At 1st level, a warlock gains the Otherworldly Patron feature. The following Snow Queen option is available to a warlock in addition to those normally offered.
Snow Queen
You derive your arcane powers from the Snow Queen, queen of the snowflakes or “snow bees”, who travels throughout the world with the snow. The Snow Queens and gardens are in the lands permafrost. She is a mysterious figure. Some believe she is evil. Others see her as benevolent.
Those who take power from her control the might of frost and cold. Her followers are emissaries for the cold, and act as her ambassadors in the warmer lands. Naturally cold creatures such as frost giants and white dragons revere and respect the Snow Queen’s warlocks, mostly out of fear of her wrath.
Expanded Spell List
The Snow Queen grants you an expanded list of spells when you learn a warlock spell. The following spells are added to the warlock spell list for you.
| Spell Level | Spells |
| 1st | fog cloud, mage armor |
| 2nd | gentle repose, gust of wind |
| 3rd | protection from energy, sleet storm |
| 4th | control water, ice storm |
| 5th | cone of cold, dominate person |
Bonus Cantrip
At 1st level, you learn the ray of frost cantrip. It counts as a warlock cantrip for you, but it doesn’t count against your number of cantrips known.
The Snow Queen’s Blessings
Starting at 1st level, when you cast the mage armor spell and target yourself, the armor appears as a thin sheen of ice that surrounds your body. In addition to the armor provided by the spell, you gain the following benefits for the duration:
- You can ignore difficult terrain created by ice or snow.
- You can tolerate temperatures as low as -50 degrees Fahrenheit without any additional protection. If you wear heavy clothes, you can tolerate temperatures as low as -100 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Whenever you take cold damage, the amount of damage that you take is reduced by an amount equal to your levels in this class (to a minimum of 0). If you have resistance against cold damage and take cold damage, this benefit is factored in after your resistance reduces the damage by half.
Cold-blooded
At 6th level, in addition to the other benefits you gain from your Snow Queen’s Blessings feature, you also gain the following benefits:
- You gain resistance to cold damage.
- You can tolerate temperatures as high as 150 degrees Fahrenheit without any additional protection.
- Whenever you cast a spell that deals cold damage, you can add your Charisma modifier to one of the damage rolls of that spell against one of its targets.
Ice Heart
At 10th level, your connection to the Snow Queen arms and protects you further. You have advantage on saving throws against being charmed or frightened. In addition, whenever a creature makes a melee weapon attack against you while standing within 5 feet of you, the creature must make a Constitution saving throw against your spell save DC. On a failed saving throw, the creature takes 2d6 cold damage and has disadvantage on its attack rolls and ability checks until the end of its next turn. On a successful saving throw, the creature takes half as much damage and suffers no further effects.
Flash Freeze
Starting at 14th level, when you hit a creature with a ranged spell attack that deals cold damage or a creature fails its saving throw against one of your spell that deals cold damage, you can use this feature to partially freeze the creature; the creature is restrained. A creature restrained by this feature must make another Constitution saving throw at the end of each of its turns. If it successfully saves against this feature two times, the effect ends. if it fails it saves two times, the creature dies and becomes a frozen statue until it thaws. If the creature is immune to cold damage or it has legendary actions, it is immune to this effect.
Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you complete a long rest.
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I like this. I once [back in D&D 3.0, into 3.5, so about 2003 onwards] created a Witch PC, using the Sorcerer variant in the 3.0 DMG, and featured cold Spells for the Character, some with variants.
For the Patron Spells, I respectfully suggest the following changes:
Level 1: Frost Fingers [Cold equivalent of Burning Hands] instead of Fog Cloud;
OR:
Level 1: Ice Knife instead of Fog Cloud [from Princes of Elemental Evil campaign book]
Level 2: Snilloc’s Snowball Swarm [From the Princes of Elemental Evil campaign book] instead of Gust of Wind.
These changes would make the Patron Spell list more obviously winter-like and Cold-oriented.
As an interest note “Frost Fingers” originally appeared as a Magic-User [read: Wizard, nowadays] Spell in an original count White Dwarf magazine issue, in a “New Spells” article for Spells sent in by readers, back in around 1980 or so [And yes, I DO have that magazine issue, somewhere!!].
Respectfully yours,
Christopher Simpson.
Hey thanks for the suggestions. Usually, with spells, I only go for PHB/SRD stuff so it’s more accessible. Of course, everyone is free to use whatever they want so long as it’s level 1. 🙂
For an interesting “Snow Queen” portrayal, in addition to “The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe” [Narnia Chronicles], have you read “The Snow Queen” by Joan D. Vinge? This is a Magnum Opus of a Sci-Fi novel, at around 470pp. Although technology-driven,being Sci-Fi, it is an interesting take on an otherwise fantasy story.
Regards,
Christopher Simpson.
Interesting. I read a little bit of the original while doing research on this. It’s pretty wild!