more specifically, both are a transactional relationship. deities gain power through the prayer and devotion of mortal souls. like Goku with the spirit bomb. you don’t actually lose anything in the transaction, but it will go away of you stop praying and following your deities rules.
warlocks on the other hand typically lose something in the transaction. but really it’s just a more traditional transaction is all. you have some patron of some power beyond mortals and they want something other than prayer because they are not divine and prayer won’t help them much. most classically this is a demon giving power in exchange for a soul, but it could also be the tooth fairy in exchange for the molars of your enemies if you really wanted.
To add onto this, clerics power comes directly from their deity. However rare of an occurrence it may be, the deity can decide not to grant the cleric their spells, if they were so inclined.
Warlocks are granted knowledge of how to perform/access their power, in exchange for their service. If they fail to hold up their end of the bargain, the patron can refuse to teach them any more, but the warlock retains the knowledge and powers he has already obtained.
This is very open to interpretation, if only because most DMs are familiar with older rulesets that would make them lose their powers for breaking the pact.
There aren’t any required mechanics but I’m sure there’s a pactbreaker optional rule somewhere in the source books.
Prayer.
more specifically, both are a transactional relationship. deities gain power through the prayer and devotion of mortal souls. like Goku with the spirit bomb. you don’t actually lose anything in the transaction, but it will go away of you stop praying and following your deities rules.
warlocks on the other hand typically lose something in the transaction. but really it’s just a more traditional transaction is all. you have some patron of some power beyond mortals and they want something other than prayer because they are not divine and prayer won’t help them much. most classically this is a demon giving power in exchange for a soul, but it could also be the tooth fairy in exchange for the molars of your enemies if you really wanted.
I really like the Warlock in the Weekly Roll comic. Their patron is a traditional angel.
https://m.webtoons.com/en/canvas/the-weekly-roll/ch-66-be-not-afraid/viewer?title_no=358889&episode_no=68
I love that the angel is a d8 lmao
Link didn’t work for me with the amp; in it.
Here’s a link without it for anyone with the same issue:
https://www.webtoons.com/en/canvas/the-weekly-roll/ch-66-be-not-afraid/viewer?title_no=358889&episode_no=68&webtoon-platform-redirect=true
To add onto this, clerics power comes directly from their deity. However rare of an occurrence it may be, the deity can decide not to grant the cleric their spells, if they were so inclined.
Warlocks are granted knowledge of how to perform/access their power, in exchange for their service. If they fail to hold up their end of the bargain, the patron can refuse to teach them any more, but the warlock retains the knowledge and powers he has already obtained.
This is very open to interpretation, if only because most DMs are familiar with older rulesets that would make them lose their powers for breaking the pact.
There aren’t any required mechanics but I’m sure there’s a pactbreaker optional rule somewhere in the source books.