it feel significantly less rubbish. Level 10 gives the Vestige a new magic action: creating a 30-foot emanation around it that grants your allies resistance to fire, necrotic, and radiant damage, as well as immunity to being charmed or frightened. Plus, if you reach zero HP while in the aura, you regain HP equal to your Warlock level and Charisma modifier. All of these powers can only be used once per long rest, but they're darned handy to have.
The level-14 capstone is Semblance of Life, which lets you temporarily transform your Vestige's stat block. For one minute, they take on the form found in the Summon Celestial, Summon Undead, or Summon Fiend spell. Its stats behave as if you'd upcast one of those spells to a level equal to half your Warlock level. Naturally, this is also a once-per-long-rest deal.
At first glance, the Vestige Warlock doesn't seem like an overly powerful character option. Your Vestige Companion and additional spells are certainly useful, but there's nothing ridiculous about the powers they offer. This is a flexible, all-rounder Warlock that can fill many niches, but doesn't overwhelmingly excel in any of them.
Maybe that's not such a bad thing. Despite a lack of build optimization, I'm more excited about a subclass than I have been for some time. That's thanks to an excellent concept rather than pure math.
You can see the full Warlock writeup in Wizards of the Coast's playtest document. If you'd like to share your own thoughts on the subclass, join the conversation in the Wargamer Discord.