Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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Since Pact of the Blade is an invocation. The Hexblade can get maybe a name and concpet change.
Make it more a Self-Buffer and enemy De-Bufer
Have the Class feature boost the pacts
BLADE = Something to boost AC/HP and maybe add an effect when hitting cursed target.
TOME = Once per short rest a spell cast from tome can bypass damage resistance / give a disadvantage to save. (Maybe add a higher level ritual as a ribbon)
CHAIN = Reaction teleport to Warlock and intercept an attack against the Warlock made by a cursed target.
Proficiency with medium armor and shields is not the overpowered feature that some people seem to think it is. If it was, players would still be using the 5.0 hexblade with the 5.5 warlock.
It's not overpowered in a vacuum. But it does take up a large portion of a power budget for a class without significant armor training in comparison to what other subclasses get. I argue this is more a problem of the base Warlock subclasses being a bit undertuned but here we are. Medium Armor & Shields is going to boost AC by 4-5 on average vs a light armor user with no shield. That is a significant boost in survivability especially in Tier 1 & 2.
If every Warlock subclass got some sort of comparable skill or ribbon feature along with their active level 3 feature, it would be fine. But most don't which is why its problematic. It forces you to either really tone down the power of the Hexblade curse for balance or publish a blatantly power crept subclass in comparison to the base PHB subclasses. Personally I like every subclass to give a flavorful ribbon skill/tool/armor proficiency along with an active power/ability. Archfey should have gotten automatic persuasion proficiency and expertise in a charisma skill of their choice. Fiend should have given automatic intimidation proficiency and maybe poisoners tools proficiency. Etc Etc.
But since the baseline design is just one active ability feature at level 3 for the most part, this is why Hex Warrior + Hexblade's curse is frequently viewed as power creep.
There's a couple of issues with this kind of fix through invocations.
First of all is the invocations needed to succeed in the archetype, melee versus caster Warlock. They have vastly different requirements from invocations and also from attributes.
Caster Warlock basically just need Agonizing Blast and they are pretty much golden in terms of competent damage output comparable to Ranged weapon users (Fighter, Ranger, Rogue). Everything else is mostly just gravy but are not needed.
In comparison a melee Warlock really want Thirsting Blade for Extra Attack (2x) in order to have competent damage, and a prerequisite is having Pact of the Blade. Furthermore you really really want Devouring Blade for Extra Attack (3x) to keep up competent damage. That's 3 invocations that are basically required to fulfill the archetype.
Next up, you have given up the safety of damaging from range, so you are targeted a lot more and often suffer from AoE-style attacks. So to not just drop like a rock by being the weak spellcaster boy you are (D8 Hit Die, Light Armor, non-DEX-main), you need some defensive measures. Armor of Shadows is terrible because it's just a +1 AC upgrade over a Studded Leather Armor, but it's there so we often take it. Fiendish Vigor grants a resource free way to get 12 static Temp HP to boost our low Hit Die and usually suffering CON modifier as we need some DEX to boost our AC to avoid taking that much damage. Some may argue that these two are not needed to fulfill the melee archetype, but they assist a very crumbling survivability, so at least one of them feels necessary.
As such we have 4-5 invocations that are basically required in order to feel successful in the melee archetype. We have 3 available at lvls 2-4, where we can get Pact of the Blade, Armor of Shadows, and Fiendish Vigor. Lvl 5 we get 2 more, where one goes towards Thirsting Blade. This basically means we get our first flexible invocation pick at lvl 5, and the rest are just in order to make your melee archetype somewhat competent. We gain +3 invocations towards lvl 12 where we pick up Devouring Blade. Out of the 8 invocations we have available at that time, 5 of them goes towards making your melee archetype functional. Compared to the caster Warlock who just requires Agonizing Blast and everything else is just icing, because they get cantrip upgrade for free that scales with Agonizing Blast because it adds beams/extra attacks rather than more damage dice like every other cantrip. There's already a heavy favoritism towards the caster build. This means the melee Warlock have very few invocations to assist their class-limited spellcasting. Their signature class feature, that's unique to the Warlock is basically discarded in order to chase a martial build.
The second issue is that giving both caster and melee Warlocks an Invocation that grants access to Shield Training is a greater boon for the caster than the martial. A Caster requires a hand free to access a Spellcasting Focus and do Somatic components - a Component Pouch or a similarly ruled Crystal/other Focus fulfills this need while leaving the hand empty between casts. This means the caster always have their second hand free to grab a shield.
A Martial however have the option to go for Two-handed Weapons or to utilize a Versatile Weapon for much the same benefit of always keeping a hand free to access a Focus (which with Pact Blade is their weapon) or to make Somatic components if a spell doesn't require a Material one (to satisfy the rules that you can dual-purpose the same hand for Material and Somatic components, but only if the spell have both).
So for the Martial to carry a Shield and get this value, they would need to give up using a Two-Handed or Versatile weapon two-handed, and they would have some awkward moments for casting spells with a Somatic component but without a Material one or they would have to invest in the War Caster feat.
From my first point I would like to reiterate that between the caster Warlock build and the melee Warlock build, the melee build is already behind on points/power, especially from the Invocation system. In the test material leading up to the 2024 rules, WotC even tested letting Devouring Blade be a free inclusion to Thirsting Blade, that automatically activates at level 12 - I believe it was level 12 Warlock and not Character Level, but I would have to check up again. Alas it was not kept, likely to keep that invocation from being loaded in comparison to others.
As such, I believe it would be a greater help for the melee build to receive some love through subclass features. Though I would strive to make this subclass very heavily leaning into a melee build and dissuade a caster build from picking up the subclass without significant drawback (or rather wasted subclass features). This also serves to counter some of the complaints that some players have for the old '14 Hexblade, that it provided too much goodies for your general Warlock build in comparison to its brethren. Instead if the subclass significantly lifted the melee build but did much less for the caster build, it would help where help is needed. My best advocates is the Valor Bard and Bladesinger subclasses that does a significant amount for a melee build, and is not considered a must-pick for caster builds.
And if caster Warlocks really wanted better armors, they could always just multiclass rather than sinking into a melee-focused subclass.