Starting as a PC in my first 5e campaign, which is Witchlight.
I'm not experienced as a caster and I'm the only caster out of 4. Others are stealth, barbarian and monk.
My character has a lot of built-in story and RP flavor fun, so I'm ok with having practical abilities. Right now I'm planning to do buffs and control, and pick up feats to be versatile.
But in general, do you think it's best to go versatile with less flashy choices as a lone non-cleric caster, OR is it as good or better to take cannon abilities to blast enemies off the map quicker?
-----
For specifics, I'm an undead warlock, but I have a grave cleric on backup if I die, so I'd like to know your general thoughts.
I would go more powerful spells since your group is lacking other high damage casters. AoE spells can shape battles, and lacking that role might prove problematic when faced with hordes of monsters. However, what really matters is what you want to play.
Most spellcasters only really need one or two good blasting spells. Warlocks, especially, benefit very strongly from upgrading their spells as they level up - remember, every time you level up you can trade out an existing spell you know for a new one, and since you have a small number of high-level slots, it's generally a good idea to trade up a lot of your spells to higher-level, more potent stuff.
Warlocks don't generally have the spell slots to spare on a ton of noncombat utility - unless you're getting a really aces, round peg round hole cast off, warlocks are generally - not always, but generally - better advised to use their leveled spells and Pact slots for heavy-duty combat magic, both blasty stuff and powerful control abilities, while tuning their Invocations towards utility if they want it. A Pact of the Tome warlock with Book of Ancient Secrets can, with a DM who's willing to help you do it, collect a sizeable array of useful rituals for out-of-battle utility magic whilst saving their limited Pact slots for winning fights. Utility Invocations like Eldritch Sight or Eyes of the Runekeeper can be both incredibly useful tools and cool, character-defining traits. A warlock able to read all forms of writing, even ancient forgotten languages, certainly has a different characterization to them than a warlock whose every Invocation is turned towards further mastering their demonic Pact blade, and a lot of those utility invocations don't ever see the love they merit.
AoE spells are very useful when in combat against hordes but that is only a small part of the game. The rest of the party can deal damage but they they can not solve issues impossible without magic (to be fair a decent DM will make it so you at least can progress without the right spells but he might make it mor etime consuming or that you miss out of some rewards.
You are travelling along a road and find a bridge over a chasm has collapsed leaving a 20ft gap. With misty step you can go to the other side and get someone to throw a rope (or two) over which when secured the rest of the party can join you
You suspect a chest is trapped have your mage hand open it while everyone is well out of the way
You have to kill a wyrmling, as you are about to defeat it it starts flying away, Earthbind means you doesn't escape so you have to track it down again.
You are exploring a tomb and find a "puzzle door" and a message carved in the stone and a but none of you understand it. Comprehend languages allows you two read the text and solve the puzzle, without it you either spend hours trying to work it out (and maybe taking damage, getting into comat when you get it wrong) or maybe take a copy and go to town to try and find someone who can read it.
The list goes on, it doesn't mean a swiss army support doesn't have any blaster spells I would always recommend an AoE spell but against a powerful enemy you can cast slow so it does much less damage, or you can haste the barb to up his AC and give hin an extra attack so he effective does "your share of the damage" or you can end combat immediatey by turning hte enemy into a snail.
Id go with support since there's a lot there that only you will be able to do, whereas rogues and barbarians are both capable of dealing massive damage and monk gives you good crowd control damage, so you're definitely not leaving your party high and dry in the damage department.
But the biggest reason to go control/support is that that sounds like you are already leaning towards that. If there's a specific way you want to play, I'd go with it. 5e isn't so unforgiving that the wrong party makeup will tank your game, and either option sounds workable in this scenario.
If you haven't picked your Pact Boon yet, I'd recommend taking Pact of the Tome and using it to gain a bunch of utility cantrips. Then take the Book of Ancient Secrets invocation to gain the ability to ritual cast so you can use your utility spells without needing to spend your precious spell slots. Maybe focus on Invocations that also have solid group utility.
Then you can focus your leveled spells more on AOE and high damage spells. It would still be smart to snag a few "just in case" utility spells, but you can keep your focus primarily on being the big damage dealer of your group.
awesome, thanks everyone for your thoughts. i'm used to playing less sandboxey games in the past with different focuses. like star wars and warhammer fantasy. and we also have a first timer too. and on top of that i haven't been THE caster before, so it's REALLY overwhelming to look at this edition which kinda seems a lot more user friendly than i'm used to, while still seeming to be balanced from what i hear. thanks again, cheers :)
thanks so much for your help. i wanna qualify that i'm leaning that way because of my instincts from other harsher systems, and also there's a complete first timer that we're all trying to make sure has a great time. so my hope going into session 0 was that someone else would have a utility/arcane/divine character they were excited about, so i could do a little utility, add to the story, and be the ranged PC. it's kind of a happy accident that the form of dread feature seems to have great control to it. i was definitely stoked about hexing people.
sorry if i'm rambling. anyway, main thing is, i picked undead warlock for flavor and to kinda be a blaster while fueling the story. the dm is an ages long close friend who does theater of the mind and has emphasized that combat might not always be the big deal. neither of which i have experience with,
so if you have any additional thoughts about balance in general, i'd love to hear them. because what i'm gathering from 5e is that there's cheat codes for everything, but that non-combat situations are actually much less forgiving. thanks :)
thanks so much for your help. i wanna qualify that i'm leaning that way because of my instincts from other harsher systems, and also there's a complete first timer that we're all trying to make sure has a great time. so my hope going into session 0 was that someone else would have a utility/arcane/divine character they were excited about, so i could do a little utility, add to the story, and be the ranged PC. it's kind of a happy accident that the form of dread feature seems to have great control to it. i was definitely stoked about hexing people.
sorry if i'm rambling. anyway, main thing is, i picked undead warlock for flavor and to kinda be a blaster while fueling the story. the dm is an ages long close friend who does theater of the mind and has emphasized that combat might not always be the big deal. neither of which i have experience with,
so if you have any additional thoughts about balance in general, i'd love to hear them. because what i'm gathering from 5e is that there's cheat codes for everything, but that non-combat situations are actually much less forgiving. thanks :)
Based on this, Eldritch Blast will probably cover your basic damage needs and getting an invocation like Repelling Blast gives it a control angle that will be useful. Grabbing a nice AOE like Shatter will cover the moments when you need a bigger burst of damage. Then look for swiss army spells that will fill niches. The suggestion to upgrade your spells is a good one since higher level spells usually give better effects than lower level effects, even when upcast.
As a Warlock you have just 2 spell slots per short rest. A lot will depend on how many rests the DM allows but generally you are probably looking at 2. So you can't afford to be spamming blasty spells or multiple AoE spells. Your go to will be cantrips, the absolute best of which is going to be Eldritch Blast, and it's invocations - Agonising blast and maddening hex should me your go to damage dealing spell. Anything else would depend on your slot levels, but sleep, darkness, hypnotic pattern, slow, enemies abound.
AoE spells are very useful when in combat against hordes but that is only a small part of the game. The rest of the party can deal damage but they they can not solve issues impossible without magic (to be fair a decent DM will make it so you at least can progress without the right spells but he might make it mor etime consuming or that you miss out of some rewards.
You are travelling along a road and find a bridge over a chasm has collapsed leaving a 20ft gap. With misty step you can go to the other side and get someone to throw a rope (or two) over which when secured the rest of the party can join you
You suspect a chest is trapped have your mage hand open it while everyone is well out of the way
You have to kill a wyrmling, as you are about to defeat it it starts flying away, Earthbind means you doesn't escape so you have to track it down again.
You are exploring a tomb and find a "puzzle door" and a message carved in the stone and a but none of you understand it. Comprehend languages allows you two read the text and solve the puzzle, without it you either spend hours trying to work it out (and maybe taking damage, getting into comat when you get it wrong) or maybe take a copy and go to town to try and find someone who can read it.
The list goes on, it doesn't mean a swiss army support doesn't have any blaster spells I would always recommend an AoE spell but against a powerful enemy you can cast slow so it does much less damage, or you can haste the barb to up his AC and give hin an extra attack so he effective does "your share of the damage" or you can end combat immediatey by turning hte enemy into a snail.
I just want to flip this a bit and point out that in all of those scenarios it can often be a lot more fun and interesting if there is no immediate and obvious solution to the problem. I think Swiss Army is the the optimal path here (if you're optimizing for "winning"), but I've often felt a little disappointed when we're presented with an obstacle and it is just immediately magicked away. Maybe the barbarian wanted to shine by jumping that 20ft. gap. Maybe the monk wanted to try to disarm the trapped chest. Maybe the ranger wanted to track down that wyrmling.
I'm not saying don't ever be useful because that might deny others from being useful, just that a party without utility magic is still entirely able to succeed and can have fun doing so. Don't feel like you need to provide all the solutions for the party. Just choose which feels more fun to you or what best compliments the personality or goals of your character and it will work out either way.
thanks so much for your thoughts. question: is hex as mandatory as it seems? before i heard the other party choices i was planning to start with hex and comprehend, but now i'm thinking to take bane instead for my concentration spell, then switch out for bless with the fey touched feat, and get hex later as a JIC situational thing. but i'm nervous about the decision because all conversations i see about warlocks in any role seem to include hex. cheers :)
thanks so much for your thoughts. question: is hex as mandatory as it seems? before i heard the other party choices i was planning to start with hex and comprehend, but now i'm thinking to take bane instead for my concentration spell, then switch out for bless with the fey touched feat, and get hex later as a JIC situational thing. but i'm nervous about the decision because all conversations i see about warlocks in any role seem to include hex. cheers :)
So, here's the important detail about Hex... it has a duration of 1 hour, and when upcast the duration extends all the way up to 24 hours. It doesn't have as major of an impact in one battle as Bane, but if you're careful or lucky you can keep up concentration on Hex for its full duration, and your spell slots always upcast to the highest available level, so you can do things like cast Hex once early in the day, and keep concentration even through Short Rests, so it's possible to be concentrating on Hex while still having your full spell slots. It also pairs really well with Eldritch Blast, because it tacks on that extra damage with every bolt of Eldritch Blast.
So, yeah... Hex isn't as good as other spells in an individual fight, but it has the potential to save you spell slots and be useful all day long. But if you lose concentration shortly after casting it, then it's kind of a waste.
Hex is amazing. There is no saving throw, it’s a bonus action and increases the damage of every attack you make by 1d6. The damage doesn’t scale but the duration does. When the target dies you can move it to a new one as a bonus action. At higher levels you can choose the maddening hex invocation which does additional damage equal to your charisma bonus to all enemies within 5 ft of the hexed target. That means at 5th level you can fire 2 eldritch blast at the same target doing 1d10 (+chr from agonising blast) (+chr maddening) (+1d6 hex) twice to the target giving a max of 46, ave of 36 damage to the primary target and an additional 10 damage to all within 5 ft (as many as 6 others in a crowd). It’s a phenomenal amount of damage.
Bane on the other hand is an action, it reduces an enemy attack and saving throw by 1d4. However it initially only targets 3 people and they each get saving throws. Chances are that at least one will make it. Even if they all fail, once they are dead the spell ends. You can’t move it on or do anything else with it.
Actually, I think you only get one use of Maddening Hex per turn, since it takes a bonus action to trigger it. So it's slightly less damage, but it's still free damage with no save that automatically hits multiple targets, albeit in a pretty short range. Although its range is dependent on the size of your target, so there's some fun to be had if there's one large or huge target surrounded by minions, since you can hit more of them.
i think for rp now what makes sense is to start w/ hex before the pc's have strong relationships, while my warlock (a very practical straight-ahead non-mystical sailor) is less aware of his powers, then add more buffs as we bond as a group, and get fey touched during the Witchlight story.
the way y'all explain hex, even tho it gets into metagaming (which isn't what i usually do but i don't judge), makes it seem like, yeah duh that's a ton of dmg that doesn't end for a bonus action.
also maybe it'll just deal with the question immediately, so i don't have to ponder it, to just start with blast + hex + form of dread and just like, not have to worry about my damage and control for a few levels.
thanks everyone for helping me out, i really appreciate it.
One thing I'd add about Hex is that it's a commitment. If you want to use it, don't expect to ever use your bonus actions for anything else. If you and the party are doing your job, your hex target will be dropping roughly every round, so you need to reapply it to a new target nearly every turn. It can be frustrating if you have competing actions like Form of Dread or commanding a Pact of the Chain familiar or Misty Step and you don't get to get your hex going until round 2 or 3. As for Maddening Hex, there would definitely be combats where you won't get a single opportunity to use it unless your party is really bad at killing stuff.
Not saying it's bad, cause it's not. Just that you should be aware of how action-hungry it is.
oh that's really helpful, thanks for pointing that out, makes a lot of sense. form of dread is a big reason i picked this class currently, and i plan to get fey touched later for misty step. i might play with hex for a level until i bond w/ the party, then bane, then replace it when i can get bless w/ feats.
it also gives me anxiety when a compounding spell like hex has a lot of abilities to add to it. i'll look at my invocations and be like, man, half of these are just for blast + hex. i think the flavor abilities are cooler. if one choice is a little worse but has flavor i'll usually pick that. like i kinda can't wait to try hunger of hadar almost BECAUSE half the party won't be able to see through it. wrinkles are cool.
One thing I'd add about Hex is that it's a commitment. If you want to use it, don't expect to ever use your bonus actions for anything else. If you and the party are doing your job, your hex target will be dropping roughly every round, so you need to reapply it to a new target nearly every turn. It can be frustrating if you have competing actions like Form of Dread or commanding a Pact of the Chain familiar or Misty Step and you don't get to get your hex going until round 2 or 3. As for Maddening Hex, there would definitely be combats where you won't get a single opportunity to use it unless your party is really bad at killing stuff.
Not saying it's bad, cause it's not. Just that you should be aware of how action-hungry it is.
Not necessarily. It depends entirely on what the bad guys are. Against mooks like goblins and orcs sure, but in a module such as Storm Giant which I am playing through at the moment, many of the enemy have hit points in triple digits. In this respect Hex is no different to Hunters Mark, yes it's a pain to keep using your bonus action to move it but against tough opponents it is more than worth it. Giants can get multi attack with +11 or more to hit, and they do 30-40 damage per hit. You have to hit them fast and hard.
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Thanks for reading :)
Starting as a PC in my first 5e campaign, which is Witchlight.
I'm not experienced as a caster and I'm the only caster out of 4. Others are stealth, barbarian and monk.
My character has a lot of built-in story and RP flavor fun, so I'm ok with having practical abilities. Right now I'm planning to do buffs and control, and pick up feats to be versatile.
But in general, do you think it's best to go versatile with less flashy choices as a lone non-cleric caster, OR is it as good or better to take cannon abilities to blast enemies off the map quicker?
-----
For specifics, I'm an undead warlock, but I have a grave cleric on backup if I die, so I'd like to know your general thoughts.
Thanks again, cheers :)
I would go more powerful spells since your group is lacking other high damage casters. AoE spells can shape battles, and lacking that role might prove problematic when faced with hordes of monsters. However, what really matters is what you want to play.
Only spilt the party if you see something shiny.
Ariendela Sneakerson, Half-elf Rogue (8); Harmony Wolfsbane, Tiefling Bard (10); Agnomally, Gnomish Sorcerer (3); Breeze, Tabaxi Monk (8); Grace, Dragonborn Barbarian (7); DM, Homebrew- The Sequestered Lands/Underwater Explorers; Candlekeep
Most spellcasters only really need one or two good blasting spells. Warlocks, especially, benefit very strongly from upgrading their spells as they level up - remember, every time you level up you can trade out an existing spell you know for a new one, and since you have a small number of high-level slots, it's generally a good idea to trade up a lot of your spells to higher-level, more potent stuff.
Warlocks don't generally have the spell slots to spare on a ton of noncombat utility - unless you're getting a really aces, round peg round hole cast off, warlocks are generally - not always, but generally - better advised to use their leveled spells and Pact slots for heavy-duty combat magic, both blasty stuff and powerful control abilities, while tuning their Invocations towards utility if they want it. A Pact of the Tome warlock with Book of Ancient Secrets can, with a DM who's willing to help you do it, collect a sizeable array of useful rituals for out-of-battle utility magic whilst saving their limited Pact slots for winning fights. Utility Invocations like Eldritch Sight or Eyes of the Runekeeper can be both incredibly useful tools and cool, character-defining traits. A warlock able to read all forms of writing, even ancient forgotten languages, certainly has a different characterization to them than a warlock whose every Invocation is turned towards further mastering their demonic Pact blade, and a lot of those utility invocations don't ever see the love they merit.
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I would lean the other way.
AoE spells are very useful when in combat against hordes but that is only a small part of the game. The rest of the party can deal damage but they they can not solve issues impossible without magic (to be fair a decent DM will make it so you at least can progress without the right spells but he might make it mor etime consuming or that you miss out of some rewards.
The list goes on, it doesn't mean a swiss army support doesn't have any blaster spells I would always recommend an AoE spell but against a powerful enemy you can cast slow so it does much less damage, or you can haste the barb to up his AC and give hin an extra attack so he effective does "your share of the damage" or you can end combat immediatey by turning hte enemy into a snail.
Id go with support since there's a lot there that only you will be able to do, whereas rogues and barbarians are both capable of dealing massive damage and monk gives you good crowd control damage, so you're definitely not leaving your party high and dry in the damage department.
But the biggest reason to go control/support is that that sounds like you are already leaning towards that. If there's a specific way you want to play, I'd go with it. 5e isn't so unforgiving that the wrong party makeup will tank your game, and either option sounds workable in this scenario.
If you haven't picked your Pact Boon yet, I'd recommend taking Pact of the Tome and using it to gain a bunch of utility cantrips. Then take the Book of Ancient Secrets invocation to gain the ability to ritual cast so you can use your utility spells without needing to spend your precious spell slots. Maybe focus on Invocations that also have solid group utility.
Then you can focus your leveled spells more on AOE and high damage spells. It would still be smart to snag a few "just in case" utility spells, but you can keep your focus primarily on being the big damage dealer of your group.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
awesome, thanks everyone for your thoughts. i'm used to playing less sandboxey games in the past with different focuses. like star wars and warhammer fantasy. and we also have a first timer too. and on top of that i haven't been THE caster before, so it's REALLY overwhelming to look at this edition which kinda seems a lot more user friendly than i'm used to, while still seeming to be balanced from what i hear. thanks again, cheers :)
thanks so much for your help. i wanna qualify that i'm leaning that way because of my instincts from other harsher systems, and also there's a complete first timer that we're all trying to make sure has a great time. so my hope going into session 0 was that someone else would have a utility/arcane/divine character they were excited about, so i could do a little utility, add to the story, and be the ranged PC. it's kind of a happy accident that the form of dread feature seems to have great control to it. i was definitely stoked about hexing people.
sorry if i'm rambling. anyway, main thing is, i picked undead warlock for flavor and to kinda be a blaster while fueling the story. the dm is an ages long close friend who does theater of the mind and has emphasized that combat might not always be the big deal. neither of which i have experience with,
so if you have any additional thoughts about balance in general, i'd love to hear them. because what i'm gathering from 5e is that there's cheat codes for everything, but that non-combat situations are actually much less forgiving. thanks :)
Based on this, Eldritch Blast will probably cover your basic damage needs and getting an invocation like Repelling Blast gives it a control angle that will be useful. Grabbing a nice AOE like Shatter will cover the moments when you need a bigger burst of damage. Then look for swiss army spells that will fill niches. The suggestion to upgrade your spells is a good one since higher level spells usually give better effects than lower level effects, even when upcast.
As a Warlock you have just 2 spell slots per short rest. A lot will depend on how many rests the DM allows but generally you are probably looking at 2. So you can't afford to be spamming blasty spells or multiple AoE spells. Your go to will be cantrips, the absolute best of which is going to be Eldritch Blast, and it's invocations - Agonising blast and maddening hex should me your go to damage dealing spell. Anything else would depend on your slot levels, but sleep, darkness, hypnotic pattern, slow, enemies abound.
I just want to flip this a bit and point out that in all of those scenarios it can often be a lot more fun and interesting if there is no immediate and obvious solution to the problem. I think Swiss Army is the the optimal path here (if you're optimizing for "winning"), but I've often felt a little disappointed when we're presented with an obstacle and it is just immediately magicked away. Maybe the barbarian wanted to shine by jumping that 20ft. gap. Maybe the monk wanted to try to disarm the trapped chest. Maybe the ranger wanted to track down that wyrmling.
I'm not saying don't ever be useful because that might deny others from being useful, just that a party without utility magic is still entirely able to succeed and can have fun doing so. Don't feel like you need to provide all the solutions for the party. Just choose which feels more fun to you or what best compliments the personality or goals of your character and it will work out either way.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
thanks so much for your thoughts. question: is hex as mandatory as it seems? before i heard the other party choices i was planning to start with hex and comprehend, but now i'm thinking to take bane instead for my concentration spell, then switch out for bless with the fey touched feat, and get hex later as a JIC situational thing. but i'm nervous about the decision because all conversations i see about warlocks in any role seem to include hex. cheers :)
So, here's the important detail about Hex... it has a duration of 1 hour, and when upcast the duration extends all the way up to 24 hours. It doesn't have as major of an impact in one battle as Bane, but if you're careful or lucky you can keep up concentration on Hex for its full duration, and your spell slots always upcast to the highest available level, so you can do things like cast Hex once early in the day, and keep concentration even through Short Rests, so it's possible to be concentrating on Hex while still having your full spell slots. It also pairs really well with Eldritch Blast, because it tacks on that extra damage with every bolt of Eldritch Blast.
So, yeah... Hex isn't as good as other spells in an individual fight, but it has the potential to save you spell slots and be useful all day long. But if you lose concentration shortly after casting it, then it's kind of a waste.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
Hex is amazing. There is no saving throw, it’s a bonus action and increases the damage of every attack you make by 1d6. The damage doesn’t scale but the duration does. When the target dies you can move it to a new one as a bonus action. At higher levels you can choose the maddening hex invocation which does additional damage equal to your charisma bonus to all enemies within 5 ft of the hexed target. That means at 5th level you can fire 2 eldritch blast at the same target doing 1d10 (+chr from agonising blast) (+chr maddening) (+1d6 hex) twice to the target giving a max of 46, ave of 36 damage to the primary target and an additional 10 damage to all within 5 ft (as many as 6 others in a crowd). It’s a phenomenal amount of damage.
Bane on the other hand is an action, it reduces an enemy attack and saving throw by 1d4. However it initially only targets 3 people and they each get saving throws. Chances are that at least one will make it. Even if they all fail, once they are dead the spell ends. You can’t move it on or do anything else with it.
Actually, I think you only get one use of Maddening Hex per turn, since it takes a bonus action to trigger it. So it's slightly less damage, but it's still free damage with no save that automatically hits multiple targets, albeit in a pretty short range. Although its range is dependent on the size of your target, so there's some fun to be had if there's one large or huge target surrounded by minions, since you can hit more of them.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
thanks everybody again for your replies <3
i think for rp now what makes sense is to start w/ hex before the pc's have strong relationships, while my warlock (a very practical straight-ahead non-mystical sailor) is less aware of his powers, then add more buffs as we bond as a group, and get fey touched during the Witchlight story.
the way y'all explain hex, even tho it gets into metagaming (which isn't what i usually do but i don't judge), makes it seem like, yeah duh that's a ton of dmg that doesn't end for a bonus action.
also maybe it'll just deal with the question immediately, so i don't have to ponder it, to just start with blast + hex + form of dread and just like, not have to worry about my damage and control for a few levels.
thanks everyone for helping me out, i really appreciate it.
Correct, we have been doing it wrong itseems.
One thing I'd add about Hex is that it's a commitment. If you want to use it, don't expect to ever use your bonus actions for anything else. If you and the party are doing your job, your hex target will be dropping roughly every round, so you need to reapply it to a new target nearly every turn. It can be frustrating if you have competing actions like Form of Dread or commanding a Pact of the Chain familiar or Misty Step and you don't get to get your hex going until round 2 or 3. As for Maddening Hex, there would definitely be combats where you won't get a single opportunity to use it unless your party is really bad at killing stuff.
Not saying it's bad, cause it's not. Just that you should be aware of how action-hungry it is.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
oh that's really helpful, thanks for pointing that out, makes a lot of sense. form of dread is a big reason i picked this class currently, and i plan to get fey touched later for misty step. i might play with hex for a level until i bond w/ the party, then bane, then replace it when i can get bless w/ feats.
it also gives me anxiety when a compounding spell like hex has a lot of abilities to add to it. i'll look at my invocations and be like, man, half of these are just for blast + hex. i think the flavor abilities are cooler. if one choice is a little worse but has flavor i'll usually pick that. like i kinda can't wait to try hunger of hadar almost BECAUSE half the party won't be able to see through it. wrinkles are cool.
Not necessarily. It depends entirely on what the bad guys are. Against mooks like goblins and orcs sure, but in a module such as Storm Giant which I am playing through at the moment, many of the enemy have hit points in triple digits. In this respect Hex is no different to Hunters Mark, yes it's a pain to keep using your bonus action to move it but against tough opponents it is more than worth it. Giants can get multi attack with +11 or more to hit, and they do 30-40 damage per hit. You have to hit them fast and hard.