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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Hexblade an Eldritch Knight Variant (PEACH)



AugustNights
2016-03-17, 11:49 PM
Hexblade
Not all Eldritch Knights who study the tedious arts of magic are interested in the traditional spells of war. Some, more sinister fighters seek out a murkier path borrowing their knowledge from apostates, witches, and the occasional cultist. Instead of studying the schools of abjuration and evocation, the Hexblade studies divination and necromancy. Divination grants the Hexblade an uncanny awareness of the battlefield, and necromancy allows the Hexblade to weaken their foes with cruel curses. With their more martial applications of the magic, some Hexblades even learn to blur the lines between the two schools.


http://i765.photobucket.com/albums/xx295/AugustNight/Hex_zpspyjw1bmv.jpg

Spellcasting
As Eldritch Knight, but instead of Evocation and Abjuration, the Hexblade can learn Necromancy & Divination spells from any class list. Like the Eldritch Knight, when changing spells known at level 8th, 14th, and 20th, the Hexblade may choose any Wizard spell. The Hexblade casts spells using Charisma instead of Intelligence. The Hexblade also gains the Chill Touch, Guidance, and True Strike cantrips, instead of the normal cantrips gained.

Bone Armor
Beginning against 3rd level, the Hexblade gains Resistance to Necrotic Damage, and is treated as Undead whenever it is advantageous to them.

Dark Divination
Beginning at 7th level, when the Hexblade uses their action to cast a Divination spell they may choose to deal Necrotic Damage equal to their Charimsa modifier to the target as well as the normal effects of the spell. Undead targeted by this effect instead gain that much temporary hp.

Hex Strike
At 10th level, the Hexblade learns how to make their weapon strikes undercut a creature’s prowess in battle. When they hit a creature with a weapon attack or target them with a divination effect, that creature has disadvantage on the next attack roll it makes against the Hexblade or their allies until the end of it's next turn. When targeting undead with this effect, the Hexblade may choose to instead grant them advantage on the next attack roll they make until the end of their next turn.

Cursed Blow
At 15th level, when the Hexblade successfully strikes a foe with a weapon attack, they may cast any necromancy spell as a Bonus Action targeting the foe regardless of the targeting of the original spell. This spell only effects the target hit with the weapon attack.

Improved Hex Strike
At 18th level, when the Hexblade hits a creature with a weapon attack or target them with a divination effect, that creature has disadvantage on all of the attack rolls it makes against the Hexblade or their allies until the end of it's next turn.


Notes

Threw together this little variant for one of my players in a regular game, and I was wondering what the playground might think of it.
Is peach still a thing?
I like to think this makes True Strike Vaguely usable, in that True Strike targets the foe you want to attack, so now instead of just wasting an action, at least the fighter gets to deal a little damage with their use of True Strike.

Change Log
* March 18, 2016: Fixed the Hex Strike issue. (Specifically that it makes them worse at fighting Undead). And added clarification to the the 8th, 14th, and 20th level spell options.

Ninja_Prawn
2016-03-18, 05:59 AM
I think this looks good. It's a much neater implementation of the hexblade concept than any of the others I've seen (which mostly tried to make it a half-casting base class).

Can't see any immediate balance concerns, though being undead "when it is beneficial to do so" is a little woolly. Well, except for the actual hexblade abilities. False Life suddenly looks very juicy!

PotatoGolem
2016-03-18, 08:51 AM
Why is this class terrible at fighting against undead? That wasn't part of the 3.5 hexblade, was it a 4e thing? As is, you're much worse at fighting a pretty common enemy type than a fighter with no subclass. And true strike is still worthless because you do much more damage by just attacking twice

Ninja_Prawn
2016-03-18, 09:05 AM
Why is this class terrible at fighting against undead?

Because it's supposed to fight alongside undead? Besides, paladins have that market cornered.

CantigThimble
2016-03-18, 09:53 AM
Why is this class terrible at fighting against undead? That wasn't part of the 3.5 hexblade, was it a 4e thing? As is, you're much worse at fighting a pretty common enemy type than a fighter with no subclass. And true strike is still worthless because you do much more damage by just attacking twice

Well, true strike can now be used as an undodgeable, unsaveable 2-5 damage guaranteed as well as being able to bolster undead minions for free out of combat. That's not nothing, though it still isn't great.

Arkhios
2016-03-18, 02:42 PM
Like PotatoGolem, I don't recall 3.5 Hexblade having anything to do with bolstering and befriending with undead so he could fight alongside them. Never saw whether Hexblade appeared in 4th edition, but to be entirely honest, anything that happened in 4th edition should stay there :P

Also, I feel a bit iffy about letting hexblade choose their spells from any class, even though they only get a limited amount of them.

These issues aside, this approach for hexblade seems most appropriate so far.
In fact, most more obscure classes not from PhB could be realized well as sub-classes.

Ninja_Prawn
2016-03-18, 02:50 PM
Also, I feel a bit iffy about letting hexblade choose their spells from any class, even though they get only a limited amount of them.

On the other hand, consider the schools. Necromancy and divination are two of the smallest schools. And it makes it less jarring that they get Guidance.

Total abjuration and evocation, levels 1-4: 78

Of which wizard: 43

Total divination and necromancy, levels 1-4: 33

Of which wizard: 20

I'd say opening up the cleric and druid lists is fair. Several of the divine spells fit the class well, especially Inflict Wounds and Speak with Dead.

AugustNights
2016-03-18, 05:06 PM
Thanks for the feedback, all.

I'd love to have a little more elegant dialogue for the Hexblade's Bone armor effect, wherein they benefit from effects that grant benefits to the Undead. Suggestions would be more than welcome.

It's true, True Strike, still isn't the optimal choice nine times out of ten, but I like to think that with this Hexblade I've expanded on the niche uses of it.
In a sense the Hexblade gets True Strike for free, as that EK only gets two cantrips at L.3, and the Hexblade gets three. Granted the EK gets a third one at L.10, and the Hexblade doesn't, but I think at that point it's kind of a wash.

Good catch on the Hex Strike ability, PotatoGolem. I've altered it to include an option rather than being automatic. That should prevent the Hexblade from digging their own grave when fighting Undead.

I've looked over the spell lists, and as Ninja_Prawn pointed out, the Hexblade really doesn't get too much of an advantage in opening the spell lists to outside of the Wizard list. Of course, with splat books, this may become a problem, but for now I'm pretty comfortable with the openness.

I've forgotten how much I love the feedback on these forums. I really must post more of my stuff here.

Flashy
2016-03-18, 05:45 PM
On the other hand, consider the schools. Necromancy and divination are two of the smallest schools. And it makes it less jarring that they get Guidance

Largely in agreement on this one, but I am a trifle worried about the fact that it opens up Hunter's Mark as an option. It's probably not game breaking since it's not like there's anything preventing a normal Fighter from getting basically the same effect by taking Hex through Magic Initiate, but it IS a pretty powerful spell, and it's one I'm not sure anyone has considered.


As Eldritch Knight, but instead of Evocation and Abjuration, the Hexblade can learn Necromancy & Divination spells from any class list. The Hexblade casts spells using Charisma instead of Intelligence. The Hexblade also gains the Chill Touch, Guidance, and True Strike cantrips, instead of the normal cantrips gained.

Bolded for emphasis, how does this interact with the unrestricted school picks at 8, 14, and 20? My reading is that you can still just choose any spell on the Wizard list (which I'd argue is definitely the right move), but I don't think it's 100% clear.


When they hit a creature with a weapon attack or target them with a divination effect

These are neat features and on the whole I like them. My only concern is that apart from Guidence and True Strike it's basically impossible to specifically target a creature with a divination spell. The only leveled spell options capable of interacting with this feature are Beast Bond, Hunter's Mark, Beast Sense, Detect Thoughts and Locate Creature. Hunter's Mark and Detect Thoughts are the only ones that it's even plausible to imagine the Hexblade actively using in combat. If you want the effect to be an exclusively weapon attack/improved True Strike ability that'll probably work fine, I just wanted to check that you weren't expecting them to get a ton of spell utility out of it.

ThePurple
2016-03-18, 05:54 PM
Never saw whether Hexblade appeared in 4th edition, but to be entirely honest, anything that happened in 4th edition should stay there :P

It was basically a melee variant of the warlock, which was itself a pact-based magic using class (more like 3.X binder, which was also replicated in 4e, though it was as a really bad klutzy controller variant of the basic warlock), which really doesn't fit with the intended thematic underpinnings of the 3.X hexblade of which this class is attempting to replicate.

T.G. Oskar
2016-03-18, 06:49 PM
Solid nitpick - why Divination, instead of Enchantment? Again, might be a 4e thing, but in 3.5, Hexblades often focused on Necromancy, Enchantment and Transmutation spells almost equally. Going just by the base 3.5 spell list of the Hexblade, less than 10 of them were Divinations; contrast with Enchantment (roughly the same amount; in fact, I think 1 extra spell over Divination), Illusion (only slightly lower than Enchantment or Divination) or Necromancy (pretty much the bulk of the spell list).

I'd work the spell list to deal with Enchantment and Necromancy (even if it overlaps with the Arcane Trickster Rogue), and maybe give them Prestidigitation for free (running off the idea of the Forced Omens ability from the Dead Levels article). I would also consider tapping into the Warlock spell list (but not the invocations, of course) for spells like Hex or Armor of Agathys.

The big problem I see with this is that your focus seems to be "make True Strike worthwhile" by having nearly all of the class features key off combat or casting a Divination spell, the school where True Strike belongs. If that's the intention, then you could make Dark Divination (or its counterpart, if you wish to rename it) explicitly mention that True Strike gets cast as a Bonus Action and adds your Cha modifier as Necrotic damage to the following attack. That way, you collapse everything into a single blow, making True Strike useful. The rest could be replaced by using Enchantment instead of Divination, with the caveat that you could treat Undead as targets for your Enchantment spells (that way, they get the benefits of your class features while using Charm/Dominate Person/Monster on them). It also gives a nice way to handle undead, without having to go Oathbreaker Paladin for it.

I feel that aiming for Enchantment as the Hexblade's other preferred school works better for them than Divination, in particular because other than True Strike and perhaps See Invisibility, you don't use those spells in combat. How about dealing Necrotic damage to an object you're trying to Identify? Also, since (IIRC) True Strike is Target: Self, you're basically dealing Necrotic damage to yourself. In exchange, all of the Enchantment spells often target an enemy (save for Friends, and even then), so the ability to impose disadvantage on their attack rolls is far more effective using this vector. There's less Enchantment spells than Divination spells so far, though if you add Warlock spells you get some more (including Hex!), but even what you get from the Wizard spell list is quite decent.

So, in short: I would strongly consider switching the access to spells from Divination/Necromancy to Enchantment/Necromancy, allow Warlock spells, and if you want to boost True Strike, make it an explicit ability. That makes for a pretty deadly Hexblade IMO, and lets you dovetail nicely into a Fighter/Warlock multiclass if you want more Hexblade feel (Pact of the Blade, for example)

AugustNights
2016-03-18, 07:15 PM
Interesting points.
Enchantment would probably be a better choice for replicating the Hexblade of 3.5, and I certainly haven't played 4e, so I wouldn't know about that. As far as I can see, if that were the case I would probably return to limiting the spell selection to the Wizard's spell list.
The True Strike buffing wasn't a goal so much as a neat side effect. (It's really weird, but in 5e True Strike targets the intended target of the attack, not the caster. I didn't even know that until I had most of the class drafted up and a player pointed it out.)
I chose Divination because of it's relationship to necromancy in popular culture, as a more dark and creepy form of magic. I was building a world where in the schools of magic were lumped together in twos, and Divination and Necromancy were the ones lumped together (where as Enchantment and Illusion were paired together).
It is true I wanted to give Divination some combat prowess, because many of their spells aren't very combat viable.
I may do some revisions, or find a way to add in some choice Enchantment spells to the list.

EDIT:
Ah more posts I didn't see!
Hunters Mark was explicitly considered, and I enjoyed how similar it is to Hex. A simple re-flavoring, and it's completely appropriate for the Hexblade.
You're right about the level spell picks. I should absolutely clarify that! Thanks for the catch!
I know adding Divination effects to the Hexstrike feature doesn't expand it's Utility *much* but it does a little bit. And it doesn't need much. Free disadvantage on enemy attacks after a successful weapon attack is pretty sweet.

Thanks again all for the feedback!

Arkhios
2016-03-18, 09:16 PM
It was basically a melee variant of the warlock, which was itself a pact-based magic using class (more like 3.X binder, which was also replicated in 4e, though it was as a really bad klutzy controller variant of the basic warlock), which really doesn't fit with the intended thematic underpinnings of the 3.X hexblade of which this class is attempting to replicate.

Well, in that case, isn't Pact of the Blade Warlock exactly a Hexblade equivalent already, making this iteration a bit redundant? (a note: I did play 4th edition, I know how Warlock played out there, I just didn't like the direction 4th edition went later on, with monetizing every class option basically, a PhB after another being published and so on, so I quit playing it. Also, Pathfinder WAS and still is better follower for 3.5 than 4th Edition ever was.)
I don't mean to undermine OP's efforts, just pointing out that it's kind of trying to re-invent a wheel.
This whole undead favoritism feels more like trying to create a Death Knight from WoW, only renaming it as a Hexblade. It's true, that Hexblade may have dabbled in necromancy, but that school has more going on than just 'undead, undead, undead'.
Additionally, I get it that those two schools are small, but like Flashy said, Eldritch Knight does indeed get spells from outside abjuration and evocation schools of Wizard's spell list. If the Hexblade is intended to have access to all spells from all classes, this may become slightly problematic.
All in all, though, the current chassis of being an Eldritch Knight variant seems alright for the chassis of Hexblade, it's the things I said above which bother me.

Edit: In fact, would it be bad if you just changed this Hexblade to get access to Warlock's spell list alone?
Also for True Strike feature, I would rather give an option to use a Bonus Action to make a weapon attack with said bonus necrotic damage on the following attack after casting True Strike.
Allowing True Strike being cast as a Bonus Action instead would make the sub-class really strong. How do you suppose this interacts with Fighter's Extra Attacks?

PotatoGolem
2016-03-19, 01:46 AM
Allowing True Strike being cast as a Bonus Action instead would make the sub-class really strong. How do you suppose this interacts with Fighter's Extra Attacks?

Poorly. IIRC, TS only benefits the next attack you make, so it's actually worse for a fighter

Arkhios
2016-03-19, 03:23 AM
Poorly. IIRC, TS only benefits the next attack you make, so it's actually worse for a fighter

Why would it be worse? For example, if it's Action Surge you're thinking about here, it requires no action, and by default even a fighter doesn't get anything to use Bonus Action for.
Advantage, even for only the next attack you make, is a big bonus, coupled with that Cha to damage as necrotic, giving at most a +5 bonus damage, which is roughly equivalent with extra damage from Two-Weapon Fighting, maybe a little less if you also count TWF fighting style.
Not to mention a rogue MC shenanigans this is screaming out for.
It's not worse, by any means, imho.

Amnoriath
2016-03-19, 09:57 AM
Why would it be worse? For example, if it's Action Surge you're thinking about here, it requires no action, and by default even a fighter doesn't get anything to use Bonus Action for.
Advantage, even for only the next attack you make, is a big bonus, coupled with that Cha to damage as necrotic, giving at most a +5 bonus damage, which is roughly equivalent with extra damage from Two-Weapon Fighting, maybe a little less if you also count TWF fighting style.
Not to mention a rogue MC shenanigans this is screaming out for.
It's not worse, by any means, imho.
Eldritch Knight already does this explicitly.

Amnoriath
2016-03-19, 10:06 AM
Overall it has good format, but the undead link is odd and your Hex strike scales far too well. This feature can offensively shut down most opponents and do so four at a time easily. Even your Cursed Blow is too strong because of Chill Touch. Overall not only does this deal more damage consistently it can render most enemies inert all the time as well.

PotatoGolem
2016-03-19, 12:47 PM
Why would it be worse? For example, if it's Action Surge you're thinking about here, it requires no action, and by default even a fighter doesn't get anything to use Bonus Action for.
Advantage, even for only the next attack you make, is a big bonus, coupled with that Cha to damage as necrotic, giving at most a +5 bonus damage, which is roughly equivalent with extra damage from Two-Weapon Fighting, maybe a little less if you also count TWF fighting style.
Not to mention a rogue MC shenanigans this is screaming out for.
It's not worse, by any means, imho.

I just meant that TS does statistically less the more attacks you have. Advantage on one attack is a huge boon for, say, a rogue with one attack. It's much less of a boon if it's one of three or four attacks. It is a damage boost, but not as big of one as it would be on another class.

AugustNights
2016-03-19, 05:46 PM
Hmmm, well it seems folks are pretty disappointed with this class as a "Hexblade" and I guess that's my fault for using that particular name and image. I like the idea of calling it a Death Knight (though I never played WoW), chaning a little bit of the flavor, and tooling around with the broken parts of the class.
Though, I also like the idea of using this chasis to build a subclass that better imitates the Hexblade of 3.5, which wasn't exactly my goal, but seems to be what people want.
Hmmm, lot to think on work on.

As always, thanks for the input!

Arkhios
2016-03-20, 04:37 AM
Though, I also like the idea of using this chasis to build a subclass that better imitates the Hexblade of 3.5, which wasn't exactly my goal, but seems to be what people want.
Hmmm, lot to think on work on.

As always, thanks for the input!

Not necessarily what we want. After all, Pact of the Blade warlock seems to be tailored upon the 4th edition Hexblade chassis. And quite honestly, it works for me.
For my part, I associated your Hexblade with the 3.5 edition class, because that's where I remember it from. :)

Don't be afraid about using Death Knight as the name should you wish to change it, because that's not technically a Blizzard Trademark. IIRC, death knights have been around several RPG's, quite possibly even before Warcraft. :)

PS. You're welcome. I hope my thoughts don't feel too harsh. It's just how I feel about this. Trying to be honest. Sometimes, honesty just doesn't please everyone :(

AugustNights
2016-03-20, 02:25 PM
Not afraid of changing the name. Don't think the ownership of the name matters much for homebrew.
I'm really just weighing the value of a name and expectation in the artistic process of design.
In any case I've received excellent feedback from you all, and have some good stuff to work from.
Not sure it I'll get around to posting the final products, but it was nice to post something here again.