In the latest class upgrade for Toril, Dire Raiders have been completely reworked into the all-new Hexblade class. This is a sneak peek at the upcoming update which will be released the week of July 22nd.

Hexblades are powerful arcane warriors who have made a pact with a mysterious entity in exchange for the ability to channel powerful magic through their weapons. In Toril, they are melee damage dealers who fill a similar role as that of Rogues and Rangers.

Whither Dire Raiders?

Dire Raiders have been a very unpopular class since their introduction. They were a noble experiment, but ultimately they were both too similar to Rangers and too handicapped by being limited to just one race. To fix that, we took the core concept of Dire Raiders as evil spellcasting warriors and found a D&D variant class that checked the same boxes - Hexblades. Though we'll miss the wolf-riding aspect of Dires, we think this will ultimately make for a more enjoyable class.

What about Orcs?

The Orc race has also suffered since its introduction, mostly due to the basic human attributes. With no attribute bonuses, there is always a better race to play. To help with this (and soften the blow of losing one of their unique classes) we will be adjusting Orc attributes to be both more thematically accurate and desirable.

Hexblades at a glance

Role : Melee DPS

: Melee DPS Races : Drow, Duergar, Half-Orc, Human, Orc, Yuan-Ti

: Drow, Duergar, Half-Orc, Human, Orc, Yuan-Ti Spellcasting : Spontaneous, 5 circles.

: Spontaneous, 5 circles. Melee powerset #1 : One-handed weapons. Offhand can be empty, use held items, or shields.

: One-handed weapons. Offhand can be empty, use held items, or shields. Melee power set #2 : Two-handed weapons.

: Two-handed weapons. Inherent Power #1 : Eldritch Celerity automatically grants the Hexblade an extra melee attack when using a one handed weapon.

: Eldritch Celerity automatically grants the Hexblade an extra melee attack when using a one handed weapon. Inherent Power #2: Baleful Hex can be used at-will on any one enemy target to increase their vulnerability to all of the Hexblade's attacks.

What's next?

All of the work for Hexblades are complete, but we won't be releasing it for one more week. During that week we'll release a few more posts detailing their power sets and spells. We'll also create a new #hexblade Discord channel so that the community has a central place to discuss the upcoming changes and offer feedback. Though we won't feature a test server, we do still want to hear feedback based on the information that's been posted - and it's not too late to make changes if needed.

At the time of the update, all existing Dire Raiders will be turned into Hexblades. New skills will be set to a level-appropriate value, and two bonus restats will be granted to every former Dire Raider.

Next up, we'll go over the 1h weapon power set for Hexblades. You can expect that post in the next couple of days.