The Hexbow: Building a Warlock for Archery?

[AureusFulgens]

So my current character is a Hexblade Warlock specializing in archery. I am curious how others would build such a character? What is the best one can do as a user of bows with Hexblade features? Have you done it before? (I have of course sought the input of my fellow players, most of whom are more experienced optimizers than me, but I thought it was interesting enough to bring up here as well.)

My own specific current situation is as follows, but as more of a theoretical question I'm curious what could be done in other situations as well.

I am currently 4th level. My recent ASI was spent on a racial feat (I am playing a setting-specific race), the most notable effect of which is that I have a fly speed of 30 feet per round. Downside of that is that my Charisma remains at 16 for the time being.
For other plot reasons, I may be able to switch out Improved Pact Weapon at 5th level (my DM has assured me of this, but I am not sure of exactly how it will work; I think there is a magic weapon related to my race that he expects I will acquire).
I am using my other invocation slot for at-will Speak with Animals, which I have gotten a decent amount of mileage out of. It's something I kind of want to keep; it's become a neat character quirk for me so far.
My spell list at the moment is Armor of Agathys, Hex, Hold Person, Invisibility, Shatter. 90% of the time I just use Hex, though Hold Person has come in handy on one rather notable occasion.

So... consider this a fairly open question. With the single restriction that you must use Hexblade Warlock for a decent number of levels (define "decent number" how you will), how can you become the baddest archer possible? Either in my specific and rather odd case, or in a different one?

[th3g0dc0mp13x]

What Level are you trying to build for? If you're going for lvl 4 there isn't much optimization available other then grab xbow expert and use a hand crossbow.

[Cikomyr]

Why not Fighter with Magic Initiate?

[Corpsecandle717]

I think some more context would be helpful here. Specifically why you've gone with the one subclass that makes a generally ranged class into a capable melee class, but then chose to tweak it so you could be ranged again.

[Zetakya]

Devil's Sight counteracts the biggest bane of archers - that of not being able to see your target.

One with Shadows (& later Shroud of Shadows) reverses the equation to your benefit.

[Evaar]

Treatmonk on Youtube has a video on this. The Ultimate Spellbow, I believe it's called. He makes the case for it being a very effective and versatile build, and I find the case compelling. I'd like but don't have access right now. I linked it in a recent post in another archer thread, you can view my post history if you don't want to google it.

[Willie the Duck]

The build is pretty much a microcosm of hexblade as a whole -- there's an incredible synergy to being able to get enough Dex to run with medium armor, enough Con to survive in general, and then use Cha for everything else. Given the obvious point of comparison to a straight up dex-based fighter who also can use a bow, you just have to make sure that the stuff you get with hexblade warlock makes up for the archery fighting style, extra hp, extra ASIs, eventual 3 and then 4 attacks per round, plus battlemaster or EK or whatever benefits the fighter has. Or, from the other side, making sure your attack output is significantly better than a simple Feypact Tomelock or Fiendpact Chainlock or whatever to justify your martial focus as a warlock.

The most straightforward answer to this is that you have access to magic weapons and weapon feats that a EB-spamming warlock does not have and spell/invocation-based access to advantage on attacks and the like that fighters rarely get. With things like Hold Person and Darkness/Devil's sight, you can get advantage on your attacks, and thus a reasonable chance to successfully land a Sharpshooter-pumped -5/+10 attack on your enemy. There are side advantages, like Hex upcasting your attacks, and defensive options like Shield and AoA.

[Daithi]

One of the guys in my group played a Hexblade and when using Eldritch Blast he fluffed it as firing magical arrows --- think Uryu Ishida the Quincy from the Bleach anime. It was actually pretty cool. He also multi-classed with Sorcerer to use Quicken/Twinning to double the number "arrows" he was firing, and he was close to the biggest damage dealer in our group (at level 17+ he would have been the biggest damage dealer).

[AureusFulgens]

What Level are you trying to build for? If you're going for lvl 4 there isn't much optimization available other then grab xbow expert and use a hand crossbow.
This character is likely to run all the way up to 20 from her current 4, unless she dies.


Why not Fighter with Magic Initiate?


I think some more context would be helpful here. Specifically why you've gone with the one subclass that makes a generally ranged class into a capable melee class, but then chose to tweak it so you could be ranged again.
It's a long story why I've chosen what I did; it boils down to the fact that I started from wanting to play a setting-specific race, chose the Cha-based class I haven't used yet to make use of the stat bonus, chose the patron that made the most sense narratively, which offered the Hexblade Patron, and then tried to move myself toward filling a role we don't have, since we have three melee guys.

I'm aware that there are probably better ways to do "archer" that involve zero levels of Warlock, but I'm not particularly interested in that question right now; I'd rather try to figure out what is the best a Hexblade can do as an archer.


Devil's Sight counteracts the biggest bane of archers - that of not being able to see your target.

One with Shadows (& later Shroud of Shadows) reverses the equation to your benefit.
Seems handy. One of my companions is a tiefling, who can cast Darkness at least once per day; I can also acquire the spell myself.


Treatmonk on Youtube has a video on this. The Ultimate Spellbow, I believe it's called. He makes the case for it being a very effective and versatile build, and I find the case compelling. I'd like but don't have access right now. I linked it in a recent post in another archer thread, you can view my post history if you don't want to google it.
Neat! Now that is something I want to watch.


The build is pretty much a microcosm of hexblade as a whole -- there's an incredible synergy to being able to get enough Dex to run with medium armor, enough Con to survive in general, and then use Cha for everything else. Given the obvious point of comparison to a straight up dex-based fighter who also can use a bow, you just have to make sure that the stuff you get with hexblade warlock makes up for the archery fighting style, extra hp, extra ASIs, eventual 3 and then 4 attacks per round, plus battlemaster or EK or whatever benefits the fighter has. Or, from the other side, making sure your attack output is significantly better than a simple Feypact Tomelock or Fiendpact Chainlock or whatever to justify your martial focus as a warlock.

The most straightforward answer to this is that you have access to magic weapons and weapon feats that a EB-spamming warlock does not have and spell/invocation-based access to advantage on attacks and the like that fighters rarely get. With things like Hold Person and Darkness/Devil's sight, you can get advantage on your attacks, and thus a reasonable chance to successfully land a Sharpshooter-pumped -5/+10 attack on your enemy. There are side advantages, like Hex upcasting your attacks, and defensive options like Shield and AoA.
That's probably a good way to be thinking. I'm likely to pick up some levels in Fighter or Rogue later down the line to shore up my weak points, but probably not until 13th or so. I'm also keeping tabs on Eldritch Blast to see if there comes a point when it's better, though I'm a bit resistant to switching over for aforementioned flavor reasons.


One of the guys in my group played a Hexblade and when using Eldritch Blast he fluffed it as firing magical arrows --- think Uryu Ishida the Quincy from the Bleach anime. It was actually pretty cool. He also multi-classed with Sorcerer to use Quicken/Twinning to double the number "arrows" he was firing, and he was close to the biggest damage dealer in our group (at level 17+ he would have been the biggest damage dealer).
That sounds pretty sweet!

[Evaar]

Neat! Now that is something I want to watch.


Here’s the link since I’m at home now:

https://youtu.be/mf91OMbQtKE

[Waazraath]

So... consider this a fairly open question. With the single restriction that you must use Hexblade Warlock for a decent number of levels (define "decent number" how you will), how can you become the baddest archer possible? Either in my specific and rather odd case, or in a different one?

My take is here: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?550866-Warlock-archer-competative

[th3g0dc0mp13x]

Half Elf variant Dark Elf (This gives you a free 1/day darkness casting It also means you don't need to use one of your precious spells known to cast it.)
Fighter 1/ Hexblade 1-12
15*,10,14*,10,10,17
Archery Fighting Style
Devil's sight.
ASI Elven Accuracy (on your cursed target you now have a ~29% crit chance.)
Extra attack invocation
Eldritch smite invocation (only on a crit.)
Sharpshooter ASI
+2 Dex ASI
Lifedrinker Invocation
Now we should continue multi-classing.
Fighter 2 for action surge
Fighter 3 for maneuvers (Precise Strike)
Paladin 2 Divine smites
Sorcerer 3 More smite fuel and quicken spell.

Quicken Shadow of Moil
Shoot twice at 1d8+10+5+5 =50ish damage

Curse target
Shoot 4 times at 1d8+10+5+5+6 =120ish damage

If you crit you drop a eldritch smite and a divine smite for 22d8 or 99 extra damage

[Willie the Duck]

That's probably a good way to be thinking. I'm likely to pick up some levels in Fighter or Rogue later down the line to shore up my weak points, but probably not until 13th or so. I'm also keeping tabs on Eldritch Blast to see if there comes a point when it's better, though I'm a bit resistant to switching over for aforementioned flavor reasons.


I'd probably suggest against trying to keep up with both archery and EB, simply because then you'll have invested so much of your build (spells selected and invocations and the like) that you won't get to do much warlock-y.

[LudicSavant]

Doing some initial calculations for build comparisons (including damage per adventuring day, utility, sustained and nova DPR vs targets of varying ACs) suggests an elven Hexblade 17 / Battlemaster 3 does very well for itself, even exceeding the nova damage of a Battle Master 20 Sharpshooter/Crossbow Expert build (https://anydice.com/program/167e4) by using a proper critfishing strategy (e.g. you Eldritch Smite only if you crit, or if it's the last attack of your routine). And is definitely no slouch at sustained damage either with constant triple advantage (such as from Foresight), all-day Hex, IPW, Lifedrinker, etc.

Getting Hexblade to 17 gives you all of your mystic arcanums (including Foresight for all-day Triple Advantage), Master of Hexes, and a 4th short rest slot. Battlemaster gets you the vital Archery style, Action Surge, and maneuvers.

[Waazraath]

Half Elf variant Dark Elf (This gives you a free 1/day darkness casting It also means you don't need to use one of your precious spells known to cast it.)
Fighter 1/ Hexblade 1-12
15*,10,14*,10,10,17
Archery Fighting Style
Devil's sight.
ASI Elven Accuracy (on your cursed target you now have a ~29% crit chance.)
Extra attack invocation
Eldritch smite invocation (only on a crit.)
Sharpshooter ASI
+2 Dex ASI
Lifedrinker Invocation
Now we should continue multi-classing.
Fighter 2 for action surge
Fighter 3 for maneuvers (Precise Strike)
Paladin 2 Divine smites
Sorcerer 3 More smite fuel and quicken spell.

Quicken Shadow of Moil
Shoot twice at 1d8+10+5+5 =50ish damage

Curse target
Shoot 4 times at 1d8+10+5+5+6 =120ish damage

If you crit you drop a eldritch smite and a divine smite for 22d8 or 99 extra damage

Nice, but few questions:
- how do you get Divine Smite to work on a ranged attack?
- why raise dex on a build with Hex Warrior (cha on attacks and damage)? - with improved pact weapon you can use it with a bow. With a +2 cha ASI and Elven Accuracy, you can max out your Cha stat.

[LudicSavant]

*snip*

Paladin 2 doesn't help you since Divine Smite only works on melee weapon attacks.
Sorcerer 3 is alright. But it won't give you more eldritch smites (since those only work with Warlock spell slots), and Quicken Spell will have a lot of bonus action competition.

Instead of taking Pal2/Sor3 you could have just taken 5 more levels in Hexblade, which would have given you Master of Hexes, a high-end Invocation (e.g. the L15 prereq ones), a 7th, 8th, and 9th level spell, and another 5th level slot every short rest. Anything you gain from multiclassing would have to be measured against that opportunity cost.

1-3 levels in Fighter really does seem like a winner though. Archery Style, Action Surge, and Maneuvers all have great dividends.

[th3g0dc0mp13x]

Nice, but few questions:
- how do you get Divine Smite to work on a ranged attack?
- why raise dex on a build with Hex Warrior (cha on attacks and damage)? - with improved pact weapon you can use it with a bow. With a +2 cha ASI and Elven Accuracy, you can max out your Cha stat.
You don't lol, I screwed up, Ludic has the right idea here.
That was a meant to be charisma, I'm just so used to dealing with dex+archery it slipped in there.


Paladin 2 doesn't help you since Divine Smite only works on melee weapon attacks.
Sorcerer 3 is alright. But it won't give you more eldritch smites (since those only work with Warlock spell slots), and Quicken Spell will have a lot of bonus action competition.

Instead of taking Pal2/Sor3 you could have just taken 5 more levels in Hexblade, which would have given you Master of Hexes, a high-end Invocation (e.g. the L15 prereq ones), a 7th, 8th, and 9th level spell, and another 5th level slot every short rest. Anything you gain from multiclassing would have to be measured against that opportunity cost.

1-3 levels in Fighter really does seem like a winner though. Archery Style, Action Surge, and Maneuvers all have great dividends.

All that yes.

[Trickery]

You want a pure warlock for this build. You have more and more ways to give yourself advantage as you gain warlock spells, and this build thrives on advantage. Advantage is how you get crits, especially with Hexblade's Curse, and you can smite on a crit to virtually instakill a target. You should consider Eldritch Smite to be mandatory on this build as soon as you can afford it.

Don't forget that Darkness lasts for ten minutes and can be cast on an object that you can cover up (put in a bag, in your mouth, etc.) if you need to temporarily dismiss it. Darkness on yourself with Devil's Sight also makes most attacks against your have disadvantage and makes you immune to being the target of many spells (ones that require a target the caster can "see" - know which ones these are since your DM might not check). Being ranged, you can also stand 10' away from allies so they don't complain about darkness. All of this makes Darkness one of the best spells for this purpose. Its duration means it can potentially last for several combats.

The downside to all of this is that you need quite a few levels of warlock before you can afford all of the invocations you need, and you have very few invocations left over until later on. But it's still an effective build.

[Talionis]

Banishing Smite and Branding Smite are on the Hexblade Spell list and can be added to ranged damage.

Warlock 12 is probably all the Warlock you need. 14 if you really want to move the curse.

I would go into Red Dragon Sorcerer for Flame Arrows. Sorcerer 6 adds Charisma a second time to the Flame Arrow damage.

[Evaar]

Getting Hexblade to 17 gives you all of your mystic arcanums (including Foresight for all-day Triple Advantage), Master of Hexes, and a 4th short rest slot. Battlemaster gets you the vital Archery style, Action Surge, and maneuvers.

With the assumption of all-day triple advantage, does the build get that much from the Archery style?

Presumably we take the Fighter level earlier than we get Hexblade 17 so it helps throughout the career, but purely white room endgame theorycrafting does it make much difference?

[Nagog]

So my current character is a Hexblade Warlock specializing in archery. I am curious how others would build such a character? What is the best one can do as a user of bows with Hexblade features? Have you done it before? (I have of course sought the input of my fellow players, most of whom are more experienced optimizers than me, but I thought it was interesting enough to bring up here as well.)

Well considering Hexblade has a lot of things the specifically state melee attacks, I'd just speak with your DM to see if they're OK with you using those at range (They may not be cool with that, as a flying archer is a trope that absolutely screams "I'm cheesing this game") Beyond that, things like Feats or finding Magic items is probably the best way to buff that at the time being. Personally? I'd just stick with Eldritch Blast, and perhaps reskin it as coming from a weapon of some sort. Eldritch Blast has the same damage as a heavy crossbow, and will scale with level. Buffing it with Eldritch Spear and Agonizing Blast will allow it to beat out a bow in any situation, and also other invocations like Repelling Blast and Lance of Lethargy allow for some great long range damage/control.

[LudicSavant]

With the assumption of all-day triple advantage, does the build get that much from the Archery style?

Presumably we take the Fighter level earlier than we get Hexblade 17 so it helps throughout the career, but purely white room endgame theorycrafting does it make much difference?

Even with Triple Advantage your Sharpshooter chance to hit still goes down ~8% without Archery, so yes it still matters a lot.

[Talionis]

Fighter 2 gets Action Surge which can be important if you are trying to leverage spells like Flame Arrows or wanting to cast a spell and attack. Hexblades often want to cast a spell at the front of combat. Even the extra attacks are not worthless.

Even with the goodness of Fighter you don’t need it for armor usually Medium Armor is good enough. Since resilient Constitution is a legitimate feat choice Fighter can be later in the build.

It fits in my 12 Hexblade/ 6 Draon Sorcerer build if you want it. You could even go Strength instead of Dex if you wanted Heavy Armor

[Evaar]

Even with Triple Advantage your Sharpshooter chance to hit still goes down ~8% without Archery, so yes it still matters a lot.

Cool, thanks for checking the math.

[Lille]

I would go into Red Dragon Sorcerer for Flame Arrows. Sorcerer 6 adds Charisma a second time to the Flame Arrow damage.

Dragon Sorcerer can only add CHA to one damage roll of the spell. In the case of Flame Arrows, that would most likely mean you can only add your CHA to one arrow.

[Trickery]

Dragon Sorcerer can only add CHA to one damage roll of the spell. In the case of Flame Arrows, that would most likely mean you can only add your CHA to one arrow.

If your table actually uses that limitation - many don't. It's a bit like the bonus action spell limitation that most tables aren't aware of, or the restrictions on Twin that few used to follow. Not contradicting you, just adding a side-point.

But I would stay either pure warlock or fighter 2 / Warlock for this build. You really want your scaling spell slots. The benefit of action surge and archery (and potentially CON saves if you start fighter) is a reasonable trade off, and action surge synergies with the short rest nature of the warlock.