Grappling more than just grappling for a grappler.

[SMac8988]

One of my players is designing a luchador esq character and plans to focus on grappling, pins, holds and slams. Now I am away from my dmg but if I remember the book doesn't go into a whole lot you can really do while grappling, excluding restraining and the missing ruling on a pin.

So what I was looking for help on was putting together a few "manuvers" he could do while having some grappled to bump his abilities more than just holding someone.

My ideas so far: All these imply the target is already grappled and take an action to do.

Slam - Str attack vs ac. Lift the target and slamming them onto the ground. 1d6+str unless from higher height. My thought is he is playing a golith. And him lifting someone tk slam wpuld put the target about 10ft off the ground, which is where the 1d6 comes from.

Choke Hold - Target must be restrained first. Str v ath/acro to maintain. If target is held like this for their con modifier in turns they become unconcious.

Arm/leg bar - Athletics vs Con save. Fail target takes 1d8 dmg, and arm becomes injuries. Multiple uses on the same limb can lead to disability and the limb becoming usless.

That was my starting three. But would love to see what everyone else has to offer!

[Jerrykhor]

Piledriver - 3d6 on a str save. Target is paralysed for 2 turns on a fail save.

German suplex - Must be from behind target. 2d10+str on grapple roll.

Stunner - Use kick (1d4) as a bonus action. If it hits, target has to make a dex save, or takes 5d6 and be stunned for 3 turns. No effect on successful save.

Spear - If you move at least 10 ft towards a humanoid, roll attack and deal 3d8 if it hits. Target is knocked prone.

[lonewulf]

Im assuming this is for a completely homebrew class? I'd combine some monk with some battle master fighter...make your own grapple-based maneuvers that use "maneuver dice" rather than superiority dice. Try to balance yours against what the Battle Master has and give the dice at the same rate.

Or, if maneuvers are preferred to be used more often then increase the base amount and acquisition rate of the dice but maybe slow down the increase in die size and definetly make them a bit less powerful. It may be a thing that needs tweaking on the fly but it could be quite fun. Hell, some maneuvers will work as is, just refluff the descriptions.

I love the idea of maneuvers that require strict positioning like the proposed German Suplex. Maybe a few that require charging (flying dropkick, flying lariat, crossbody, etc).

[SMac8988]

Im assuming this is for a completely homebrew class? I'd combine some monk with some battle master fighter...make your own grapple-based maneuvers that use "maneuver dice" rather than superiority dice. Try to balance yours against what the Battle Master has and give the dice at the same rate.

Or, if maneuvers are preferred to be used more often then increase the base amount and acquisition rate of the dice but maybe slow down the increase in die size and definetly make them a bit less powerful. It may be a thing that needs tweaking on the fly but it could be quite fun. Hell, some maneuvers will work as is, just refluff the descriptions.

I love the idea of maneuvers that require strict positioning like the proposed German Suplex. Maybe a few that require charging (flying dropkick, flying lariat, crossbody, etc).

As of now, I am just using a "Grappler build", they are starting level 7, and he is going 4 bear barb and 3 swashbuckler.

I love the idea of position based stuff, making it more tactical where the grapple started, and spears lariat and flying kicks to knock prone and into a grapple are awesome!

[Joe the Rat]

On the basics: "grapple" is a grab. You control their movement. Shove knocks someone prone. grapple+prone is barely a pin - almost more of a weak lock. You have them down, and they aren't moving until they break the lock, they are really easy to beat up on (advantage to adjacent attackers, they are at disadvantage), but they can still act - try to wriggle out, hit you back, cast spells, whatever they like. Pin they put in the grappler feat, and it's not a very good feat. I'd make that a default. If you have someone grappled (or grappled and prone) you can pin them.

A dash of monk, or tavern brawler would really help you out here - it gets you an unarmed damage base, which is very easy to use for "doing damage with bare hands" Actually Tavern brawler is really good, with the Bonus Action grapple on an unarmed strike. Using chairs as weapons is gravy.

Beyond the Athletics expertise, what are you using out of rogue?

If you do not object to tweaks, you could rework his Sneak Attack to only work with his unarmed strikes and/or grappled opponents. This becomes your technique damage. Color to fit what you are twisting/hitting/slamming them into. Alternatively, you could sacrifice sneak attack for battle master techniques - these have built in riders to the attacks.

[lonewulf]

I like the use of Barbarian....raging now makes me think of "Hulking Up", lol.

[SMac8988]

I like the use of Barbarian....raging now makes me think of "Hulking Up", lol.

I like the idea of his sneak damage only going on grapples as like bonus damage for being skilled in them.

I love the idea of charging stuff.

I think I may put in another npc at one point he can tag team with and have a double lariat finisher put in place. Like if a target is hit with two lariat the same turn, like maybe even on the same initiative it crit and does some big bonus damage. May encourage him to train our monk in some moves so they can do it together.

[Armored Walrus]

How about some soft holds/pain holds as opposed to locks?

Wrist lock - Once you have the target grappled, you can shift your hold to a wrist lock. The target may use its action on its turn to attempt to break the hold, as normal, or it may ignore the hold and attack as normal, resulting in the wrist being broken, and the target suffers -1 to attack and damage for the remainder of the combat.

Choke hold - Once you grapple the target, you can shift your hold to a choke. The target is restrained. The target may use its action to attempt to break free of the grapple. If it fails, the target is still held, but no extra affect is applied. If the target chooses to ignore the hold by taking any action other than trying to break the grapple, subtract 2 from it's initiative score. Continue to subtract 2 from the target's initiative score each round that the hold is maintained, and the target doesn't attempt to break free, until the target is the last to act in every round.

Pressure point - Once you grapple the target, you apply force to a pressure point on the target's anatomy, causing the target to involuntarily flinch away from the area of pressure and inflicting 1dx damage. The target must make a Wisdom saving throw, DC of 8 plus the amount of damage taken. If the fail is saved, the target is too distracted by the pain to take any action other than to try and break the grapple on its turn.

I would propose these techniques only work on humanoid creatures, or have some CR-based ability check for the PC to be able to figure out how to apply the techniques to the anatomy of non-humanoid creatures.

[lonewulf]

This is making me want to make a full-fledged homebrew class for grappling/wrestling, lol. I know that I would get overwhelmed and never finish it tho XD

[Mellack]

I just want to warn you about being too specific with the holds/attacks. PC's have to fight a wide variety of creatures, many of wich are not humaniod. These moves should still work on a crocodile, ankeg, and a hell hound for the character to be useful. They will already face issues with very large creatures. I think you are better off keeping them general and then fluffing it for each specific instance.

[Zene]

Have you (and the player) read the 5e Grappling Guide 2.0? If not, you can find it via google. Great stuff in there, without any homebrew required. Lots of things you can do within the rules: restrain, pin, drag, drop, suplex. Add in unarmed attacks while grappling, and the tavern brawler feat to use random things like chairs as weapons, and that's basically all you've got in wresting right there; all the moves beyond that can just be flavor on top of those mechanics.

Bards make excellent grapplers, and awesome luchadors. If you really want to go full luchador style, max both strength (for the grappling mechanics) and dex (for the flashy acrobatics). At Bard 3 grab expertise in Athletics and Acrobatics.

As the guide covers --in much more detail-- the three key pieces for successful grappling builds are expertise in Athletics (bards can get this at L3), a way to gain advantage on grapple checks (bards get this with the Enhance Ability spell at L3), and a second attack (valor bards get this at L6). Eventually, to grapple larger foes, you'll want to get the Enlarge/Reduce spell (either yourself or have it cast on you) -- you can get this at Valor Bard 10 with magical secrets if noone else in the party is going to have it. But all of these pieces can also come from other sources if you don't want to go Bard -- the guide covers this in detail.

The one thing missing from the Valor Bard Luchador build is an easy way to suplex (drop the enemy for damage and auto-prone). There are two ways around this that I'm aware of. One is to pick up some rogue thief or (I think -- I'm AFB for the moment) champion fighter to get the bonus to vertical jump distance; you'll probably also need/want winged boots or boots of springing and striding. The other way that I'm aware of is to pick an extremely tall race -- like Bugbear or Goliath. I believe it says in the PHB that your reach is 1.5 times your height. So if you're 8' tall, you can lift a grappled opponent (assuming you can actually lift them based on their size/weight and your strength score) over your head, and then drop them from just over 10'. Meaning 1d6 falling damage and auto-prone. Note that this would break the grapple, but you should be able to use one of your attacks to re-grapple.

[RickAllison]

One simple addition is grappling specific parts of a person, and this should apply to even larger creatures. For example, he could grapple an ancient dragon's wing to attempt to keep it from flying off, or its tail to keep it from using that against anyone but the grappler.

This allows for it to remain useful even when they are normally too big to wrestle.

[ChildofLuthic]

Beyond the Athletics expertise, what are you using out of rogue?

If you do not object to tweaks, you could rework his Sneak Attack to only work with his unarmed strikes and/or grappled opponents.

I'd probably work it so you can sneak attack with unarmed strikes as long as the other conditions are met: someone else in melee with you or advantage (with a grappled oppoment.) It's not going to be any better than if you just had a dagger.