An Unarmed Barbarian Archetype

[Rowan Wolf]

I was just thinking about those threads I remember seeing that where there was a bit of dissatisfaction that there only really the lithe fast martial artist represented by the monk, but not a beefy brawler type. So play-grounders would the barbarian with a proper archetype design fit that niche that some where wanting?

[Yorrin]

Well, Barbarian did make one of the better unarmed brawlers in 3.5, so it would be appropriate to bring that back to 5e. Makes sense thematically, too, imo.

[Madfellow]

You could just take two levels of monk and then multiclass into barbarian for the rest of your career. I don't know if unarmed strikes are enough reason to justify a distinct subclass of barbarian.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

The Barbarian is a good brawler right out of the box. Advantage on strength checks means advantage on grapple checks. I think you also get rage bonuses to unarmed damage.

I mean. Your best source of damage will probably be tossing people off cliffs, but at least you'd be good at crowd control.

AFB or I'd be factoring in Tavern Brawler.

[Knaight]

This sounds like something that could be useful to me. A barbarian makes a lot of sense for the beefy brawler (though a fighter subclass could possibly also work), and the class-subclass design is at least partially there to make homebrewing easier, as you can work at the subclass level.

[Slipperychicken]

Couldn't you just take Tavern Brawler?

Also, Barbarians are already the best grapplers in the game, improved only by a dip or two for expertise.

[MeeposFire]

Technically they do exist but it would require the DM to actually put them in as they are not the default which are magic items that improve unarmed attacks. Wearing magical gauntlets will allow you to hurt magical creatures but on their own they lack the power you expect from wielding most magic weapons. Having unarmed themed magical weapon bonuses will allow you to compete with other weapon options. There is already an item in one of the adventure modules and you could certainly use any magic weapon in the DMG that is available to al weapon types (remember that unarmed strike is under the simple weapon table so it is a choice you could use if your DM wants to).

tavern brawler will help a lot especially since it gives you the ability to actually crit with an unarmed strike. Bonus points to your DM if he creates unarmed boosting items that also work with improvised weapons. That way you can beat people with fish, chairs, and whatever you find and still be just as effective (but oh so much more fun and thematic).

[b4ndito]

I've been desperately looking to make something similar to the Black Blood Cultist for 5e. Nothing I've done has come out looking right.

[AgentPaper]

There is only one change needed to make a brawny rogue viable: Allow Unarmored Defense to key off of Strength and Wisdom instead of Dexterity and Wisdom. The only other Monk ability that keys off of Dexterity that I can find is Deflect Missiles, and even then you're still reducing damage by at least 1d10+monk level.

I'm currently using this rule in a game I'm running, allowing one of my players (a Dragonborn) to use it for his monk, and there's been no problems thus far. You're still a bit weak compared to a dex-based monk, for all the same reasons that any dexterity character is better than a strength character of the same kind, but he's having fun with it, and nothing has broken, so I'm calling it a success.

[unwise]

I did the same thing as @AgentPaper and it worked pretty well. We changed missle deflection to pugalism. It works the same, but only against bludgeoning attacks, either ranged or melee.

We have had a fighter battlemaster, a beserker and a monk all be str based brawlers so far in our games.