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Can a multiclassed Warlock use a spell slot from the Spellcasting feature of a non-Warlock class to perform Eldritch Smites?

Eldritch Smite says:

Once per turn when you hit a creature with your pact weapon, you can expend a warlock spell slot to deal an extra d8 force damage to a target, plus another d8 per level of the spel slot, and you knock the targert prone if it is huge or smaller.

The multiclassing rule for Spell Slots (PHB, page 164) says:

You determine your available spell slots by adding together all your levels in the bard, cleric, druid, sorcerer, and wizard classes, half your levels (rounded down) in the paladin and ranger classes, and a third of your fighter or rogue levels (rounded down) if you have the Eldritch Knight or the Arcane Trickster feature. Use this total to determine your spell slots by consulting the Multiclass Spellcaster table.

Pact Magic (PHB, page 107) says:

If you have both the Spellcasting class feature and the Pact Magic class feature from the warlock class, you can use the spell slots you gain from the Pact Magic feature to cast spells you know or have prepared from classes with the Spellcasting class feature, and you can use the spell slots you gain from the Spellcasting class feature to cast warlock spells you know.

(All emphasis mine.)

It's pretty clear to me that spell slots are supposed to be interchangeable. You can't know which ones are paladin and which ones are sorcerer, for example. It is easy to tell warlock spell slots apart from the others however, but it seems you can cast paladin spells using warlock slots, so the intention here seems to be interchangeable as well.

Can you use a Spellcasting spell slot to Eldritch Smite?

I know from the question "If I multiclass into Paladin, can I use up any class's spell slots for Divine Smite?" that Divine Smite can use Warlock slots, but I want to know if it works the other way around as well.

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2 Answers 2

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Eldritch Smite is Warlock slot only

Only warlock spell slots from the Pact Magic feature can be expended to use Eldritch Smite; spell slots from the Spellcasting feature do not work with it.

An unofficial tweet by rules designer Jeremy Crawford in November 2017 confirms that this was intentional (unlike the paladin's Divine Smite, which had similar wording initially but was changed in errata later to work with any spell slot):

Talking about Eldritch Smite; can you only use Warlock spell slots to power it, or can you use any slot (à la Divine Smite)? The RAW on it specifies Warlock slots.

Eldritch Smite works with warlock spell slots only—the ones you get from Pact Magic.

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Can you use a Spellcasting spell slot to Eldritch Smite?

No

The invocation description says: "you can expend a warlock spell slot".

Therefore the only spell slots you can use for the smite are Warlock spell slots.

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    \$\begingroup\$ No need for JC tweets or anything else. It is in the rule itself, really clearly. \$\endgroup\$
    – Protonflux
    Commented Jan 3, 2018 at 17:35
  • \$\begingroup\$ it could have been a typo like the paladin smite was when it first came out \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 24, 2018 at 3:19
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    \$\begingroup\$ It could be, but as it stands that is the RAW. Of course you can have a house rule that any spell slot could be used, I certainly don't see that as over-powered, even though it breaks the obvious restriction of only a small number of smites per short rest. You lose the spell slot you use which will effect what you do elsewhere. \$\endgroup\$
    – Protonflux
    Commented Jan 25, 2018 at 15:25
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Protonflux AFAIK, the RAW never defines "warlock spell slots". Warlock levels grant spell slots via the Pact Magic class feature (PHB p. 107). A warlock can cast warlock spells using spell slots gained EITHER from the Pact Magic class feature or the Spellcasting class feature (PHB p. 164). Does "warlock spell slots" refer to slots granted by the warlock class or to slots that can cast warlock spells? The paladin errata suggests the latter (i.e. that "[class] spell slots" means slots that can be used to cast [class] spells). Crawford's tweet resolves the matter; it should be the former. \$\endgroup\$
    – Greg Faust
    Commented Jul 11, 2018 at 0:02

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