In any case, back to the 2024 Hexblade. I don't think it needs medium armor proficiency. If a character wants to wear medium armor, take a feat at 4th.
The problem with this approach is that if the 2024 Hexblade wants to use a shield, they have to first take the Lightly Armored feat because that is the only armor-related feat that grants shield training. And what this means is that a 2024 Hexblade has to use their first two feats (4th and 8th level) to gain medium armor and shield training. Worse, it means effectively throwing away a feat because they already have Light Armor training (but not shield training).
Considering most campaigns end or fizzle out by or before 12th level, this means the 2024 Hexblade will, at most, get exactly one feat not dedicated to simply getting the armor and shield training the subclass had baked in with the 2014 version.
My own fix is that ALL armor-related feats bundle in shield training, but it's confounding to me that the folks in charge of the 2024 rules didn't do that as well.
they wanted getting a shield and medium armor to be more costly for classes who have neither. They did UAs where armor was much easier to obtain for all classes. You could get an armor proficiency as a origin feat.
there was tremendous push back to how easy it was for certain classes that were supposed to not have the base durability of martial classes to gain it, and it was saying that it should be less than what 2014 even offered. Arcane casters were specifically singled out,
In 2024 they didnt want arcane casters to easily gain medium armor/shields. They want it to be costly in terms of feats, or require multiclassing, which dms can easily not allow if they want a more straightfoward balancining. They want them to have to choose between dex or con for AC versus concentrtiom, or make a signifigant investment.
thats why the UA has specifically avoided hexblade with medium armor in 2 iterations.
Yeah i agree, but you cant hamstring a class because of multiclass reasons.
Yes, you can. That's part of the reason in 2024, all the subclasses were moved to level 3.
Changing all subclasses to lvl3 is a design decision that effects all the classes in the same way, it is a good choice to hamper multiclassing. You are contradicting yourself, first you say paladins can easily go 3 lvls in warlock for stuff now your saying moving subclasses to 3 fixed that (which it did that's why arguing against certain subclass features because of multiclassing is beyond stupid).
Secondly, hampering a subclass due to multiclassing is still beyond stupid and defiantly never taken into consideration by any serious game designer. Thank god you are not on the WoTc design team, gameplay would definitely suck a** with your train of thought.
Its very interesting that some of yall have decided that hexblade needs more Than 18 base AC to survive in melee, when thats all most people get, and also more than it ever had before.
While i understand many of you want to be able to prioritize constitution while also getting 18 AC, thats a balance change in 2024, to not be able to get that out the box, (for classes who dont have it innately) including hexblade, probably hexblade was a driving force in this change happening, As it was not only an easy source for it, but also, Hexblade was seen as being a better martial than a martial if you were t going for a power attack build.
Its also interesting that people think warlock should be able to specialize into durability, without having to use the features specifically designed to allow warlocks to specialize into durability. If durability isnt worth it to you, dont take those features. Its totally unbalanced if hexblade had the same durability as other classes without any durability invocations, and on top that, they would have even more durability with these invocations.
People are really suggesting hexblade get UA Genie paladin durability baseline (22 AC) and still can throw tough(2*level Max HP0, lucky, (PB rerolls a day), fiendish vigor (12 hp on top of max hp at will that lasts until you take damage), armor of shadows (+1 AC) and lifedrinker (recover hp every round) And thats without using any spell slots or concentrating on anything. Warlock also has better defensive spells than paladin.and this would give them 19 AC at level 3, 20 AC at level 4. (meanwhile the heavily armored classes designed to be tough have 18) while still dealing out top teir damage..
a fully invested unarmored monk or barbarian wouldnt get as much (23 AC) as this until level 20 with capstone, but sure Hexblades need it to survive.
And because i saw it mentioned, you dont need to recast fiendish vigor or blade ward in combat to gain a strong benefit, you already got +12 max hp, or likely dodged a few hits by the time they are gone, and you can cast them in emergencies, in which case you feel like its worth giving up damage.
Its also interestig that yall want to focus on t1 and t2, in which warlocks potential survivability is already overperforming.
I mean i get that some people want hexblade to be the best class in the game, but these suggestions are noticeably unbalanced.
Have yall guys playedtested this hexblade, or other martial classes in 2024? you are asking for a lot here.
Its very interesting that some of yall have decided that hexblade needs more Than 18 base AC to survive in melee, when thats all most people get, and also more than it ever had before.
While i understand many of you want to be able to prioritize constitution while also getting 18 AC, thats a balance change in 2024, to not be able to get that out the box, (for classes who dont have it innately) including hexblade, probably hexblade was a driving force in this change happening, As it was not only an easy source for it, but also, Hexblade was seen as being a better martial than a martial if you were t going for a power attack build.
Its also interesting that people think warlock should be able to specialize into durability, without having to use the features specifically designed to allow warlocks to specialize into durability. If durability isnt worth it to you, dont take those features. Its totally unbalanced if hexblade had the same durability as other classes without any durability invocations, and on top that, they would have even more durability with these invocations.
People are really suggesting hexblade get UA Genie paladin durability baseline (22 AC) and still can throw tough(2*level Max HP0, lucky, (PB rerolls a day), fiendish vigor (12 hp on top of max hp at will that lasts until you take damage), armor of shadows (+1 AC) and lifedrinker (recover hp every round) And thats without using any spell slots or concentrating on anything. Warlock also has better defensive spells than paladin.and this would give them 19 AC at level 3, 20 AC at level 4. (meanwhile the heavily armored classes designed to be tough have 18) while still dealing out top teir damage..
a fully invested unarmored monk or barbarian wouldnt get as much (23 AC) as this until level 20 with capstone, but sure Hexblades need it to survive.
And because i saw it mentioned, you dont need to recast fiendish vigor or blade ward in combat to gain a strong benefit, you already got +12 max hp, or likely dodged a few hits by the time they are gone, and you can cast them in emergencies, in which case you feel like its worth giving up damage.
Its also interestig that yall want to focus on t1 and t2, in which warlocks potential survivability is already overperforming.
I mean i get that some people want hexblade to be the best class in the game, but these suggestions are noticeably unbalanced.
Have yall guys playedtested this hexblade, or other martial classes in 2024? you are asking for a lot here.
How are you getting a 22AC baseline? AoS gives you 15 AC (with a 14 in DEX because that is what you are starting with and its not going up anytime soon), and if you are adding CHA to that you have 18 AC at level 3, 19 AC at lvl 4 if you put another point in CHA and 20 AC at level 8 if you max out CHA again. Any other martial gets the same AC at any level with full-plate + shield if they want, while also being able to take feats which increase their dmg and still increasing their primary stat (GWM and fighting style defense gets you 19 AC and a lot more dmg, while any other feat plus shield gets them 21 AC with defense).
A monk starts with about 16 AC (by putting 17 in his DEX which is what they use for most things and a 16 in WIS which they need for the rest), at lvl 4 they go up to 18 and at lvl 8 they go up to 19 AC, but again this is without the help of any subclass its just base. Barbarians unarmored defense sucks because non of the stats they need are their primary stat but they get rage to reduce most of the dmg they take by half which makes up for the poor AC.
You are still assuming that warlock needs to use their spells to stay alive, and that is still stupid beyond stupid, because if I have to waste my spells to exist in melee than might as well play paladin and just get good AC and use my spells to smite. They can give medium armor to hexblades and be done with it or give them a CHA unarmored defense like they gave to Draconic sorcerer (which becomes basically a half-plate once you max out CHA with a 14 in DEX). If a +2 AC is all hexblades are gonna get (assuming they get rid of all the hoops you have to jump through to get it and the restriction to not wear armor) than the best way to play PotB is still gonna be to fight dip at lvl1 and just take another subclass (or still take hexblade and stack that +2 on top of good armor if they get rid of the armor restriction). The hexblade is supposed to allow PotB to be optimized without the need to multiclass, otherwise it has not reason to exist.
Also you say our suggestions are unbalanced, yet you were the one who claimed to have tested the new hexblade and according to you it was good, something which is definitely no true, because you assume that your hex target is always in range and not moving around and you always have that +2 and never dropping CON on defensive spells and everything goes as it should. This shows me that you did not really playtest the hexblade in a real game scenario, and for you to say that our suggestions are unbalanced without any testing is presumptuous and frankly wrong. Having an AC that scales between 17-19 from level 3-8 (18-20 if you invest in the armor of shadows invocation) is quite balanced, it still requires a 14 investment in DEX which is quite reasonable when you remember that if a hexblade wants a heavy weapon they also need 13 STR and even if they decide to dump STR and wield a normal weapon in two-hands (because no shield profs) at best they are either getting 1 more AC or 1 more hp per level plus better CON (which realistically its the option they are going for). Now if you are telling me that 17/18 - 19/20 AC is broken, then I suggest you ban bladesingers and paladins at you table, because they can get a lot more AC while also having lvl 1 spells slots for shield and can use the rest of their spellcasting to buff their dmg or help out the party (bladesingers with bladesong and mage armor get 18-20 AC scaling with INT plus INT on concentration, plus first level slots for shield). I can assure you your assessment of the balancing of hexblade is objectively wrong and you need to play more DnD to get a hang of what actual balance looks like.
I wouldn't trust ChatGPT with this(or anything), since we don't know where it pulled that bit of info from. For all we know, it pulled it from a source that has no source for the Moorcock claim(Or it might be Moorcock who claimed it in what would have been a typical move for him), creating conformation bias loops.
As far as I'm concerned, focus on tradition & iconography, and the optimization playstyle(all of which is valid), tends to pigeonhole perspective.
They're trying to move away from the Bladelock only Hexblade, and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
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Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
I wouldn't trust ChatGPT with this(or anything), since we don't know where it pulled that bit of info from. For all we know, it pulled it from a source that has no source for the Moorcock claim(Or it might be Moorcock who claimed it in what would have been a typical move for him), creating conformation bias loops.
As far as I'm concerned, focus on tradition & iconography, and the optimization playstyle(all of which is valid), tends to pigeonhole perspective.
They're trying to move away from the Bladelock only Hexblade, and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
No non bladelock player is picking this subclass. As it is, most of its features want you the be in melee (+2 AC while in 10ft, attack after casting, move towards a target to get to melee range, etc.) they are just badly designed features.
the subclass is trying to be an in between of a generic subclass but also the bladelock subclass which leaves us with this hot mess. Other warlocks have other subclasses to choose from. Hexblade should be the bladelock subclass there are no 2-ways about it, the same as the bladesinger is the gish for wizards this needs to be the gish for warlocks.
just fix the messy AC and remove all the convoluted conditions you need for some (really unappealing and boring) features and ship it. At this point I have no faith in them to actually ship a good appealing and exciting hexblade. Ill just look around for 3rd party material or create my own.
At 3rd level, you acquire the training necessary to effectively arm yourself for battle and power over curses that make you more effective in close quarters. You gain proficiency with martial weapons and shields.
Hex Weapon. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can touch one weapon that you are proficient with. If the weapon is heavy you ignore disadvantage caused by not having the required Strength or Dexterity score. When you attack with that weapon, you can use your Charisma modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls. As a bonus action you may send the weapon to a pocket dimension or summon it from that pocket dimension. While in the pocket dimension the weapon is considered to be within 1ft of you. A weapon returns from the pocket dimension if you die. These benefits last until you finish a long rest. If you have/gain the Pact of the Blade invocation these benefits extend to every pact weapon you bond with or conjure with that invocation.
Hexblade’s Curse. You can cast Hex without expending a spell slot a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier. When you cast Hex using this feature you can make it not require concentration, but it also ends when the target dies. You regain all uses of this feature when you complete a long rest.
Hungering Hex. When a cursed enemy within 10ft of you drops to 0 hit points you regain 1d8+ your Charisma Modifier hit points.
3rd Level Unyielding Will
Same as UA
6th Level Malign Brutality
Accursed Critical. Any melee attack roll you make with your Hex Weapon against a target you cursed scores a Critical Hit on a 19 or 20 on the d20.
Harrowing Hex. After you cast a level 1+ spell that has a casting time of an action, you can make one melee attack with your Hex Weapon as a bonus action.
Hindering Curse. When you hit a target cursed by you with an attack roll, the target has disadvantage on its next saving throw before the start of your next turn.
10th Level Armor of Hexes
If an enemy that is cursed by you deals damage to you, you can use your reaction to roll a d6. On a 6 you take no damage. If you don’t roll a 6 you instead reduce the damage by your Warlock level + the number rolled on the d6.
14 Level Master of Hexes
Explosive Hex. When a creature cursed by you that you can see dies you can cause the curse to explode. Each creature of your choice within 30 feet emanation of the cursed creature gains the same curse. If you were concentrating on a spell to maintain the curse you must continue to concentrate. If the spell requires a saving throw the target(s) can attempt it to avoid having the curse spread to them if they succeed.
Hex Restoration. When you complete a short rest or use your Magical Cunning feature you regain one expended use of Hexblade’s Curse feature.
Inescapable Hex. If a creature cursed by you starts its turn within 10 ft of you and ends its turn 30ft or further from you in a space you can see, you can teleport to an unoccupied space you can see within 10ft of of the creature.
In any case, back to the 2024 Hexblade. I don't think it needs medium armor proficiency. If a character wants to wear medium armor, take a feat at 4th.
The problem with this approach is that if the 2024 Hexblade wants to use a shield, they have to first take the Lightly Armored feat because that is the only armor-related feat that grants shield training. And what this means is that a 2024 Hexblade has to use their first two feats (4th and 8th level) to gain medium armor and shield training. Worse, it means effectively throwing away a feat because they already have Light Armor training (but not shield training).
Considering most campaigns end or fizzle out by or before 12th level, this means the 2024 Hexblade will, at most, get exactly one feat not dedicated to simply getting the armor and shield training the subclass had baked in with the 2014 version.
My own fix is that ALL armor-related feats bundle in shield training, but it's confounding to me that the folks in charge of the 2024 rules didn't do that as well.
they wanted getting a shield and medium armor to be more costly for classes who have neither. They did UAs where armor was much easier to obtain for all classes. You could get an armor proficiency as a origin feat.
there was tremendous push back to how easy it was for certain classes that were supposed to not have the base durability of martial classes to gain it, and it was saying that it should be less than what 2014 even offered. Arcane casters were specifically singled out,
In 2024 they didnt want arcane casters to easily gain medium armor/shields. They want it to be costly in terms of feats, or require multiclassing, which dms can easily not allow if they want a more straightfoward balancining. They want them to have to choose between dex or con for AC versus concentrtiom, or make a signifigant investment.
thats why the UA has specifically avoided hexblade with medium armor in 2 iterations.
this is again wrong on so many things. 1.) explain to me, how a dm will easily not allow MC, it is a core feature in 2024, as soon as a dm disallows that we are already in the realm of homebrew 2.) the +2 only works when the cursed target ( if the hexblade even has curses left to begin with ) is within 10', best case scenario with his curses he will have an uptime of 25-30% so that's not even worth a +1 AC 3.) why jump all these loops of harmstringing yourself of picking 4+ invocations and be pigeonholed into a completly useless subclass 4.) it might have been there intent to make it more difficult for arcane caster's to get better AC with feats, what it is doing is they are just picking a 1 lvl dip of ftr or paladin 5.) again, they need better AC then monks & rogue e.g. because these 2 classes can disengage from melee a hexblade/ftr/barb/paladin can't
no offense meant, but have you ever played in higher then t1 games at a table, because of how you explain it sure sounds like you haven't, a AC 18 ( best case for hexblade ) in t3+ is worth nothing. And why should opponents attack the "tank" with AC 22-25 when there's an easy target sitting in melee, oh he has maybe 30 HP more when he takes tough + has fiendish vigor up, at that stage thats not even lasting 1 round of combat ( +12 to hit vs 18 ac = 75% vs the 40-55% hit chance of someone who really is supposed to be in melee and each doing 20-30+ dmg; most of the Monsters having 3 attacks ).
AC 25 => 3x 25 x 0.4 = 30 incoming dmg on avg AC 18 => 3x 25 x 0.75 = 56 incoming dmg on avg
as for how to reach AC 25 ( paladin, others can reach it pretty easy too ): - heavy armor + shield + def. FS = 21 ( shield of faith +2, +1 shield, +1 armor ) or just use shield spell ( easy to get via background and that is imo 100x more valuable then tough and lucky together )
Yeah i agree, but you cant hamstring a class because of multiclass reasons.
Yes, you can. That's part of the reason in 2024, all the subclasses were moved to level 3.
Changing all subclasses to lvl3 is a design decision that effects all the classes in the same way, it is a good choice to hamper multiclassing.
No, it doesn't. Moving Warlock Subclasses to level 3 from level 1 in no way affects Paladins and Warlocks in the same way that Bards were affected by their subclasses moving to level 3 ... from level 3. Single class Artificers, Barbarians, Bards, Fighters, Monks, Paladins, Ranger, and Rogues were not affected by they change, but some multiclass characters and single class Clerics, Druids, Sorcerers, Warlocks, and Wizards were definitely impacted. It definitely did not affect "all classes in the same way".
At 3rd level, you acquire the training necessary to effectively arm yourself for battle and power over curses that make you more effective in close quarters. You gain proficiency with martial weapons and shields.
Hex Weapon. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can touch one weapon that you are proficient with. If the weapon is heavy you ignore disadvantage caused by not having the required Strength or Dexterity score. When you attack with that weapon, you can use your Charisma modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls. As a bonus action you may send the weapon to a pocket dimension or summon it from that pocket dimension. While in the pocket dimension the weapon is considered to be within 1ft of you. A weapon returns from the pocket dimension if you die. These benefits last until you finish a long rest. If you have/gain the Pact of the Blade invocation these benefits extend to every pact weapon you bond with or conjure with that invocation.
Hexblade’s Curse. You can cast Hex without expending a spell slot a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier. When you cast Hex using this feature you can make it not require concentration, but it also ends when the target dies. You regain all uses of this feature when you complete a long rest.
Hungering Hex. When a cursed enemy within 10ft of you drops to 0 hit points you regain 1d8+ your Charisma Modifier hit points.
3rd Level Unyielding Will
Same as UA
6th Level Malign Brutality
Accursed Critical. Any melee attack roll you make with your Hex Weapon against a target you cursed scores a Critical Hit on a 19 or 20 on the d20.
Harrowing Hex. After you cast a level 1+ spell that has a casting time of an action, you can make one melee attack with your Hex Weapon as a bonus action.
Hindering Curse. When you hit a target cursed by you with an attack roll, the target has disadvantage on its next saving throw before the start of your next turn.
10th Level Armor of Hexes
If an enemy that is cursed by you deals damage to you, you can use your reaction to roll a d6. On a 6 you take no damage. If you don’t roll a 6 you instead reduce the damage by your Warlock level + the number rolled on the d6.
14 Level Master of Hexes
Explosive Hex. When a creature cursed by you that you can see dies you can cause the curse to explode. Each creature of your choice within 30 feet emanation of the cursed creature gains the same curse. If you were concentrating on a spell to maintain the curse you must continue to concentrate. If the spell requires a saving throw the target(s) can attempt it to avoid having the curse spread to them if they succeed.
Hex Restoration. When you complete a short rest or use your Magical Cunning feature you regain one expended use of Hexblade’s Curse feature.
Inescapable Hex. If a creature cursed by you starts its turn within 10 ft of you and ends its turn 30ft or further from you in a space you can see, you can teleport to an unoccupied space you can see within 10ft of of the creature.
Still needlessly convoluted. Still dipping for armor because I would rather have half-plate than having to wield a shield and then having to take warcaster to effectively cast. Armor of hexes and exploding hex are mechanically weird and I would never expect anything which is worded and functions so unintuitively to be published. Not to be rude, but its still weird clunky and has a bunch of unnecessary features that still will not make any hexblade player happy because it still misses good AC (shield is just worse than medium armor prof)
...and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
I am completely confused by this statement. You are talking "non this" and "non that" and perspective changes and I am so lost who you are actually talking about.
But I never heard of warlocks being a playable class until I purchased the 2024 PHB. I never heard of hex blade until the UA test class came out and I started to read this forum. Apparently the class is based on some sort of character in movies I never heard of. But I am interested in this because this class allows someone to be a fighter/Mage multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
...and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
I am completely confused by this statement. You are talking "non this" and "non that" and perspective changes and I am so lost who you are actually talking about.
But I never heard of warlocks being a playable class until I purchased the 2024 PHB. I never heard of hex blade until the UA test class came out and I started to read this forum. Apparently the class is based on some sort of character in movies I never heard of. But I am interested in this because this class allows someone to be a fighter/Mage multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
...and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
I am completely confused by this statement. You are talking "non this" and "non that" and perspective changes and I am so lost who you are actually talking about.
But I never heard of warlocks being a playable class until I purchased the 2024 PHB. I never heard of hex blade until the UA test class came out and I started to read this forum. Apparently the class is based on some sort of character in movies I never heard of. But I am interested in this because this class allows someone to be a fighter/Mage multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
Well that's the thing. The way the UA is designed it does not allow you to play the fighter/mage without multiclassing because it does not provide you with the necessary tools to do; i.e. good AC to be in melee (well it does but the way it does it is bad and the actual AC you get through it is garbage). So if you want to play the fighter/mage fantasy starting as a lvl1 fighter and then transition to warlock is still the optimal way to do it. Or just go bladesinger once its released if it stay similar to what they showed in the UA.
But I never heard of warlocks being a playable class until I purchased the 2024 PHB. I never heard of hex blade until the UA test class came out and I started to read this forum. Apparently the class is based on some sort of character in movies I never heard of. But I am interested in this because this class allows someone to be a fighter/Mage multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
If I am reading this correctly, then you are new to D&D, yes? You never played with the 2014 rules and books?
Asking because Warlock was a core class in the 2014 PHB, and the Hexblade subclass was canon in 2017, when Xanathar's Guide to Everything was published.
While the warlock class has roots in older editions of the game, the Hexblade was new when it was released. Some folks have made convincing arguments the subclass is inspired by Elric of Melniboné, a character from a series of fantasy books first published more than 50 years ago. (No movies of him as of yet.)
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Yes, you can. That's part of the reason in 2024, all the subclasses were moved to level 3.
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My houserulings.
they wanted getting a shield and medium armor to be more costly for classes who have neither. They did UAs where armor was much easier to obtain for all classes. You could get an armor proficiency as a origin feat.
there was tremendous push back to how easy it was for certain classes that were supposed to not have the base durability of martial classes to gain it, and it was saying that it should be less than what 2014 even offered. Arcane casters were specifically singled out,
In 2024 they didnt want arcane casters to easily gain medium armor/shields. They want it to be costly in terms of feats, or require multiclassing, which dms can easily not allow if they want a more straightfoward balancining. They want them to have to choose between dex or con for AC versus concentrtiom, or make a signifigant investment.
thats why the UA has specifically avoided hexblade with medium armor in 2 iterations.
Changing all subclasses to lvl3 is a design decision that effects all the classes in the same way, it is a good choice to hamper multiclassing. You are contradicting yourself, first you say paladins can easily go 3 lvls in warlock for stuff now your saying moving subclasses to 3 fixed that (which it did that's why arguing against certain subclass features because of multiclassing is beyond stupid).
Secondly, hampering a subclass due to multiclassing is still beyond stupid and defiantly never taken into consideration by any serious game designer. Thank god you are not on the WoTc design team, gameplay would definitely suck a** with your train of thought.
Its very interesting that some of yall have decided that hexblade needs more Than 18 base AC to survive in melee, when thats all most people get, and also more than it ever had before.
While i understand many of you want to be able to prioritize constitution while also getting 18 AC, thats a balance change in 2024, to not be able to get that out the box, (for classes who dont have it innately) including hexblade, probably hexblade was a driving force in this change happening, As it was not only an easy source for it, but also, Hexblade was seen as being a better martial than a martial if you were t going for a power attack build.
Its also interesting that people think warlock should be able to specialize into durability, without having to use the features specifically designed to allow warlocks to specialize into durability. If durability isnt worth it to you, dont take those features. Its totally unbalanced if hexblade had the same durability as other classes without any durability invocations, and on top that, they would have even more durability with these invocations.
People are really suggesting hexblade get UA Genie paladin durability baseline (22 AC) and still can throw tough(2*level Max HP0, lucky, (PB rerolls a day), fiendish vigor (12 hp on top of max hp at will that lasts until you take damage), armor of shadows (+1 AC) and lifedrinker (recover hp every round) And thats without using any spell slots or concentrating on anything. Warlock also has better defensive spells than paladin.and this would give them 19 AC at level 3, 20 AC at level 4. (meanwhile the heavily armored classes designed to be tough have 18) while still dealing out top teir damage..
a fully invested unarmored monk or barbarian wouldnt get as much (23 AC) as this until level 20 with capstone, but sure Hexblades need it to survive.
And because i saw it mentioned, you dont need to recast fiendish vigor or blade ward in combat to gain a strong benefit, you already got +12 max hp, or likely dodged a few hits by the time they are gone, and you can cast them in emergencies, in which case you feel like its worth giving up damage.
Its also interestig that yall want to focus on t1 and t2, in which warlocks potential survivability is already overperforming.
I mean i get that some people want hexblade to be the best class in the game, but these suggestions are noticeably unbalanced.
Have yall guys playedtested this hexblade, or other martial classes in 2024? you are asking for a lot here.
How are you getting a 22AC baseline? AoS gives you 15 AC (with a 14 in DEX because that is what you are starting with and its not going up anytime soon), and if you are adding CHA to that you have 18 AC at level 3, 19 AC at lvl 4 if you put another point in CHA and 20 AC at level 8 if you max out CHA again. Any other martial gets the same AC at any level with full-plate + shield if they want, while also being able to take feats which increase their dmg and still increasing their primary stat (GWM and fighting style defense gets you 19 AC and a lot more dmg, while any other feat plus shield gets them 21 AC with defense).
A monk starts with about 16 AC (by putting 17 in his DEX which is what they use for most things and a 16 in WIS which they need for the rest), at lvl 4 they go up to 18 and at lvl 8 they go up to 19 AC, but again this is without the help of any subclass its just base. Barbarians unarmored defense sucks because non of the stats they need are their primary stat but they get rage to reduce most of the dmg they take by half which makes up for the poor AC.
You are still assuming that warlock needs to use their spells to stay alive, and that is still stupid beyond stupid, because if I have to waste my spells to exist in melee than might as well play paladin and just get good AC and use my spells to smite. They can give medium armor to hexblades and be done with it or give them a CHA unarmored defense like they gave to Draconic sorcerer (which becomes basically a half-plate once you max out CHA with a 14 in DEX). If a +2 AC is all hexblades are gonna get (assuming they get rid of all the hoops you have to jump through to get it and the restriction to not wear armor) than the best way to play PotB is still gonna be to fight dip at lvl1 and just take another subclass (or still take hexblade and stack that +2 on top of good armor if they get rid of the armor restriction). The hexblade is supposed to allow PotB to be optimized without the need to multiclass, otherwise it has not reason to exist.
Also you say our suggestions are unbalanced, yet you were the one who claimed to have tested the new hexblade and according to you it was good, something which is definitely no true, because you assume that your hex target is always in range and not moving around and you always have that +2 and never dropping CON on defensive spells and everything goes as it should. This shows me that you did not really playtest the hexblade in a real game scenario, and for you to say that our suggestions are unbalanced without any testing is presumptuous and frankly wrong. Having an AC that scales between 17-19 from level 3-8 (18-20 if you invest in the armor of shadows invocation) is quite balanced, it still requires a 14 investment in DEX which is quite reasonable when you remember that if a hexblade wants a heavy weapon they also need 13 STR and even if they decide to dump STR and wield a normal weapon in two-hands (because no shield profs) at best they are either getting 1 more AC or 1 more hp per level plus better CON (which realistically its the option they are going for). Now if you are telling me that 17/18 - 19/20 AC is broken, then I suggest you ban bladesingers and paladins at you table, because they can get a lot more AC while also having lvl 1 spells slots for shield and can use the rest of their spellcasting to buff their dmg or help out the party (bladesingers with bladesong and mage armor get 18-20 AC scaling with INT plus INT on concentration, plus first level slots for shield). I can assure you your assessment of the balancing of hexblade is objectively wrong and you need to play more DnD to get a hang of what actual balance looks like.
I wouldn't trust ChatGPT with this(or anything), since we don't know where it pulled that bit of info from. For all we know, it pulled it from a source that has no source for the Moorcock claim(Or it might be Moorcock who claimed it in what would have been a typical move for him), creating conformation bias loops.
As far as I'm concerned, focus on tradition & iconography, and the optimization playstyle(all of which is valid), tends to pigeonhole perspective.
They're trying to move away from the Bladelock only Hexblade, and the idea of you GETTING the powerful blade, by changing it so you receive power FROM a powerful blade, in order to accommodate non-Bladelock players so they aren't pigeonholed into one playstyle, which is a problem with a good chunk of subclasses that's been brought up by non-optimizers over the 10-11 years of feedback. Is their perspective any less valid than any other? Try to mentally walk a mile in their shoes. It really expands your understanding.
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
No non bladelock player is picking this subclass. As it is, most of its features want you the be in melee (+2 AC while in 10ft, attack after casting, move towards a target to get to melee range, etc.) they are just badly designed features.
the subclass is trying to be an in between of a generic subclass but also the bladelock subclass which leaves us with this hot mess. Other warlocks have other subclasses to choose from. Hexblade should be the bladelock subclass there are no 2-ways about it, the same as the bladesinger is the gish for wizards this needs to be the gish for warlocks.
just fix the messy AC and remove all the convoluted conditions you need for some (really unappealing and boring) features and ship it. At this point I have no faith in them to actually ship a good appealing and exciting hexblade. Ill just look around for 3rd party material or create my own.
One last shot. I’ve got new UA to play with
3rd level Hexblade Spells
Same as UA
3rd Level Hex Warrior
At 3rd level, you acquire the training necessary to effectively arm yourself for battle and power over curses that make you more effective in close quarters. You gain proficiency with martial weapons and shields.
Hex Weapon. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can touch one weapon that you are proficient with. If the weapon is heavy you ignore disadvantage caused by not having the required Strength or Dexterity score. When you attack with that weapon, you can use your Charisma modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls. As a bonus action you may send the weapon to a pocket dimension or summon it from that pocket dimension. While in the pocket dimension the weapon is considered to be within 1ft of you. A weapon returns from the pocket dimension if you die. These benefits last until you finish a long rest. If you have/gain the Pact of the Blade invocation these benefits extend to every pact weapon you bond with or conjure with that invocation.
Hexblade’s Curse. You can cast Hex without expending a spell slot a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier. When you cast Hex using this feature you can make it not require concentration, but it also ends when the target dies. You regain all uses of this feature when you complete a long rest.
Hungering Hex. When a cursed enemy within 10ft of you drops to 0 hit points you regain 1d8+ your Charisma Modifier hit points.
3rd Level Unyielding Will
Same as UA
6th Level Malign Brutality
Accursed Critical. Any melee attack roll you make with your Hex Weapon against a target you cursed scores a Critical Hit on a 19 or 20 on the d20.
Harrowing Hex. After you cast a level 1+ spell that has a casting time of an action, you can make one melee attack with your Hex Weapon as a bonus action.
Hindering Curse. When you hit a target cursed by you with an attack roll, the target has disadvantage on its next saving throw before the start of your next turn.
10th Level Armor of Hexes
If an enemy that is cursed by you deals damage to you, you can use your reaction to roll a d6. On a 6 you take no damage. If you don’t roll a 6 you instead reduce the damage by your Warlock level + the number rolled on the d6.
14 Level Master of Hexes
Explosive Hex. When a creature cursed by you that you can see dies you can cause the curse to explode. Each creature of your choice within 30 feet emanation of the cursed creature gains the same curse. If you were concentrating on a spell to maintain the curse you must continue to concentrate. If the spell requires a saving throw the target(s) can attempt it to avoid having the curse spread to them if they succeed.
Hex Restoration. When you complete a short rest or use your Magical Cunning feature you regain one expended use of Hexblade’s Curse feature.
Inescapable Hex. If a creature cursed by you starts its turn within 10 ft of you and ends its turn 30ft or further from you in a space you can see, you can teleport to an unoccupied space you can see within 10ft of of the creature.
this is again wrong on so many things.
1.) explain to me, how a dm will easily not allow MC, it is a core feature in 2024, as soon as a dm disallows that we are already in the realm of homebrew
2.) the +2 only works when the cursed target ( if the hexblade even has curses left to begin with ) is within 10', best case scenario with his curses he will have an uptime of 25-30% so that's not even worth a +1 AC
3.) why jump all these loops of harmstringing yourself of picking 4+ invocations and be pigeonholed into a completly useless subclass
4.) it might have been there intent to make it more difficult for arcane caster's to get better AC with feats, what it is doing is they are just picking a 1 lvl dip of ftr or paladin
5.) again, they need better AC then monks & rogue e.g. because these 2 classes can disengage from melee a hexblade/ftr/barb/paladin can't
no offense meant, but have you ever played in higher then t1 games at a table, because of how you explain it sure sounds like you haven't, a AC 18 ( best case for hexblade ) in t3+ is worth nothing. And why should opponents attack the "tank" with AC 22-25 when there's an easy target sitting in melee, oh he has maybe 30 HP more when he takes tough + has fiendish vigor up, at that stage thats not even lasting 1 round of combat ( +12 to hit vs 18 ac = 75% vs the 40-55% hit chance of someone who really is supposed to be in melee and each doing 20-30+ dmg; most of the Monsters having 3 attacks ).
AC 25 => 3x 25 x 0.4 = 30 incoming dmg on avg
AC 18 => 3x 25 x 0.75 = 56 incoming dmg on avg
as for how to reach AC 25 ( paladin, others can reach it pretty easy too ):
- heavy armor + shield + def. FS = 21 ( shield of faith +2, +1 shield, +1 armor ) or just use shield spell ( easy to get via background and that is imo 100x more valuable then tough and lucky together )
No, it doesn't. Moving Warlock Subclasses to level 3 from level 1 in no way affects Paladins and Warlocks in the same way that Bards were affected by their subclasses moving to level 3 ... from level 3. Single class Artificers, Barbarians, Bards, Fighters, Monks, Paladins, Ranger, and Rogues were not affected by they change, but some multiclass characters and single class Clerics, Druids, Sorcerers, Warlocks, and Wizards were definitely impacted. It definitely did not affect "all classes in the same way".
How to add Tooltips.
My houserulings.
Still needlessly convoluted. Still dipping for armor because I would rather have half-plate than having to wield a shield and then having to take warcaster to effectively cast. Armor of hexes and exploding hex are mechanically weird and I would never expect anything which is worded and functions so unintuitively to be published. Not to be rude, but its still weird clunky and has a bunch of unnecessary features that still will not make any hexblade player happy because it still misses good AC (shield is just worse than medium armor prof)
I am completely confused by this statement. You are talking "non this" and "non that" and perspective changes and I am so lost who you are actually talking about.
But I never heard of warlocks being a playable class until I purchased the 2024 PHB. I never heard of hex blade until the UA test class came out and I started to read this forum. Apparently the class is based on some sort of character in movies I never heard of. But I am interested in this because this class allows someone to be a fighter/Mage multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
Well that's the thing. The way the UA is designed it does not allow you to play the fighter/mage without multiclassing because it does not provide you with the necessary tools to do; i.e. good AC to be in melee (well it does but the way it does it is bad and the actual AC you get through it is garbage). So if you want to play the fighter/mage fantasy starting as a lvl1 fighter and then transition to warlock is still the optimal way to do it. Or just go bladesinger once its released if it stay similar to what they showed in the UA.
If I am reading this correctly, then you are new to D&D, yes? You never played with the 2014 rules and books?
Asking because Warlock was a core class in the 2014 PHB, and the Hexblade subclass was canon in 2017, when Xanathar's Guide to Everything was published.
While the warlock class has roots in older editions of the game, the Hexblade was new when it was released. Some folks have made convincing arguments the subclass is inspired by Elric of Melniboné, a character from a series of fantasy books first published more than 50 years ago. (No movies of him as of yet.)