Warlocks should gain more powers from their choice of pact. What the Hexblade gets is about the right amount. Make book and chain as significant.
Also, the warlock should have to choose one of Eldritch Blast, Hexblade, or powers related to mind control as a class ability.
I don't like that idea as it soft locks you into a play style really early.
One of the things I love about the Hexblade patron is one of its expanded spells, elemental weapon, expressly cannot be used with Pact of the Blade. It's a subtle thing that you can easily miss, but it's a good spell that encourages choosing other pacts.
The game, as it currently exists, doesn't care about roles. And if we're to take the coastal wizards at their word, that One D&D is meant to be backwards compatible with 5e, then they still don't care about roles.
If you want to reduce clerics (and that's already off-topic, but I'll bite) down to whatever "roles" you think should be, then every conceivably deity or faith must follow that suit. The intention isn't to gate certain roles to specific traditions, is it?
I already hate this conversation because trying not to use proper language that delineates your ideals with how D&D has always worked is frustrating beyond all get out. Each world works with a pantheon, sometimes multiple pantheons. Even if you want to dip into monotheism with Christianity, it doesn't exist in a vacuum. There are more religions, faiths, deities in this world than you can shake a stick at. Never mind all the different sects that practice Christianity differently.
Build your world that way, if you must. But don't expect anyone to be on board with such radical change. It honestly sounds like you want to play 4e or PF2e. Go play those.
You still didn't address the rogue analogy or the main, bolded points. Which are the main reasons really. You can make up the flavor and backstory reasons whatever you want, it's easy. But mechanics take some actual thinking. You might say cleric subclasses don't have roles, but life and peace domain are very obviously support-based, war and forge are clearly made for melee, while light is a ranged blaster caster.
Subclasses in 5E don't have specific roles (which might partially be related to 4e) but they do seem to have specific themes, when it comes to cleric, the theme is usually related to their primary deity (I say primary as most people are likely to worship several gods with one god more than the rest) but it's not necessary that it has to be (there isn't a specific rule that says it has to be the case). A grave domain cleric is themed around life and death.
Another example of themes in warlock is hexblade, it's easy to confuse it for "weapons" but the true theme of hexblade is Shadowfell, only a single feature of hexblade actually relates to weapons and a couple of the expanded spell list options.
A roles based system might be simpler for understanding one's position in a party but a themes based system lends itself more to customization and role-play. There are arguments for both but 4e that was more (to my understanding, never played it) role based essentially failed (it was not popular) while 5e that is more themes based has succeeded (most played edition of D&D).
One D&D is suppose to be backwards compatible to both systems anyways, so re-doing subclasses makes things a tiny bit more difficult.
I beg to differ, some classes do. Look at the artificer, it's got very clear roles - melee/infiltrator (armorer), support (alchemist), ranged (artillerist), pet (battle smith). Monk, aside from a collection of melee subclasses, has support (mercy), infiltrator (shadow), and ranged (sun soul). And so on.
The main reason hexblade has only one feature working for melee, is because the rest were already present in melee invocations. The subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade. What is even the hexblade's patron? A sentient weapon (that his own feature forbids him to bond with)? Maker of sentient weapons? Raven Queen? Shadowfell itself? Dunno, but it has everything a charisma-based melee can dream of.
Backwards compatibility remains the biggest problem in the way of merging subclasses based on what they're made for. But simply tagging which old feature belongs to which new subclass might be enough to solve it.
One of the things I love about the Hexblade patron is one of its expanded spells, elemental weapon, expressly cannot be used with Pact of the Blade. It's a subtle thing that you can easily miss, but it's a good spell that encourages choosing other pacts.
Honestly, that looks like an oversight to me. Hexblade subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade which was supposed to be the warlock's melee option, only it was MAD and lacked any defenses to go into melee. Then again, there's hex weapon feature, which doesn't work with sentient or artifact weapons. In a subclass designed around the idea of a bond with a sentient or artifact weapon.
Warlocks should gain more powers from their choice of pact. What the Hexblade gets is about the right amount. Make book and chain as significant.
Also, the warlock should have to choose one of Eldritch Blast, Hexblade, or powers related to mind control as a class ability.
I don't like that idea as it soft locks you into a play style really early.
EVERY class is locked into a play style.
That isn't true, some classes like Paladin, Cleric and Bard actually are quiet versatile in which roles they play, and for some classes there are sub classes which add significant ways to do other roles, like hexblade for warlock or circle of the moon for druid.
Subclasses in 5E don't have specific roles (which might partially be related to 4e) but they do seem to have specific themes, when it comes to cleric, the theme is usually related to their primary deity (I say primary as most people are likely to worship several gods with one god more than the rest) but it's not necessary that it has to be (there isn't a specific rule that says it has to be the case). A grave domain cleric is themed around life and death.
Another example of themes in warlock is hexblade, it's easy to confuse it for "weapons" but the true theme of hexblade is Shadowfell, only a single feature of hexblade actually relates to weapons and a couple of the expanded spell list options.
A roles based system might be simpler for understanding one's position in a party but a themes based system lends itself more to customization and role-play. There are arguments for both but 4e that was more (to my understanding, never played it) role based essentially failed (it was not popular) while 5e that is more themes based has succeeded (most played edition of D&D).
One D&D is suppose to be backwards compatible to both systems anyways, so re-doing subclasses makes things a tiny bit more difficult.
I beg to differ, some classes do. Look at the artificer, it's got very clear roles - melee/infiltrator (armorer), support (alchemist), ranged (artillerist), pet (battle smith). Monk, aside from a collection of melee subclasses, has support (mercy), infiltrator (shadow), and ranged (sun soul). And so on.
The main reason hexblade has only one feature working for melee, is because the rest were already present in melee invocations. The subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade. What is even the hexblade's patron? A sentient weapon (that his own feature forbids him to bond with)? Maker of sentient weapons? Raven Queen? Shadowfell itself? Dunno, but it has everything a charisma-based melee can dream of.
Backwards compatibility remains the biggest problem in the way of merging subclasses based on what they're made for. But simply tagging which old feature belongs to which new subclass might be enough to solve it.
The hexblade fluff text generally says the Raven Queen was the first person to make the sentient weapons and that they are generally connected to the Shadowfell. Indeed pact of the blade was missing three things that Hexblade supplied, the feature, the smite spells and medium armour. But most of the hexblade featuers are still tied to hexblade's curse and reflect the dark nature of the shadowfell, like bringing back victims from the dead to act as a specter or forcing the target of your curse to become less able to target you.
Some subclases might be better at different roles but it does not always necessarily mean they are restricted to those roles, it is more that they are restricted to the theme of the subclass. Artificer isn't a popular class, yet as you say is the most role based, it could be because it's the newest but there is also the possibility that it's just too much playing to roles.
Warlocks should gain more powers from their choice of pact. What the Hexblade gets is about the right amount. Make book and chain as significant.
Also, the warlock should have to choose one of Eldritch Blast, Hexblade, or powers related to mind control as a class ability.
I don't like that idea as it soft locks you into a play style really early.
EVERY class is locked into a play style.
That isn't true, some classes like Paladin, Cleric and Bard actually are quiet versatile in which roles they play, and for some classes there are sub classes which add significant ways to do other roles, like hexblade for warlock or circle of the moon for druid.
Paladins soak up damage. Clerics and Bards buff. Circle of the Moon goes into melee.
The hexblade fluff text generally says the Raven Queen was the first person to make the sentient weapons and that they are generally connected to the Shadowfell. Indeed pact of the blade was missing three things that Hexblade supplied, the feature, the smite spells and medium armour. But most of the hexblade featuers are still tied to hexblade's curse and reflect the dark nature of the shadowfell, like bringing back victims from the dead to act as a specter or forcing the target of your curse to become less able to target you.
Some subclases might be better at different roles but it does not always necessarily mean they are restricted to those roles, it is more that they are restricted to the theme of the subclass. Artificer isn't a popular class, yet as you say is the most role based, it could be because it's the newest but there is also the possibility that it's just too much playing to roles.
Well, the simplest reason for hexblade's curse and specter features is that the pact boon and invocations already exist, so WotC had to come up with something new to fill the levels. That doesn't change the fact that all warlocks who want to go melee choose hexblade, and most hexblades are melee.
No one says roles mean restrictions. It all depends on how much you give to the class itself. Spellcasters have access to all kinds of versatile tools just through the selection of spells. The remaining four spellless martials rely on skills and general features.
The reason why I'd like subclasses to have roles is because there's a lot of subclasses that do essentially the same thing, like almost all of barbarian's subclasses - they just let you do additional damage during rage in slightly different ways, plus a ribbon. None of them lets barbarian truly be something else, like monk's way of shadow and way of mercy.
The game, as it currently exists, doesn't care about roles. And if we're to take the coastal wizards at their word, that One D&D is meant to be backwards compatible with 5e, then they still don't care about roles.
If you want to reduce clerics (and that's already off-topic, but I'll bite) down to whatever "roles" you think should be, then every conceivably deity or faith must follow that suit. The intention isn't to gate certain roles to specific traditions, is it?
I already hate this conversation because trying not to use proper language that delineates your ideals with how D&D has always worked is frustrating beyond all get out. Each world works with a pantheon, sometimes multiple pantheons. Even if you want to dip into monotheism with Christianity, it doesn't exist in a vacuum. There are more religions, faiths, deities in this world than you can shake a stick at. Never mind all the different sects that practice Christianity differently.
Build your world that way, if you must. But don't expect anyone to be on board with such radical change. It honestly sounds like you want to play 4e or PF2e. Go play those.
You still didn't address the rogue analogy or the main, bolded points. Which are the main reasons really. You can make up the flavor and backstory reasons whatever you want, it's easy. But mechanics take some actual thinking. You might say cleric subclasses don't have roles, but life and peace domain are very obviously support-based, war and forge are clearly made for melee, while light is a ranged blaster caster.
Okay, fine, your rogue analogy doesn't hold water because clerics, their relation to their deities, and their "roles" don't work the way you think they do. The domains most commonly associated with a given deity are suggestions; not a requirement. That's literally in the PHB.
If you’re playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity’s suggested domains when selecting your character’s domain.
Bolded and italicized for emphasis.
Nerys, one of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, is canonically a cleric of Kelemvor with the War Domain. His suggested domains are Death and Grave, though the PHB also states the Life Domain would be appropriate for a cleric of any Good or Neutral deity. As for anyone's "role" within the game, that's incidental. Looking back on the cleric, they can still prepare enough spells to do any other "role" you think a cleric can do. We're a long way away from the Controller, Defender, Leader, and Striker of 4e. "Roles" don't matter in this edition, and I'd be surprised if they did in One D&D.
One of the things I love about the Hexblade patron is one of its expanded spells, elemental weapon, expressly cannot be used with Pact of the Blade. It's a subtle thing that you can easily miss, but it's a good spell that encourages choosing other pacts.
Honestly, that looks like an oversight to me. Hexblade subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade which was supposed to be the warlock's melee option, only it was MAD and lacked any defenses to go into melee. Then again, there's hex weapon feature, which doesn't work with sentient or artifact weapons. In a subclass designed around the idea of a bond with a sentient or artifact weapon.
You mean the Hex Warrior feature, which carries no such restriction? Or the Pact of the Blade, which only stipulates you cannot shunt an artifact or sentient weapon into extradimensional space? The patron itself is basically a Hephaestus from the Shadowfell. They aren't a weapon itself, but the entity which makes such weapons. The Raven Queen is just one such example, and one lifted from 4e.
I don't know why you think the purpose of the subclass is to form a bond with such a weapon. Or why you think the Hexblade is a crutch to prop up Pact of the Blade. Or that the inclusion of elemental weapon is an oversight. But, since you've literally been wrong about everything else you've typed in this thread, I don't think it matters.
You still didn't address the rogue analogy or the main, bolded points. Which are the main reasons really. You can make up the flavor and backstory reasons whatever you want, it's easy. But mechanics take some actual thinking. You might say cleric subclasses don't have roles, but life and peace domain are very obviously support-based, war and forge are clearly made for melee, while light is a ranged blaster caster.
Okay, fine, your rogue analogy doesn't hold water because clerics, their relation to their deities, and their "roles" don't work the way you think they do. The domains most commonly associated with a given deity are suggestions; not a requirement. That's literally in the PHB.
If you’re playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity’s suggested domains when selecting your character’s domain.
Bolded and italicized for emphasis.
Nerys, one of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, is canonically a cleric of Kelemvor with the War Domain. His suggested domains are Death and Grave, though the PHB also states the Life Domain would be appropriate for a cleric of any Good or Neutral deity. As for anyone's "role" within the game, that's incidental. Looking back on the cleric, they can still prepare enough spells to do any other "role" you think a cleric can do. We're a long way away from the Controller, Defender, Leader, and Striker of 4e. "Roles" don't matter in this edition, and I'd be surprised if they did in One D&D.
Honestly, that looks like an oversight to me. Hexblade subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade which was supposed to be the warlock's melee option, only it was MAD and lacked any defenses to go into melee. Then again, there's hex weapon feature, which doesn't work with sentient or artifact weapons. In a subclass designed around the idea of a bond with a sentient or artifact weapon.
You mean the Hex Warrior feature, which carries no such restriction? Or the Pact of the Blade, which only stipulates you cannot shunt an artifact or sentient weapon into extradimensional space? The patron itself is basically a Hephaestus from the Shadowfell. They aren't a weapon itself, but the entity which makes such weapons. The Raven Queen is just one such example, and one lifted from 4e.
I don't know why you think the purpose of the subclass is to form a bond with such a weapon. Or why you think the Hexblade is a crutch to prop up Pact of the Blade. Or that the inclusion of elemental weapon is an oversight. But, since you've literally been wrong about everything else you've typed in this thread, I don't think it matters.
The roles I want to see are also suggestions, not requirements. Also I don't recall ever saying that any spells or other parts of cleric's versatility should be taken away. Merely that subclasses could be merged together based on their function. Would it be bad if peace, life, and grave were folded into one subclass that let you choose any of their collective features on each respective tier, like hunter or totem warrior? Stop thinking of lore and flavor, because they don't matter; you can make these up within a minute when you describe how your setting works. Think of it from purely mechanics standpoint. Less subclass bloat, more options and customization within subclasses themselves.
Also, read up one the design behind hexblade, by Mike Mearls. "Idea of the warrior mage", "characters like Elric, Michael Moorcock's series of novels" (literally a guy who formed a pact with a sentient artifact weapon; he was physically frail but with a powerful will and knowledge of the occult), "this sort of like shadow warrior type character. Sort of the mirror of the Paladin", "this idea that you have this pact you made with this weapon, like Elric and his sword". I know what I'm talking about. Do you?
I'd say that each of the classes in 5e have an inclination towards a role - "locked in" is a bit too strong of language. Subclasses can alter, tweak or otherwise add to that inclination, and race, feats and magic items offer further tweaks.
And, yeah, Hexblade is absolutely intended as a stealth fix for Pact of the Blade. We've got Word of God to that very effect. The problem is that, well, the writers botched it. No big surprise there.
I mean, hells. Warlock, Binder and Hexblade were all distinct classes in 3e. 4e went out of its way to combine the three classes into one uber-Warlock class; the three classes still exist in the form of Book, Chain and Blade pacts, respectively. Based on the history of the word "Hexblade" along with fact it literally includes the word "blade" in its name, its kind of a stretch to assume that its, well, not meant to be used with a weapon of some kind.
It's pretty obvious that Hexblade was meant to compensate for the Pact of the Blade being kinda poorly done, and the rest of it was just filler they use in the hopes no-one would notice. Every other subclass is pretty clear in what patron or being it represents, but the Hexblade is very vague. And before anyone mentions the Raven Queen, they did consider making that its own warlock subclass, and it didn't have anything to do with weapons specifically.
I'd kinda like the option to have a sentient weapon, or an heirloom, or something that I unlock powers with as I level up warlock. Pretend I've got a Fallen Avenger sword and go to town weilding it. Or an elven Moonblade that was sealed or something.
I'd say that each of the classes in 5e have an inclination towards a role - "locked in" is a bit too strong of language. Subclasses can alter, tweak or otherwise add to that inclination, and race, feats and magic items offer further tweaks.
And, yeah, Hexblade is absolutely intended as a stealth fix for Pact of the Blade. We've got Word of God to that very effect. The problem is that, well, the writers botched it. No big surprise there.
I mean, hells. Warlock, Binder and Hexblade were all distinct classes in 3e. 4e went out of its way to combine the three classes into one uber-Warlock class; the three classes still exist in the form of Book, Chain and Blade pacts, respectively. Based on the history of the word "Hexblade" along with fact it literally includes the word "blade" in its name, its kind of a stretch to assume that its, well, not meant to be used with a weapon of some kind.
nobody has said it's not connected to weapons, I said the primary theme is "shadowfell". Obviously the lore is sentient weapons created by the Raven Queen, however I think some people are still confusing what a hexblade patron is; it's a patron, a warlock does not wield the hexblade patron, the warlock forges a pact with the hexblade and they can use part of the power they gain to channel into other weapons they come across; but they never get to actually wield the patron weapon. Like with the Fiend Pact, the Fiend isn't casting hellish powers on the warlock's behalf, they have gained those powers themselves under guidance or assistance of the fiend, you don't get to summon or order that fiend about.
You know an issue I have with the Raven Queen supposedly being the patron behind Hexblades (which a number of people ignore anyway because the lore is that vague)?
The Raven Queen is all about ensuring people get their intended deaths and that those who cheat death are dealt with. In other words, her thing is similar to what Grave clerics are about. And you can even play a Grave cleric of her if you want. So why does none of the Hexblade's features do anything to detect or counteract undead? Why does one of them raise undead from people you kill instead of letting their soul pass on?
You still didn't address the rogue analogy or the main, bolded points. Which are the main reasons really. You can make up the flavor and backstory reasons whatever you want, it's easy. But mechanics take some actual thinking. You might say cleric subclasses don't have roles, but life and peace domain are very obviously support-based, war and forge are clearly made for melee, while light is a ranged blaster caster.
Okay, fine, your rogue analogy doesn't hold water because clerics, their relation to their deities, and their "roles" don't work the way you think they do. The domains most commonly associated with a given deity are suggestions; not a requirement. That's literally in the PHB.
If you’re playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity’s suggested domains when selecting your character’s domain.
Bolded and italicized for emphasis.
Nerys, one of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, is canonically a cleric of Kelemvor with the War Domain. His suggested domains are Death and Grave, though the PHB also states the Life Domain would be appropriate for a cleric of any Good or Neutral deity. As for anyone's "role" within the game, that's incidental. Looking back on the cleric, they can still prepare enough spells to do any other "role" you think a cleric can do. We're a long way away from the Controller, Defender, Leader, and Striker of 4e. "Roles" don't matter in this edition, and I'd be surprised if they did in One D&D.
Honestly, that looks like an oversight to me. Hexblade subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade which was supposed to be the warlock's melee option, only it was MAD and lacked any defenses to go into melee. Then again, there's hex weapon feature, which doesn't work with sentient or artifact weapons. In a subclass designed around the idea of a bond with a sentient or artifact weapon.
You mean the Hex Warrior feature, which carries no such restriction? Or the Pact of the Blade, which only stipulates you cannot shunt an artifact or sentient weapon into extradimensional space? The patron itself is basically a Hephaestus from the Shadowfell. They aren't a weapon itself, but the entity which makes such weapons. The Raven Queen is just one such example, and one lifted from 4e.
I don't know why you think the purpose of the subclass is to form a bond with such a weapon. Or why you think the Hexblade is a crutch to prop up Pact of the Blade. Or that the inclusion of elemental weapon is an oversight. But, since you've literally been wrong about everything else you've typed in this thread, I don't think it matters.
The roles I want to see are also suggestions, not requirements. Also I don't recall ever saying that any spells or other parts of cleric's versatility should be taken away. Merely that subclasses could be merged together based on their function. Would it be bad if peace, life, and grave were folded into one subclass that let you choose any of their collective features on each respective tier, like hunter or totem warrior? Stop thinking of lore and flavor, because they don't matter; you can make these up within a minute when you describe how your setting works. Think of it from purely mechanics standpoint. Less subclass bloat, more options and customization within subclasses themselves.
Also, read up one the design behind hexblade, by Mike Mearls. "Idea of the warrior mage", "characters like Elric, Michael Moorcock's series of novels" (literally a guy who formed a pact with a sentient artifact weapon; he was physically frail but with a powerful will and knowledge of the occult), "this sort of like shadow warrior type character. Sort of the mirror of the Paladin", "this idea that you have this pact you made with this weapon, like Elric and his sword". I know what I'm talking about. Do you?
Once again, I find myself correcting you. You're attempting an appeal to authority, a logical fallacy. That only works when the person in question is an actual person of authority. Whatever Mearls might have said in the past has no bearing on what the finished product looks like. The descriptive text for the Otherworldly Patron, as it appears in its published form, does not match the ideas he expressed in that interview. The end point, not the starting point, is what matters.
You want to unnecessarily complicate character creation and growth by adding new branching points every few levels. If that's honestly what you want, then D&D isn't the game for you. And your activities here aren't going to make it happen, either. The design is set, and it works. If you think your way is better, then stop what you're doing. Put your designer hat on and actually draft up what this might look like. Because, and I have to say this, it doesn't look like it will reduce bloat.
You've also been way off-topic for a while now. So take this conversation to a new thread.
You know an issue I have with the Raven Queen supposedly being the patron behind Hexblades (which a number of people ignore anyway because the lore is that vague)?
The Raven Queen is all about ensuring people get their intended deaths and that those who cheat death are dealt with. In other words, her thing is similar to what Grave clerics are about. And you can even play a Grave cleric of her if you want. So why does none of the Hexblade's features do anything to detect or counteract undead? Why does one of them raise undead from people you kill instead of letting their soul pass on?
That's because she isn't expressly the patron behind them. A patron can be anything that fits the bill. An archfey patron could be a member of one of the courts or a hag. A celestial patron could be an angel, an archon, a guardinal, or even a unicorn. A fiendish patron could be virtually any fiend. A great old one is presumed to be chthonic, which covers all maner of entities. An undead patron could be a lich or vampire.
So a hexblade patron is someone or something, with ties to the Shadowfell, or not (you'll see in a minute), who either makes physical weapons or has interest in turning a person into a weapon. And that can be anything; even something unexpected. Uk'otoa, from Explorer's Guide to Wildemount, could comfortably be a Fathomless, Great Old One, or Hexblade patron. The latter two are explicitly mentioned in the book, and the former is an educated guess.
The listed domains you see in sourcebooks are suggestions, not requirements, and The Raven Queen isn't a deity in every setting. Whether she's even an option is generally up to the DM.
Once again, I find myself correcting you. You're attempting an appeal to authority, a logical fallacy. That only works when the person in question is an actual person of authority. Whatever Mearls might have said in the past has no bearing on what the finished product looks like. The descriptive text for the Otherworldly Patron, as it appears in its published form, does not match the ideas he expressed in that interview. The end point, not the starting point, is what matters.
You want to unnecessarily complicate character creation and growth by adding new branching points every few levels. If that's honestly what you want, then D&D isn't the game for you. And your activities here aren't going to make it happen, either. The design is set, and it works. If you think your way is better, then stop what you're doing. Put your designer hat on and actually draft up what this might look like. Because, and I have to say this, it doesn't look like it will reduce bloat.
You've also been way off-topic for a while now. So take this conversation to a new thread.
"That only works when the person in question is an actual person of authority" - Mearls literally is this person of authority, it's the guy who designed the thing explaining how and why he designed the thing, and you dismiss the designer saying you know better. Uh, okay then. I usually look up RAI when RAW isn't clear, but what do I know.
"The end point, not the starting point, is what matters" - we're in the starting point of a new edition right now. The design was set, and it worked... in the first edition. Why even make the other five? Why make warlock, hexblade, binder, why then merge them into a single class? Why would a warlock have 8 branching points in the form of invocations? What are you even doing in Unearthed Arcana, a subsection of forum dedicated to change, arguing against change itself? Haughty attitude doesn't add weight to your arguments either, you know.
If you want to argue "rework potential" then it would behoove you to understand what that would reasonably look like. So far, we've been told this edition will be backwards compatible. So, what does that mean?
All the old subclasses will remain viable. This means we can expect any new subclasses to have features at the same levels.
It means, regarding the warlock, Eldritch Invocations as an idea will remain unchanged. We might see errata, but they aren't going anywhere.
You're musing about rebuilding everything from the ground up. You're using language that, so far, has not been embraced by the design team. Wizards of the Coast is not calling this a new edition. If you want to engage honestly with the subject, then do it on their terms.
If you want to argue "rework potential" then it would behoove you to understand what that would reasonably look like. So far, we've been told this edition will be backwards compatible. So, what does that mean?
All the old subclasses will remain viable. This means we can expect any new subclasses to have features at the same levels.
It means, regarding the warlock, Eldritch Invocations as an idea will remain unchanged. We might see errata, but they aren't going anywhere.
You're musing about rebuilding everything from the ground up. You're using language that, so far, has not been embraced by the design team. Wizards of the Coast is not calling this a new edition. If you want to engage honestly with the subject, then do it on their terms.
That's a fair point. Backwards compatibility remains the strongest argument against the deeper changes, but I suppose it's also fair to say that we don't know the extent of this compatibility. It might be just core mechanics and PC characteristics, so that just adventures could be left untouched. Remember, they did add optional and substitute class features in Tasha's when they needed to fix ranger, and then reworked monsters and races in MMotM, marking the old versions as "legacy". If they could sell the same creatures twice, they could as well sell subclass features twice as well. I agree that the probability of really radical class reworks is not that high, but it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility either.
Also, remember how they called 5e "DnD Next"? That didn't stick. I can't speak for everyone, but something tells me One DnD will mostly be called 5.5e.
If you want to argue "rework potential" then it would behoove you to understand what that would reasonably look like. So far, we've been told this edition will be backwards compatible. So, what does that mean?
All the old subclasses will remain viable. This means we can expect any new subclasses to have features at the same levels.
It means, regarding the warlock, Eldritch Invocations as an idea will remain unchanged. We might see errata, but they aren't going anywhere.
You're musing about rebuilding everything from the ground up. You're using language that, so far, has not been embraced by the design team. Wizards of the Coast is not calling this a new edition. If you want to engage honestly with the subject, then do it on their terms.
Backwards compatability with subclasses just mean we need the same number of subclass features at roughly the same levels. That a lot of room for other things.
Eldritch Invocations and their sister Artificer Infusions will very likely remain in the new edition. That said, there's been more than a little discontent over how they've handled them in the past, so we're likely to see old ones phased out and newer ones similiar to Tasha ones phased in. And there's a definite difference. Its like.... We are very likely to see a complete and utter lack of Conjure XYZ spells, given how unbalanced and unweildly they were, so we're going to be seeing more of the Tasha style summons and politely pretending the old ones don't exist.
Its notable that the only 5e PHB spell (cantrip and 1st) not in the new spell lists is Eldritch Blast. There's a chance it will move from a spell to a class feature to avoid certain shinanigans and issues with it prior.
Short rest-based classes have proven to be an abject failure of design. So, at least that will be undergoing revision of -some- sort with the warlock spell slots. Its quite possible that we'll end up testing a half-caster warlock with invocations akin to how Artificer does its thing.
So there's quite a lot of room with new design and new revisions while keeping backwards compatability open.
One of the things I love about the Hexblade patron is one of its expanded spells, elemental weapon, expressly cannot be used with Pact of the Blade. It's a subtle thing that you can easily miss, but it's a good spell that encourages choosing other pacts.
EVERY class is locked into a play style.
You still didn't address the rogue analogy or the main, bolded points. Which are the main reasons really. You can make up the flavor and backstory reasons whatever you want, it's easy. But mechanics take some actual thinking. You might say cleric subclasses don't have roles, but life and peace domain are very obviously support-based, war and forge are clearly made for melee, while light is a ranged blaster caster.
I beg to differ, some classes do. Look at the artificer, it's got very clear roles - melee/infiltrator (armorer), support (alchemist), ranged (artillerist), pet (battle smith). Monk, aside from a collection of melee subclasses, has support (mercy), infiltrator (shadow), and ranged (sun soul). And so on.
The main reason hexblade has only one feature working for melee, is because the rest were already present in melee invocations. The subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade. What is even the hexblade's patron? A sentient weapon (that his own feature forbids him to bond with)? Maker of sentient weapons? Raven Queen? Shadowfell itself? Dunno, but it has everything a charisma-based melee can dream of.
Backwards compatibility remains the biggest problem in the way of merging subclasses based on what they're made for. But simply tagging which old feature belongs to which new subclass might be enough to solve it.
Honestly, that looks like an oversight to me. Hexblade subclass itself is a crutch for pact of the blade which was supposed to be the warlock's melee option, only it was MAD and lacked any defenses to go into melee. Then again, there's hex weapon feature, which doesn't work with sentient or artifact weapons. In a subclass designed around the idea of a bond with a sentient or artifact weapon.
That isn't true, some classes like Paladin, Cleric and Bard actually are quiet versatile in which roles they play, and for some classes there are sub classes which add significant ways to do other roles, like hexblade for warlock or circle of the moon for druid.
The hexblade fluff text generally says the Raven Queen was the first person to make the sentient weapons and that they are generally connected to the Shadowfell. Indeed pact of the blade was missing three things that Hexblade supplied, the feature, the smite spells and medium armour. But most of the hexblade featuers are still tied to hexblade's curse and reflect the dark nature of the shadowfell, like bringing back victims from the dead to act as a specter or forcing the target of your curse to become less able to target you.
Some subclases might be better at different roles but it does not always necessarily mean they are restricted to those roles, it is more that they are restricted to the theme of the subclass. Artificer isn't a popular class, yet as you say is the most role based, it could be because it's the newest but there is also the possibility that it's just too much playing to roles.
Paladins soak up damage. Clerics and Bards buff. Circle of the Moon goes into melee.
Well, the simplest reason for hexblade's curse and specter features is that the pact boon and invocations already exist, so WotC had to come up with something new to fill the levels. That doesn't change the fact that all warlocks who want to go melee choose hexblade, and most hexblades are melee.
No one says roles mean restrictions. It all depends on how much you give to the class itself. Spellcasters have access to all kinds of versatile tools just through the selection of spells. The remaining four spellless martials rely on skills and general features.
The reason why I'd like subclasses to have roles is because there's a lot of subclasses that do essentially the same thing, like almost all of barbarian's subclasses - they just let you do additional damage during rage in slightly different ways, plus a ribbon. None of them lets barbarian truly be something else, like monk's way of shadow and way of mercy.
Okay, fine, your rogue analogy doesn't hold water because clerics, their relation to their deities, and their "roles" don't work the way you think they do. The domains most commonly associated with a given deity are suggestions; not a requirement. That's literally in the PHB.
Bolded and italicized for emphasis.
Nerys, one of the Heroes of Baldur's Gate, is canonically a cleric of Kelemvor with the War Domain. His suggested domains are Death and Grave, though the PHB also states the Life Domain would be appropriate for a cleric of any Good or Neutral deity. As for anyone's "role" within the game, that's incidental. Looking back on the cleric, they can still prepare enough spells to do any other "role" you think a cleric can do. We're a long way away from the Controller, Defender, Leader, and Striker of 4e. "Roles" don't matter in this edition, and I'd be surprised if they did in One D&D.
You mean the Hex Warrior feature, which carries no such restriction? Or the Pact of the Blade, which only stipulates you cannot shunt an artifact or sentient weapon into extradimensional space? The patron itself is basically a Hephaestus from the Shadowfell. They aren't a weapon itself, but the entity which makes such weapons. The Raven Queen is just one such example, and one lifted from 4e.
I don't know why you think the purpose of the subclass is to form a bond with such a weapon. Or why you think the Hexblade is a crutch to prop up Pact of the Blade. Or that the inclusion of elemental weapon is an oversight. But, since you've literally been wrong about everything else you've typed in this thread, I don't think it matters.
The roles I want to see are also suggestions, not requirements. Also I don't recall ever saying that any spells or other parts of cleric's versatility should be taken away. Merely that subclasses could be merged together based on their function. Would it be bad if peace, life, and grave were folded into one subclass that let you choose any of their collective features on each respective tier, like hunter or totem warrior? Stop thinking of lore and flavor, because they don't matter; you can make these up within a minute when you describe how your setting works. Think of it from purely mechanics standpoint. Less subclass bloat, more options and customization within subclasses themselves.
Sentient weapon can't be pact weapon. Jeremy Crawford clarified that.
Also, read up one the design behind hexblade, by Mike Mearls. "Idea of the warrior mage", "characters like Elric, Michael Moorcock's series of novels" (literally a guy who formed a pact with a sentient artifact weapon; he was physically frail but with a powerful will and knowledge of the occult), "this sort of like shadow warrior type character. Sort of the mirror of the Paladin", "this idea that you have this pact you made with this weapon, like Elric and his sword". I know what I'm talking about. Do you?
Hmm....
I'd say that each of the classes in 5e have an inclination towards a role - "locked in" is a bit too strong of language. Subclasses can alter, tweak or otherwise add to that inclination, and race, feats and magic items offer further tweaks.
And, yeah, Hexblade is absolutely intended as a stealth fix for Pact of the Blade. We've got Word of God to that very effect. The problem is that, well, the writers botched it. No big surprise there.
I mean, hells. Warlock, Binder and Hexblade were all distinct classes in 3e. 4e went out of its way to combine the three classes into one uber-Warlock class; the three classes still exist in the form of Book, Chain and Blade pacts, respectively. Based on the history of the word "Hexblade" along with fact it literally includes the word "blade" in its name, its kind of a stretch to assume that its, well, not meant to be used with a weapon of some kind.
It's pretty obvious that Hexblade was meant to compensate for the Pact of the Blade being kinda poorly done, and the rest of it was just filler they use in the hopes no-one would notice. Every other subclass is pretty clear in what patron or being it represents, but the Hexblade is very vague. And before anyone mentions the Raven Queen, they did consider making that its own warlock subclass, and it didn't have anything to do with weapons specifically.
I'd kinda like the option to have a sentient weapon, or an heirloom, or something that I unlock powers with as I level up warlock. Pretend I've got a Fallen Avenger sword and go to town weilding it. Or an elven Moonblade that was sealed or something.
nobody has said it's not connected to weapons, I said the primary theme is "shadowfell". Obviously the lore is sentient weapons created by the Raven Queen, however I think some people are still confusing what a hexblade patron is; it's a patron, a warlock does not wield the hexblade patron, the warlock forges a pact with the hexblade and they can use part of the power they gain to channel into other weapons they come across; but they never get to actually wield the patron weapon. Like with the Fiend Pact, the Fiend isn't casting hellish powers on the warlock's behalf, they have gained those powers themselves under guidance or assistance of the fiend, you don't get to summon or order that fiend about.
You know an issue I have with the Raven Queen supposedly being the patron behind Hexblades (which a number of people ignore anyway because the lore is that vague)?
The Raven Queen is all about ensuring people get their intended deaths and that those who cheat death are dealt with. In other words, her thing is similar to what Grave clerics are about. And you can even play a Grave cleric of her if you want. So why does none of the Hexblade's features do anything to detect or counteract undead? Why does one of them raise undead from people you kill instead of letting their soul pass on?
*n/m*
Once again, I find myself correcting you. You're attempting an appeal to authority, a logical fallacy. That only works when the person in question is an actual person of authority. Whatever Mearls might have said in the past has no bearing on what the finished product looks like. The descriptive text for the Otherworldly Patron, as it appears in its published form, does not match the ideas he expressed in that interview. The end point, not the starting point, is what matters.
You want to unnecessarily complicate character creation and growth by adding new branching points every few levels. If that's honestly what you want, then D&D isn't the game for you. And your activities here aren't going to make it happen, either. The design is set, and it works. If you think your way is better, then stop what you're doing. Put your designer hat on and actually draft up what this might look like. Because, and I have to say this, it doesn't look like it will reduce bloat.
You've also been way off-topic for a while now. So take this conversation to a new thread.
That's because she isn't expressly the patron behind them. A patron can be anything that fits the bill. An archfey patron could be a member of one of the courts or a hag. A celestial patron could be an angel, an archon, a guardinal, or even a unicorn. A fiendish patron could be virtually any fiend. A great old one is presumed to be chthonic, which covers all maner of entities. An undead patron could be a lich or vampire.
So a hexblade patron is someone or something, with ties to the Shadowfell, or not (you'll see in a minute), who either makes physical weapons or has interest in turning a person into a weapon. And that can be anything; even something unexpected. Uk'otoa, from Explorer's Guide to Wildemount, could comfortably be a Fathomless, Great Old One, or Hexblade patron. The latter two are explicitly mentioned in the book, and the former is an educated guess.
The listed domains you see in sourcebooks are suggestions, not requirements, and The Raven Queen isn't a deity in every setting. Whether she's even an option is generally up to the DM.
"That only works when the person in question is an actual person of authority" - Mearls literally is this person of authority, it's the guy who designed the thing explaining how and why he designed the thing, and you dismiss the designer saying you know better. Uh, okay then. I usually look up RAI when RAW isn't clear, but what do I know.
"The end point, not the starting point, is what matters" - we're in the starting point of a new edition right now. The design was set, and it worked... in the first edition. Why even make the other five? Why make warlock, hexblade, binder, why then merge them into a single class? Why would a warlock have 8 branching points in the form of invocations? What are you even doing in Unearthed Arcana, a subsection of forum dedicated to change, arguing against change itself? Haughty attitude doesn't add weight to your arguments either, you know.
If you want to argue "rework potential" then it would behoove you to understand what that would reasonably look like. So far, we've been told this edition will be backwards compatible. So, what does that mean?
You're musing about rebuilding everything from the ground up. You're using language that, so far, has not been embraced by the design team. Wizards of the Coast is not calling this a new edition. If you want to engage honestly with the subject, then do it on their terms.
That's a fair point. Backwards compatibility remains the strongest argument against the deeper changes, but I suppose it's also fair to say that we don't know the extent of this compatibility. It might be just core mechanics and PC characteristics, so that just adventures could be left untouched. Remember, they did add optional and substitute class features in Tasha's when they needed to fix ranger, and then reworked monsters and races in MMotM, marking the old versions as "legacy". If they could sell the same creatures twice, they could as well sell subclass features twice as well. I agree that the probability of really radical class reworks is not that high, but it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility either.
Also, remember how they called 5e "DnD Next"? That didn't stick. I can't speak for everyone, but something tells me One DnD will mostly be called 5.5e.
Backwards compatability with subclasses just mean we need the same number of subclass features at roughly the same levels. That a lot of room for other things.
Eldritch Invocations and their sister Artificer Infusions will very likely remain in the new edition. That said, there's been more than a little discontent over how they've handled them in the past, so we're likely to see old ones phased out and newer ones similiar to Tasha ones phased in. And there's a definite difference. Its like.... We are very likely to see a complete and utter lack of Conjure XYZ spells, given how unbalanced and unweildly they were, so we're going to be seeing more of the Tasha style summons and politely pretending the old ones don't exist.
Its notable that the only 5e PHB spell (cantrip and 1st) not in the new spell lists is Eldritch Blast. There's a chance it will move from a spell to a class feature to avoid certain shinanigans and issues with it prior.
Short rest-based classes have proven to be an abject failure of design. So, at least that will be undergoing revision of -some- sort with the warlock spell slots. Its quite possible that we'll end up testing a half-caster warlock with invocations akin to how Artificer does its thing.
So there's quite a lot of room with new design and new revisions while keeping backwards compatability open.