I know this is subjective, but in my analysis, Hexblade Warlocks are far better at combat than Fighters or other melee classes. Note:
- +Cha to attacks: this is easy to overlook until you look at it closely. Most fighters have to pick Strength for their melee weapons (for why I’m not talking about ranged weapons, see Spells), which outside of wielding weapons is a rather rare ability to see coming up. Hexblades, however, can choose to add their Charisma instead of Strength, which is useful in about every social situation on all the planes. Charisma is arguably even more used than Dexterity - however, this depends on what type of campaign you’re playing. Charisma is insanely good to wield weapons is my point.
-Spells: This is where the Hexblade differs the most from other classes (except maybe the eldritch knight). Warlocks get a variety of spells that are useful in social situations, giving them use outside of battle with their already high Charisma stat. In addition, spells like eldritch blast or other ranged spells allow the warlock to fight and deal good amounts of damage even in range situations, allowing you to focus on melee weapons.
- +Cha to attacks: this is easy to overlook until you look at it closely. Most fighters have to pick Strength for their melee weapons (for why I’m not talking about ranged weapons, see Spells), which outside of wielding weapons is a rather rare ability to see coming up. Hexblades, however, can choose to add their Charisma instead of Strength, which is useful in about every social situation on all the planes. Charisma is arguably even more used than Dexterity - however, this depends on what type of campaign you’re playing. Charisma is insanely good to wield weapons is my point.
Considering your initial context about Hexblades being better at combat that Fighters or other melee classes, you're just taking one ability score modifier and replacing it for another. So whether or not you're using DEX/STR or CHAR, +3 modifiers each for instance, you are still going to have the same melee damage output. Social Situations aren't exclusive with combat scenarios either so I don't see the collaborative point you're making there.
-Spells: This is where the Hexblade differs the most from other classes (except maybe the eldritch knight). Warlocks get a variety of spells that are useful in social situations, giving them use outside of battle with their already high Charisma stat. In addition, spells like eldritch blast or other ranged spells allow the warlock to fight and deal good amounts of damage even in range situations, allowing you to focus on melee weapons.
Again, social situations outside of combat does not make them better at combat than other melee classes, so I can't really see the correlation you're trying to make which would make them better at combat for having strengths in those areas, but that also does not mean other melee classes or fighters can't also put points into those areas to achieve a similar effect. Melee class fighters also have ranged weapons, to which they can add their ability modifiers to just like with Eldritch Blast (sans invocation).
Subjectively Hexblade is more front-loaded with their features than other classes giving them the appearance of being more capable. Objectively you're getting similar uses but with different features and different ability scores.
EDIT: I'm not trying to be rude either, if it seems that I came off that way. I forget sometimes that text doesn't convey tone as well as I would like.
I know this is subjective, but in my analysis, Hexblade Warlocks are far better at combat than Fighters or other melee classes.
Even with an agreed-upon standard of "better," a lot of that will depend on how far out you're looking. Are you talking at level 3, level 8, level 14 or level 20?
Early on, I'd say both are strong. But as a Fighter progresses, they get Indomitable, multiple uses of Action Surge, more extra attacks, more feats/ability increases, and some fairly impressive features if you choose the right Archetype. Sure, Hexblades have magic, but that's limited to a few spell slots, and focusing your invocations on Eldritch Blast to compensate means you're not using them for Pact Weapon invocations and more general-purpose combat improvements. And of course, the Fighter could always choose the Eldritch Knight archetype, and have more spells slots by 4th level.
Whether any particular Fighter build is superior in combat to any particular Hexblade build is still somewhat subjective, especially if a particular battle allows for effective ranged strategies. But as far as overall average DPR output, I have a hard time seeing a Hexblade matching a Fighter as they continue leveling up.
At third level, Hexblades can take the Blade Pact, and Improved Pact Weapon invocation, which allows for +CHA on attack and damage rolls - for all weapons. Slashing, piercing, bludgeoning, ranged, finesse... a fighter would have to have high STR and DEX to do that.
And, CHA is your spellcasting ability... talk about a SAD class!
At third level, Hexblades can take the Blade Pact, and Improved Pact Weapon invocation, which allows for +CHA on attack and damage rolls - for all weapons. Slashing, piercing, bludgeoning, ranged, finesse... a fighter would have to have high STR and DEX to do that.
And, CHA is your spellcasting ability... talk about a SAD class!
You can replace STR or DEX if you want to with CHAR with Hexblade features...so it doesn't really matter that Fighters or other melee classes can't use CHAR, SAD development or otherwise. You can literally get the same effect with STR or DEX at level 1.
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.
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.
Finally, the weapon you conjure can be a shortbow, longbow, light crossbow, or heavy crossbow.
This just gives a +1 to attack and damage rolls whether you're using DEX, STR, or CHAR, since you don't have to use CHAR. Unless you're wielding a weapon that already applies a bonus, the comparison is still the same.
EDIT: Every class has an ability score tied to it for their feature uses btw. DEX and STR are just the most common for melee combat because they're the essential abilities. By being able to use CHAR you don't have to put points into STR or DEX to gain the same benefits a fighter would by only having to put points into STR or DEX.
I’m just trying to say that Hexblades are better OVERALL than fighters, with combat prowess that put them on par with fighters and then some outside of combat.
The Hexblade is a SAD, OP class which should have been "nerfed" prior to publication, so I'm not sure it's fair to compare any other class to it.
It's also ridiculously front-loaded. Wait until 11th level, when the Battle Master Fighter decides to open a can of whoop-@$$ and action surges for six attacks with his greatsword, adding his d10 superiority dice to five of them.
Remember that the HexBlade doesnt get more then TWO ordinary attacks with his main weapon, while a warrior gets 4 I think. Thats not counting extra attacks for action surges and feats and specialites for both classes. So with a weapon Id say a fighter is better, but overall in and out of combat, a HexBlade is more versatile. Id still choose a HexBlade over a warrior any day, but thats just me and my warlock fetish talking
The Hexblade is a SAD, OP class which should have been "nerfed" prior to publication, so I'm not sure it's fair to compare any other class to it.
It's also ridiculously front-loaded. Wait until 11th level, when the Battle Master Fighter decides to open a can of whoop-@$$ and action surges for six attacks with his greatsword, adding his d10 superiority dice to five of them.
Actually, a BM Fighter at lvl 11 can get six attacks with with action surge. And, lets say we make a Heavy Crossbow dude, with Sharpshooter and Crossbow expert feat and 20 in dex and nonmagical Crossbow, you can shoot six times with +11 to hit and use Sharpshooter to to take a -5 penalty to the attack roll to add +10 to the attack's damage. If you miss with one you can use the Precision Attack and expend one superiority die to add it to the roll to make it a hit, or choose another Maneuver to add damage and a effect. All this he can do at a range up to 400 feet without disadvantage.
So thats, in best case scenario; 5 attacks doing 1d10+15+1d10 and one attack doing 1d10+15. Max damage then is 190 damage. Thats one wicked round. Ofc youve spent all your abilties and have to attack "normally" until your next short rest, but still...... A HexBlade cant do that in one round at lvl 11.
Ofc, a HexBlade is as i said earlier alot more versatile, and can probably do more damage over time if he sticks with Eldritch Blast, but in close combat using melee, a fighter will most probably always outdamage a warlock.
Fighters and Hexblades each have things the other doesn't. What do Fighters get? Larger Hit Dice, Heavy Armor, a Fighting Style, Second Wind, Action Surge, Indomitable, more ASI/Feat slots, and that's not getting into the subclass abilities. Plus of course the ability to attack 2, 3 or even 4 times without using an Invocation. The baseline Fighter abilities may not be as flashy as other classes, but they're all very useful not just for offense but defense too.
I find that I have to disagree with you on your analysis that a CHA based warrior (Hexblade) is better than a STR based warrior (Fighter) because of out of combat utility surrounding their prime ability score.
1. What gets rolled in your game vs my game depends on the table, campaign, session, and encounter. A highly social campaign set in a city involving intrigue with many factions will have much more in the way of CHA skills than a heavy dungeon crawl clearing caverns and catacombs of critters. Despite only having one skill, STR is a lot of your adventuring from being able to climb and swim and push heavy things with Athletics as well as carrying capacity and passive feats of strength. Also, do remember that in gaming culture, CHA used to the the dump stat because it never got rolled ever because social situations were solved by roleplaying rather than rolls. Based on your table, that CHA might not get rolled as much because of that culture possibly lingering.
2. In combat and besides hitting enemies with your weapon, there is a comparison of other uses of CHA and STR. The big one that stands out to me is saves. CHA saves might be important for resisting some powerful magic but against martial foes, there's a lot of little uses of STR to resist being pushed, pulled, knocked prone, immobilized, restrained, grappled, and so on. The fighter has a high STR and proficiency in STR saves to protect them from these movements while the warlock is going to be flung about like a rag doll.
3. Because of the changing metagame of CHA being an important ability score (for the social encounters) and several classes being reliant on CHA for spellcasting (bard, paladin, sorcerer, warlock), there is a lot of high CHA in a typical party. Even without one of the spellcasters, it's likely that at least one of the other characters will be trying to make CHA a secondary ability score (such as the rogue or cleric). The problem is that multiple characters with high CHA all rolling for Persuasion doesn't really help the party because you only need one good roll. In a "standard" party, swapping out the STR fighter for the CHA warlock takes away what is likely the only source of raw muscle and STR and replacing it with yet another talky guy and CHA.
Like others said Versatility is the real difference, a Fighter is focused on what it can do, its a one trick pony, but he can do it well and even more.
While on the other hand the Hexblade is a Gish character a bit of melee and a bit of magic, the invocations can make for a nice customisation, but in reality there's only an handfull of invocations that are really usefull( i'm not counting those that give you a one time use spell for a spell slot, since i find it lame that you need tot ake an Invocation to have those spells that you can learn from other ways and using one of you're few spell slots for it)
So you end up with the same selection of invocations as nearly everyone else: Agonizing Blast, Imroved Pact Blade, thirsting Blade and Lifedrinker as a minimum, with mask of many faces/Master of myriad forms and/or Devil's Sight and maybe Eldritch Smite if you don't dip in pally for the Smite.
Off cours when you look at it, all those invocations looks like extra class features, but Since Thirsting blade is nearly an obligation to stay on par with the other melee classes, is it really a choice?...
Now personaly i don't account much for the abilities in comparing classes, after all there is items for that.
Whenever i have the chance i get my hands on a pair of gauntlets of ogre's Might( and a fighter can also have one of the other items that bumps up INT/CHA, dunno if there's any for CHA though...)
If its better or not is once again depending on the use you make of it and your gameplay style, since even there's similitudes, both classes are drasticly different.
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To be honest, if you crunch some numbers, a Blade Pact Hexblade's average damage output isn't that much better than eldritch blast spam. A Blade Pact warlock also has to pump a lot of resources (spells, invocations and ASIs) to be viable. The exception to this is if you specifically build for PAM/GWM/Sentinel. That can take you over what eldritch blast can give you but it's circumstantial. A fighter can easily and regularly go over that threshold of damage.
The addition of spells (two slots for most of your career) and charisma focus (with limited proficiencies to make the best of it), sorta balance this. In the end a Blade Pact Hexblade is a fun class to play but hardly the monster of battle you're suggesting. It does decent damage, with a small side of maneuverability, utility or crowd control. A fighter is a monster on the battlefield. Outside? Yeah, that's a bit more limited but that's intended for the sake of balance.
Now want a real monster on and off the battlefield? Try Bard.
Oh, I forgot about the Hexblade’s (10 I think?) second-to-last feature, Armor of Hexes, which is what made me make this thread. You get to roll a d6 when a Hex-cursed attacks you. On a 4 5 or 6 (which as big-brainers might know is a 0.5 chance), the attack misses, regardless of the actual attack roll. The only restriction on this ability is that the Hex has to be up
Which means if you’re fighting a big boss and you hex them, you get expertise against their attack roll, crit on a 19, and are guaranteed to be hit by them less than or equal to 50% of the time. This lasts for 10 rounds of combat.
As much damage as the fighter can put out, you have to admit the Hexblade rocks at killing “boss” encounters.
As much damage as the fighter can put out, you have to admit the Hexblade rocks at killing “boss” encounters.
Hexblades are set up for high single target dps and some crit fishing, yes. So is a Paladin and they arguably have better defense, survivability and smiting capabilities. Also, don't underestimate a Fighter unloading on a boss.
Honestly, most people just dip Hexblade and move onto other things. As a single class, it does well. As a dip it's excellent because it's so front loaded. This isn't to say it's a bad subclass or that Warlock in general is bad. It just means it's not OP.
I know this is subjective, but in my analysis, Hexblade Warlocks are far better at combat than Fighters or other melee classes. Note:
- +Cha to attacks: this is easy to overlook until you look at it closely. Most fighters have to pick Strength for their melee weapons (for why I’m not talking about ranged weapons, see Spells), which outside of wielding weapons is a rather rare ability to see coming up. Hexblades, however, can choose to add their Charisma instead of Strength, which is useful in about every social situation on all the planes. Charisma is arguably even more used than Dexterity - however, this depends on what type of campaign you’re playing. Charisma is insanely good to wield weapons is my point.
-Spells: This is where the Hexblade differs the most from other classes (except maybe the eldritch knight). Warlocks get a variety of spells that are useful in social situations, giving them use outside of battle with their already high Charisma stat. In addition, spells like eldritch blast or other ranged spells allow the warlock to fight and deal good amounts of damage even in range situations, allowing you to focus on melee weapons.
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If you are focused on fighting, a Fighter is a better choice.
A Hexblade (and this is pact dependent) can be good at fighting and at social situations.
Considering your initial context about Hexblades being better at combat that Fighters or other melee classes, you're just taking one ability score modifier and replacing it for another. So whether or not you're using DEX/STR or CHAR, +3 modifiers each for instance, you are still going to have the same melee damage output. Social Situations aren't exclusive with combat scenarios either so I don't see the collaborative point you're making there.
Again, social situations outside of combat does not make them better at combat than other melee classes, so I can't really see the correlation you're trying to make which would make them better at combat for having strengths in those areas, but that also does not mean other melee classes or fighters can't also put points into those areas to achieve a similar effect. Melee class fighters also have ranged weapons, to which they can add their ability modifiers to just like with Eldritch Blast (sans invocation).
Subjectively Hexblade is more front-loaded with their features than other classes giving them the appearance of being more capable. Objectively you're getting similar uses but with different features and different ability scores.
EDIT: I'm not trying to be rude either, if it seems that I came off that way. I forget sometimes that text doesn't convey tone as well as I would like.
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Even with an agreed-upon standard of "better," a lot of that will depend on how far out you're looking. Are you talking at level 3, level 8, level 14 or level 20?
Early on, I'd say both are strong. But as a Fighter progresses, they get Indomitable, multiple uses of Action Surge, more extra attacks, more feats/ability increases, and some fairly impressive features if you choose the right Archetype. Sure, Hexblades have magic, but that's limited to a few spell slots, and focusing your invocations on Eldritch Blast to compensate means you're not using them for Pact Weapon invocations and more general-purpose combat improvements. And of course, the Fighter could always choose the Eldritch Knight archetype, and have more spells slots by 4th level.
Whether any particular Fighter build is superior in combat to any particular Hexblade build is still somewhat subjective, especially if a particular battle allows for effective ranged strategies. But as far as overall average DPR output, I have a hard time seeing a Hexblade matching a Fighter as they continue leveling up.
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At third level, Hexblades can take the Blade Pact, and Improved Pact Weapon invocation, which allows for +CHA on attack and damage rolls - for all weapons. Slashing, piercing, bludgeoning, ranged, finesse... a fighter would have to have high STR and DEX to do that.
And, CHA is your spellcasting ability... talk about a SAD class!
You can replace STR or DEX if you want to with CHAR with Hexblade features...so it doesn't really matter that Fighters or other melee classes can't use CHAR, SAD development or otherwise. You can literally get the same effect with STR or DEX at level 1.
This just gives a +1 to attack and damage rolls whether you're using DEX, STR, or CHAR, since you don't have to use CHAR. Unless you're wielding a weapon that already applies a bonus, the comparison is still the same.
EDIT: Every class has an ability score tied to it for their feature uses btw. DEX and STR are just the most common for melee combat because they're the essential abilities. By being able to use CHAR you don't have to put points into STR or DEX to gain the same benefits a fighter would by only having to put points into STR or DEX.
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I meant that the Hexblade warlock does very well at all levels overall, but especially in combat.
I’m just trying to say that Hexblades are better OVERALL than fighters, with combat prowess that put them on par with fighters and then some outside of combat.
I don’t know why I said “combat” sorry
The Hexblade is a SAD, OP class which should have been "nerfed" prior to publication, so I'm not sure it's fair to compare any other class to it.
It's also ridiculously front-loaded. Wait until 11th level, when the Battle Master Fighter decides to open a can of whoop-@$$ and action surges for six attacks with his greatsword, adding his d10 superiority dice to five of them.
DICE FALL, EVERYONE ROCKS!
Remember that the HexBlade doesnt get more then TWO ordinary attacks with his main weapon, while a warrior gets 4 I think. Thats not counting extra attacks for action surges and feats and specialites for both classes. So with a weapon Id say a fighter is better, but overall in and out of combat, a HexBlade is more versatile. Id still choose a HexBlade over a warrior any day, but thats just me and my warlock fetish talking
Actually, a BM Fighter at lvl 11 can get six attacks with with action surge. And, lets say we make a Heavy Crossbow dude, with Sharpshooter and Crossbow expert feat and 20 in dex and nonmagical Crossbow, you can shoot six times with +11 to hit and use Sharpshooter to to take a -5 penalty to the attack roll to add +10 to the attack's damage. If you miss with one you can use the Precision Attack and expend one superiority die to add it to the roll to make it a hit, or choose another Maneuver to add damage and a effect. All this he can do at a range up to 400 feet without disadvantage.
So thats, in best case scenario; 5 attacks doing 1d10+15+1d10 and one attack doing 1d10+15. Max damage then is 190 damage. Thats one wicked round. Ofc youve spent all your abilties and have to attack "normally" until your next short rest, but still...... A HexBlade cant do that in one round at lvl 11.
Ofc, a HexBlade is as i said earlier alot more versatile, and can probably do more damage over time if he sticks with Eldritch Blast, but in close combat using melee, a fighter will most probably always outdamage a warlock.
Fighters and Hexblades each have things the other doesn't. What do Fighters get? Larger Hit Dice, Heavy Armor, a Fighting Style, Second Wind, Action Surge, Indomitable, more ASI/Feat slots, and that's not getting into the subclass abilities. Plus of course the ability to attack 2, 3 or even 4 times without using an Invocation. The baseline Fighter abilities may not be as flashy as other classes, but they're all very useful not just for offense but defense too.
I find that I have to disagree with you on your analysis that a CHA based warrior (Hexblade) is better than a STR based warrior (Fighter) because of out of combat utility surrounding their prime ability score.
1. What gets rolled in your game vs my game depends on the table, campaign, session, and encounter. A highly social campaign set in a city involving intrigue with many factions will have much more in the way of CHA skills than a heavy dungeon crawl clearing caverns and catacombs of critters. Despite only having one skill, STR is a lot of your adventuring from being able to climb and swim and push heavy things with Athletics as well as carrying capacity and passive feats of strength. Also, do remember that in gaming culture, CHA used to the the dump stat because it never got rolled ever because social situations were solved by roleplaying rather than rolls. Based on your table, that CHA might not get rolled as much because of that culture possibly lingering.
2. In combat and besides hitting enemies with your weapon, there is a comparison of other uses of CHA and STR. The big one that stands out to me is saves. CHA saves might be important for resisting some powerful magic but against martial foes, there's a lot of little uses of STR to resist being pushed, pulled, knocked prone, immobilized, restrained, grappled, and so on. The fighter has a high STR and proficiency in STR saves to protect them from these movements while the warlock is going to be flung about like a rag doll.
3. Because of the changing metagame of CHA being an important ability score (for the social encounters) and several classes being reliant on CHA for spellcasting (bard, paladin, sorcerer, warlock), there is a lot of high CHA in a typical party. Even without one of the spellcasters, it's likely that at least one of the other characters will be trying to make CHA a secondary ability score (such as the rogue or cleric). The problem is that multiple characters with high CHA all rolling for Persuasion doesn't really help the party because you only need one good roll. In a "standard" party, swapping out the STR fighter for the CHA warlock takes away what is likely the only source of raw muscle and STR and replacing it with yet another talky guy and CHA.
That’s a fair point, and exactly why I listed this topic as subjective.
Like others said Versatility is the real difference, a Fighter is focused on what it can do, its a one trick pony, but he can do it well and even more.
While on the other hand the Hexblade is a Gish character a bit of melee and a bit of magic, the invocations can make for a nice customisation, but in reality there's only an handfull of invocations that are really usefull( i'm not counting those that give you a one time use spell for a spell slot, since i find it lame that you need tot ake an Invocation to have those spells that you can learn from other ways and using one of you're few spell slots for it)
So you end up with the same selection of invocations as nearly everyone else: Agonizing Blast, Imroved Pact Blade, thirsting Blade and Lifedrinker as a minimum, with mask of many faces/Master of myriad forms and/or Devil's Sight and maybe Eldritch Smite if you don't dip in pally for the Smite.
Off cours when you look at it, all those invocations looks like extra class features, but Since Thirsting blade is nearly an obligation to stay on par with the other melee classes, is it really a choice?...
Now personaly i don't account much for the abilities in comparing classes, after all there is items for that.
Whenever i have the chance i get my hands on a pair of gauntlets of ogre's Might( and a fighter can also have one of the other items that bumps up INT/CHA, dunno if there's any for CHA though...)
If its better or not is once again depending on the use you make of it and your gameplay style, since even there's similitudes, both classes are drasticly different.
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To be honest, if you crunch some numbers, a Blade Pact Hexblade's average damage output isn't that much better than eldritch blast spam. A Blade Pact warlock also has to pump a lot of resources (spells, invocations and ASIs) to be viable. The exception to this is if you specifically build for PAM/GWM/Sentinel. That can take you over what eldritch blast can give you but it's circumstantial. A fighter can easily and regularly go over that threshold of damage.
The addition of spells (two slots for most of your career) and charisma focus (with limited proficiencies to make the best of it), sorta balance this. In the end a Blade Pact Hexblade is a fun class to play but hardly the monster of battle you're suggesting. It does decent damage, with a small side of maneuverability, utility or crowd control. A fighter is a monster on the battlefield. Outside? Yeah, that's a bit more limited but that's intended for the sake of balance.
Now want a real monster on and off the battlefield? Try Bard.
Oh, I forgot about the Hexblade’s (10 I think?) second-to-last feature, Armor of Hexes, which is what made me make this thread. You get to roll a d6 when a Hex-cursed attacks you. On a 4 5 or 6 (which as big-brainers might know is a 0.5 chance), the attack misses, regardless of the actual attack roll. The only restriction on this ability is that the Hex has to be up
Which means if you’re fighting a big boss and you hex them, you get expertise against their attack roll, crit on a 19, and are guaranteed to be hit by them less than or equal to 50% of the time. This lasts for 10 rounds of combat.
As much damage as the fighter can put out, you have to admit the Hexblade rocks at killing “boss” encounters.
Hexblades are set up for high single target dps and some crit fishing, yes. So is a Paladin and they arguably have better defense, survivability and smiting capabilities. Also, don't underestimate a Fighter unloading on a boss.
Honestly, most people just dip Hexblade and move onto other things. As a single class, it does well. As a dip it's excellent because it's so front loaded. This isn't to say it's a bad subclass or that Warlock in general is bad. It just means it's not OP.
TheManyNamed: “So is a Paladin and they arguably have better defense”
Me: “and are guaranteed to be hit by them less than or equal to 50% of the time.”
IDK about you but I don’t think paladins have that same boast.