My question is, using the 2nd level spell Magic Weapon to make a non-magical bow into a magical weapon. the spell lasts for an hour, and says the weapon becomes a magic weapon with a +1 bonus. By an exact reading, you /should/ be able to bond the bow in the 1 hour window that it's magical. As long as you don't unbond, it should remain bonded. The bond criteria does not include the weapon no longer being magical.
Clever. If you have a party member capable of casting it that is a interesting work around.
While I suppose that's clever, I personally dislike this approach to the game and the rules. If your DM allows it, more power to you.
My question is, using the 2nd level spell Magic Weapon to make a non-magical bow into a magical weapon. the spell lasts for an hour, and says the weapon becomes a magic weapon with a +1 bonus. By an exact reading, you /should/ be able to bond the bow in the 1 hour window that it's magical. As long as you don't unbond, it should remain bonded. The bond criteria does not include the weapon no longer being magical.
Clever. If you have a party member capable of casting it that is a interesting work around.
While I suppose that's clever, I personally dislike this approach to the game and the rules. If your DM allows it, more power to you.
Fair enough, a balance a DM could choose is something like its a pact weapon while the spell is active. So you still don't need a permanently enchanted weapon, but it wont keep a bow bound forever. Though with the BA binding once a magic ranged weapon enters the game the limit is pretty pointless. But I kind of think gimmicks like this fit the classes theme.
I use Fantasy Grounds, and I have run through many mock battles with a Pactblade. I must state that I am quite underwhelmed.
First, I am a bit disappointed that the Pact Blade no longer has the +1. But now that Weapon Mastery is a thing, and you do not get it, it feels even worse in comparison to others fighting with weapons.
I keep scratching my head about the low AC, and I keep telling myself there must be something they see that I do not. Armor of Shadows is not worth it because you generally then have to go without Eldritch Mind, which you need for your Concentration Saves, unless you plan not to use Hex or Witch Bolt, et al.
It is great that Armor of Agathys takes a Bonus Action to cast, but it generally does not last beyond two hits. If you do throw on Hex or Witch Bolt to a target, you are empty of spell slots, and that sweet Hellish Rebuke sits collecting dust. Even with Fiendish Vigor, topping your Temp HP to twelve is not that great, especially above the fifth level. I’m not sure that this is a gish because the Pact Blade is out of spells by the second round and maybe the first.
And the Feats! Where are the Feats for a Pact Blade? What Feats boost your Charisma and your weapon-fighting ability? I created a TWF Ranger, and though everyone is down on the Ranger, it kicks the Pact Blade’s butt with its Nic, Vex, Vex attack with Hunter’s Mark (Hex.) I sure hope a supplement comes out quickly with new Invocations that boost AC; but, I’m not sure the Pact Blade has a spare Invocation to switch out for anything like that. Polearm Master does not boost your Charisma, and so I am not sure the point of going Pact Blade where the whole point is to be able to use a weapon with your Char modifier, and you'll be lacking at a 17.
You seem happy with the subclass. Have you run it through some mock battles? Oh, BTW, I agree that Archfey is fun!
I do not see the purpose of the Pact Blade. I may as well skip it and rely on Eldritch Blast, which with Spell Sniper, let’s you use it in melee, AND you can push your target/s back. You get three beams at 11, similar to the Pact of the Blade attacks, and four beams at 17!
Its as much of a gish as a caster who gets 9th level spells should be imo. It should be falling behind paladin, fighter, barbarian etc in melee combat.
Low Ac: sort of its a decent bit lower than a tank, not that much lower than a two handed or dual wielder.
Armor of Agathys, all temp hit points top it off and keep it going, so it will last longer than previously. Also imo it should reduce how often you get hit. If me and my 2 buddies are fighting a dude with some weird blue energy around him and my buddy frank stabs him to no seeming effect but the blue energy lashes out and freezes him solid, guess what I am not doing on my turn.
Feats: I sort of agree on this point if you take feats to be better in combat your charisma stagnates and the point of pact of the blade is you use your charisma to attack. It is one of the we will see in play things I guess which unfortunately takes a lot of time as one offs here and there don't really show it.
If you want to see how far pact of the blade can go check out d4 deep dive hes doing 2024 PH builds and he started with a pact of the blade single class. It wasn't crazy OP but it seemed decent. And imo you'd likely have 1 free invocation on his build for armor fo shadows and its 1 Ac, but he assumes no magic items where as you likely can get +1 studded leather fairly early. He only calculates DPR and its a fairly optimistic white room take
Edit to add and I suspect you will find eldirtch blast just as if not more underwhelming, you wont be dual wielding hand crossbows or getting a heavy weapon mastery on your long bow so your damage will be even more behind a martial there.
Pact of the Blade is just all and all pretty underwhelming (IMO) compared to the Hexblade. You almost have to multi-class and the Warlock spells in the 2024 PHB are not great, especially for PotB.... it feels like you're better off playing an Eldritch Knight
Pact of the Blade is just all and all pretty underwhelming (IMO) compared to the Hexblade. You almost have to multi-class and the Warlock spells in the 2024 PHB are not great, especially for PotB.... it feels like you're better off playing an Eldritch Knight
Yeah, I think warlock got some great quality of life improvements. But the base expected damage went up so much they needed more than quality of life improvements to justify playing closer to a 1/2 caster than a full caster most the game. If you want more caster in your gish both 2024 valor bard and 2014 blade singer just trounce pact of the blade warlock.
First, I am a bit disappointed that the Pact Blade no longer has the +1. But now that Weapon Mastery is a thing, and you do not get it, it feels even worse in comparison to others fighting with weapons.
College of Valor Bards don't get Weapon Masteries either. I suspect the trend will be that you get it at 1st level or you don't get it at all. I suspect that when they are updated, Bladesinger Wizards, Armorer Artificers, Battle Master Artificers, Hexblade Warlocks, and anybody else I am forgetting will not get Weapon Masteries except by taking the Weapon Master feat.
Pact of the Blade is just all and all pretty underwhelming (IMO) compared to the Hexblade. You almost have to multi-class and the Warlock spells in the 2024 PHB are not great, especially for PotB.... it feels like you're better off playing an Eldritch Knight
Yeah, I think warlock got some great quality of life improvements. But the base expected damage went up so much they needed more than quality of life improvements to justify playing closer to a 1/2 caster than a full caster most the game. If you want more caster in your gish both 2024 valor bard and 2014 blade singer just trounce pact of the blade warlock.
I don’t know that the valor bard “trounces” bladelock; Trantmonk shows for damage at least the two are similar. 2024 rules bards and warlocks both lack melee support, and unless the bard abuses the obviously broken conjure elementals after level 10, the bladelock will surpass by quite a bit once you get to level 12-13. I’m not sure a hexblade would be much different than PotB in 2024 rules (if you only convert over). The issue for warlock is lack of significant support for the style until you get the 3rd attack.
Overall it leaves me wondering if the warlock overall got enough in the new rules compared to other classes. 1 extra spell per short rest (for 10 levels) is still pretty weak, depending on how often you get to short rest.
Pact of the Blade is just all and all pretty underwhelming (IMO) compared to the Hexblade. You almost have to multi-class and the Warlock spells in the 2024 PHB are not great, especially for PotB.... it feels like you're better off playing an Eldritch Knight
Yeah, I think warlock got some great quality of life improvements. But the base expected damage went up so much they needed more than quality of life improvements to justify playing closer to a 1/2 caster than a full caster most the game. If you want more caster in your gish both 2024 valor bard and 2014 blade singer just trounce pact of the blade warlock.
I don’t know that the valor bard “trounces” bladelock; Trantmonk shows for damage at least the two are similar. 2024 rules bards and warlocks both lack melee support, and unless the bard abuses the obviously broken conjure elementals after level 10, the bladelock will surpass by quite a bit once you get to level 12-13. I’m not sure a hexblade would be much different than PotB in 2024 rules (if you only convert over). The issue for warlock is lack of significant support for the style until you get the 3rd attack.
Overall it leaves me wondering if the warlock overall got enough in the new rules compared to other classes. 1 extra spell per short rest (for 10 levels) is still pretty weak, depending on how often you get to short rest.
Yes, the bards damage is similar while they are a full caster with better defenses, that is trouncing them. Heck bards have enough spell slots they can apparently beat warlock baseline by just casting cloud of daggers over and over. The warlock in theory is supposed to be rocking out single target damage because they are giving up being a full caster. The designers expressed it directly, because of eldritch blast is SO powerful they can't justify giving warlocks more casting power than pact magic. Which was fine in 2014 because it was true, they did enough damage via pact of the blade or eldritch blast to be a contributor in single target damage, they no longer are, especially with eldritch blast.
They aren't the only class that needs a rebalancing, I think rangers and rogues need a bit of love as well. But the warlocks baseline gets blown out and its hard to go pact of the blade given how bad their defenses are. Sure you can multiclass to get better armor, but once that is opened up a bard etc can dip lock as well.
In XGtE the Subclass does not have a Feature called Pact of the Blade. So. Can you take this invocation on a 2024 Warlock with the 2014 Subclass.
There is no official answer as of yet. My assumption is that it now requires the Pact of the Blade feature.
I take Pact of the Blade Invocation and DDBeyond does NOT let be pick Improved Pact Weapon Invocation
Improved Pact Weapon
Prerequisite: Pact of the Blade feature
You can use any weapon you summon with your Pact of the Blade feature as a spellcasting focus for your warlock spells. ~~~Same as Pact of the Blade Level 1 Invocation.
In addition, the weapon gains a +1 bonus to its attack and damage rolls, unless it is a magic weapon that already has a bonus to those rolls. ~~~NOT part of Pact of the Blade
Finally, the weapon you conjure can be a shortbow, longbow, light crossbow, or heavy crossbow. ~~~ Not part of Pact of the Blade.
I suspect the intent is to let you use them, but they have not updated the system yet to allow it. One of the flaws with a reboot with their backwards compatibility. Invocations take up such little space its disappointing they didn't just redo them all.
I suspect the intent is to let you use them, but they have not updated the system yet to allow it. One of the flaws with a reboot with their backwards compatibility. Invocations take up such little space its disappointing they didn't just redo them all.
It would have added at least 4 pages (1 sheet front and back folded in the middle). Which probably would have added content that players would have enjoyed, but keep in mind that each Character and Chapter starts on a fresh page. And the additional 4 pages would have incurred additional writing, art, layout, printing, and binding costs. I'm down for a 640 page Player's Handbook that updated all the 2014-2024 player options, but not everyone is.
At a glance, the 2024 pact of the blade looks even better than the 2014 version. Technically, the pact is better, but there are a number of things that have changed in the 2024 version and reduced its viability as a top-tier damage dealer as well as the loss of the Hexblade. It is convenient that you can get it at level 1 now. The weapon used to get through resistance to non-magical weapon damage, but those resistances seem to have either disappeared, or been turned into complete resistance to bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing damage. Now it gives you the ability to change the damage type of your pact weapon to psychic, radiant, or necrotic, which is probably to compensate. The pact of the blade now lets you use your charisma modifier for melee weapon attack and damage rolls, which means that you don't need the hexblade subclass to use this feature, (probably because the subclass doesn't actually exist in the 2024 rules) which is much more convenient. However the hexblade gives you other very necessary things like medium armor and shield proficiency as well as hexblade's curse, letting you crank up your AC and regain lost hit points as well. All that, combined with the second weapon the Hexblade would also let you use with charisma made the dual-wielding, charisma focused builds pretty viable in combat even though dual wielding builds weren't as good in that version. The pact of the blade doesn't give you 2 weapons to use charisma with, so you would want to just conjure a heavy weapon now, right? Well, Bladelocks got hit HARD with the new heavy weapons rules. You now need a strength of at least 13 to wield a heavy melee weapon without disadvantage, rather than just, not be small. And unfortunately, that 13 in strength you will need to get to wield those weapons, will probably result in less points in your dexterity score. This means that you may need to trade some of your AC just to get decent damage, even though you will probably be struggling to get AC already because you are a melee fighter who only has proficiency in light armor. And to add insult to injury, the pact of the blade doesn't give you a fighting style or ANY weapon masteries. I am honestly not sure why the pact of the blade doesn't include weapon mastery with your conjured pact weapon. It seems like a pretty big missed opportunity to me. Now, you can take a lvl 1 dip into fighter to get heavy armor proficiency, shield proficiency, weapon masteries, a fighting style, and a way to get a bit of self healing in, but I don't really like that multiclassing should have to be this necessary to make a good bladelock. I definitely don't think that the bladelock is unviable, but it unfortunately isn't the great contender for top-tier damage that it used to be. Maybe if they got weapon masteries, better AC options, and if the invocation Improved Pact Weapon were still here or brought back it might be a different story. If they bring Improved Pact Weapon back, I think they should change the part that says you can use the weapon as a spellcasting focus (now is already a base pact of the blade feature), to the ability for your conjured ranged weapons to create their own magical ammunition.
Technically, the pact is better, but there are a number of things that have changed in the 2024 version and reduced its viability as a top-tier damage dealer as well as the loss of the Hexblade.
The Hexblade still exists. It just needs to be updated to the new pattern of Subclass features. The Hexblade patron will likely see an update due to how some of the mechanics have changed, but until then, you are free to use the Hexblade as is, aside from the adjustments per the PHB.
Please see this excellent summary, with references, from Silvva (a moderator here) about using previous content with the 2024 rules update.
And to add insult to injury, the pact of the blade doesn't give you a fighting style or ANY weapon masteries. I am honestly not sure why the pact of the blade doesn't include weapon mastery with your conjured pact weapon.
College of Valor Bards don't receive Weapon Masteries. The trend appears to be that Weapon Masteries are awarded at a class level and not a subclass level. A Warlock doesn't warrant them. A Wizard doesn't warrant them. An Artificer doesn't warrant them. As such, you won't see a Pact of the Blade/Hexblade (Warlock), Bladesinger (Wizard), Armorer (Artificer), Artillerist (Artificer), or Battle Smith (Artificer) with Weapon Mastery. The community often associates "uses weapons" with "needs weapon mastery" in 2024 and that is not the case.
The Hexblade still exists. It just needs to be updated to the new pattern of Subclass features. The Hexblade patron will likely see an update due to how some of the mechanics have changed, but until then, you are free to use the Hexblade as is, aside from the adjustments per the PHB.
Please see this excellent summary, with references, from Silvva (a moderator here) about using previous content with the 2024 rules update.
Yes, the 2024 version was made to be backwards compatible with 2014 content, but I think it would be best to ask your dm before using 2014 content in a 2024 version game. I wouldn't count on using 2014 content before talking to your dm, but I think it won't be a problem if you have a session zero anyway.
Btw, thank you for that summary! It is really in-depth and informative. Much appreciated!
Honestly at this point PotB is not going to allow for a melee warlock that can fight along a 2024 monk. Without weapon mastery it seems a bit of a joke, and I will just stick to the sidelines with eldritch blast.
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Are you really sure about that?
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While I suppose that's clever, I personally dislike this approach to the game and the rules. If your DM allows it, more power to you.
Fair enough, a balance a DM could choose is something like its a pact weapon while the spell is active. So you still don't need a permanently enchanted weapon, but it wont keep a bow bound forever. Though with the BA binding once a magic ranged weapon enters the game the limit is pretty pointless. But I kind of think gimmicks like this fit the classes theme.
Those are interesting thoughts.
I use Fantasy Grounds, and I have run through many mock battles with a Pactblade. I must state that I am quite underwhelmed.
First, I am a bit disappointed that the Pact Blade no longer has the +1. But now that Weapon Mastery is a thing, and you do not get it, it feels even worse in comparison to others fighting with weapons.
I keep scratching my head about the low AC, and I keep telling myself there must be something they see that I do not. Armor of Shadows is not worth it because you generally then have to go without Eldritch Mind, which you need for your Concentration Saves, unless you plan not to use Hex or Witch Bolt, et al.
It is great that Armor of Agathys takes a Bonus Action to cast, but it generally does not last beyond two hits. If you do throw on Hex or Witch Bolt to a target, you are empty of spell slots, and that sweet Hellish Rebuke sits collecting dust. Even with Fiendish Vigor, topping your Temp HP to twelve is not that great, especially above the fifth level. I’m not sure that this is a gish because the Pact Blade is out of spells by the second round and maybe the first.
And the Feats! Where are the Feats for a Pact Blade? What Feats boost your Charisma and your weapon-fighting ability? I created a TWF Ranger, and though everyone is down on the Ranger, it kicks the Pact Blade’s butt with its Nic, Vex, Vex attack with Hunter’s Mark (Hex.) I sure hope a supplement comes out quickly with new Invocations that boost AC; but, I’m not sure the Pact Blade has a spare Invocation to switch out for anything like that. Polearm Master does not boost your Charisma, and so I am not sure the point of going Pact Blade where the whole point is to be able to use a weapon with your Char modifier, and you'll be lacking at a 17.
You seem happy with the subclass. Have you run it through some mock battles? Oh, BTW, I agree that Archfey is fun!
I do not see the purpose of the Pact Blade. I may as well skip it and rely on Eldritch Blast, which with Spell Sniper, let’s you use it in melee, AND you can push your target/s back. You get three beams at 11, similar to the Pact of the Blade attacks, and four beams at 17!
Cheers!
/rant off
Its as much of a gish as a caster who gets 9th level spells should be imo. It should be falling behind paladin, fighter, barbarian etc in melee combat.
Low Ac: sort of its a decent bit lower than a tank, not that much lower than a two handed or dual wielder.
Armor of Agathys, all temp hit points top it off and keep it going, so it will last longer than previously. Also imo it should reduce how often you get hit. If me and my 2 buddies are fighting a dude with some weird blue energy around him and my buddy frank stabs him to no seeming effect but the blue energy lashes out and freezes him solid, guess what I am not doing on my turn.
Feats: I sort of agree on this point if you take feats to be better in combat your charisma stagnates and the point of pact of the blade is you use your charisma to attack. It is one of the we will see in play things I guess which unfortunately takes a lot of time as one offs here and there don't really show it.
If you want to see how far pact of the blade can go check out d4 deep dive hes doing 2024 PH builds and he started with a pact of the blade single class. It wasn't crazy OP but it seemed decent. And imo you'd likely have 1 free invocation on his build for armor fo shadows and its 1 Ac, but he assumes no magic items where as you likely can get +1 studded leather fairly early. He only calculates DPR and its a fairly optimistic white room take
Edit to add and I suspect you will find eldirtch blast just as if not more underwhelming, you wont be dual wielding hand crossbows or getting a heavy weapon mastery on your long bow so your damage will be even more behind a martial there.
Pact of the Blade is just all and all pretty underwhelming (IMO) compared to the Hexblade.
You almost have to multi-class and the Warlock spells in the 2024 PHB are not great, especially for PotB.... it feels like you're better off playing an Eldritch Knight
Yeah, I think warlock got some great quality of life improvements. But the base expected damage went up so much they needed more than quality of life improvements to justify playing closer to a 1/2 caster than a full caster most the game. If you want more caster in your gish both 2024 valor bard and 2014 blade singer just trounce pact of the blade warlock.
College of Valor Bards don't get Weapon Masteries either. I suspect the trend will be that you get it at 1st level or you don't get it at all. I suspect that when they are updated, Bladesinger Wizards, Armorer Artificers, Battle Master Artificers, Hexblade Warlocks, and anybody else I am forgetting will not get Weapon Masteries except by taking the Weapon Master feat.
How to add Tooltips.
I don’t know that the valor bard “trounces” bladelock; Trantmonk shows for damage at least the two are similar. 2024 rules bards and warlocks both lack melee support, and unless the bard abuses the obviously broken conjure elementals after level 10, the bladelock will surpass by quite a bit once you get to level 12-13. I’m not sure a hexblade would be much different than PotB in 2024 rules (if you only convert over). The issue for warlock is lack of significant support for the style until you get the 3rd attack.
Overall it leaves me wondering if the warlock overall got enough in the new rules compared to other classes. 1 extra spell per short rest (for 10 levels) is still pretty weak, depending on how often you get to short rest.
Yes, the bards damage is similar while they are a full caster with better defenses, that is trouncing them. Heck bards have enough spell slots they can apparently beat warlock baseline by just casting cloud of daggers over and over. The warlock in theory is supposed to be rocking out single target damage because they are giving up being a full caster. The designers expressed it directly, because of eldritch blast is SO powerful they can't justify giving warlocks more casting power than pact magic. Which was fine in 2014 because it was true, they did enough damage via pact of the blade or eldritch blast to be a contributor in single target damage, they no longer are, especially with eldritch blast.
They aren't the only class that needs a rebalancing, I think rangers and rogues need a bit of love as well. But the warlocks baseline gets blown out and its hard to go pact of the blade given how bad their defenses are. Sure you can multiclass to get better armor, but once that is opened up a bard etc can dip lock as well.
For Hex Blade subclass on a 2024 Warlock
How to get Improved Pact Weapon
Prerequisite: Pact of the Blade feature.
In XGtE the Subclass does not have a Feature called Pact of the Blade. So. Can you take this invocation on a 2024 Warlock with the 2014 Subclass.
There is no official answer as of yet. My assumption is that it now requires the Pact of the Blade feature.
How to add Tooltips.
I take Pact of the Blade Invocation and DDBeyond does NOT let be pick Improved Pact Weapon Invocation
Improved Pact Weapon
Prerequisite: Pact of the Blade feature
You can use any weapon you summon with your Pact of the Blade feature as a spellcasting focus for your warlock spells. ~~~Same as Pact of the Blade Level 1 Invocation.
In addition, the weapon gains a +1
bonus to its attack and damage rolls, unless it is a magic weapon that already has a bonus to those rolls. ~~~NOT part of Pact of the Blade
Finally, the weapon you conjure can be a shortbow, longbow, light crossbow, or heavy crossbow. ~~~ Not part of Pact of the Blade.
I suspect the intent is to let you use them, but they have not updated the system yet to allow it. One of the flaws with a reboot with their backwards compatibility. Invocations take up such little space its disappointing they didn't just redo them all.
It would have added at least 4 pages (1 sheet front and back folded in the middle). Which probably would have added content that players would have enjoyed, but keep in mind that each Character and Chapter starts on a fresh page. And the additional 4 pages would have incurred additional writing, art, layout, printing, and binding costs. I'm down for a 640 page Player's Handbook that updated all the 2014-2024 player options, but not everyone is.
How to add Tooltips.
At a glance, the 2024 pact of the blade looks even better than the 2014 version. Technically, the pact is better, but there are a number of things that have changed in the 2024 version and reduced its viability as a top-tier damage dealer as well as the loss of the Hexblade. It is convenient that you can get it at level 1 now. The weapon used to get through resistance to non-magical weapon damage, but those resistances seem to have either disappeared, or been turned into complete resistance to bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing damage. Now it gives you the ability to change the damage type of your pact weapon to psychic, radiant, or necrotic, which is probably to compensate. The pact of the blade now lets you use your charisma modifier for melee weapon attack and damage rolls, which means that you don't need the hexblade subclass to use this feature, (probably because the subclass doesn't actually exist in the 2024 rules) which is much more convenient. However the hexblade gives you other very necessary things like medium armor and shield proficiency as well as hexblade's curse, letting you crank up your AC and regain lost hit points as well. All that, combined with the second weapon the Hexblade would also let you use with charisma made the dual-wielding, charisma focused builds pretty viable in combat even though dual wielding builds weren't as good in that version. The pact of the blade doesn't give you 2 weapons to use charisma with, so you would want to just conjure a heavy weapon now, right? Well, Bladelocks got hit HARD with the new heavy weapons rules. You now need a strength of at least 13 to wield a heavy melee weapon without disadvantage, rather than just, not be small. And unfortunately, that 13 in strength you will need to get to wield those weapons, will probably result in less points in your dexterity score. This means that you may need to trade some of your AC just to get decent damage, even though you will probably be struggling to get AC already because you are a melee fighter who only has proficiency in light armor. And to add insult to injury, the pact of the blade doesn't give you a fighting style or ANY weapon masteries. I am honestly not sure why the pact of the blade doesn't include weapon mastery with your conjured pact weapon. It seems like a pretty big missed opportunity to me. Now, you can take a lvl 1 dip into fighter to get heavy armor proficiency, shield proficiency, weapon masteries, a fighting style, and a way to get a bit of self healing in, but I don't really like that multiclassing should have to be this necessary to make a good bladelock. I definitely don't think that the bladelock is unviable, but it unfortunately isn't the great contender for top-tier damage that it used to be. Maybe if they got weapon masteries, better AC options, and if the invocation Improved Pact Weapon were still here or brought back it might be a different story. If they bring Improved Pact Weapon back, I think they should change the part that says you can use the weapon as a spellcasting focus (now is already a base pact of the blade feature), to the ability for your conjured ranged weapons to create their own magical ammunition.
The Hexblade still exists. It just needs to be updated to the new pattern of Subclass features. The Hexblade patron will likely see an update due to how some of the mechanics have changed, but until then, you are free to use the Hexblade as is, aside from the adjustments per the PHB.
Please see this excellent summary, with references, from Silvva (a moderator here) about using previous content with the 2024 rules update.
College of Valor Bards don't receive Weapon Masteries. The trend appears to be that Weapon Masteries are awarded at a class level and not a subclass level. A Warlock doesn't warrant them. A Wizard doesn't warrant them. An Artificer doesn't warrant them. As such, you won't see a Pact of the Blade/Hexblade (Warlock), Bladesinger (Wizard), Armorer (Artificer), Artillerist (Artificer), or Battle Smith (Artificer) with Weapon Mastery. The community often associates "uses weapons" with "needs weapon mastery" in 2024 and that is not the case.
How to add Tooltips.
Yes, the 2024 version was made to be backwards compatible with 2014 content, but I think it would be best to ask your dm before using 2014 content in a 2024 version game. I wouldn't count on using 2014 content before talking to your dm, but I think it won't be a problem if you have a session zero anyway.
Btw, thank you for that summary! It is really in-depth and informative. Much appreciated!
I wish Pact of the blade allowed you to use DEX or CHA for AC mod
Dragon Sorcerer can use 10 + DEX + CHA for AC (with no armor) Why not Pact of the Blade (or Warlocks in general)
You should homebrew a feat or invocation that does that.
Honestly at this point PotB is not going to allow for a melee warlock that can fight along a 2024 monk. Without weapon mastery it seems a bit of a joke, and I will just stick to the sidelines with eldritch blast.
Are you really sure about that?