If my character or the campaign hypothetically makes it to level 20, I'm looking to go(not in this particular order mind you) College of Swords 6/Archfey Pact 3/Swashbuckler 11. My patron for this character is Titania, who he and Fey that worship her refer to as the Mother(flavor note: he was an orphan and ran the orphanage when he grew up, hence a motherly patron). I'm using Daggers reflavored and redesigned as throwing knives for weapons and magic, schools being mostly illusion, transmutation and conjuration magic(spells like mage hand, minor illusion, booming blade, cloud of daggers, bane, etc.)
For party roles I'm trying to be the face, support, and minor striker(though I know I'm sacrificing sneak attack dice by multiclassing, I'm trying to ensure that i land sneak attack more often with the extra attack given by College of Swords 6). The face is going to be the major role for this character as we don't have any CHA based party members(its actually most of the party's dump stat). Think of a performer in the circus who uses their skills and abilities in combat(sort of the feel I'm going for).
I want to take the Actor, Fighter initiate(thrown weapon fighting), and Bountiful Luck feats. Aiming for at least 18 in CHA and DEX by the end campaign.
I know that it's not necessarily adviced to plan so much ahead, but if this is achievable then this is the build I'm set one. This build hits home on the playstyle and flavor that I really want to play so please no other class or subclass suggestions. I understand that this isn't going to be the absolute strongest build and may even be the opposite, but I believe I'll have fun playing this character and I don't want to ask the DM to retcon anything because I chose something at a bad time to do so. This is a very tedious thing to ask someone to break it down and show me the order they would build it in, so if you do so I thank you.
The hardest part of this build is going to be the early levels when you're deciding which class to level up in first... 3 classes is a lot to balance.
I think I would start with Warlock. For one, I feel like it makes sense for a Pact to be a starting point for a character. Maybe play it as the knowledge gained from your pact inspiring you to discover Bardic magic on your own. Mechanicallly, your Warlock Subclass comes online right at level 1, so you benefit from that class the most right at level 1.
From there I would hit Rogue for two levels to get Sneak Attack and Cunning Action. This will open you up to a lot more mobility on the board, and as much as I would want to get the benefits of Swashbuckler right away, I think it makes sense to just focus on College of Swords for 6 levels right after that to really just get that extra attack as quickly as possible. Then get your next level in Rogue to finally hit Swashbuckler, round off Warlock on your next level up, then focus on Swashbuckler for the rest of your build.
I wouldn't worry too much about the Actor feat. It's mostly useful for just rounding out an uneven charisma score, but if you're already focusing on Illusion spells, you can accomplish the same effects of the feat using clever use of Minor Illusion.
I wouldn't worry too much about the Actor feat. It's mostly useful for just rounding out an uneven charisma score, but if you're already focusing on Illusion spells, you can accomplish the same effects of the feat using clever use of Minor Illusion.
I was going to take the actor feat simply for the shenanigans of having the Warlock invocation mask of many faces and pretending to be somebody else *insert spiderman meme*. I thought it would be hilarious to have some of those"who is the real one and who is the imposter" moments.
That's a solid combo, actually. I played as a character with the Actor Feat once, but that was simply to round out an uneven Charisma score, since at the time I couldn't find any other feats that would improve Charisma and I didn't have any other odd scores in my abilities. I really had to go out of my way to find uses for it, but Mask of Many Faces definitely makes it something you could utilize constantly.
As transmorpher said, three classes is really hard. You can end up putting off your asi for a very long time if you don’t level it thoughtfully. That level spread means you only get 3 the whole campaign, and using the progression they suggest (which makes good sense) you don’t get your first one until level 7, and the second at, I think it’s 13. Better roll really good stats.
For party roles I'm trying to be the face, support, and minor striker(though I know I'm sacrificing sneak attack dice by multiclassing, I'm trying to ensure that i land sneak attack more often with the extra attack given by College of Swords 6).
You know I'm playing a character build very close to this, currently a Swords Bard 5/Swashbuckler 5/Hexblade 1 and I have found that a Blade Cantrip like Booming Blade actually makes up for the lost Sneak Attack dice, but you do have to remember that Booming Blade does not play well with Extra Attack. You have to choose one or the other with this build. I was originally going for Bard 6/Rogue 11/Warlock 3 like you, but I think I might actually forgo Bard 6 and switch that last level over to Rogue for another ASI or Feat. So that would be Bard 5/Rogue 12/Warlock 3.
I started as a Bard for story reasons, but starting as a Rogue probably gives the most benefits as well as the more advantageous saving throws. Pick a Variant Human to ease up the Feat burden and pick up Fighting Initiate? Maybe Actor. Oh Bountiful Luck is a halfling Feat, I didn't see that you picked halfling.
Anyway I would recommend taking Rogue to 4 for an ASI/Feat, then taking Bard to 4 for another ASI/Feat. After that you can kind of pick up levels where you want. As a rogue you can put your Expertise in Performance and Persuasion to be the face. Having both Bard and Rogue means you're going to have a lot of proficiencies and Expertise so you can cover all the social skills and start picking up things like acrobatics or perception.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I don't think Actor is a good feat for you, since it doesn't let you do "something new," just "something better" that you're already going to be good at (likely with Expertise in those skills). For +1 Cha feats, Fey Touched would likely be more meaningful, or Skill Expert, or something that unlocks wholly new features like Telepathic or Telekinetic. Or even something selfish like Second Chance...
Thrown Weapon Fighting Style is only crucial if you're making more than 2 attacks per round. You're never going to get there, no matter what, so Archery would be pretty much strictly superior for throwing darts, but Thrown might still be nice (for the accuracy) if you're throwing daggers instead, or a mix of the two. Daggers can sometimes get you a second attack using Two-Weapon Fighting even without Extra Attack, so that's a small point in their favor I suppose. I think that a fighting style isn't really "necessary" for your though, you're not a thrown weapon fighter first and foremost, but rather a face/support who does their damage via sneak attack or setting up others' attacks, not making tons of attacks per round with lots of static damage bonuses on each attack. A thrown weapon striker built to do that would have been using Fighter orRanger, and darts and Sharpshooter, not messing around with Bard and Rogue levels...
I understand why you're pushing for Rogue (Swashbuckler) 9 for Panache (can basically charm people in social encounters all day long), and Rogue 11 for Reliable Talent (though, you can recreate Reliable Talent for charisma checks with a different Bard 3 subclass, which I'll get to below). However, Reliable Talent isn't really "something new," just "something better," and that 2 levels of Rogue is the difference between Level 3 Warlock and Level 5 (3rd level spells, 1 more invocation, and reaching the invocations that require 5 Warlock levels), which does let you do several cool "something new"s.
I understand why you'd want Warlock (Archfey) 1 (can burst charm/frighten enemies in combat for 1 round), and Warlock 3 for a Pact Boon (for Tome or Talisman boons probably?). I think that Warlock 5 might be worth it, depending on what Pact Boon you're taking... as a Tomelock, for example, you have access to Far Scribe as a Warlock 5, which is potentially campaign changing. Or if you're a Bladelock, you have access to Thirsting Blade, which could be useful for cutting yourself free from College of Swords (see below). But also... Warlock here is in a way, redundant with your Bard levels. Rogue and Bard levels (see below) are going to give you ways to magically influence people out of combat, or in combat if you haven't been hostile to them yet.... do you really need one more (weaker) way to do that in a small AOE burst via Archfey Warlock? You clearly aren't interested in being an EB blaster, so what tricks does Warlock give you that more (or earlier) levels of Bard or Rogue couldn't?
What I don't quite see, is the need for Bard (Swords) 6. On the plus side, it gets you Extra Attack (which is nice for making Sneak Attack more reliable), and either Dueling (+2-4 damage a round) or Two-Weapon Fighting (probably not since you're a hybrid caster who will want one open hand). The Blade Flourish options range from negligible (a couple of extra damage from Slashing Flourish, bonus AC from Defensive Flourish that can be entirely wasted if the DM just attacks someone else), to niche useful (hard enemy repositioning without saves/opposed checks with Mobile Flourish ), but come at the cost of uses of your 3-5 Bardic Inspiration per long (short after Bard 5) rest. If you're pumping Dex to 18 or 20, you probably aren't interested in the Medium Armor proficiency it's giving you. I'd say that Swords is okay , but I do wonder if you considered Eloquence or Glamour schools instead... because those give you much more thematic and interesting abilities for face and support.
3 Levels of Eloquence would get you Silver Tongue, which is essentially Reliable Talent for social checks much earlier in your career than you'd otherwise get that. Unfailing Inspiration at 6 makes your 3-5 bardic inspirations per short rest very potent support buffs too, in a way that will likely impact battle more (crucial saves, big GWM/Sharpshooter hits, etc.) than a Sword bard would use those same charges for a Flourish. And being able to magically ensure that creatures understand you (including dumb creatures like animals, undead, monsters), and are thus subject to your Swashbuckler Panache.... that has the potential to really make some encounters go in fun ways.
3 Levels of Glamour would get you Mantle of Inspiration, which is a pretty good-value use of a single Bardic Inspiration charge (20-30ish THP 3-5/short rest? yeah!) as a support character that every combat will find useful. It also gives you a new way to charm groups of people for a long time outside of combat, which is something your Panache can't do... and which comes much earlier in your career. And at 6.... I dunno, its a pretty short list of class features at any level of any class that rival at-will bonus action Command for 10 rounds!!!
I don't think that Eloquence or Glamour challenge your character concept... if anything, they fit into it even more closely than Swords does? I like Archfey Warlock, and if you have to have it, I'd even take it to 5... but I think cutting it out and just being a Bard/Rogue will feel much better leveling up. Putting it all together, here's what I'd recommend:
Level 0: Halfling, with 8/16/14/8/11/17 for starting stats.
Level 1: Rogue 1. Four skills, on top of the two from your Background, and Thieves Tools! Expertise in Thieves' Tools and Persuasion. Whenever you throw a dagger, its a d4+3+d6 (average 9), not bad in T1.
Level 2: Bard 1. Another skill, and a musical instrument!
Level 3: Bard 2. Half-proficiency in the 11/18 skills you don't yet have proficiency with.
Level 4: Bard 3 (Glamour). Expertise in Deception and Performance? Can now charm entire rooms full of people for 1 hour by giving a little speech or musical performance! Can now buff your entire party (arguably yourself included since you can see and hear yourself) with 5 THP as a bonus action up to 3 times per long rest.
Level 5: Bard 4. Skill Expert (+1 Charisma) to get one more proficiency (now have 8 total), and another Expertise skill (Athletics? Stealth? Arcana?).
Level 6: Bard 5. You rushed Bard 5 for Font of Inspiration, because it fundamentally changes how your Bardic Inspiration (and Mantle of Inspiration) get used every day, doubling or tripling your uses! Also, that Mantle of Inspiration now hands out a bit more THP, 8 per character instead 5 (isn't a lot individually, but is a lot collectively!)
Level 7: Bard 6. Last one for a while, sorry, but Mantle of Majesty was too powerful to leave on the table.
Level 8: Rogue 2. Cunning Action at last. Your 9 damage per round with dagger throws is starting to look pretty poor compared to the party, but now will begin improving.
Level 9: Rogue 3. Better initiatives, slightly better sneak attacks. d4+3+2d6 (average 12), but your to-hit modifier isn't great with +3 Dex.
Level 10: Rogue 4. If you'd like to grab Bountiful Luck, you can, will definitely have some big moments at the table and its easy to use! But realize that it will interfere with keeping reactions free for Uncanny Dodge, and getting your Dex and Cha higher are also priorities... so you might want to take an ASI +2 Dex here instead. d4+4+2d6 (average 14).
Level 11: Rogue 5. Uncanny Dodge is real good.... d4+4+3d6 (average 17).
Level 12: Rogue 6. Expertise in 2 more skills (you now have it in 5 of your 8 proficient skills, oh my).
Level 13: Rogue 7. Evasion is real good.... d4+4+4d6 (average 19).
Level 14: Rogue 8. You might want to take ASI to bring Dex to 20 (better AC and full attack accuracy with your 1 attack/round to land sneak attacks) or Cha to 20 (better saves and skill checks and 2-3ish more Bardic Inspirations per day). You probably have a good sense of what's more important for your playstyle/party role by this point. If Dex, d4+5+4d6 with full to-hit progression (average 20).
Level 15: Rogue 9. Panache! You've been doing this since level 4 for entire rooms with 1 minute speeches, but now you're able to do it more subtly and swiftly to single targets. d4+5+5d6 (average 25).
Level 16: Rogue 10. You might want to take ASI to bring your last of Dex or Cha to 20. Or, you can start branching out into your "ribbon" feats like Bountiful Luck, Inspiring Leader, Lucky, Chef, or Warcaster.
Level 17-20: Choices!
Rogue 11: Depending on how your DM interprets things, Reliable Talent might actually apply to every single skill via Jack of All Trades (since you're adding a portion of your proficiency bonus to every skill). Probably not RAI...But even if its just for the 8 that you're actually proficient in and Thieves Tools, pretty great! But honestly, you're already going to be ludicrously over-passing your skill checks with Expertise, how much better do you really need to be? How often are you going to run into DC 27 skill checks and have rolled under 10?
Bard 7 or 9: Doesn't have a lot more amazing class features, but access to 4th or 5th level spells up from 3rd level spells is signifigant.
Bard 10: Magical Secrets wowowowow!!!! I personally love taking Find Greater Steed with this for a Pegasus, but you do you :)
Warlock (Archfey) 1: Warlock splash in T4?! Yeah sure why not. That combat AOE charm/frighten is a nifty enough trick
Warlcok (Archfey) 2 or 3: A little harder to find invocations (Devil's Sight?) or pact boons (Talisman I guess?) that are going to fundamentally change your playstyle at this point, hmmm.
Personally, I'd recommend that you finish off these four levels with Bard 10, which gets you one more feat, 5th level spells, d10 inspirations, 11 THP Mantles of Inspiration, a nifty Magical Secret spell, and 2 more Expertise skills (now Expert in 7 of your 8 proficiencies).
What you're left with is a pretty good striker on rounds where you attack: you'll only make 1 attack most rounds, but can make 2 attacks if you draw a second dagger first (though you'll often have better uses for a bonus action), and a hit will likely do d4+5+5d6 (25ish) damage. You're a fantastic face, with the ability to charm people out of combat pretty much at-will all day long. You're a fantastic support character, handing out huge bursts of THP to the entire party dozens of times per day, and HUGE pads of THP during short rests if you take Inspiring Leader in Tier 4. You're a fantastic control caster, having access to full-caster stat save-based spells through 5th level, and at will Command as a Bonus Action for 10 rounds!!!!! You're also a fantastic exploration character, with half-proficiency in 10/18 skills, and double proficiency in 7/18 skills and Thieves tools (and regular proficiency in 1 skill and 1 instrument, lol).
This character will feel fun in just about every context, and at all tiers of play. It's good.
-College of Swords has a feature that many overlook: Weapon Spell Focus. I can hold my dual daggers in both hands and still cast spells.
-Extra attack increases chances of landing sneak attack. I'll take more consistent sneak attack than higher damage with less likely chances of hitting.
Won't lie, college of Eloquence has been very tempting over Swords, and may still be an alternative. I'll have to see how the rest of the party composition is and really debate it. Glamour was never considered. Those abilities don't quite work how you may think they do. Charm a whole room? Charm 5 people max if your CHA is 20, and they can still make saves against it. Mantle of inspiration is nice, but I don't want to be known as the perse healer. I am taking Healing word, but that's it for healing really.
Archfey was a thought that came up today and was backstory driven. I am rethinking it for, you guessed it, the hexblade. It's really going to be damage vs socual utility. At level 10, in the 2nd round of combat if I go Swords4/Swash5/Hexblade1 and having the fighting initiate thrown weapon style, applying hexblade's curse and Hex on the same creature, if it isn't next to another creature and I don't have disadvantage, I'm throwing a knife and on hit, dealing 1d4+5(dagger with thrown weapon bonus added)+3d6 sneak attack+1d6 hex+4 hexblade curse. The lowest I can hit is 14, the highest is 37, an average of 25 and I can do that for a minute so long as I don't get hit. At Swords6/Swash11/Hex 3, same situation, 1d4+5 dagger+6d6 sneak attack+1d6 hex+6 hexblade curse, low of 19, high 57, average of 38 damage which is really close to your base Rogue, and if I miss, I can simply try again thanks to extra attack or the bonus action. In melee range I can do pretty much the same thing except I can add booming blade and a blade flourish to it. I could could take Sharpshooter deal more, but if someone else takes it then I'll let that be where they shine.
I'm fairly certain now that we have a druid and two frontlines so far, so I may fall back into more face and striker than support. I'll still keep some of support spells, but may look for a higher damage output.
Thank you for your input though. I want to make 100% decision I will have to see what the rest of the party is looking like and then I may go down slightly different paths.
For party roles I'm trying to be the face, support, and minor striker(though I know I'm sacrificing sneak attack dice by multiclassing, I'm trying to ensure that i land sneak attack more often with the extra attack given by College of Swords 6).
You know I'm playing a character build very close to this, currently a Swords Bard 5/Swashbuckler 5/Hexblade 1 and I have found that a Blade Cantrip like Booming Blade actually makes up for the lost Sneak Attack dice, but you do have to remember that Booming Blade does not play well with Extra Attack. You have to choose one or the other with this build. I was originally going for Bard 6/Rogue 11/Warlock 3 like you, but I think I might actually forgo Bard 6 and switch that last level over to Rogue for another ASI or Feat. So that would be Bard 5/Rogue 12/Warlock 3.
I started as a Bard for story reasons, but starting as a Rogue probably gives the most benefits as well as the more advantageous saving throws. Pick a Variant Human to ease up the Feat burden and pick up Fighting Initiate? Maybe Actor. Oh Bountiful Luck is a halfling Feat, I didn't see that you picked halfling.
Anyway I would recommend taking Rogue to 4 for an ASI/Feat, then taking Bard to 4 for another ASI/Feat. After that you can kind of pick up levels where you want. As a rogue you can put your Expertise in Performance and Persuasion to be the face. Having both Bard and Rogue means you're going to have a lot of proficiencies and Expertise so you can cover all the social skills and start picking up things like acrobatics or perception.
Yeah you were telling me about that on another thread I made. I didn't see a reason for my character to go Warlock. I did make up a patron for him to worship but I thought it was kind of lazy to be like"well he has a patron so hexblade". Then I found one in the legit lore while simply looking up archfey and it says that she's referred to as a mother(perfect for my orphan character who runs an orphanage) , check one, and her emissaries are equipped with magical daggers, check two and it gave me another tie to the world and lore and backstory. Perfect.
I'm gonna write something more up later tonight looking at College of Swords more closely since you're committed... but I need to point something out about Hexblade you may have overlooked.
Hex Warrior
At 1st level, you acquire the training necessary to effectively arm yourself for battle. You gain proficiency with medium armor, shields, and martial weapons.
The influence of your patron also allows you to mystically channel your will through a particular weapon. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can touch one weapon that you are proficient with and that lacks the two-handed property. When you attack with that weapon, you can use your Charisma modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls. This benefit lasts until you finish a long rest. If you later gain the Pact of the Blade feature, this benefit extends to every pact weapon you conjure with that feature, no matter the weapon’s type.
That's one particular dagger or one particular dart you're talking about, not "daggers" or "darts." Hex Warrior is not what you're looking for, as a Thrown Weapon combatant. Pact of the Blade won't fix that, either, as it is still one specific weapon, and only lets you materialize the weapon with an action, and it disappears if more than 5 feet away from you.
There's no real way you're going to end up throwing daggers or darts with Charisma, so don't get invested in that idea....
In melee range I can do pretty much the same thing except I can add booming blade and a blade flourish to it.
Just as a note, you can't do Booming Blade and Blade Flourish at the same time. Booming Blade takes the [Tooltip Not Found] Action and Blade Flourish can only be done when you take the Attack Action. I wish they could be done on the same action, believe me, but they can't. Nice thing, though, is that Sneak Attack can be combined with either of them.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
About the flourishes: none of them are explicitly restricted to melee weapon attacks but in practice none of them are useful for ranged weapon attacks.
defensive flourish adds AC to you after making the attack. ideally ranged attackers are attacked less often than melee attackers, but OK maybe this one is a little bit useful.
slashing flourish applies extra damage to an enemy that is within 5 feet of you the attacker. If there is such an enemy within 5 feet congratulations that means that you made that ranged attack with disadvantage!
Mobile flourish pushes your enemy somewhere between five and 15 feet depending on how your DM interprets it. But the second half of that ability which would let you spend your reaction to then rush up to become 5 feet away from it is nothing that you will be interested in ever using as a ranged attacker or as somebody who’s wanting to keep that reaction for bountiful luck or uncanny dodge!
The flourishes are just really so bad for a thrown weapon user this feels like a square peg in a round hole situation… you sure you wouldn’t rather be a blade singer or something?
About the flourishes: none of them are explicitly restricted to melee weapon attacks but in practice none of them are useful for ranged weapon attacks.
defensive flourish adds AC to you after making the attack. ideally ranged attackers are attacked less often than melee attackers, but OK maybe this one is a little bit useful.
slashing flourish applies extra damage to an enemy that is within 5 feet of you the attacker. If there is such an enemy within 5 feet congratulations that means that you made that ranged attack with disadvantage!
Mobile flourish pushes your enemy somewhere between five and 15 feet depending on how your DM interprets it. But the second half of that ability which would let you spend your reaction to then rush up to become 5 feet away from it is nothing that you will be interested in ever using as a ranged attacker or as somebody who’s wanting to keep that reaction for bountiful luck or uncanny dodge!
The flourishes are just really so bad for a thrown weapon user this feels like a square peg in a round hole situation… you sure you wouldn’t rather be a blade singer or something?
Nah. If I'm using anything, it'll probably be the mobile flourish. No I wont dash up, but I like the idea of being able to move an opponent closer or further away from teammates or off of cliffs, into traps, into spells, etc. As I said with the original post I know this isn't the most optimized character but I liked it for the flavor and it still very very effective. The College of Swords idea was first from A)me wanting to be like an Entertainer character so I was always going to go to the bard, B) the extra attack because I do want to still feel like I'm doing a little bit more in combat but I don't want to be super Spell heavy, and C) it had great flavor in just the description of the subclass and that's when I said I want to throw knives. Swords bards entertain through juggling blades and throwing knives. I think I said imagine the circus performer earlier, but latest media has given me a really good example...Loki, except less evil.
I'm gonna write something more up later tonight looking at College of Swords more closely since you're committed... but I need to point something out about Hexblade you may have overlooked.
Hex Warrior
At 1st level, you acquire the training necessary to effectively arm yourself for battle. You gain proficiency with medium armor, shields, and martial weapons.
The influence of your patron also allows you to mystically channel your will through a particular weapon. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can touch one weapon that you are proficient with and that lacks the two-handed property. When you attack with that weapon, you can use your Charisma modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls. This benefit lasts until you finish a long rest. If you later gain the Pact of the Blade feature, this benefit extends to every pact weapon you conjure with that feature, no matter the weapon’s type.
That's one particular dagger or one particular dart you're talking about, not "daggers" or "darts." Hex Warrior is not what you're looking for, as a Thrown Weapon combatant. Pact of the Blade won't fix that, either, as it is still one specific weapon, and only lets you materialize the weapon with an action, and it disappears if more than 5 feet away from you.
There's no real way you're going to end up throwing daggers or darts with Charisma, so don't get invested in that idea....
I thought I had commented on this earlier in the thread, but I keep letting my phone lock and then it keeps refreshing and loses my reply. I meant to put in there that I was going to talk to the DM about that and see if he would allow the pact weapon to be two daggers gifted by Titania and if I could somewhat combine the features from thrown weapon fighting and the pact of the blade. It may be a bit much and I know RAW would stop this, but if the DM would allow I would like to throw a dagger and call it back in the same turn. With the two features it wouldn't seem that absurd. Up to him, but I hear he's fairly open to homebrew so long as it's not game breaking.
I think you will totally nail the skills/support side of this character, but you will find throwing daggers very difficult to manage in actual play, especially with the added restrictions required to trigger Sneak Attack.
A dagger's thrown range is 20 feet. This means it will be very easy for enemies to engage you which causes all sorts of problems. You will have tools to get out of this - Cunning Action, flourishes, Misty Step, etc, but you may find you're spending all your resources saving your own butt instead of supporting your teammates or killing stuff dead.
Any farther than 20 feet = disadvantage = no Sneak Attack. Same with an enemy adjacent to you, so a lot of your energy is just going to be spent trying to stay within that narrow band between 5 and 20 feet away where you can be effective. It's a recipe for frustration.
Both of Swashbuckler's level 3 abilities are very good, but entirely meant for melee combat. I think this guy would just perform waaay better with a dashing rapier or something. You could still carry daggers and throw them when the opportunity presented itself. I would just really caution anyone to not try that as their primary method of attacking unless they were building the whole character around supporting that particular mechanic (and even then you're doing heavy optimization just to keep pace with any other regular build).
I think you will totally nail the skills/support side of this character, but you will find throwing daggers very difficult to manage in actual play, especially with the added restrictions required to trigger Sneak Attack.
A dagger's thrown range is 20 feet. This means it will be very easy for enemies to engage you which causes all sorts of problems. You will have tools to get out of this - Cunning Action, flourishes, Misty Step, etc, but you may find you're spending all your resources saving your own butt instead of supporting your teammates or killing stuff dead.
Any farther than 20 feet = disadvantage = no Sneak Attack. Same with an enemy adjacent to you, so a lot of your energy is just going to be spent trying to stay within that narrow band between 5 and 20 feet away where you can be effective. It's a recipe for frustration.
Both of Swashbuckler's level 3 abilities are very good, but entirely meant for melee combat. I think this guy would just perform waaay better with a dashing rapier or something. You could still carry daggers and throw them when the opportunity presented itself. I would just really caution anyone to not try that as their primary method of attacking unless they were building the whole character around supporting that particular mechanic (and even then you're doing heavy optimization just to keep pace with any other regular build).
I made an oversight of the swashbuckler's sneak attack. 1 simple 'and' instead of 'or' and requiring me to be within 5 feet have made sneak attack opportunities much more seldom. My brain us fried at this point. My group needs to play already so instead of sitting here pondering and number crunching and building time and time again I can just go with the campaign.
To Chicken_Champ: You were right and I apologize. Thrown daggers aren't going to work or at least not often. I don't know what character I'm going to make anymore. My group really needs to have session 0 already so I can see the rest of the party composition.
If you're more open to different subclasses, I think that a SoulKnife Rogue might get you more the flavor you want. It allows you to manifest magical psychic blades which have a much greater throwing range than normal daggers. Unfortunately it doesn't pair well with Hexblade, because the psychic blades so you can't, by RAW, treat them as your Hex Warrior weapon... but I think it wouldn't be hard to convince your DM to let you, if you're really set on Hexblade now, especially since you seem to have some backstory already written for it.
If you're more open to different subclasses, I think that a SoulKnife Rogue might get you more the flavor you want. It allows you to manifest magical psychic blades which have a much greater throwing range than normal daggers. Unfortunately it doesn't pair well with Hexblade, because the psychic blades so you can't, by RAW, treat them as your Hex Warrior weapon... but I think it wouldn't be hard to convince your DM to let you, if you're really set on Hexblade now, especially since you seem to have some backstory already written for it.
It seemed interesting, but I'm going to see what the rest of the party is before deciding. So far I'm fairly certain we have a barbarian as a tank and a druid as support/blaster confirmed and then a Ranger and a Fighter unconfirmed. I've had a few character Concepts in mind so whatever the party is missing I'll just play that I guess. This was just the one I was looking forward to the most. I suppose I could still play it and take other feats and just use a Rapier but I was just really trying for something that I didn't think had been done too many times before.
I fell asleep last night working on it, frustrated that it was turning into a 4-class multiclass.... but the short version is, "Loki" as a concept says more about Intelligence to me than it does Charisma, even though he's manipulative af. An Artificer's returning weapon infusion is a way to let your Charisma-based dagger (Hexblade) or Intelligence-based dagger (Battlesmith) be used on every throw, multiple times per round, even without Thrown Weapon Fighting style (though Thrown certainly helps its damage)... it isn't the most thematic class for you, but 2 or 3 levels wouldn't hurt, and it can even give you Extra Attack if you don't get it elsewhere. Bloodhunter Profane Soul isn't a very good subclass... but due to the way its spellcasting is worded, 3 levels of it will let you cast all your Warlock spells of any level with Intelligence (even if you're a Warlock 17/Profane Soul 3), which could be useful in a MAD build. Battlemaster does everything that Swashbuckler flourishes do, and more. Whispers Bard is less smiley and happy than Eloquence, but absolutely fits the same Charm/Fear theme that Archfey warlock does, and has a much easier-to-apply damage application of inspirations to boot. Fey Wanderer Ranger provides more bonuses to charisma checks, and also has a no-action bonus damage effect that's more reliable than sneak attack, and gives you a second chance on failed charm/frightened effects (or lets you turn those against you against your enemies after you pass them).
Put it all together and.... something, I didn't make my way all the way through it, clearly some of those classes need to get trimmed off. But there's no shortage of classes and subclasses that we can slam together to make an Intelligence- or Charisma-based charm-themed thrown weapon striker, who focuses more on attacks and occasional mental control than they do on party buffs or battlefield control spells.
If you're more open to different subclasses, I think that a SoulKnife Rogue might get you more the flavor you want. It allows you to manifest magical psychic blades which have a much greater throwing range than normal daggers. Unfortunately it doesn't pair well with Hexblade, because the psychic blades so you can't, by RAW, treat them as your Hex Warrior weapon... but I think it wouldn't be hard to convince your DM to let you, if you're really set on Hexblade now, especially since you seem to have some backstory already written for it.
It seemed interesting, but I'm going to see what the rest of the party is before deciding. So far I'm fairly certain we have a barbarian as a tank and a druid as support/blaster confirmed and then a Ranger and a Fighter unconfirmed. I've had a few character Concepts in mind so whatever the party is missing I'll just play that I guess. This was just the one I was looking forward to the most. I suppose I could still play it and take other feats and just use a Rapier but I was just really trying for something that I didn't think had been done too many times before.
On the plus side, it seems like your party is already pretty well covered in terms of balance for combat, so you can freely kind of do whatever you want. It's a good opportunity to get experimental and try out a build you hadn't considered before.
I'd say the important thing is to not worry too much about getting the best possible build. Just create what looks like fun for you and run with it.
If my character or the campaign hypothetically makes it to level 20, I'm looking to go(not in this particular order mind you) College of Swords 6/Archfey Pact 3/Swashbuckler 11. My patron for this character is Titania, who he and Fey that worship her refer to as the Mother(flavor note: he was an orphan and ran the orphanage when he grew up, hence a motherly patron). I'm using Daggers reflavored and redesigned as throwing knives for weapons and magic, schools being mostly illusion, transmutation and conjuration magic(spells like mage hand, minor illusion, booming blade, cloud of daggers, bane, etc.)
For party roles I'm trying to be the face, support, and minor striker(though I know I'm sacrificing sneak attack dice by multiclassing, I'm trying to ensure that i land sneak attack more often with the extra attack given by College of Swords 6). The face is going to be the major role for this character as we don't have any CHA based party members(its actually most of the party's dump stat). Think of a performer in the circus who uses their skills and abilities in combat(sort of the feel I'm going for).
I want to take the Actor, Fighter initiate(thrown weapon fighting), and Bountiful Luck feats. Aiming for at least 18 in CHA and DEX by the end campaign.
I know that it's not necessarily adviced to plan so much ahead, but if this is achievable then this is the build I'm set one. This build hits home on the playstyle and flavor that I really want to play so please no other class or subclass suggestions. I understand that this isn't going to be the absolute strongest build and may even be the opposite, but I believe I'll have fun playing this character and I don't want to ask the DM to retcon anything because I chose something at a bad time to do so. This is a very tedious thing to ask someone to break it down and show me the order they would build it in, so if you do so I thank you.
The hardest part of this build is going to be the early levels when you're deciding which class to level up in first... 3 classes is a lot to balance.
I think I would start with Warlock. For one, I feel like it makes sense for a Pact to be a starting point for a character. Maybe play it as the knowledge gained from your pact inspiring you to discover Bardic magic on your own. Mechanicallly, your Warlock Subclass comes online right at level 1, so you benefit from that class the most right at level 1.
From there I would hit Rogue for two levels to get Sneak Attack and Cunning Action. This will open you up to a lot more mobility on the board, and as much as I would want to get the benefits of Swashbuckler right away, I think it makes sense to just focus on College of Swords for 6 levels right after that to really just get that extra attack as quickly as possible. Then get your next level in Rogue to finally hit Swashbuckler, round off Warlock on your next level up, then focus on Swashbuckler for the rest of your build.
I wouldn't worry too much about the Actor feat. It's mostly useful for just rounding out an uneven charisma score, but if you're already focusing on Illusion spells, you can accomplish the same effects of the feat using clever use of Minor Illusion.
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I was going to take the actor feat simply for the shenanigans of having the Warlock invocation mask of many faces and pretending to be somebody else *insert spiderman meme*. I thought it would be hilarious to have some of those"who is the real one and who is the imposter" moments.
That's a solid combo, actually. I played as a character with the Actor Feat once, but that was simply to round out an uneven Charisma score, since at the time I couldn't find any other feats that would improve Charisma and I didn't have any other odd scores in my abilities. I really had to go out of my way to find uses for it, but Mask of Many Faces definitely makes it something you could utilize constantly.
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As transmorpher said, three classes is really hard. You can end up putting off your asi for a very long time if you don’t level it thoughtfully. That level spread means you only get 3 the whole campaign, and using the progression they suggest (which makes good sense) you don’t get your first one until level 7, and the second at, I think it’s 13. Better roll really good stats.
You know I'm playing a character build very close to this, currently a Swords Bard 5/Swashbuckler 5/Hexblade 1 and I have found that a Blade Cantrip like Booming Blade actually makes up for the lost Sneak Attack dice, but you do have to remember that Booming Blade does not play well with Extra Attack. You have to choose one or the other with this build. I was originally going for Bard 6/Rogue 11/Warlock 3 like you, but I think I might actually forgo Bard 6 and switch that last level over to Rogue for another ASI or Feat. So that would be Bard 5/Rogue 12/Warlock 3.
I started as a Bard for story reasons, but starting as a Rogue probably gives the most benefits as well as the more advantageous saving throws. Pick a Variant Human to ease up the Feat burden and pick up Fighting Initiate? Maybe Actor. Oh Bountiful Luck is a halfling Feat, I didn't see that you picked halfling.
Anyway I would recommend taking Rogue to 4 for an ASI/Feat, then taking Bard to 4 for another ASI/Feat. After that you can kind of pick up levels where you want. As a rogue you can put your Expertise in Performance and Persuasion to be the face. Having both Bard and Rogue means you're going to have a lot of proficiencies and Expertise so you can cover all the social skills and start picking up things like acrobatics or perception.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I don't think Actor is a good feat for you, since it doesn't let you do "something new," just "something better" that you're already going to be good at (likely with Expertise in those skills). For +1 Cha feats, Fey Touched would likely be more meaningful, or Skill Expert, or something that unlocks wholly new features like Telepathic or Telekinetic. Or even something selfish like Second Chance...
Thrown Weapon Fighting Style is only crucial if you're making more than 2 attacks per round. You're never going to get there, no matter what, so Archery would be pretty much strictly superior for throwing darts, but Thrown might still be nice (for the accuracy) if you're throwing daggers instead, or a mix of the two. Daggers can sometimes get you a second attack using Two-Weapon Fighting even without Extra Attack, so that's a small point in their favor I suppose. I think that a fighting style isn't really "necessary" for your though, you're not a thrown weapon fighter first and foremost, but rather a face/support who does their damage via sneak attack or setting up others' attacks, not making tons of attacks per round with lots of static damage bonuses on each attack. A thrown weapon striker built to do that would have been using Fighter orRanger, and darts and Sharpshooter, not messing around with Bard and Rogue levels...
I understand why you're pushing for Rogue (Swashbuckler) 9 for Panache (can basically charm people in social encounters all day long), and Rogue 11 for Reliable Talent (though, you can recreate Reliable Talent for charisma checks with a different Bard 3 subclass, which I'll get to below). However, Reliable Talent isn't really "something new," just "something better," and that 2 levels of Rogue is the difference between Level 3 Warlock and Level 5 (3rd level spells, 1 more invocation, and reaching the invocations that require 5 Warlock levels), which does let you do several cool "something new"s.
I understand why you'd want Warlock (Archfey) 1 (can burst charm/frighten enemies in combat for 1 round), and Warlock 3 for a Pact Boon (for Tome or Talisman boons probably?). I think that Warlock 5 might be worth it, depending on what Pact Boon you're taking... as a Tomelock, for example, you have access to Far Scribe as a Warlock 5, which is potentially campaign changing. Or if you're a Bladelock, you have access to Thirsting Blade, which could be useful for cutting yourself free from College of Swords (see below). But also... Warlock here is in a way, redundant with your Bard levels. Rogue and Bard levels (see below) are going to give you ways to magically influence people out of combat, or in combat if you haven't been hostile to them yet.... do you really need one more (weaker) way to do that in a small AOE burst via Archfey Warlock? You clearly aren't interested in being an EB blaster, so what tricks does Warlock give you that more (or earlier) levels of Bard or Rogue couldn't?
What I don't quite see, is the need for Bard (Swords) 6. On the plus side, it gets you Extra Attack (which is nice for making Sneak Attack more reliable), and either Dueling (+2-4 damage a round) or Two-Weapon Fighting (probably not since you're a hybrid caster who will want one open hand). The Blade Flourish options range from negligible (a couple of extra damage from Slashing Flourish, bonus AC from Defensive Flourish that can be entirely wasted if the DM just attacks someone else), to niche useful (hard enemy repositioning without saves/opposed checks with Mobile Flourish ), but come at the cost of uses of your 3-5 Bardic Inspiration per long (short after Bard 5) rest. If you're pumping Dex to 18 or 20, you probably aren't interested in the Medium Armor proficiency it's giving you. I'd say that Swords is okay , but I do wonder if you considered Eloquence or Glamour schools instead... because those give you much more thematic and interesting abilities for face and support.
3 Levels of Eloquence would get you Silver Tongue, which is essentially Reliable Talent for social checks much earlier in your career than you'd otherwise get that. Unfailing Inspiration at 6 makes your 3-5 bardic inspirations per short rest very potent support buffs too, in a way that will likely impact battle more (crucial saves, big GWM/Sharpshooter hits, etc.) than a Sword bard would use those same charges for a Flourish. And being able to magically ensure that creatures understand you (including dumb creatures like animals, undead, monsters), and are thus subject to your Swashbuckler Panache.... that has the potential to really make some encounters go in fun ways.
3 Levels of Glamour would get you Mantle of Inspiration, which is a pretty good-value use of a single Bardic Inspiration charge (20-30ish THP 3-5/short rest? yeah!) as a support character that every combat will find useful. It also gives you a new way to charm groups of people for a long time outside of combat, which is something your Panache can't do... and which comes much earlier in your career. And at 6.... I dunno, its a pretty short list of class features at any level of any class that rival at-will bonus action Command for 10 rounds!!!
I don't think that Eloquence or Glamour challenge your character concept... if anything, they fit into it even more closely than Swords does? I like Archfey Warlock, and if you have to have it, I'd even take it to 5... but I think cutting it out and just being a Bard/Rogue will feel much better leveling up. Putting it all together, here's what I'd recommend:
What you're left with is a pretty good striker on rounds where you attack: you'll only make 1 attack most rounds, but can make 2 attacks if you draw a second dagger first (though you'll often have better uses for a bonus action), and a hit will likely do d4+5+5d6 (25ish) damage. You're a fantastic face, with the ability to charm people out of combat pretty much at-will all day long. You're a fantastic support character, handing out huge bursts of THP to the entire party dozens of times per day, and HUGE pads of THP during short rests if you take Inspiring Leader in Tier 4. You're a fantastic control caster, having access to full-caster stat save-based spells through 5th level, and at will Command as a Bonus Action for 10 rounds!!!!! You're also a fantastic exploration character, with half-proficiency in 10/18 skills, and double proficiency in 7/18 skills and Thieves tools (and regular proficiency in 1 skill and 1 instrument, lol).
This character will feel fun in just about every context, and at all tiers of play. It's good.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Chicken_Champ:
College of Swords for a couple of reasons:
-College of Swords has a feature that many overlook: Weapon Spell Focus. I can hold my dual daggers in both hands and still cast spells.
-Extra attack increases chances of landing sneak attack. I'll take more consistent sneak attack than higher damage with less likely chances of hitting.
Won't lie, college of Eloquence has been very tempting over Swords, and may still be an alternative. I'll have to see how the rest of the party composition is and really debate it. Glamour was never considered. Those abilities don't quite work how you may think they do. Charm a whole room? Charm 5 people max if your CHA is 20, and they can still make saves against it. Mantle of inspiration is nice, but I don't want to be known as the perse healer. I am taking Healing word, but that's it for healing really.
Archfey was a thought that came up today and was backstory driven. I am rethinking it for, you guessed it, the hexblade. It's really going to be damage vs socual utility. At level 10, in the 2nd round of combat if I go Swords4/Swash5/Hexblade1 and having the fighting initiate thrown weapon style, applying hexblade's curse and Hex on the same creature, if it isn't next to another creature and I don't have disadvantage, I'm throwing a knife and on hit, dealing 1d4+5(dagger with thrown weapon bonus added)+3d6 sneak attack+1d6 hex+4 hexblade curse. The lowest I can hit is 14, the highest is 37, an average of 25 and I can do that for a minute so long as I don't get hit. At Swords6/Swash11/Hex 3, same situation, 1d4+5 dagger+6d6 sneak attack+1d6 hex+6 hexblade curse, low of 19, high 57, average of 38 damage which is really close to your base Rogue, and if I miss, I can simply try again thanks to extra attack or the bonus action. In melee range I can do pretty much the same thing except I can add booming blade and a blade flourish to it. I could could take Sharpshooter deal more, but if someone else takes it then I'll let that be where they shine.
I'm fairly certain now that we have a druid and two frontlines so far, so I may fall back into more face and striker than support. I'll still keep some of support spells, but may look for a higher damage output.
Thank you for your input though. I want to make 100% decision I will have to see what the rest of the party is looking like and then I may go down slightly different paths.
Yeah you were telling me about that on another thread I made. I didn't see a reason for my character to go Warlock. I did make up a patron for him to worship but I thought it was kind of lazy to be like"well he has a patron so hexblade". Then I found one in the legit lore while simply looking up archfey and it says that she's referred to as a mother(perfect for my orphan character who runs an orphanage) , check one, and her emissaries are equipped with magical daggers, check two and it gave me another tie to the world and lore and backstory. Perfect.
I'm gonna write something more up later tonight looking at College of Swords more closely since you're committed... but I need to point something out about Hexblade you may have overlooked.
That's one particular dagger or one particular dart you're talking about, not "daggers" or "darts." Hex Warrior is not what you're looking for, as a Thrown Weapon combatant. Pact of the Blade won't fix that, either, as it is still one specific weapon, and only lets you materialize the weapon with an action, and it disappears if more than 5 feet away from you.
There's no real way you're going to end up throwing daggers or darts with Charisma, so don't get invested in that idea....
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Just as a note, you can't do Booming Blade and Blade Flourish at the same time. Booming Blade takes the [Tooltip Not Found] Action and Blade Flourish can only be done when you take the Attack Action. I wish they could be done on the same action, believe me, but they can't. Nice thing, though, is that Sneak Attack can be combined with either of them.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
About the flourishes: none of them are explicitly restricted to melee weapon attacks but in practice none of them are useful for ranged weapon attacks.
defensive flourish adds AC to you after making the attack. ideally ranged attackers are attacked less often than melee attackers, but OK maybe this one is a little bit useful.
slashing flourish applies extra damage to an enemy that is within 5 feet of you the attacker. If there is such an enemy within 5 feet congratulations that means that you made that ranged attack with disadvantage!
Mobile flourish pushes your enemy somewhere between five and 15 feet depending on how your DM interprets it. But the second half of that ability which would let you spend your reaction to then rush up to become 5 feet away from it is nothing that you will be interested in ever using as a ranged attacker or as somebody who’s wanting to keep that reaction for bountiful luck or uncanny dodge!
The flourishes are just really so bad for a thrown weapon user this feels like a square peg in a round hole situation… you sure you wouldn’t rather be a blade singer or something?
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Nah. If I'm using anything, it'll probably be the mobile flourish. No I wont dash up, but I like the idea of being able to move an opponent closer or further away from teammates or off of cliffs, into traps, into spells, etc. As I said with the original post I know this isn't the most optimized character but I liked it for the flavor and it still very very effective. The College of Swords idea was first from A)me wanting to be like an Entertainer character so I was always going to go to the bard, B) the extra attack because I do want to still feel like I'm doing a little bit more in combat but I don't want to be super Spell heavy, and C) it had great flavor in just the description of the subclass and that's when I said I want to throw knives. Swords bards entertain through juggling blades and throwing knives. I think I said imagine the circus performer earlier, but latest media has given me a really good example...Loki, except less evil.
I thought I had commented on this earlier in the thread, but I keep letting my phone lock and then it keeps refreshing and loses my reply. I meant to put in there that I was going to talk to the DM about that and see if he would allow the pact weapon to be two daggers gifted by Titania and if I could somewhat combine the features from thrown weapon fighting and the pact of the blade. It may be a bit much and I know RAW would stop this, but if the DM would allow I would like to throw a dagger and call it back in the same turn. With the two features it wouldn't seem that absurd. Up to him, but I hear he's fairly open to homebrew so long as it's not game breaking.
I think you will totally nail the skills/support side of this character, but you will find throwing daggers very difficult to manage in actual play, especially with the added restrictions required to trigger Sneak Attack.
A dagger's thrown range is 20 feet. This means it will be very easy for enemies to engage you which causes all sorts of problems. You will have tools to get out of this - Cunning Action, flourishes, Misty Step, etc, but you may find you're spending all your resources saving your own butt instead of supporting your teammates or killing stuff dead.
Any farther than 20 feet = disadvantage = no Sneak Attack. Same with an enemy adjacent to you, so a lot of your energy is just going to be spent trying to stay within that narrow band between 5 and 20 feet away where you can be effective. It's a recipe for frustration.
Both of Swashbuckler's level 3 abilities are very good, but entirely meant for melee combat. I think this guy would just perform waaay better with a dashing rapier or something. You could still carry daggers and throw them when the opportunity presented itself. I would just really caution anyone to not try that as their primary method of attacking unless they were building the whole character around supporting that particular mechanic (and even then you're doing heavy optimization just to keep pace with any other regular build).
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I made an oversight of the swashbuckler's sneak attack. 1 simple 'and' instead of 'or' and requiring me to be within 5 feet have made sneak attack opportunities much more seldom. My brain us fried at this point. My group needs to play already so instead of sitting here pondering and number crunching and building time and time again I can just go with the campaign.
To Chicken_Champ: You were right and I apologize. Thrown daggers aren't going to work or at least not often. I don't know what character I'm going to make anymore. My group really needs to have session 0 already so I can see the rest of the party composition.
If you're more open to different subclasses, I think that a SoulKnife Rogue might get you more the flavor you want. It allows you to manifest magical psychic blades which have a much greater throwing range than normal daggers. Unfortunately it doesn't pair well with Hexblade, because the psychic blades so you can't, by RAW, treat them as your Hex Warrior weapon... but I think it wouldn't be hard to convince your DM to let you, if you're really set on Hexblade now, especially since you seem to have some backstory already written for it.
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It seemed interesting, but I'm going to see what the rest of the party is before deciding. So far I'm fairly certain we have a barbarian as a tank and a druid as support/blaster confirmed and then a Ranger and a Fighter unconfirmed. I've had a few character Concepts in mind so whatever the party is missing I'll just play that I guess. This was just the one I was looking forward to the most. I suppose I could still play it and take other feats and just use a Rapier but I was just really trying for something that I didn't think had been done too many times before.
I fell asleep last night working on it, frustrated that it was turning into a 4-class multiclass.... but the short version is, "Loki" as a concept says more about Intelligence to me than it does Charisma, even though he's manipulative af. An Artificer's returning weapon infusion is a way to let your Charisma-based dagger (Hexblade) or Intelligence-based dagger (Battlesmith) be used on every throw, multiple times per round, even without Thrown Weapon Fighting style (though Thrown certainly helps its damage)... it isn't the most thematic class for you, but 2 or 3 levels wouldn't hurt, and it can even give you Extra Attack if you don't get it elsewhere. Bloodhunter Profane Soul isn't a very good subclass... but due to the way its spellcasting is worded, 3 levels of it will let you cast all your Warlock spells of any level with Intelligence (even if you're a Warlock 17/Profane Soul 3), which could be useful in a MAD build. Battlemaster does everything that Swashbuckler flourishes do, and more. Whispers Bard is less smiley and happy than Eloquence, but absolutely fits the same Charm/Fear theme that Archfey warlock does, and has a much easier-to-apply damage application of inspirations to boot. Fey Wanderer Ranger provides more bonuses to charisma checks, and also has a no-action bonus damage effect that's more reliable than sneak attack, and gives you a second chance on failed charm/frightened effects (or lets you turn those against you against your enemies after you pass them).
Put it all together and.... something, I didn't make my way all the way through it, clearly some of those classes need to get trimmed off. But there's no shortage of classes and subclasses that we can slam together to make an Intelligence- or Charisma-based charm-themed thrown weapon striker, who focuses more on attacks and occasional mental control than they do on party buffs or battlefield control spells.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
On the plus side, it seems like your party is already pretty well covered in terms of balance for combat, so you can freely kind of do whatever you want. It's a good opportunity to get experimental and try out a build you hadn't considered before.
I'd say the important thing is to not worry too much about getting the best possible build. Just create what looks like fun for you and run with it.
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