Shadow vs spectre vs familar

[KyleG]

A level 6 hexblade gets to create a spectre IF he slays a creature under hexblades curse.
Im curious how balanced it would be as a shadow instead? Or perhaps a chainlock familiar for 24hrs or something. The spectre just doesnt feel right for my character who I have been flavouring close to this shadowmancer, shadowwarrior type.

[Clone]

If you think a shadow suits your character more, simply flavour the Spectre as a shadow being. You can even get creative with it! The stats give you the mechanical direction but he flavour is something you can totally customize.

[Protolisk]

As a minor thing, the standard RAW of Hexblade is that you summon your Specter (or Shadow or whatever you might be changing it to) is summoned whenever you kill a humanoid, not when your Hexblade's Curse target dies.

Otherwise, the Specter is stronger than a Shadow in almost every way. Similar resistances and immunities, but immune to a bit more conditions, and instead of becoming near useless in sunlight it is instead just suffers a Perception penalty of disadvantage. It does lose the Strength reducing effect, which is a very powerful effect for a PC to have at their disposal, while the Specter comes with a way to stop enemy healing (to an extent). Simply flavor the Specter as a shadowy being and you should be good to go.

[KyleG]

As a minor thing, the standard RAW of Hexblade is that you summon your Specter (or Shadow or whatever you might be changing it to) is summoned whenever you kill a humanoid, not when your Hexblade's Curse target dies.

Otherwise, the Specter is stronger than a Shadow in almost every way. Similar resistances and immunities, but immune to a bit more conditions, and instead of becoming near useless in sunlight it is instead just suffers a Perception penalty of disadvantage. It does lose the Strength reducing effect, which is a very powerful effect for a PC to have at their disposal, while the Specter comes with a way to stop enemy healing (to an extent). Simply flavor the Specter as a shadowy being and you should be good to go.

Sorry it was late and wasn't looking at my XGE at the time. You are of course correct. Im surprised that spectre is stronger, I really thought the strength effect would swing it as the enemy healing stopping in my limited experience is going to be less effective when the dm doesn't heal often.

I guess the short lived familiar idea would really swing it upward in strength? At the moment it just feels like spectre is going to be a little lack luster but I guess ill find out soon enough. level 6 here I come.

[NNescio]

Sorry it was late and wasn't looking at my XGE at the time. You are of course correct. Im surprised that spectre is stronger, I really thought the strength effect would swing it as the enemy healing stopping in my limited experience is going to be less effective when the dm doesn't heal often.

I guess the short lived familiar idea would really swing it upward in strength? At the moment it just feels like spectre is going to be a little lack luster but I guess ill find out soon enough. level 6 here I come.

It also has Incorporeal Movement and doesn't have weaknesses to Radiant.

Note that the CR system is balanced assuming the creature is fighting the PCs. Not while in the hands of one. A Shadow is likely far more useful for utility and combat support purposes, and can devastate entire areas by induing an Shadowpocalypse, but it's still rated lower CR-wise because that system assumes its fighting the PCs (and the 'numbers' the CR system uses for rating is pretty lopsided anyway, basically boiling down to 'how much damage it deals to a PC' and 'how much damage it takes to drop the monster', all most assuming a straight 'in-the-open' fight. Stealth and strength drain are barely a blip the way CR is calculated, even if they make the Shadow far deadlier).

That said, as DM I will never allow a PC to gain control over a Shadow (unless it's a RAW option, like a Necromancer's Command Undead* effect), because the potential for a Shadowpocalypse derailing the campaign is just too high.

The simple option is to just reflavor the Spectre as a shadowy being while keeping all its mechanical stats identical.

Edit:
(*Also note that:
1. Command Undead is a high level [Necro 14] class feature
2. Controlling a Shadow is a significant opportunity cost because it means the Necro isn't controlling another higher-CR undead that can be more useful in combat. (Granted, a Necro can get other spawn-creating undead like Vampires as minions, but those can be even harder to get [Vamps need to be hit with Feeblemind first], and they either self-police themselves better than Shadows or don't spread as easily.)
3. The Necro needs to hunt down a Shadow to control.
4. The Necro needs to haul said Shadow all over the place [potentially into sunlight and into civilized society] near its person if it wants to benefit from the Shadow. While keeping the Shadow 'alive' in the process. [This is a limitation too for most of a Necro's other undead controlling abilities.]

So a Necro who wants to cause a Shadowpocalypse has to deliberately prepare for it, at significant effort and opportunity cost. [and can be semi-fiated away by a DM saying nope, you can't find any Shadows nearby]. On the other hand, a Hexblade with the houserule [to swap out Spectres for Shadows] can create Shadows on demand so long as there are humanoids around, making a localized Shadowpocalypse [which has a high chance of blowing up into a not-so-localized Shadowpocalypse] a tempting option for PCs fighting a hostile humanoid dungeon/organization/settlement. [Or not-so-hostile ones that the PCs just plain don't like.] Heck, they might even cause a Shadowpocalypse by accident if they accidentally create a spawn and it escapes.)

[KyleG]

Fair enough. Ill stick to reflavouring then.