D&D 5E At my table: Hexblade removed, Pact of the Blade enhanced

[LapBandit]

I've removed Hexblade from the list of possible Warlock patrons at my table.

I've enhanced Pact of the Blade as follows:

At 3rd level, when you choose Pact of the Blade, you gain proficiency in medium armor, shields, and all weapons.
At 6th level, you gain the Extra Attack feature.

I feel like those two changes are all a melee warlock needs. The Charisma to hit and damage replacement of the Hexblade at level 1 along with the curse and all the proficiencies seems like overcompensation for a crappy original Pact of the Blade in the PHB.

 

[Gadget]

You make a very good point. I like this, and always thought that the Hexblade was a 'stealth' blade pact fix. Add in a few of the newer invocations to choose from and I think you're good. One small thing (perhaps one reason why the developers went the way they did), is that this might give more features than a pact sub-class usually gives. I don't have my books with me, but I think these new features, added to the features the blade pact already has, might make it more feature rich than the other pacts. Though I would argue that this is still balanced.

 

[ad_hoc]

I agree about removing Hexblade.

I think you have gone too far with the Pact. Pacts are minor, they shouldn't be strong. Look at the other pacts.

I would add cha to hit/DMG with weapons and martial weapons and call it a day.

Warlocks get good spells to protect themselves.

 

[LapBandit]

The reason I was willing to add to the Pact is that the Warlock is really built around Eldritch Blast for sustained damage. Given that the Warlock who chooses Pact of the Blade is likely to give that up for different invocations and style of play I found these changes reasonable. I've seen it in play up to level 11 (I made the Pact changes long ago) and I can tell you that it does not outcompete a EB-based Warlock for damage, although EB-based Warlocks do tend to be more boring IMHO.

 

[Ganymede81]

I definitely agree that the Hexblade was a backdoor way to revise the Pact Blade, and that some of its features simply belong with the latter instead of shoehorned into the former.


I'd also support rolling some of the boon-specific invocations into their respective pact boons, with an appropriate drop in the number of invocations known (maybe one-for-one, maybe less).

 

[Bardbarian]

I think the charisma to hit and damage is important to keep the class balanced in melee. As a caster with limited spell slots the warlock more than any other caster is reliant on a high spell DC. This is why they have the unique item of Rod of the pact keeper. Having to split stats to keep strength high weakens them considerably. I agree you can do fine without the hexblades curse however. increased crit and + proficiency mod damage is unnecessary with the changes you made. Keep in mind also that the Eldritch blast scales further than melee attacks. A warlock can never get more than 3 attacks albeit they can get them before level 11. An EB warlock will get a 4th attack at higher level and that makes it very hard to keep Melee relevant.

 

[ad_hoc]

The reason I was willing to add to the Pact is that the Warlock is really built around Eldritch Blast for sustained damage. Given that the Warlock who chooses Pact of the Blade is likely to give that up for different invocations and style of play I found these changes reasonable. I've seen it in play up to level 11 (I made the Pact changes long ago) and I can tell you that it does not outcompete a EB-based Warlock for damage, although EB-based Warlocks do tend to be more boring IMHO.

With your changes I would take Blade Pact, not use a weapon, keep using Eldritch Blast, and enjoy +5AC.

 

[Iry]

Hexblade has other interesting class features like the curse and specters. So I wouldn't get rid of the Hexblade itself, even if you improve Pact of the Blade so that it doesn't require Hexblade to be solid.

Side note: With this change, Pact of the Blade can take Thirsting Blade at Level 5 to get his second attack, then trade it out at Level 6 since they do not stack. Not sure if you wanted to do anything with Thirsting Blade.

 

[Ganymede81]

With your changes I would take Blade Pact, not use a weapon, keep using Eldritch Blast, and enjoy +5AC.

The regular Hexblade can do that, all while retaining the superior features of that subclass, a pact boon that it will actually benefit from, and the opportunity to take boon-centric invocations that it can actually use.

 

[ad_hoc]

The regular Hexblade can do that, all while retaining the superior features of that subclass, a pact boon that it will actually benefit from, and the opportunity to take boon-centric invocations that it can actually use.

The only ability that a Hexblade has that pertains to weapons is the cha to hit/dmg (and martial weapon proficiency). Everything else doesn't care about it. The best pact for a Hexblade is probably Tome though Chain is fine too.

Patron is a bigger cost than Pact.

In any case, we're talking about not allowing Hexblade but giving the pact of the blade medium armour and shields. This is just as problematic.

If a pact provides medium armour and shields then it is the most powerful pact regardless of whatever else it provides.