Hexblade Swashbuckler... or other Rogue Subclass

[5eNeedsDarksun]

So I'm thinking of playing a Rogue with 3ish levels of Hexblade. There seems to be a lot of support for the idea that Swashbuckler makes a really good combo here. To a point I get it; Swashbuckler is a strong subclass and the Charisma bonus to initiative has great synergy with Hexblade.

However, given that you'll likely be attacking with Booming Blade some of the other abilities don't seem to mesh that well. Fancy Footwork seems kind of wasted since you've got a bonus action freed up with not attacking 2 weapon. Yes, you could Fancy Footwork + Dash/Hide, but that seems likely to just get the rest of your party attacked vs just using your bonus action to Disengage and back up a bit. Secondly, the ability to gain Sneak Attack without advantage is good, but how much do you want to be doing this and risking missing with only 1 attack per round? I'd say never if possible and the Warlock part of this build should be able to provide you with ample ways to generate advantage.

That said, a couple of questions:

1: Anybody try this, and what did you end up doing with your bonus action? Is the initiative bonus just the selling feature for this multiclass? Am I missing something here?

2: What other subclasses work well here? I like the Assassin for synergy given that the Booming Blade damage will be subject to the auto-crit for surprised creatures. Others?

[elyktsorb]

Swashbuckler is probably the best given the Charisma synergy.

Thief doesn't offer anything at low levels you can't get from other subclasses.

Inquisitive keys off of Wisdom mostly so it's out.

Arcane Trickster is probably pointless given you already cast stuff and probably have low Int.

Scout's Skirmisher can be interesting though the extra Proficiencies won't amount to much.

Mastermind's bonus action Help is also neat, but not anything spectacular, and doesn't benefit you.

Phantoms's whispers of the dead adds flexibility for skills you have the stats for but aren't proficient in, but Wails from the Grave wants Rogue levels.

Soulknife I think want's Rogue levels to for its stuff.

I would never recommend Assassin, as the double damage to Surprised enemies is literally the only active thing going for the subclass, and getting Surprise consistently is both dependent on the DM and the rest of your party and a fair amount of good luck.

[CTurbo]

Hexblade is a perfect match for Swashbuckler, but I'd probably stick to a single level of Warlock.

Fancy Footwork is a great match for Booming Blade. You walk up and hit an enemy with Booming Blade and then step away just out of reach. If they choose to pursue you the extra damage from Booming Blade kicks in.

I played a Tabaxi Swashbuckler with a single level of Draconic Sorcerer that spammed Booming Blade and it was extremely effective.

Hexblade should be even better since you can keep Dex at 14 and just max Cha.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Swashbuckler is probably the best given the Charisma synergy.

Thief doesn't offer anything at low levels you can't get from other subclasses.

Inquisitive keys off of Wisdom mostly so it's out.

Arcane Trickster is probably pointless given you already cast stuff and probably have low Int.

Scout's Skirmisher can be interesting though the extra Proficiencies won't amount to much.

Mastermind's bonus action Help is also neat, but not anything spectacular, and doesn't benefit you.

Phantoms's whispers of the dead adds flexibility for skills you have the stats for but aren't proficient in, but Wails from the Grave wants Rogue levels.

Soulknife I think want's Rogue levels to for its stuff.

I would never recommend Assassin, as the double damage to Surprised enemies is literally the only active thing going for the subclass, and getting Surprise consistently is both dependent on the DM and the rest of your party and a fair amount of good luck.

Hmm, so maybe the best of a mediocre lot (at least in this case) I started looking closer at options and came to mostly the same conclusion.

Trickster, for sure makes a whole lot more sense to multiclass into something like Bladesinger or EK if you don't want to straight class so full agreement there.

Inquisitive as you say is wisdom based, so maybe ok if you're multiclassing into Cleric. Even so you end up making roles to get you sneak attack without advantage, which the Swashbuckler gets automatically.

And you're right; most of the rest of the classes don't really do much.

Except Assassin. I've read on threads for a while that surprise, and thus this class, is really DM dependent. Our group tends to have a lot of surprise. We have also generally allowed fairly liberal harvesting and creating of poisons by characters proficient in the poisoner's kit. The end result for this character would be Sneak Attack Dice + Booming Blade Dice + Poison Dice all * 2 fairly regularly. Basically he'd hit like at truck before the fighting even started.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Hexblade is a perfect match for Swashbuckler, but I'd probably stick to a single level of Warlock.

Fancy Footwork is a great match for Booming Blade. You walk up and hit an enemy with Booming Blade and then step away just out of reach. If they choose to pursue you the extra damage from Booming Blade kicks in.

I played a Tabaxi Swashbuckler with a single level of Draconic Sorcerer that spammed Booming Blade and it was extremely effective.

Hexblade should be even better since you can keep Dex at 14 and just max Cha.

I don't see how Fancy Footwork helps. Any other rogue could just disengage with Bonus Action since Booming Blade doesn't allow a Bonus Action attack... unless you found another good use for your Bonus Action.

[Sherlockpwns]

I’m mostly just miffed someone said scout extra proficiency won’t amount to much… it’s not just proficiency but expertise, and nature and survival rolls are not rare corner case skills (I’m looking at you performance!)

Not saying scout is a good fit here either, but it’s not bad.

I also like thief a lot. It doesn’t make use of the booming blade sneak, but climb speed and use objects quickly are real nice to have.

Imo, none of the subclasses are going to add that much spice to the booming blade. Sometimes you may get an assassinate off, sure. Otherwise I’d say use the subclass to fill out what else you do.

[elyktsorb]

Except Assassin. I've read on threads for a while that surprise, and thus this class, is really DM dependent. Our group tends to have a lot of surprise. We have also generally allowed fairly liberal harvesting and creating of poisons by characters proficient in the poisoner's kit. The end result for this character would be Sneak Attack Dice + Booming Blade Dice + Poison Dice all * 2 fairly regularly. Basically he'd hit like at truck before the fighting even started.

If your DM let's it happen then it's definitely worth it, same with poison, since poison is actually really annoying as you typically need a DC 20 Nature check or Poisoner's Kit check to harvest Poisons (something most Rogue's aren't going to get consistently due to Nature not being a Skill Rogue's can naturally choose, and Nature being a generally worthless skill to take in general what with not needing Int on most Rogue Subclasses.

And Poisoner's Kit is also risky, as if you have it, but not the Int investment, you can't even get Expertise from your level 1 or 6 feature as the only tool it let's you have Expertise in are Thieve's Tools. So both of those coupled with the fact that. "If the character fails the check by 5 or more, the character is subjected to the creature's poison." Your more than likely to just end up poisoning yourself constantly trying to harvest Poison.

So yeah, at lvl 3 when you get Poisoner's kit Proficiency as the Assassin, unless you rolled stats and got good ones, you probably don't have the Int investment to reliably harvest poison. Then there's the issue of Poisons also being very DM dependent.

But if your DM is working with you then it is viable, simple as that.


I don't see how Fancy Footwork helps. Any other rogue could just disengage with Bonus Action since Booming Blade doesn't allow a Bonus Action attack... unless you found another good use for your Bonus Action.

Well yeah, but that leaves the bonus action open, typically it means you can do two weapon fighting so that you make sure your sneak attack goes off, in this case you could save it in case you need to Dash for some reason, having it open is better than not having the option, and you always get the free 'disengage' as long as you attack, or if you had the Poisoner feat, you could apply poison to a weapon as a bonus action, attack, and then move away without provoking an opportunity attack. This also means that if you run into enemies with the Sentinel feat, it won't work on this ability as it's not an actual Disengage, it just makes it so that enemies can't take opportunity attacks against you at all.


I’m mostly just miffed someone said scout extra proficiency won’t amount to much… it’s not just proficiency but expertise, and nature and survival rolls are not rare corner case skills
Not saying scout is a good fit here either, but it’s not bad.


I mean survival sure, but Nature? I've played a Druid frequently in 5e and Nature is the least useful skill ever, I suppose you could use it in order to be good at extracting poisons. (You don't actually need a Poisoner's Kit to extract Poison's) But Scout is more situated to being at range and doesn't offer any really mechanical incentive to use poisons, lacking a bonus action to use them without a feat, and lacking a way to disengage if it does use it's bonus action to apply a poison to a weapon mid-combat without a feat.

[Khrysaes]

I don't see how Fancy Footwork helps. Any other rogue could just disengage with Bonus Action since Booming Blade doesn't allow a Bonus Action attack... unless you found another good use for your Bonus Action.

That is really it, it frees up the bonus action. In addition, it makes it easier to land sneak attacks. Finally, the aforementioned synergy between charisma.

Booming blade also scales better than extra attack, albiet that is not counting sneak attack, which benefits from having that second attack

So booming blade, if it hits or not you can walk away. Dash if you need to as a bonus action. If your BB hit, the creature hopefully has to move to get to you or someone else, and thus take damage, OR stay still, allowing you to do the same the next turn.


That said, Bladesinger may actually work well with this even with only 13 int as there are plenty of spells that don't rely on it. The level 6 feature allows you extra attack AND a cantrip(booming blade), AND this allows a third attack with a second weapon as a bonus action if wanted. This is at least 7 levels not of rogue though.

[Dualight]

As already noted, the main draw of Fancy Footwork is that you can get back out of an enemy's reach while still having your bonus action free for other stuff, like Hexblade's Curse, or hex or even just Dash or even Hide before your attack, instead of needing to Disengage after to provoke the booming blade bonus damage. It is that increased flexibility, as well as the option of getting into the fight faster, that makes Fancy Footwork valuable. Friendly reminder that Dash does not mean that you must move twice your speed, only that you can do so, if you want to. Assuming 30 ft. speed, an enemy that is (30- reach difference)+ feet away(even less if the enemy has more that 5 ft. reach) is too far for a non-Swashbuckler to booming blade, disengage, and move far enough back to trigger the rider damage. A Swashbuckler, meanwhile, can pull this stunt off on enemies within (60- reach difference), which probably won't come up often, but is valuable when it does.

Also, while it takes a long time to kick in, Panache is fantastic if you have more reasons to boost CHA than a pure Swashbuckler, as it is basically a drawback-free non-magical charm person cantrip out of combat, and a taunt of sorts in combat, running off a Charisma(Persuasion) skill contest, so Expertise and Reliable Talent boost it even further, on top of that good Charisma.
With Hexblade, you can actually get away with prioritising Charisma over Dexterity, as your offence can run off that without giving up on Sneak Attack, which can also go off when you cast booming blade, an medium armour makes the defensive drawback of a lower Dexterity insignificant for a while.

Admittedly, quite a few of the fun synergies apply to any rogue, Swashbuckler is preferred mostly for having Charisma as its secondary focus, so you can benefit from the Charisma the multiclass already wants with rogue features.

Sorry if I rambled a bit there, it got away from me.

[diplomancer]

So I'm thinking of playing a Rogue with 3ish levels of Hexblade. There seems to be a lot of support for the idea that Swashbuckler makes a really good combo here. To a point I get it; Swashbuckler is a strong subclass and the Charisma bonus to initiative has great synergy with Hexblade.

However, given that you'll likely be attacking with Booming Blade some of the other abilities don't seem to mesh that well. Fancy Footwork seems kind of wasted since you've got a bonus action freed up with not attacking 2 weapon. Yes, you could Fancy Footwork + Dash/Hide, but that seems likely to just get the rest of your party attacked vs just using your bonus action to Disengage and back up a bit. Secondly, the ability to gain Sneak Attack without advantage is good, but how much do you want to be doing this and risking missing with only 1 attack per round? I'd say never if possible and the Warlock part of this build should be able to provide you with ample ways to generate advantage.

That said, a couple of questions:

1: Anybody try this, and what did you end up doing with your bonus action? Is the initiative bonus just the selling feature for this multiclass? Am I missing something here?

2: What other subclasses work well here? I like the Assassin for synergy given that the Booming Blade damage will be subject to the auto-crit for surprised creatures. Others?

I'm not judging here whether it's better to go Hexblade 1 or Hexblade 3. But if you do go Hexblade 3, there's no need to go Pact of the Blade. Pact of the Tome gives you a Familiar that can Help you land your attacks, amongst other goodies. Pact of the Chain gives you an even better Familiar, that can even give you a very good use of your freed up bonus action with Investment of the Chain Master.

[Sorinth]

I don't see how Fancy Footwork helps. Any other rogue could just disengage with Bonus Action since Booming Blade doesn't allow a Bonus Action attack... unless you found another good use for your Bonus Action.

Hex, the smite spells, Hexblade's curse are all BA. You might not be using your BA every turn but you'll still be using it relatively often so freeing it up is quite good.

[Pildion]

So I'm thinking of playing a Rogue with 3ish levels of Hexblade. There seems to be a lot of support for the idea that Swashbuckler makes a really good combo here. To a point I get it; Swashbuckler is a strong subclass and the Charisma bonus to initiative has great synergy with Hexblade.

However, given that you'll likely be attacking with Booming Blade some of the other abilities don't seem to mesh that well. Fancy Footwork seems kind of wasted since you've got a bonus action freed up with not attacking 2 weapon. Yes, you could Fancy Footwork + Dash/Hide, but that seems likely to just get the rest of your party attacked vs just using your bonus action to Disengage and back up a bit. Secondly, the ability to gain Sneak Attack without advantage is good, but how much do you want to be doing this and risking missing with only 1 attack per round? I'd say never if possible and the Warlock part of this build should be able to provide you with ample ways to generate advantage.

That said, a couple of questions:

1: Anybody try this, and what did you end up doing with your bonus action? Is the initiative bonus just the selling feature for this multiclass? Am I missing something here?

2: What other subclasses work well here? I like the Assassin for synergy given that the Booming Blade damage will be subject to the auto-crit for surprised creatures. Others?

Well, Swashbuckler is the best, but the other one subclass I would think about it Inquisitive. True that Inquisitive keys off Wisdom with Insightful Fighting. But I find that if you put 1 of your first Expertise in Insight with 10 wisdom score that's good enough.

I've played this very class, vHuman HexBlade3>InquisitiveRogue17. With Pact of Tome to get 3 more cantrips and change out your Invocations to Book of Ancient Secrets, Devil's Sight to get Find Familiar / Detect Magic. Campaign ended at level 12 but I was not having any trouble with Insightful Fighting at any point, won 90% of the checks I'll bet.

[J-H]

Swashbuckler is good with Hexblade. If you go Hexblade 2, you get 2 Eldritch Invocations, which are worth 3/4 to a full feat each. Darkvision, Disguise Self at Will, etc. Hexblade 3 also lets you pick up a couple of 2nd level spells per day, like Invisibility.

I also like Hexblade as a way to add shield proficiency on a Swashbuckler. It removes your ability to TWF, but bumps your theoretical AC by 2-5 points depending on what grade of shield you get. I like having the option.

I probably wouldn't go beyond Hexblade 3 though.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I'm not judging here whether it's better to go Hexblade 1 or Hexblade 3. But if you do go Hexblade 3, there's no need to go Pact of the Blade. Pact of the Tome gives you a Familiar that can Help you land your attacks, amongst other goodies. Pact of the Chain gives you an even better Familiar, that can even give you a very good use of your freed up bonus action with Investment of the Chain Master.

The pact was the other thing I was thinking about, and yes the Chain with the upgraded familiar is definitely worth a look, though I think at that point I'd be committed to Warcaster, which isn't a bad thing as on this character I'd likely be using all 3 parts of the feat. Pact of the Blade can cast through the weapon so saves needing Warcaster... but does using a feat to get Find Familiar become a need or will the character be able to get advantage consistently without it? I think both have merit.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

As already noted, the main draw of Fancy Footwork is that you can get back out of an enemy's reach while still having your bonus action free for other stuff, like Hexblade's Curse, or hex or even just Dash or even Hide before your attack, instead of needing to Disengage after to provoke the booming blade bonus damage. It is that increased flexibility, as well as the option of getting into the fight faster, that makes Fancy Footwork valuable. Friendly reminder that Dash does not mean that you must move twice your speed, only that you can do so, if you want to. Assuming 30 ft. speed, an enemy that is (30- reach difference)+ feet away(even less if the enemy has more that 5 ft. reach) is too far for a non-Swashbuckler to booming blade, disengage, and move far enough back to trigger the rider damage. A Swashbuckler, meanwhile, can pull this stunt off on enemies within (60- reach difference), which probably won't come up often, but is valuable when it does.

Also, while it takes a long time to kick in, Panache is fantastic if you have more reasons to boost CHA than a pure Swashbuckler, as it is basically a drawback-free non-magical charm person cantrip out of combat, and a taunt of sorts in combat, running off a Charisma(Persuasion) skill contest, so Expertise and Reliable Talent boost it even further, on top of that good Charisma.
With Hexblade, you can actually get away with prioritising Charisma over Dexterity, as your offence can run off that without giving up on Sneak Attack, which can also go off when you cast booming blade, an medium armour makes the defensive drawback of a lower Dexterity insignificant for a while.

Admittedly, quite a few of the fun synergies apply to any rogue, Swashbuckler is preferred mostly for having Charisma as its secondary focus, so you can benefit from the Charisma the multiclass already wants with rogue features.

Sorry if I rambled a bit there, it got away from me.

Don't apologize. Some good ideas on bonus action use here from you (and other posters). The hide first (BA) then attack then skip away combo I hadn't thought about; that's definitely good to get advantage if you don't have it already. That by itself might swing me into playing this multi.

[Keravath]

I have a warlock/rogue that I've played to level 17 so far. Arcane trickster 12/warlock 5. Hexblade is a good choice, mine is a fae warlock at the moment for roleplaying reasons.

The additional magic options from arcane trickster, especially when combined with the level 9 ability that gives disadvantage on saves when the character is hidden can be particularly effective. Find familiar is good and I went with blade pact warlock with improved pact weapon, thirsting blade and devils sight. I find devils sight particularly useful since I don't like having disadvantage on perception checks when in the dark.