Hexblood Race Guide: D&D 5e (2014)

Introduction

Hexblood comes from Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft as a lineage built entirely around a bargain gone strange: a hag reshapes someone, in body and in magic, and the changes never fully wash out. A hexblood carries the physical marks of that bargain, forked ears, unusually colored skin, hair that regrows however often it is cut, and an eldercross, a living crown that grows from the temples and cannot be removed. Mechanically, the lineage hands you a Fey creature type, permanent Darkvision, a bonus-action scrying token, and two free spells that answer two very different problems: getting information out safely, and getting past someone's face-to-face judgment.

What makes Hexblood worth a dedicated look next to the library's other race-granted-spellcasting options is how differently it structures that spellcasting. A Tiefling or an Aasimar unlocks its free spells gradually, gating a spell behind 3rd level or 5th level the way a class feature would. Hexblood hands you both of its spells, disguise self and hex, at 1st level, tracks them as two separate resources instead of one shared use, and then lets you recast either one the same day if you happen to have a spare spell slot. That structural difference changes which classes get the most out of the race.

The ability scores are flexible rather than fixed: like every Van Richten's lineage, Hexblood lets you put +2 and +1 (or three +1s) wherever your class needs them.

---

Disclaimer

Ratings use a four-color system reflecting overall power in the context of the 2014 rules:

• ● Red - Poor. Avoid or situational at best.
• ● Orange - Situational. Useful in specific builds or campaigns.
• ● Green - Good. Reliable value in most builds.
• ● Blue - Excellent. Best-in-slot or near it for the right build.

---

Where Hexblood Comes From

A hexblood's transformation almost always traces back to a hag, whether through a direct bargain, a swap at birth, or a slower supernatural drift that surfaces as the character ages. The book frames the origin as an open question for the player and DM to answer together rather than a fixed backstory: did a parent trade for a hag's favor before you were born, did fey kidnappers swap you for a hag's own lost child, were you cursed as a young and later freed of the curse but left permanently changed, or did an accident during your original life as a fey creature strand you in this form. None of those origins change a single mechanical trait, but they shape how a table frames the character's relationship to the hag who marked them, and whether that hag is still watching.

The book also notes a rare, table-optional endpoint: a hag can perform a lengthy ritual to transform a hexblood they created into a new hag outright. It requires both parties present and both willing, and it permanently removes the character from player control if it ever happens. Most hexbloods never approach this, and it exists as campaign-ending flavor rather than a mechanic worth building around, but it is worth knowing the option exists in the source material if a DM wants to use a hag NPC's offer as a long-term plot hook.

---

Racial Traits

● Creature Type: Fey

You are a Fey, not a Humanoid. This rarely comes up at most tables, but it flips outcomes for any effect that keys off creature type. A hold person spell (Humanoid-only) does not affect you. A Ranger's Humanoid-focused Favored Enemy options don't apply against you as an NPC, and a hexblood NPC becomes immune to any spell or monster feature written to target Humanoids specifically. Mostly flavor, occasionally a real mechanical edge case in a fey-heavy or planar campaign.

● Size: Medium or Small

You choose your size when you take the lineage, independent of whatever race you're replacing. This is a minor but real customization point: a Small hexblood gets the usual Small-creature tradeoffs (disadvantage-free use of most weapons still applies in 2014, but carrying capacity and some narrative framing shift), while Medium keeps the default assumption most classes and equipment are built around.

● Speed: 30 ft.

Standard walking speed, no bonus and no penalty. Nothing distinguishes this from the baseline most races use.

● Ancestral Legacy

If you are replacing an existing race with this lineage, you keep any skill proficiencies that race granted, plus any climbing, flying, or swimming speed it granted. If you don't keep those elements, or you choose Hexblood at character creation with no race to replace, you instead gain proficiency in two skills of your choice. This is the same flexible-legacy pattern the book uses across all three of its new lineages (Dhampir and Reborn included): it exists so a hexblood variant of an existing race, an Elf who was hag-touched, a Halfling who struck the bargain, doesn't lose everything that race offered outside its ability scores.

● Darkvision (60 ft.)

Standard 60-foot Darkvision: dim light as bright light, darkness as dim light, colors read as shades of gray in the dark. Permanent, passive, and it never competes with anything else the race offers.

● Eerie Token

As a bonus action, you can harmlessly pull a lock of hair, a fingernail, or a tooth from your own body and imbue it with magic until you finish a long rest. While the token holds its magic, you can spend an action to send a twenty-five-word telepathic message to whoever is holding it, as long as they're within 10 miles of you, or spend an action to enter a 1-minute trance that lets you see and hear from the token's location as though you were standing there. The trance ends early if you dismiss it or become incapacitated, and while it's active, you're blinded and deafened to your actual surroundings. Once you create a token, you can't make another until you finish a long rest, at which point the piece of yourself you removed regrows.

Two features live in one trait: a private, hard-to-intercept messaging channel, and a remote scouting tool. Neither costs a spell slot, and neither requires a spellcasting class. Hand the token to a scout or a familiar-equivalent ally before they go somewhere you can't follow, and you have a way to check on them or warn them without exposing your own position. The once-per-long-rest limit means you're choosing between the message and the trance for that cycle unless you plan around it, since both draw from the same single token.

● Hex Magic

You can cast disguise self and hex using this trait. The two spells are tracked independently: once you cast one of them with Hex Magic, you can't cast that specific spell with the trait again until you finish a long rest, but the other spell's free use is untouched. You can also cast either spell using any spell slot you have, regardless of whether that spell is normally on your class's spell list. Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma is your spellcasting ability for both spells, chosen once when you gain the lineage.

This is the trait that separates Hexblood from every other race-granted-spellcasting option already covered in this library, and it's worth walking through exactly why in its own section below.

---

Ability Scores

Hexblood's ability score increase is flexible. Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft gives all three of its lineages (Dhampir, Hexblood, and Reborn) the same rule: increase one ability score by 2 and a different one by 1, or increase three different scores by 1. No optional rule is needed. The approach matches Tasha's Cauldron of Everything's Customizing Your Origin, but it is built into the lineage itself.

Point the bonuses at whatever your class already wants, and let Hex Magic's chosen ability (Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma) ride along with the same stat you were already raising.

Charisma is the natural pick for the Hex Magic ability if you're playing a Warlock, Bard, Sorcerer, or Paladin, since it doubles up with your class's existing casting stat and keeps your free hex's save DC (where relevant) and disguise self's general utility tied to a number you're already maximizing.

Wisdom makes sense for a Cleric, Druid, or Ranger for the same reason, and it's a defensible pick for any class whose flexible ability score increase is already going into Wisdom.

Intelligence is the outlier choice, mostly relevant for a Wizard, Artificer, or Eldritch Knight who wants Hex Magic's ability aligned with their own casting stat, though neither disguise self nor hex meaningfully cares which of the three abilities you pick beyond flavor and whichever save DC math might come up.

---

How Hexblood's Free Spellcasting Compares to Other Race-Granted Spellcasting

Several races in the 2014 catalog grant spells for free. The mechanics differ enough that "free spells" understates how different the payoff is from race to race.

Hexblood's structural difference is real, not cosmetic. Both Tiefling and Aasimar spread their free spell access across a level curve, holding a piece of the kit back until 3rd or 5th level the way a subclass feature would. Hexblood gives you its entire spellcasting package, two spells instead of one to three, at character creation, and it's the only one of the three whose own text explicitly lets you burn a spell slot to recast a free spell the same day. That last part matters most for a class that already has spell slots to spare: a Warlock recovering slots on a short rest, a full caster with an unused low-level slot late in the day, or any multiclass dip that adds even one spell slot to a Hexblood's pool effectively triples the number of free-spell casts available compared to a race that caps at one use per spell per long rest with no stated recast path.

disguise self and hex also cover more practical ground per spell than a cantrip does. Where Tiefling's Thaumaturgy and Aasimar's Light are utility cantrips with narrow combat relevance, both of Hexblood's granted spells are 1st-level spells with real mechanical weight: disguise self changes your appearance and voice for an hour, and hex is a damage-and-debuff concentration spell that most classes would otherwise need to burn a spell slot, or a feat, to access at all.

---

Which Classes Get the Most Out of a Free Hex?

hex is normally a Warlock staple: 1d6 necrotic damage on every hit against the hexed target, plus disadvantage on ability checks of a chosen type, for the cost of a 1st-level slot and a bonus action. See the full hex spell guide for the complete damage math. A Hexblood gets that spell for free, once per long rest, with no slot spent, on any class, whether or not hex is normally on that class's spell list at all.

Non-spellcasting martials benefit the most in relative terms. A Fighter, Barbarian, or Rogue with no spell slots of their own would never otherwise cast hex. Hex Magic hands them a free 1d6-necrotic-per-hit damage amplifier for one fight per long rest, no class investment required. It doesn't stack into a build the way it does for a Warlock chaining Eldritch Blast beams, but "free extra damage on every hit for a martial who has none otherwise" is a real, uncomplicated gain.

Warlock gets the least marginal value from the free cast, but the most value from the slot-recast option. A Warlock already has hex on their known-spell list in most builds and casts it from their own short-rest-recovering Pact Magic slots. The free Hex Magic cast is a nice buffer for a fight before your first short rest, but the bigger prize is that Hex Magic lets a Warlock recast hex using a Pact Magic slot even after the racial once-per-long-rest use is spent, effectively giving a Hex-focused Warlock one more concentration-spell cast per day than the class alone provides.

Any Charisma or Wisdom class with spell slots to spare gets a clean, no-cost damage tool it wouldn't otherwise build toward. A Bard, Sorcerer, Cleric, or Druid who doesn't normally take hex still benefits from a free, no-slot cast when a fight calls for sustained single-target pressure, and can recast it with a spare low-level slot on a day when concentration is otherwise open.

disguise self pulls in the opposite direction: any class built around social infiltration, scouting, or avoiding a fight altogether gets a useful hour of appearance-and-voice-change, for free, once per long rest, with the same slot-recast option available if the scene runs long.

---

Best Classes for Hexblood

● Warlock

The cleanest fit in the catalog. hex is already a staple Warlock spell, and Hex Magic gives a Warlock a free cast before their Pact Magic slots come online, plus a slot-recast path once the free use is spent. Charisma as the Hex Magic ability means the racial spells share a save DC with the Warlock's own spellcasting, and disguise self covers the social and infiltration side of patron-driven intrigue that Warlock's own kit rarely addresses directly.

● Bard

Charisma-primary, so Hex Magic's chosen ability lines up with the class immediately. A Bard who doesn't normally prepare hex gets a free damage amplifier for a fight where it matters, and disguise self fits a Bard's usual social-and-infiltration toolkit without spending a spell slot the class would rather use on Faerie Fire or a support spell.

● Rogue

A Rogue has no spellcasting of its own outside Arcane Trickster, so disguise self is close to strictly better than anything the base class offers for infiltration: an hour of changed appearance, once per long rest, alongside whatever Disguise Kit proficiency and Deception the Rogue already brings. hex's disadvantage-on-ability-checks clause pairs with Sneak Attack setups against a single hard target, though a Rogue won't chain the damage the way a Warlock does.

● Sorcerer

Charisma-primary with a chronically short spell list. A free hex that costs no slot and can be recast with a spare slot on a light day gives a Sorcerer sustained single-target damage without eating into a resource pool the class is famous for running out of.

● Fighter or Barbarian

No spell slots to recast with, although the flexible ability score increase can still go into Strength or Dexterity. Still, a once-per-long-rest free hex is free damage for a class that would never otherwise touch the spell, and disguise self is a usable infiltration tool a martial has no other way to access. Playable, but a race with a combat trait serves a pure martial build better.

---

Worst Classes for Hexblood

● Wizard

A Wizard already has disguise self and effectively unlimited access to any 1st-level spell they've copied into their spellbook, including hex if they've picked it up through a feat or multiclass dip. Hex Magic's free casts are redundant against a class that can already prepare and cast both spells from its own enormous spell list.

● Ranger

Wisdom-and-Dexterity-primary, with its own spell list that already leans toward battlefield and survival utility rather than social infiltration or single-target damage curses. Neither Hex Magic spell reinforces what a Ranger's kit is already doing.

---

Best Feats for Hexblood

● War Caster

If your build leans on the free hex for sustained damage, keeping concentration matters as much as it does for any Warlock running the spell natively. Advantage on Constitution saves to maintain concentration protects the one resource that makes repeated hex casts worth the bonus-action cost.

● Actor

+1 to your Hex Magic ability if you pick Charisma, advantage on Deception and Performance checks when impersonating someone, and voice mimicry to layer on top of disguise self's visual change. The combination closes the one gap disguise self alone leaves open: sounding like the person you look like.

● Fey Touched

+1 to an ability of your choice plus a free misty step and one 1st-level spell from the divination or enchantment school, learned permanently and castable once per long rest without a slot. Thematically on-brand for a hag-touched lineage, and mechanically it gives a non-spellcasting Hexblood a third free spell alongside disguise self and hex, with the same slot-recast structure once the feat's own free use is spent.

---

Multiclassing Considerations

Warlock + any class with leftover low-level slots: A short dip that adds even one 1st-level spell slot from another class gives a Hex-focused Hexblood Warlock an extra hex cast per day beyond what Pact Magic alone provides, since Hex Magic's slot-recast option doesn't care which class the slot came from.

Rogue + Warlock: A short Warlock dip adds Eldritch Blast and Pact Magic slots on top of a Rogue's Expertise and Sneak Attack, and the free disguise self plus hex cover both halves of an infiltration-and-strike build without spending either class's own limited slots on either spell.

---

Example Build: Hexblood Warlock (Levels 1-10)

Race: Hexblood (Fey, Hex Magic ability: Charisma) | Class: Warlock, Fiend Patron, Pact of the Tome | Background: Charlatan

Starting Stats (Point Buy, lineage +2 CHA and +1 CON): STR 8, DEX 14, CON 15 (14+1), INT 10, WIS 10, CHA 17 (15+2)

Core Loop: Open with the free Hex Magic hex on the first fight of the day, then recast it with a Pact Magic slot in the second encounter after a short rest. Eldritch Blast plus Agonizing Blast plus hex's 1d6 necrotic stacks every hit. Burn a spare low-level slot to recast disguise self mid-session when infiltration runs longer than an hour.

---

FAQ

Does Hexblood get an Ability Score Increase?

Yes, a flexible one. Like the book's Dhampir and Reborn lineages, Hexblood increases one ability score by 2 and a different one by 1, or three different scores by 1, wherever you choose.

Can a Hexblood cast disguise self and hex without spending a spell slot?

Yes, once each per long rest. The two spells recharge independently, so casting one free doesn't use up the other. Once a free use is spent, Hex Magic lets you recast that spell again the same day using any spell slot you have.

What creature type is a Hexblood, and does it matter?

Fey, not Humanoid. This flips outcomes for any effect that keys on creature type, most commonly a Humanoid-only spell like hold person or a Humanoid-focused favored-enemy feature, though it comes up rarely at most tables.

Is Hexblood good for a class that does not cast spells at all?

Playable, but the weakest fit in the catalog. A martial class gets Darkvision and two free spells that use an ability score most martials don't build around, and Eerie Token works regardless of class. The flexible ability score increase at least lets a martial put +2 on its attack stat.

How does Hexblood compare to Tiefling or Aasimar for race-granted spellcasting?

Hexblood grants both of its spells at 1st level and tracks them as two independently-recharging resources with a stated slot-recast option. Tiefling and Aasimar each spread their spell access across level thresholds (3rd and 5th level) with no stated slot-recast path in either race's own text, trading Hexblood's front-loaded access for a slower, more gradual unlock.

---

Final Notes

Hot Take: Players default to reading Hexblood as a Warlock-only pick because hex is right there in the name. That's the shallow read. The trait that actually sets Hexblood apart from Tiefling and Aasimar is the slot-recast clause buried in Hex Magic's text, a race-granted spell you can cast again with your own spell slots once the free use is gone. That single line makes Hexblood better for any class with slots to spare than for the one class that already has hex on its list by default.

Hexblood rewards a build that wants two useful 1st-level spells at character creation instead of a slow-unlocking kit gated behind level thresholds, and it does so without asking you to pick a subrace or read through a transformation table first. With flexible ability scores, the lineage costs a build nothing in stats; its tradeoff is the lack of any combat trait beyond a free hex.

If your build has a spell slot to spare, whether that's a Warlock, a Bard, a Sorcerer, or a martial with a one-level dip, Hexblood turns two free spells into more than two casts a day and gives you a free scouting-and-messaging tool that costs no resources at all. A hexblood's hag-marked origin also fits naturally into a build from the Ravenloft guide's character options section, where hag bargains, curses, and Dark Gifts shape a character from session zero onward.

For the full race index, see the D&D 5e (2014) race guides hub.