I've always hated multi-classing and felt it makes an already somewhat janky system even worse. According to Wizards of the Coast though, only slightly more than half of players multiclass, so I guess there are plenty of people that agree with you. Though you can multiclass in Pathfinder, there are a ton of classes that are 'purebreed' versions of multiclass designed to borrow playstyles from the original classes and meld them into something different with internal synergy.
That said said, if you really think Hexblades aren't 'good' (something I disagree with unless we're talking hard cheese, but whatever), then you should honestly LIKE this change, because now it means you get to be a hexblade + a typical warlock subclass and get the benefits of both.
I might have badly expressed myself then (sorry for my broken english) as I 'do' think that Hexblade is 'mechanically' a good subclass by itself.
My issue is that for some, the whole subclass is summarized by its Hex Warrior feature (which is accessible too early), while they dismiss the rest (the theme, the spell lists, the focus on hexes) as if it doesn't really matter to define what the subclass offers and tells as a story.
So, no, i don't think a typical warlock with the pact of the blade is 'better' than a pure Hexblade, that would just be something else (which may be a blast to play for those into it).
In the end I guess everyone seeks and enjoy different things, I personally just find sad that those not really interested into the whole Hexblade package say that merging the one feature other classes abuse is a reason good enough to invalidate the rest of the subclass.
Okay, I get what you mean now. To be fair, I understand where you're coming, but I feel Hexblade was already one of the most flavorless options for warlocks to begin with. The line about the Raven Queen is throwaway, there are no real flavorful tie-ins, and her presence as a patron or the class's supposed connection to shadowfell are all poorly visualized. Honestly, most warlocks do a terrible job of flavoring their patron anyways, but whenever someone plays it at our table our GM insists on making it a huge part of their RP identity and that can be harder for hexblades than others.
If you want to go this route, I would much rather unique types of pact weapons (for instance, fiend patron's pact weapon is fire damage or something) where you kind of become a weapon/sorta-paladin of a patron, or create a patron more tied to the concept of martial prowess than the Raven Queen is, maybe a god sending out bonding weapons or choosing warriors and subtly forcing them to fight each other to test his creations.
I like playing hexblade because it's one of the least janky ways to play a fairly balanced and properly flavored close combat mage (artificer can be too but they didn't give us that...). I always have to add my own flavor to it though when I play it at TT, which I do for all classes true, but it feels like hexblades need it the most. There are a lot of great ways to seed that with fiend (look at Wyll; perfect and obvious), archfey, or even GOO (basically your thrice cursed twice blessed Cthulhu mythos chad), but not really hexblade.
I think WoTC agrees because instead of revamping the patron they just let it be an option for all warlocks. Thematically, I think this fits better personally, and imo they should instead just make the Raven Queen a more realized patron closer to the others and let people free to choose Pact of the Blade with her or not.
